Jomier listens – half flattered by her confidences, half appalled at her indiscretion. She goes on, filling in the gaps. H, I, J. J for Jomier? What will she tell K, L, M and N about Jomier? Will his pot belly become a talking point like A’s crooked willy?

Dessert. Dyspepsia now joins the headache caused by the champagne cocktail but Jomier eats on. Vanilla ice cream and hot chocolate sauce join the wine, brandy, Angostura bitters, fish soup, garlic mayonnaise, melted cheese, masticated lamb, ratatouille and oregano in his stomach. Annie cuts into her crème caramel with her spoon but does not eat it. The food is bad but not that bad. It is also expensive. The frugal Jomier chides the would-be debonair lover with the money wasted on uneaten artichokes, skate and crème caramel. The debonair lover ignores the frugal Jomier: he has other things on his mind. How to hold down the swill in his stomach; when to pop the capsule of Viagra.

Neither wants coffee. Jomier calls for the bill. Annie goes to the lavatory. Perhaps he should too. The bill arrives. Jomier tries to reason himself out of outrage. He tells himself that the management of Garnier’s has to factor in rent, wages, pension contributions, business rates, depreciation of assets into the £35 bottles of wine and the £8 ice cream. He is paying for the ambience as much as the food. It is an investment in happiness for two. But Jomier does not feel happy. He feels nauseous. He loathes Garnier’s. He is losing control of his mood.

Jomier braves the silent snarl of the taciturn waiters by leaving no tip beyond the 12.5 per cent service charge. He stands and walks the length of the restaurant to the cloakroom. There is a small panelled room with two washbasins and dim lights on the walls. Two doors lead from this antechamber: one marked ‘Gentlemen’, the other ‘Ladies’. As Jomier makes for the former Annie comes out of the latter. They cannot pass one another without touching. They touch. She puts her arms on his shoulders, her mouth close to his right ear and whispers: ‘Hurry up.’

Jomier goes into the Gents. He does not stand at the pissoir but goes into the cubicle and shuts the door. Annie’s two whispered words have excited his senses. His penis wavers in a state of uncertainty as to what function it is called upon to perform. Jomier waits. He cannot evacuate the urine from his bladder until the blood drains from the corpus cavernosa. Jomier ponders on this design flaw in the male genitalia. Women may not have the convenience of a penis but their urinary and reproductive functions do not have to timeshare a single tract.