Candlenight

considered a sensible mode of transport.

A grey squirrel shot out of the hedge, apparently intent on hurling itself under their wheels. Claire ignored it.

'Look out!' Elinor yelled, but Claire neither braked nor swerved.

'You've run over it!'

'Perhaps.' Claire didn't even look in the mirror.

Elinor was profoundly shocked. 'What's happened to you. Claire? What's happened to you?'

'Don't be ridiculous, mother.' Claire tossed her ragged black mane. 'They're vermin.'

Elinor was hunched in the corner, well away from her daughter, wrapping her arms around herself, shivering inside.

Claire spun the wheel as they rolled out of the trees and past the sign that said simply, Y Groes. The lumbering vehicle went across the river bridge with only inches to spare either side. The inn lay before them, and above it reared the church, its squat tower massive from this angle, its weather vane pricking a pale halo in the cloudy sky.

'Stopping raining, anyway,' George observed from the back seat.

Chapter XLIV

It took Berry all of twenty minutes to find out where Bethan McQueen lived.

First off, he went into the Welsh Pizza House and ordered a plain cheese and tomato from an English guy who wore a white plastic apron. On the apron a drooling red dragon brandished a knife and fork. The pizza was crap, but the guy thought Bethan McQueen might be the girl who lived over the bookstore.

Hampton's bookshop had a window display featuring the new Ordnance Survey maps, local travel guides and a handful of books — in both English and Welsh — about the history of Wales. Most prominently displayed was a paperback with a man's face superimposed over a map of Wales. The face looked thoughtful and ended in a beard with a forked tip. The book was called Glyndwr, The Last Prince. It was by a Dr. D. G. Evans.

'Naw.' Berry said aloud. 'Couldn't be.'

He went in out of the rain.

'Dreadful weather,' said an elderly man, looking up from a copy of the Spectator spread before him on the counter.

'Could be worse. I guess,' Berry said.

'It was worse a few nights ago. The river almost burst its banks.'

Berry picked up the Glyndwr paperback and turned it over and saw another bearded face in a black and white photograph on the back.

'Holy shit,' he said.

'Sold seven copies in the past couple of days,' the elderly man told him proudly. 'Mostly to journalists more interested in the author than the subject.'

Berry put the paperback on the counter with a ten pound note. 'Guess that makes it eight.'

'Actually, they're remainders,' the bookseller confessed. 'Touch of inspiration, though I say it myself. As soon as I heard Plaid'd picked him as the candidate, I rang the publishers and offered to do a deal for however many copies they had left, they were only too pleased, only having managed to get rid of a couple of thousand.'

'When'd it come out?'

'Five years ago? Six? Not much interest, you see, outside Wales, in Owain Glyndwr.' He wheezed out a laugh. 'Actually, not much interest inside Wales until now. But that's business. You have to seize the moment. If he wins I'll doubtless flog the lot, if he doesn't I'll still have made a reasonable profit.'

Berry said. 'Listen, can I ask you… Does Bethan McQueen live here?'

'Ah,' The bookseller folded the paperback into a brown paper bag and handed Berry his change. 'The lovely and intriguing Mrs. McQueen.' He pointed to the ceiling. 'Up there.'

'Intriguing?'

'Oh well.' He smiled ruefully. 'Beautiful widow living quietly and discreetly. Never any visitors… Well, this chap' — he pointed to the Glyndwr books — 'on occasion, but never for very long. I'm a terrible old gossip, as you may have gathered, so pay no heed to a thing I say. There's a short alley next to the shop door. Just inside that you'll find another door in a recess. Ring the bell. I don't know if she's in.'

'Thanks.' Berry stepped out into the rain and then dodged into the alleyway. The door in the recess was plain, no glass, and painted some indiscernible colour. He pressed the bell-push and waited, not able to tell if it was working. Until the door opened and Bethan McQueen stood there in white jeans and a turquoise sweater of soft wool.

'Mr. Morelli.'

'Hi,' Berry said, suddenly lost for words. 'I, ah… I have this feeling we should talk.'

'About Giles Freeman?'

'And maybe other things.'

Bethan McQueen said, 'Did you tell Guto you were coming?'

'Sure did.'

'And what did he say?'

'I don't recall the exact words. But he seemed to be indicating that if I bothered you I could expect to have him clean the street with my ass.'

Bethan McQueen turned on a small, impish smile. 'You had better come up,' she said, 'while he's safely out of town.'

'Tea? Or coffee.'

'Tea, please. No milk.'

'I'm glad you said that, I don't think I have any milk. Do you like it strong?'

'Like crude oil,' Berry said. While she made the tea he took in the apartment. It looked temporary, like a storage room for furniture that was destined for someplace else. There was a big sofa with a design involving peacocks. He sat in one of a pair of great fireside chairs with loose covers in a floral print. Too big for the room, like the enormous Welsh dresser in honeyed pine. The dresser was empty save for a few books.

As Bethan returned with a tray, two white cups with saucers on it, and biscuits, there came a hoarse crackle from outside and then a tannoyed voice announced:

'THIS IS SIMON GALLIER, YOUR CONSERVATIVE CANDIDATE. I SHALL BE AT THE MEMORIAL HALL AT SEVEN-THIRTY TONIGHT WITH MY SPECIAL GUEST, THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR TRADE AND INDUSTRY, THE RIGHT HONOURABLE JOHN GORE. I HOPE TO SEE YOU THERE AND WE WILL BOTH WELCOME YOUR QUESTIONS ON LOCAL AND NATIONAL ISSUES.'

Then the same message — presumably — was repeated, in Welsh.

'He's English, this Gallier.' Berry said, taking a cup and saucer. 'But he's learned Welsh, right?'

'I believe' — Bethan perched on an arm of the sofa— 'that he has been on some sort of crash course. Two weeks work at a residential centre. Very intensive.'

'Like, they wake you up in the middle of the night, flash a light in your face and make you answer personal questions in Welsh?'

Bethan smiled.

'That the kind of course you had Giles on?'

Bethan's smile became a frown. 'Don't think me rude.' She looked him hard in the eyes. 'But who exactly are you?'

Simon Gallier's speaker-van made a return trip up the street, 'DON'T FORGET, SEVEN-THIRTY AT THE MEMORIAL HALL. AND MAKE THOSE. QUESTIONS TOUGH ONES!'

'That's a tough one,' Berry said.

'You do not know who you are?'