Say Goodbye to the Boys (18 page)

XVIII

 

 

 

 

When it was all over, everything said, judgements passed, I went down to the
Ariadne
on a late spring day with a can of paraffin and set light to her. With Mash away in a place that would, I hoped, have a rhythm to its day not unlike that of the army's, the boat was mine, and only fire seemed right for her. Ceri, also home for the weekend, joined me on the dune; stood silent at my side to watch. It was no go for us. Now we could only meet to mess about, kid each other, although I wanted it to be otherwise, guessed she might too.

A hesitant fire at first, but once it had hold the
Ariadne
blazed there on the mud, dissolved before our eyes in great tongues of flame, her timbers exploding. Out of the town the children came running – Robert Owen, Sian Thomas, Captain X among them – and they danced around her for a while, then crowded close to us, turning now and then to me as if an explanation were due for so loud, so violent a burning. Laura and Will Wilkins had also arrived, as had Amos Ellyott, but he stayed to one side, the man apart, sensing more ambiguities, I was certain, in this final, boyish act. I doubted if he would be thinking, as I was, of the day of MT's sports day, when the children were like skaters on that sodden track, and Emlyn and Mash out with the towels, and the shrieks, and the legs flying, and the laughter, and the searches in the long grass for the ones who had got lost.

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Parthian

The Old Surgery

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SA43 1ED

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This ebook edition first published in 2012.

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© Mari Stead Jones

 

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