"Milliways has a way of looking after its patrons," Jim says, "especially the younger ones. Mother hen tendencies. It has to be slightly alive with a sense of responsibility, otherwise the entire system would have devolved into chaos a long time ago. I don't think it would allowed Matilda to meet me if I were a danger to her, and it certainly wouldn't have allowed her to bring me back here.

"I do think there are options she's going to want to explore when she's older that will be considerably easier without her father's record following her every move. The sooner she learns secure methods for dealing with that, the better."