Billy picked up a coffee cup, gave it a shake to check the fill level, then placed it down on the counter again. “Not often, no. That was the first time he’d been in here, in fact. Ever. To be honest, I’m not even sure he knew it was my shop. He’d dropped his phone. Smashed the screen. Needed a replacement.”

“And did you fix it?” Logan asked.

“Yes. It took a couple of days because I had to wait for the screen to come in, but I fixed it. iPhone 11. Good phone. I’m an Android man myself, but you can’t fault the Apple build.”

“So, he came back in for it once you’d fixed it?”

Billy shook his head. “No. He had me send it on. Never bloody paid me, either.”

“You sent it to his home?”

“To an office address. His production company. He made… videos. Weddings, maybe? I’m not sure what. Doing well, by the sounds of things,” he said, and he tried very hard to keep the note of bitterness from his voice.

“Aye, we heard about that,” Logan said, taking note of the tone. “Did you keep in touch? Before he came in to get his phone fixed, I mean. Have you kept in contact over the years?”

There was a blowing out of cheeks and a shrug of slender shoulders. Something about the movements came very close to making Logan laugh, although he’d be damned if he could explain why. “Sometimes. Not often. But yes. From time to time.”

“I’d heard you’d had a falling out. That was why the act stopped.”

“God, yes. Huge,” Billy confirmed. “It was awful. It got really quite acrimonious for a while.”

“But you made up?”

“Not really, no.”

“Oh. So, what happened to get you talking again?”

Billy gave another shrug, and this time pulled a face that could only be described as ‘comically befuddled.’

“Thirty-odd years, I suppose. The mellowing that comes with old age. The perspective it brings. We were young men, then, full of fire. Archie was determined we were going to crack America. I thought we should play it safe here, but he was all big talk about Vegas. And Hollywood, of all the bloody places.”

He drummed his fingers on the counter and looked around at the shop, as if only just seeing it properly for the first time.

“And now look at me. Failed comedian. Failed teacher. Failing shopkeeper.” He clucked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “We lost a lot of money with that American Dream tour. Almost everything, in fact.”

Tyler jumped in before Logan could continue. “Sorry, you were a teacher?”