“Absolutely. I only really noticed how much I missed it when I left the hospital I was in and had to start telling strangers my real name. I feel there’s a great mystery hidden in a name. Not only does it mean something to others, it has an essential influence on its owner. Why don’t you think about a name you really like, or maybe imagine what you’d call a daughter if you had one. The change might surprise you.” He paused. “I think the trough is clear now. What about that curry?”

“That’s a stylish dress you’re wearing. Alaia isn’t it?” said Zeno, tucking into his rice and salad.

Miranda tossed her head. “Is it? I can’t remember.”

“I think so. Bought my wife one from him. He’s Tunisian, isn’t he?”

“Does she wear it?”

“Not much actually. I think she feels it’s a little young on her.”

“Did you put your hands up her legs when she wore it?”

“No.”

“Well then.”

“I don’t see.”

“If the next time she wore it, you groped her—say, while she was serving your veggy burger—she would be doing the housework in it.”

While Zeno was thinking what to say, Miranda lost interest and turned to Fleur. “Scrumptious curry, darling. Hot and slow.”

Fleur giggled. “Like you.”

“Zeno doesn’t think so—do you, Zeno?” asked Miranda, peeling her walnut lips back over her teeth. But Zeno was otherwise occupied watching Phyllis and the Rose. He was becoming aware of subtle changes in the atmosphere whenever he focused on the girl. The sun had finally gone, and in the twilight her skin had taken on the delicate texture of a magnolia. If he looked at her without listening to the conversation, he could see the lights and shades each of her movements produced. A sense of well-being accompanied the focus of his look, not dissimilar to the sensation he had felt years before when composing songs for the B-sides of his records.

At the other end of the table Nick was taking stock of Fleur’s fancy man. There was something he found disturbing—disturbing only because he couldn’t nail it down. He began separating what he saw into categories: the man’s dress was conventional, perhaps a bit too conventional—the blazer well cut, but hard to say if it was made to measure or Marks and Sparks, as he was sitting down; his shirt was dark blue with a white collar—a style Nick had always found irritating—and matched by a tie almost the same temperature blue, with black diagonal stripes. A club tie, perhaps—but from which? He also noticed that the man ate hastily, and had the habit of laughing before any humorous sentence was finished, as though half consciously aware that every pleasing experience soon passes, but instead of savouring the experience by retaining it, became over-anxious and, in hurrying, hastened the pleasure. Nicholas felt Fleur’s interest might be misplaced. He wondered if the man had been a prisoner of war, concluding that he could possibly have taken part in the campaign in Korea if his rank had been earned in combat. His chin was shadowed, even though he was close-shaven. One of those poor chaps who needed to shave twice a day. The timbre of his voice was keen and powerful, but not immediately noticeable because his accent was a little off—a voice that had started life speaking one dialect, tried to move to another, and fallen somewhere in between. And, finally, there was the signet ring on his pinky, a custom which in Nick’s experience generally indicated sexual deviation.