‘Did you and Mum do something special for your birthday maybe?’ Penny enquired further.

Finally, Ned shook his head. ‘No, nothing too special. I wasn’t one for going to dances and pubs and what not. And that wasn’t our style either. She had made me dinner at her house. And we were listening to music . . .’ He closed his eyes, remembering.

‘What were you listening to?’

Ned opened his eyes. ‘Got to Get You Into My Life. That was the song on the record player when Anna jumped up and said, “I have a surprise for you.” Then, she was gone for a minute and when she came back she gave me this. Of course, I knew it was an album. From the shape alone, but it was covered in wrapping paper. The paper was red. And she had placed a little silver ribbon on it.’ Ned paused and Penny knew that he wasn’t trying to recall details; he had committed all of this to memory a long time ago – he was dealing with the naked emotion of the situation – those feelings that he was never sure what to do with.

Penny tried to think what her mother would do in a situation like this – to try to get her father talking. ‘Were you surprised when you opened it?’

He nodded, still looking hard at the album itself, as if the item was a window to that day in the past.

‘Oh yes. Very. Of course, Anna loved birthdays. She loved surprises. She loved doing things for others. She was always about making other people happy, as you know. I remember she was wearing a pair of red trousers. I joked that she had even tried to colour coordinate herself with the present.’ He smiled. ‘But there was more to that night. This was one of the things that she did that made me realise that I needed to marry her. That she was the right woman for me. The lengths that she went to, all the time, day in, day out, just to make me happy. She was one in a million your mother. Everyone needs that, I think,’ Ned said, finally looking at his daughter. ‘Someone who would do anything for you. Someone who just loves you more than anything in the world. Someone who would go to great lengths to see you happy, to make you happy. I’m glad you’ve found that, Penny,’ Ned said glancing at Colin, before allowing his eyes to rest quickly on the teardrop on her cheek.

They began extracting the records one at a time, comparing the album title with what was on the list and checking each one off accordingly – or rather, Penny and Colin made an inventory of what was in the box while Ned lovingly examined each album as they handed it to him.

As they emptied the boxes and realised that they had gone through all the contents, Penny frowned. One record was missing.