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which she had bought at a local antique shop, and switched on the
radio. Some gloomy piece of Mahler droned into the room. She tried the talk
radio, but it was a phone-in about death. She switched the radio off, reached
for an envelope, addressed it, stamped it, sealed her letter inside and reached
for a cigarette.
    Besides
these occasional bouts of homesickness there was another reason why she felt so
irritatingly out of sorts. It was to do with her work. Hemingway’s women, her
chosen field of study, did not seem particularly relevant to rural England.
Hemingway, Anglophile though he might have been, liked to meet his English
friends as far away from England as possible. Though he had created many
memorable English characters, they were always to be found in France or Italy
or Spain or Africa. The England of winding lanes and pubs and tea-shops was too
cosy for Mr H. As she lit up, inhaled gratefully and flicked out the match, she
could not help thinking that perhaps this whole adventure had been a mistake
and that she should have taken her year off in Paris or Venice or even Havana.
Anywhere but this pretty, passionless place.

Eight
     
     
     
    ‘I
don’t like all this,’ complained Harold Meredith. He
tapped on the double-strength shatter-proof glass of the anti-bandit screen.
‘Can you hear me in there?’
    ‘
’fraid so, Mr Meredith,’ Martin assured him.
    In
less than a month since Nick Marshall’s appointment the first signs of change
had appeared at Theston post office. Already the old-style weighing machines
had gone, replaced by digital scales which gave exact weight and cost almost
instantly. Bar-codes were appearing on everything from recorded delivery forms
to pension books, and Marshall had introduced decoders, speeding up
transactions and saving time at the stock-taking end of the day. Now a brand
new counter-to-ceiling security screen had replaced its scratched and yellowing
predecessor.
    Martin
was cautiously approving. For all his initial reservations, he was flattered
that Marshall saw him as an ally in his fight to improve Theston’s status. It
was a refreshing change from the years with Padge who moaned and grumbled but
had stoutly refused to join the union or reply to any of the questionnaires
they sent out.
    All
Martin wanted was for those at the top to stop fiddling around with a system
that worked perfectly well, to stop treating the Post Office as a political
football and to accept that it was, as Marshall had said, ‘part of national
life’ and would stay that way for a long, long time.
    ‘How
am I going to give you the book?’ asked Harold Meredith.
    ‘Just
drop it down in the tray.’
    ‘I
can’t, there’s something over it.’
    ‘I’m
going to move that for you.’ Martin slid back the protective cover. ‘There you
are.’
    Reluctantly,
as if parting from a loved one for the last time, Mr Meredith let his pension
book slip down into the stainless-steel retainer. Martin slid back the cover,
almost catching Meredith’s still-outstretched hand.
    ‘Is
this because of Aids?’ Meredith stared enquiringly up at him.
    Martin
swiftly passed his checker over the barcode. It pinged appreciatively.
    ‘No,
no, it’s just to make us feel a little bit safer.’
    ‘Who
from?’
    ‘Blood-crazed
pensioners, Mr Meredith,’ called out John Parr, leaning over. ‘People with a
score to settle.’ Martin cast his eye over the docket for date and signature.
Harold Meredith watched suspiciously, it’s this new man, isn’t it?’
    Martin
reached for his wooden-handled date stamp and thumped it down, first on the
docket and then on the counterfoil. Since Marshall had told him of digital
scanners that could read a pension card, check details 0n a database, mark the
transaction and automatically count out the sum to be paid, Martin had been
unusually sensitive to the laboriousness of the process.
    ‘Armed
raids on post offices increased twenty-five per cent last year, Mr