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my neck.
     
    The last time I’d been in court it was to testify against a group of my erstwhile brothers-in-arms. I tried not to think about it much these days, but their names still ran through my head like a chant.
     
    Donalson, Hackett, Morton, and Clay.
     
    There was a rhythm and a flow to them that chilled my skin and cramped my muscles. When the barrister had read them out in a different order, I had almost failed to recognise them as the same group.
     
    Almost. The memory fades, but I don’t think I’ll ever forget them entirely. I was claiming rape. They were claiming it was all some happy drunken orgy that had got out of hand.
     
    I’d already been through the agonies of a military court martial, and been found guilty of gross misconduct. Foolishly, as it turned out, I’d sought justice in the civil arena.
     
    I might have got it, too. Then the whispers started. Whispers about the affair I’d stupidly indulged in with one of my training instructors. It was against the rules, and soon got blown up out of all proportion.
     
    My main witness defected, and the inevitable happened.
     
    I lost.
     
    It cost me my career in the army, one I’d spent four years carefully constructing. It also cost me my self-respect, and the repercussions blew a hole in my relationship with my parents so big you could have driven a Boeing 777 through it, sideways on.
     
    Still, I’d walked across that burning bridge. It had taken me a while, but eventually I’d picked up most of the pieces. I didn’t know if I could do it all again.
     
    I looked up at O’Bryan, found him watching me intently. I led the way to the door without speaking.
     
    “Look,” he said as I pulled it open for him to leave, “juvenile detention would break a lad like Roger. Perhaps turn him to crime permanently. It could ruin his whole life. Just say you’ll think about it, eh?”
     
    I found myself nodding reluctantly as I stood to one side to let O’Bryan out.
     
    “OK,” he said, “I’ll give you a few days to – Oi! Get away from it you little bastards!”
     
    I jumped as O’Bryan’s voice rose from softly persuasive to a full-blown roar. He leapt out of the front door and went dashing towards the pavement, the briefcase swinging against his legs as he ran.
     
    I stuck my head round the door and saw a group of kids scrambling away from the ruin that was now O’Bryan’s Mercedes, like malicious monkeys in a safari park when the game warden with the tranquilliser darts appears.
     
    The kids scattered with a precision that spoke of long practise, all disappearing over garden hedges and through gates in different directions. O’Bryan got as far as the pavement before it dawned on him that trying to catch any of them was an utter waste of time.
     
    He faltered and then stopped dead, putting his case down slowly on the cracked paving next to his feet. His full attention was taken by the beautiful example of the German sports car maker’s art. Or what had been, when he’d set out that morning.
     
    I saw him lift his hands to his chubby face in horror. As he shook his head the sunlight glinted off the lenses of his little wire-rimmed glasses, as though his eyes themselves had flashed fire.
     
    Almost against my will, I found myself following him out, stopping just behind his shoulder as he surveyed the damage.
     
    The Merc was wrecked. The hood was in tatters, the chrome windscreen wipers had been twisted into loops, and all four tyres had been comprehensively slashed. Something heavy and sharp had been dragged along the bodywork, leaving deep gouges right down to the bare steel from headlight to taillight.
     
    “The little bastards,” O’Bryan whispered. “Three years I’ve spent rebuilding this car. Bought it for peanuts as a right basketcase.” He turned and favoured me with a sad, lopsided smile. “I only brought it today because the clutch has gone on my Cavalier. Three bloody years. ”
     
    I didn’t speak. There