He would find a pub, and take a room, perhaps. If that wasn’t possible – and why would it be, out in the wilderness? – he’d have to sit in a bus shelter and wait for that same sun to do its business elsewhere and rise again. It would rise, and it would rise on him if he let it. Of course, the bus he was on might simply turn round, and it could take him all the way back to the station they’d just left – in which case he’d be at Burnley Manchester Road again, retracing his steps to the opposite platform so as to catch another train south or west. He’d buy a ticket with a card that couldn’t last much longer – or perhaps he’d try to dodge the fare. In fact, he’d enjoy being caught doing that, because he’d relish the attention.

‘I’ll need a name and address, sir.’

‘Of course you will,’ he’d say. ‘I’m sorry. I’m just… caught short, so to speak.’

‘What I’ll have to do, sir, is put down that I issued a penalty fare and you couldn’t pay it as of now. So what will happen is the company will write to you, and make arrangements for payment.’

Could he give a false address?

They’d be wise to that kind of ruse. If he had nothing with which to identify himself, perhaps the transport police would appear? Too busy to investigate lewd graffiti, they would be there for his misdemeanour, ready at the next station – ready to take him into an office and treat him with the infinite patience of those who knew what to do when a man had no money.

But at what point did things become menacing?

He would have to raise his voice and insult them. Perhaps if he’d finished the whisky he might manage to be unreasonable? He might throw a punch and shout, ‘God is great!’ – then everything would change. How long before you found yourself sitting bruised and cuffed on a metal bed, your shoelaces gone? You’d sit, knowing there was nobody coming to claim you. No mother to sigh with disappointment, and no wife or brother or son – no partner, even.

No Monica, no Amy. Absolutely no Elizabeth.

He would be like a piece of left luggage that nobody was looking for.