‘And doing it well,’ said Helen loyally. They didn’t hear much from their son despite Helen keeping up the emails and calls. Kevin showed little interest in spending time with them. It was sixteen months since he’d come down to ask Pearly to invest in a venture to produce inflatable dinghies and been disappointed by the response. Pearly wasn’t prepared to put in that sort of money for a start-up project with little prospect of success. He’d suffered from being his son’s backer before.

Matt also asked about Leanne, and Pearly was happy to respond. He felt emotionally close to his daughter even now that she was married, a doctor and a mother, living on the other side of the world. He was pleased and proud of everything concerning her, wishing only that she wasn’t so far away. ‘She just seems to go on passing exams,’ Pearly said. ‘Doctors never seem to stop climbing the qualification ladder. We can’t keep up with the areas she’s specialised in.’

‘Can’t pronounce some of them,’ said Helen.

‘She always was a bright cookie,’ said Matt. ‘Whenever I was at your place she seemed to be doing homework. Either that or reading books about serious stuff.’

‘And Frances,’ said Helen. ‘How’s she? The baby must be due soon.’ The thoughtfulness of the enquiry was typical.

‘Less than a month,’ said Natalie. ‘I’m going up to be there.’

‘I might never get her back. She’s gone all clucky,’ said Richie.

‘Will Kevin come back for the 125th?’ asked Natalie.

‘I doubt it,’ said Pearly, and to Matt, ‘Will you?’

‘Of course. We can’t have it overrun with old buggers like you and Dad.’

‘Andrew Nisse is coming from London,’ said Helen.

‘There’ll be quite a few from overseas, I imagine,’ said Natalie.

‘Who’s Andrew Nisse?’ said Matt.

‘The economist who was knighted,’ said Helen. ‘Pearly was the same year.’

‘A regular swot,’ Pearly said, ‘but he’s become a big name over there.’

He’d sent an email to Andrew, who had replied that he was happy to do anything to help the reunion along. He asked after some of his schoolmates and hoped they would be there. A different bunch to Pearly’s friends, but Pearly was able to tell him that one was high up in the PM’s department and that another had been even higher on Mount Cook and died in an avalanche there. Andrew said his mother had told him about the tragedy.