‘Have we really got anything left that is of use to you today? I really can’t believe so. We are members of a dying tribe. There is no place for us in the new society, like the Amazon Indians. I am an historian, so I know the pattern of history, and the shape it takes, rather like a great, slow, deep-cutting river, wearing its course down through the stratum of time. We, and the things which we stand for, are now on the river’s edge, on the bank, waiting to be swept up and carried away until not a speck remains. I don’t honestly think that Cuckoo and I will mind too much when the moment comes. We are old now, we are also childless, we have had a pleasant life: not excessive, not too little, and it has lasted a fairly long time, and after we go there won’t be a trace left of who we were, or what was. That, perhaps, is the only wistful thing about it all.’ The soft laugh again, sniffing his brandy glass. ‘On the other hand, I don’t suppose that there will be anyone about who cares much. This’ll be blocks of flats by then. Sodium lamps instead of parasol pines, tennis courts where Cuckoo tends her broccoli and beans, car parks where the Triton blows his shell. But there you are. It’s the historical pattern, time manoeuvring itself, bringing the bottom to the top and the top down to the bottom. The river surges up every so often, bites into its course, sets off again, getting narrower and meaner. But inexorable.’ He smiled. ‘However, if you think that you have learned anything here, I’m happy. If you feel, as you say, that you have been offered a baton and taken up the race, then I am doubly pleased. But I must just warn you that you are running with valueless currency. You have to know that. It won’t buy you half a loaf in the brave new ideological world you are inheriting. Mark my words.’

‘I shan’t leave the race.’

‘That’s your affair. Good luck. And, by the way, none of this on the terrace. Cuckoo would upbraid me for being negative again, which, I suppose, I am.’ He turned and put his hand lightly on Marcus’s arm. ‘When you leave, whenever that may be, be gentle at the parting. She’s going to miss you exceedingly, I fear.’ With a fleeting smile, swift as a blink, he went on towards the steps.

Cuckoo, seeing them approach, raised one arm, bracelets sparkled. ‘You’ve been ages! We are quite bereft. Leni thinks a little music perhaps? A good idea? So still …’

‘As you like,’ said Archie Charlie. ‘What shall it be?’

‘No Mozart this evening.’ she said. ‘So many fiddles; and I really never could abide a fiddler. Play the Franck in D Minor, that’s my mood: romantic, haunting.’ The lips were smiling; the eyes were filled with shadow.