Mike pulled away from the kerb.

The Edinburgh University Department of Geology and Geophysics turned out to be part of a sub-campus called the King’s Buildings, a couple of miles south of the city centre. Most of the science and engineering departments lived out here, Henry learned, along with a couple of government research institutes. The department itself was housed in a building called the Grant Institute of Geology, a blocky 1930s frontage with rambling modern extensions to the rear.

The suburbs of Edinburgh ran away to the north. To the south there was an open area, trees and grassland, that turned out to be a golf course.

From Mike, Henry learned that Edinburgh was in fact pretty much ringed by golf courses.

When Henry and Mike walked up to the entrance a couple of undergraduates came out, carrying notebooks. They both seemed to have pierced tongues — my God — and, in their lurid war-paint sunscreen, to Henry they looked about twelve years old.

There was a security check at the door. Henry signed the book, alongside where Mike had already filled in his name for him. He’d spelled it wrong: HNERY.

Oh, Henry thought.

The entrance hall was 1930s grandiose, but its glory was faded. There were portraits of the department’s great men on the walls, and three granite slabs with lists of former professors. But the slabs weren’t up to date, and the hall was cluttered with a couple of fish tanks and a small seismology station. Mike shrugged. “We’ve been putting in stuff for the undergraduates. That’s a salt water aquarium over there, and this seismology station is live. Educational. But we have to scramble for the funding. And it costs a couple of hundred quid for every word you get carved on those big granite tombstones up there…”

Thus, thought Henry, times change, and not always for the worse.

Mike gave Henry a quick tour of the department.

The core of the Institute was the handsome old 1930s building, tall ceilings, oak panels, echoing; the modern extensions were cramped and rambling, with cheap ceiling tiles and linoleum floors. But, like every geology lab Henry had ever been in, the place was cluttered with samples. Even in the corridors there were big oak chests of drawers, all neatly numbered by hand-drawn labels. There were basement storage areas for the bigger samples — the foundations would have had trouble with the weight otherwise — and the rocks there were stored in open pallets or, sometimes, in cruder containers, like photocopier paper boxes. There was a cold room where ocean floor core samples were stacked up, in grimy metal tubes; Mike pointed out the department’s milk store here, ready to fuel the British need for a continual tea supply.