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Victor’s case philately was about the highest level he could plausibly be represented as having attained. The Royal Stamp Collection was housed in a small room off the State Apartments, not much changed since King Victor’s day, with its pair of reading-desks and its low leather arm-chairs in which a man might relax with his Hine and Havana after the effort of studying an 1866 Bolivian five-centavo mauve. Louise found Albert already in one of the chairs, in exactly the right pose, slumped back with his wine-glass in his hand. It was a mild shock; despite having thought about his new neatness at the funeral, and what Soppy had said about his having changed, Louise’s mental image of her elder brother was still that of a few years back, the hairy leftie vegetarian who harangued banquets of financiers about the vital need to preserve the habitat of the natterjack toad. Now, in his formal clothes, with his beard trimmed to a naval wedge and his hair receding sharply above the temples, he could have been the ghost of Great-grandfather, apart from the blue intelligent gaze.
    â€œYou’ll be eating veal next,” said Louise.
    He twitched his head, puzzled. Her skirt was too tight to copy his pose so she perched on a chair-wing.
    â€œYou’ve changed,” she said.
    â€œHave I? Doesn’t feel like that, from inside—I suppose it never does. You were talking to Soppy.”
    â€œNice to see her.”
    â€œWhat did you think?”
    â€œShe seemed a bit down.”
    â€œUnderstatement of the year. She’s pretty well at the end of her tether. So, if it comes to that, am I.”
    â€œI was just thinking how smug and kempt you look.”
    â€œTraining.”
    â€œIsn’t it just the time of year? Christmases with Aunt Eloise must have been pretty good hell. Soppy says she used to get out of it by nipping off to Argentina, but I don’t think you get away from your childhood that easy.”
    â€œI tried to get her out there this year. I thought there might be a chance, with the FO wanting to pretend the Falklands War was only a sort of folk-myth which never really happened at all, but Mrs T. put her foot down. Don’t you long for the days when you could go buzzing around the world incognito and everyone looked the other way?”
    â€œThe hacks would make a real meal of her, I suppose.”
    â€œShe’s not been coping with the hacks that well, actually. I don’t know. She knew what she was in for when she took me on, I thought.”
    â€œYou don’t. No one does. I was brooding about Granny’s marriage. No one else can imagine what it’s like, and no one can imagine what their own one’s going to be like.”
    â€œAnyway, it isn’t just the hacks. Did she tell you she’d sacked poor Bridget while I was in Oslo, for no reason she can explain? Just said the girl got on her nerves.”
    â€œIt happens.”
    â€œNot like that. I tried to reason with her and she clammed up. She’s eating much too much.”
    Louise just stopped the burst of laughter. How could he tell? Soppy’s appetite was known to be limitless. It had been a family joke since nursery days. But she could see that Albert had taken that into account and was still bothered.
    â€œYou saw what she had on her plate?” he said. “She’ll fill it up a couple of times, and then she’ll do her duty by three or four puddings and top off with a few slabs of cheese—and then as soon as we’re home she’ll be at the fridge for a snack.”
    â€œShe ought to be in The Guinness Book of Records.”
    â€œThey wouldn’t let her in. She cheats. She’s taking pills to help shove it through.”
    â€œOh. I must say that doesn’t sound too good.”
    â€œNo. Any ideas?”
    â€œWell … I think she’s bothered, too. I said something about how spruce you were getting to look and she started talking