Dermo was your man and he was on to it from the get-go. A beast of some mass by God. Pitching lime-lit horrors up into the eaves. What were the odds? If only he could just… but in rising he had buckled, and taken the chair down with him, just as it had burst from behind the municipio and waddled across the road.

And in the morning, as Rula peeled and salted his egg, things got the better of him again, breaching his defences so easily now that he wished his mouth stitched up for good. There was too much salt on the egg, the waiter was giving them looks, and why in hell’s name were the windows of the trattoria open at this hour. Rula steadied herself and led her gaze over his shoulder, down to the lake and away from what was coming. Didn’t she know well enough about his damn legs? And no wonder. All that pounding the streets of another dago town that she and her cronies had cooked up between them.