Updark looked out of the window as if summer had come to the Parks and he was watching a game of cricket and Dyer’s reply was of no more consequence than the sound of the Audi’s wheels bearing them towards St Giles. ‘I can’t say I’m surprised. “It’s quite hard to trust a nation that is prepared to cheat at mixed curling,”’ which sounded familiar, until Dyer realised that Updark was quoting Dyer’s own words back at him, not from a previous conversation they’d had, but from a text that Dyer had sent to Leandro after the bullying resolution. ‘Little piece of Moroccan advice, Basil, that our American friends feel Professor Whitton might also benefit from. He who has fire in his heart has smoke in his head.’ He let the silence linger. ‘And here’s another. A poor man is never believed.’

The car had stopped. They were outside the Taylorian.

‘Off you go to your library,’ Updark said, snapping shut his notebook. ‘Just don’t go planning a trip up the Amazon, that’s all. We need to keep in touch.’

Dyer’s hand was already on the door handle. He got out, shaken. Why was Updark referring to his Brazilian research? Was Dyer wrong to have put his trust in the librarian, her guarantee? Had Updark discovered Madrugada’s book?

He closed the car door, and was about to walk away when he stopped and tapped the polarised window.

Updark’s features unscrolled into view. He pushed his pink face to the light. It appeared still to be suffering from what Dyer’s book dealer in Rio had once referred to as scattered insect damage.

‘Thought of something?’

‘I forgot to ask,’ said Dyer. ‘How’s the patch-testing? Have they found any suspect agents?’

Updark, disregarding his tone, answered in a deadpan voice. ‘They wondered if it might be an eczema. They’ve given me a steroid, but as you can see it hasn’t solved it.’

Chapter Thirty

OBSERVED ONLY BY THE COUPLE in the painting, Dyer sits down in the French and German reading room, and opens the book. The plunk of his heart.

Still there.

Dyer puts Madrugada’s monograph back in the stacks, his faith immediately restored in the system which has promised to look after it for five more days, and returns to Ward Road.

He walks past the house where he was standing when Updark’s car drew up, as if catching him red-handed with Rougetel on one of their illicit outings into town, until he finds the front door with ‘No. 8’ on it, and rings the bell. He waits, rings again. No answer.