‘That’s just what I mean, sir!’ Michael hissed.

He leaned on the rail for a moment.

Sir, he thought quietly. Sir or madam. Person in charge. I know you do your best, because we all do. You’re trying to help me go north, but look at the network spreading out of this town – look at the rails – and look at all the things beyond your control. You have electrical problems. You have wear and tear. You have to deal with vandalism, while thoughtless people like me fling themselves under your wheels. How can you hope to get it right, ever? If a train gets in on time, we should line the platform, cheering the miracle.’

Michael breathed in, and smiled again: Glasgow had ceased to exist.

The Highlands were suddenly a fiction of someone else’s past – he would never reach them. No, not now: for he had a new plan. He would take the little purple train because it was there, close by – he could see it, and it was real. It was short, neat and noisy and he wanted suddenly to know where it went. If it went in a circle, he’d stay on it for as long as he could, and if he couldn’t die on the tracks perhaps he could die more comfortably, in one of its seats? He’d met someone, years ago, who told a story about travelling on the Tube in London – the Circle line, in fact – and discovering that the man he’d sat next to was dead.

He was sitting next to an actual corpse.

‘So what did you do?’ Michael said.

‘I didn’t do anything,’ said the somebody. ‘I didn’t want to get involved, so I got off at the next stop.’

‘Did you report it?’

‘No.’

How long had that solitary former person been going round and round on the Circle line? How many passengers had decided not to get involved, and when had it slumped so far forward that it couldn’t be ignored? Perhaps it had rolled onto the floor, and people had still stepped over it? Another dead person, dammit – where’s the guard?

He reached the purple train, and climbed on board.

No, no, no: he would never get back to the Highlands, because they were in the past and this was a train to the future – where it was actually going he still had no idea. Someone would tell him, or the destinations would soon start to scroll endlessly across the display panel, for you couldn’t avoid knowing where you were bound for very long. At that moment he was happy to sit, uncertain whether he’d be taken forwards or backwards. His ticket might be valid, but it was equally possible he’d have to buy a new one.

So what?