‘Your little brother strode in out of the wilds with a sword on his person,’ Rory said.

‘A katana,’ Eustace said.

‘A replica of a katana,’ Bimbo said.

‘A replica of a katana,’ Rory said. ‘In any case, what kind of a person does that? A person in needs of subduing, I’d say.’

‘That fella needs more than subduing is what that fella needs,’ said the first man.

‘Come up,’ said the second man. He strode forward, brandishing the golf club ­two-­handedly and with evident purpose. Rory and Eustace, intuiting the man’s capability, got on to their feet and stepped clear of Derek. Derek tried to scramble upright. The man drew the golf club back over his shoulder and swung down with all his might, the head of the club landing on the forearm Derek instinctively raised. There was a crack and Derek screamed. The man with the club got off three decisive swings, connecting meatily with Derek’s limbs and torso as he flailed backwards off the sofa and tried to cram his entire body in under the tabletop.

The man with the club ceased his attack. He paced around in a little circle, breathing heavily through his nose.

‘Come out from under that table, Derek,’ he said with no venom in his voice, just an even brotherly solicitude.

‘What’s all this in aid of?’ Rory said.

‘Who are you?’ said the first man.

‘Who are you?’ Rory said back.

‘We’re Derek’s brothers,’ said the man with the club.

‘And what did your brother do warrants getting absolutely laced out of it with a golf club?’ Eustace asked.

‘He topped Mammy’s Sphynx,’ the first man said.

‘Hah?’ Eustace said.

‘The mammy’s Sphynx,’ said the man with the club. ‘It’s a breed of cat. High pedigree, very delicate, very expensive. We got it for the mammy last year when the oul fella finally kicked the bucket.’

‘Be way of company for her,’ the first man said.

‘The oul fella was useless company, but he was company all the same,’ the man with the club said.

‘Daddy was an awful prick is what Daddy was,’ Derek said from under the table.

‘Shut up, Derek,’ the first man said.

‘Eleven hundred euro,’ the man with the club said.

‘Eleven hundred euro of an outlay for that creature and it hadn’t a hair on its entire body,’ the first man said. ‘The heating bills she was landed with.’

‘The mammy had to keep the house equatorial the whole year round, the rads on full pelt,’ the man with the golf club said.

‘And the awful expensive food it could only eat.’

‘And all the shots it had to keep getting.’

‘It was an awful oul sickly oul wrinkly oul bald oul yoke.’

‘It looked like a shaved ballbag with four legs stuck on it is what it looked like,’ the man with the club said.

‘But she loved it,’ the first man said.