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a soft grey and the rain so fine it’s hardly felt at all.
    This cold is a slow ache; it makes your skin sore, it makes you want to crouch double. And it’s been with him right from the start – it crept up as the Callisto docked in
Tiger Bay, and snuck like a thief into his bones. Now it’s here with him in the basement room he has rented, coating the walls with frozen sweat, clinging to his clothes in a spray of bright
droplets. Frankie’s two days in Cardiff have been spent below ground. The snow on the road outside is terrifying. He has never seen such a thing before; he thinks the sky has fallen. Frankie
hasn’t been able to muster the courage to walk into the city. His chest hurts. He sits at the table below the whited window, smokes, pours coffee from the little pan he stole from his
grandmother’s kitchen, and watches the legs of passers-by as they pick their way along the street. The men move purposefully, the wide fabric of their trousers pinned to their legs in the
gale. Frankie is more interested in the women – the teetering slip and skid of heels, followed by a high-pitched shriek, has him craning up at the pavement outside. All he can make out
through the stiff weeds where the railings used to be are the mottled shins of a girl sliding away fast.
    The whole city seems fast to him. On Tuesday he left his ship, and today, Friday, he has a home and a new life. No one cares who he is or where he’s come from, and no one wants to know his
business. This should please Frankie, who escaped the slow turn of his farming life for the glamour of the sea: who hated the constant mewling of his grandmother, the coins in her pocket clanking
her to church three, four times a day (as if she might miss a miracle, or, in her absence, find that Faith had left the country). In the end, Frankie left instead. His last sight was of Carmel, his
little sister, waving madly from the harbour, and behind her, Sliema rippling in a hot mist.
    ~
    Frankie knew what to do when he came into port: register, find a place to stay, then cut another passage on the sea. And despite the air like needles up his nose and the wind
full of shrapnel, he was excited. He squinted up at the tallest buildings, and down the wide streets to the alleyways off them teeming with people; saw steam from the opened door of a bakery like a
giant’s breath out; stood amazed at the procession of silent cars gliding through the snow.
    At the door of the Seamen’s Mission he joined the line of sailors and saw a familiar face – a Greek stoker from his own ship. Frankie raised his eyebrows in greeting, but the man was
busy in talk and looked through him. He cast around for anyone else he might know, listened hard for the sound of his own language; it was a mostly silent queue. The men stood clutching their
kit-bags and suitcases, or blowing on their hands until they were safely through the door.
    When it was his turn, he was questioned, his papers were scrutinized, and he was told to sign a sheet. Without raising his head, the man at the desk put his thick finger on a line.
    Francisco Gauci? Sign there. Frankie picked up the pen, his hand puce, and scrawled a numb X. The man finally looked up.
    Let’s see if it matches, he said, unfurling Frankie’s papers one more time. A younger man at the next desk glanced over, sniggered.
    It’s the Genuine Article, alright. Maltese are you? Frankie understood this last bit. Nodded gratefully.
    You’ll want to see Carlo Cross, then. He’ll fix you up. Not related are you, by any chance?
    Another snort from the next desk. Frankie didn’t understand the joke, but knew it was at his expense.
    And don’t forget to report to the police, said the man. And seeing Frankie’s worried face, softened.
    Just routine, son. Your first visit to Wales, is it? and Frankie, who knew enough of what was being asked, nodded again and said,
    Yes, first time in England.
    At last the man smiled at him.
    As he turned to leave, a