‘Alice, tell me you haven’t become so removed from reality that you fail to understand the seriousness of this? You’ve been employing this man for five months. This could rub off on all of us. Make any potential investor run a mile.’

‘Robert, please, stop being so melodramatic.’

‘Am I, though, am I? Where is he then?’

‘Who?’

‘This cowboy builder of yours.’ His voice rises with exasperation. ‘I mean he’s supposed to be your foreman, running your project. So why isn’t he at work? It’s not like today is bank holiday Monday – or is it bank holiday Monday? Is it, Alice, is it?’

‘I don’t know where he is. I told you already. He comes and goes.’

‘And that doesn’t seem a little suspicious to you? Oh, dear God!’ he explodes.

Emmy materializes in the doorway. ‘Mummy, why are you fighting with Daddy?’ Her face puckers. ‘He’s only just gotten here today.’

‘Emmy’s right.’ Robert knuckles his eyes again then stretches out his hand to me and when I don’t go to him, he comes to me and determinedly gives me a hug under the raptor eye of our daughter. ‘Look, I’m sorry,’ he mumbles to the top of my head, ‘this isn’t your fault, you weren’t to know. Of course you weren’t to know.’ His skin smells oddly sweet and I hold my breath. ‘How in your wildest dreams could you have imagined such a thing?’

After lunch, without asking first, Robert drags his suitcase up the stairs to my bedroom. ‘Maybe I’ll take a quick shower.’ He yawns. ‘Might wake me up.’

I try to think it’s not his fault. He doesn’t know who I am any more.

Robert has put on weight. When he takes off his clothes, I look away.

‘What are these?’ He peers at one of Emmy’s ticker-tape labels on the light. ‘La lámpara.’ He peels it off. ‘You know the glue will stain it, don’t you?’

‘Leave it,’ I tell him. ‘Emmy likes them, she’s learning Spanish.’

‘As if she’ll remember one word in a month’s time.’ Robert snorts.

He wanders round the room picking up objects, fingering the books in the shelves, and I’m overcome with an intense wave of possessiveness. I’d forgotten what it feels like. The welling depression – when you hate the way their hair sits over their ears, when you hate the way they walk and talk. When the sound of their footsteps makes you want to curl up in the most hidden corner of the house. When finally even the smell of their skin repels you. That’s when you know love is dead.