Looking back at those events under your intense though sensitive examination, I am obliged to conclude that my defection was no accident or coincidence. It was an act of sheer cowardice that took advantage of a chance encounter to secure a refuge. In all honesty, I was terrified of all that lay ahead – of the fame, the fortune, the certainty of failure.

I was made out to be the best violinist since Kreisler, but I did not feel that way. I knew that others would discover, sooner or later, what I already knew – that my reputation was many times greater than my ability. I blame no one for that, least of all your father or mine. I was born with the curse of an intelligence larger than my talent. Other artists could fool themselves through a rich and glorious career that they were God’s gift to suffering humanity. Not me. I had seen the suffering, and I knew myself. I knew every flaw in my technique, every gloss in my half-wrought interpretations, every flimsy imitation of genius. And if I knew these shortcomings, some discriminating ear would surely flush them out and expose me as second-rate. I could not face that disgrace.

After the hullabaloo of my début, I suppose I might have settled into the routine whirl of a top violinist, one of the best, but not the best. That is not what I was cut out for. If I could not be supreme, why bother? Call it performance anxiety or the worst case of stage fright in history, but I could not live with being less than I was cracked up to be.

So I took the emergency exit. I could have left my Medzhiner friends at any time and returned home to Blenheim Terrace. But, hearing the Song of Names in my head, I knew that I could never face an audience with less than absolute truth. I was a fraud. I was not the equal of a Hassid, a Neveu, a Haendel. I might fool the masses, but inside I would be an impostor – mocking those things that I held most dear. I had to get away.

And now, for much the same reasons, I have decided to take the escape route once again. I hope you won’t be too disappointed. I was both dumbstruck and uplifted by your scheme to put me back on stage – until I realised that it was, for the most part, an angry imposition of your will over mine. If that was the game, you won and I quit. Congratulations.