M. stopped. Those steps! He must have missed the academy door. The steps lay far beyond his academy door - he was sure of it! "Fool" he muttered to himself. "Missed the door, eh? Gazing too long at strolling couples, that's the trouble; the tyranny of longing." The couple were some way ahead by now. The pinch had put a spring in the young fellow's walk which the girl watched turning her head and grinning at him. M. retraced his steps. He had not allowed time for this lapse of concentration. Even before he'd crossed the square, the heels of the last student had probably already disappeared into the academy door as the bells sounded. He started to run. The shop-windows were being opened and caught up his face (bobbing and bothered) in their panes and turned it away. It's no use you watching these windows as they flash past, you with your silly grimace on your face and out of breath - he warned himself. You have studies this morning; is the work done? Twisting his brow, he wondered, but his mind fogged; he couldn't complete a thought.
Horrified, he stared at the grey stone wall, fingering it where the academy door should be. There was nothing. A bizarre thought crossed his mind. What if the academy no longer wanted him there as a student? He was after all, much older than the other students. Had they watched him? No-one else used this door to the complex, a tiny access-way to storerooms he'd discovered quite by accident. Had they seen him and blocked it off, too polite (too embarrassed) to say anything to him directly? Take hold of yourself M. - he urged himself; that's crazy thinking; you're insignificant; who would bother with this effort? Besides! he suddenly thought, this wall hasn't been disturbed for years.
Yet still he wondered whether some giggling academy clerk was watching him from one of the windows high-up on the side opposite - and indeed he did turn and glance up. Confused, he stepped back into an alcove and leaned against a protruding shop-window to cool his back. In this restful position he surveyed the half-fallen pyramids of confectionery through the side pane before him. Mr. Warrilow would never allow this - his bonbons were always neatly displayed in rose-shaped trays cut by hand from white card. What had come over him? There! At the front, why a thin trickle of pralines had rolled all the way from his neglected display to the window! He leaned forward into the street and looked up at the shop-front. The name above the confectioners was unknown to him. What had happened to Warrilow's name-plate? He gazed down the hill. A solitary cyclist struggled to climb, his head bent low. M. looked around with a heart beating in alarm. The architecture was familiar, yes even down to the marble facades and the balustrades; all was in the usual place; most of the shops established here and there were selling the right wares - yet there were a few glaring exceptions he now spotted. An insurance office where the repair-shop should be; a man selling bicycles where before there had been none. And all the names were unfamiliar; the wares all displayed in the wrong way.
He looked back to the square in the distance and went cold. The perspective was wrong; he'd turned down the wrong street. Yes, it was obvious now and he started to run. Head turned sideways, he burst back onto the square, looked startled and ran down the next street spinning his legs. Here it was! The academy door! He clasped its central brass-knob with both hands, the better to oust that other phantom street, and he stood and he swayed. That a street so horribly similar - such a one as to make you think the people, those steady figures, have gone mad and rearranged their familiar windows all at the same time and not to advantage what's more - that such a street should lay in wait for you just yards away was horrifying. One morning you were bound to trip down it. The trap was worse than finding yourself walking one day towards a replica of some acquaintance you know to be several hundred miles away.
He pushed the door and slipped through. It felt like an escape. All the academy corridors smelled of the cleaning-fluid used on the linoleum floors. A line of dusty ceiling lights with worn out bulbs at infrequent intervals cleared the view for him. The door at the end opened into a lobby piled up with bicycles. To get across to the yards he had to step with long slow strides, leaning forward all the time and holding on to handle-bars at angles and upturned wheels. M. was understanding: the academicians could not be expected to spend their time leaving these machines one against another in neat rows, for the convenience of just one student in the habit of arriving via this back-lane route. Some days however he nearly despaired of getting through. If he hummed a prayer and crossed himself, would the cycles part like the seas? He trod down the next machine. And then would he ever trust these things to stay parted?
He hurried on. Part way down a corridor, he came across a little recess on a level with his eyes, and yet he'd never noticed it before. Irritated by his previous lack of observation but curious to know what it contained, he sped along to get a close look. Had others always blocked his view of it; had he never come down this way before? Perhaps not! The recess turned out to be more of a dent in the wall, quite smooth like the inside of an egg, and screwed into its depths it contained a round brass clock. Eight minutes past the hour. Only a touch late after all. In fact nearly on time (so M. considered) and if the professor was late, probably the students would be sitting on the desks talking in little groups and smoking their cigarettes still. He wondered whether the clock was really fixed in place or something temporary and new, and so he crouched and tried to look beneath it. Then he lifted his hands and tried to twist it from the wall. It would not budge. Furious with himself for being distracted by such a pointless concern - it seemed to him that the clock had done this on purpose - and especially so since he was now up to ten minutes late, he flapped his arms at the device, turned and ran with long strides down the considerable length of this corridor. The turn at the end led into the even longer and somewhat narrower corridor where lay his lecture theatre. Already he could see a small part of its closed door and imagined a few voices drifting out towards him.
The door, plain flat and rather forbidding (M. thought) had a small meshed window set at eye level. No, there were no chattering voices leaking into the corridor - or rather there was only one. M. stood arrested by the sound of the professor's talk. M. was as yet not visible from the room. He would catch his breath a moment - rushing in breathless was obviously undignified, even if it did demonstrate a concern to arrive on time. Then he would step lightly forward until he could see through the window and assess the chances of a nearly unnoticed entry. Heads down, the students wrote at their desks. M. could not see the professor for he was standing to one side. Craning his neck to get a glimpse, M. toppled gently and stepped forward to check himself. It had been soundless, but the movement had caught the eye of one student who looked up; a thin fellow wearing a blue sweater (knitted for his student days - M. thought) a fellow he had noticed on countless occasions whose lifeless fishy gaze now met his. And the fellow showed no recognition! Not a muscle twitched! The fellow had calmly put his head down again to his writing and not even expressed surprise that M. was outside.
