It was ten o’clock in Bournemouth, Saturday night: silent and still with a faint hint of chilliness under the stars at Hengistbury Head, where my parents live. My wife, children and I had spent a gentle week with them, pottering and pootling. No better place for it either. Hengistbury Head is right at the other end of Bournemouth Bay from Sandbanks, the place you may have heard of where houses cost more than they do in the Hamptons, where you might see Harry Redknapp or Piers Morgan or Botox ladies. I’ve never seen anyone famous at Hengistbury Head and I really hope I never do. It’s a cosy little backwater (much prettier than Sandbanks), still quite underdeveloped, suburban even. The odd luxury high-rise is starting to sprout among the bungalows, and I suppose it’s only a question of time before the developers get their teeth into it and it starts to look like Monaco or Miami.
Ten o’clock at Hengistbury Head and for all that was happening it might have been the dead of night in the depths of winter.
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