Ah, so that’s what she’s after. Eleanor does not need my say-so to let Peter drop music, but she suspects I know a secret that he never shared with his mother. Tricky, this. I wonder how much she has squeezed out of the pimply brat, or whether she is implying that he was corrupted by contact with those hateful, reclusive, bearded Jews. I vividly recall her anti-blackhat prejudice.

‘There is not much to say that I couldn’t have told you on the phone.’ I shrug with feigned irritation. ‘Peter, when I first heard him, echoed a style that I had not heard since childhood, an expressive freedom that I thought might develop into something significant and worthwhile. I was anxious to trace its source, which seemed authentic and untouched by modern distortions. He led me to a kindly old rabbi in Oldbridge who gave him remedial lessons during breaks in his paper round. I visited the rabbi myself and found nothing untoward. He represented a defunct tradition and we had a nostalgic chat. I gather that he is, sadly, no longer alive.’

‘That’s right,’ snaps Eleanor. ‘I caught Peter trying to visit this man not long after he won the prize. He came home all upset, refusing to practise or eat supper. He had rung the bell and found different people living there. Never heard of the rabbi, or of his daughter who, I suspect, Peter fancied. There were blank stares when Peter mentioned their names, no speaka da English.

‘I read that this man, Rabbi Katzenberg, drove his van into the Taw while running a fruit and veg round. It was in all the papers. I told Peter the man was dead, and he went berserk. Said he was a holy man, a musical genius. I said, “Don’t be silly: these people are primitives, barely out of the Middle Ages. What can they know of Bach and Beethoven, with their long beards and thick wigs?”

‘Peter wouldn’t listen. He went into a slump, almost failed his exams. Then Frederick moved in with me. Peter’s playing changed, it sounded hollow. He did not seem to be trying so hard, he had lost his ambition. I’m no musician, but it seemed to me as if something had gone out of my boy, as if this dead rabbi had taken his soul.’

‘That’s a bit metaphysical, isn’t it?’

‘You tell me, Mr Simmonds. I read the Isaac Bashevis Singer novels you mentioned. They are full of strange occurrences, of men and women being occupied by dybbuks – isn’t that what they’re called? These people are a menace. They dabble in the occult. They possess unnatural powers and prey on innocent folk.’

‘These people?’

‘You know who I mean.’