We sat, uncomfortably, on a pair of scuffed red-leather chairs, the backs of which appeared to consist of interwoven deer antlers, precluding any form of relaxation or ease. Bracelets clattered. Mrs Millar hunched forward eagerly and ready with a platitude to cover the period of waiting. It came easily enough. Did I know this part of France very well? I confessed not, but that I was touring about finding my way. My, she said, that’s interesting. Did I ever get to New York? I said no, not very often, and she confided, as if it were secret, that she had once had an apartment, very small, on East 38th Street and that she missed it very much from time to time. She was saddened that you couldn’t see the kind of view from her windows on East 38th Street that you could, for instance, from the terrace of L’Hermitage. But, and she laughed nervously as if she had made a worrying confession, home is where the heart is, didn’t I agree? And before I could reply there was a sudden and urgent bleeping from the region of Mrs Millar’s own heart.

She sprang to her feet, set her glass down on a Benares brass tabletop, with the speed of light took mine, and hurried me towards a towering pair of double doors.

‘They are finished. The proofs. So you just take the elevator up to the third floor. Right this way.’

The hall was vaulted. An uneasy mix of the Sistine Chapel and a Scouts’ hut in Chobham. Acres of dark varnished wood, panels, beams, a ceiling far above apparently covered with scenes from the Chase. It was difficult to see from the point of view of height, dirt, gloom and damp rings. A hefty staircase led upwards, stuck about with carved heraldic beasts; the panels were cluttered with more dark oil paintings in cracked gilt frames, and in a far corner, glaring at this desolation, an upright stuffed bear from whose outstretched paws hung, in the one, a hammer, in the other, a tarnished brass gong.

In the centre of the room a huge pietra-dura topped table big enough to seat the Last Supper; beyond it, glittering in steel and glass, an elevator thrust upwards to the top gallery.

‘Here it is,’ said Mrs Millar unnecessarily as the grilled cage descended softly in a whisper. ‘Off you go now.’ She rattled open the cage and pushed me inside. ‘Press No. 3. I’m off to my jogging! I do hope we might meet again one day. Look at the view together? It’s been great to see you.’