Being asked odd questions by small boys was not an unusual occurrence for Peter Noakes when on the beat. It was an occupational hazard which he rather enjoyed. He longed for promotion, but a small part of him knew that when that glorious day came, he would look back nostalgically at the strange unpredictability of the street.

Amid the rabble of children having ears clipped and fears calmed, Timothy Turner was unremarkable; a little better spoken, slightly more polite, but an unexceptional bundle of energetic arms and legs, with the tie neatly knotted in the morning and shirt tails escaping by the afternoon. He usually grinned, often waved and occasionally cannonballed into Peter or his colleagues, blurting out apologies immediately. However, he rarely asked questions. He had a resolute self-sufficiency, the origins of which Peter could guess at.

His expression was strange. Normally Peter would have greeted Timothy by thumbing his nose, but this nervous sincerity demanded more. "Hello, Timothy. What do you want to know?"

Timothy swallowed. "When you married Akela, who was your Best Man?"

Whatever question Peter had anticipated, it was not this. Smothering his amusement, he replied, "I can introduce you, if you like. Bill?" He beckoned another policeman, some yards down the street. "Timothy Turner, Constable William Mitchell. Constable Mitchell and I started our training on the same day, Timothy, and have been comrades ever since. Bill, this is Mr. Timothy Turner, Dr. Turner's son and the star musician in Camilla's Cub pack."

Constable Mitchell nodded to Timothy. "I remember you, young man. You'd played the violin in the nativity last year, didn't you?" Timothy nodded. "My niece was an angel. Very enjoyable. Nice to meet you. I hear your father's getting married?" Timothy nodded again, but the expression was wary. "Congratulations. Lovely news."

"Thank you," he replied politely.

The change in the boy's face had been slight, but had not been unnoticed by Peter. "Were you heading home Timothy or to the hospital to see your dad?"

"Home. Dad'll be at work for hours."

Catching the eye of his partner, he continued. "I was just about to patrol closer to your neck of woods, Timothy. Would you mind if I tagged along with you?"

As Timothy shook his head, the partners exchanged glances of total comprehension; a minutely raised eyebrow answered by a barely perceptible nod. Saying his goodbyes, Bill headed back up the street, positioning himself more centrally than before, with a fuller view.

Experience had taught Peter Noakes that however hard a conversation was, it was often a lot easier if you could have it without having to look at anyone. Timothy's fleeting expression concerned him: had he been asked, he would have said he expected Timothy to be delighted about his father's remarriage. The relationship between father and son was close, yet Timothy had always seemed very fond of Sister Bernadette; but that look had been one of anxiety, even pain. They had already sauntered around the corner into Warwick Road when he opened the conversation. "That wasn't quite what you want to know, is it?" he probed.

Looking straight ahead, Timothy shook his head. "No, not exactly."

"What is it, then?"

Timothy looked down awkwardly. "Was he, Constable Mitchell I mean, any good?"

Momentarily Peter wished the supplementary question had been asked when the man in question was present, simply for the fun of considering the question at great length, and the desire to laugh resurrected itself. "Yes. He was great."

"Why?"

Everything about Bill Mitchell had offended Lady Browne, from his accent to him offering her his arm to him recounting the first time they had arrested somebody during his speech: the offence had been indecent exposure. While everybody else, even Sister Julienne, had found it impossible not to laugh, Lady Browne denounced it as vulgar. This alone would have sufficed for Peter to consider Bill Mitchell as the best possible of best men, even without any of the other qualities he had brought to the role; but there had been many, all of which brightened one of his most precious memories.

"I suppose he was reliable and supportive and did all of the Best Man jobs without any fuss," he said.

Timothy's response was a truculent kick at a stone against the side of a shabby low wall, and thrusting his hands into his pockets. Peter now paused, leaning against the wall. "Timothy, sit down," he said, gesturing to a smoother section, in slightly better repair. The boy obeyed and he continued gently. "What is it that you're getting upset about? Is there something worrying you about your dad getting married again?"

