‘I’d like to go to Russia,’ he said. ‘But I can’t, not with things as they are now.’

‘You mean McCarthy?’

‘You’ve heard of him then?’

‘Well, yes, we’ve heard of him.’

‘Those Russians, they’re pretty well up in my field, I read them up, I wouldn’t mind a trip, but not with things as they are.’

‘When you’re Senator, what’ll your attitude be to McCarthy?’

‘My attitude? You’re kidding me again?’

‘Not at all.’

‘My attitude — well, he’s right, we can’t have the Reds taking over.’

Ella hesitated, then said, demure: ‘The woman I share a house with is a communist.’

She felt him stiffen; then he thought; then he loosened again. He said: ‘I know things are different here with you. I don’t get it, I don’t mind telling you that.’

‘Well, it doesn’t matter.’

‘No. You coming back to the hotel with me?’

‘If you like.’

‘If I like!’

Again, she gave pleasure. She liked him, and that was all.

They talked about his work. He specialized in leucotomies: ‘Boy, I’ve cut literally hundreds of brains in half!’

‘It doesn’t bother you, what you’re doing?’

‘Why should it?’

‘But you know when you’ve finished that operation, it’s final, the people are never the same again?’

‘But that’s the idea, most of them don’t want to be the same again.’ Then, with the fairness which characterized him he added: ‘But I’ll admit it, sometimes when I think, I’ve done hundreds, and it is pretty final.’

‘The Russians wouldn’t approve of you at all,’ said Ella.

‘No. That’s why I wouldn’t mind a trip, to find out what they do instead. Tell me, how come you know about leucotomies?’

‘I once had an affair with a psychiatrist. He was a neurologist too. But not a brain surgeon — he told me he never recommended leucotomies — except very rarely.’

He suddenly said: ‘Ever since I told you I was a specialist in that operation you haven’t liked me as much.’

She said, after a pause: ‘No. But I can’t help it.’

Then he laughed and said: ‘Well, I can’t help it either.’ Then he said: ‘You say, I once had an affair, just like that?’

Ella had been thinking that when she used the phrase, of Paul: I once had an affair, it was the exact equivalent of his ‘a pretty flighty piece’ — or whatever the words were he had used that meant the same. She found herself thinking, involuntarily: Good! he said I was like that! Well, I am and I’m glad of it.