M. stepped past the door slowly. The corridor continued straight to a windowed door in the distance which opened onto a metal escape. The window, bright with sunlight, dazzled him a little, and anyway he did not want to descend there. He paused, gazed down at his feet a while, then returned past the classroom quickening his pace lest anyone by chance came out of the door behind him. What to do? No matter. It was nothing of huge importance. He would ask to borrow the notes of a fellow student - nothing simpler - or perhaps he would approach the professor directly, ask him for a copy of his lecture notes despite his intimidating dress and way of raising his head like a haughty bird whenever addressed. M. would catch up, that was all. The library was set in the middle of the complex and could only be reached via a thousand little ways through other buildings that were irrelevant to one's subject. One had to move along high-up balconies looking down on halls of listening students. One had to negotiate corridors, some on ground level but others that climbed hundreds of feet to ascend and then to pass over some closed-off theatre. M. knew several short-cuts where he could slide between buildings scarcely able to breathe as he stepped sideways over broken masonry and the rubble of years. Then came the sequence of rooms - one had to pass through scores of empty rooms, entering in one wall and exiting through a door directly opposite, and was glad of the occasional glass-ceilinged passage that had been left open to the light from one of the rare shafts that pierced to the foundations of the institution, for soon, ahead of one, lay the door to re-entering the warren of closed-in rooms. Sometimes one literally fell into other empty rooms, for some people grew inclined to rush things and throw open doors with a dash while on the run - but they soon were forced to check and silence their progress. At some point the 'productive' rooms appeared. Still many many empty ones were to be crossed, but the 'habitation' of the books had spread this wide and one could expect to find ever more frequent 'filled' rooms from now on.
The library was in disarray. Many new books had been brought in over recent years or resurrected from half-forgotten stores; and the librarians, far too few in number for the daunting task, had merely grouped them by subject and dumped them in piles with only the broadest of labels on the doors. M. passed through rooms marked simply 'chemistry' and 'castles', picking his way along a narrow path to the exit. He passed along a curving balcony where he could half see down into a large circular room containing a huge book pile in the centre. Many students toiled at the pile. Some worked together sifting through parts of the pile, examining books then passing them down to others who deposited them on a smaller reject pile. Some worked alone, a little frantically, tossing books sideways in little arcs without even bothering to read titles (or so it seemed) and perhaps, it occurred to M., they were looking for something they had seen before and would know again by its look or its smell.
M. felt weary. He began to continue past these book rooms, and to make his way out again and into the more lonely places. He crossed some thirty or so empty rooms in succession before he felt safe enough to find somewhere to lie down without being disturbed. He would return to the books, yes, and his study, but not quite now. There was, after all, no immediate hurry. He hunted for some rudimentary screen, anything that would conceal him from a rushing student barging his was through M.'s bedroom. But it was difficult - most rooms were neither carpeted nor papered and bare of any furniture. Against a wall, a blackboard stood in one of the rooms. It was possible (M. noticed) to go down on all fours and to crawl into the space between them. He could stretch out full-length and conceal himself comfortably here. Flashing his eyes round the dark space and smiling impishly, M. quickly drifted off into a deep sleep.
A form of tapping awoke him. He had been hearing it for a while (he realised) but sleep had been more inviting than investigation, and anyway he didn't mind it at all. His eyes focused. He saw a row of shoes facing him. His cheek lay flat on the floor and before him, not ten feet away, glinted the toes of a line of shoes. Academic shoes. And above him the tapping on the blackboard started again. Rolling onto his back, he stared upwards mesmerised by the noise and by the fear of being discovered. The teacher wrote furiously. At the end of each line, his head half appeared round the edge of the board before darting back to start again with a flip of his gown. M. could feel the shirt sticking to his back. The thought of being discovered by the teacher alone wasn't so distressing; he thought he could carry the moment off. But a whole classroom of students? The idea of being made to rise from his inexplicable hiding-place in front of a full audience froze him. It could end up in farce - the teacher trying to pull him out by the leg. He wouldn't do it! He needed to be better concealed. Somehow he needed the teacher on his side. He would have to trust to luck. Perhaps the man had a kindly nature - an exception, then, in his profession (thought M.) but he could see no other way out. As the man's head half-appeared once more, M. waved sharply. The chalk stopped. Their eyes met. And then almost immediately the teacher returned to scribble a new line. There had been scarcely a pause. Probably (M. reasoned) any student who had noticed something, would think it a pause in the teacher's thought. Now that was lucky. The teacher was his friend now. He would maybe do his best to draw attention to himself and away from anything that might be behind this board.
The teacher continued to work down the board. He scarcely ever appeared round the edge now; it was as if he didn't want to believe M. was there at all. M. lay on his back, eyes wide, staring at the point where the chalk finished. What would this teacher do (he wondered) the man needed to block the sides somehow. Doubt crept into M.'s mind. Perhaps the teacher was confused; or perhaps he was a man of slow decision? For a moment the teacher's face appeared again, round the corner, and stared at him. It appeared as alarmed as M. was himself. Was the man paralysed? What did he think M. was doing? Laying in wait for him? Ready to attack as soon as the students had left the lecture-room? Well M. could soon put him right on that score if only the teacher would find some excuse to come round the back and clear the matter up; it would take M. only a few seconds. Now the teacher was walking away from the board, he noticed, to the door through which M. had entered. He opened it, seemed to check that the sickly light next door was on, then extinguished the bright lights in his own classroom. For a few moments he was silhouetted immobile in the doorway, giving (so it appeared) M. sufficient time to consider his escape route. M.'s heart raced. After a short sway, he rushed forward crawling quickly like a dashing mouse across the open floor and into the light of the further room, scuttled across that, stood up and left without noise.
The afternoon was sinking into early evening: time for the last lecture of the day. M.'s usual place was to be lost in the crowd somewhere, writing with head down until his wrist ached. But he walked away from the theatres. He'd realised, quite abruptly and quite unavoidably, that he could never - not even once, as a sort of joke - sit at another lecture. He could not find a reason why; at least no clear and obvious reason why things would not move, such as a smashed wheel lying flat by an angled cart. Perhaps some foggy influences on what had happened to him; but no one clear cause for the catastrophe. It was all the more shocking to him. He stepped forward slightly light-headed. A small euphoria washed through him - he would go and watch a dance! Ha! This evening he'd go; of course not to dance himself (he couldn't overcome his phobia against dancing, he knew that) but he'd go to watch others. Yes. He'd enjoy that. And so he set off.
The dance-hall lay at the bottom of a grassy hill across which a thin path ran from the road, though most students ignored the path. Through the dark, little groups converged on the yellow light of the entrance, the doors of which had been invitingly propped open with two poles. Hopeful students within these noisy groups looked over at other groups for familiar faces. Three boys jostled and kicked the air all the way down the hill, then just short of the hall, licked their palms and flattened moustaches and already smoothed-down hair, before diving in. The groups of girls were larger. Usually they could be loudly heard laughing before they were seen, and one approached the door now, the girls all taking shorter steps than necessary as had long been the fashion, a sort of conscious female mincing - sometimes they were so amused by one another that they had to stumble forward, bent double, something which made them even more amused. M. was behind this group. He was keeping back, timing his arrival at the entrance with a view to being free from comment or jostle.
