A retired English gentleman in Ibiza

We are invited for drinks to this man's villa. On one of our walks round this 

magical island we got into conversation with him simply by asking him the way, or my partner did in Spanish.  He enquires are we English and we strike up a conversation.

Now we sit in the lounge of this astonishing piece of architecture carved into

the rocks and hanging dizzyingly over the cliff edge.  I look out onto the 

jewel of a bay below, the setting is paradisaical.

Vivyan talks of why he left England....'oh you know neighbours...wherever I lived in the UK they were difficult.  In a world of their own you might say, always in a bit of a huff, out of sorts, sullen, you might say and yes, a bit inner. One could have

wished they would be a bit forthcoming, ..., oh you know, one would have wished that they could show a mite more munificence, a shade more bounteousness as most people in Crouch

End do. Do you know Crouch End?"

"Eh...yes."

"Yes...just up from the Bus Depot, just go up the

hill there, Piper‟s Mount it‟s called, then take a left till you pass the big sorting office for the

Post Office. Take a right and you will come to some disused tennis courts, pass them and I

am, or was,  jut there. But I tell you, a bit more of the old of grace from them would not go badly, a

bit of the old je ne sais quoi, if you catch my drift.  But no, there was no generosity of spirit, or open-handedness of mind forthcoming from them,

Thinks  "...open handedness of mind, what kind of a sentence is that?"

"L’enfer c’est les autres. If you catch my drift, so I got out of old Blighty and it was the best thing I ever did."
We descend the interminable steps from his villa, stupefied, not really knowing
why.

"Why didn't you ask where he got his money from?"  
"Don't you think that would have been a little indecorous. He wouldn't have invited us back if I had been that bald."