Selina said that she supposed I hadn’t brought anything with me for my breakfast. There were shops not far away that stayed open “till all hours.” I wouldn’t want to go “out there at this hour,” she said in a doubtful interrogatory tone. Perhaps she expected me to say there was nothing I’d like better than foraging for food in the sinister twilit streets of Maida Vale, but I didn’t, I didn’t know what to say. All my life breakfast had just appeared, to be eaten or rejected as it took my fancy. I was spoiled, wasn’t I? I took too much for granted. Selina began one of those conversations with herself that were quite common with her and the only times she didn’t call the person she was talking to “darling.” How would I manage for breakfast? She could let me have something. Yes, but what? They never had cooked breakfasts, did they? She had to watch her figure for professional reasons. Perhaps cornflakes could be managed. What about bread? I would need butter and milk, there was no end to it. Still, it was only the once and after that, when I had settled in . . .

Max took absolutely no notice of any of this. He had got up, found himself a book and come back to the table, where he sat reading with total concentration. I just stood there, aware of the light in this dining room and realizing that the big triple-paned arched window was the one where the girl’s face was among the lilies and the vine leaves. I realized too, though it may not have been at that precise time, that once I had got used to the concept of a flat in a house, I simply took it for granted that it would be in the top of that house, would in fact be the top floor.

I took the tray of food Selina gave me, two slices from a sliced loaf, a pat of butter, a teabag, and about a quarter of a pint of milk in a small water glass, a bowl of cornflakes, and a plate with a spoonful of marmalade on the edge of it. Also on the tray was a key.

“You’ve got your own door into the area, darling.”

What was an area, apart from being a piece of land or a part of a town? I didn’t like to ask. No doubt I would find out.

“Good night, then,” Selina said. She tapped the spine of Max’s book with a long orchid-pink fingernail. “Say good night, darling.”

“Good night,” said Max, without looking up.