Hugh would, David supposed, have adopted both children if they had been at all receptive to the idea. They weren’t. Having had two years to hope the marriage wouldn’t take place, they were, at twelve, too old, too used to being fatherless, to risk the experience. If Diana wasn’t as shocked and threatened by the marriage as David, neither was she enthusiastic. It might, other things being equal, have drawn the two of them together again in the nearly forgotten mutuality which had worked so well for their benefit when they were little children.

But suddenly other things weren’t equal. Did David notice, even at the wedding, that Diana was visibly taller than he? Within a year, she was six inches taller than David, two inches taller than their mother! Not only did David have this awful man towering over him but his own sister as well, and she was developing breasts. David’s mainly scornful attachment to her changed to pure hatred. He teased her brutally, as if both her height and body were grotesque. ‘Giant boobs! Giant boobs!’ he taunted in his piping, as yet not even cracking child’s voice.

Diana was slow to realize her physical advantage, perhaps because David had succeeded in making her feel as mortified by it as he was. But finally one evening just before Hugh Bacon came through the front door, Diana gave David a mighty shove which toppled him over a chair. Then she fell on her brother, her hands at his throat, and he struggled helplessly under her intimate, astonishing weight.

Hugh pulled her off, saving David’s life, but then he thrashed David to within an inch of it while David howled, ‘It’s D’s fault. She pushed me.’ Hugh didn’t care if she had started it, he said, and then he gave David a brief lecture on what his behaviour with his sister would be henceforth, all protective gallantry, which was the only decent manifestation of his natural superiority over her.

‘But she’s bigger than I am,’ David whined.

‘Not for long,’ Hugh said, ‘and that’s beside the point. She’s a girl.’

At dinner Hugh decided they had too informal a household. From now on, he would hold their mother’s chair, and David would hold Diana’s. When she looked around mistrustfully, Hugh reprimanded her, telling her that a lady commands trust. This rotten new rule meant that David couldn’t pull the chair out from under her unless she was looking.

Later that evening, a remarkable thing happened. Hugh went to David’s room to apologize.

‘Your mother has pointed out to me that I set you a poor example by using physical force, and I agree with her. I also trust that in future I won’t have any reason to use it.’