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he?”
    â€œYour mother is going to a golf tournament?”
    â€œNot just going to it. She is playing in it! She has been looking forward to it for weeks.”
    â€œAnd you don’t want her to play in it?” I asked. “Is that it?”
    I always think golf is like hurling, standing still. I can never understand why people want to play it. But then I’m not a grown-up. They’re different.
    â€œNo, that’s not it,” said Hal. “Not exactly. The thing is, they have a date for it, my mother and Him.”
    â€œA date? They live together, Hal. People who live together don’t go on dates. ”
    â€œThat’s the problem,” Hal explained. “He never takes her out, my mum says. And she’s always moaning that he doesn’t take her golf seriously, so this time he’s promised faithfully to go with her, and she’s all excited about it. She’s even bought a special outfit and everything. But now, if he gets this important job with all that extra money … he won’t go with her and she’ll be furious. There’ll be a big row. She might even kick Him out. ”

    His eyes were shining at the thought of it.
    You think this is a fairly feeble plan, right? I do too, but at the time it did seem to make some sort of weird sense. Hal can be quite convincing when he’s all worked up about something. And he really was worked up about this.
    â€œSo, let’s imagine that Larry leaves this message on Alec’s phone,” I said. “Then what?”
    â€œThen he will take the job, and the next morning early, we are going to follow Him, to see how it all works out,” Hal said.
    â€œNot me,” said Larry quickly. “I have a plane to catch on Saturday morning. School trip to Paris.”
    â€œNot to worry,” said Hal. “Just me and Olivia will be plenty. You go to Paris, Lar, we can handle the rest.”
    I don’t think Larry knew what hit him. Somehow, it seemed, he was going to make this crazy phone call, even though he’d never actually agreed to doing it. I suppose he could have put his foot down, but Hal had somehow bamboozled him, blinded him with the brilliance of it all or something, I don’t know.
    â€œMe?” I squeaked. “ Follow him! Oh, Hal, I don’t like this. This is a weirdness too far for me.”
    â€œBut, Olivia, I’m … desperate,” Hal said.
    â€œYou’re desperate, all right,” I muttered. I don’t think he heard me. “Why, Hal?” I said aloud. “Why is it so important?”
    â€œShe’s … they’re …”

    â€œWhat, Hal?”
    â€œBoarding school,” he said. “She said if I don’t start getting on with Him, I’ll have to go to boarding school. She says I make her life a misery, and she can’t stand it any longer.”
    Boarding school. Well, that mightn’t be too bad. There might be making apple-pie beds and having midnight feasts and putting whoopee cushions on the teachers’ chairs and that sort of thing. It might be quite fun.
    But I didn’t say any of that to Hal. I just asked, “Well, do you, you know … make her life a misery? Apart from leaving the taps running and so on.”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œSo, what’s her problem then? Why is she going to send you to boarding school?”
    â€œWell, I suppose it’s because I don’t talk to Him.”
    â€œOh, Hal!”
    â€œI wish you wouldn’t always say ‘Oh, Hal!’ Olivia.”
    â€œSorry, but you mean, you don’t talk to him at all? As in, not a word? As in, ‘Will you ask him to pass me the sugar?’”
    â€œYeah, pretty much.”
    â€œAnd you haven’t spoken to him for two years?”
    â€œNo!” said Hal. “I mean, I used to talk to Him. I used to say, ‘oh, hello’ and ‘well, good-bye,’ and that kind of thing. But since he