to explore.
‘Hey,’ said the man, smiling suddenly. It lit up his features and broke the mood immediately. He dropped a long arm to scratch the dog. ‘Is this Festival City?’
‘That depends,’ said Gwyneth. ‘Who are you?’
He looked around the room. ‘You know, you’re all so lucky.’
‘We’re what?’
‘I mean,’ he gestured to the scroll, ‘you’ve got this blank canvas, right? And this town … Man, anything you do to this town is going to make it better, isn’t it? You could put up a picture of this dog taking a leak and it would be more attractive than ninety-five per cent of the town centre.’
‘I like you,’ said Sven, coming forward.
‘But you could make it – God, absolutely fantastic! And that’s your job description, isn’t it? I mean, you’ve got so much potential. So much fun! Fairs and parties, and celebrations and flowers and …’ He stopped and collected himself for a moment. ‘Sorry. I’m getting carried away.’
‘No, go on,’ said Gwyneth, finding herself doing something uncharacteristic. Smiling.
‘Well, you can basically plan for anything – one town had a new tram network. One place made an entire square blue – the stones, the walls, everything. You take the money you have and find out what you can do, then Brussels puts up some more money, then lots of people come and bring money into the town and it all works brilliantly …’
Arthur turned round slowly from the window. ‘Sorry, but – who are you?’
‘Oh, sorry, hi – I’m Rafe.’
Arthur couldn’t sleep that night. Something felt wrong. Something wrong in the world … Of course all insomnia is melodramatic, he thought, staring at the flashing LED of his alarm clock. Three thirty-two a.m. Insomnia makes you feel you are the only person awake in the entire world. Of course, he could have got up and phoned his half-brother Kay, who lived in Australia and would be more than happy to hear from him in the middle of the afternoon … but no. He felt pinned to the bed, and even thinking nice thoughts about Gwyneth wouldn’t help him drift off.
Finally, in a fit of exasperation, he threw the covers off, got up and stared out of the window. All the windows in the executive estate were dark, every single one. Somebody must be up, he thought. Somebody, anybody, doing something. No babies? No parties? Yet there was nothing but the sodium lights of the tall street-lamps, and the distant hum of the motorway. Nobody moved. Nobody stirred. Arthur looked up to the stars, and imagined the world this quiet a thousand years ago, with everyone asleep when it got dark and up with the sun.
He shivered in the early morning cold, but didn’t go back to bed – now he was up, he actually felt rather peaceful. He liked the idea of the world quiet; full of possibilities and opportunities. Everyone asleep, optimistic about tomorrow – or at least, optimistic enough to sleep. A thought struck him. This would be a good time to see the place, see the absolute raw material he was dealing with – what the streets looked like empty. If this was going to be his town he should go out, take a look around it, examine it from the beginning with no hordes of teenagers or gangs of lads getting in the way, and no cars to block the view across the road. The more he thought about it, the more he felt it was a good idea. Even if, he realized, somewhere not too far away, it sounded like something was howling.
Ten miles away in her mother’s house, Fay had felt pulled awake at the same time as Arthur. Her first day at work hadn’t gone so bad … well, Ross hadn’t groped her. As such. But this was all going to be worth it for the look on Arthur’s face when she and Ross won the bid and left him crying on the street. Yeah. Her face took on a grim satisfaction and she turned over again on the single bed and fell asleep.
The darkness was hinting at dawn. Arthur looked at his own reflection in the window. God, yeah. That really was something howling. It did it again. Arthur reminded himself that wolves no longer roamed the countryside.
Sounded bloody weird, though.
‘We’re all going out at what time in the morning?’ said Gwyneth.
‘No sodding way,’ said Sven.
‘Listen to me,’ said Arthur, then realized he was begging, and that he was trying to remember about this whole respect issue, and took a breath.
‘Look,’ he said. ‘This came to me last night. It’s a great idea. We’re going to go out into the city when there’s nobody else there, and take a good long look at it. See what we’ve got to work with. It’s the only time of day we can do it – after the drunks and before the milkman. Plus, it’ll be fun. Maybe. No, yes it will. It’ll be like an expedition.’
‘Fine by me,’ said Cathy.
‘Great, that’s great!’ said Arthur. ‘Well done.’
‘I usually get up at that time to start the boys’ breakfast. And do the ironing, you know.’
‘I can’t, anyway,’ said Sven. ‘It would interfere with Sandwiches’ digestion.’
‘Yeah – might make it work,’ retorted Arthur.
‘Couldn’t you come without your dog?’ said Gwyneth.
‘No. He sleeps right across me.’
As if to demonstrate, Sandwiches crawled up and lay in the most ungainly fashion across Sven’s lap, a forlorn stubby pair of legs and a single ear hanging down either side.
‘That’s disgusting,’ said Gwyneth, committed vet.
‘I think it would be nice to have something to cuddle at night,’ said Cathy. Then everyone – including her – remembered she was actually married and already shared a bed with her husband and she blushed.
‘Yes, well,’ said Arthur briskly, ‘we’re going to take a look at a blank canvas; imagine what we could do if we set our minds to it. Too late for the drunks and too early for the milkman,’ he repeated. ‘Do milkmen still exist?’
‘You’re thinking of the bogeyman,’ said Gwyneth practically. ‘Milk, yes, bogeys, no.’
‘Speak for yourself,’ said Sven, with one finger up his nose.
Just then Rafe walked in, the only fresh-looking person in the room. Gwyneth had invited him along for the day to ‘see how the department works’ and he, amazingly, still seemed quite enthusiastic in the moments he could join them between hurrying to the toilet to cope with Cathy’s near-endless coffee provision.
Cathy looked at Rafe with that strange mixture of lust and motherly devotion only women teetering on the brink of menopause can conjure up for fresh-faced young men. ‘Hello, Rafe. More coffee?’
‘No, I’m fine thanks, Mrs P. What’s up?’
‘He’s trying to make us go out in the cold and dark.’
‘Why?’
Sven explained, and Arthur hovered in a corner feeling stupid. He’d planned to get them all whipped up with his enthusiastic oratory. Sven was making it sound as if he was transporting them
