She looks at William, shocked into silence, and tries to speak again, but it is as though she is being choked and she falls to her knees weeping in loud, mannish sobs, burying her face in the warm comfort of fresh intestines.

Harold wipes a thin tear away into his beard.

‘Woman, I feel your pain,’ he says, his voice husky. ‘I too am a spent being who dedicated my life to the preservation of what was not to be preservated.’

De Flunkl regards Harold out of the corner of his eye, raising his eyebrows, and at this point a small man pokes his head out of the open doorway of the dwelling near the fountain and halloos them.

On seeing this little head, suspended in shadows as though floating, Saint John begins moaning lowly, like a deaf mute searching for words.

The man has soft contours, his flesh brimming with an unhealthy, shining looseness. But he is not fat, more like an overgrown baby. He has a wide grin and a blond beard so thin and light it cannot be seen except with proximity. He steps forth, out of the shadows, and appears in flowing robes that might be monastic, possibly capuchin, though they have no hood and he has no tonsure.

‘Tired wayfarers, welcome to Nobber,’ he smiles, raising his hands in greeting. ‘I am Ambrosio of Kilkenny. Mary, are you in good cheer? It is not too hot, no?’

‘Who is this woman?’ de Flunkl demands.

‘Mary, my goodly wife.’

‘What nonsense are you speaking?’ Harold says.

‘Has she offended you? A common occurrence. I apologise.’

‘She said that her name was Emota, her husband killed, and she widowed,’ Harold says.

‘Emota is a horse and Mary is my wife,’ Ambrosio replies, still smiling, ‘and has unfortunately become somewhat deranged of late.’

‘And her children?’ Harold Tuite gasps, throwing a hand across his breast.

‘She has none, and is only a child herself; sixteen summers seen.’

They all stare at her lined face, de Flunkl shaking his head. She is still moaning on her knees into the intestines, seeming grief-stricken.

‘I have seen one more summer than her and my comportment is slightly more developed and I trade fewer barbs with friendlysome guests,’ de Flunkl says.