Barbel The float settled in the water and as my gaze lifted from the surface, I saw a man standing obliquely opposite me on the other bank, looking across the river with a pair of binoculars. At first, I thought he was watching me but it became apparent that he was looking slightly further along my bank, downstream, at an overhanging tree. Like many low-lying trees on river banks the lower branches had caught rubbish that drifted down when the river was swollen, like plast