In the broad and high foyer, a cashier leaned his elbows on the counter to his office and stared over at the students. The shutters to his room were all down bar one which framed him in a bright light. He made no attempt to get the students' attention. Those who did not notice him, he watched wearily until they laid a hand on the tasselled rope across the corridor leading to the hall - at which he'd mockingly say (almost to himself as a commentary) "No,no,no, think you can get in free, do you?" Only then would the students look round. Only then would the 'Admission' sign above his head be obvious. And all through this pantomime, the cashier would make no helpful gesture - merely stare in an absent way at them. The students pushed their coins at him. He in return looked them up and down, something they had the impression he had to do as part of his job, then regardless of their dress, nodded to a bucket of loose tickets at the end of his counter, a bucket they should have already noticed. They were left with the impression that the cashier/doorman was supposed to screen them, weed out the unsuitable, but that they were not worth the trouble. If their coins weren't exact, he'd push change towards them without looking at it. It was never right.
The hall was long and wide. The music had already started; the ritual formed itself. Why had M. thought he would enjoy this 'monkey' business? Why were these youngsters so 'obvious'? Where was the 'class'? He tried to conceal an involuntary sneer. This was a detested scene and the only reason he could come up with for thinking he would enjoy himself amongst these people, was that he was fascinated by them precisely because he detested them so much. The boys were gathered in a mass along the whole length of one wall. As usual (he thought) the girls held court throughout the rest of the hall in small groups spread out at random. This was a 'girl's world. Not a boy's. The girls came here to 'be sexy' (though many denied that) and only a few to actually get some sex. And why did he find that so unpleasant (he wondered)? Was it merely because it is a hugely destructive power these girls have, and so cheaply got? Why blame them? He watched a girl catch sight of a friend in a neighbouring foursome, touch the hands of her own group then skip lightly to her friend, letting the silk of her dress rise and tremble and shake. She'd let fly no quick glances to the wall of boys opposite. A girl in a red dress, surrounded by her friends, arched her hip, shuffled her feet, and gazed down her shoulder in a parody of flamenco, to the loud laughter of the others. The boys - in smaller groups, ones and twos - wore more mask-like faces. A girl preferred her boy to hold his enthusiasm in; just a little; until they'd got to know one another of course - after that it was different. All these ugly rules! These babyish conventions! M. shuddered. As the hall filled, the groups of girls were forced nearer to these clumps of boys and romantic approaches were almost inevitably triggered. One boy tried his hand at summoning his chosen girl over in an imperious fashion - but no girl would have any of that.
M. felt ill. The primitive power of girls offended him; the stupidity of men, he found alien. He was suddenly weary again. His inclination, from the start, had been to remove himself, he'd not stay long anyway, and he found himself in an alcove, off the main hall, sitting on a semi-circular bench around the curved wall. Four students, men seemingly unconcerned with the absorbed girls, stepped out of the sallow light and entered his darker corner. One - the leader; M. could see that straight away - put his arms over the shoulders of the others, leaned towards M., and with smiling eyes introduced everybody. "Hey my friends!" he beamed to the others: "You must welcome this man. Can we join you? We'll promise not to disturb. . ." The student walked forward offering his hand. M. announced himself and was accepted into the group, and given some sort of pride of place (he felt) next to this student who introduced himself in return, as "Jungmann".
"See how he leaves the crowd to it?" Jungmann enthused to his friends. "How he, with unswerving taste, finds the best spot in the hall? You are one of us M.! We recognise a fellow aesthete." They seemed disinterested in the hall's ritual, set themselves apart from it, yet they were there just like him (surely for different reasons?) and they talked amongst themselves, with interest, of plans for a trip the following night.
Jungmann's dark eyes seemed to watch over his friends and encourage them. His black coat, tailored and full-length, was pushed back behind his hands which he stuffed into his pockets. Three girls had edged near. One, a red-cheeked foxy-faced student who stepped with a spring in her heels was trying to ask Jungmann something, egged on by the others who were giggling. It was obvious they had eyes only for him. Indeed one, in her eagerness to get noticed, nearly toppled one of the boys over. She scarcely seemed to notice. Jungmann welcomed them with the same sparkle in his eye and warmth that he had for his friends. The three girls and he settled into a banter which Jungmann tried to bring his friends into whenever he could - though they were gazing out at the dancers and sometimes couldn't hear him. M. caught sight of a girl on her own who seemed to know the other three in a rather distant way, for they only gave one another simple nods of recognition. A cheery girl, M. thought, for she seemed to do a form of dancing walk, like a child, right up to him, and giggled pleasantly at his awkwardness. She came and stood right next to him, their arms almost touching, the two of them looking out over the crowd in the centre of the floor. The backs of their hands knocked together now and again. M. could feel the heat of the girl right next to him; he put his hand on her shoulder and let it rest there. She was young and M. wondered whether she was a student yet. He could feel the bones beneath the fabric of the green dress she wore. The dress, he noticed, felt like a dry swimming-costume, the one he remembered as a child his tiny sister used to wear. It slightly repulsed him, though the girl did not repulse him at all. Quite the contrary.
Their revelry was soon interrupted. Jungmann was suddenly behind them (M. had quickly removed his hand from the girl's shoulder) and he put his arms round the new couple, swaying them almost imperceptibly as he encouraged them to join the group tomorrow night on a planned excursion. The boys were going now - but would M. join them tomorrow? He was to meet them outside the dance-hall tomorrow; at seven; at the tram-stop. The girl's friends (he assumed them to be) had already agreed to come, so surely she would too? She glanced over at the other girls then nodded gleefully. M. thought it a little too gleeful, and was chilled by a brief jealousy. M. must meet at the tram-stop for the excursion was to be out of town. He must come. It wouldn't be the same without him. It was as if Jungmann sensed that M. was the only one of the group who might let him down. The girls all grabbed one another now, and ran out amongst the dancers. Jungmann watched them, laughed, then nodded to M. and led his troupe from the hall. After a short while, M. also left for his room.
