CHAPTER 47
We didn’t see that much of either my uncle or his trout for the rest of her stay, which can be fairly blamed on some of us having to work for a living, but over the next few months it was noticeable that unless Hywel had that friend of Sar’s with him, he was mostly on his own at the pub. At least, that was what I heard from Dad via Mam.

CHAPTER 30
It started quietly, but it gathered speed as it continued. Bob didn’t say anything, but I caught little hints in the pubs and when I visited his place. The odd snide remark, almost always from the younger drinkers; the bit of broken glass he’d missed picking up from his carpet. It was harder to miss the dog shit smeared over his street door, though. His float was kept at the dairy overnight, so they couldn’t get at it, but I soon realised that it was a steady and concerted campaign.

CHAPTER 45
“What’s happened, Tony?”

“Head injury, breaks all over. Hit by a car”

“Calm, love. Calm. Where is she?”

“Our local hospital. Mum’s with her, and Sar, but she’s in a right state”

“Tone, go and look after them, aye? I’ll make some calls. Who have you rung so far?”

CHAPTER 27
They had taken the best part of three hours, and Staff Sullivan had done us proud with a private room to sit with Bob. He had even found us a tray of tea, proper Army brew. Bob had sat silent, staring at his cup, till Matthew laid a hand on his shoulder.

CHAPTER 43
He did, or so Mam told me the day after.

“She’s really found a good man, Lainey. And that boy will grow up sound as well. We have hope now, after so long. Your Dad and I, well, Twmi can be very soft at times. We have sent flowers to Alison and her husband. They will understand why”

CHAPTER 42
Now, that was a wedding. The only tradition not observed seemed to be that of a fight among the guests, but I could most definitely live without that. My Uncle Arwel and his Boy had even had their hair cut! The girls looked gorgeous, and so did my wife, Steve was both touching and funny in his best man’s speech, and whoever came up with the idea of putting him in a kilt was inspired. The vicar, oddly, in an Anglican church, was a Roman Catholic, but he was sharp, and funny, and his own humour meshed well with that of Steve.

CHAPTER 25
Ernie wasn’t too full of gossip that night, and we spent it going over old, old tales of our times in Normandy and further on. The toast, in essence, was ‘absent friends’, and several times we found ourselves sitting silent, as if by mutual agreement.

CHAPTER 40
Sarah had mentioned the others like her that she had come across, and I had been doing my own digging for any info, good or bad, on one of them. She was from somewhere over our neck of the woods, which meant there was a risk of ‘history’ with some of the other wedding guests, and I rather preferred relaxing outside a few beers rather than dealing with their effects on idiots.

CHAPTER 38
Events continued to take their own course in another station, as I was definitely being kept well clear of any involvement in the case, and more importantly away from any possible perception of involvement. I got hints, though, and as the trial was approaching I was ‘asked’ to attend an interview with the IPCC, the body that oversees complaints against us. If I had realised what was to happen only a week after my interview, I would have found it very difficult to answer their questions with a straight face.

CHAPTER 37
I left them to their chat, for there was nothing I could meaningfully add. I was still undecided about Joe Evans but after all I had been given sight of his witness statement. I had seen Steve in a very different light after that, and I knew that I was never going to dig any deeper. Leave that particular case deep frozen, Lainey.

Siân was off at the weekend, which chimed with my own self-planned working roster, and she was insistent.

CHAPTER 35
I was in work the next day, but in my own HQ instead of Cardiff. It felt strange, after so long in civvies, but the uniform was the thing that had helped me hold things together when life had thrown shit at me. That dreadful funeral, the confrontation with Mam and Dad, the ritual had helped me cope. Siân was on a stupidly early start, so I had to eat breakfast alone. I hated early turns, so as I was now effectively supernumerary, I had treated myself to a nine o’clock start.

CHAPTER 22
“Come in, do! George, is there a problem?”

“Sort of, sir. Chap here, Gerald, he’s come all the way down to ask a favour of you”

“Beattie, may we please have some tea. Gentlemen, tea?”

CHAPTER 33
“Can you get the plate?”

“Not yet, Ma’am. Parked up too close behind the van. Two men, looks like. Another car joining them now”

Hansen. “What are they doing?”

CHAPTER 19
I gave my hair a last quick comb, and buffed up the toe caps of my shoes on the backs of my trousers. Why had I bought flowers? They weren’t good ones, but they weren’t roses. Mam had said that flowers all said things, all had different messages and places and times they were each right for, and roses were making a very clear statement best not said right at the start. It wasn’t really the start, of course, for we had been dancing the blushing two-step for months. Mithering, her mam had called it. Sod it, couldn’t I just be back outside that bloody airfield again?

CHAPTER 31
The drive over to the Channel coast was getting familiar now, but this time we had our parents with us. Our parents, not Siân’s, as that would have been a step so excessive I’d have lost control. I would never forgive her for what she had said and done, but I had agreed with my wife that we had to come to some sort of understanding. Our Mam and Dad, though, needed no such adjustment. Somewhere near Swindon, Dad turned round to face me.

CHAPTER 18
The Ouse was low and slow, murmuring past the moorings as I laid out my tools. Somewhere overhead a lark was singing away, and there was a splash near the far bank as a vole dropped into the water. Dragonflies droned past, and when I looked down past the rail I saw a pair of dead eyes fixed on mine as a pike hung almost motionless, drifting slowly downstream as it waited for something to kill.