Right now, though, I’m not sure what else would be achieved by that scene. I’m very conscious that I’ve been slow to unfold my story so far. Also, I’m mindful that you stuck by me back there, during my blue period. And I’m genuinely touched by that. So I’m proposing that we just play those cylinders ourselves, in Francesca’s absence.

There’s a certain knack to loading one onto the spindle, but it’s easily acquired. The wood and brass parts are strongly reminiscent of my mother’s old Singer sewing machine, a legacy from her mother, Betty Castle. A brass lever, its patina fogged by decades of idleness, snaps down to hold the roll into position, and the needle descends from the rear of the cabinet. On the front of the panel is a huge circular Bakelite on–off switch, like the lid of a coffee canister. If you would be so kind. Thank you. A yellow bulb flares unsteadily into life beside it.

Another click, and the basement fills with a muted crackling sound, followed by the noise of someone clearing their throat. A woman begins to speak. She has impeccable prewar diction, but the slightly strangulated vowels of someone aiming at the accent of a social class above her own. ‘Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.’

That’s all there is of her. The raw crackle fades to a repeating bump and hiss, which continues to play out like the sonic counterpart to the shadows around the walls of the basement.

The paper wrapper on the next cylinder is marked, in thick pencil, ‘Christmas ’34’. It’s a recording of half a dozen voices singing ‘Silent Night’. The cylinder has warped and the melody seems to oscillate slightly between keys as the spindle turns. After two verses, everyone stops singing except for one tenor voice that carries on bravely in German, before finally dissolving in laughter halfway through the chorus.

We are silent for a while. A change has come over the basement. The temperature appears to have dropped a couple of degrees. Something is stirring. The dead are beginning to move among us. Our skin tingles at their approach.

It’s time to unwrap the third cylinder. It comes from a set of containers kept separate from the others, five Harvey Nichols hatboxes whose lids are labelled in block capitals: nn: do not erase. The inscription on the paper wrapper is consistent with the handwriting on the other cylinders, but there’s something distinctive about it. Turn it towards the light. It’s the neatness of the lettering. The words ‘Volume 1’ are written with the scrupulousness special to the earliest stage of anything – work, love, friendship; that moment when a fresh start gives us the hope of shedding old habits and becoming a better person. I wonder – not selflessly – if this care can be maintained through the later stages of a long project.