And that seemed to do it. That broke the spell.

He was overcome then with guilt and shame, and he fell down onto his knees and began quietly sobbing.

He cried, and he cried-deep, satisfying, pointless, lonely, self-pitying tears-and then he picked himself up, went to the bathroom, wiped his eyes, took some toilet paper and returned to the bedroom.

And he carefully picked up every scrap and splinter of the vase.

He wasn't angry with Gloria. He wasn't disappointed with Gloria.

He was angry and disappointed in himself.

He was stupid.

Totally stupid.

It was late. He lay down on the bed.

That night the ceiling, half lit by the streetlights through the curtains, became the screen for Israel's nightmares. He saw himself with Ted, in the van, travelling forever. Travelling with no hope of arrival or rest. Pointlessness. Humiliations. Gloria with other men. Ted with his mother.

He was stupid.

Totally stupid.

It could never have worked between them. They were mismatched. Gloria's family: they had money. They were 'accomplished'-that was it. There was no higher term of praise in Gloria's family for someone they admired: 'accomplished'. Which meant money, really. He remembered Gloria's mother had once used the phrase 'inferior people'. He was an inferior person. Worse: he was neither one thing nor the other. He was neither inferior nor superior. He was just middling. He imagined himself riding in the van, down the middle of a long road, and then suddenly braking sharply, and the van beginning to keel over. The feeling of the van falling over.

He fell into a deep sleep.

And when he awoke it was morning.

And there was still no sign of Gloria.

The sun was streaming in, bright and pale. He got up, went to the kitchen. Went to the fridge. Ate a couple of crackers spread with cream cheese. Took a slug of white wine from an opened bottle. There was no other food in the house.

Gloria must have been eating out.

The flat felt cold and unlived in.

He didn't know what to do. He thought about leaving a note. That wasn't right. He went back to the bedroom. He looked again at the pile of books on the table beside the bed.

Law books.

Hardback history.

And there, on the top, was a copy of Postmodern Allegories. His friend Danny's book.

It must have been the copy he'd sent Israel.

It was probably the copy he'd sent him.

'Ah!'

It felt as though someone had inserted a knife into his foot. He rocked back onto the bed, and brought his foot round-a piece of the vase was embedded in there. He'd missed a bit. When he pulled it out, there was a little blister, a bleb of blood. A drop of blood on the white cotton sheet.

He lay down in a stupor, a kind of hungover dullness descending upon him, weighing him down, a deep weariness overcoming him.

He was filled with loathing for his life. Not only away in Tumdrum, but also here in London. He no longer had a life in London. You have your life where you're living.

Everything seemed pointless and meaningless.

He thought he might perhaps spend a few days in bed, waiting for Gloria to return. Waiting to see what happened.

Knowing nothing would happen.

The phone rang. He was convinced it was Gloria. He jumped out of bed, ran to the hallway, grabbed the phone before the answerphone message began.

'Hello?' he said. 'Hello?'

The person at the other end of the phone hung up.

Israel dialled number recall.

It was Gloria's parents.

He frantically dialled, unthinking; the phone rang, someone picked up, and Israel said, 'Hello, Gloria? Can I speak to Gloria please?'

And it was Gloria's father saying, 'Who's calling?'

And Israel said, 'It's me, Israel…Gloria's…'

And he detected a slight pause, voices in the background. 'I'll just check if she's here, Israel.'

And Mr Kahn said, 'She's not here at the moment, Israel.' And finally, Israel knew.

It was over.

17

They were driving back through England in silence.

Driving through England meant nothing.

Driving through England felt to Israel like driving through his own loss and ignorance. He understood nothing about England. In Israel's mind, calling himself an Englishman meant taking no notice of what it meant to be English. His identity as an Englishman was non-existent. Yet he had no other national identity: he was hardly European. And he certainly wasn't Irish. He was, notionally, Jewish, but he had effectively reduced all his allegiances down to himself. And now, without Gloria, he was not even a couple. He was an example only of himself. There was nothing to be elaborated or extrapolated from him: he was Israel Armstrong, and that was all.

'Ye're thinking very loudly,' said Ted. 'Ye want to stop yer blertin' there. I can't hear me own ears here.'

'What?'

'Something on yer mind?'

'Mmm.'

'Ye're thinking about?'

'The future,' said Israel.

'What about it?'

'I despair of the future.'

'Well, it speaks very highly of you,' said Ted.

'Let's go home,' said Israel.

'You are home,' said Ted.

'Not anymore,' said Israel.

'I don't know what ye're coming back for. Ye'll be resigning anyway, when we get back, eh?'

'I guess.'

'Shall we stop off at a service station for a coffee and something to eat?' said Israel's mother. 'Watford Gap?'

