"I've been thinking," Laurence said. "How old were you when you stopped believing in Father Christmas?"

Clive had been staring into the fire; at the sound of Laurence's voice he blinked and sat back further on the davenport. "I can't remember exactly. I know I didn't believe in him by the time I was eight years old, but I may have stopped believing a few years before that."

"I believed in him for a really extraordinary amount of time." Laurence's voice was made even softer and calmer from the wine he had been drinking. "I say, what time is it?"

"I'm not sure. It must be past midnight."

"I know you aren't sure, you haven't a watch and the clock is in the next room. Why don't you look?"

He rose, but as he did so the chimes rang for one o'clock, and so he sat down again beside Laurence. Their thighs brushed briefly; Clive shuddered. "Don't you think Flora may be waiting up for you?"

"I can assure you she isn't. She's been rather tired lately."

Pippa too had been tired, yawning as she passed the bowl of potatoes at dinner. His mother had been ill and had had to do her Christmas shopping only two days before, coming home with her arms full of packages and the lines on her face looking deeper than they ever had before. It frightened Clive, the idea that his mother was becoming old. Months ago he would have comforted himself with the image of his mother in Heaven with God, but now it struck him for the first time that to doubt the existence of God was to doubt a life after death.

Certainly he could not imagine Laurence fading into nothingness; there was too much of a vibrancy to be destroyed. His eyes were quick and darted about, from his career to his wife to his old Oxford friends. Every letter sent was an account of rapid motion, going to the country for a week and leaving there to go abroad to France, returning from France and playing tennis with Simmons before dashing to the office and then dinner. Even now as Laurence sat beside him he examined his fingernails and tapped his foot against the carpet.

"Flora may be feeling rather tired for quite a while. Can I tell you something, old man?"

"Yes."

"You'll be the first in your branch of the family to know: Flora's in a delicate condition." Laurence grinned. "Until the middle of July, the doctor believes. Can you believe it?"

Clive could; it profoundly upset him. He did not like to imagine Laurence being intimate with his wife, nor did he like to imagine Flora growing larger and larger with child. "Congratulations."

"My father has been making noise about a grandson, but I'm personally hoping for a girl, actually, a little Flora as beautiful as her mother." He tilted back his head, closing his eyes, his long eyelashes resting against his cheek just above its flush. "Though I wouldn't mind a boy either, of course. You know, my sister Gloria's son has got your mother's eyes."

"Has he?"

"He certainly has. No one else in our family has those large amber colored-eyes but your mother and Tom. I wonder if my child could end up with your eyes."

Clive felt a distinct sensation in his chest, the feeling that had haunted him over the past years, which he had associated at times with various boys but now solely connected to Laurence. It was Laurence's eyes the baby should have, along with his strong limbs and dark curls. Surely through his children Laurence would not perish, if through no other means. Clive hoped for his immortality, and yet was disturbed by the thought of its production.

"Ever since you were quite young I've thought you had beautiful eyes. In fact when I was around your age I had a silly thought one day, that if I ever met a girl with eyes like yours I would marry her. Of course it was absurd."

"Flora's eyes are brown, aren't they?"

"Of course it was absurd," Laurence repeated.