Read Online Mandrake by Susan Cooper - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Susan Cooper
Tags: SF, OCR-Finished
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pity to go on a day like this, a pity to leave home…
It was like pushing against gravity. Queston shook his head violently; went to fill the dog’s water-bowl and leave her a day’s meal; threw the brown-paper parcel of his manuscript on the back seat of the car, and drove away.
On the way, brooding over his reactions, he decided to go by train; there could be no wandering off the route then, or freak decisions to turn back for home. He made for Micheldever, a small station on the London line, and left the Lagonda in the yard. The station was deserted, and he had to shout before an ancient, creaking little man, surly and muttering, emerged from some hidden depths; even then, before he could buy a ticket, the old man had to shuffle away to fetch the booking-office key. When the ticket was handed over at last, suspicion trickling out with it through the grimy window, it cost at least three times as much as Queston remembered for journeys of that length two years before.
A train was due in half an hour. ‘You’re in luck,’ the old man said obscurely, and vanished, coughing with a childish, painful noise.
Queston walked slowly up and down the long platform, listening to his own steps. A nightingale was bubbling somewhere in the green, dark wall of fir-trees that grew close on the other side of the track; he could smell the resinous warmth of the air. It was like a ghost station, where nothing so vibrantly mechanical as a train would ever come. Even the old familiar holiday posters were missing from the walls; the poster-frames were still there, but gaping empty. Only in the waiting-room, with its bare wooden benches forlorn round the walls, did he find one poster glaring down at him. It carried no picture; no purple Highland loch or pneumatic beauty queen: but three lines of bold black type on a white ground.
IS YOUR JOURNEY
REALLY
NECESSARY?
Queston stared. The words woke a vague echo in his mind; there had been such posters when he was a child, he thought, shackling the worried country during the Second World War. Thirty-five years ago.
But this poster was quite clearly brand new.
Twenty minutes late, the train came in: a diesel car with one coach. There were only three other passengers beside himself, and every station platform where they stopped was as bare as Micheldever had been.
Even the platforms at Waterloo were half empty. At the barrier, a uniformed inspector peered closely at his ticket.
‘You’ll be coming back today, sir?’
‘Yes, of course,’ Queston said. ‘It’s a day return ticket, isn’t it?’
‘Just checking,’ the man said. He held out a slip of green paper. ‘Here’s your pass.’
‘Pass? ’ Queston looked down at the slip. It was printed, in neat black type: London Regional Council: admit bearer for twenty-four hours : and overstamped with the date. He said, incautiously: ‘What’s this for?’
‘Not been here for some time, have you? ’ The man glanced up at him with a faint patronizing grin; the tolerance of the cockney for the provincial. ‘You hang on to that, mate, and give it up when you get on your train tonight. You’ll need it if you happen to get stopped by a bobby for anything, too.’
‘Good God,’ said Queston; but a woman behind him was impatiently clicking her tongue, and he moved on out of the way. As he passed, he caught sight of the letters ‘ m.o.p.’ on the ticket inspector’s cap.
He crossed the deserted station. Although it was midday, the snack bars and restaurants were closed. They looked as though they had been closed for a long time. There were no taxis in the station approach. Queston set out to walk.
At once he was startled by the altered horizons of London. From the middle of Waterloo Bridge, with the wind catching at his hair, he looked up and down the Thames at a great bristling fringe of the blocks of flats whose beginnings he had seen two years before. They were everywhere, in clusters and groups. He found it
It was like pushing against gravity. Queston shook his head violently; went to fill the dog’s water-bowl and leave her a day’s meal; threw the brown-paper parcel of his manuscript on the back seat of the car, and drove away.
On the way, brooding over his reactions, he decided to go by train; there could be no wandering off the route then, or freak decisions to turn back for home. He made for Micheldever, a small station on the London line, and left the Lagonda in the yard. The station was deserted, and he had to shout before an ancient, creaking little man, surly and muttering, emerged from some hidden depths; even then, before he could buy a ticket, the old man had to shuffle away to fetch the booking-office key. When the ticket was handed over at last, suspicion trickling out with it through the grimy window, it cost at least three times as much as Queston remembered for journeys of that length two years before.
A train was due in half an hour. ‘You’re in luck,’ the old man said obscurely, and vanished, coughing with a childish, painful noise.
Queston walked slowly up and down the long platform, listening to his own steps. A nightingale was bubbling somewhere in the green, dark wall of fir-trees that grew close on the other side of the track; he could smell the resinous warmth of the air. It was like a ghost station, where nothing so vibrantly mechanical as a train would ever come. Even the old familiar holiday posters were missing from the walls; the poster-frames were still there, but gaping empty. Only in the waiting-room, with its bare wooden benches forlorn round the walls, did he find one poster glaring down at him. It carried no picture; no purple Highland loch or pneumatic beauty queen: but three lines of bold black type on a white ground.
IS YOUR JOURNEY
REALLY
NECESSARY?
Queston stared. The words woke a vague echo in his mind; there had been such posters when he was a child, he thought, shackling the worried country during the Second World War. Thirty-five years ago.
But this poster was quite clearly brand new.
Twenty minutes late, the train came in: a diesel car with one coach. There were only three other passengers beside himself, and every station platform where they stopped was as bare as Micheldever had been.
Even the platforms at Waterloo were half empty. At the barrier, a uniformed inspector peered closely at his ticket.
‘You’ll be coming back today, sir?’
‘Yes, of course,’ Queston said. ‘It’s a day return ticket, isn’t it?’
‘Just checking,’ the man said. He held out a slip of green paper. ‘Here’s your pass.’
‘Pass? ’ Queston looked down at the slip. It was printed, in neat black type: London Regional Council: admit bearer for twenty-four hours : and overstamped with the date. He said, incautiously: ‘What’s this for?’
‘Not been here for some time, have you? ’ The man glanced up at him with a faint patronizing grin; the tolerance of the cockney for the provincial. ‘You hang on to that, mate, and give it up when you get on your train tonight. You’ll need it if you happen to get stopped by a bobby for anything, too.’
‘Good God,’ said Queston; but a woman behind him was impatiently clicking her tongue, and he moved on out of the way. As he passed, he caught sight of the letters ‘ m.o.p.’ on the ticket inspector’s cap.
He crossed the deserted station. Although it was midday, the snack bars and restaurants were closed. They looked as though they had been closed for a long time. There were no taxis in the station approach. Queston set out to walk.
At once he was startled by the altered horizons of London. From the middle of Waterloo Bridge, with the wind catching at his hair, he looked up and down the Thames at a great bristling fringe of the blocks of flats whose beginnings he had seen two years before. They were everywhere, in clusters and groups. He found it
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