The middle-aged man got up too, folding his paper, pulling out his pipe from his pocket as he stepped down. The carriage was empty. John leaned back in his seat, staring at the advertisements opposite. Magical Margate. Finest Sands in England. Frequent Fast Trains. He stood up and checked his appearance in the mirror. The welts on his face where she’d slapped him had faded now, but he’d nicked himself shaving this morning and there was a small scab on his chin. The bruise on his thigh wasn’t so tender, and had turned a lurid yellow. At least he wasn’t limping now. Arthur would see him as he’d last seen him, a little older, with lines around his mouth, faint creases on his forehead and one or two premature flecks of grey in his hair. He wondered how Arthur would look, what he was doing with his life now. He’d never said. He dropped the cigarette on the floor, stubbed it out with his heel.

The train drew into Bexleyheath. There was a map at the station and John memorised the way. He reckoned it was about a mile. A good stroll. He checked on his watch. Quarter past two. He’d be there about half past, just after. A decent time to arrive. He hoped Arthur was there, wasn’t on his summer holiday, or at work, even though it was a Saturday. This conversation had to be done man to man. He couldn’t write. Nor did he want it in writing. You never knew who might get hold of it.

He stepped out of the station, past a small parade of shops, stopping at a newsagent’s and buying some more cigarettes and a box of matches. The day was warm, that dusty heat of midsummer. The gardens looked dry and the trees had lost the freshness of spring, their leaves flat and dark. They weren’t yet showing the exhaustion of August, but it wouldn’t be long. Interwar houses lined the streets, rows of 1930s semis or bungalows, pebble-dashed in sandy stone, woodwork painted brown or green. Bay windows lined with net curtains. He shouldn’t be so sniffy, John thought. On a teacher’s salary, he’d be lucky to afford one of these. There weren’t many cars parked, and they were all pre-war, he noted, an old black Austin Seven, a deep red Morris Eight.

Only twenty years ago, this had been countryside, farms and lanes and woodland. Now there were hedges, saplings, lawns. Everyone must have arrived a stranger. Where had these people come from? Men like Arthur, home from war?