They drive south to the river and look around Chelsea. Jomier is forced to make a number of concessions in its favour. There is a lively atmosphere on the King’s Road on a Saturday morning; there is no equivalent of John Sandoe’s bookshop in Notting Hill, nor anything approaching that paradigm of department stores, Peter Jones. Judith argues that there are fewer smug fund managers in Chelsea than there are in Notting Hill; Jomier counters that the haute bohemians you find in the Chelsea Arts Club or living on barges on the Thames are no better. In any event, after collecting lists of properties for sale, both are obliged to accept Sandra’s judgement that the sums raised by the sale of their two houses would not be enough to buy a decent-sized house in either Chelsea or Notting Hill.

‘It looks as if it’s going to have to be Hammersmith,’ says Judith.

‘Or Wandsworth,’ says Jomier.

Both are being considerate as lovers should be considerate. Neither means what he or she says.

They return to Judith’s house in Wandsworth where she prepares a scratch lunch from the cling-filmed leftovers in her fridge. The long afternoon. Jomier reads Judith’s weekend Guardian and snoozes in an armchair. Judith stretches out on the sofa and reads a novel. Jomier wakes feeling muzzy and suggests a walk on Wandsworth Common. Judith says that she is all walked-out after the morning traipsing around Chelsea. Jomier goes out on his own. He does not go far. It is growing dark. He is in alien territory. Anywhere south of the river is as threatening as Amazonia. He might get lost. Or mugged. He does not go on to the common but walks along residential streets. Lights have been switched on in ground-floor rooms but the curtains left open. Jomier glimpses tableaux of life in Wandsworth. Not so different to Hammersmith, surely?

He comes across a cluster of estate agents and peers yet again at properties posted in their brightly lit windows. The houses seem much like Judith’s. There do not seem to be any that are larger. It would have to be a big house to provide Jomier with a study and accommodate all his books. Or would he have to throw some away to leave space for the bric-a-brac? Jomier is suddenly weary – not physically weary from walking but mentally weary from wrestling with the idea of moving house.