The previous November, a row of wooden beach huts, their paintwork lifted and flaked by the hard east wind, had burned to the ground. The fire brigade came from twelve miles away, and had nothing to do by the time it arrived. “,” the local paper decided, though no culprit was ever found. An architect from a more fashionable part of the coastline told the regional TV news that the huts had been part of the town’s social heritage and must be rebuilt. The council announced that it would consider all options, but since then had done nothing.

Vernon had moved to the town only a few months before, and had no feelings about the beach huts. If anything, their disappearance improved the view from the Right Plaice, where he sometimes had lunch. From a window table, he now looked out across a strip of concrete to damp shingle, a bored sky, and a lifeless sea. That was the east coast: for months on end you got bits of bad weather and lots of no weather. This was fine by him: he’d moved here to have no weather in his life.

“You are done?”

He didn’t look up at the waitress. “All the way from the Urals,” he said, still gazing at the long, flat sea.

“Pardon?”

“Nothing between here and the Urals. That’s where the wind comes from. Nothing to stop it. Straight across all those countries.” Cold enough to freeze your knob off, he might have added in other circumstances.

“Oorals,” she repeated. As he caught the accent, he looked up at her. A broad face, streaked hair, chunky body, and not doing any waitressy number in hope of a bigger tip. Must be one of those Eastern Europeans who were all over the country nowadays. Building trade, pubs and restaurants, fruit picking. Came over here in vans and coaches, lived in rabbit warrens, made themselves a bit of money. Some stayed; some went home. Vernon didn’t mind one way or the other. That’s what he found more often than not these days: he didn’t mind one way or the other.