Brond (28 page)

‘What do you call a man who sticks his finger up an Englishman’s arse?’ I asked aloud, but the constable stared back in dismay.

He did not realise that it was a joke. He was right, of course. You always spoiled a joke if you changed the ending.

Ah’ve been hurt masel.

Now the rain was heavy. It soaked the ground and turned it black. It streamed down the policeman’s face. It ran in stone tears down the lion face of the prophet.

It fell like a judgement not on Brond but on Primo, the Scottish soldier, dead in the mud. But then when had it ever been Brond?