Alicia, fluffy and frilly, still wore her hair brought youthfully high to a ribbon bow on the crown, from where rich brown curls tumbled in a cascade to her shoulders. Nearly sixty, she looked in essence younger than her son Gervase, and she would still have been pretty but for the pinched hardness of her mouth.

She had been a fair sort of mother to me for the seven years of her reign, seeing to my ordinary needs like food and new clothes and treating me no different from Gervase and Ferdinand, but I'd never felt like going to her for advice or comfort. She hadn't loved me, nor I he rand after the divorce we had neither felt any grief in separation. I'd detested what she'd done afterwards to Gervase, Ferdinand and Serena, twisting their minds with her own spite. I would positively have liked to have had friendly brothers and sisters as much as Malcolm would have valued friendly children. After nearly twenty years, Alicia's intense hurt still spread suffering outward in ripples.

Serena's picture showed her as she had been a year earlier, before aerobic dancing had slimmed her further to a sexless-looking leanness. The fair hair of childhood had slightly darkened, and was stylishly cut in a short becoming cap-shape which made her look young for her twenty-six years. A leggy Peter Pan, I thought, not wanting to grow up: a girl-woman with a girlish voice saying "Mummy and Daddy", and an insatiable appetite for clothes. I wondered briefly whether she were still a virgin and felt faintly surprised to find that I simply didn't know and, moreover, couldn't tell.

"These are very interesting," West said, glancing at me. "I should certainly like to borrow them." He shuffled them around and sorted them out. "Who are these? You haven't put their names on the back, like the others."

"That's Lucy and Edwin, and that's Donald and Helen."

"Thanks." He wrote the identification carefully in small neat letters.

Malcolm stretched out a hand for the photographs which West gave him. Malcolm looked through them attentively and finally gave them back.

"I don't remember seeing any of these before," he said.

"They're all less than three years old."

His mouth opened and shut again. He gave me a brooding look, as if I'd just stabbed him unfairly in the ribs.

"What do you think of them?" I asked.

"A pity children grow up."

West smiled tiredly and collected the lists and photographs together.

"Right, Mr Pembroke. I'll get started." He stood up and swayed slightly, but when I took a step forward to steady him he waved me away. "Just lack of sleep." On his feet, he looked even nearer to exhaustion, as if the outer grey ness had penetrated inwards to the core. "First thing in the morning, I'll be checking the Pembrokes."

It would have been churlish to expect him to start that afternoon, but I can't say I liked the delay. I offered him another drink and a reviving lunch, which he declined, so I took him to the hotel's front door and saw him safely into a taxi, watching him sink like a collapsing scarecrow into the seat cushions.

Returning to the suite, I found Malcolm ordering vodka and Beluga caviar from room service with the abandon to which I was becoming accustomed. That done, he smoothed out the Sporting Life and pointed to one section of it.

"It says the Arc de Triomphe race is due to be run this Sunday in Paris."

"Yes, that's right."

"Then let's go."

"All right," I said.

Malcolm laughed. "We may as well have some fun. There's a list here of the runners."

I looked where he pointed. It was a bookmaker's advertisement showing the ante-post prices on offer.

"What are the chances," Malcolm said, "of my buying one of these horses?"

"Er," I said. "Today, do you mean?"

"Of course. No good buying one after the race, is there?"

"Well…"

"No, of course not. The winner will be worth millions and the others peanuts. Before the race, that's the thing."

"I don't suppose anyone will sell," I said, "but we can try. How high do you want to go? The favourite won the Epsom Derby and is reported to be going to be syndicated for ten million pounds. You'd have to offer a good deal more than that before they'd consider selling him now."

"Hm," Malcolm said. "What do you think of him as a horse?"

I smothered a gasp or two and said with a deadpan face, "He's a very good horse but he had an exceptionally exhausting race last time out. I don't think he's had enough time to recover and I wouldn't back him this time."

"Have you backed him before?" Malcolm asked curiously.

"Yes, when he won the Derby, but he was favourite for that, too."

"What do you think will win the Arc de Triomphe, then?"

"Seriously?" I said.

"Of course seriously."

"One of the French horses, Meilleurs Voeux."

"Can we buy him?"

"Not a hope. His owner loves his horses, loves winning more than profit and is immensely rich."

"So am I," Malcolm said simply. "I can't help making money. It used to be a passion, now it's a habit. But this business about Moira jolted me, you know. It struck me that I may not have a hell of a lot of time left, not with enough health and strength to enjoy life. I've spent all these years amassing the stuff, and for what? For my goddam children to murder me for? Sod that for a sad story. You buy me a good horse in this race on Sunday and we'll go and yell it home, boy, at the top of our lungs."

It took all afternoon and early evening to get even a tinge of interest from anyone. I telephoned to the trainers of the English – or Irish – runners, asking if they thought their owners might sell. I promised each trainer that he would go on training the horse, and that my father would send him also the two-million-guinea colt he'd bought yesterday. Some of the trainers were at the Newmarket Sales and had to be tracked down to hotels, and once tracked, had to track and consult with their owners. Some simply said no, forget it.

Finally, at seven forty-five, a trainer from Newmarket rang back to say his owner would sell a half-share if his price was met. I relayed the news and the price to Malcolm.

"What do you think?" he said.

"Um… the horse is quite good, the price is on the high side, the trainer's in the top league."

"OK," Malcolm said. "Deal."

"My father accepts," I said. "And, er, the colt is still in the Sales stables. Can you fetch it tomorrow, if we clear it with the auctioneers?" Indeed he could. He sounded quite cheerful altogether. He would complete his paperwork immediately if Malcolm could transfer the money directly to his blood stock account, bank and account number supplied. I wrote the numbers to his dictation. Malcolm waved a hand and said, "No problem. First thing in the morning. He'll have it by afternoon."

"Well," I said, breathing out as I put the receiver down, "you now own half of Blue Clancy."

"Let's drink to it," Malcolm said. "Order some Bollinger."

I ordered it from room service, and while we waited for it to arrive I told him about my encounter with his gardener, Arthur Bellbrook.

"Decent chap," Malcolm said, nodding. "Damned good gardener."

I told him wryly about Moira and the prize vegetables, which he knew nothing about.

"Silly bitch," he said. "Arthur lives in a terrace house with a pocket handkerchief garden facing north. You couldn't grow prize stuff there. If she'd asked me I'd have told her that, and told her to leave him alone. Good gardeners are worth every perk they get."

"He seemed pretty philosophical," I said, "and, incidentally, pretty bright. He'd spotted that the kitchen garden wall is thicker than it should be at the corner. He'd asked old Fred, and heard about the room I built there. He wanted to know how to get in, so he could use it as an apple store."

Malcolm practically ejected from his armchair, alarm widening his eyes, his voice coming out strangled and hoarse. "My God, you didn't tell him, did you?"