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, having enjoyed a romantic interlude, Laytah the call-girl and Dddwwychlyff (?) take turns trying to push each other out the Revolving©window. Now, the librarian spots Wolfcastle…

The Cardiff Grandma Chapter 22

Wolfcastle turned from the window abruptly, his mind a blur with thoughts. They had stood against something, that much was true. But that was a long time ago. He was different now, he’d changed. Not just older with more gray hairs and wrinkles – something inside of him had altered. And Ddwwchllyff - Ddwwchllyff had changed too, he used to be taller for one thing.

This combination of thoughts had suddenly returned to Wolfcastle’s mind as he walked back towards the centre of town. The Lada would be safe with the kid for a good few hours yet, five pounds still bought a fair degree of protection in that part of town, and besides he fancied stretching his legs a little.

At 5’ 10’ Wolfcastle had always been shorter than Ddwwchyllf – until the last time they’d met anyway. He couldn’t dwell on that just now, he had an appointment to keep and wanted to freshen himself up before then.

As he strolled back towards the city centre other thoughts entered his consciousness. It had been a strange few hours that was for sure. Why had Wong’s people been so jumpy? Was there something else going on that he didn’t know about? Did it matter? Did it matter that he didn’t know about it?

There was this appointment to keep, but first he still had to freshen up. But first he needed to get something to eat. There had been a lot of something to eat at Wong’s, and Wong had eagerly offered bits of it to his friend, but Wolfcastle had to use all of his diplomatic skill in turning it down. Hunger became a driving force now as Wolfcastle quickened his pace. But first he wanted to make a call. There was someone he wanted to check up on. But first he had to find a phone.

Earlier, while still with Wong, the position of the Earth in relation to the Sun had gradually, constantly, ongoingly shifted. Almost unperceptively, creeping ever onwards, advancing with every passing second of time… until, eventually, the Earth’s position was such as to make it seem as if the Sun had risen above the fog soaked horizon.

That was when it dawned on him!

He remembered something Ddwwchyllff had handed to him in the recent past. One of his hair-brain inventions. What had he called it? A ‘portable…’, no…a ‘mobile phone booth’©. Wolfcastle fished deep inside his jacket pocket and spooned out a small little cylinder that had been quietly tucked away all this time. The ‘igniter’ Ddwchyllff had called it. From his trouser pocket Wolfcastle then dug deep and slipped out the other component - ‘the booth’. The booth, in it’s unignited state, resembled a metal match box, without matches. From a quick examination it was plain to see where the igniter connected to the booth. Looking over his left shoulder to check whether anyone was watching (no one seemed to be), he cautiously screwed the two pieces together then placed them down on the pavement and stepped back.

There was a subtle gurgling noise, then a more unsubtle whooshing sound. Within seconds the mobile phone booth had inflated itself and was standing upright in front of the astounded Wolfcastle. He stepped inside, after once again checking that no one was watching (someone was, but he didn’t see her), and quietly slammed the door behind himself.

At the end of a night shift she couldn’t just crawl off home to bed. She needed time to unwind after© work. The librarian was routinely a creature of habit. One of her routine habits was to spend as long as it took to drink a few strong cups of tea doing exactly that. She had a favourite place to conduct this ritual - Piere’s bistro, a small little tiny back street coffee-shop. She liked it for several reasons, none of which are of importance.

As she sat there, relaxing after work, she suddenly remembered something. She reached into her shoulder bag and eased the mass of printed and copied pages out onto the small table at which she sat seated at. She skimmed over the dossier, her research. It was hard to ignore the conclusion she was inevitably going to conclude once she finished: when it came to student numbers someone was cooking the books (and may very well chop them up and serve them on a bed of fresh Alevut leaves for all she knew).

She just had to trace it all back and find out who was running the scam. And then…

…and then something odd had happened. Across the street a disheveled looking figure had stopped and placed a small box on the pavement and then stepped back. In the time it took to say ‘self-inflating’ the box had transformed into what certainly looked like a phone booth.

(to be continued…)