Gordon did not respond, but looked down at the ground with pursed lips. Ashley watched him curiously, was this American puritanism or something deeper?

Good God! The instant the possibility struck Ashley he knew it to be right. He could have laughed aloud at his perception. Cousin Gordon is in love with Portia, he told himself with absolute assurance.

The essential truth that people always failed to understand about intelligence, Ashley believed, was that it allowed its possessor deeper intuition and keener instincts than those granted to others. Stupid people liked to delude themselves that while they may not be clever, they were at least able to compensate with feelings and insights denied to the intellectual. Drivel, Ashley thought. It was precisely this kind of false belief that made stupid people so stupid. The truth was that clever people had infinitely more resources from which to make the leaps of connection that the world called intuition. What was ‘intelligence’ after all, but the ability to read into things? The Romans, as so often, knew better than the Britons.

They turned and walked along Catherine Street towards Westminster. Perhaps feeling that his silence was brutish, Gordon began to talk. He confided to Ashley that at the airport his aunt and uncle had more or less forced him onto Ned and Portia.

‘Why don’t you guys take the bus into town together?’ Hillary had said. ‘Have a bite to eat somewhere. Maybe take in a movie. We’ll take care of the luggage.’

Pete had slipped Gordon ten pounds and patted him on the shoulder while Portia bit her lip petulantly and Ned had done his best to look pleased.

‘Just as well we did the tactful thing, then,’ said Ashley. ‘You really don’t have to come to the House of Commons if you don’t feel like it, by the way. It’s most people’s idea of hell. I’d quite understand.’

‘Will they let an American in?’

‘I just have to wave this,’ said Ashley, flourishing his pass and trying not to look proud about it.

‘You gonna be a politician?’

‘Maybe. Maybe.’

‘Like Ned?’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘Ned’s gonna follow his father, right?’

‘I hardly think so,’ said Ashley, amused. An image came to him of Ned Maddstone in grass-stained cricket whites, flicking the golden flop out of his eyes and rising to speak from the government benches on the subject of currency fluctuations and interest rates. ‘Politics and Ned don’t quite go together.’

‘Really? Only that’s not what Portia said to me.’

‘What do you mean exactly?’

‘She said Ned had told her he was going to follow his father into Parliament one day.’

‘Well, maybe he will,’ Ashley said casually, while something inside him snapped with a familiar fury. Did Ned seriously imagine political seats could be passed on from father to son, like writing-desks and shooting-sticks?

Well, perhaps they could, he reflected bitterly; this is, after all, England. Meanwhile of course, Ned’s summer was too precious to him for it to be wasted on politics: too much fucking and cricket and fucking and sailing and fucking and fucking to be done, so why not let Ashley the Manchester carthorse do the secretarial work this year, eh, Pa old thing? Plenty of time for catching up after Oxford, don’t you think, Daddy darling? And one day, when I’m ‘ready to settle down’ I could send for good old Ashley and have him for a political assistant. Poor Ashley would be so grateful…, in fact, why not get him in training for it now? Give him a bit of experience? Just the thing! We’ll invite him along for dinner and put it to him, he’ll be so grateful. It’ll get that nasty business of reading his embarrassing diary off my conscience, too. We’ll give him the old oil and have him typing letters and licking envelopes before you can say Arrogant Cunting Upper Fucking Class Arseholes…

‘You all right?’

‘Mm? Yes, fine, fine … miles away,’ Ashley smiled vaguely at Gordon as if emerging from a gently eccentric daydream. ‘So,’ he said brightly. ‘First time you’ve met the great Ned then?’

Gordon nodded cautiously. ‘The Great Ned?’

‘Forgive the promptings of a sarcastic heart,’ said Ashley. ‘He’s very popular of course. Very talented, but … oh, you don’t want to listen to me. None of my business.’

‘Hey, if he’s dating my cousin, I want to know everything there is to know,’ said Gordon. ‘Portia thinks his shit don’t stink. But you’re in school with the guy. You’ve known him longer than she has.’

‘Well, let’s just say I wouldn’t like my cousin going out with him,’ said Ashley. ‘It’s hard to define. Most people think he’s charming and honest and everything that could ever be appealing in a man. Personally, I find him cold and arrogant and deceitful. Ah…’ Ashley looked up as Big Ben began to chime the half hour. ‘Twelve-thirty. If it’s all right with you, we might stop off at that pub round the corner. Said I would meet a friend there for lunch. If we feel like it we can go on to the House afterwards.’

‘Hey, look, if I’m in the way…’

‘Not at all. You’ll like Rufus. And he’ll like you. Well, he’ll like your ten pounds. You can buy a lot to drink with ten pounds.’

‘Oh well, if…’

‘I’m joking. He’s as rich as God. And I’m sure you’ll find that you have a great deal in common.

Ned lay in bed gazing up at the ceiling. With a fist clenched over her cheek, Portia slept tightly curled like a kitten beside him.

He hadn’t yet told her about the nightmare of watching Paddy Leclare dying on board the Orphana. On the bus from Heathrow they had talked almost like strangers, Ned concerned not to make Gordon feel left out and Portia strangely shy in her cousin’s presence too. He wasn’t going to worry her, but the experience had shaken him. He had never confronted death, responsibility and fear before and to meet them all in one go was unsettling.

Sailing back to Scotland with a dead man below had not been pleasant for him. Rufus Cade had behaved oddly too. It seemed natural that Ned should skipper the boat back to Oban and everyone but Cade agreed that it was right and sensible. Ned, without vanity he knew it to be true, was the best sailor amongst them, and surely Leclare’s last bestowal of trust in him proved his right to command? Not that he was able to repeat that secret to Cade or anyone else. For five hours, as dawn broke and they made their miserable way back to harbour, Cade had sullenly criticised all Ned’s decisions and gone out of his way to undermine his authority at every turn. This had never happened to Ned before and had left him feeling hurt and puzzled.

It was only as they were making their way through Oban harbour towards the quayside and the flashing blue lights of the ambulance and police-cars awaiting them that he had understood.

Cade had approached him shyly. ‘Look, I’m sorry, Maddstone,’ he said, staring down at the decking. ‘I suppose I was a bit upset by it all. Didn’t mean to criticise you. It’s right for you to be in charge.’

Ned had laid a hand on Cade’s arm. ‘Bloody hell, Rufus, don’t give it another thought. Under the circumstances you’ve been amazing.’

The rest of the day had passed in a confused dream of witness statements, telephone calls and interminable waiting before Ned had finally been allowed to lead the party off to Glasgow to catch the night train to Euston. Leadership was exhausting.

Portia’s head stirred on his chest and he found himself looking into her eyes.

‘Hello,’ he said.

‘Hello.’

And they laughed.

Ashley watched as Gordon drained his second Guinness.

‘You seen her, Ashley,’ he said, belching as he wiped the froth from his mouth. ‘She’s beautiful. Wouldn’t you say she’s beautiful?’

‘Very beautiful indeed, Gordon,’ said Ashley who possessed several very old Greek textbooks that he considered infinitely more exciting.