Six weeks after Colin's death…
The sun is coming up, gradually filling the room with light, and in the branches of the old oak outside, a blackbird is singing, the liquid notes sweet and clear on the early morning air. I have been huddled on the window seat for most of the night, unable to sleep and unwilling to try for fear of the dreams that haunt me. Soon the household will begin to stir, but for now, everyone else is asleep. Turning back to the window, I notice that the moon is still hanging in the pale sky, not yet vanquished by the sun, even though it is now streaking the high cirrus clouds with rosy brightness. Sun and moon, glimpsing each other briefly at the turning of each dusk and dawn, but fated never to meet… how lonely they must be. Heavy of heart, I look away from the window and close my eyes, trying to muster up the strength to embark upon this most difficult of days. I still can't believe that we have had to wait this long, but it's finally upon us: Colin's memorial service, and I have not the faintest idea how I am going to get through it.
The private family funeral had taken place a month earlier, but as an active officer of the security services, I had been forbidden to attend; to the outside world, Colin had worked for the Department of Trade and Industry as an IT technician, and his death was passed off as a suicide, as we had predicted. Things at Five are still far from normal following Collingwood's attempted coup, and all of us in Section D have been ordered to maintain heightened levels of personal security. The day after the end of the crisis, Harry had rescinded my permission to visit Colin's family and break the news, instead deciding to send Adam. "He's a far better choice," he had told me, "because he's not emotionally involved, and he can keep a poker face in any situation. Believe me, it's for the best," he had assured me calmly, as I stood in the doorway of his office and indignantly asked for an explanation. "Come to that, you're to have no more to do with the Wells family, d'you understand? Leave them to grieve in their own way. Knowing that Colin was murdered by a bunch of far-right conspirators plotting to overthrow the state won't help them."
I had stared at him in astonishment, unable to believe what I was hearing. "I can't just vanish from their lives…these are people I have known for years! They won't understand. I have to see them, to pay my respects… I was their son's best friend. I accept that I can't go to his funeral, but Harry, please. I need to do this." He had finally looked up from his screen to fix an opaque amber gaze on me. "I'm sorry, Malcolm, but the answer is no." Burying my clenched fists in my trouser pockets, I had enquired bitingly, "May I at least know the reason why?" Harry had sat back, put his hands behind his head, and scrutinised me from head to toe. "Because you're too close to the situation; because you know that you have to end your association with Colin's family now, and putting off the inevitable won't help, and because I've just given you a direct order which I expect you to obey implicitly." My mouth had fallen open in shock: has he really just pulled rank on this? Impassive, Harry had watched my reaction, before turning back to the ever-present pile of paperwork. "If that's all, Malcolm…" he had added dismissively, and I had belatedly remembered the other reason I was there.
"Actually, it's not. I can't find Jill anywhere. Not at her school, not at the address we have on file. You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?" Harry had made a noise of vague enquiry, not looking at me. "Jill, Jill Robinson, Colin's girlfriend? I need to tell her what's happened; I promised him." That does get his attention. "You promised him? How, exactly?" I gulped uneasily, realising I have said too much. "Oh, you know. We had a standing agreement." Harry had nodded – such pacts are common in our line of work – and then said, "Miss Robinson has been... relocated. She got an offer she couldn't refuse, the job of a lifetime. And that's all I'm going to say." I had blinked in surprise, my brain racing to make sense of the words. "Where is she, Harry?" He had shrugged, "Somewhere far, far away from London, or so I'm assured." Taking a deep breath for control, I had forced myself to remain calm, even while my nails dug into my palms and my chest grew tight. "Harry. Does she even know that Colin is dead?" I could still hear Colin's voice telling me that she was going out of her head with worry… but Harry's attention had wandered back to his screen. "Hmmm? Oh, yes. Ruth went to see her, I believe." Oh, no. I can just imagine what Ruth would have told her…she's never liked Colin to begin with… "I see." And I had turned on my heel and left the inner sanctum without another word. Harry bloody Pearce, always one step ahead… oh, Colin, I'm so sorry.
