The intimacies between men and women are not for publication, he thinks. They are often innocently obscene or infantile. Nobody, anyway, really knows what goes on between other men and women. Couples who are a delightful and charming double act in public can be shockingly vicious to each other when they think they are not observed. His father was routinely cruel and dismissive to his mother in private, which led to her protracted depression and overdose. Julian was only twelve, and he misses her still.

Simon is in ebullient mood. He doesn’t see death as an unhappy event. His wiring has never been quite right. His cheeks, baked to the colour of a Provençal roof tile, become a still deeper tone of raw sienna as he drinks. He likes wine and takes it in gulps. He quaffs.

He has been introduced to the children before they went off to bed, nervously refusing his offer of a bedtime story, based on his own experiences.

‘Lovely children. I sometimes wish I had children, but it’s not easy when you are doing what I am doing. We all have to make sacrifices, don’t we?’

And he’s off, around the globe. Kim tries to join in but Julian gives up. Nothing stops Simon’s flow. Julian wonders what exactly it is that Simon has sacrificed: he has been paid generously out of the family trust for the twenty-five years since he left Eton, he has had many relationships, most of which ended disastrously and expensively, and for all those years he stayed as far away from the family as he could. Now, however, he thinks it’s time to take an active interest in the affairs of the bank: in fact he is prepared to become a director.

‘Very good idea, Simon, but these days we ask for a university degree and the Institute of Bankers exam, as well as an MBA or an accounting qualification. And we also need to see some aptitude for maths.’

‘I bring a lot of experience of the real world to the table. Wouldn’t it be possible to find a role for me?’

‘No, the reason we put the need for qualifications in place was precisely because of the family. They all wanted to be directors. And not just the men.’

‘Still, now that Dad’s shuffled off the mortal coil, I am sure I could make a contribution. Banking has gone global, so everyone says, and I have a worldwide experience of different people and cultures.’

At this moment Fleur arrives.

‘Simon darling, how are you? Love the sarong. Isn’t it a little chilly around the naughty bits on a night like this?’

‘Fleur, my balls are like biltong, they have been sundried and salted. They can take a breeze without flinching.’