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She left. A week later, in much thesame mood, she married an airline cabin steward called Smith. Dirk had kicked her desk over, and then had to pick it uphimself later when she didn’t come back. Nobody, it seemed, wished to have anything detected. He hadrecently, to make ends meet, taken up doing palmistry in drag onThursday evenings, but he wasn’t comfortable with it. He couldhave withstood it - the hateful, abject humiliation of it all wassomething to which he had, in different ways, now becomeaccustomed, and he was quite anonymous in his little tent in theback garden of the pub - he could have withstood it all if hehadn’t been so horribly, excruciatingly good at it.

Dirk stared at the neat, thin face in astonishment. ” he said. “Don’t stand there looking like a startled whatsisname, whatare those things what aren’t seals? Much worse than seals. Bigblubbery things. Dugongs. Don’t stand there looking like astartled dugong. Why has that…” Gilks pointed into the roombehind him, “why has that. ” “How m…” started Dirk. “How, may I ask, do you come tobe here, Gilks? ” “Three hundred pounds,” said Gilks. ” “Perhaps you would allow me to speak to my client,” saidDirk.

At the end of the corridor the porthole doors swungopen and two figures came through them. Hands rushed towardsher as she became hopelessly entangled in the drip stand andbegan slowly to spin towards the floor. She was unconscious as they carefully laid her back in herbed. She was unconscious half an hour later when a disturbinglyshort figure in a worryingly long white doctor’s coat arrived,wheeled the big man away on a stretcher trolley and thenreturned after a few minutes for the Coca-Cola machine.