definitely knows something. Since he came back… something's different about him. All these secrets…'
'Urn, Tosh…'
It was Gwen, standing at the entrance to the Autopsy Room. Neither of them had heard or seen her arrive.
'Yes?' said Toshiko.
'I…' Gwen trailed off before she could continue her sentence, looking from Owen to Toshiko and back again.
'Did you…?' said Owen.
'Did I what?'
'Did you hear any of that?'
Any of what?' asked Gwen.
'What we were just talking about?'
'You mean about you both having met Michael before tonight?'
Owen grimaced, and Toshiko looked down at her shoes as if in shame.
'Yep. That's the one,' said Owen.
'Yes. Yes, I did hear that.'
'Right…'
Gwen shifted awkwardly. Actually,' she said, 'I think it's possible we all have.'
'What do you mean?' asked Owen.
'Well, you've met him before. And I just heard what Tosh told you. And I think I've met him too.'
SIX
'Have we run out of Marmite?'
Great, thought Gwen Cooper. Man the hunter-gatherer, reduced to scouring around the kitchen asking his girlfriend if there's any Marmite left.
'I don't know, Rhys,' she replied, shouting down the hallway between their bedroom and the kitchen. 'Did we buy any?'
'I dunno,' said Rhys. 'I was going to get some the other day, but now I can't remember whether I did or not.'
He was standing in front of an open cupboard, wearing only his pants and a pair of slippers.
Man the hunter-gatherer, indeed.
Gwen wondered how the timeline of human development might look in illustrated form. It might start with monkeys dragging their knuckles across the floor, developing into upright cavemen brandishing clubs, and ending with an illustration of Rhys, in profile, standing in his pants and slippers and peering into a cupboard.
'Found some!' said Rhys. 'There was some behind the Oxo cubes in the cupboard.'
'How long's it been there, Rhys?' asked Gwen. 'It might have gone off.'
'Can Marmite go off?' asked Rhys.
It wasn't a question that Gwen wanted to bother herself with this morning, because this morning was her first day with a new partner. The last one had transferred to Bristol, and the one before that was now a desk sergeant. It almost felt like her first day on the job all over again.
'Rhys… What do you think?' she said, stepping into the kitchen. 'Do I look all right, or do I look a twat?'
Rhys looked at her and smiled, wiggling one eyebrow suggestively. 'Oh yes,' he said. 'Very fetching. Would you like to arrest me, officer? Why are you worried about what you look like?'
'Seriously, Rhys. Does it look all right?'
'It's your uniform, love. You wear it every day. It's not like you're going to a wedding.'
'I know, but it's just… Never mind.'
'You look lovely,' said Rhys. 'But then you always look lovely to me.'
Gwen smiled. 'Thanks, love,' she said.
Rhys smiled back and took a bite of his Marmite on toast. 'Funny this,' he said, with a mouthful of food. 'Sell-by date said fifth of March but it tastes fine. You'd never know.'
The corridors of the police station smelled of coffee first thing in the morning. Coffee and floor polish.
Sergeant Rowlands, an older man with more than a touch of the George Clooney about him (which had not gone unnoticed), walked her through the station, his longlegged strides leaving her struggling to keep up.
'You know who Andy Davidson is, don't you?' he said.
Gwen nodded.
'He's been with us for best part of a twelvemonth. Nice lad. Down to earth and all the rest of it. Don't get him onto the subject of TV or he'll talk your leg off.'
Gwen asked him where they would be going on patrol.
Town,' said Sergeant Rowlands. 'It's half term, so it should keep you busy.'
He walked her into one of the staff rooms, where a tall PC with fair hair sat reading
'Andy, this is Gwen Cooper who I was telling you about. Gwen, this is PC Davidson. No relation to Jim. Why don't you two get yourselves acquainted and then I want you out there saving the good people of Cardiff from the forces of evil by half nine. OK with you?'
Gwen smiled, perhaps a little bashfully. She had sworn on her first day at the station that she wouldn't turn into a twelve-year-old girl when Sergeant Rowlands cracked jokes, but it was occasionally difficult.
'So… you got a boyfriend?' Andy asked as they took a left on the corner of Duke Street, opposite the edge of the castle walls, and drove down through one of the busier thoroughfares, lined on one side by market stalls and on the other by indoor shopping malls.
'What? I mean yes,' said Gwen. Partners for all of twenty minutes, and was he already hitting on her? Was this about to get awkward?
'Oh,' said Andy, as if he could read her mind, 'I didn't mean it like… It was just the whole getting-to-know- you chit-chat thing. No. Oh God, no. No, I just meant, like, 'Have you got a boyfriend? Do you have any pets? Going away on holiday this year?' You know, that kind of thing.'
'Ah,' said Gwen, laughing and relieved. 'Yes. I have a boyfriend. Rhys.'
'Cool,' said Andy. 'I have a girlfriend. Her name's Kelly. Actually…' He paused as he took the car down through a pedestrianised area, waiting for gangs of shoppers and loitering teenagers to realise there was a police car behind them. 'Actually, we've only been seeing each other three weeks. But she's all right, like.'
He paused again as he pulled the car up next to the entrance of the St David's Shopping Centre and a flower stall.
'Which reminds me… It's our three-week anniversary today, and nothing says 'I like you a lot and I'd quite like to see you again' better than a cheap bunch of flowers. Hang on a sec'
Andy jumped out of the car and ran over to the flower stall. Gwen watched him through the window, shifting awkwardly in the front passenger seat. Was this Andy's style? Her last partner had been infinitely less endearing; a woman with a face like an aggravated bulldog and little in the way of patience. Gwen wondered whether she had picked up some of her worst habits, especially when it came to patrol. When Andy came back to the car he put the flowers in the boot.
'Can't have them on the back seat,' he said. 'What would people think? So… What does Rhys do?'
'Rhys?' said Gwen. 'Oh, he works for Luckley's.'
'Luckley's?'
'Yeah. The printers.'
'He prints stuff?'
'No. He's in logistics.'
'Lorries, then?'
'Kind of.'
'Ah, right. Any kids?'
