Colin Dexter: Death Is Now My Neighbor

MASTER: Seek not wisdom and truth, my son; seek rather forgiveness. Now go in peace, for verily hast thou disturbed my meditations — of lust and of the necessary pleasures of a woman.

“Well, at least it’s left on time.”

“Not surprising, is it? The bloody thing starts from Oxford. Give it a chance, though. We’ll probably run into signaling failure somewhere along the line.”

She smiled, attractively. “Funny, really. They’ve been signaling on the railways for — what? — a hundred and fifty years, and with all these computers and things...”

“Over one hundred and seventy years, if we want to be accurate — and why shouldn’t we? Eighteen twenty-five when the Stockton to Darlington line was opened.”

“Yeah. We learned about that in school. You know, Stephenson’s Rocket and all that.”

“No, my dear girl. A few years later, that was. Stephenson’s first locomotive was called The Locomotive — not very difficult to remember, is it?”

“No.”

The monosyllable was quietly spoken, and he knew that he’d made her feel inadequate again.

She turned away from him to look through the carriage window, spotting the great sandstone house in Nuneham Park, up toward the skyline on the left. More than once he’d told her something of its history, and about Capability Brown and Somebody Adams; but she was never able to remember things as accurately as he seemed to expect. He’d told her on their last train journey, for example, about the nationalization of the railways after World War II: 1947 (or was it 1948?).

So what?

Yet there was one year she would never forget: the year the network changed its name to “British Rail.” Her father had told her about that; told her she’d been born on that very same day. In that very same year, too.

In 1965.

“Drinks? Refreshments?”

An overloaded trolley was squeezing a squeaky passage along the aisle; and the man looked at his wristwatch (10:40 A.M.) as it came alongside, before turning to the elegantly suited woman seated next to him:

“Fancy anything? Coffee? Bit too early for anything stronger, perhaps?”

“Gin and tonic for me. And a packet of plain crisps.”

Sod him! He’d been pretty insufferable so far.

A few minutes later, after pouring half his can of McEwan’s Export Ale into a plastic container, he turned toward her again; and she felt his dry, slightly cracked lips pressed upon her right cheek. Then she heard him say the wonderful word that someone else had heard a month or two before; heard him say “Sorry.”

She opened her white-leather handbag and took out a tube of lip salve. As she passed it to him, she felt his firm, slim fingers move against the back of her wrist; then move along her lower arm, beneath the sleeve of her light mauve Jaeger jacket: the fingers of a pianist. And she knew that very soon — the Turbo Express had just left Reading — the pianist would have been granted the licence to play with her body once more, as though he were rejoicing in a gentle Schubert melody.

She had never known a man so much in control of himself.

Or of her.

The train stopped just before Slough.

When, ten minutes later, it slowly began to move forward again, the Senior Conductor decided to introduce himself over the intercom.

“Ladies and Gentlemen. Due to a signaling failure at Slough, this train will now arrive at Paddington approximately fifteen minutes late. We apologize to customers for this delay.”

The man and the woman, seated now more closely together, turned to each other — and smiled.

“What are you thinking?” she asked.

“You often ask me that, you know. Sometimes I’m not thinking of anything.”

“Well?”

“I was only thinking that our Senior Conductor doesn’t seem to know the difference between ‘due to’ and ‘owing to.’ ”

“Not sure I do. Does it matter?”

“Of course it matters.”

“But you won’t let it come between us?”

“I won’t let anything come between us,” he whispered into her ear. For a few seconds they looked lovingly at each other. Then he lowered his eyes, removed a splayed left hand from her stockinged thigh, and drank his last mouthful of beer.

“Just before we get into Paddington, Rachel, there’s something important I ought to tell you.”

She turned to him — her eyes suddenly alarmed.

He wanted to put a stop to the affair?

He wanted to get rid of her?

He’d found another woman? (Apart from his wife, of course.)

“Tickets, please!”

He looked as if he might be making his maiden voyage, the young ticket collector, for he was scrutinizing each ticket proffered to him with preternatural concentration.

The man took both his own and the young woman’s ticket from his wallet: cheap day returns.

“This yours, sir?”

“Yes.”

“You an OAP?”

“As a matter of fact I am not, no.” The tone of his voice was quietly arrogant. “To draw a senior citizen pension in the United Kingdom a man has to be sixty-five years of age. But a Senior Railcard is available to a man who has passed his sixtieth birthday — as doubtless you know.”

“Could I see your Railcard, sir?”

With a sigh of resignation, the man produced his card. And the slightly flustered, spotty-faced youth duly studied the details.

Valid:until MAY 7, 1996

Issued to:Mr. J.C. Storrs

“How the hell does he think I got my ticket at Oxford without showing that ?” asked the Senior Fellow of Lonsdale.

“He’s only doing his duty, poor lad. And he’s got awful acne.”

“You’re right, yes.”

She took his hand in hers, moving more closely again. And within a few minutes the PADDINGTON sign passed by as the train drew slowly into the long platform. In a rather sad voice, the Senior Conductor now made his second announcement: “All change, please! All change! This train has now terminated.”

They waited until their fellow passengers had alighted; and happily, just as at Oxford, there seemed to be no one on the train whom either of them knew.

In the Brunel Bar of the Station Hotel, Storrs ordered a large brandy (two pieces of ice) for his young companion, and half a pint of Smith’s bitter for himself. Then, leaving his own drink temporarily untouched, he walked out into Praed Street, thence making his way down to the cluster of small hotels in and around Sussex Gardens, several of them displaying VACANCIES signs. He had “used” (was that the word?) two of them previously, but this time he decided to explore new territory.

“Double room?”

“One left, yeah. Just the one night, is it?”

“How much?”

“Seventy-five pounds for the two — with breakfast.”

“How much without breakfast?”

Storrs sensed that the middle-aged peroxide-blonde was attuned to his intentions, for her eyes hardened knowingly behind the cigarette-stained reception counter.

“Seventy-five pounds.”

One experienced campaigner nodded to another experienced campaigner. “Well, thank you, madam. I promise I’ll call back and take the room — after I’ve had a look at it — if I can’t find anything a little less expensive.”

He turned to go.

“Just a minute!... No breakfast, you say?”

“No. We’re catching the sleeper to Inverness, and we just want a room for the day — you know? — a sort of habitation and a place.”

She squinted up at him through her cigarette smoke.

“Sixty-five?”

“Sixty.”

“Okay.”

He counted out six ten-pound notes as, pushing the register forward, she reached behind her for Key Number 10.