‘Just be honest with me, Alec,’ she says. ‘Just tell me if you want it all to be over.’

I draw a long, hot bath, drinking half a bottle of Scotch with too much Nurofen. The bruising around my stomach is very bad, and my knees, into which they slammed the metal pole, have almost locked up since the drive. There’s an intense yellow-black bruise at the top of my left shin, a stain that I can never imagine eradicating. I’ll need to see a doctor, to pay somebody privately to check me out and not ask too many awkward questions. There are also marks around my shoulders, more bruises on my back, even a clump of dried, sticky blood in my hair. When did that happen? I can book the appointment under a pseudonym and say that I got into a fight. Then I’ll need blood work and X-rays. I’ll need tests.

Just after nine I order a sandwich mixto from room service and make a series of calls on the hotel phone. Mum is out, so I leave a message on her answering machine telling her that I’m away on business and can be reached in my room. Saul is having dinner in a restaurant in London and it is difficult to hear what he is saying, but I feel a delirious homesickness just listening to his words, to the easy laughter of girls in the background. I worry that my voice is unstable and see that my fingers tremble on the bed when we are speaking. He says the divorce is going through with Heloise, but does not elaborate, and promises to come back to Madrid before long. Then I call Sofía.

‘Is it OK to talk?’

‘What do you mean?’ By her clipped, dismissive tone it is obvious that she is in a sour mood.

‘I mean is Julian around?’

‘He is out.’

‘Look, I’m sorry I’ve been out of touch. I can’t explain now. It’s not what you think.’

‘And what do I think, Alec?’

It sounds as though she has one eye on a television set or a magazine, just to irritate me. She knows I hate it when she doesn’t concentrate on what I’m saying. I want to scream the truth at her, to weep, to ask for her help. I feel so utterly fragmented and alone in the hotel room and wish she were beside me, to care for me and to listen. But it is useless.

‘I can imagine what you think. That I’ve been with another woman, that I’ve been in London or something. But it’s not that. I had business, OK? That’s all. Don’t be angry.’

‘I am not angry. I am glad you are all right.’

There is a long pause. She wants to bring the conversation to an end. I draw my knees up tight against my chest and find that I begin to shiver as I talk.

‘Sofía?’

She moves the receiver away from her mouth and takes a deep, stagey breath.

‘Yes?’

‘Can you meet me? When I get back to Madrid? In two days? Can we go to the Reina Victoria?’

‘On Monday? This is when you are coming back?’

There is mild criticism even in this simple question.

‘Yes.’

‘And that’s what I am to you now? Just hotels? You don’t telephone me for more than a week and now you want to fuck me? Is that it?’

‘You know that’s not true. Don’t do this. I’ve been through hell.’ My voice cracks here but she does not react.

‘What do you mean, you’ve been through hell? I have been through hell. I am sick of this, Alec, I am sick of it.’

‘I got into a fight.’

A tiny beat of shock. ‘What kind of a fight?’

It’s strange. All I want now is to win the argument, to make her ashamed of her churlishness.

‘I was beaten up. Here in Zaragoza. That’s why I wasn’t able to go south for Julian. He’s left messages wondering where I am. I was unconscious for a while.’

It is an awful lie, one of the worst I have ever told her, but necessary in that it works to bring her round. She is instantly distraught.

‘Unconscious? You got into a fight? But you don’t fight, Alec. Where did this happen? Lo siento, cómo estás mi vida?’

‘Here in Zaragoza. I was looking at some property. Saul is thinking of buying a place up here. I said I’d help him while he was back in England. Some men attacked me when I went to my car.’

‘Saul was with you?’

‘No. No. He was coming out from London later on. I just left the hospital today. Tell Julian, all right? I don’t want him to be angry.’

It feels bad to be doing this, but I don’t have any choice.

‘Alec,’ she says sweetly, touching my heart with her voice. I think of the barn, of that blackness under the hood, and squeeze my eyes tight to reply.

‘I’m all right now. It’s just some bruises. But I’m so angry, you know? I think if I saw those men again, I would kill them.’

‘I know, I know…’ She is crying.

‘I long to touch you,’ I tell her. ‘I miss you so much.’

‘Me too,’ she says. ‘I will book the hotel. We can talk about it then.’

‘Yes. But don’t cry, OK? Don’t be upset. I’m fine.’

‘I just feel so bad…’

There is a knock at the door. This startles me perhaps more than it might once have done, but it’s just room service. Saying goodbye to Sofía I stand up slowly off the bed, securing my dressing gown as I look through the fish-eye lens in the door. There’s a waitress on the other side, very pretty and alone. She seems struck by me when she walks in, a reaction that may be sexual, which may be shock. I cannot tell. She places a tray on the bed.

‘Buenas tardes. Señor Milius.’

Out of nothing, a dream of sex pulses inside me. I would gladly lie down with this girl on my bed and sleep next to her for days. Anything just for the gentleness and peace of a woman’s touch. I hand her a five-euro tip and wish she wouldn’t leave.

‘Thank you, it was my pleasure,’ she says, and I am on the point of asking her to stay when my head suddenly splits with pain. She has gone, closing the door behind her, and I drop like a stone on the bed, wondering how many more pills, how much more water and whisky I will have to drink before this all goes away. I am angry as I look at my broken body, knowing that it was wrong to have arranged to meet Sofía so soon. The bruising on my legs and stomach will terrify her. I wish the girl had stayed. I wish I was not alone.

Like an invalid, I manage to eat only half of the sandwich before vomiting its contents into the toilet. Something is wrong with me, something more than just shock and exhaustion. It’s as if they poisoned me back at the farmhouse, as if they put something into my blood. I fall into a hopeless sleep, waking up wired and distraught at four in the morning. I leave the lights on in the room for comfort and get dressed slowly, taking a walk around the centre of Zaragoza for more than an hour. Then, back at the hotel, unable to sleep again, I check out at six, eat breakfast, and head back on the road to Madrid.

31. Plaza de Colón

Kitson is awake at seven when I call him from a petrol-station landline. He does not sound surprised to hear from me.

‘Been away, Alec?’

‘Something like that.’

I tell him that we need to get together as soon as I return to Madrid and suggest a two o’clock meeting under the waterfall at Plaza de Colón. He does not know the place, but I describe it to him in detail and ask him to come alone.

‘Sounds intriguing.’

The drive takes about seven hours. I have to rest repeatedly because my eyes ache with a persistent migraine. Painkillers have numbed my reflexes and I feel foggy with the consequences of what I am about to do. Back in the city, aware that ETA will now almost certainly know where I live, I drop the Audi in Plaza de España, take a quick shower at the flat and follow the counter-surveillance route around the barrio up to El Corte Inglés. It’s vital that I am not observed meeting Kitson, who will demand assurances that I have not been followed. There’s no visible tail at the bank on the corner of Martín de los Heros, and nobody follows me into the trap on the first floor at the post office. At Corte Inglés I use the switchback escalators and try on several items of clothing while checking for surveillance. Again, nothing. As a final safeguard, I limp downstairs into the metro at Argüelles, get onto Line 4 and step off at the last moment at Bilbao station, waiting for a second train in case I was followed onto the first. For three minutes I have the platform to myself, then a schoolgirl of thirteen or fourteen comes down the stairs with a friend. Both of them are clutching satchels. ETA have either lost me or decided not to plant a tail. If they have put a tracer in the car it will lead them only as far as the garage. If they have triangulation on the mobiles that will only pin-point my apartment.