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‘Let me, sir,’ offered Jones, knowing that it was useless to volunteer, that the rector probably did this every day. But the lid yielded as he spoke and the divine spread on the desk the sorry contents: a woman’s chemise, a cheap paper-covered ‘Shropshire Lad’, a mummied hyacinth bulb. The rector picked up the bulb and it crumbled to dust in his hand.

‘Tut, tut! How careless of me!’ he ejaculated, sweeping the dust carefully into an envelope. ‘I have often deplored the size of my hands. They should have been given to someone who could use them for something other than thumbing books or grubbing in flower beds. Donald’s hands, on the contrary, were quite small, like his mother’s: he was quite deft with his hands. What a surgeon he would have made.’

He placed the things upon the desk, before the propped photograph like a ritual, and propping his face in his earthy bands he took his ruined dream of his son into himself as one inhales tobacco smoke.

‘Truly there is life and death and dishonour in his face. Had you noticed Emmy? Years ago, about the time this picture was made.... But that is an old story. Even Emmy has probably forgotten it.... You will notice that he has neither coat nor cravat. How often has he appeared after his mother had seen him decently arrayed, on the street, in church, at formal gatherings, carrying hat, coat, and collar in his hands. How often have I heard him say “Because it is too hot.” Education in the bookish sense he had not: the schooling he got was because he wanted to go, the reading he did was because he wanted to read. Least of all did I teach him fortitude. What is fortitude? Emotional atrophy, gangrene....’ He raised his face and looked at Jones. ‘What do you think? was I right? Or should I have made my son conform to a type?’