Since then they'd done a roll-call of tours all over the world: Jordan, Bahrain, Cyprus, British Guiana, Belize. Not forgetting their time in the Falklands, when they'd been under continuous artillery and mortar fire for almost two days and nights. Wherever there was a shitty job to be done, send in the Paras. The Regiment's motto, Utrinque Paratus, said it all -'Ready for Anything.'

'Hey, Frank, wanna drink?' Taffy raised his pint mug.

'We're on a round,' Dillon yelled back. 'Come and join us.' And turning to Harry, 'Got a coin for the juke-box?'

Dillon pushed through the ruck of bodies, passing Jimmy and Steve at the bar, frantically signalling to get served. Harry went over to give them a hand. Taffy drained his glass and waved it aloft. 'I'll have a pint, Jimmy!'

'I'll be a second.' Dillon pointed to the crudely-painted sign reading GENTS' TOILETS tacked above a scarred green door at the far end. 'Gonna take a leak.' On the way he stopped at the juke-box and did a quick recce through the Fifties section, then with a grin inserted the coin and punched up his all-time favourite. Christ, if he had a quid for every time he and Susie had bopped to 'Great Balls of Fire'… go for it, Killer!

Heading for the Gents', he had to laugh at the antics of the Toms, pounding the table and yelling at Jimmy and the others to get a move on: six young faces, slightly flushed with heat and the few they'd had on the way, bursting with health and high spirits. And Billy Newman acting the comic, sprawled back in his chair, grasping his throat, tongue lolling out, as if he'd just crawled across the desert. Smashing lads, Dillon thought, the best, and felt a glow of real pride. My lads. Better than those fat knackers you saw on the streets back home, hair dyed green and purple, safety-pins through their nostrils, with pasty, drab faces like dead fish on a slab.