A sharp buzzing noise cuts across the morning peace, and sighing, I pad, bare-footed, to the intercom by my bedroom door, and peer at the screen, before pushing the comms button. "Bore da," I greet my aunt, who is standing outside the door that shuts off my wing from the rest of the house. "Bore da, love. Can I come in? I've brought you a cup of tea." I deactivate the lock, and she swings through, carrying a tray in both hands. The heavy door shuts silently behind her, but not before I catch the faint sound of sobbing. Mother, it would seem, is awake too. "How is she today?" I enquire, taking the tray from my aunt as I meet her at the entrance to my bedroom, and gesture for her to join me on the window seat. "Not good; one of her nurses is with her now," Aunt Emily informs me, "the poor thing, she can't have slept a wink," by which I understand that she is referring to whichever one of the three private nurses whom I have hired to provide round-the-clock care, rather than my mother, who is given a nightly cocktail of drugs that any bright young thing from Chelsea would envy. "Gerald is up, too. He's gone for a run on the Heath, seeing as it's such a nice morning."
I wrinkle my nose at the mention of Gerald: Gerald is not my idea, but my mother had been insistent that she needed a bodyguard. Wide-eyed, and plucking nervously at the embroidered lapels of her dressing gown, she had gasped breathlessly, "You don't know what it was like, Malcolm, the shock almost killed me. I was hospitalised, for heaven's sake! Besides, you're not here most of the time, and I'm in fear of my life… they know who I am, and they could come for me, any moment. It's all right for you, you're used to living with mortal danger, but I'm not, and my heart couldn't stand another fright like I had that night when…when…when…" and she had dissolved into noisy tears. Unable to cope with her histrionics in my own grief-stricken state, already feeling guilty, and wanting nothing more than for her to stop, I had reluctantly agreed, and so Gerald, ex-Marines, ex-Scotland Yard, ex-Royal Protection Squad, and looking as fit as a fiddle in his early forties, had arrived to accompany my mother wherever she went, to patrol my grounds, and to provide her with the sort of reassurance that I, her own son, was apparently unable to, even with my best technological wizardry. I suppose I should be grateful to him, really, but I find his presence under my roof intolerably irksome, for reasons I don't care to examine too closely at present. He's utterly professional and totally discreet; indeed, I'd hardly know he was there, if I was used to living with a houseful of staff, but I'm not, and I'm finding the adjustment very hard after a lifetime spent seeking only peace and privacy. Still, needs must…
Somehow, I had managed to drive down to Bournemouth on the night of Aunt Emily's phone call, peering blearily through the windscreen as the dark miles had reeled past, and the next day I had visited Mother in the San, where Aunt Emily had managed to have her sectioned following her sojourn in the downstairs loo, alternately screaming Jocelyn Meyers' name like a banshee and tremulously threatening to 'harm herself,' until the paramedics had battered the door down and sedated her. The visit had not gone well, so I had requested an urgent meeting with the Head of Psychiatry. "She's had quite a shock, Mr Wynn-Jones, and as you know her heart isn't good. Absolute rest and quiet, and proper care, that's what's needed now. It's not a matter of more medication, but of calming her, addressing the underlying issues, and restoring normalcy in her life. If even half of what she's told us since she was admitted is true, then she's had quite the time of it with this Meyers chap. Apparently she's been passing herself off as a member of the aristocracy – this Lady Angela Anglesey persona of hers, you know. This Meyers chap had met her at the Bournemouth bridge club's annual charity event last November, and well, things just developed from there, according to her. They've evidently had some ongoing sort of… well, liaison, is probably the best word for it. She's started to put together a fairly coherent version of events now, we think, but as you'd be aware, she is very much given to fabricating fantasies, so we're taking what she says with a healthy pinch of salt, naturally. Once she's stabilised, I recommend that she be removed immediately from Bournemouth, with the caveat that she either enter residential treatment in London, or receive continuous care at home." Naturally, I had rejoined silently, appalled at what I was hearing, before wearily asking for details of what would constitute an acceptable level of in-home care. She is my mother, after all, and tempting as the idea of checking her into somewhere like the Priory Clinic was, I wanted her at home, where the silence and loneliness have become oppressive and every room holds memories of Colin or Ruth, or both. When Aunt Emily had offered to come up to London and help, the decision had become more palatable.
