River’s grandmother had died four years ago. Now the Old Bastard, as River’s mother called him, rattled around the four-bedroomed house on his own.
“He should sell the place, darling,” she’d said to River on one of her vanishingly rare visitations. “Get himself a nice little bungalow. Or move into one of those residential complexes.”
“I can see him going for that.”
“It’s not all daytime TV and abuse these day. They have,” and she’d waved her hand airily; her standard semaphore for trivial detail, “regulations.”
“They could have Commandments,” River told her. “It wouldn’t tear him from his garden. Is it his money you’re after?”
“No, darling. I just want him to be unhappy.” That might have been a joke.
— Slow Horses (Mick Herron), Loc. 1455-63