But he froze before he had reached far enough, halted, certainly, by the same secret doubt I had seen in others, the querulous look and fear that asked, Is there yet someone alive in that shell? Some living human being watching and waiting to come back to life to seek retribution against those who wronged him in his time of indisposition? Might there yet be some ember that could burst suddenly into flame, escaping, falling away to earth like a maggot dropping from a carcase?

Quinn’s behaviour meant nothing to me - I had long since stopped feeling threatened by such as him. I was no longer afraid, quite used to it, in fact; had been for, I don’t know, a very long time, as long a time as it takes to forget fear.

One of the patients came round with the tea-trolley. On it were blue cups containing sugared tea and orange cups containing unsugared. And one syringe.

But I was not to receive this drink.

The telephone rang in Quinn’s office and behind the frosted-glass partition I could just make out Tanya’s turquoise-clad figure as she jumped up and came to the door. She began pulling on her coat. Quinn, belly jutting, stood in the doorway, eyeing her up and down from behind as she jinked her way through this daft circus he called his workshop. A sense of fate jabbed somewhere in my chest as I realized she was coming towards me. Then she was beside me, slight, dark, a little ugly, reaching for the brakes on the wheelchair. ‘We have to go back to the ward,’ she said. ‘You have a visitor.’

THREE

How miserable I was becoming - not like me - on this wretched, wretched day. Sunlight lasered through the clouds and filled my eyes with yellow blindness as Tanya wheeled me through the slush back to the ward, saying nothing, contemplating, perhaps, the fact that she too would be apprehended over this new mistake. And I? Who could say what would happen to me now. More time wasted, and my work-time to boot. Ah, that I could feign illness, send a luminescent green flush from my nose, sweat at will, change the colour of my skin. My ancient wish of becoming invisible stirred itself again - though I never really wanted to be completely invisible. It was just my head which, from time to time, I longed to have removed from my shoulders and placed on the end of a string, to have it dangled in my pocket that I might still hear, yet not bear full witness to, the musterings around me.