When Mikhail had turned up in Leningrad, her mother had done what was required to get rid of him. But that was Leningrad. And that was Lidiya and her story. His being here now, in Australia, created an entirely new story. And it was Galina’s alone: her story, her problem, her decisions, her life, her future.

It was better not to think.

She settled him into her home and helped him unpack his belongings. His clothes, although creased and grubby, were of the best quality. No patched and darned garments for him, no worn-at-heel shoes, no threadbare, warmth-defying cloth: Mikhail’s fine clothes advertised his membership of the Soviet elite.

He shoved a bundle at her. ‘These need to be cleaned,’ he said.

Briefly her old self revived, and she shoved them back at him.’ I will show you how to clean them,’ she said.

His anger was quick to flare. This was a man unaccustomed to being opposed, but, like it or not, he was dependent on her — not for money, he seemed to have plenty of it, but for everything else. His English was so poor it would earn him no rewards in the Australian streets and shops, and, as a member of the Soviet elite, he’d had people to take care of his personal needs. Mikhail needed her.

The days and weeks passed, though time itself, without work or friends or outings to measure it by, lost all meaning. Automaton Galina shopped and cooked and cleaned; she tended her little garden, she cleared the rubbish in the lane; when the roof leaked in a heavy storm, she found a plumber and had it fixed. Automaton Galina kept the wheels of life turning.

It might have been different if Mikhail were easier to like, but he ordered rather than asked, he took rather than gave. But could it have been different? Lidiya had hated this man. To like him, even to tolerate him, would be a betrayal of her mother. Yet there was a vague, haunting sense — nothing she could hold on to — that here in Australia the claims of family trespassed where once they would not have dared.

The saddlery reeked of his smoking. When he moved, when he spoke, when he breathed, it was with a lifetime of cigarettes. He complained constantly. The cigarettes in this country were shit, gavno. The food in this country, also gavno. The whole damn country, gavno. And she wanted to say: Then leave, just leave. But where would he go? Mother Russia wouldn’t take him back, and that was, in truth, the only place he wanted to be.