He arrives home to find the house empty. He wanders through the unusually quiet hallway, the absence of dog and bicycles suggesting Jane has taken the family to the park. Bram drifts into the deserted studio. He is numb now, the sharp pain he experienced earlier replaced by a dullness, an emptiness, a weighty sense of being utterly lost. He pulls his hat from his head and sits heavily on a lump of unworked stone. Somewhere in the garden a blackbird sings with inappropriate brightness. Bram’s dry mouth is aggravated by the dust that habitually fills the air in the studio. He coughs, spluttering, the sound echoing off the hard surfaces of the room.

Perry’s voice startles him. “You sound like a man in need of a drink,” he says, coming from the darkness of the hallway clutching a bottle and glasses. He pulls up a wooden stool and sits opposite Bram. “If you don’t mind my saying so,” he prattles on as he pours generous measures for both of them, “you look frightful. Here, this should pep you up.”

On any other day, Bram might have questioned the need for brandy, have questioned Perry’s readiness to produce it, have questioned there being any in the house. On any other day, he might have paused and thought at least of eating something, or of drinking water to steady his already twisted stomach. But not today. Today all he wants is something to ease his suffering. Something to blur the image he cannot shake from his head of Lilith being held close by Louis. Of Lilith going. He drains his glass and then holds it out to be refilled. Wordlessly, he downs the second measure.

“I say.” Perry laughs lightly. “Steady on.”

“Another,” Bram insists.

Perry watches him a moment longer and then asks, “Want to talk about it, old chap?”

Bram shrugs and shakes his head. “No. Yes. No! What is there to say?”

“Clearly something is amiss.”

“She’s gone, Perry. She’s made her decision, chosen the way her life is going to be, and it does not include me.”

“Ah.”

“Yes, ah.” He leans forward, elbows on knees, turning his drink around in his hands, staring at the silky liquid inside as if it might reveal some sort of answers, some sort of explanation, some sort of action he might take.

“I assume we are talking of the delectable Lilith?” Perry asks.

“I was a fool ever to think she would consider me. Seriously consider me.”

“I thought she was rather keen—”

“She’s chosen Louis,” he cuts in.

“I see. Pressure from her family, perhaps? Someone considered more … suitable?”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Bram tells him.

Perry seems about to respond to this but says nothing, topping up their glasses instead.