‘Seeing if you want to come out to play later,’ says Salvi cheekily. He’s actually got one hand on his hip. He looks like a naughty schoolboy. ‘As I was in the neighbourhood. I’ve been in Primrose Hill intimidating a witness-for-the-prosecution.’

He hands me the tulip, laughing at his own macabre joke, and I take it. ‘Really?’ I ask. I’m sure I should be saying something equally witty, but I can’t think of anything. My heart is thundering in my casual chest too much.

‘Yeah, want to see his blood? I have some on my handkerchief.’

‘Er, no, you’re all right.’ I yank my vest down over my tracksuit bottoms. Try to look unruffled.

He laughs again, loud and bold. ‘So, yeah, all in a day’s work. Do you want to come out for dinner, around eight? Put your glad rags on?’

I look down at my sorry outfit, then back up at him. ‘OK,’ I say quickly, all pretence of not caring he is here gone. ‘Yes, I’d like to.’

‘Great. So, the famous Palladian,’ he says, looking up at our kitchen window. ‘Can I come up and take a look?’ He already has one of his shiny feet over the threshold.

‘Er …’ I really don’t want him to, but before I know it he is bounding up the clanking stairs behind me, two at a time, to the inner door. He’s in the hall with me. He’s in the sitting room. That’s a really expensive suit he’s got on, I think, as he stomps around, looking this way and that. I put the tulip on my chair and tap Dad on the shoulder.

‘Dad? Dad, Salvi’s here. We’re going out later but he’s just come for a quick look at the flat.’

Dad goes to get up. Salvi is admiring the cornicing, looking out of the Palladian window, picking things up and putting them back down again – including Kemp’s sunglasses. His bum looks nice beneath the vents of his smart jacket. His shirt is pure white and very crisp still, for the end of the day.

‘Hello, fella? How you doing?’ he says in Dad’s direction, after he has examined my box of pencils and set them back on the table.

‘Hello,’ says Dad, from his chair. ‘How are you?’

‘Good, good, great actually. Really great. I wondered what this place looked like on the inside. How long you been here?’

‘Thirty-six years.’

Salvi nods. ‘Love it, love it,’ he says. He wanders to the doorway of the kitchen, peeks his head inside, then does the same with the bedrooms and the bathroom. ‘I feel a bit like an estate agent,’ he laughs. ‘I’ll be getting my tape measure out in a minute. Right, well, I’ve got to shoot off. Meet you at Wotton’s on the Strand, at eight, Prudence?’