Before they even have time to respond to his entrance, he disappears again and runs across to the billiard room. A minute later he is back, an hourglass in his hand, beaming.

“I knew it was somewhere. It’ll help us keep time.”

Wordlessly, both Charlie and Thomas turn away from him and start climbing out of the ring.

“Mr. Price was right, then. He said you were too much of a pair of sissies to step in the ring with me.”

Charlie watches Thomas’s back stiffen at this and speaks at once. “I’ll give you a few rounds.”

Julius smiles. “Mr. Cooper! Excellent. Queensberry rules, I suppose. Though I do wonder at times what it was like in the bare-knuckle days.”

He turns his back without waiting for a response, opens the wardrobe, searches it for a pair of gloves. The pair he settles on are worn across the knuckles. A mosaic of cracks marks the old leather. He punches the gloves together and watches a cloud of dust disperse.

“Shall we say one round, for starters? Just to warm up.” Julius lifts one stool over the ropes into the ring and places the hourglass on top. “There we go. Ready?”

He turns the hourglass, watches the first few grains of sand slide through its waist, then climbs in the ring and starts circling its empty centre with rhythmic, light-footed steps. Ignoring Thomas’s warning look, Charlie nods and climbs in after the head boy.

They spar in silence. The sand shifts slowly in its glass. It is clear from the start that Julius has had training and is, in fact, a very accomplished boxer. Thankfully he seems content to prance around, blocking or dodging Charlie’s punches and landing a few soft jabs on Charlie’s forehead and shoulders. As time runs down, Charlie finds himself enjoying the exercise. It is not so very different from yesterday’s bout with Thomas.

When the sand is all but gone and Thomas is about to announce the end of the round, Julius steps into Charlie. It isn’t a very complicated movement: he simply moves his leg inside Charlie’s, drops a few inches at the knees, then pushes off from the toes and pours the weight of his body into an uppercut to the short of Charlie’s rib. Three quick body hooks follow, all hitting the same spot. As Julius dances away, Charlie crumples to the ground. It is not that he cannot get air. But each breath is agony, a sharp and stabbing pain as though bone has rent the tissue of his lung.

When he collects himself, he finds Thomas by his side, quietly raging. Julius is sitting on the stool inside the ring. He is cool and composed, not showing a thread of Smoke.

“How about three rounds, Mr. Argyle? You look like you need to blow off steam. Just give me a second to catch my breath.”