Horace dropped the receiver but the voice kept coming out, insinuating, threatening,

‘I’ll get you, you cunt. I’ll fucking pull out your tongue and tie it round your fucked-up neck, see if you can chat up my old lady then. Eh? See if you can ponce around my fucking house in your garters and socks when I’m out earning a fucking crust. I’ll fucking…’

And so on. Horace decided to disconnect the phone. He was not going to call the police. He was not going to run away. He was simply going to wait for the man to come round. He had a key, after all. It was his house, not Horace’s.

‘Was that him again, Horry?’ called a woman from the kitchen. She sounded distant and busy. The house was arranged with the kitchen at the back. Horace stood in the front room with one hand on the mantelpiece and the other hooked into the watch-pocket of his waistcoat. It was a stance he enjoyed because it carried a proprietorial air.

‘Yes, darling,’ he shouted back. ‘He insists on killing me, though he seems not yet to have settled on a method.’

‘Method?’ came back the busy voice. ‘I’ll tell you what his method’s going to be. He’s going to cut your head off with an old knife.’ She laughed. ‘That’s what he told me.’

At that moment there came a sharp rapping at the front door.

‘Alright, alright,’ said the woman, ‘keep it down.’ She moved along the narrow hallway. Horace heard her skirt slide against her nylons. She passed the door to the front room.

‘You better duck down Horace, or go upstairs and sit in the bathroom.’ Horace chose the latter course and hurried away, collecting his suit jacket as he went. The rapping started up. ‘Alright!’ the woman said.

Horace settled onto the toilet next to the bath and picked up a copy of the Standard. He could just make out the proceedings below.

‘No he’s at work,’ said the woman. ‘No, he doesn’t, he hates your lot. Pinkoes, he calls you. No thanks. None of your business, is it?’ Horace heard the front gate open and then a shout and the sound of somebody falling and then the woman screaming. He moved to the top of the stairs. A big man stood in the front doorway with his arms around the woman.

‘I done it Bella,’ said the big man. ‘For you. I done him, that’s all that fucking matters. He was tearing us apart. He ain’t got no right.’

Stepping into the house the big man manoeuvred the woman into the front room and put her on the settee. ‘Right then,’ he said. He went back to the front door and pulled inside the body of a youngish man wearing a tweed jacket and flannels. ‘We’ll have to get you fixed up, won’t we mate?’

At the top of the stairs Horace pondered what the best thing might be to do.