“We drink your health, Mark,” said Hunt, raising his glass. “May you flourish, not exactly like the green bay tree as I have done, but in a more godly manner.”

“What’s wrong with my tree?” asked Kate. “It looks healthy enough to me, has she sold me a dud?”

“You clearly don’t know your Book of Common Prayer,” said Hunt.

“No, I don’t, and I’m surprised that you do. I was brought up as an atheist, remember? Anyway, what have bay trees to do with the Book of Common Prayer?”

Hunt explained that the ungodly therein flourished. “Oh dear,” said Kate, staring at her innocent plant, “is it a bad omen?”

“No,” said Hunt, “just a small sign that our common culture is perishing. If you had spent as many years of your youth in church as I did, you would turn out virtuous like me, and like me, you would have the inestimable advantage of knowing the English Hymnal and the Prayer Book off by heart. You can imagine what a strength they have been to me in times of trouble. And none of you can recognise a single quotation.”

“I’m sure Evelyn would know about bay trees,” said Kate, rather offended by these slurs on her learning and her tree. “You must ask Evelyn. Do you do the Prayer Book in Religious Knowledge, Ruth?”

“No,” said Ruth, “we do things like abortion and euthanasia and capital punishment.”

“Modern learning,” said Hunt. “You see where it gets you. Picking up black men in pubs.”

“We did racism too,” said Ruth. “And the Gospel of St. Mark. And I didn’t pick him up, I just got talking to him. There is a difference, you know.”

“Mark,” said Kate, suddenly starting to her feet, sidetracked. “Oh dear, I completely forgot to give you your birthday present. Do run up to my bedroom, there’s a love, it’s in my stocking drawer, in a brown paper bag. It’s only a very small present, I couldn’t think what to get you, now you’re so grown up”—and Mark went off, Kate defending her tree the while, protesting that it was not merely decorative but edible, and Mark brought down his present, which was a smart dull-black Parker pen, and kissed his mother and told her that over the years she had bought him at least a dozen Parker pens, but that he solemnly promised not to lose this one, and Kate apologised for being so unoriginal, and said she would contribute to the cost of the car, and then Mujid and Simone and the girls went into a huddle, from which they emerged, Mujid declaring that he thought this was the moment to present Kate with the present he and Simone had bought her for all her hospitality.