There he remained all the next day, until it was time to set off for the tram-stop. He didn't want to meet the others outside. No. When they leaped on board, he would already be there, waiting. And watching. He set off for the terminus. Sat on a yellow wooden bench inside the terminus building, he tried to spot the approaching tram by gazing into the square where a round, active, fountain splashed; but everyone's view had been blocked by a stocky man who'd planted himself dead in front of the door, a man who made the ill-fitting glass panes rattle with his stamping. M. recognized him as a former student at the academy. Even when the man left off his stamping, he was striking an odd and provocative attitude. Like himself, the man was older than the other students and it was only now that M. realised that the man had simply disappeared perhaps a year ago or more. And what had become of him? The fellow was stopping passengers from leaving the terminus. He stood, almost crouched, legs apart before the door and swayed, a scowl ready on his face for any person fool enough to try to get past. A small group of boys whispered close to him, and peered through the panes. They pointed outside and looked to one another all the while keeping half an eye on him; until too close for the threat to be ignored, he rushed and scattered them in all directions. He was quick to bound back also, and allowed himself a bit of strutting which seemed to command the situation again. A few isolated people, scattered in isolated places, shifted their weight noiselessly or picked their fingers. The ticket-seller, sitting behind his screen, who had been flicking through a wad of cards counting with his lips silently, looked up for a moment.
M. fished around in his side pocket, pulled out a sweet, started forward, then hesitated, fetched out a few more sweets, and approached the fellow quite boldly at a quick walk, his palm held open to display his gift. Of course the man kicked at him sideways and sent him scuttling back to his bench. M. looked forward, seemingly unconcerned; though his chest had started to heave exceptionally which everyone could see. Eventually a woman, correctly relying on some men's disinclination to strike a lady, gathered her two children (one of whom had been in the group that tried earlier) and approached the door, something which after some hesitation clearly began to cause a small panic within the man. To everyone's relief she subdued him with merely a woman's challenging stare - and after she had passed through, the others all got up and gathered bags and adjusted clothes in preparation for their own flight. Was the fellow drunk after all? He swayed a little, reaching behind him for the door handle which was too far away; until eventually he had to turn his head round and stagger sideways. The man managed to get out into the square, clumped heavily to the low wall surrounding the fountain, put his hands up to his ears to stop the noise of the water and sank slowly to the ground.
Shortly afterwards, a tram banged its way in unbending jolts around the perimeter. It squealed and swept three beams of light across the few travellers who were already walking from the terminus. Amongst them was M. All the while a tram was moving, conductors tended to stand to attention on the platform at the rear. One could address them but they had a tendency to stare past one at the approaching road while giving any sort of reply. However it was their habit to stand in the road while taking tickets and waiting for their passengers to leap up onto the platform. M. was lucky for this particular conductor was keen to stand outside and look to and fro in the dark for stragglers coming up the hills to the square, all the while keeping one hand on his vehicle as if to keep it in check until he gave the signal to proceed. It was easy for M. to glance around and to duck into the tiny alcove beneath the stairs to the upper deck. In a flash, he was ensconced. Nobody had noticed. The corner doubled back on itself and anyway was in deep shadow. Huddled with his chin on his knees which he wrapped with his arms, M. felt quite secure; but as an extra precaution he even had time to shift the conductor's knapsack just a little in front of him.
"Hey!" called the conductor. "You! Out of there." M. froze. "Come on . . . trot off somewhere else!" Slightly confused, M. lifted himself on one hand. He had every intention of giving up the idea and trying to explain things, though it would be difficult. Then the tram jerked onwards and he tumbled back. The conductor hopped on board while the vehicle was moving and released a slow symbolic kick at a mongrel dog, yards away, its ears flat, which had been getting too close to the wheels.
The aroma from the conductor's packed-lunch, which M. knew to be garlic-sausage sandwiches for he could see the torn corner of a packet at the edge of the knapsack, started to tickle his nose. M. judged it to be the remains of a lunch rather than an uneaten one - for what time of day was this? The remains, and therefore unwanted; so why should not he - M. - do the man a favour and save him the trouble of throwing this refuse away? It was, anyway, almost rotten by now, M. was sure of it for was not the smell in this corner quite oppressive? Why surely, had not the passengers already noticed it? Still, it was true that there was a nagging doubt. Why had it been left? Eh? For a snack on his way home at the end of this shift? M. knew it . . . he knew what type of man this would be. He dozed: the better to forget the garlic sausage, for his conscience had got the better of him. And anyway the dance-hall was only a mile or so further on. And there he would see. Ha! How his suspicions - no, his convictions - would be confirmed!
Jungmann's voice woke him with a shock. Many footsteps seemed to bang right by his face. He sat up quickly and winced - his neck hurt - ha! so he had fallen asleep had he? And sunk face down on the tram floor had he? What was this? It sounded like Jungmann's group. It was the only one travelling out tonight. Jungmann was counting them on, in a joking fashion, patting some on the back, calling to others struggling to climb aboard in thin high heels. How they all laughed! What a noise! Don't they think of the poor conductor who must be tired-out by now - it's obvious to anyone that this is the end of his day, not the beginning of revelries, M. thought. With his face flat on the sooty tram-floor, M. could just see his girlfriend of the night before (she wore a different dress to the swimming-costume one) bobbing in and out of his view. She laughed uproariously, pulled down the cap of a handsome student - only a little older than she - then lifted one corner of it to reveal his ear which she then nibbled between her laughs. Had M. really contemplated marriage with this girl? How foolish; how stupidly optimistic, of him! A day left alone in a bachelor room after meeting such a girl - it was surely bound to lead to such fancies. Now he knew for sure the real position. Just as he'd expected of course.
Jungmann called out: "All here?" and straight away signalled to the conductor to move off before any reply could come. But he also looked over the group and called again: "Anyone missing? Is anyone coming still?" Then he swung his arm forward like a cavalry officer, and the tram moved off. See! - M. eagerly told himself. Ha! I said so! See! Ha, ha, ha! Not a thought. I didn't even enter their minds. Not even hers! Of course I should leap out right now. Leap out and upbraid them - forgot me didn't you! Surprise! Then of course, join in the banter, reprimand Jungmann in particular in mock serious tones for utterly forgetting about his promise. Perhaps lightly tap him across the arm. I could . . . The revellers alighted finally. M. could hear their laughter receding down the street. The tram moved off again and he approached the laughter once more; it burst in as the tram drew level, then he left it behind. His face was again flat on the platform. Its grimy ridges receded from him in parallel rows. He could even see through the tiny gaps between the platform and the conductor's two black shoes (at least when a street lamp passed, he could) shoes which swayed with the tram, left and right, and which creaked despite being quite worn down. The shoes gave the conductor away. His pompous uniform with its lapels and stiff collar was immaculate. But the man could not help but betray his poverty by his shoes - for shoes were not supplied by tram-operators (the things wore out so quickly in this work) and M. had always been in the habit of examining conductor's shoes even when he was a child. And look at the man now! The vehicle was empty - Jungmann and his crowd had been the last of his travellers, more than likely right up to the end of the line - yet still he stood to attention, swaying with the tram! The fool! What? Did he think the tram-driver - someone of immense importance in his narrow life no doubt - was watching him in some concealed mirror and giving him admiring glances? Him? With his two sprouts of ginger hair coming out on either side of his cap, and those squeaky shoes? M. would slip away as soon as the ass moved down the tram to check beneath his seats. Even if the tram were moving, he would do it. When he finally got back to the terminus, and the square, he found that the only other soul out at that hour, was the crazy man, the former student, the fellow who'd blocked the terminus door (and he still by his fountain which he seemed not to be able to leave just yet) who saw M. and pointed at him, laughing silently.