"You're a very long way away, dear. A penny for your thoughts?" Aunt Emily's voice breaks gently into my reverie, and I meet her warm brown eyes with a start. "Oh, I've just been wool-gathering. Thinking about this and that…" I peer down into the now-tepid contents of the mug in my hand, noticing that she has used the Doctor Who mug I had brought home from Colin's desk. I had given it to him, after all, his first Christmas on the Grid: it had seemed only right that I reclaimed it. It's the one with K-9 and the Fourth Doctor on it... he had been Colin's Doctor, the one he had grown up with, and he had loved K-9, too. We had often discussed building one of our own… but there had never been the time, and now, there never would be. "Malcolm, please tell me why you're so sad this morning, for I can't bear to see you like this." I look up, and rather to my surprise I realise that are tears rolling off the end of my nose and plopping into my tea. "It's today," I finally confess, and there is a tiny noise of understanding. Aunt Emily is the only one I have told about Colin; Mother is incapable of taking in anything that isn't about her own situation, at present, and the hired staff certainly doesn't need to know. "Oh, my dearest heart, I'm so sorry. Would you like me to come with you?" I would, very much, but I shake my head. "That's very kind, but you'd best not. I haven't cleared it with work and, and, besides, I think I need to do this myself."
My aunt sets her teacup down and reaches across to take the hand not clutching Colin's mug. "You do too much on your own, Malcolm. Let me come with you. I'll sit right up the back if you want, but I think someone needs to be there for you. He was your very best friend, and he died in the most dreadful circumstances." I can't refuse her again, not when she's smiling at me like that; and besides, Dr Chapman's words about letting people help me are echoing in my ears. "All right, I'd like that, Aunt Em. It's at eleven o'clock, so we'd better get ourselves underway." She stands up, and when I have also risen to my feet, she opens her arms. "Come here, then," she says in Welsh, and I do, returning her embrace gratefully. "Right, you'd best away and get ready, and I'll go and tell Milly that I'm going out, and see that her day nurse has arrived. Shall I ask Mrs Murchison to make something for you?" Mrs Murchison had been my aunt's idea: upon arriving with Mother, she had been horrified by my gaunt appearance and kitchen devoid of anything except tea, and had insisted on hiring a cook. "Your mother's certainly not well enough, and I can't be spending all day in the kitchen, not when she needs a close eye kept on her. And you really have grown terribly thin."
She is only speaking the truth: in the last month, I have lost almost a stone and a half, and my clothing hangs on me as on a scarecrow. Food holds no appeal for me, for it all tastes like cardboard, further dulling my almost non-existent appetite. And so Mrs Flora Murchison has been installed, to my aunt's quiet satisfaction: a tall, elegant-looking Scotswoman in her sixties, with a long history in private service, and an imperturbable manner that has come in handy when dealing with my mother. "Erm, just toast, I think. I'm not very hungry." Aunt Emily sighs, "Mrs Murchison is a Cordon Bleu cook, but all you ever ask for is toast. What about a nice omelette, or some porridge with brown sugar and cream? It would do you the world of good." I shudder at the thought of anything other than plain toast, with perhaps a scraping of butter. "I'm sure she is an excellent cook, but I really couldn't. Not today." And with that, my aunt gathers up the tray of tea things, and leaves with a final, reassuring wink. Despite the terrible sadness that accompanies my every waking moment and fills my dreams, the ordeal that lies ahead suddenly doesn't seem so insurmountable, now that I no longer have to face it alone.
It had been a terrible shock, coming so close on the news of Colin's death, to learn that the man my mother had been alluding to for months was not only real, but was none other than Sir Jocelyn Meyers, ex-ambassador to Russia, ex-Board member of Gastream, and now Mrs Amelia Wynn-Jones's ex-lover, by her own account, even though I have had the greatest of difficulty in trying to understand what a man like Meyers, with his predilection for young, sleek, Slavic blondes, could possibly have seen in a woman like her. There's nowt so queer as folk, Colin would have said, adopting a Northern accent and rolling his eyes in mock-horror at the thought. Instead, I had rolled my own eyes like a frightened horse, and wondered wildly who else could have known. With a flash of intuition I had recalled how unusually hostile toward me his daughter Ros had been when we were presenting her with the evidence of her father's criminal activities the other day, and my heart had actually missed a couple of beats, before logic reasserted itself and dismissed it as a mere coincidence. She had been hostile and unpleasant to everyone; this seemed to be her default modus operandi, and a good thing, too, or else I would have felt compelled to tell Harry about my mother's liaison, and that is a prospect I do not relish. I can just imagine what he would say…
As I had driven out of London that night, I recollected that my mother had first met Meyers as Lady Angela Anglesey in Bournemouth, and she would no more have admitted her deception to him as their association continued than she would have spontaneously donated her beloved mink coat to Oxfam. I was reasonably sure that no-one in Meyers' circle would have known who she was, or her connection to an officer of MI-5. Even so, I have been consumed with guilt, both personal and professional, ever since. I should have found out who he was; I should have taken better care of her. I should never have left her alone so much, for I know that she had acted as she had out of loneliness, as much as from her own over-active imagination. Instead of being completely caught up with Ruth, I should have insisted on knowing who he was, from the very beginning, and then vetted him myself; I should have been the spook I was trained to be. I should have been a better son… shaking myself out of the sudden, heavy lethargy that has descended, making every limb feel leaden and my heart the most leaden thing of all, I make my way slowly towards the bathroom, and begin my ablutions.
