Shifting the heavy Victorian chaise-longue hadn’t been as straight forward as Eurig Dafydd had supposed; it had meant moving the formica topped table and the four mismatched dining chairs, and shoving the Welsh dresser over a couple of feet. He’d had to lift the rug too, because every time he lunged at the chaise it had ruffled and snagged around the carved oak legs. Twice he’d nearly given up and, slumping into the solace of the chaise’s worn leather, he’d wondered whether he might not leave the damn thing where it was; where it had stood for twenty odd years because Fflur had liked the view across the strait towards Caernarfon and the mountains. But Fflur wouldn’t be coming back to Cwningar. She’d settled for the house near Rhos in their quite amicable divorce and taken up with a new boyfriend, some doctor from Chester with an annual membership at an exclusive health club that entitled them both to sun-beds, saunas and squash. No more rambles with a Collins pocket flora for Fflur… no more midnight swims in Malltraeth Bay or beachcombing along Newborough Sands. She’d joined the Cheshire set.

Eurig had always preferred the view from the French window, where the three peaks of the Rivals scraped the sky beyond the acres of dunes and the sea, and where a path, just beyond the buddleia bush, cut its way through the August carpet of thrift and common sea lavender in the dune slacks, leading to the secluded beaches near Abermenai Point. With a final shove, he repositioned the chaise and from this new vantage point, lying on the cool leather to catch his breath, he watched two peacocks and a common blue in a complicated dance around the butterfly bush. After some time, the equally intricate moves of two boys, cruising one another as they made for the beach along the path, absorbed his attention. One of them reminded him of Seimon, and lest he should feel again the stab of his oldest son’s words, he sought to distract himself and attended to the rug that he’d slung over the back wall to air in the morning sun.