The sound of a collision outside woke M. He dropped from his bed and sleepily, not bothering to put on his slippers, walked to the window, drew the curtain and peered out yawning a little. In time to see a struck car below, revolving slowly almost on the spot (the driver quite astonished) he searched and found further on another vehicle, at an odd angle, its front dented, its occupant looking away. The scene preoccupied him for a few minutes. He pulled the little dining-chair he normally had by the wall, over to the window, sat and watched a couple of passers-by stop on the pavement and look at the cars, holding their bags straight down by their sides. The two drivers were out of their cars now. They inspected their damage, brushed the arms of their coats a little and didn't meet one another's gaze at first.
Suddenly M. searched for the clock. It was nine thirty. The day's lectures had already started without him. "So!" he said to himself, "you're out of it, are you? Well, good for you young man! Full marks! It's time somebody did it. Why! You're free now. You have a free canvas; not one confined by some second-rate academic's syllabus. Why, you can read what you like now; follow a whim, why not? Become an autodidact! Why not? Slip into the lectures you like - any ones you want for there are hundreds each day all over the place, and nobody notices who sits there. Later (maybe) you'll become an authority and write books of your own. Is it that fanciful?" Light-headed, he went to the stove to cook a large breakfast of eggs and potatoes.
The season changed. Summer began to bear the students along now, their gestures became more liquid, faces browned and smiled. From the day he abandoned lectures, M. found that his clock had changed. He now slept late. Often he stayed up until late as well. He enjoyed calling it his autodidact clock. His daily routine started with a small amount of food which he ate half asleep, unwashed, and scarcely dressed. His energy now up, the eyes less bleary, only one foot dragging now, he would check his grin in the sideboard mirror and go for a wash in the shared bathroom down the corridor. He would then settle his room: a chair to be pushed in, the bed straightened, a china ornament on the mantle-piece, a figurine of a knight slashing his sword, turned a quarter of a circle each morning - his daily ritual. And then away to the academy buildings.
His reading stopped after a few days. None of the books fired his interest in the way he felt they should - so he decided to leave them aside for a time, until an enthusiasm for something suddenly fired itself up perhaps. He kept an interest in where his old academic course was going, though. Walking amongst the students who gathered in the corridor between lectures, though he talked to no-one he could gain an impression of the struggles they had. Sometimes, leaning his back against the wall arms flat and legs out, he glimpsed some papers held in the fist of his neighbour, and marvelled at how far they had progressed since his time. Why, some of the symbols they used, he hadn't even seen before. Often he found himself whistling silently to himself in surprise. He seemed to need to be there, right at the spot where, so others might think (the less imaginative ones, that is) his ending had come. Why did he need to be there? He couldn't tell. He walked past the old rooms sometimes, glimpsing bowed student heads, down at work, and he experienced a sense of freedom and expectation. He kept watch on the old notice-boards, looking for lists containing his name, lists which finally forgot all about him.
M. felt that he should approach the college officials. After all, no-one - so he realised with a shock - seemed to be aware that he had stopped studying. What would the attitude of these officials be? Was it even allowed? Well - M. laughed to himself - they can't force me to study can they! I'm sure they will banish me from the buildings though. They will force me to go, and perhaps that's what I need. I have no right to be here. The officials were easy to spot. Unlike students (not least because of their age) but also unlike professors, they therefore stood out. One could hear these fast-moving officials long before they were seen. Their slapping shoes and habit of talking in a fast mumbling way amongst themselves, could be heard several bends in the corridor ahead. Then, when they did burst into view, their appearance confirmed their identity, if one bothered to look up and check one's assumption. They had all adopted a sort of voluntary uniform of grey trousers too baggy and too long for them - this despite their being shorter than average - and a black silver-buttoned blazer always done up.
M. saw two of these creatures coming his way along the dark corridor. He tried to catch their eye as he approached, but they sped past and he was forced to turn round and follow them at their own break-neck speed. They seemed to duck their heads into the bends of this corridor which threw them right over to the walls against which they threw up angled arms. All the while, the two kept up an animated low conversation but without the use of gestures, just fast-moving jaws; and the hard flooring - so M. had noticed - had now changed to a deep carpet, but despite M.'s hopes, the official's shoes still slapped as much as ever. The two disappeared through a door on the side and closed it behind them. M. stopped outside and read the sign. He mused to himself - Admissions Registrar; what luck I have today; I might have wasted hours searching another day for just this place! He knocked softly. He could faintly hear a sort of crackling; but no-one answered; he knocked again. Bemused by the sound, he bent and searched for a keyhole but found none. He knocked again and this time entered without being called, assuming this to be the expected approach. The room was pitch dark except for the half-concealed glow of a coal fire. Had the officials forgotten to turn on the light (M. thought) in their hurry for the fire? And what sort of thin blood flowed through their veins to make them dash like this for the fire (it wasn't even winter yet) before even turning on the light? He could see the back and side of an official's head as he sat in a high chair, his hands held out to the orange sputtering flames. M. felt around the wall, almost as far as the man, until he found the light-switch. A sickly yellow glow from a wall-light didn't even cause the official to twitch his head. M. knocked on a table. Wearily the official turned towards him and quite openly showed him a bored expression. Where had the other official disappeared to? - thought M. He searched quickly but there was no sign. Already this official had lost interest in him and was fussily puffing up a large cushion on which to lay his feet. M. desired to explain to this man that something had happened to his studies (without it being clear exactly what) and he had carefully rehearsed his speech: but this was not how he had visualised it. And now it came out rushed, some of it in the wrong order, words missed . . . "Please convey my apologies" this he did manage to express "to the lecturers - even if a question about their competence does enter your mind. It is clearly my fault and something internal to me. In fact, I doubt whether they would even recognise me, for I would have shunned any overture on their part, any invitation to a conversation, so embarrassed was I in their presence."
