If Francis could not find a girl, he would start a fight, and one by one we were barred from old haunts where the landlords and owners had often stood us a drink, or the bouncers let us slip to the front of the queue. Something within him was terribly different – the spark that had ignited the dry scrubland of Cambridge dinners and clubs had gone out, and so we were just killing time. The expression came to life: we were murdering time, drowning it in alcohol and choking it on smoke. Everything we did seemed like a washed-out version of something we had done before. The horrible thing was that at times he would really be just like his old self, fun would threaten to break through like a sneeze, a giant, socially awkward release. It was like catching sight just for a moment of someone you know to be dead, from behind or with their face turned away in a crowded shop, before realizing it is just a stranger.

It was on one such occasion that I made my only attempt to broach the cause of the change in his behaviour. It may seem strange that I did not approach him more than once, but Francis was no longer open to discussions on the subject of himself, his erstwhile favourite topic. He was always intoxicated or hung over, and both states had their own particular dangers. He would meet such sallies first with affectionate requests to lighten up, to stop being so serious, and then, if pushed, would become sullen and uncommunicative. To go so far as to suggest there had been a change in him was to shatter the suspension of disbelief, to admit that we were no longer happy, and such admissions invariably enraged him, or left him morose. It was the beginning of the evening, and he was on the up, clutching a glass in a steady hand and humming to himself, gazing out over the diners in the restaurant where I had been for my first dinner with Michael. Jessica had gone to the toilet, and I took advantage of her absence to get off one question at point blank range.

‘Francis, did something happen to you? Is there something wrong? You know I would do anything for you.’

He looked down. He could not bear my gaze. He swallowed twice, as if something uncomfortable were trying to make its way up his throat. In the end he gulped it back down, and came up with a smile. ‘Nothing whatever, James. Honestly, you’re like Jessica, you’ve developed such a taste for worrying. You don’t know what a strain it puts on me, always coming up with new things for the two of you to worry about. What on earth would you do with your time if I wasn’t here?’

As the term progressed, the old Francis showed himself less and less, and was replaced by a man with glassy eyes and unpredictable moods. Our problems grew as even Lisa’s faultless management of the Cambridge system showed the strain of his behaviour. She took care not to see him, but would do whatever we asked of her on his behalf. He was breaking windows, vomiting in courts, swearing at the porters, fucking girls in the shadows of the colonnade by his staircase. Lisa kept supplying him with essays, but he simply did not bother to hand them in, and if he went to supervisions at all he turned up drunk. He was coming close to being sent down.