I have taken the day off, unlike the rest of Section D, who will come straight from Thames House, and we arrive at St Margaret's in good time. Five's usual church had been unavailable due to restoration works, and so alternate arrangements have been made. With my father's well-worn copy of Tennyson under my arm, I walk wearily into the fine old building, and find a pew towards near the chancel, under the glorious sixteenth-century window. The sense of peace which always finds me in church eludes me today, though, and not all the beauty in the world can dispel the darkness that fills my soul, nor lift the heaviness from my heart. My aunt sits quietly beside me, and together we wait. After a few minutes, she nods towards the book. "In Memoriam?" she asks, and I nod. "At first, I thought something from Milton, but this…this just felt like a better fit. Of course, if it was up to Colin, I'd be reading the entire Hitchhiker's Guide… he wasn't much for poetry." We sit in companionable silence for a while longer, watching the sunlight turn the myriad fragments of coloured glass into kaleidoscopic patterns, shifting on the worn paving stones, and I feel nothing. Nothing but loss and sorrow and a great aching emptiness at the core of my being; I fear that there is only anger and grief and loneliness left, and as if there will never be anything else.
None of which is helped by the arrival of Section D, trooping in after Harry. Ruth follows hard on his heels, looking neither left nor right as she slides into the front pew next to him; Harry nods at the others in a perfunctory fashion. I feel Aunt Emily stiffen beside me. "Isn't that Rachel? My word, she's moved on rather fast. Who is that much older man she's with?" Before I can reply, the congregation is getting to its feet at the vicar's invitation, and the strains of Abide with Me issue forth from the organ. Why do they always begin these services with Abide with Me, I wonder, as for the first time in my life I sing the words without one scrap of feeling, as hollow inside as one of the great instrument's own pipes. I'm unable to take my eyes from the pair in front of me; Ruth is subtly getting as close as she can to Harry without actually touching him, and he seems to be leaning more and more towards her, for his part. The hymn drones to a close and we all sit obediently as the clergyman reads – of course – the twenty-third Psalm. Colin would have been rolling his eyes at all this hypocrisy, I tell myself, feeling strangely unsettled and unable to focus as the sonorous voice rolls over the well-known words, even with Aunt Emily's comfortable presence beside me. As Harry climbs stiffly to his feet and makes his way towards the pulpit to give his reading, I spot Ruth giving his hand a surreptitious squeeze of encouragement, and the lines from Whitman go unnoticed as I wrestle with an overwhelming temptation to knock both their heads together for treating Colin's memorial service like…like…like a date. How dare they… I am jolted out of my rage-filled thoughts by Aunt Emily nudging me. "I think it's your turn, love." Looking up, I see the vicar waiting expectantly, and I gather my wits and my Tennyson, and slip out of the pew.
Trying to calm myself, I survey the faces that I know so well, in amongst the administrative staff, the colleagues from other sections, the representative from the DG's office: Adam, pain showing only in his eyes; Zaf, with Jo tucked in next to him, both unusually solemn; Aunt Emily, smiling encouragement; Harry, his face carefully bland; and Ruth, who is not looking at me at all, but is taking the opportunity to observe him from beneath demurely lowered lashes. I open the book of poetry to the place I have marked, and in a shaky voice, begin to read, stumbling over the lines.
Our little systems have their day;
They have their day and cease to be:
They are but broken lights of thee,
And thou, O Lord, art more than they.
