He thought he might take refuge in the abbey. He hoped it might be cool there, and inspire him again, remind him what it was to believe in something, but the abbey was closed to visitors for a music rehearsal. Harold sat in a pocket of shade and briefly watched the copper statue, until a small child burst into tears because it had waved and offered her a boiled sweet. He would wait in a small teashop where he reckoned he could afford a pot of tea for one.

The waitress scowled. “We don’t do drinks-only in the afternoon. You have to have the Regency Bath cream tea.” But he was already sitting down. Harold asked for the Regency Bath cream tea.

The tables were set too close together and the heat was so solid you could almost see it. Customers sat with their legs open and flapped the air with their laminated menus. When his order arrived, a small scoop of clotted cream swam in a pool of fat. The waitress said, “Enjoy.”

Harold asked if she knew the quickest route towards Stroud but she shrugged. “Do you mind sharing?” she said, only without making it sound like a question. She called out to a man at the door and pointed at the seat opposite Harold’s. The man sat apologetically and pulled out a book. He had a neatly chiselled face, and closely cut light hair. His white shirt was open at the collar, revealing a perfect V-shape of toffee-coloured skin. Asking Harold to pass the menu, he also asked if he liked Bath. He was an American, he said, doing England. His girlfriend was currently enjoying the Jane Austen experience. Harold wasn’t sure what this might be, but hoped for her sake that it didn’t involve the very famous actor. He was relieved that they fell into silence. He didn’t need another encounter like the one in Exeter, or even the one he had just had. Despite his obligation to other people, he wished at that moment he had walls.

Harold drank his tea, but couldn’t face the scones. He felt dulled with such apathy it was like being at the brewery again in the years following Queenie’s departure; like being an empty space inside a suit, that said words sometimes and heard them, that got in a car every day and returned home, but was no longer connected up to other people. The manager appointed after Napier suggested Harold should take a back seat until his retirement. Filing, he suggested. The odd piece of consultative advice. Harold was given a special desk with a computer and his name on a badge but no one had approached. He draped a serviette over his plate and caught the eye of the chiselled man opposite.

“Too hot for food,” said the man.

Harold agreed. He instantly regretted it. The chiselled man now seemed to feel obliged to make further conversation.