Candlenight

summer, without a jacket and a tie and a watch and chain. Claire, they said, would have been proud to know him. And he, they were sure, would have been very proud of his granddaughter.

'Er, we… We don't know an awful lot about the judge.' Giles admitted. 'That is, his death… The solicitor, Mr. Davies, implied it had been fairly sudden. Quick, I mean.'

'And without pain, wasn't it, Eirlys.' Mrs. Huws said.

'Very weak, he was though, at the end. Weak in body, mind, not in spirit. And he was over ninety. Dr. Wyn wanted to send him to the hospital in Pont, but he refused. He knew he was going, see. and would not leave Y Groesfan.'

'In case his spirit could not find its way back.' Mrs. Hywels said. Giles smiled, acknowledging that no spirit in its right mind would want to leave Y Groes.

'Don't forget now.' Mair Huws said. 'If you find you have run out of anything, come to the shop and knock on the door if we are closed.'

'Great.' said Giles. 'Er, diolch yn fawr.'

'Goodbye then Mr. Freeman. 'And welcome to Y Groesfan.'

Giles went back to the house, his gratitude brimming over. Life in Y Groes was already turning out exactly as he'd hoped it would.

That night they built a big log fire in the inglenook (Giles, with a howl of delight, had uncovered what looked like a year's supply of cut, dry logs in a shed) and spread two sleeping bags on the living room floor.

Claire, ever efficient, had brought them just in case. The house really was remarkably clean, and Giles was surprised how generally trauma-free the move had been. They hadn't had a single row — although Claire was the sort of quietly-efficient professional person it was hard to pick fights with anyway.

Giles did get rather angry with himself as he discovered he had no natural ability when it came to making log fires and had to keep getting up in the night to feed the thing. At this rate what looked like a year's supply of logs would probably last about six weeks. Altogether Giles reckoned he got about three hours' sleep, and he awoke next morning with a slight headache.

Of course, the ache began to fade as soon as he looked out of the window and saw the hills freshly speckled with early sun. He pulled on his trousers and went barefoot through the primitive kitchen to fill the kettle with spring water which came, apparently, from their own private supply and in as much quantity as if it were from the mains. He cupped his hands under the tap and tasted it — probably better than the stuff they bought in bottles from Sainsbury's — and rubbed the rest into his eyes, rinsing away the remains of his headache.

He went back into the living room and stared down at Claire, still sleeping, curled foetally in her yellow sleeping bag. He didn't think he'd ever seen her looking so relaxed. so untroubled. Even her hair — short, blonde, business-like — mustn't have it flying over the lens, ruining a shot — seemed to have loosened up and was fanned out over the edge of the sleeping bag and onto the hearthrug below.

She really did, he thought, look reborn.

Giles felt his lungs expand with something he identified as joy. It felt quite strange and moving.

'This, my darling,' he said softly, a little chokily, 'is where it really begins.'

Claire slept on.

Chapter XXI

On Sunday evening, Giles decided to make his first visit to his new local, Tafarn y Groesfan. Claire watched him walk out of sight down the hill before setting off alone to chase the spirit of the place in the only way she knew how: by taking pictures of things.

She walked out of the front garden gate and did not look back. She wanted to photograph the cottage last of all. That was the natural sequence. She didn't want to take its picture until she'd made other connections… out there.

Feeling as if she were descending into a dream, Claire walked into the last burst of brilliance from the setting sun.

It forced her to look downwards, denying her a view of the church, denying her a picture too, because from this side the tower would be hard against the light and it was too bright yet to make any dramatic use of that.

There was nobody on the main street. Dark blinds were down in the windows of the post office— Swyddfa 'r Post, it said above the door, without a translation. Claire took a picture of the post office, with herself reflected in the dark window, a slender, crop-haired woman, face semi-concealed behind the battered Nikon. This was a picture to prove that she really was here, an image in the window along with two terraced cottages and a black cat. Part of the scene.

She photographed interlocking beams in the end wall of the general store, pushing out like bones under a taut white skin.

Then she became aware of a very distinguished old oak tree, standing at the bottom of the street, above the river bridge. She filled the frame with the stern expressions on its trunk, and then took another shot on wide angle, to get in a heavy tractor looking flimsy and transient in its shade.

Claire could almost feel the ancient male arrogance of the tree, its roots flexing in the earth.

That made her wonder about her own roots, how deep they were here.

She'd phoned her mother to explain that they would spending a few days at the cottage. Not yet telling her however, that they actually intended to make it the permanent home — although Giles had thought they should.

Indeed, he seemed to be looking forward to it. 'Christ. I'd love to see the old bag's face, when she finds out.' he kept saying. Giles, who had never got on with his mother-in-law was taking full advantage of her being out of favour with Claire as well.

'You're doing what?' Elinor had said.

'It seems only right, mother. He did leave it to me. Did you really think I could sell it without a second thought?'

'You can't sleep there. It'll be damp.'

'Why should it be? It hasn't been empty long. I gather he hadn't been in hospital for more than a few days when he died.'

'And dirty.'

'We'll clean it.'

Elinor was breathing very hard.

'Mother…'

'What?' Elinor snapped.

'You said my grandfather had only seen me once.'

'When did I say that?'

'When I rang you two weeks ago.'

'Well. I–I've told you about that, surely.'

'No.'

'I must have.'

'You haven't.'

'Well. I don't want to talk about it now.'

'Oh mother, please — this is ridiculous.'

'You don't know what that man was like, Claire.'

'I expect I'll find out this weekend then. I shall ask people in the village about him. I'll find out from them when I saw him. Somebody must know—'

'No!'

'What?'

'Listen… We went to see him just once, your father and I,' her mother said, 'when you were a very small child, three or four. I've told you before, I'm sure, but I don't suppose you were very interested at the time. Anyway, we thought he ought to see his granddaughter. Just once, for the sake of—'