It's no good; I can't do this. I can't stand here and spout nineteenth-century poetry for Colin, the most modern man I know… not with Ruth sniffling loudly as Harry passes her his handkerchief for her to cry crocodile tears into, and Jo's eyes filling with genuine tears, and…and…and Colin's gone, and not all the words in the world will bring him back. I can't do this… Just as I am about to concede defeat and slink back to my seat, I notice that the light in the church is changing, becoming warmer, somehow, brighter, the colours in the great stained glass window in the chancel shining more vividly… and there, sitting right at the back of the nave, is an elderly gentleman in an old-fashioned suit, a watch-chain looped precisely through his waistcoat, watching me with bright brown eyes. He gives me a tiny nod as our eyes meet, and there is such understanding, such infinite depths of sorrow and wisdom and recognition in his gaze that I feel as if there are just the two of us in the church. I can almost hear that deep, rich voice saying, in his indomitable way, Ah, lad. I can see this one's took you bad, this one goes deep. A good mate, then. I've had more than me fair share of these days meself. It's like losing a bit of yourself. You've got to honour 'is name, remember 'im always, and then, why, you must pick yourself up an' go on for both of you. We all just 'ave to muddle through, day by day. You must, you know, when there's a war on…
I shut the book loudly, and the congregation starts at the sharp sound. "I'm sorry, but I can't go on. Colin hated all this fake piety and solemnity, hymns and readings and po-faced gatherings in the pub after. Colin was my very best friend, and now he's gone, and the least I can do is to honour his memory in the best way I can think of, by telling you what he was really like. Most of you only knew him as a geek, a back-room egghead, making gadgets and doing crosswords; but he was so, so much more. Colin Wells was the most extraordinary human being, and I'll tell you why. With his abilities, he could have been the next Tim Berners Lee or Bill Gates; but instead, he humbly chose to use that fierce intellect to serve his country, and he deserves our deepest gratitude. Jo, you're here today because of the MP3 early warning system that Colin devised for you – the last thing he ever did – Adam, Colin's diligent surveillance on ops has saved your life a dozen times over; Zaf, it was Colin's hacking skills that enabled you to pull off all those dirty tricks on the British Way, and so many other ops besides; Ruth, Colin was the first to pick up what was really going on with Forrestal's cyber-terrorism; and Harry, God knows, the country owes him many times over for all the lives he saved quietly, from the tech suite or the surveillance v…van, simply by being the very best at what he did, until he was murdered for no other reason than because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, his future stolen from him by brutal men, because they thought that they could do so with impunity. I will never forget that Colin Wells paid the ultimate price for doing the work he loves: his life, indeed, all of our lives, are worth so much more than that." I pause, throat tightening, and use my handkerchief to stem the hot tears that are threatening to fall; I'm surprised to see several listeners also dabbing at their eyes or nodding in agreement, before going on, "He wasn't all about his work though. The Colin I knew had a wicked sense of humour, and a ready smile; he'd do anything for his family, or a friend. He loved Arsenal FC body and soul, and Doctor Who just a little bit more than that. He was absolutely brilliant, and kind, and funny, and a thoroughly decent human being. He was my brother in all but blood, and I shall miss him more than words can say. Ave atque vale, Colin. And now, I would like to close with something from his favourite book."
At the back of the church, two bright brown eyes twinkle approvingly, as I take a long breath, and then begin, "Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western galaxy, lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea…" And from nowhere, and everywhere at once, comes the peace that has eluded me for so long, washing over me like the coolest, most refreshing water after being lost in the desert of my own desolation, trickling into my desiccated spirit and reviving my soul. The more I recite from the Hitchhiker's Guide, the more peaceful I feel, as I honour my friend in the way he would have wanted; the old churchwarden nods at all the right places, beaming benevolently, and some of the hardest knots in my stomach, my shoulders and my back begin to loosen for the first time since learning of Colin's death; the relief I feel is inexpressible. Like an overstrained rope, finally given slack; like a beast of burden turned out into the field, instead of back into harness; like a condemned man who knows the end is coming, and is unexpectedly, miraculously reprieved.
