Pearly was pleased there was no open invitation to speak. At too many funerals he’d been exasperated by speakers motivated by the desire to be the centre of attention rather than a wish to pay tribute to the deceased. The undertaker told Pearly of an elderly couple in town who came to many of the funerals purely for the food on offer: they ate heartily and in an inconspicuous manner squirrelled more away. Pearly passed much of the service in perusal of the crowd to see if he could spot the pair. Bludgers, his father would have called them. His father had a nose for bludgers. It could have been so many of those present. How few people are virtuous in physical appearance; how many have a demeanour suggestive of evasion, corruption and deceit, whether deserved or not. On facial characteristics alone, Pearly identified several serial murderers and fraudsters.

He and Helen didn’t go to the graveside but found an opportunity to talk briefly to Jill before the hearse left. She wasn’t incapacitated by grief. ‘He was so pleased you were re-elected,’ she told Pearly. ‘He talked about you often. He remembered going to see you play umpteen years ago. We both felt awful about Buster biting your leg when you visited that time. It’s never happened with anyone else.’

‘I’d forgotten all about it,’ lied Pearly. ‘Rob will be greatly missed — always so generous with his time and talents.’

‘He just wanted to go at the end, He’d had enough. It was cruel really.’

‘The turnout showed how people respected him,’ said Pearly.

‘He gave so much time to good causes,’ said Helen.

‘Thank you. He was a lovely man to live with.’ Pearly thought that the best thing said all day about Rob. What finer epitaph could there be, and from someone best able to judge. He remembered talking to Rob about the harbour development and Rob saying that once as a boy when he was fishing there a seagull swooped down, took his bait and got hooked.

‘I couldn’t get it off,’ Rob had said. ‘I panicked and killed it with a rock. I still think about it sometimes. You know, about what I could have done. To save it, I mean. I buried it in the shingle.’ That was Rob Prendergast: leaving the world with his worst crime the unintended death of a seabird.