nothing comes of nothing. And yet. . and yet . .there is something: the cursor blinking on and off, one or nought, should or ought? It strikes him that: It must’ve been at exactly that time — to the very year — that they were developing the first microprocessors, writing new programming languages and creating operating systems that pushed them together soft into hard . .Not that we — I — was aware of it, computers were Toltec pyramids, stepped down into the basements of corporate HQs, and ministered to by priestly Morlocks in white coats. I do remember an early computer game — Ping? Pong? — at any rate, two white bars either side of a blackened television screen, batting between them a white cursor which on impact made a synthesised tongue-popping noise. It was absurdly unimpressive — as a visualisation of table tennis cruder than a child’s stick drawing of a real live man, but Mark loved it . . so for hour after hour we’d played it in amusement arcades: pulling the levers, twisting the dials, our heads hanging there in all the ring-a-ding-dinging and the reek of melting sugar . .He sighs, Aaaaah, — Mark had given him a novelty ballpoint pen, inside its fat belly were six ink cartridges: green, blue, black, red . . I forget the other two . .He had explained his note-taking system to the boy and this was his thoughtful response. Mark showed his father how you could push down two of the coloured ballpoints at once, and so write duochrome. Busner had long since ceased to take any sort of notes at all — let alone such pretentious ones! Yet he feels the want of that pen now, imagines wielding it with all six nibs out, so as to fuse colour and symbology in this realisation being compounded within him from images, memories, recent ideas and long-since-made clinical observations . .A mother and small child exit the newsagents — they wear matching scarlet puffa jackets so bright they could be spotted floundering on a glacier from a helicopter . .The child tears the cellophane from a lollipop, the mother the cellophane from a packet of cigarettes, the breeze choreographs their filmy discards . .Aaaah, he turns abruptly away to see that the memories have indeed crept right up behind him, and that they aren’t so much as bothering to play the game! for when he turns towards them they wiggle their limbs shamelessly in the bright spring sunlight: Miriam: who gave me that digital watch, and that bastard Whitcomb — he had one of the first pocket calculators and was mucking about with it the day I went to see him and he told me they were thinking of pulling the plug from a socket hidden behind a grotesque coat tree, its nine upturned branches ending in animal horns of some sort that have been mounted into the wood. The parlour maid gets to her feet all tangled up in her full skirts and the cabling of the machine, which is, Audrey thinks, as ugly as the coat tree, being confected out of broom, bagpipes and an electrical fan. Its whine whirrs away into silence, and the housekeeper who has opened the door — a grim-faced harridan with her face scraped back into her hair and her hair scraped back into a frightening bun — calls back: That’ll do for now, Rose, before giving her attention once more to this unanticipated visitor. Is it Mister or Missus De’Ath that you wishes to see? No title is bestowed on Audrey maybe if I had a visiting card? who replies, I don’t suppose my brother will be at home, so if you could kindly tell my sister-in-law that Audrey De’Ath desires a word I’d be most obliged. She believes this well done, and that she is also well got up to pay this call in a new pleated skirt, linen for best, belted mackintosh and cloche hat. She has also borrowed a slim parasol with a porcelain handle from Appleby’s collection that must cost a month of this one’s wages — poor old mare, back in harness again! The housekeeper runs a sceptical eye from the top to the bottom of Audrey, while behind her the parlour maid continues her battle with the lashing tail of the vacuuming machine. The housekeeper is on the point of shutting the door in Audrey’s face while she goes to speak to her mistress, when two doors open simultaneously on to the hallway — one at the very back, through which Albert emerges, treading gingerly, a large china tankard in his hand — and one to the left, whence comes in a crisp cloud of white organdie a lady of Audrey’s own age, who, although she has only clapped eyes on her once, briefly, and six years previously, she nevertheless immediately recognises. Albert pads towards the door, saying, What’s this, then, Missus Egremont — then sees who it is and for a moment his broad, smooth face is seized by an unaccountable expression: Albert. . shocked? before he moves to his wife’s side and takes her arm. Rosalind, my dear, he says, this is my sister Audrey. And to Audrey there is a curt: You’d better step in here. They all three go into the drawing room, which is as uglily done out as the hall. Surveying the heavy old pieces of oak and mahogany furniture that have been pressed into service for telephone tables, wireless and phonograph cabinets, Audrey surmises that this a domesticated battle of the sexes, one, moreover, in which the amiable and doughy blonde has already capitulated. The three of them move in and out, round and between overstuffed armchairs — a formal dance of awkwardness, until Albert says, Won’t you sit down, Audrey? No fanks, Bert, Audrey replies, cockneyfying purely to see its effect on the two of them. Then she takes up a paper knife that lies on the mantelpiece and ting-tings it along a row of china dogs, china sheep, china shepherdesses in hooped skirts with china crooks, until it clanks against a brass box fashioned from the casing of a 50-pounder shell. On the domed lid of this is inscribed: In Grateful Acknowledgement of the Service Given by Albert De’Ath —. Which is all Audrey wishes to know, so she prises open the lid with the paper knife, revealing the little white cartridges, and says, D’you mind? then without waiting for an answer withdraws a cigarette. Both De’Aths start forward, speaking over one another, The matches are —/Can I get you a —? and laughing she is pleased to take receipt of both boxes, deftly remove a match from each one, strike both and suck fire from one flamelet, then the other, funnelling the smoke out at them — the dead matches she drops in the grate. You’re all done at the Arsenal, then? she says presently, and Albert concedes this with a nod, before continuing, so as to forestall the looming oddity of the situation, May I introduce you to my wife, Rosalind? Audrey grimaces. — Charmed, I’m sure, and, taking the baby-soft hand she’s offered, continues: I expect you miss your gauntlets and your racy peaked cap. Rosalind blushes. — I’m — I’m. . Well, frankly, I’m amazed you remember —. Well, I do, Audrey states baldly, and leaves go the hand, but it seems that you do too. Tell me, what did my brother say to you that day at the Danger Buildings? If he didn’t speak of me on that occasion, he must’ve since — told you something of my way of carrying on, eh? My scandalous amours and incendiary opinions? Rosalind is struck dumber — she shares with her husband an air of ponderous containment, and, while pretty enough, Audrey detects within her overripe skin fleshiness about to ooze grubbily out. We all, Albert declares, did our bit. As if this is what’s at issue between us! Audrey laughs bitterly, flings herself down in one of the chairs, boldly crosses her legs, takes a pull on her gasper and rejoins: Maybe so, Bert, although some of us sacrificed more than others, and some of us. . She looks pointedly to the crystal dolphin that leaps beside a Chinese vase. . gained. Turning to the silly thing in her shepherdess’s dress, she raises her voice: Did he ever speak to you of our brother, my dear? Did he so much as tell you he ’ad one? Well, ’e weren’t as clever as Bert — not a born ’ustler like your ever so upstandin’ ’usband! Stan wasn’t one to black the King’s boots, oh no, couldn’t turn three tricks at once for the same master — but ’e was our flesh an’ blood —! A cry drops down into the drawing room from high up in the house, piped here through a speaking tube Albert has had installed. Baby! Rosalind exclaims, then, spying an Old English sheepdog that lies on its back by the hearth with rigid straw-filled limbs upthrust, he chortles indulgently: Oh, the silly thing’s left his doggie here, I shall have to take Darsing up to him. . You will excuse —. And she is gone, the stuffed dog tucked awkwardly under her fleecy arm.