‘No, but …’

Susan interrupts. ‘No, Mr McKinley. We definitely don’t have lice.’

‘They’re fine, Kenneth. Really. Be nice.’ Andi is unrolling something from a long box.

‘Och, very well. You’d better set down on Andi’s paper. What thash for, I have no idea. You’re not thinking of shoiling yourshelves, are you?’

‘Just keeping you alive, Kenneth,’ says Andi with a smile, as she tears off a long sheet of soft, wide paper from her roll and places it on the seat of the sofa for us. We sit down cautiously. The old man responds with a gargling growl in his throat as if he thinks her efforts to keep him alive are a waste of everyone’s time.

As well as the music, I now detect another noise: a clacking sound that comes from the old man when he speaks.

‘You’ll wait, I hope, until we get to the end of thish movement? Mr Bruckner, I find, is not a composer that can be hurried.’ And there it is again: clack-clack.

His eyes are closed, but his hands are moving in time with the strange music, as if he is conducting an invisible band. Andi crosses the room to an old-style record player where a black vinyl disc is revolving and, when she pushes a button, the music stops abruptly.

The old man opens his eyes at the sudden silence. What happens next is an amazing transformation. It is almost as if Mr McKinley becomes younger before our eyes. He doesn’t, of course, but as he talks it is as if he is warming up. He slurs less, and straightens up, raising his wrinkled neck from out of his slumped shoulders, like a tortoise.

‘Come now, Andi. That surely wasn’t necessary?’ he says.

‘Mr Bruckner can wait, Kenneth. You have visitors,’ says Andi. ‘Susan Tenzin and Malcolm …?’

‘Bell.’

‘Malcolm Bell. And Susan has brought cake.’

The old man rattles the phlegm in his throat and it’s as if his mind clears at the same time. His eyes, which are almost hidden beneath a hedge of white eyebrow, widen a little. ‘Och, yes. I’ve been expecting you. Welcome to my wee abode. Andi – we’ll take tea right here, I think.’ Then that noise: clack-clack.

Mr McKinley has the face of someone who has recently been on a strict diet. My Aunty Gina did it once and she looked awful. His jowls hang thinly and there’s a long strip of loose flesh starting under his chin and swooping down until it is concealed by a black silk cravat tucked into his cardigan top. His trousers, shiny with age, seem far too big for his skinny legs.