He was roused to accusation. He said, 'You phoned Melissa.'

'I sure did! More than once.'

'And you told her we were getting married?'

'You bet.'

She was still completely naked, but from somewhere she had produced a stick of gum – she never chewed while they made love – and set her jaws in their easy circular motion, and at the same time grinned good-naturedly down at him, waiting for his outburst, and enjoying herself.

'How did you get the number?' An irrelevant question, but her jauntiness had thrown him.

'Michael! You called her from my place while I was at work. You think it doesn't show up on the phone bill?'

He was about to speak but she laughed and clutched his elbow.

'Do you know what happened when I called that number first time? A little child answered and so just to make sure I said, "Sweetheart, can I speak to your daddy?" and do you know what she said?'

'No.'

'Real serious. "My daddy's saving the world in Lordsburg." Isn't that cute?'

It was no longer possible to have such a conversation naked. He went to the bathroom and fetched a dressing gown, and when he came back he was surprised to find her getting dressed. She still looked cheerful. He sat on a chair by the bed, watching her as she stepped into her skirt and bent with a grunt to fix her shoes.

Finally he said, 'Darlene, let's be clear. We're not getting married.'

She spoke as she pinned her hair in a mirror by the TV set. 'I have to get home to shower and change. I'm helping out at the school tonight for an hour. But don't worry. Nicky gets off work at the pharmacy in ten minutes and she'll give me a ride.'

She was ready to leave and came and sat by him on the edge of the bed. She smiled ruefully and patted his knee. He was already feeling some rising regret that she was going. Was it self-love, this appetite for such a voluminous woman? His life had been a steadily mounting curve, Maisie to Darlene.

She said, 'Listen to me. A list of things you ought to know. One is, you're not an entirely good person, nor am I. Two, I love you. Three, I always assumed you were married. You didn't talk about it, I didn't ask. We're consenting adults. Four, when I spoke to Melissa I found out there was no Mrs Beard. Five, there have been times when you made love to me you said you wanted to marry me. Six, so I've decided. We're getting married. You'll kick and scream, but my mind's made up. I'll wear you down. No escape, Mister Nobel Lauree-ate. The stagecoach is pulling out and I do believe you're on it!'

She was so merry, so hopelessly optimistic and well disposed. So American. He started to laugh, and then so did she. They kissed, then kissed deeply.

He said, 'You're magnificent, and I'm not marrying you. Or anyone.'

She stood and took her bag. 'Well, I'm marrying you.'

'Stay a little longer. I'll drive you home.'

'Uhuh. I just got dressed. You'll make me late. I know you.'

She blew him a kiss from the door and was gone.

He remained in the chair wondering whether to phone Hammer and find out how the meeting with the lawyer went. The conversation would be easier from his own point of view, he decided, if he took a shower first. He thought he might watch the local TV news to see if the project was getting full coverage, but the remote was under a pillow, under one of many, on the far side of the bed, and he did not feel like stirring, not just yet. He was so lethargic that it crossed his mind that it would be a fine thing to move, or be gently moved on a hospital gurney to another room where the bed was made and his clothes were not sliding off the chair and the contents of his suitcase were not advancing across the floor. Not possible. He belonged here, in this world. So he would take a shower, now. But he did not get up. He thought about Melissa and Catriona approaching him along the Interstate, driving into the sunset, and how wise he had been, not telling Darlene of their arrival. She would want them all to have dinner together and discuss the future. He wondered where Tarpin was staying, and then he reminded himself he should be feeling excited about tomorrow, which made him think again about Hammer. And so his mind turned soporifically through the complications of the evening, so that when it came, the explosive knock or kick against his door, his startled surprise took the form of an involuntary leap from the chair and a jolt of pain through his chest. Then it came again, two powerful blows resounding against the hollow plywood.

'All right,' he shouted. 'I'm coming.'

Pulling open the door sucked the dry asphalt warmth of the evening into the motel room and revealed Hammer against an orange sky, and behind him a large figure in a suit.

'I'm not even asking,' Hammer said flatly. 'We're coming in.'

Beard shrugged as he stood back. Why then should he apologise for the state of the place?

Hammer looked pale, his face was rigid. He said in the same unmodulated voice, 'Mr Barnard, Mr Beard.' It was usually 'Professor'.

Beard shook the man's hand and gestured towards the chaotic bed, the only place to sit, and he returned to his chair. Barnard, who carried a document case, brushed the sheet with a fastidious flick of his hand, reasonably concerned about bodily fluids getting on his grey silk suit. Hammer sat beside him, and the three were hunched close together, like children plotting in a bedroom on a rainy afternoon.

Barnard, big, square-jawed, thin-lipped, with heavy-framed glasses, six three at least, and bursting out of his shirt, gave an initial impression, by the way he perched his case on his knees and kept his ankles together, of a meek-mannered fellow in a tough guy's body, more of a Clark Kent type, and apologetic about it. Toby at his side looked to be in a state of shock. There was a novel tremor in his right hand, and he kept swallowing hard, sending his Adam's apple up with an audible click. This should have been the kind of occasion when he sought out Beard's gaze for a conspiratorial or satirical exchange. Lawyers! But he would not meet his colleague's eye. Instead, he stared at his clasped hands as he said, 'Michael, this is bad.'

In the silence Barnard nodded sympathetically and waited, and then said in a voice pitched a little too high for his form, 'Shall I begin? Mr Beard, as you know, my firm is instructed from England in the matter of various patents granted to you. I'm going to spare you the legal language. Our intention is to settle this reasonably and swiftly. Our immediate wish is for you to cancel tomorrow's public event because it is prejudicial to our client's case.'

Beard's mind's eye, like a studio camera on a wire, was moving smoothly through the Dorset Square flat looking for the pile in which his old employment contracts were concealed. He said through a pleasant smile, 'And what case is that?'

'Sweet Jesus,' Hammer said softly.

'In the year 2000 my client personally made a copy of a three hundred and twenty-seven page document which we know to be in your possession. These were notes written by Mr Thomas Aldous before his death and while he was employed at the Centre for Renewable Energy, near Reading, England. This copy has been examined by reputable experts, top physicists in their field, including Professor Pollard of Newcastle University, and they have also examined your various patent applications. From their conclusions, parts of which have been seen by Mr Hammer here, we have every reason to believe that those applications were based not on original work by you, but on the work of Mr Aldous. Theft of intellectual property on such a scale is a serious matter, Mr Beard. The rightful owner of Mr Aldous's work is the Centre. These were the clear terms of his employment, which you can read for yourself.'

Beard maintained his engaged, kindly grin, but privately he registered this threat or setback in the form of an uncomfortable rippling of his pulse, like a syncopated drum roll, that did not simply distort his consciousness, but interrupted it, and for a second or two he might have passed out.