When it's over, when the Lord's Prayer has been recited and the blessing given and Amazing Grace has been mumbled, rather than sung, by a congregation unsure of all the words, I apologise to Aunt Emily in advance for leaving her alone, before hastening to the very last pew; but he has gone. Wondering if I was seeing things all along, I sink down onto the smooth, polished wood. Wood that is strangely warm, seeing that it is at the back of the nave and in the shadows; wood that seems to hum and resonate with unseen energy, as I touch it wonderingly. When I feel a hand rest lightly on my shoulder, I jump, before looking up, expecting to see a pair of bright brown eyes set in a wrinkled face; instead, the eyes that meet mine are a true, clear green, with not a wrinkle to be seen around them. "You spoke very well," Doctor Sally Chapman tells me, "but it's a pity that you haven't yet come to see me, or made an appointment with Diana Jewell." It's true: I haven't, unable to face the thought of dissecting my grief in a clinical setting. "Is that why you're here?" I ask, dreading the answer, and she shakes her head as she sits down beside me. "I'm not quite that desperate for patients," she smiles, "but I am worried about you, Malcolm, and I think you need to talk to someone." She sits back in the pew, crossing long legs clad in elegant black slacks. I know she's right, but I insist, "I'm fine, truly I am." Doctor Chapman scans my face keenly, and sighs, "You're a terrible liar. I'm sorry, but I'm suspending you – on compassionate leave, medical leave, or French leave – take your pick. You're a liability in your present state of mind, and your colleagues are concerned." I look at her sharply, and she adds, "Well, one of them is, at least. Jo's a loyal friend, isn't she?" And with that, she unfolds herself from the pew. "I'll expect to hear from you shortly, then."
I don't know how long I sit there in the semi-shadows with my head in my hands as I stare at the flagstones beneath my feet and contemplate everything that has just happened, but when I hear my aunt's voice asking "Malcolm, are you all right?" I realise that everyone else has gone. No doubt they've made all haste to the Cricketers Arms… I really should join them, but oh, the thought of it… Ruth and Harry, sitting smugly in a corner together, Adam and Zaf telling off-colour jokes as they always do after the enforced solemnity of the memorial service, Jo watching me with those big blue eyes full of solicitude when she thinks I'm not looking… I can't, I just can't. Aloud, I reply, "I'm sorry, but would you mind terribly if we just went home? I… I'm not feeling up to joining the others, I'm afraid." My aunt reaches out to take hold of my shoulder, and what she says next is startling. "Oh, but that's just why you must, you know." My eyes meet hers, shocked at her seeming lack of compassion, and she continues, "All your life you've hidden from other people, avoided social situations, and kept yourself to yourself. Now, I know why you do it – I saw you growing up, after all – but sometimes, Malcolm, we must rise above ourselves, and this is one of those occasions. How do you think it will look if Colin's best friend doesn't attend his wake, and give him a proper send-off? No, it won't do. So you'll go, and raise a glass to him, and you'll put your best foot forward and never mind that little minx, or any of them." And before I can protest, she is propelling me out of the pew, her small hand surprisingly strong on my shoulder. "Besides, the lady who was talking to you will be there, won't she, the one who looks like Rita Hayworth?" Blinking, I stammer, "Y…y…yes, Doctor Chapman might be there," and Aunt Emily treats me to a blinding smile as she tightens her grip. "Gadewch i ni fynd , fy nai."
From the darkest recesses of the church, I think I hear the faintest echo of the churchwarden's earlier words: You've got to honour 'is name, remember 'im always, and then, why, you must pick yourself up an' go on… you just must, you know, when there's a war on… and then I am outside, with the July sunlight blazing down, glittering off the wide brown river as we cross the Jubilee footbridge, and walk along the South Bank to the Cricketers' Arms, and the little gathering around the tables beside the water. "What's that you're humming, love?" Aunt Emily asks, and I blush bashfully. "Oh, just something that Colin would have liked instead of a hymn, I expect," and go back to humming the next few bars, while I allow myself to imagine that a dearly familiar figure lopes easily beside me, the golden light of summer glinting on his spectacles in the dappled shade beneath the trees.
If life seems jolly rotten
There's something you've forgotten
And that's to laugh and smile and dance and sing
When you're feeling in the dumps…
I miss him so much.
A/N: Malcolm begins to read from 'In Memoriam' by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and then quotes the opening lines from 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' by Douglas Adams. Finally, he is humming Eric Idle's song, 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life', from the Monty Python movie, 'Life of Brian'. Colin always did have a black sense of humour, after all. And Aunt Emily is saying "Let's go, my nephew" in Welsh, as well she might, having seen the beauteous Dr Chapman.