"Yes." In silence, Peter digested this answer. Then the dam broke. "Dad asked me to be Best Man and I said yes, because he said it meant standing next to him in church and giving him the rings at the right moment and he said he wanted me to do it because it wasn't just about him and Sister Berna-, I mean Shelagh, getting married, but it was the three of us. But Jack says that being Best Man means lots of other things that Dad didn't tell me about like having a party in a pub and getting drunk and dancing with people and I don't know how to do those things, so I won't be any good and I'll spoil it, but I don't know how to find out what I need to do."

Peter looked away. He had imagined bitter jealousy and resurgent grief and his eyes danced with mirth at the gauche charm of the actual problem; but he was touched by the transparency of the boy's affection. There had been time enough during his vigil the night that Fred was born for Peter to consider with new eyes the bond between Dr. Turner and his motherless son.

Taking a seat beside Timothy, he peered into his face. "So, let's get this straight. You're worried because of something Jack Smith told you?"

"Yes."

"Do you think Jack's ever been a Best Man?"

"No," said Timothy, "but he's been to weddings. I've only been to one, years ago and I can't remember it."

"Alright," continued Peter. "But is Jack always right about everything?"

"No," Timothy conceded.

Peter started to grin. "Is he usually right?"

The smile was infectious and Timothy met his eye. "No, not usually." Now they were both grinning. "But it's not just taking care of the rings, is it? You just said Constable Mitchell did 'all the jobs' without any fuss and you wouldn't need to fuss about rings."

"You'd be surprised." Peter remembered one cousin's stag party, where the rings detached themselves from the Best Man, went for a private party and never returned, resulting in a last minute dash to a pawn shop the following morning. "Your dad's right, Timothy. There are other bits and pieces, sometimes, depending on the kind of wedding and what the people getting married are like, but the most important thing with any wedding is the service, when you say your vows and exchange rings and actually get married. So, the big job for any Best Man is to get the groom to the church, properly dressed, ready, with the rings and on time." Conspiratorially, he added, "And, to be honest, Timothy, we both know your dad: that last bit might be quite a big job to be getting on with." For the first time, Timothy laughed. "Agreed?"

"Yes. But," he added, "I still want to know what the other things are, so I can do them all properly. I don't want to spoil it. What are they?"

Peter strongly suspected that somewhere there was a man, a friend, colleague or relation, whom Dr. Turner would ask to carry out the public aspects of the role, or possibly the shy couple, already the subject of swarms of gossip, wanted to avoid them altogether in favour of a quiet ceremony. But the son's earnestness could not be palmed off with cheap refusals. "Alright, I'll tell you.

"There are three things a Best Man usually does: the most important thing is the bit in the church, which you know about. The other two, one's before the wedding and one's at the reception afterwards. Before the wedding you sometimes have a party where the groom's friends get together and have a bit of knees up to celebrate him getting married. It's called a stag do."

"Why? What's it got to do with deer?"

"Nothing to do with deer. You know, I've no idea why it's called that. It just is. It's supposed to celebrate the end of him being a bachelor." Trying to explain the concept of a last night of freedom was beyond him, Peter decided, even to a boy as intelligent as Timothy.

"But my Dad isn't a bachelor. He's a widower."

"Well, yes, so maybe he doesn't want a party and that's why he never mentioned it to you."

Timothy eyed him shrewdly. "Is that the party in a pub that Jack told me about?"

Peter acknowledged that it normally was. "Doesn't have to be though."

"Did you have one?"

"Yes."

"And was it at a pub?"

Once again, he conceded that truth.

"Did you enjoy it?"

What recollections Peter had of that lively night at The Pig and Whistle were somewhat hazy. From his knowledge of both Dr. Turner and his sweet, but rather prim, Shelagh, he imagined that sharing those memories with Timothy would not go down terribly well, even if he could remember them; Camilla had been happy to leave them among the mysteries of pre-married life. His affirmation was suitably vague, however it was enough for the shoulders next to him to droop once more.

"So I should have a party. But I don't know what you do at parties for grown-ups or how you make them happen and I'm not allowed to go to pubs."

"It doesn't have to be party and it doesn't have to be at a pub. Does your dad like pubs?"

