Frejah started the engine – there was an immensely satisfying roar from below and behind, and several LED instruments came instantly to life on the sculpted dash in front of the driver. After its first burst of power the engine settled into a potent idling, with barely any detectable vibration, a sense of energetic imminent release.

‘Is this your own car, Frejah?’ I said. I knew it was a stupid question even as I blurted it out, but I was overwhelmed by the discovery of what she drove around in. I felt something like an awestruck teenager finding himself materializing on the command deck of a spaceship.

‘It’s the car I use, yes,’ she said.

‘But do you own it?’ That was too direct, too impertinent. ‘I mean—’

‘I think of it as my car. No one else drives it.’ She revved the engine once, and a cloud of thin dark smoke billowed past the windows. ‘Now – we need to get to the train station.’

I was surprised, but said nothing to that. She had said she would drive me all the way to Tristcontenta, and in the last few seconds I had developed and was relishing the expectation of a day or two speeding across Dearth’s central plain in this extraordinarily lovely car. A short lift to the railway station was not what I was hoping for.

Frejah drove and controlled the car expertly through the parking lot access tracks. The highly tuned engine sounded awe-inspiringly on the point of erupting into devastating power. We approached the pay station and barriers, but Frejah made no attempt to slow the car. The barrier jerked suddenly upwards, almost as if in apology for having the temerity to be in the way. We swept underneath. After a long curving and ascending ramp we emerged into the cold daylight of Dearth City, a forest of tall buildings, with cars, buses and trucks everywhere, lighted advertising signs, a few pedestrians wrapped inevitably against the freezing air. None of them looked at us as we snarled past, presumably preoccupied by the need to arrive wherever they were going as soon as possible, not to gawp at passing cars.

I noticed that at every street junction, and jutting out at a low level from many industrial buildings, was a brightly lit digital display. The dazzling green image refreshed constantly: from the temperature (at that moment -19°C) to something called M per cent (‘Mutability’? – anyway standing at 7.5 per cent, although on some displays it showed as 7.25 per cent).

Swerving efficiently but not dangerously between slower vehicles, Frejah soon reached the main entrance yard to the station. She pulled over into a zone clearly marked as prohibited for parking or waiting.

‘Are you leaving me here?’ I said, trying to conceal my sense of disappointment.

‘Do you still have the return half of your train ticket?’

‘Yes.’