"I don't even live in America." said M. in as sympathetic a voice as he could manage. The second official suddenly appeared behind M. - right on his shoulder. M. was blocking a doorway which he hadn't even noticed, and the man whistled two notes of warning in M.'s ear, that he was coming through regardless. Quickly the two officials were by one another, leaning together almost touching foreheads and mumbling again in the way that all of them did. When they had finished, they broke apart and one of them happened to notice M. again as he turned back towards the door. He opened his arms at M. and shrugged. He seemed sympathetic, M. thought. The officials didn't leave the room yet; but nothing more was forthcoming. After a while M. left.
Many of his days now, M. spent in the labyrinthine outer buildings and dining-halls where rest-rooms could be found. Occasionally he saw a face he recognised and wondered from which lecture theatre he'd just come and through which rooms and ways was he going to wend before finding the town and his road home. He followed one or two of these students for a couple of rooms, just out of curiosity, but always abandoned the trail very soon. Why had he fallen? His old school-teachers had assumed an academic path for him. It seemed to be where his inclinations lie, and though they must have surely known that his path would never have been glittering (something which he himself failed to notice) they knew that he could get an average pass in most subjects you could set him. He did need to spend a few more hours learning his facts than some; but there were many just like him. It was only very recently that he had accepted just this very thing, M. realised. There were many 'just like him'. That's not what I used to feel - he mused. He turned the thought over and over, and swallowed it. Formally, in those old school-days, he felt he was in fact just a bit special; it was just that he hadn't discovered yet where his great talent lie. But what was this conceit grounded in? His results didn't reflect it. No. But he'd always felt he could soar to extraordinary heights if . . . He wondered now whether that was true. And worse; he had felt that those who got to know him well enough, would glimpse this trembling potential and value and treasure his company. He'd blinded himself to all the evidence that people tended to bump into him, take a look, and move on without any qualms. In hindsight, they never feared they were going to miss out on much. He had the average number of friends of course, friends who didn't move on. Most people who lived in a city had friends. But they were average fellows themselves; boys and girls who found themselves linked together completely by chance.
And women! Oh! Most of all he'd felt that should a student lover, a partner, come along, someone to quash all these emotional longings, ah! then concentration and memory would come naturally and the heights, yes the heights indeed, they could surely be reached. Bah! Emotional disfunction? Distractions? Lack of drive? There never was only one reason for a fall. That was the lazy mistake everyone made. 'That man' never left his job for the reason you think; 'that marriage' never failed for the reason you've just voiced - It Is Never That Simple. There is always a tumbled confusing room-full of mistakes and impediments and chances.
A few years had passed now (he realised) and still he haunted these rest-rooms and corridors. He'd been thinking about taking a short trip out to the hills (the town was overlooked by hills on two sides) it appealed to him; the walk and air would invigorate him, and besides, he wished to look down on this academy which sprawled seemingly half way across the town. M. set off light-hearted for the first time in months. His eyes followed the bunched tops of the trees as they led him down an avenue and out of the town. The houses started to rise a little as if beginning the climb themselves, then suddenly ceased altogether, the last one scrubbed clean of any moss or ivy, a barrier against disorder. The hills began. The road turned immediately. He tried to swing his left arm once the climb began, but the right had to remain straight because he carried a black waxed brief-case, the only container he had. A little breeze pushed him downwards somewhat; but the weak sunshine brought out a smile which he released, as there was nobody to see.
The road climbed through scrub-land and low bushes. As it rounded a corner there slowly tilted into view, a small passing place, flat and dusty, part way up the hill. A curious man stood there, a squat figure, like something from a circus, staring at M. and obviously waiting for his arrival. As he rose a few more steps, M. could see that the figure stood on a mat, a gymnasium mat and with a start noticed for the first time his strong-man get-up and almost grotesque muscles. M. stared at the stony road, head down, and made a play of his struggling up this incline which made the strong-man smile, something M. could see out of the corner of his eye. The figure turned out to be a muscled boy, about fifteen-years-old but carrying a mature-man's beard already; his skin was flaky with eczema; perhaps, M. thought, he dreamt of a career in the circus and was playing out the part as some kind of training. The boy stepped off the mat, strolled a little towards M. gazing up at the hills (for what, M. could not work out) apparently uninterested yet coming towards M. nonetheless.
Could M. step off the path and by picking his way through the scrub, treading down thorns and doubtless catching his clothing on them (which would be awkward for this journey he was on) could he ignore and avoid this boy? No. It would be too pointed. The child may take offence and kill him primitively. What was this the boy was doing? Beckoning? He was inviting M. to come over to the mat - so he got in first before the strong-man could speak. "Enjoy your afternoon . . ." he called "it's a fine day." He paused then added in the long silence "See you!"
He stepped forward the final pace, gripped M.'s elbow and walked him briskly to the mat. "Don't think I don't recognise you." he said. "You promised to be my assistant today." The boy had placed him in the middle of the gymnasium mat, was looking him over from feet to shoulders, turned him round . . . "What kept you? I've been waiting. Kept me waiting . . ." He knocked the top of M.'s head with his knuckles, brought his face (traces of his eczema lay even there, thought M.) close to the side of M.'s face, stared at M. who still surveyed the scrub, and repeated - "Kept - me - waiting."
M. heard stones rolling and wheeled round. A pair of lovers were descending the road behind him. Where had they come from? The hills had been deserted. Startled, he searched further up for more. At once the strong-man leaped in front of him and urged the lovers forward. "Here! Here! A demonstration of self-defence - there's no charge. I have a mat, can you see it over there? Everyone needs self-defence." The young man pretended not to notice and continued to descend the road; but his girl smiled at the strong-man and nodded sympathetically at the mat which made her hang back a little and gave the strong-man the chance he'd been looking for. "Just half-a-dozen throws and feints, eh? See my happy assistant? We'll demonstrate a few for you; it won't take long. And one day you'll thank me; it may be in twenty years time, but you will . . ."
He was pushing M. into the centre and trying to persuade the couple to sit on a large rock. It was too much to do at the same time and M. tried to shrug off his grip. The boy shook him (like a lover shaking the corpse of his partner, M. thought) and commanded him "Look! Stand there! It's pretend. I don't really throw you - I lift you and then make as if I throw you; show them how it would be. Then I lower you gently; like a baby. There's nothing to be afraid of . . . nothing." M. froze. Without enthusiasm the couple had settled. The girl was a little taller than her lover; he rested his chin on the shoulder of her green jacket, pressing his face to her straight neck from where he was forced to brush her hair away from his eyes. She sat straighter than he, clicking her tongue a little. The strong-man faced them both, listening to the clicking of her tongue. Then he performed the first of his throws, explaining each movement of arm and leg, each grip even down to the position of his fingers and toes. The boy shifted uncomfortably on the rock; the girl stared motionless. Each throw - he was on his third by now - concentrated heavily on the head. All of them involved at some point or other a grip around the head or the neck. Extraordinarily keen to please, the strong-man kept his eyes on the couple all the time, gently manipulating M. with blind hands.
