“I know that,” I retorted, despite feeling less confident than I tried to sound. Through the exit from the waiting-room beyond the doorless entrance I could see a sign on the further platform. Black lichen or a vandal’s paint spray had covered the name of the station except for the first two letters of each word, so that the sign resembled a joke at the expense of any visitor. I wondered how my aunt had read it, although would it have been in this state when she was here? I didn’t even know how long ago that was. Perhaps I would find some insight in the waiting-room.

The doors to the platform had collapsed, and the windows overlooking it had been thoroughly smashed. At least this let in the daylight, such as it was, enabling me to pick my way around the rubble strewn across the floorboards. Tattered posters clung to the walls, portions of them groping at the shadows as a chilly wind enlivened them. The vintage images advertised holiday resorts, bygone or certainly transformed since. One poster showed a family on a seafront while the other placed a couple with their son and daughter on a beach. Of course they must be different families, but somebody had gouged out every face and the plaster behind them, filling their outlines with wet red brick. The tattered silhouettes were growing restless with a wind, and I was reminded of the kind of seaside sideshow where customers paid to thrust their faces through the holes that grotesque figures had above their necks. Why should I imagine that all the holes in the posters were about to produce the same face? Just now I preferred to leave that kind of fancy to my aunt, and I made my way over to the booking office.