I tried several times to take Marco and Riccarda out together, to films and concerts or even just to a pub. One night at my kitchen table before we went to see a late-night show of Company Limited, they argued, as if by agreement, about everything – the pronunciation of the word ‘costolette’, the architectural merit of the Hayward Gallery, the films of the Tavianis or Wajda. Later, Marco found an excuse to turn on me and say: ‘You’re so Anglicised, all your knowledge of Urdu poetry comes from listening to recordings of ghazals by pop stars and pretty female singers – it’s the music and the easy lyricism you love, not the underlying philosophy.’ I didn’t respond.

There was a side of Riccarda I glimpsed on rare occasions, when we went dancing with friends. (She, at forty-seven, the oldest of us.) She drank deep and danced wild till dawn, intoxicated more by her own longings than any alcohol she’d had: longings for a past she’d lost, or a future she knew did not await her. She danced like a slave in a field, re-enacting some half-forgotten ritual, limbs twisting, hands on breasts or hip or groin, shocking hapless younger partners.

One of these partners was Marco, who took us one evening to a club on Bond Street where couples of the same sex could dance together. After a few drinks, she decided to dance with us both. But it was Marco she was challenging. Like a tiger, circling a fine thoroughbred pony. He met the challenge well – he was graceful on the dance floor. I left them, feeling vaguely excluded, and sat down by the wall with a glass of iced whisky to watch them. They were on the floor for an hour. Riccarda finally seemed to snap out of her trance, and they walked towards me. Marco was smiling. He grabbed my glass and drank it down in one gulp. ‘Hot,’ he muttered, and though it was a late November night, I saw that his face was shining with sweat, his shirt was open to his belt, and his grey suit was clinging to his body. Riccarda, on the contrary, in her blue jeans and baggy striped shirt, looked as if she’d just stepped out of a beauty salon.