Timothy wrinkled up his nose. "I don't know. I don't think he goes to them."

"Be a bit silly to have a party in a pub then, wouldn't it? Let's have a think." In the corner of his eye, Peter noticed two young men loitering, eyeing a bicycle by the kerb. "Why don't we walk? Walking helps me to think." Obligingly, Timothy jumped off the wall and pattered alongside Peter, who slowly started pacing down the street, watching the two young men move on with wry satisfaction. "The only rule with a stag do is that it's with the groom's male friends and you do something the groom likes." This was possibly stretching the truth, but would do for now. "So, you need to think of something that your dad does with his friends at the weekend or when he's not working."

"I don't think Dad's really got any friends."

Peter winced at the cruelty of the observation, more cruel because it was said without any intention of cruelty. Yet what made it still more distressing was that it was true. It was unusual for a day to go past when he did not hear the consumptive growl of the doctor's car hurrying from patient to patient to patient. He was at the centre of Poplar's little world, a cross between sage and saviour, but, for that very reason, was distanced from the community; a revered figure who served them, but an outsider. Guiltily, Peter wondered why he himself had never reached out in friendship towards the lonely man; he liked and respected him, shared his values, admired his care for his patients and their paths frequently crossed professionally. He knew him to be compassionate, assiduous and intelligent. There were differences of character and background, accent and education, but they were far less marked between Patrick Turner and himself than they were between himself and his wife. It was the unspoken difference which exaggerated the gulf between their generations making fifteen years in age seem as unfathomable as a continent: they had both served, but what similarity could there ever be between two years stationed in West Germany, which left him with only lively anecdotes and a loathing for pickled cabbage, and six years of war, about which he had never heard Patrick Turner voluntarily speak? He did not even know on which front he had served. There was something intangible which linked those who had endured the evils which Peter had only followed through black and white newspaper print and crackling accounts on the wireless and which no amount of empathy and imagination could replicate.

"Who does he spend his time with when he isn't at work, then?"

Timothy thought for a moment, then turned slightly pink and answered quietly. "Me."

"And what do the two of you do?"

The blush deepened. "Things that I like doing." He remembered the times he had complained about how much time his father spent at work, about how he was left behind, always second best. The spoken complaints were small streams in the waves of resentment ebbing within him. He had never before examined the small spare time his father had, never been confronted with the fact that it was spent ferrying him to Cubs or violin, cheering him as he wobbled along on his bicycle, bending over a meccano kit or playing board games with him. "He does the things I want to do."

Peter thought of little Fred mewling in his cradle and choked. "Well, that's it, then. You find something both of you like doing and the two of you do that as your celebration."

They continuing their pacing, each thinking of the man whom they loved most in the world: one worn down by work and suffering, the other tiny and unconscious that such things existed. "Dad likes plays," offered Timothy tentatively. "He and Mum used to go to the theatre before she was ill. Perhaps we could go to a play. And maybe Uncle David could come too. I suppose Uncle David and Uncle Kenneth are Dad's friends. They go fishing together sometimes, although it's a bit awkward because Dad doesn't like leaving the practice and Uncle David's busy because he works at a big hospital and Uncle Kenneth lives in Bristol. Dad likes fishing too," he mused, "but it would be too cold to go fishing now, wouldn't it?"

"Suspect so. But you're getting a plan now. And I bet your dad's brothers would help you with it."

Timothy shook his head. "They're not Dad's brothers. I just call them uncle. Uncle David, Uncle Kenneth and Dad all trained to be doctors together. Uncle Michael's my only proper Turner uncle. He's OK, but he lives quite far away too and since Granny Turner died, we don't see him very much. I think Uncle David would help. He's really good at surprises and presents. He took me to Lords once to see Middlesex play, and we always see him when we go Christmas shopping, because his hospital is near Oxford Street. He had lots of good ideas last year about what to get Dad."

