Enduring Passions by David Wiltshire

his white shirt front and murmured ‘Good, good.’
    Fervently, for the only time in her life, Fay silently thanked the German Chancellor.
     
    Tom had come down the stairs into a room thick with smoke from the wooden and clay pipes of several men gathered around the bar and fire. Their sudden roar of laughter and voices with broad Gloucestershire accents coming up through the floorboards had woken him up. The woman who had shown him in earlier was pulling a pint, the handle clonking back on each release. She seemed to be in no better mood than before. All the men fell silent and looked at him. He gave a weak smile and a nod, ‘Good evening.’
    There were a couple of grunts.
    The landlady, work on the tankard finished as froth flowed down the sides, called out ‘You want that bread and cheese now?’
    He shook his head. ‘I’m going out to eat.’ She wiped her hands on the same tea towel he had noted that afternoon.
    ‘Suit yourself. Don’t forget we lock up at eleven on the dot.’
    He nodded and edged past them and out into the fresh night air. It was only a short walk to the market square, dominated by the church. A couple of cars were parked outside a hotel. Down a side street he found a café but somehow he didn’t fancy sitting there for the next hour or soon his own. It took a while, but eventually his nose led him to the fish and chip shop. There was a little queue, and a couple of youths, sitting astride their bikes as they ate their penny worth of scraps.
    He had rock salmon and chips, with plenty of vinegar and salt, wrapped in one layer of grease paper and then two sheets of newspaper.
    Cold or not, he found a seat and picked a hole through the newsprint and then into the hot succulent depths, pulling out a chip first, then breaking off lumps of battered fish fried in lard.
    Tom knew of no finer food in the kingdom.
    He started to think what he was going to do. Would he just hang around outside the house in Imperial Square? That seemed stupid. Inadequate. The answer when it came, seemed simple. He would write a letter to her at Codrington Hall. It would give her his address, and suggest a time and meeting place for the Saturday. He only hoped she wouldn’t be offended, or that in some way she would get into trouble. But it was the only thing he could think of to do.
     
    The morning was cloudy, threatening rain. He stood on the platform waiting for the train to Cheltenham. In one way it felt sad, leaving her, but it was also a day nearer to the weekend. Tom strolled past milk churns on trolleys, to the end of the platform where it sloped down to track level. A water tower with a canvas pipe dripped steadily on to the ballast.
    He checked his watch, looked down the track to the gasworks beyond the station.
    Several people were gathering, some sitting on the benches, but mostly standing or in the waiting-room. Beside him were a group of small boys – trainspotters, with their books, sitting on a parked handcart by the wooden fence, squabbling over something.
    For a brief moment he wondered if she would appear on the platform, but knew it was wishful thinking – she knew nothing of his movements, but still….
    The rails started to give out a faint hum, his eyes drawn to where the track curved away out of sight. A signal clonked down. The humming increased. The boys stopped fighting and gathered near him.
    And then, in that exciting moment that he saw the children still experienced , around the bend in the distance came a black smudge. Spurts of white steam flickered at its wheels, and smoke flowed away from its chimney.
    It grew in size until he could see that it was an old MSWJR engine now in GWR colours.
    When it finally got to the other end of the platform it had slowed right down, and by the time it reached him it was moving at a walking pace. With a surge of steam it ground to a halt.
    He nodded to the driver and walked away down the length of the train until he found an empty third class