AMP: Artists' Meeting Place and Resource Collective

For earlier Chapters and an explanation of this dreadful story, see blog: The Cardiff Grandma. WARNING: This novel contains fake Welsh.
In the previous episode, we learn too much about Dr Snought and his unhealthy avuncularism toward concocted foreign students.

The Cardiff Grandma Chapter 18A

Wolfcastle turned from the window abruptly, snapping his eyes away from the fog. The fog. It seemed it had always been there.

“So it is agreed then?” said the speaker in a questioning tone, seeking confirmation from the other man

“Yes, OK” was Wolfcastle’s reluctant reply. What had he just agreed to?

Wong wasn’t involved in the Awful BusinessTM, not as far as Wolfcastle was aware at least. He was a big figure in the rug smuggling trade though. Second only to the now non existent dog smuggling racket, smuggling rugs had recently become the major problem for the police to deal with. Wong was old and wise, he knew the score. He just had to bide his time and wait – it would only be a matter of weeks before the government would refuse to recognize that as a crime too. In the meantime there was still good money to be made from importing Moroccan, Columbian and Mongolian floor coverings. Three square feet of hand woven Ulan throw could earn a hefty profit for those willing to pay someone to blackmail someone else to take all of the risks of smuggling it.

As Wolfcastle told his tale, of what had occurred, how it had lead him back to Wales once more and what he wanted to do next, Wong had done what came natural to him – listened. The multiple and rapid fluctuations in air pressure that reached Wong’s ear drums were, almost instantly transferred to his middle ears and amplified approximately twenty two times before moving on to his two hair-filled, fluid-packed cochlea and up towards his brain. There the vibrations were translated into recognizable units and pieced together to form what experts call language. Then the old man had eagerly offered to give Wolfcastle his support.

It hadn’t been asked for and Wolfcastle had been somewhat embarrassed at the time. What was he meant to do with the old man’s surgical truss? All the same, he wasn’t about to offend by declining the offer, and it was good to know he could rely on his old compatriot – even if it was just for secondhand medical items.

(to be continued)