“But there are hard feelings,” said Fat Charlie. “Lots.”

“Do you have an address for him?” asked Rosie. “Or a phone number? You probably ought to phone him. A letter’s a bit impersonal when your only son is getting married—you are his only son, aren’t you? Does he have e-mail?”

“Yes. I’m his only son. I have no idea if he has e-mail or not. Probably not,” said Fat Charlie. Letters were good things, he thought. They could get lost in the post for a start.

“Well, you must have an address or a phone number.”

“I don’t,” said Fat Charlie, honestly. Maybe his father had moved away. He could have left Florida and gone somewhere they didn’t have telephones. Or addresses.

“Well,” said Rosie, sharply, “who does?”

“Mrs. Higgler,” said Fat Charlie, and all the fight went out of him.

Rosie smiled sweetly. “And who is Mrs. Higgler?” she asked.

“Friend of the family,” said Fat Charlie. “When I was growing up, she used to live next door.”

He had spoken to Mrs. Higgler several years earlier, when his mother was dying. He had, at his mother’s request, telephoned Mrs. Higgler to pass on the message to Fat Charlie’s father, and to tell him to get in touch. And several days later there had been a message on Fat Charlie’s answering machine, left while he was at work, in a voice that was unmistakably his father’s, even if it did sound rather older and a little drunk.

His father said that it was not a good time, and that business affairs would be keeping him in America. And then he added that, for everything, Fat Charlie’s mother was a damn fine woman. Several days later a vase of assorted flowers had been delivered to the hospital ward. Fat Charlie’s mother had snorted when she read the card.

“Thinks he can get around me that easily?” she said. “He’s got another think coming, I can tell you that.” But she had had the nurse put the flowers in a place of honor by her bed and, several times since, had asked Fat Charlie if he had heard anything about his father coming and visiting her before it was all over.