Carl smiled privately and nodded at the floor. To Ben, he looked like some putty-nosed, puffy-faced, prematurely aged, mumbling drug casualty. But to his dad, Ben knew, Uncle Carl still carried the glamour of what he had been: the most handsome human alive, the prince in the sawpit. Gordon had spoken mistily of Carl sweeping into parties in a navy greatcoat, Gitanes at his lips, book of Mallarmé in his hand (truly), impossible European model on his arm. ‘Carl’s charisma somehow protected him from being beaten up as a wanker,’ Ben remembered his dad telling him. ‘We all invested hope in him. The one lobster who would be allowed to climb out of the pot. Dux of our class, popular, gentle, gorgeous, idolised by girls in three school districts and beyond; what could possibly go wrong?’

To explain the difference between that and this Carl was, Ben sensed, to hold life in your hands: history, the former self and its shadow, the tightrope an adventurer such as his uncle had had to walk (and fall from); the mysteries of chemistry.

‘My mother broke her hip,’ Gordon said, ending the silence. ‘My dad’s in a nursing home and making a pest of himself.’

Ben could see his father being softly intimidated by Uncle Carl. Gordon was sweating and stammering like a nervous kid.

‘My sister really fucked you all up, didn’t she?’ Carl said. ‘I should never have let her inflict herself on you.’ To Ben, he added, ‘Sorry, mon ami. Clearly not everything she’s done is a failure.’

Gordon raised his hands haplessly. ‘She’s not the cause of every problem.’

‘Did your old man do it? That’s what I heard.’

‘Do what?’

‘It was an accident,’ Ben interrupted. If Uncle Carl, the last tendril of the Bluebird grapevine, had ‘heard’ that Grandpa ran over Grandma Norma on purpose, then this must have been what the community had decided. Ben didn’t want his dad brooding on that.

‘Leonie also told me you’re milking the property market while taking an implacable stance against it,’ Carl continued. ‘Hypocrisy always played well in this place.’

‘Ben, do you want to go downstairs?’ Gordon suggested.

‘He’s old enough to be part of the men’s talk,’ Carl said. ‘Aren’t you, mon ami?’

‘So what are your plans?’ Gordon asked, yielding to Carl without a struggle.

Through the corner window, Ben saw a car pull a U-turn in front of the Hilton and park beside the bottle shop. A carnelian red Prius. He saw Grandma Leonie get out. It didn’t seem right. Should he tell his dad?