Our house was situated on a lane that led from Mill-Farm (Pandy in welsh) to one of Mill-Farm’s stock yards and shearing barns, therefore it was a common sight to see the old farmer Mr Jones or one of his two sons walking past our gates either going to or from their barn.

The old man was always surly, and rarely smiled or even replied when you said hello to him. The two boys were both about the same age as me. One called Morris who was pleasant, but would never stop to past the time of day. The other was Bryan, who was surly like the old man, but you would often find him stood motionless starring with a look like he was undressing you, he made my flesh creep.

One day in June, I can remember sitting in the orchard looking up the hill and seeing old Mr Jones standing on top of a stone platform about fifty yards up the hill, he was waving. As I studied him I could make out he was standing sideways to me, holding his penis and having a pee. I thought how disgusting doing that in public, and especially attracting attention to himself.

I turned away, and ignored him, when some time later Jim came out I told him what I’d seen. Jim asked where Mr Jones had been standing, and when I explained, he said, But that’s our water tank! Our water came direct from the filter beds on the hill, to a stone tank and then it was piped to the house. As soon as Jim told me that was our water, I realised what that funny taste was in our water. I’d been thinking for several weeks now, that the water didn’t taste quite right, and had put it down to the lack of rain. I immediately felt sick, but at that very moment Mr Jones came walking nonchalantly past, and waved a friendly hello. 

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