Emily Barr - The Sleeper

If I ended up staying away longer than I expected, I would ask the neighbours to drop in with more supplies. I felt entitled to ask for that favour since for years I had fed their teenage boy’s snake when they went on holiday. Whenever that happened, I half wanted to put one of the cats into the snake’s tank and see what happened. My money would have been on the cat, but testing that out would have been unneighbourly, even though I would have been poised to step in the moment things became heated.

This was fine, I told myself. I had been in Cornwall for years, and going back to London was not a big deal. Everyone went to London. Lara had covered the ground I was about to cover twice a week.

It was only London. Laurie would still be here. I would come back.

The wood burner was blazing fiercely, to look after them for the first bit of my absence. I had announced myself unavailable for all work for the foreseeable future. My bike was propped in the hallway, safe and studenty. In my handbag were ticket, purse and phone, and a book to read. The sun had set hours ago, and normally I would be drinking tea in front of the fire, probably wearing pyjama bottoms and a jumper, and thinking about going to bed with a man, a book and a cat.

I tried to leave without saying goodbye, but I couldn’t.

‘I love you,’ I said, back over my shoulder. ‘I’ll miss you. I’m sorry. I’ll be back.’

‘Sure,’ he said. He was trying to be casual. ‘That’s fine. Have fun. Don’t worry, Iris. I love you and I always will. Come back to me.’

I walked, in blackness, to the top of the lane to wait for the taxi, blinking hard. The night air breathed coldly on to my face: I should have had a single tear frozen to my cheek, but instead I had a snotty nose, which I wiped elegantly on my sleeve.

There was a sprinkling of stars between the clouds, but the moon was hidden and all I could make out of my surroundings were the jagged edges of bare trees reaching up.

When the headlights came out of the night, I stepped back, wanting to shrink from the brightness. The cab stopped beside me in a crunching of gravel, and the driver got out to open the boot for my bag. It didn’t need to go in the boot, but I let him do it.

‘Didn’t know anyone lived all the way down there,’ he said.

‘Yes,’ I agreed. I was going to the city now: I was going to have to do small talk good-naturedly. ‘It is quite remote.’

‘That’s right. Where you going, love? Truro, was it?’

‘Yes. Truro station, thanks. I’m catching the train to London. The sleeper train.’

‘Oh, the famous sleeper train. My daughter gets that sometimes. It’s a good service. Still. You take care of yourself.’

‘Yes.’

‘Bad business. Make sure you keep that door locked.’

I smiled at him, forced myself not to snap or swear. ‘I’ll be fine,’ I said. ‘But thank you.’

As I stepped up from the shadowy platform on to the brightly lit train, I pictured Lara doing the same thing. Guy Thomas would already have been here, waiting for her. I wondered whether he had stood at the door to the carriage, extending a hand, helping her up, pulling her close, kissing before they even pulled away from Truro. Maybe they had waited until they were a distance from home turf, chugging through anonymous dark countryside.

There were about fifteen people, I thought, getting on at Truro. I had booked this deliberately for Sunday night to retrace Lara’s steps, so some of these people were, presumably, going to go straight to work at the other end of this journey, like Lara had. Nobody was in business-type clothes. A few people had huge bags and were obviously heading for an airport. Others were in jeans and big coats.

My sleeping compartment was tiny, but it looked comfortable enough. You would have to be extraordinarily committed to the idea of an extramarital affair to carry one out in here, but for one person alone it was fine. I would not have slept tonight no matter how luxuriously appointed it had been.

I could not imagine how two people had shared this bed, which was smaller than a standard single one. They must have slept on top of one another, or not at all. No wonder their affair had swiftly spilled over into their London lives.

I sat on the narrow bed and felt the train jerk as it started to move.

I wanted to call Laurie, but I knew he would not answer.

People from my old life were, I was sure, still living in London. When I first came to Cornwall they had emailed, for a while, concerned and regretful and all of that. I ignored all of it. We didn’t need them, Laurie and me, and eventually they took the hint. I changed my mobile number, closed down my old email account and never sent a Christmas card.

If they saw me in the city, they would want to talk, to know what I had been doing for all this time. It was only the fact that it was London that made it safe. We could have been hiding in a corner of London for all those years and the chances of our running into anyone would have been slim. This trip was about Lara, not about me. It was not about Laurie.

And besides that, now that I had my unlikely funds, I was building up to doing all sorts of things. If I were to travel and see the world, I would need to be able to go to London first. This was a bit of a trial run; it was a test of my bravery. It was the first separation.

It was also a place to apply for a new passport. Mine had vanished without trace. I was uneasy about that. I had told no one, and I was certainly not going to tell Laurie. I was, however, considering mentioning it to Alex Zielowski.

A woman was standing in the open doorway, in train uniform. She was short, older than me, a comfortable maternal figure.

‘Hello there,’ she said. ‘Now you’d be …’ She checked the clipboard in her hand. ‘Iris Roebuck. Yes? Could I have a look at your ticket, my love?’

People were having illicit sex in every corner of the compartment. They stood pressed up against the wall. She sat on the edge of the sink. He was on top of her on the bed, with no option of lying side by side. Then they were no longer Lara and Guy, but Laurie and me, then Guy and Diana, Sam and Lara, Guy and one of his other women, Sam and me, Laurie and Lara. Me and DC Alex Zielowski. I grabbed my handbag and set off in search of that gin and tonic, and Ellen Johnson.

The bar carriage was almost empty. Its luxurious seats waited expectantly, the free newspapers on each table tempting no one but two middle-aged men.

‘Yes?’ said the young barman. I felt sorry for him because those acne scars were going to be with him for ever, even when he was properly grown up.

‘Gin and tonic, thanks,’ I said, looking round again for the mysterious woman who had been Lara and Guy’s friend. She still wasn’t there.

‘Sure.’ He started reaching for things. ‘Ice and lemon?’

‘Yes please. Do you always work on this train?’

He sighed, knowing what was coming. ‘Yes, often.’

‘So you knew …’

He leapt in before I could finish.

‘I did. I should make a little sign saying that. “Yes, I knew them to serve a drink to. But I know no more about what happened than you do.” Everyone wants to know. I wasn’t working the night when … Well, you know.’

He picked up a sliver of lemon with a miniature pair of tongs and dropped it into my drink. It made the tiniest splash; like a fairy jumping into a swimming pool.

‘I bet you see all sorts of things in this job.’ This seemed the right thing to say.

‘Oh, you wouldn’t believe the things that go on. Terrible business, him getting killed. On the train! Right here! Those two’d been at it for ever. People think we’re invisible or something. Or they just don’t care.’