‘Nobody’s mentioning drugs,’ says Jonathan. In fact, nobody has mentioned anything about Hadley’s professional life. I suppose it would be in poor taste.

A good-looking young foreigner – I can’t place the accent – speaks in halting English about Hadley’s love of art, and his patronage of young artists.

‘Who’s he?’ I ask Jonathan.

‘Oh, he’s the new Nico. He makes online installations. Whatever they are.’

‘Where’s he from?’

‘The back pages of QX, dear,’ says Jonathan, ‘like the rest of ’em.’

The coffin eventually disappears through the curtains, and there’s a lot of competitive displays of emotion from the muscle boys. Stuart and Matt are hunched over in their seats, hands over their eyes, shoulders shaking. Even Jonathan, sitting on my right, is sobbing and sniffling. ‘What are you crying for?’ I whisper. ‘You couldn’t stand Hadley.’

‘I’m not crying for him,’ snaps Jonathan. So I guess nearly everybody is taking this as an opportunity to feel very sorry for themselves.

When we get outside, sunglasses are clamped over faces.

The wake is in a nearby pub, where the escorts get quickly drunk and start doing noisy folk dancing, which involves a lot of stamping while one of them plays a guitar. ‘Oh, Hadley would have loved this,’ I hear someone say.

Stuart materialises in front of me. He’s peeled off his outer layers and is now dressed for the hunt, his T-shirt so thin and tight he could be shrink-wrapped. Stuart regards all social events, even funerals, as sexual opportunities. I’m wearing a suit, not least because I have to go back to work.

He places a hand on my chest.

‘You’ve shrunk.’ It’s an accusation.

‘Yes, thanks, I’m very well,’ I say, in a social voice. ‘And yourself?’

‘I don’t know why you bothered to come. I didn’t notice you crying.’

This is the man over whom I shed so many tears in private. I feel nothing now, not even desire.

‘You’re right, it is terribly sad for his mother. Well, Stuart, look after yourself.’ I hold out my hand.

‘See you, Rob.’

‘Not if I see you first.’ He grins, but I mean it.

I get to work at two o’clock. At half past three, Simon brings me the usual cup of tea. He’s the only person, apart from Derek, who knows why I had the morning off.

‘Was it awful?’

‘Yes. But not for the reasons you might think.’

We go for a walk after work, round and round Lincoln’s Inn Fields in the dark, going nowhere, just talking. Simon seems to think that I should be more upset than I am, and when I tell him about the elderly mother he actually seems to be crying a bit himself.

‘Honestly, it’s not that big a deal,’ I say. ‘Hadley was one of those people who had a death wish. I mean, really, he just got his wish.’

Simon is quiet for a while, and we complete our fourth or fifth circuit of the square.