Hogan laughs a great big Father Christmas laugh.

‘What about after that?’

‘Divorced.’

‘Oh, come now, you don’t want to be divorced.’

‘Yes, I do.’ She giggles wildly. ‘Then I can sex someone else.’

‘Emmy!’ I say. ‘That’s enough.’

‘Good job on their manners,’ Robert hisses.

‘Daddy?’ She wriggles round on his lap. ‘You know Enunciada?’

‘Is she a friend from school?’

‘No, silly. Enunciada! On Benjamín’s television.’

‘Oh ... I see.’ Robert is unable to keep the disapproval from his voice. ‘Well what about her?’

‘She’s been down there.’

‘Down where?’

‘There.’ She widens her eyes into a blink-free stare and directs them at the ground.

‘Where?’ Robert says.

‘To hell,’ she breathes with awe.

‘Oh. Right . . . well that’s very bad.’

‘No, actually it’s okay, cos Enunciada’s going to get resurrectioned!’

‘Oh. That’s nice.’

‘Benjamín says he’s been to hell too. In fact he says he’s been to hell and back.’

‘Really,’ Robert quips acidly, ‘let’s hope he enjoyed it.’

‘Daddy!’ Emmy says, disappointed. ‘You’re not listening. It’s hell, okay? How could he enjoy it? Plus it was probably really hot.’ She eases herself off her father’s lap.

‘Now where are you going?’ Robert sighs.

‘To sharpen my toes,’ she answers coquettishly.

‘Little fireball, ain’t she?’ Selby watches her flouncing off. He helps himself to one of the cookies out of the bowl and breaks it in half. ‘Hey, these are galletas de azúcar. Mexican sugar cookies. My mother had a maid who used to make these.’ He looks at me closely and too late I realize my mistake in bringing Dolores’s biscuits out. ‘Who’s the baker in the family?’

‘Benjamín, probably,’ Robert says belligerently. ‘The man seems to do everything round here except the one thing we pay him for.’

‘You mean the little Mexican with the broken jaw?’ Hogan says. ‘The one that’s supposed to watch the place for you?’

‘You can’t trust a Mexican to watch out for other Mexicans.’ Selby laughs humourlessly.

‘I’d trust Benjamín with my life,’ I snap then immediately adopt a more measured voice. ‘I’d have been lost without him.’

‘Seems to me, he’s the one who’s lost,’ Robert says waspishly. ‘I thought you said he’d be back by now.’

‘He’ll be here soon,’ I reassure him smoothly, but with every passing hour Benjamín’s return looks less likely and I’m thankful for it. Duval must have heard about the murdered guard and kept him in the schoolroom.

‘It’s not like we don’t pay this man a decent wage. I’m sure it’s a lot more than he’d get in his own country, so is it really so unreasonable that we should ask him to account for himself? Because my wife seems to think it is.’

‘Mummy!’