‘And Betty?’ John said.

‘Nothing’s going to happen to Betty unless you’re around.’

A damp cottage in mid-Wales miles from anywhere, outdoor privy, spring water, Rayburn cooker. Just the job. There was a wireless, but nothing else. The beds were old, the furniture shabby. The previous owner had died and his children rented the house out.

‘Born in it,’ they’d said as they handed him the key. ‘It was his father’s before him. Goes right back, it does. Great-grandfather and all. Was a wooden house once, you know? Our father bricked it in. That’s why it’s called Larch Cottage.’

‘Nothing to do with the forest then?’

‘Oh no. These were put up for the navvies working on the railway. Jerry-built, the lot of them.’

It was by chance he’d found it, really, stuck a pin in a map. Pantydwr. A bit of a palaver to get there, especially with his bicycle and rucksack, but now he was settled in, it couldn’t be better. The land sloped down to the Marteg.

‘It’s illegal to fish, though.’ All he saw were tiddlers anyway, and keen-eyed kingfishers. He woke in the morning with the chatter of the house martins, went to bed with the screech of the barn owl. There was a farm up the road which sold eggs, and it was a short bike ride to the village for the basics and a newspaper.

He was used to living by himself. Once he had a routine, it wasn’t so bad. Out by day, cycling or walking, packing a sandwich and a thermos of tea, rain or shine. A pint after supper in the pub. The landlord was called Berwyn, spoke Welsh to the locals, English to him.

‘From London, eh? I expect it’s a bit quiet for you round here.’

‘That’s what I want,’ John said. Anatoly wouldn’t find him here.

‘You’re not married then?’

John shook his head, sipped his beer.

There was an old man in the corner with grey whiskers and unkempt hair. His brown trousers were tied up with binder twine and his baggy tweed jacket was ripped at the shoulder seams. A Welsh collie with matted fur curled at his feet.

The barman beckoned John close, eyeing the man in the corner.

‘If it’s peace and quiet you want,’ he said, ‘avoid Dai. He may be the richest farmer round these parts but he talks the hind legs off a donkey.’ He smiled. ‘I’d go outside if I were you.’ Added, ‘Before he spots you.’

John sat on the bench, leaning against the wall, soaking in the evening sun. Perhaps he could jack in his job, get another one round here? Teach in the village school? Live in the cottage, get a dog for company. Who would ever find him?

Anatoly.

Though how Anatoly had traced him was a mystery.

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