So I showed up prompt at o-seven-hundred the next morning only to find out that consultant shrinks do not do enlisted hours and spent the next two hours in Dr Moriarty’s waiting room reading a magazine that I swear to God was called Head Cases.

Dr Moriarty? I know, almost a professor. Hilarious, right?

By the time Dr Simon Moriarty finally showed up, I was starting to get to a handle on the psychology of the whole psychiatry thing: if bad things happen to you when you’re young, then you’re liable to blame someone for it when you grow up, possibly someone with a similar hairstyle to whoever did the bad things in the first place.

I explained my conclusions to Dr Moriarty, when he finally rolled in looking like the guitarist from Bon Jovi and smelling like the drummer from the Happy Mondays. Not a dickie bow or elbow patch in sight.

‘Nice theory,’ said Moriarty, collapsing on to the couch. ‘I told Marion we shouldn’t leave psych mags strewn around the waiting room.’ He lit a thin cigar and blew the smoke in a dense funnel towards the ceiling, while I tried to remember if I’d ever heard the word strewn spoken aloud before. ‘The charming Colonel Brady suggested that I leave Woman’s Own out there so we can weed out the gays. Man’s a genius.’

‘Good kisser, too,’ I said, straight-faced.

Simon Moriarty grinned through a mouthful of smoke.

‘There might be some hope for you, soldier.’

I thought it best to burst that bubble. ‘I want to volunteer for a second tour in the Lebanon.’

Moriarty expertly flicked his cigar through a half-open window. ‘Then again, maybe not.’

So we talked for an hour. A bit like your normal pub chat, when you’ve been out for a few days with your best mate and your eyeballs are filmed with vodka.

I sat behind the desk while Moriarty lay on the couch and frisbeed questions at me. Eventually he came around to:

‘Why’d you join the army, Daniel?’

I remembered something from the magazine. ‘Why do you think I joined the army?’

Moriarty did the kind of long hard fake laugh that would make a Bond villain proud. ‘Wow, that is hi-larious,’ he said with a confidence that made me feel I’d been saying hilarious wrong all these years. ‘I feel quite the fool now, wasting all that time in university when all I had to do was read a magazine. Have a nice time in the Lebanon.’

I sighed. ‘Okay, Doc. I joined up because . . .’

Moriarty actually sat up.

‘Because?’ ‘Because the uniforms set off my eyes. Come on, Doc. Work for the money.’

Simon Moriarty blinked away the previous night’s party. ‘They flew you home early, McEvoy. Remind me why they did that?’