Sometimes his mother would call to him, but he only answered when it suited.

On the morning of his fiftieth birthday Charles Polkinghorn woke early, aware that something had to be done. It could have been the presents; presents still gave him a thrill, though he was clever at finding out in advance.

His mother came, bringing the half-dozen Swiss voile shirts embroidered with his monogram. In all the house, she always rose the earliest. She kissed him. Her cheek, of legendary complexion, had the taste of icy water.

‘Many happy returns, dear Charles!’ she said, so brightly, she could have been speaking through falling water.

‘Aren’t they lovely?’ she prompted. ‘Feel.’

‘Yes,’ he said.

He looked at them.

Presently she went down into the garden into the dew and spider-webs. She liked to visit it before the heat, to sever the heads of roses. Thorns would tear at her silken wings, of a rose colour too, but she always won in the end.

The day was already promising a blue blaze, in which the new, feverish leaves would do little to allay apprehensions. Still, Charles was prepared for it: the tufts of blossom blowing brown in a withering wind. This year Auntie Maud would not be there to share his distress. In other details the programme promised to be much the same: roast chicken, and chocolate mousse; Harriet had iced a cake – Harriet, whose wizened face was one of those perennial loyalties he dared not look directly in the eye.

Charles went down. After breakfast, which his mother’s figure did not allow her to share, he knew for certain there was something. Thumping. At times, his heart would sound like a man approaching in crêpe-rubber soles along a linoleum corridor.

He realized then; sleep perhaps had planted in him the necessity for correcting a mistake. It was the boxful of unopened letters. The lacquered box on the mantelpiece.

Could it be that the sealed letters might breed the dangers he thought to escape, secrets stirring, gases expanding, poisons maturing? His rubbery heart was maddening him. And towards nine, the postman would arrive with more.

At nine, precisely, he did. Clocks accompanied the event. Charles, who was watching, noticed the peak of a cap glinting through the cotoneasters.

Inspiration drove him down the path. To liberate. The flaps of his hacking-jacket flew.

There was something this morning disguised as a bill. Something more innocent-dangerous. And – might he thank Heaven? – a letter from Auntie Maud.

Charles Polkinghorn returned quickly to the dining-room, to decide, but not quickly enough, which letters to open first. To repair. To avert. The box tumbled the whole collection out on the table, into the marmalade, amongst the crumbs.

Then he opened. One.

... this machine will cut closer, wear better than any other on the market. It will demolish the worst growth of Paddy’s lucerne, Paterson’s Curse, paspalum, or that most stubborn invader of the home lot, Kikuyu grass.

The rotator’s cut ...