My mind suddenly switches back to the dream. Orla’s dream. Aren’t objects in dreams always something other than how they appear? So the tree? That old mulberry tree? How long since I’ve thought of it? Does it represent the past? Does it represent me? My fear? Or … or my Mame, perhaps? The red, remember? Mame’s red?

I consider the actual tree – the old mulberry. I remember gathering fruit from it as a child. Miss Vaughn (Hungarian by birth), who owned the tree back then, was best friends with Mame – Mame’s only friend so far as I can remember. She’d lay out a sheet and then shake the branches. The fruit would come raining down. Mame made jam, cordial, syrup, curd, cobbler, custard, dumplings, sorbet, pikelets. She even glazed the odd chicken and rabbit.

When did that old tree finally die? I don’t remember.

Was the tree still fruiting when the Clearys came to stay?

Wasn’t it already dead by then?

Still, I don’t remember.

But the hands …

‘It is time, meine Carla.’

I find myself standing outside a nearby café. I enter, order a poached egg on toast and a pot of tea at the counter, grab some cutlery and a paper napkin, then sit at a table by the window and gaze out at the quay from this new, slightly more obtuse angle, until the waitress brings me my cup and teapot. I pour out my tea (don’t look at the hands! Don’t focus on the hands!). It’s in one of those squat, familiar, stainless-steel pots (typical of rough and ready catering establishments) and as I lift it to pour I inadvertently catch sight of my reflection in its silver-angled surfaces.

Eh?

I stop pouring, alarmed, and adjust the pot to try and see my cheek in it. Is that …? Ow! A little stream of tea pours out of the full pot and on to my lap. Ow ow! I put the pot down and dab at my trousers with my serviette, then grab my knife and try to see my reflection in it. Useless. Back of a fork. Nope. Teaspoon …?

Uh …? Is that …? I throw down the teaspoon and angle my cheek towards the windowpane. There’s a light on overhead, so perhaps if I …? If I …?

Good heavens! Is that …? Is that a large, black felt-tip mark right across my left cheek? But … but how the heck …?

Argh! Of course! The numbers on my arm! I push up my sleeve. There they are – the four numbers – slightly blurry now. I must’ve slept with my cheek resting against them at some point! And now there’s a giant, black, back-to-front …

I grab the damp serviette and start rubbing away at the mark, focusing very hard, trying to …

Eh?

I de-focus with a slight jump. Someone is … no, no, not someone, Mr Huff – MR FRANKLIN D. HUFF! – is standing at the other side of the window peering in at me! He lowers his knuckle. He has just knocked on the window.