The OAPs returned, drag racing past on the esplanade. I put the light out but Leslie carried on making the gesture, the movements becoming more impatient with every try. I stood it as long as I could before I took her hand in mine and made her stop.

We walked back to her house soon afterward. When we reached her porch she patted me on the arm, stepped inside, and shut the door in my face. Through the stained glass I watched her blurry shape retreat quickly down the hallway. Then she was gone.

I was about to turn away when the door opened and Leslie’s father stepped out.

“Peter,” he said. Embarrassment doesn’t come easily to men like Henry May, so they don’t hide it well. “I thought we might get a cup of tea — there’s a café on the high street.”

“Thanks,” I said. “But I’ve got to get back to London.”

“Oh,” he said and stepped closer. “She doesn’t want you to see her with the mask off …” He waved his hands vaguely in the direction of the house. “She knows if you come inside she’s going to have to take it off and she doesn’t want you to see her. You can understand that, right?”

I nodded.

“She don’t want you to see how bad it is,” he said.

“How bad is it?”

“About as bad as it could be,” said Henry.

“I’m sorry.”

Henry shrugged. “I just wanted you to know that you weren’t being sent away,” he said. “You weren’t being punished or something.”

But I was being sent away, so I said good-bye, climbed back into the Jag and drove back to London.

I’d just managed to find my way back onto the A12 when Dr. Walid called me and said he had a body he wanted me to look at. I put my foot down. It was work and I was grateful to get it.