At last, the girl shrugged in an irritated fashion. Her lover lifted his chin. Already she was up. His hand went round her waist, comfortably, and they moved away from the arena. The strong-man unwound his arm-lock, left M. for the moment, stepped after the couple, calling, crying out to them - there were only two more holds to show, the best ones, he had saved them till the end, they were to wait only two more minutes, perhaps one minute would be enough . . . M. saw his chance to escape. He could return down the hill and catch up the couple. He started to descend, all the while turning his head and keeping his eyes on the strong-man's back. However, it turned out to be an easy escape. The strong-man seemed to have lost interest now. He stood alone on his mat, his back to M. and the couple, looking up the hill again.
M. reached a bend. He could almost touch the pair of lovers now; they had been listening to the crunch of gravel behind them and turning their heads in anticipation of his arrival. But he stopped on the bend. That strongman's back - it provoked him; the way it searched up the hill again, leaning and stiffening. M. had something to say about that. He boiled. Wouldn't it be reckless for him to return to that mat now? Of course it would. But he'd have to do it anyway. If not now, he'd only run half a mile further down this hill and then race back, he knew - for he boiled so.
He had caught the fool strong-man out. The fool must be told. Let him know he was exposed - that everybody could see it. He was fooling no-one: the only fool was him. Angry, and resigned to his fate, M. surrendered to his recklessness, ran back to the mat shouting on the way. Yet the strong-man didn't turn round.
The strong-man's back shook slightly. The man seemed to have stiffened. Ha! But M. couldn't see his face. Was he sobbing, or was it fury? Was it laughter! M. continued. "The trouble is . . . you young pup . . . the trouble for we men smarter than you, is that you're stupid and you'll end up turning a head for real soon. This twisting and gripping, yes, and this unhealthy interest in the head . . . it'll be your undoing as well as your victim's; a police matter . . ."
The town no longer appealed to him. His disgust with the boy seemed to have spread to the town also. He began to slowly climb the road again but all the while kept his eye on the strong-man. The boy's back had stopped shaking. Then suddenly he spun round to M. and threw a small rock. Shocked, M. ducked as the missile passed close over his head. He started back as another came at him. Dodging yet more, he slid out of range, turned, and ran. He left the town and the academy. He'd left it all now. He'd not return. A journey appealed; other places. He imagined passing cottages and factory walls, churches to pass, heavy rivers to cross. Perhaps he would even venture abroad. The land rolled swiftly beneath his feet all day, and it grew late. Above the grey hills and black valleys, a line of clouds caught the early moonlight, and he came to a row of houses with small front gardens and low hedges with gates, and looking around he saw the deep shadows of a town. He reached a pavement and now his shoes rang more clearly. No-one was about. A thin rain had started and ahead the spare street-lights illuminated a sign pointing to the railway station. Hurrying between the houses, he followed the narrow alley-way, his mind dwelling on thoughts of warm carriages and cream wall-lights and cushioned seats. At the further end of a small square, a flight of stone steps rose to the station entrance.
He found himself in a narrow waiting-room that curved. Along one wall stretched a curved bench, scarcely lit up by a dim yellow ceiling-light he had already seen glowing through the wet window-panes. Three passengers sat there, two women and a man, all with cases at their feet which dripped water and wet the stone floor beneath the bench - all three looked up as he entered but none said anything. M. sat carefully away from the others beneath a window; he did not wish to disturb these neighbours; and looked back down the alley he had walked, and allowed the little stress that always rose in him amongst strangers, to evaporate. There seemed to be no ticket-office here. As he sat and gazed out at the rain, legs stretched forward for he was beginning to feel quite comfortable now, he wondered what the routine was here. It must be some sort of branch-line, he thought. There seemed to be nowhere to buy your ticket. Where were the trains? Perhaps they came and fetched you when a train was ready? Perhaps he should ask these other quiet and polite passengers? Ah, it would be obvious soon. Surely he could hear, now and again, the distant muffled whistle of several trains? He fancied he could hear also the ticking of someone's watch in the room, but dismissed it as impossible.
He had noticed a door behind the bench where one of the other passengers sat, and wondered how the cleaner would ever gain access. For surely it was a cupboard; and surely the whole bench would have to be hauled forward to get to it, something he thought impossible? And there lay a black and damp man-hole cover in the middle of the floor in front of them. It wasn't a perfect fit and he could see - to his surprise - a dull light, scarcely brighter than the dark at the floor, coming through the cracks in a few places. And there! Yes! He distinctly saw, just occasionally, a thin wisp of steam rising from a crack and almost immediately disappearing. It was obvious. They should have been through there ages ago. No-one was coming for them at all. He looked at the others. They also had begun to gaze at the cover, and they glanced at him also because it had been he who'd discovered it first. He got up. Crouched over the cover, he noticed an iron lever stored beneath the bench right opposite. Having seized it, eased it into its groove, and heaved down, he slowly lifted the cover to one side - to the audible relief of the other three. M. wondered about just how long these three had been waiting here with their wet bags and nursing their individual puzzlement. He knelt over the round hole and looked down.
Beneath him lay a vast railway-station. He lay flat and stuck his head through the man-hole. He found himself in the roof of a station, the ends of which he couldn't fathom, overlooking perhaps seventy or eighty trains, some dark and in groups, some isolated and building-up steam, many lit up and moving slowly in lazy curves into the blur of a drizzling rain. From the man-hole an iron ladder descended straight down hundreds of feet to many rows of track. He could see illuminated carriages directly below and a rigid column of steam rising noiselessly from an engine stack. M. lowered his foot onto the ladder, ignoring the muttered apprehension of the others behind him - they could follow if they wished - and began the descent. It was colder than he'd expected, and wetter though what he first took to be rain, was in fact constant dripping from the girders of the roof. He looked up; fearing any flying suitcases thrown down in advance of one of the others above. High up there, he could distinguish the face of the gentleman passenger in the hole, but it seemed that no-one would be following him. He could understand their reluctance. This was an uncomfortable descent, and despite the guard rail, not without risk. Was there no easier route to the trains? Did one have to travel miles to the next town before one could find a station built on the regular pattern?
