I gazed up at the wide building. I had never seen one before. It seemed so ordinary.

We waited a minute before the telephone squawked again. ‘He wants to know what it’s about,’ the man said, the receiver still by his chin.

Tibbot was annoyed, and I was sure much of the anger was for me. ‘Tell him it’s about a car he received in 1950. Police business.’

The man narrowed his eyes. ‘About a car he received in 1950. Yeah. I don’t know.’ We waited again.

‘You know what kind of people are in these places?’ Tibbot asked under his breath. ‘You know it’s not just for the sick now? There are … others.’ He looked at me to see if I understood.

I did. It was what was detailed on that samizdat leaflet that I had found beside Liberation Square. The commitment to provide healthcare for everyone, including those with mental illnesses, had suited the government in a way that was never made public but was whispered about. It was something else we had borrowed from the Soviet Union: dissident intellectuals – and sometimes trades unionists or general troublemakers – were dumped in places like this and doped up until their words died on their tongues. The hospitals had become an extension of the political process. The Communists had told us from the beginning that everything would soon be political, but we hadn’t fully understood them. We had thought it meant that the structures of society would be moulded to serve the public. We were – I was – beginning to understand that it meant that they would be bent to serve the requirements of politicians.

Eventually the telephone rang and the man in white put it to his ear. ‘All right.’ He placed the handset back in its cradle and looked us up and down, rubbing his palms over his hips. ‘What’s all this about a car?’ he asked.

‘I think you have to do as you’ve been instructed,’ Tibbot replied, pointing to the telephone.

The man shrugged his shoulders. ‘I’ll take you up.’

He unlocked the gate and led us up a long and winding gravel path to the twin-winged house. A very large ground-floor window on the left glared out light into the country evening. It held a number of faces staring out, hardly moving, while the corresponding window on the right showed only a smattering of faded furniture. Both were barred. With a clanking of locks from inside, the front door opened for us.

‘They’re to see Dr Larren,’ the gatekeeper told a heavy-set man wearing an identical uniform, before returning to his post.

The new man told us to follow him, closing and securing the door with a key from a large bunch hanging on his belt. He smelled like he hadn’t washed in a long time. ‘This way,’ he said.