‘Square …’ She studies his face intently, then grins, showing almost empty gums. ‘Come,’ she says, and pulls Tom’s left arm over her shoulder. He leans against her, trying not to put too much of his weight on her shoulders, but she is surprisingly strong. Together they hobble across the street, along the next stretch of pavement. They cross another two streets, Tom almost crying with pain.

‘Let me rest for a minute,’ he gasps, in Greek. He slides down the wall of a half-collapsed building with an ornate balcony, a section of which has fallen. It makes a lopsided bench. The old lady sits down next to him as though it is the most natural thing in the world. Tom rests his head against the wall. It is throbbing sickeningly and the pain in his leg is excruciating. He imagines it laid open, gleaming meat and yellow bone, raw nerves jumping like severed power lines. Madder and caput mortuum.

‘What is the matter, dearest one?’ The old woman has very gently taken his hand without his noticing, but now he feels her rough, dry palm against his own skin. ‘You have been fighting. You have been brave, my son. Aman, but you are finished with that now.’

‘She’s dead,’ Tom says, the Greek coming easier with the firm grip of the woman’s hand. ‘I found her, but I was too late. I could have saved her.’

‘You did what you could.’ She smiles, revealing almost toothless gums.

‘So many dead. I’ve seen so many corpses.’ Tom feels tears begin to trickle down his face. ‘I don’t know what to do with them all. I thought I could tell the living about them. But in the end, they have no names. They’re gone.’

‘It is true,’ she agrees.

‘Her name too. Zoë. It was Zoë. And when I’m dead, no one will remember her at all.’

‘When one goes, and one is left behind, that one must stand up. That one who knows suffering, my dearest, who knows loss, must stand up and cry for those who have gone to the strange land.’

‘But I don’t know what I can do, Mother.’

‘We sing for the dead, don’t we, dearest one? I know. I have sung my heart out. Right out, dearest boy: nothing left. But you are strong.’ She lets go of his hand and spreads her fingers across his chest, over his heart. ‘Listen. There is someone singing already. Are you ready to go now?’

‘I don’t know,’ says Tom, but when the old woman takes his arm he finds he can stand. He can bear the pain.

‘Good, good,’ his companion says, cackling. She helps him across the next street and there is the square just ahead. They step out into the thickening amber light. The bare trees are cutting deep veins of shadow across the dead grass.