‘My dear, I don’t know. Didn’t look. English stamp … must be. And another. Delivered by hand. He’s in luck.’

‘By hand?’

‘Yes.’ He scratched his chin busily; he knew that he was about to lie, and lying made him extremely uncomfortable, since, as far as he knew, he did it very rarely. ‘Minna’s gone down to that damned boat. They sent a car.’

‘Why, I wonder? Anything wrong?’

‘No … no … she was in great form. Won’t be long, she said, you know Minna … always in a hustle.’

‘And he had a letter from the boat then?’

‘Yes … probably that tiresome Film Star, she never took her hands off him all evening.’ He crossed his legs; lying over. Relief. ‘We just met in the hall … they’ve walked into St Jean, batteries for his wireless or something.’

She spread the letters out like a hand of cards. ‘Isn’t it boring when you know by the handwriting exactly who’s sent what, and that you can’t be bothered to read them. No fun.’ She slapped them on to the desk, straightened the Beardsley page-boy. ‘I’m sorry that yesterday was so utterly foul for you … with Grottorosso, I mean, and after the first meeting being so irritating. Minna didn’t say much, but what did happen? Can you say? Or would you rather not?’