‘Yes. Does Jane know about her?’

‘No, and that’s one of my worries. Jane is sort of insecure about me.’

‘How’s that?’

He shook his head. ‘It’s hard to explain and it’s bound up with one of my other problems. The whole fucking thing’s all bound up together and with my. . I’m sorry, Mr. . Cliff, I’m not sure I can go on with this.’

It was 4 pm, late enough under the circumstances. I had a bottle of Black Douglas in the bottom drawer of the desk. I got it out, opened the bar fridge and put a couple of ice cubes in two plastic glasses left over from the party. I added solid slugs of the scotch and pushed the drink across to him.

‘Have a drink, Bobby, and collect your thoughts. Nothing you say to me gets said to anyone else without your permission.’

He took the glass and had a sip, then a longer pull. ‘Okay, thanks. This is the really embarrassing bit. . bits. Being stalked by a woman and not being able to handle it, that’s bad enough, but. . I went home with Miranda. I don’t know why. I suppose I thought I should. I couldn’t get it up for her. She was beautiful and all that, but I just couldn’t. I’ve had some trouble in that department over the years. .’

‘You’re not Robinson Crusoe.’

‘What? Oh, yeah, but nothing like this. It was miserable.’

‘Do I have to ask the obvious question?’

‘No. With Jane everything is wonderful. Amazing, really. But Miranda, or whoever she is, has threatened to harm Jane. To physically hurt her. And she says she’ll tell her I’m really gay and that I’m just using her as a. .’

‘Beard, the Americans call it.’

‘Do they? Okay. She says she knows I’m not and that she can fix my problem, but she says she’s so hurt that’s what she’d do.’

‘Unless?’

‘Unless I agree to see her, respond to her messages and emails, go on a holiday with her, all that.’