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

For previous acknowledgements see The Truth About Babies (Granta Books, 2002), Ring Road (Fourth Estate, 2004), The Mobile Library: The Case of the Missing Books (Harper Perennial, 2006), and The Mobile Library: Mr Dixon Disappears (Harper Perennial, 2006). These stand, with exceptions. In addition I would like to thank the following. (The previous terms and conditions apply: some of them are dead; most of them are strangers; the famous are not friends; none of them bears any responsibility.)

Mark Adair, Agnostic Mountain Gospel Choir, Lisa Allardice, Mark Amory, Matthew Anderson, Rosie Apponyi, Clare Asquith, Tove Bakke, Brendan Barrington, Oonagh Barronwell, Nicholas A. Basbanes, Carmel Beaney, Tal Ben-Shahar, E. V. Bernini, Andrew Black, Terence Blacker, Shona Blair, Jean Bleakney, Stephen Bleakney, Humphrey Bogart, Walter Bonatti, Owen Bowcott, Sam Bowman, Maureen Boyle, Fran Brearton, Oliver Broderick, Charlie Brown, Claire Burgoyne, James M. Cain, Garrett Carr, Ruth Carr, Ciaran Carson, Daragh Carville, Gavin Carville, Helen Cathcart, Martina Chapman, Lorraine Clarke, Tom Clarke, Faye Clowe, Julian Cope, E.V. Corbett, Victoria Coulson, William Crawley, Edmund Crispin, Robert Crosby, Amanda Cross, Daniel Cullen, Pauline Currie, Cahal Dalat, Robina Dam, Teresa Davey, Emily Dedakis, Jonathan Derbyshire, The Destroyers, Hannah Devlin, Maria Dickenson, Lizzie Dipple, Philip Dodd, Garbhan Downey, Maria Doyle, Linda Drain, Sarah Durand, Terry Eagleton, Joe Eszterhas, Pauline Evans, Paul Farley, Leontia Flynn, Leigh Forgie, Anne-Marie Fyfe, Miriam Gamble, Becky Gardiner, Elaine Gaston, James Geary, Carlo Gebler, Kieran Gilmore, Ray Givans, Alison Gordon, Rebecca Gower, Dominic Graham, Ken Gregory, Michelle Griffin, Lisa Guidarini, The Hackensaw Boys, Salwa Hamid, P.J. Hart, Rabbi Hayim Halevy Donin, Andrew Harvey, Maria Hatchell, Gerry Hellawell, Dr Henry, Katherine Herring, Laurence Heyworth, Reginald Hill, Jonathan Hodgers, Christine Hooper, Caoilinn Hughes, Patrick Hughes, Michael Innes, Kenneth Irvine, Richard Irvine, Chris Jackson, Paul Jeffcutt, Oliver Jeffers, Rory Jeffers, Peter Johnston, H.R.F. Keating, Michael Keating, Lisa Keogh, Dave Kinghan, Lizzy Kingston, Matt Kirkham, Emily Krump, Dan Le Sac (and Scroobious Pip), Dan Leith, Amy-Rachel Lindsay, Leon Litvack, Edna Longley, Michael Longley, Lemas Lovas, Ross MacDonald, Paul Maddern, Maureen Maher, Bernard Malamud, David Marcus, John McAllister, Mrs McAvoy, Niall McCabe, Cormac McCarthy, Eugene McCusker, Rachel McDowell, Philip McGowan, Jayne McKee, Colin McKeown, Olwyn McKinney, Chloe McLenaghan, Fionola Meredith, Robbie Meredith, Richard Milbank, Sinead Morrissey, Oliver Mort, Barbara Morton, Marie-Louise Muir, Jane Murdoch, Fionnuala O'Connell, Hugh Oddling-Smee, Malachi O'Doherty, Philip Oltermann, Christopher Owens, Boom Pam, Otto Penzler, Andrew Pepper, Charmain Porter, Nicci Praca, Gail Prentice, Ellery Queen, Antonia Quirke, Joan Rahilly, Lucy Ramsey, Tom Ramussen, David Rice, Asche Rider, Gareth Robinson, Chrissie Russell, David Russell, Noel Russell, W.L. Saunders, Maureen Scott, Michael Scott, Helena Scullion, Matt Seaton, Maire Shannon, Michael Shannon, Bernard Share, Chris Sherry, David Smylie, Damian Smyth, Diane Spratt, Elaine Stockman, C.J. Stone, Pat Taylor, James Thompson, John Thompson, Sara Tibbs, Susan Tomaselli, David Torrans, Eoghan Walls, Emma Ward, Caroline Walsh, Joseph Wambaugh, Laurence Wareing, Donald Westlake, Emma Whitehead, Vi Whitehead, Paul Wild, Paul Willetts, Alex Wylie, Rachel Younger.