The ground was wet and he picked his way round pools of water; the carriages seemed alarmingly tall and difficult to reach. Stretching to his utmost he turned the handle of a carriage door, eased it open and climbed in. Here were dry seats and comfort, even if there wasn't much light. An empty train to himself, he thought. He walked through several carriages, partly to check on his safety, tried out half a dozen seats which took his fancy, and wiped a line of condensation from one of the windows, which left the balls of his fingers almost black. He peered out. There seemed to be no people near by. The ladder was obviously wrong. Yes, of course, he could see that now. He was not going to climb back up (there was no doubt about that) gaze around and explain his mistake to someone. No, he would sit here; eventually this train would take its place in the world and soon he would be shooting through the night past sleeping cities and shimmering fields, and he would watch them flutter away behind him. He leant against the window and tried to sleep.
For a couple of days he watched through the windows as the train hissed round bends and roared beneath bridges. Frequently he was lulled to sleep, comforted by the clatter of the railway sleepers, and often he would only wake when the carriage jolted to a stop. After dusk on the second day, he felt the train slow into a station and searched out for a name-plate. A town he knew! He'd had to visit the place some years ago when doing some work for a mail-order firm. At least he'd have a sense of direction now. He'd been aware of a persistent ache in his bowels all day long, and had been intending to disembark anyway in search of a functioning bathroom. To his irritation, he could find none; and could find no-one to ask. He left the platform and stood on the station steps. Beneath the broad sweep of stone steps, three globe street-lamps lit up the road outside, but beyond that it was quite dark. He tried to recall a public convenience in this old haunt of his. Suddenly he recalled one in a school swimming-pool that was nearby. The place was open to the general public also, and though no doubt the school would be closed at this late hour, he was sure he could climb the fence and find the building open.
He slipped quietly through the swing door. A glass roof above the pool gave him enough moonlight to see his way around. Three balconies of changing-rooms rose towards this roof. The convenience (there was only one, M. recalled) lay on the middle one. He removed his shoes, for the stone floor echoed alarmingly. And as he padded forward, a door on the balcony beneath him banged open and a janitor, his shoes tapping and with squeaking bucket, almost tracked his steps, the two men walking one above the other. The lavatory lay exactly as M. remembered it; he closed the door silently and in the pitch dark, smiled like a native.
Back on the station platform, to his astonishment, the train seemed to be waiting for him. He leaped on board half expecting it to move off instantly, a patient servant to his needs. When it did finally set off, he soon settled back into slumber. A cold wind and some rain blowing against his face woke him, and he found himself staring at the side of a man's shoe and an ankle wearing a short brown sock, which suddenly moved off. He was lying on his side on the carriage seat - the train was stopped again and the door opposite him left open. He raised his eyes and tilted his head to see down the carriage and find out who the shoe belonged to. It was black outside. An unknown station.
He had woken with a craving for citrus fruit. How long was it since he'd eaten? A day? Two? Of course he should eat something to nourish; not just citrus fruit; well he would - but afterwards. This need for fruit - not just one piece but more like an armful - was urgent. He must get out and, against the odds for it was the middle of the night still, search this station for something. Perhaps some juice would do; a vending machine might be supplied. At the carriage door he stared along a dark curving platform where, in the distance, a cluster of lights glowed. He thought he could make out an open kiosk and a couple of shadows moving round it. Slashed by an intermittent wind, he trod warily, inching across the wet stone for just two lamps dropping weak cones of light illuminated the way, and it wasn't until he reached the glow of the kiosk that he brought his arms completely down and straightened up again. Half a dozen people stood within the glare of the lights. One man in a dark velvet hat and a coat which flapped in the wind, stood holding two paper cups of hot drink, one of which he sipped. His acquaintance came from the shadows and took the spare cup from him. Neither looked at the other. The square kiosk was open on all sides, though the shutters weren't quite fully raised - a token resistance to the weather. A woman within the counters sat wrapped up and reading a book. Dismayed, M. saw that it was a confectioner's. He quickly ordered a black coffee, hoping to distract his fruit cravings. Supping it down in large hot gulps, it seemed to work for the moment; and as an afterthought he bought handfuls of confectionery which he stuffed into pockets for later.
He caught sight of a ticket-office through the hall window. He'd made a decision. Yes, he would travel back to his childhood town, the place where all his oldest and in some ways most profound memories lay. This was no attempt at a fresh start at life. No, he had no illusions. He could change nothing - no matter what he did. He'd return 'home' for the comfort of these memories and the familiarity of the place - that was all. Why, perhaps some of his former neighbours were there still! Yes, he'd make a visit, a visit that might even stretch to several years if he enjoyed it. He stepped boldly up to the network map hanging on the wall, and worked out a route. Then for many hours he sat with other upright passengers who scarcely ever moved from their seats. He was heading in the direction of his home region, to a large city and if not actually to his little home town just yet, then only a local journey away. Just like the people around him he wore the face that lacked animation common to all travellers, a face that appeared longer than it actually was. And behind the face he sometimes came out of an absent-minded state to dwell on recollections which never registered in his features at all.
Stopped at a station the name of which he knew to be in quite the wrong direction, he rose, quite shocked for the moment, and stood at the carriage door, leaning out. A few others had already disembarked and further down the platform were tugging the arms of uniformed conductors. He joined them. A dozen or so passengers, like him, had been directed onto this train which had been scheduled and posted to M's home town, but which had in fact all the time been heading in quite the opposite direction. No-one could explain it for them. This was not a case of one isolated passenger miss-reading the train-boards. A few even claimed that they had been pushed onto this train by the very hands of some railway employee. It was humbly agreed that there would be no charge for a journey back. They were to wait for a train going in the opposite direction. This next train would take them directly. Why, yes here it came now; they were to jump on now for this was the very one, and their worries were quite over. M. joined a carriage where he could keep an eye on a few of these fellows whom he'd made a point of being able to recognize. He enjoyed the first day for they travelled almost exclusively through pine-forests where sometimes the train had to slow to a bare walking pace while branches scraped the very sides. He tried not to sleep, making do with tiny naps, for he wished to keep these others in sight and if need be, follow them. But inevitably he woke one day to find them gone; he rose up and dashed down other carriages where, to his relief, he recognized at least one of the others; after which he returned in a reassured frame of mind to his seat.
A few days later, dawn revealed a landscape quite strange to him, and even a small herd of grazing animals which he couldn't even recognize. This was too much! He approached a man who had been sitting all night at the other end of his carriage. Where was M. going? - the man questioned. What was the name of the town again? Why it wasn't even in this country! They had crossed a border, did he not even realise that? Back in his seat, M. found in one pocket, some of the confectionery he'd bought. The wrappers glinting green and black in the half-light made him smile. He sat facing the window, pushing a confection gently into his mouth, eating, beginning another, preparing the next, eating, tears rolling silently down his cheeks.
No comments:
Post a Comment