‘How’s your head? Do you think it’s going to rain?’ she said, like this was just a normal day. I was pleased when the sky spat at her. She looked pretty awful, which was good. She should look awful. It surprised me to see that she was shaking; her hands trembled as she straightened out her jumper (actually my jumper – I’d given it to her), those dark eyes flashing nervously, settling nowhere, and it struck me with some satisfaction that she was scared of me. Her body was shaking beside mine. She should be afraid. She should tremble. She should be ashamed.

I walked in silence. She could do the talking; I had nothing to say to her. We crossed the main road and headed to the river, neither of us needing to agree on a route; we had walked this walk hundreds of times. ‘Con,’ she said as we came down the steps, ‘I just want you to know that I really thought I knew myself better than this . . . I’m really shocked.’

And I bet she was. She was such a sensible person, you see, Dr. R, she was so straight – she was wearing her blue parka, for Christ’s sake. She was Ness – the big sister, the responsible one, the efficient, sensible Mrs. Jones, the moralizer, the put-on-another-jumper preacher, the sock-puller-upper. Adultery and betrayal was out of character and I could imagine her surprise at what she was capable of. Her fingers shook as she tried to unzip her pocket to get out a tissue. I would draw the line if she started crying. If anyone was going to cry it should be me. Fortunately she just blew her nose. ‘I let myself get too close to him.’

‘You can say that again,’ I said. We were now in the open space of the towpath. It was muddy and I was wearing the wrong shoes. The tide had come and gone, litter clung to branches, the water was indeterminable from the sky – the whole scene was drenched in drabness.

She touched my arm.

‘Don’t touch me,’ I said, stopping in my tracks. I know, very melodramatic – but I couldn’t bear her to touch me; she had sacrificed such intimacies with her actions. There had to be some sort of payback, karma, whatever. ‘How long has it been going on?’ I asked, using the present tense despite their promises. But of course they’d got their stories straight: it was only the second time it had happened. Suspiciously unlucky to have been caught on the second time, wouldn’t you say?