up here with his brother, Noel: jumping their bikes over the hillocks and dells in North End Woods, dismounting to battle with other kids, their weaponry sticks and acorns, then charging through the under-growth – sloshing into the boggy hollows. Finally they would freewheel towards home down Wildwood Road, past the big houses with their glossy privet hedges, cooling Jags and Rollers ticking in the driveways. _Right Wildwood Road. Left North End Way. Comply Jack Straws Castle_... _Comply_... _comply with your fucking restraining order, you dickhead! If you do it again and they catch you, you'll be in a fucking sweat box!_ Dave's headlights washed over a gaggle of seven-year-olds who were tumbling out of the new-old coaching inn. They were batting a white balloon between them. Abuilt and the photos transferred over from General Roy's – but Dave doubted it. Cabbing was always an unhealthy occupation, sitting on the shuddering seat, all the dreadful humours gathering in your belly and legs as the stress flowed in through ears and eyes and hands on the steering wheel. _Piles – that's what you get from all that sitting_... _piles_... _that's why they're such arseholes. Cabbies aren't anything much anyway – they think they're professionals, but they aren't. They're mostly ex-something else, ex-coppers, ex-army, ex-crims, ex-bloody-boxers – and then they end up here on the wall at the airport, ex-fucking everything_.

A screen was wedged high up in the corner of the dining area showing the lane movements in the second feeder park. This was bigger than the