‘Gareth Greenway,’ he blurted.

‘Okay, Mr Greenway, how can I help you?’

He looked slowly around the room. There wasn’t much to see-filing cabinet, desk, calendar on one wall, a bookcase of paperbacks and a poster from a Frida Kahlo exhibition. ‘You haven’t got any recording devices or anything like that, have you, Mr Hardy?’

‘No, nothing like that.’

‘Good. Have you ever heard of psychosurgery?’

‘Yes.’

‘Psychosurgery was performed on me nine months ago against my will.’

I let out a slow breath as I studied him more closely. There were no physical signs; he didn’t twitch or dribble, but he had the air of an alien, of someone for whom everything around him was strange and new. ‘How did that happen, Mr Greenway?’

‘I don’t know. That’s the problem. I can’t remember. I know I was in the hospital for some time.’

‘What hospital?’

‘Southwood Private Hospital. It’s what you’d call a loony bin.’

That was the first flicker of aggression I’d seen; he opened his eyes wider as he spoke and seemed to be flinching back, although in reality he didn’t move a muscle. I didn’t react; I’d seen enough psychoanalytical movies to know how to behave. ‘Go on,’ I said.

“They did this to me, made me like this, and I don’t know why. All I know is that they’re going to do it to Guy and they’ve got to be stopped.’

‘Who’s Guy?’

‘He was my friend, my only friend, in there.’

‘I see. Why do you think he’ll be… treated the way you were?’

‘This is the hard part,’ he said. ‘I don’t know why. I just have these impressions. They won’t come together properly. That’s what things are like since they cut into me. That’s the idea. You don’t make connections between all the things that’re wrong in your life so they don’t bother you as much. You see?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Well, it didn’t quite work with me. I’m still bothered. They tell me I was violent. I don’t feel violent anymore. I was an actor. I couldn’t act now, I wouldn’t know how. That’s what it does to you. How would you like it, Mr Hardy? Would you trade in all your anxieties for the sort of peace of mind that stopped you from doing what you do now? Even if that’s what causes the anxieties? I assume you have some?’