From crabbing once a year, he’d then progressed to a warped piece of bamboo stick with a bent nail on the end for a hook and had fished for slippery grey-brown gudgeon in the local river. Rice Krispies had opened a whole new world to him when they’d run a special offer of a fishing rod and reel on the back of their packets. He’d lived on the cereal for weeks, eating an extra bowl every night before bed just so that he could cut out and save enough tokens to bag himself one. By the time he’d got his shiny new rod in his hands he never wanted to look at a Rice Krispie ever again. But it was a sacrifice that was worth it as it set him on a lifetime of unceasing pleasure as an angler.

His very first cast with it had caught him a small tench, and Greg had been so excited that he’d struck too fast, flicking the fish off the line and high into the air where it disappeared over a hawthorn hedge behind him, never to be seen again. He’d calmed down a lot since then.

After that, he’d fished with his dad for years, many hours spent in companionable silence. When his dad had passed away, Ray had slipped seamlessly into his father’s place. They too had spent many companionable hours, but never in silence.

‘Matey,’ Ray said, breaking into his thoughts. ‘What’s on the menu for lunch today?’

Greg got out his plastic box. ‘Cheese sandwiches.’

‘Me too. A gourmet delight that cannot be surpassed,’ Ray concluded. ‘Though Marla does make me eat that bloody fancy granary stuff. Why do women not know that cheese sandwiches should only ever be consumed when they’re made with white bread?’

Greg grunted. He quite liked granary bread.

‘They are different creatures from us, Gregor, my dear friend. Never let us forget that.’

‘No.’

Greg opened his lunch box and took out his sandwiches, and he and his friend worked their way through their snack, gazing out over the canal.

His only disappointment had been that his son Bobby had never shared his passion for fishing. He’d brought him along once or twice when he was about eight, but his son had been bored to tears. Greg had tried again when his son reached eleven, but the joys of angling never did catch Bobby in their thrall. He was into football – a sport that Greg didn’t understand at all. Perhaps he should have taken more time to learn to like it, as he felt that he didn’t know Bobby as his own father had known him – and that saddened him.

‘You’re a bit glum today,’ his friend observed. ‘Even for you. All well in the Ashton household?’