‘What does it matter?’ said Shirley.

It doesn’t, thought Marianne, but it illustrates that with some folk the niceties prevail whatever the circumstances. Grief or no grief. When she arrived here this morning she had found Ann dusting the furniture, making sure her home was spick and span in readiness for the housewifely eyes of the women who would sit with her in the living room prior to the departure of the cortège.

My mum made me clean the bathroom before my dad’s funeral, Marianne recalled, in case anyone went in there to use the loo – not that it had required cleaning, any more than Ann’s house is ever other than immaculate. I remember thinking, How can my mother spare a thought for that, when she’s just lost her husband? I felt like ticking her off.

The longer you lived, the better you came to understand the quirks of human nature, and the keeping up of appearances essential to some if they themselves were not to fall apart. On the day Shirley’s son was buried, I was as shocked as everyone else to see her dressed like a fashion plate. I had a lot to learn, and I still have.

She saw Howard glance at Ann and Kate, and put down his cup.

Howard cleared his throat. ‘There’s something I have to tell you, and there’s no time like the present.’

A moment of silence preceded his saying that his father’s death, coupled with his mother’s decision to emigrate to Israel, had resolved a personal dilemma with which he had lived for some time. He then relayed the events of the morning in Munich he would prefer to forget.

‘It was like being told straight that there was no way of me being a father to my kid. As if someone had drawn me a picture of his future and I wasn’t in it. On that same day, Karin made it clear that there was no chance of her coming to live with me in England—’

‘So you’re now going to live with her in Germany,’ Kate cut in, ‘that’s what you’re telling us, isn’t it?’

‘My way of putting it would be that I’m going to where my son and the woman I love are.’

‘Which happens to be the country responsible for six million Jews being consigned to their deaths. How could you, Howard!’ Kate flashed. ‘And what about the business Dad devoted most of his life to and left to you?’