"Answer the lassie," Dean said, nudging me.

"No, I haven't," I confessed.

"Ya coward," said Lizzie.

"I'll tell her for you if you like," Droid offered (there is an entire generation of Andrews with the shared nickname of Droid, post Star Wars).

"Na," I said. "But she is just fabulous. I mean —»

"Why not tell her?" Liz asked.

"I'm shy," I sighed, hand on heart, eyes heaven-ward, lashes fluttering.

"Get out a here."

"So tell her," Ash said.

"Also," I sighed. "She's got a boyfriend."

"Ah-ha," Ash said, looking at her pint.

I waved one hand dismissively. "But he's a wanker."

"That's all right, then," Liz said.

I frowned. "Actually, that's the only flaw Verity seems to have; her lousy taste in men."

"So you are in with a chance then?" Liz said brightly.

"Yeah," I said. "I think she's going to chuck him."

"Prentice," Ash insisted, tapping the table. "Tell her."

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"Because I wouldn't know how to," I protested. "I've never told anybody I love them before. I mean, how do you? The words sound so corny, so devalued. It's so… it's just such a cliche."

Ash looked scornful. "What rubbish."

"Well, smarty-pants," I said, leaning over to her. "Have you ever told anybody you love them?"

"Hundreds of times, darling." Ash said in a deep voice, pouting. Dean guffawed. Ash drank from her pint, then shook her head. "Well, actually, no."

"Ha!" I said.

Ash leaned over to me, her long nose almost touching mine. "Tell the girl, you idiot."

"I can't," I said, sitting back. "I just can't. She's too perfect."

"What?" Ash frowned.

"Infallible. Too perfect; ideal."

"Sounds like misogynist romantic shite to rne," snorted Liz, who's always taken a hard line on such things.

"It is," I admitted. "But she's just incredible. D'you know where she was conceived?"

Dean and Ash exchanged looks; Andy spluttered into his beer while Lizzie rolled her eyes. "Aw yeah," Dean said, nodding and looking quite serious. "Doesn't everybody?"

I was shocked, and almost cut short my next gulp of beer. "You don't really, do you?"

"Course not, Prentice," Ash said shaking her head. Her long fair hair spilled from over one shoulder. "What diff —»

"Aw, it's just incredible," I told them. "Her mum told me; Aunt Charlotte. Bit of a nutter, but okay. I mean totally aff her heid really, but anyway — " I took another gulp of beer, " — she had this thing about psychic energy or some crap like that… and about Scottish history —»

"Aw; runs in the family, does it, Prentice?" Dean asked.

"Naw; she's not a McHoan… anyway; she'd married this English guy called Walker and they hadn't consummated the marriage, right, not on their wedding night; she wanted to wait, and when they did get it together she made sure it was in this wee village called Fortingall, right? Near Loch Tay. Thing is, she'd heard something about Fortingall being where Pontius Pilate —»

"Wait a minute," Dean said. "How long was it between them getting married and them humping?"

"Eh?" I scratched my head. "I don't know; a day or two. Oh! I mean, they'd done it before, like. It wasn't their first time or anything. It was just Aunt Charlotte's idea that it'd be more special if they hadn't done it for a while, and then did it under this tree. But they had been fucking before. I mean; good grief, this is the love generation we're talking about here."

"Right," Dean said, apparently mollified.

"Anyway; Fortingall is where some people say Pontius Pilate was born, and —»

"Whit?" Andy said, wiping his beard. "Away ye go."

"So they say," I insisted. "His dad was in the… shit… the seventh legion? The ninth? Damn… " I scratched my head again, looked down at my trainers (and thought with some relief that at least tonight I would not have the long struggle to undo the buckles and untie and then loosen the laces on the Docs, which were my usual drinking gear these days). "Or was it the seventh legion?" I pondered, still staring at my Nikes.

"Never mind if it was the fuckin" foreign legion," Droid said, exasperated. "You're no trying to tell us Pontius fucking Pilate was born in Scotland!"

"Well maybe!" I said, spreading my arms wide and almost spilling Ash's whisky. "His dad was in the legion stationed there! Apparently! I mean, the Romans had a military camp and Pontius Pilate's pa was stationed there, maybe, and so young Pontius could have been born there! Why not?"

"You're making this up," laughed Ash. "You're just like your dad; I remember those stories on a Sunday afternoon."

"I am not like ma dad!" I yelled.

"Hey, shoosh," Lizzie said.

"Well, I'm not! I'm telling the truth!"

"Aye, well," Ash said. "Maybe. People get born in funny places. David Byrne was born in Dumbarton."

"Anyway; Pontius Pi —»

"Whit?" Dean grimaced. The guy that wrote Tutti frutti?

"Listen; Pontius —»

"Na; that was John Byrne," Lizzie said. "David Byrne; the guy in Talking Heads, ya heidbanger."

"Look, anyway, forget Ponti —»

"Anyway, it was Little Richard."

"Will you shut up? This isn't about Pon —»

"What? In Talking Heads?"

"Shut up! I'm telling you; Po —»

"Na; that wrote Tutti Frutti."

"I give in," I said, sitting back. I sighed, supped my export.

"Aye, the song; but no the film."

"It wasnae a fillum; it was a series."

"Ah know, you knew what ah meant."

"I hate these drunken, rambling conversations," I breathed.

"Aye, but I've heard worse." Ash nodded.

"Anyway, it wasnae fillum at all; it was video."

"It was naawwwt!" Dean drawled scornfully. "Ye could see it was fillum! What sort a telly have you got?"

I crossed my legs, crossed my arms and swivelled to look at Ash. I rubbed my rather greasy face and focused on her. "Hi. Come here often?"

Ashley pursed her lips and studied the ceiling. "Just the once," she said, frowning at me. "In the toilets." She gathered my shirt lapels in her fist and pulled me close to her face. "So who talked?"

"Fnarr fnarr," I breathed over her. Ash's face wrinkled, quite attractively, actually. But then it was late.

"Hi youse," a deep voice said, bending over us. "Yer oan."

"On what?" I asked the very large fellow with very long hair who had spoken.

"The pool table; PM and AW; that's youse, is it no?"

"Shit, aye, right enough."

Ash and I went to play pool.

I'd been just about to ask her about the jacuzzi in Berlin, but now didn't seem like the right time.

Uncle Fergus had the observatory built back in 1974 (when the heavenly Verity was four). The idea was two-fold. First of all — according to my father — Fergus wanted a bigger and better telescope than he had. Dad had a three-inch refractor in a shed in the garden at Lochgair. Fergus ordered a six-inch reflector. Also, it was a business sample. The lenses and mirror were to be made in the new Specialist Glass Division of the Gallanach Glass Works, the Urvill-owned factory which even yet provides the town with a significant proportion of its employment. Not only, therefore, would Uncle Fergus have a fascinating and unique additional feature for his not-long restored castle, it would be both an advertisement for his Glass Works and tax-deductible!

The fact the telescope was a wee bit close to Gallanach itself, and so possibly prone to light pollution from the town's sodium vapour lamps, was less of a problem than it might appear; with Uncle Fergus's connections he could have the offending lamps shaded at the council's expense. So Uncle Fergus was prepared if necessary — and only selectively, of course — to dim his home town.

(His niece had already bettered that; when the diminutive, bloody and bawling form of Verity Walker had appeared on the scene, the lights had actually gone out.)