When he had pulled up at the neat bungalow in King’s Hedges he had been eager now to see her. But the aged nature of the woman who opened that door had shocked him, despite the fact that he had tried to prepare himself. At first, she hadn’t recognized him, then it had seemed to flood her face, the knowledge of who she was looking at, and they had fallen into each other’s arms, both crying.

She was tiny, surely much shorter than she had once been, and he had to lean down to hold her shaking body.

They had sort of staggered back inside the house like a many-limbed creature and she had stood back a little, holding his arms and gazing up at him.

The slap that followed then, not that hard, across his cheek, had been almost welcome, albeit a surprise. Then she had sobbed again and pulled him towards her.

Finally they had been sitting in her tidy living room, Mum holding onto one of his hands as though afraid if she let go, he might disappear again.

‘Where have you been, Liam?’ she’d said. ‘Why did you never come back, lovey?’ Then she had said, with satisfaction, ‘I knew it. I knew you’d come back someday,’ before bursting into tears again.

Liam had taken a breath, trying to think about the words he had arranged during the thirty-odd hours he had spent in the air, rabbit-hopping the cheapest way he could get from Bangkok to London. He still hadn’t found the right ones. But now he decided there was no point in anything but the bluntest truth.

‘I had to go away, Mum,’ he said, looking into her eyes, which seemed to be roving all over his face and neck, like she was checking him all over for something.

He thought back to that night, fifteen years ago, when Anastasia’s father had come at him with the golf club. The surprise and shock of it had floored him before he had time to fight back.

The blows had rained down, on his legs, his arms, but never on his head or his back. He only understood why later. This was a beating by someone who knew with almost surgical precision what to do when you wanted someone to be in pain, but not so battered that they might die or need to be hospitalized.

When the beating had stopped, the man, whose name he only later found out was Patrick Ryland, spat on him, the hot froth of it landing on his cheek.