The first row of summer flies swiftly by as combatants play a long game

The journey towards Brexit has barely begun, but for David Davis the experience has already been rich with learning. In May last year, Mr Davis told the public that, after voting Leave, Britain’s first port of call should be “not Brussels, but Berlin”, in order to strike a trade deal with Germany. “A Uk-german deal,” he trumpeted, “would include free access for their cars and goods, in exchange for a deal on everything else. Similar deals would be reached with other key EU nations.”

After Mr Davis promised this, it was quietly explained to him that in fact it is not possible to strike a trade deal with Germany, or with any other individual EU nation. This is because the EU only ever strikes deals as a single bloc. That is, indeed, rather the point of the EU. And in any case, if nations inside the EU were permitted to negotiate trade deals with nations outside the EU, Mr Davis’s fellow Brexiteers wouldn’t have spent their entire campaign arguing that we needed to leave the EU in order to negotiate them. Still, I’m sure Mr Davis is up to speed now. Two months after making this promise, he was made Britain’s chief Brexit negotiator.

His dreams of Berlin sadly dashed, the Brexit Secretary went to Brussels yesterday for the crucial opening day of talks. The first item on the agenda: what should be the first item on the agenda? Last month, Mr Davis announced on ITV that the timetable for the Brexit talks would be “the row of the summer”. The EU had demanded that the first topics of discussion be citizens’ rights, Britain’s exit bill, and Northern Ireland’s border. “Wholly illogical,” Mr Davis told Robert Peston. The Irish border issue couldn’t possibly be resolved, he scoffed, until agreements were in place on trade and customs.

After yesterday’s talks, Mr Davis – his hair, it seemed to me, looking somewhat harassed – held a press conference with Michel Barnier, his EU counterpart. Monsieur Barnier immediately confirmed that the first topics of discussion would, as per the EU’S demands, be citizens’ rights, Britain’s exit bill, and Northern Ireland’s border.

The row of the summer, it seemed, had ended in a matter of hours.

The two men’s answers weren’t especially revealing, but we were assured that they looked forward to “productive discussions”, “imaginative solutions” and “a constructive approach”. Perhaps to enliven the occasion, Monsieur Barnier answered all questions from British journalists in French, even after one of them begged him to answer in English.

Inevitably he was asked about Britain’s political volatility. Was Monsieur Barnier concerned that, in six months, Mr Davis might not be Brexit Secretary any more?

“How flattering,” said Mr Davis. The question, though, wasn’t necessarily meant as an insult. In six months, for all anyone knows, Mr Davis might be Prime Minister.

The way things are going, I’m beginning to think any of us might.