‘Naked, and dragged down to the depths to be drowned slowly and eaten. Your bones picked clean, and the human race finished . . .’

Even Kate was starting to look bored. She still had her eyes pointed at Albert, but she was fiddling with a loose thread on her jeans, and I was fairly sure she was no longer listening.

‘There will be no more humans, and the world will return to the fish and the animals, the way it was before Eve ruined things in the Garden of Eden. There’s no time to repent your ways. You were born evil, like all humans, and now jellyfishies will kill you and return the world to nature.’

He paused and licked his lips. Quick as anything, Dr Jones leapt up. ‘Thanks so much, Albert,’ she said. ‘Very thought-provoking . . . umm, insights.’

‘We’re all going to die,’ Albert reminded us. ‘We’re going to die, killed by jellyfishies, those same ones what attacked the rest of the world. Like the one we’re standing on.’

‘Ah, um, Albert.’ All around us there was a hush. Conversations stopped, and heads twisted round. This was a controversial point, and might just make the evening interesting. You could see the internal conflict in Dr Jones. Her mouth was half open, her hand raised. You could almost see her mind ticking over as she swayed between thanking him for his lecture just to get rid of him, and starting a fight she was bound to lose. She puffed air into her cheeks, and then blew it out slowly.

‘No, sorry, Albert, this almost certainly isn’t a jellyfish.’ She pursed her lips and you could see she was already regretting her decision. ‘And, while we’re on the subject, Albert, I’m not sure that your description of the . . . erm . . . attacks is quite accurate.’

‘It was horrible ’ Old Albert started again, this time with relish. It was unusual for him to have an interested audience. ‘Jellyfishies rose up to the surface, millions of them, in the dead of night, attacking everything living on the sea. Crushing all the boats and ripping babies out of their mother’s arms. There was crying and shrieking. Oh, the wails were terrible. And the oceans were red with blood.’

‘The creatures to which you’re referring, whilst they may be related to jellyfish, are nevertheless distinct organisms,’ said Dr Jones patiently. ‘They appear to be solitary animals, unlike jellyfish. There certainly weren’t millions of them.’

‘Everybody drowned, all the sinners. Only the pure were left, but not for much longer, because you’re all going to die . . .’ Albert raised his arms to the ceiling and then waved them round the room to make sure we knew that it was us he was talking about. He didn’t need to do that, though, because his point was clear.