Candlenight

'No,' Berry said uncertainly. 'That's not how I—'

'Fuck 'em all, that's what I say.' Giles stared into his beer. 'I've had it with all these smug London bastards. They're the ones who're out of touch, you know. Had it with Westminster too. And newspapers that try to tell the public what's important in life, what they should be concerned about. This is a place where you can't bargain on London terms. Listen to this — I wasn't going to say anything about this, I thought you'd snigger—'

Giles leaned back, drew in a breath and said.

'R'wyn dysgu Cymraeg.'

Berry stared at him, expressionless.

'Means 'l am learning Welsh.'' Been working at it for several weeks now with cassette tapes. When we move in here I'm going to take proper lessons. What d'you think about that?'

'Let me get you another drink.' said Berry.

He pushed his way through to the bar and said to the barman. 'Gimme a couple of those beers with the dragon on the label.'

It was worse than he'd thought.

So Berry said casually. 'Listen. Giles, that… study. You didn't feel it was a mite depressing in there, all that heavy furniture, those old books?'

Giles put down his glass and laughed in amazement.

'Depressing? That study has to be absolutely the best part of the house. Super atmosphere. Real old Welsh. Stark, strong—'

'Yeah but, Giles, what it. what if it was, you know… '

He couldn't say it. He just couldn't bring himself to say it. 'So you're learning Welsh, huh?' he finished lamely.

'We have these cassettes,' Giles said. 'We play them in the car. Claire and I try and talk to each other in Welsh, over breakfast. R'wyf i eisiau un siwgwr. I should like one sugar.'

'Could be real useful that. Giles, you have to use a teashop making so much money they can refuse to serve people who don't place their order in Welsh. What else can you say? How about, 'Don't spit in my beer. I can't help being English.''

'You're not into this at all. are you. Berry?'

Berry smiled sadly.

'Cwrw, that's beer. Peint o gwrw. Pint of beer. The C in cwrw mutates to G after a vowel. More or less everything mutates in Welsh; once you grasp that you can start making progress.'

Berry lost patience with him.

'OK, then, Giles, ole buddy. You go over lo the bar and order us up a couple half pints of whatever it was, guru, right?'

'I could do it. I expect.' Giles said. 'If I really had something to prove.'

'Ten pounds says you won't go through with it.'

Giles, eyes flashing, pushed back his chair and rose decisively to his feet.

'Right.' he said. 'Put your money on the table.'

Berry pulled his wallet out of the hip pocket of his newly torn jeans and placed a ten pound note under the ashtray.

Giles put on his stiff-upper-lip expression. 'Right, you listen carefully.'

Aw, hell. Berry thought. Can't you ever keep a hold on your mouth, Morelli?

Through his fingers, he watched Giles march to the bar. Two men in front of Giles who'd been conversing in Welsh ordered a pint of lager and a whisky and soda in English. Berry saw Giles stare down his nose at them. When it was his turn he said loudly.

'Hanner peint o gwrw, os gwelwch yn dda.'

Lowering his voice and pointing at the bottle with the dragon on it, he added. 'Er, make that two.'

Berry thought he'd never seen so many wry smiles turned on at once. It was like a chorus of wry smiles. You had to feel sorry for Giles; he was a brave man and a born fall-guy.

He was still cringing on Giles's behalf, when, at the adjacent table, the young man in the Starship Enterprise jacket nodded towards Giles and said laconically to the girl with the luminous green hair.

'Sice.'

Berry spilled a lot of beer. He felt himself go pale.

Within a minute Giles was back, red-faced, slamming two glasses on the table and snatching the tenner from beneath the ashtray.

'Bastard.' he said.

'I'm sorry, ole buddy. I didn't plan to set you up.'

'You're a bastard.' said Giles. 'I think I'll go to bed.'

'What about your beer?'

'You drink it.' said Giles. 'I'll see you at breakfast.'

'Giles, what's 'sice' mean?'

'Piss off,' said Giles.

'Come on, Giles, I'm serious, what's it mean?'

'Piss off, you know what it means.'

'Aw, for Chrissakes, Giles, if I knew what it meant would be asking you?'

'Sais,' Giles hissed. 'Sais.'

'Yeah, right, sice.'

'English,' said Giles. 'It means English. Often used in a derogatory way, like the Scots say Sassenach. Satisfied now?'

'I don't know,' said Berry. 'Maybe, I… I don't know.'

'I'm going to bed,' said Giles. 'OK?'

Part Four CROESO

Chapter XIX

ENGLAND

Four or five times Berry had picked up the phone, intending to call Giles, each time pulling back. In his head, he'd almost had it figured out. 'See Giles, I've always been sensitive to atmospheres and I just had the feeling there was something badly wrong in there. Humour me, OK? Have a priest take a look.' Every time he heard himself saying that, he chickened out. A priest! Had he really been about to say that?

From the Newsnet office, the day after they'd got back from Wales, Berry had called Giles's paper and asked if he was around. 'It's Gary Willis here,' a guy said. 'Giles has taken some leave. Gone to move some of his stuff out to this place he's got in Wales.'

'When's he gonna be back?'

'I don't know, mate, and Roger's not here at the moment. But it can't be more than a week or two.'

Berry stood at his apartment window, looking out at the block from which you could see the Thames. He clenched his fists.

All the way home from Aberystwyth, he and Giles had discussed their respective careers in journalism, the differences between the British and American media and even the rift between Berry and his dad and what had caused it, the ethics of the job, all this stuff.

Everything, it seemed, except the cottage in Y Groes, Giles's future there, Berry's feelings about the place. It