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to do, I had to get back to some semblance of normality.
    I finished my tea and moved to the section on local history. There were half a dozen guide books to the Suffolk coastline, its churches and cathedrals. A couple of tatty histories on the drowned city of Dunwich and some old OS maps that were probably still relevant. There was also a pamphlet, presumably locally written and produced, judging by the poor quality of the paper and printing, about the Battle of Winter Bay in 1672. I didn't plan on reading it, but the coincidence provided an added prickle.
    An hour later I'd finished it. The last page was defaced. Somebody had scribbled words: SUFFER CHILDREN... SUCCOUR TO THE CRAW. THEY WERE TAKEN! all over it. That word again. Craw . I could still make out what the printed words were supposed to be beneath, though. I stretched gingerly, listening to the crackle in my back, and mused about the handwriting. It was different to the other note. What did it mean? I had seen no reference to children in the pamphlet's text.
    Southwick had once been a major anchorage for the English naval fleet. Gorton Ness to the north and Dotwich to the south had formed a natural bay - Winter Bay - before erosion sanded it straight. In May 1672, a number of sailors were in Southwick while their ships were being prepared for battle: war with the Dutch was imminent. It was planned that the Allied fleets would form a blockade off Dogger Bank, so that the Dutch fleets could be intercepted if it should make a move to retreat to home ports. The Dutch fleet was anchored off Walcheren Island, biding its time before a strike designed to open a channel in the North Sea for Dutch shipping.
    For three days the English fleet lay in the bay, fattening itself with men, provisions and ammunition. The Earl of Sandwich was anxious that the Dutch might attempt a surprise attack but his warnings were unheeded. A French scout ship returned at dawn, the entire Dutch fleet on her foam. By the time the careened flagship had been refloated, and the 90 ships put to sea, the Dutch were charging in from the horizon. Cue bloodbath.
    I put the pamphlet back and rubbed my face. I fancied a beer. The thought of that pretty beach turned red with blood, of sunken ships, of burnt, bloated bodies drifting in with the tide for days after the end of fighting, was difficult to stomach. People came here to eat ice cream and get a suntan. They bought premium-priced beach huts and decorated them, gave them twee names, visited them a couple of weeks every year.
    They come here to die.
    I winced and jerked my head, as if the words had been spoken to me. Yes, they did come here to die, eventually, but that didn't make it into some dark receptacle. It was a village with an aged population, with a reputation for being a winding-down sort of place, a place of rest. I saw old men and women sitting on deckchairs or benches or wheelchairs, staring out to sea as if unpicking a code that could be read by them alone. In the summer they shifted dune-slow across the gravel and wore their best clothes for lunch in the local pubs. They stared straight ahead and chewed and chewed. It was a sort of lethargy, this business of ageing, of dying. It was about slowing right down to a point where your body could begin the business of consuming itself.
    Which was pretty much where I was up to. Was I kidding myself? Would I ever run along the beach? Would I ever kick a football again? I could not even bend over to touch my knees. I was here to die too. It was just going to take much longer than it did for most. But it wasn't this, or the ugly graffiti, or Southwick's unpleasant history, that was gnawing at me. I was leafing through books, drinking tea, pinching Ruth's fruit shortcake, and somewhere Tamara was getting on with her life. Perhaps she was wondering about me. Or was pushing me from her mind, thinking me dead. Maybe this was some kind of Ukrainian test. I go, you find me . Was I failing her?
    Restless,