Peter smiled. "Sounds ideal." He had no idea who Uncle David was, but the boy's easy affection suggested that he was entirely the right man to help guide him towards some appropriate event. Oddly, Peter also felt a pang of relief: somewhere, acquired some time, there were friends close enough to fulfil this role and Patrick Turner's life of duty had not left him entirely bereft.

As they came to the corner, they stopped. This was now the edge of the area which Peter could legitimately claim was on his beat and while there was a 'grocer's shop' nearby which deserved an impromptu visit, the seedy reasons why he was not prepared to explain to Timothy. He started to make his excuses, however Timothy's interrogation was not yet finished.

"Constable Noakes, what was the other thing?"

"Sorry?"

"You said there were two things. There was a party and there was something else, something which happened afterwards, at the - " he groped for the word.

"Reception?"

"Yes."

Somewhere nearby Peter heard a hum and a low rumble, like an aircraft. He knew its threatening pulse and was not thinking when he gave his careless answer. "Oh, it's a speech to all of the guests. At the reception there are speeches to entertain the guests." The hum rose further, then burst with a blow and a cry. "Excuse me, Timothy. Wait here!" And he sprinted, as far as he could sprint even after Fred's fitness regime, in the direction of the noise.

It took only a handful of minutes for three brawling teenagers to be separated and sent sulking back to their homes. It was ugly, not uncontrollable. However, in those minutes a different damage had been done. When Peter returned to the crossing, Timothy was still patiently standing there. He was only a few years younger than the boys Peter had just admonished, but a stark contrast: against their uncontained fury and a visceral desire to hurt was quiet obedience, motivated by love.

"I'm sorry about that," Peter began, then he observed Timothy's face. It was beyond whiteness; it was almost grey. "Are you alright?"

Timothy replied briefly. "Yes."

"Are you sure? You don't look well."

"No, I'm alright. Could you tell me about the speech, please?" Something had shut down within him. He was still polite and attentive, but the back of his eyes were haunted.

As Peter explained, he waited for awkward questions or acute observations. Yet, Timothy simply listened, occasionally nodding to show his comprehension. It was a new silence. Now Peter realised that in the first few moments after he outlined the 'other thing', he could have appeased this worry with humorous reassurance, but in his absence it had atrophied into fear. He recalled his words, wishing he could reclaim them as easily, introducing the topic more gently.

"So, it's a speech to everyone there about what Dad's like, and it should tell some funny stories about him when he was younger, but it should make the people who don't know him think he'll be a good husband? And it needs to be entertaining."

"It doesn't really matter if it's entertaining or not."

The pursed lips were unyielding. "But good ones are?"

Reluctantly, he answered. "Yes, but it doesn't have to be. It's better to be sincere." He was about to add a further encouragement, to dwindle the enormity of the task, when he was arrested by a change he saw occur in front of him. It was palpable. Almost physically Timothy's shoulders appeared to shift, while his face acquired a granite resolution.

"I see. Thank you, Constable Noakes."

"Timothy, if you don't want to do a speech, it'd be alright. Your dad would have told you all about it if it really mattered to him. And I'm sure you'll be great if you do one. Everyone told me you were fantastic in Robin Hood."

"It's not the same, though. When you're playing someone else."

"Not that different. It's still getting up and talking."

Timothy shook his head. "It's just," and the voice trembled, "if it's supposed to be entertaining, it's just - I wish I could just play my violin." He turned away and wiped his sleeve hastily across his nose. Unfooled, Peter considered reaching out an arm towards Timothy, but decided against it. Despite everything, what was most striking was not the boy's distress, but his determination.

Instead he waited until Timothy turned back, then briefly clapped him on the shoulder. "Everyone gets scared about giving speeches at weddings. I did."

"Really?"

"Really."

"Thank you. And thank you for telling me about everything. I need to go home now." In a brief pause, the determined look faltered. The eyes were enormous in the child's face. "Constable Noakes, if you've written one, could you help me write mine?"

Fear rose from the boy like a stench; Peter could not say no.

"Thank you very, very much. Goodbye."

As he watched the child turn and then trudge wearily down the street, Peter was oddly exhausted. Ruefully, he reflected that he had just experienced his first great lesson about the trials of parenting.