“But you didn’t dread the surgery the last time you had a problem with your gum,” I persisted. “And ice cream helped. Don’t you remember? Cold things stop the inflammation. The dentist said that too.”

“I’m not talking about that,” he replied.

I didn’t insist. He moved away from the lamp. Although we’d already had our dessert and were making Cuba Libres with the bottles from the minibar, he took a plastic container from the fridge. Ismael’s movements had lost that touch of indecisiveness, that characteristic moment of hesitation so indicative of his pensive nature. The way he moved to the fridge was as nimble as a cockroach scuttling away when it feels itself cornered. The container held cold limpets in sauce.

“Where did you get that?” I asked.

“It’s the leftovers from lunch.”

“I’m going to take a walk,” I said before he could choose one of the limpets and put it in his mouth, and once I was outside I realized that I was abandoning him there with his wedding plans.

The streets had a rundown air. I walked barefoot on the asphalt for some indefinite time, taking no notice of its roughness on my soles. The bar where I usually had breakfast was open. A huge TV screen I’d never noticed in the mornings was showing a Steven Seagal movie with the volume on high. The waiter greeted me and I couldn’t help feeling slightly uneasy. I hadn’t expected him to recognize me. In the mornings, after my swim, I always turned up wearing sunglasses, a sarong, and with my hair tied back; if he knew it was me, then there wasn’t much difference between making an effort to look good and walking straight out of the water with your face all salty and your hair a mess. I sat down with a vivid consciousness of the point-lessness of making plans: there were limpets in the chill case, and though I was ready for my third drink of the night, that fleshy mollusk whetted my appetite. I hadn’t slept well or eaten properly for days and was only just becoming aware of that fact; and it wasn’t Ismael’s fault that we’d stayed at the hotel instead of going to Arrecife.

“I’d like some limpets,” I told the waiter.

“They are delicious,” he replied.