Enter Judith. Jomier notes at once that Judith is physically unlike her friend Ruth. She is tall and has no protruding bust or bottom. Jomier notes too that Judith seems familiar. This puts him on his guard. There have been embarrassments in the past. Jomier has put questions to a woman over dinner which she had answered over dinner a year before. He had forgotten. She had not. And Ruth? Has she forgotten that she has already introduced him to Judith? Jomier thinks not. If he has met Judith, it was not at one of Ruth’s dinner parties. It was further back in the past.

Jomier does not talk to Judith as they stand awaiting the call to dinner. He knows he will be placed next to her at the scrubbed pine table in Ruth’s basement kitchen and wishes to hold in reserve what little he might have to say. Ruth has briefed him. Judith is not a widow. She is divorced. This encourages Jomier. He prefers divorcees to widows. Widows are sentimental about their dead husbands. With death all the sharp edges are rubbed off. A special bovine look comes into their eyes as they reminisce about their happy years with Edward or Humphrey or James. Safely reduced to ashes in an urn, Edward and Humphrey and James are not there to contradict them. Dead men tell no tales. Only a few friends who knew the couple well wonder at the rewriting of history.

Divorcees are more entertaining. They are bitter. There are only rough edges. Johnny, Simon, Tim or Harry were weak, two-timing, alcoholic, stingy, absent. Jomier listens with attention because this is no doubt how Tilly talks about him. Weak, yes. Two-timing, yes. Alcoholic, no. Stingy, yes. Absent, no. Bad in bed? The undersized penis? The premature ejaculation? Or adequately equipped but sexually neglectful? Saturday nights spent reading Herodotus. Or watching CNN.

Will Judith be different? A non-embittered divorcee? Ruth ushers her guests down the stairs to her basement kitchen. It is not large but she has crammed in an Aga, a dresser, an upright piano with a sofa in the bay. The view from the bay window is of the door to the coal-hole beneath the pavement. The other window looks out on to a paved gully with steps leading up to the garden. The dresser displays Victorian plates and saucers.

Jomier is placed between Ruth and Judith. This is to prevent him from talking to any of the other women among the guests. Jomier knows what is expected of him and turns to Judith. Again the sense that he has met her before. He asks: ‘Who do you think will win Wimbledon?’

Judith laughs. ‘You have changed.’

Jomier is caught off guard. She remembers. He does not.

‘Changed?’

‘You used to say that sport was for idiots.’

‘I did?’

‘Don’t you remember?’

‘When?’

‘A long time ago.’

‘Where?’

‘At your parents’ house. I came over with the Hardings for lunch.’