“It looked so tantalising,” Catharine said. She smiled at the man. “I’m sorry,” she said sweetly and replaced the prawn on the crushed ice where it lay accusing and untouched until the end of the meal.

Her simple gesture had broken a taboo. For a moment Wavery sat opposite another person.

“But why did you do that?”

“I don’t know. Might I be hungry? Can we talk about something else?” and they became very serious about a matter neither of them in the least cared about until the waiter arrived with their food.

The tension remained until after lunch when a boy appeared in the restaurant supporting a tray of plastic roses. He made for the bearded man’s table. Each rose was planted in a small green tub and adorned by a pair of white-framed sunglasses. The boy set down a tub next to the silver plate. He invited the señorita to sing. When the young girl giggled the plant reacted with a lascivious writhing.

“What an extraordinary thing!” said Wavery. The fat man waved away the boy, who turned to Wavery. He shook his head.

“They’re called rock plants,” said Catharine. She was laughing.

He was glad. They did not have the luxury of time that allowed them to quarrel. When she laughed like that it was impossible not to laugh with her.

They began to talk again and there was lightness between them. They remembered places both of them knew: the countryside near Cambridge, where she had grown up; the garden at Hidcote; a walled town in Italy; a hotel with a virulent ceiling fresco of Aurora. Drawing Catharine out, Wavery felt he might sit and listen to her for as long as she chose to talk. He thought, This is what happens when people communicate. This is exactly what happens. You are fascinated to know what makes the other person tick. And he was genuinely interested in this lively, alert, intelligent woman. She was someone whose company he cherished in a way he had forgotten.

She in her turn was touched by his reticence, his grace, by his acceptance of her as a charming companion and someone he would like to spend time with.

“You were so interested, Thomas, so amusing, and, I suppose, older. I felt liberated. I felt far funnier, far more intelligent than I’d felt for ages. Because you were a good listener. I could tell you were trained to be like that with everyone.”

Something else Catharine admitted to herself in the course of their conversation. Something she had only begun to articulate. She didn’t know who Wavery was, beyond the fact he was a diplomat. As a diplomat he was perfect: he couldn’t lay a linger on her. She could use him without ever knowing who he was. She saw his apparent strength and kindness and she believed he could do for her what she had not been able to ask of anybody. As the afternoon went on, a voice crept into her head. Look here, said this voice, I think this man can help you in a way no one else can.