I left the house, my crumbling mansion which I inherited from my parents at a peppercorn rent, and headed for the cafe. The plaster was flaking off the garden wall which was reckless with unpruned bougainvillea. I made a mental note to let the riot continue.

From the public gardens I looked back at the faded pink house whose long windows had lost all their white paint and thought that if I didn't have to go and inspect bludgeoned, brutalized bodies I could persuade myself that I was a retired count whose annuity was in a vice.

I was nervous, part of me willing this day not to proceed to my first meeting with a new person and my face naked-all that sizing up, all that accommodation, all that… and no mask too.

A corner of pepper trees in the gardens whispered to each other like parents who didn't want to wake the kids. Beyond them, Antonio, who never slept, who hadn't slept, he once told me, since 1964, was winding down his red canvas awning which sported only the name of his bar and no advertising for beer or coffee.

'I didn't expect to see you before midday,' he said.

'Nor did I,' I said. 'But at least you recognized me.'

I followed him in and he started the coffee grinder which was like a wirewool scrub on my eyeballs. Yesterday's Polaroid was already up on his memorial wall. I didn't recognize myself at first. The young-looking one between the fat man and the pretty girl. Except that Olivia wasn't looking very girlish either, more… more of a…

'I thought you were off today,' said Antonio.

'I was but… a body's been found on the beach. Anyone been in yet?'

'No,' he said, looking out vaguely in the direction of the beach. 'Washed up?'

'The body? I don't know.'

Standing in the doorway wearing a dark suit which had been cut in Salazar's time and had knuckle-brushing sleeves was a young guy. He approached the bar stiffly as if it was his first time on TV and asked for a bica, the one-inch shot of caffeine which adrenalizes a few million Portuguese hearts every morning.