'He's been in and out of institutions since he was twelve. He told me the other day that I didn't understand what it it was like to be sent away from home so young. "Oh don't I?" I said. "I was sent away at the age of eight." "What you done then?" he asked with a wide-eyed respect, as if I were one of the Kray brothers. I hadn't the heart to tell him that my only crime was to have been born into a fee-paying family.'
'Two cultures.'
'I'm afraid it's more like one and a half. But he really wants to pick himself up and do his best for his son ... he showed me a letter he'd written to his wife who, I must admit, I'd pictured as someone younger. He asked me to check the spelling, which was a joke. He prayed for his son "to be kept safe mentally and fiscally". There was only one "l", but I was amazed that he knew the word at all.'
'Are you sure it wasn't "physically"?'
'What? Oh shit!!'
'Don't worry. You may be right. We'd all like to protect our loved ones from the long reach of the Revenue.'