In those early days, the only danger I remember was Lord Soulford. Francis had no photographs of him. I picked up his image from the newspapers. The irascible tone of his politics seemed to combine so perfectly with the shots of him in the broadsheets, emerging red-faced and brisk from important meetings or giving a stern smile of approval at a charitable function, that I always pictured him talking, his arm raised in fist-shaking emphasis. I happened to see him once on Channel 4 News being interviewed about the government’s proposed reforms to A levels, and was impressed by the conviction with which he denounced the plans, the government and, when things became contentious, the interviewer himself. He stood like a colossus astride our expenditure, casting his shadow over the trade and exchange that was the lifeblood of our leisure. His relationship with Francis was more like a business arrangement than a familial one: his son consented, for an enormous fee, to be governed by his father, to keep his name out of the papers and to smile at Lord Soulford’s side in photographs when required. Though the deal was mutually beneficial, something in Francis’s nature compelled him to test his father’s tolerance. He would turn up to appointments late, lose a little bit more money than he had to spend at the Peterborough dog track, and write slightly lunatic letters on political subjects to The Times, which would invariably be printed with his real name and home address. He liked to keep his father simmering, but never allowed him to come to the boil. Either cowardice or prudence kept him just the right side of the line.

I only challenged him once over this tendency. The two of us were drinking coffee on the second floor of Caffè Nero, sitting under a giant poster of beautiful women drinking espresso in a Roman piazza, whilst outside the windows the rain fell on the traders and tourists doing business in Market Square. It was midday after a binge, and we had the intimacy of mutual discomfort, and the slight disconnection from the rest of the world that makes everyone who shares it feel like brothers. Empowered by this, I confronted him with some of his sins against his father, and asked for reasons.

‘Habit, I suppose. When I was younger I used to love finding new ways of infiltrating his calm. He was always so scrupulously polite to me when I was at school, as if I was a guest. I never embarked on irritation deliberately, but if I could do something I wanted and know that it might strike a nerve, it added an extra spice. When I was at Eton I used to steal one of his cars and go drag racing in Epping Forest. There’s nothing up there, just miles and miles of abandoned tracks, and the highbeams lacing in and out of the trunks. Red tail-lights glowing like coals in the woods, and the roar of engines. The roads split, then come back together, and you had to make sure that your opponent was looking at your bumper before you swung back on to the track, or you’d side-swipe him and wipe out together. I used to make a bit of money that way, winning races. I’d bring home Papa’s MG all bruised and battered in the morning, and I’m pretty sure he knew something was up, but he couldn’t say a thing. He was trying for nomination as the local Conservative candidate and he couldn’t afford a scandal. He would just sit there at breakfast and pretend not to know, asking me how I was enjoying school and how I planned to spend the rest of my exeat, while I fell asleep in my cornflakes.’ Francis smiled to himself and closed his eyes.