“Dad, have you been listening to me? All I’ve been trying to demonstrate to you all these years,” Banks went on, “is that I’ve been doing a decent, honest day’s work, just like you did.”

“And Jet Harris, local legend, was a bent copper?”

“Yes.”

“And you’re going to expose him.”

“Something like that.”

“Well,” said Arthur Banks, rubbing his hands together. “That’s all right, then. You’ll be having another pint, I suppose? On me, this time.”

Banks looked at his watch. “Better make it a half,” he said. “I’ve got a date.”

Was it the age of my innocence,
Or was it the lost Land of Oz?
Was it only a foolish illusion,
The summer that never was?

Did I walk through the fields with the child in my arms
And the golden wheat over my head?
Did I feel my heart breaking under the weight?
Was my sweet sleeping boy child a burden, like lead?

I remember him crying the day he was born
And his hand like a spider that wouldn’t let go
And he wouldn’t let go and he wouldn’t let go
And the pain tore my heart out and filled me with woe.

Can a dreamer take hold of reality
And become a responsible man?
Can a killer become a lover
Or is he forever damned?

You can’t follow me where I’m going now
And you can’t go the places I’ve been
Don’t listen to the demons I’ve listened to
Or look into the darkness I’ve seen.

There’s a field and a boy and the tall golden wheat
And eternity held in a day
But it’s so hard to hold and it’s so hard to reach
And forever rushing away

Was it the age of my innocence,
Or was it the lost Land of Oz?
Was it only a foolish illusion,
The summer that never was?

Banks lay in bed late that night listening to Neil Byrd’s CD on his Walkman after dinner with Michelle and a phone call from Annie. “The Summer That Never Was” was the first song on the CD, though the liner notes said it was the last song Byrd had recorded, just weeks before his suicide. As Banks listened to the subtle interplay of words and music, all set against acoustic guitar and stand-up bass, with flute and a violin weaving in and out, like Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks, he felt the despair and defeat of the singer. He didn’t understand the song, didn’t know what all the tortured phrases meant, only that they were tortured.

Here was a man at the end of his tether. And he was thinking of his child, or of his own childhood. Or both.

Banks couldn’t even begin to imagine what this had meant to Luke Armitage when, his mind disoriented with strong cannabis, he had heard it for the first time in Liz and Ryan’s flat. Annie was right. How callous could the bastards be? Or stupid. It no doubt never even entered their addled minds what damage they might be doing. All they could think of was opening up Luke’s mind to his father’s music to further their careers, and everyone knew that drugs opened the doors of perception.