The police offered to run her back to the pub—they were taking a still-shaken Jim there. But it was 2 A.M., and Nina didn’t have a friendly railway employer who would put her up somewhere and she couldn’t afford a hotel room. She blinked a lot, hoping she wouldn’t burst into tears again, wishing desperately she knew what to do. Eventually Marek leaned forward.
“You know, we go to Birmingham,” he said quietly. She looked at him. The policemen looked at each other, not knowing whether this was allowed, but aware that it would be a massive problem off their hands. Jim was already waving good-bye.
“Fine,” said one of the policemen finally, handing her an incident report. “Don’t go driving onto any more train crossings, okay?”
Nina nodded. “Never again,” she said.
And then everyone left and the blue lights vanished and suddenly they were up in the cab by themselves. Marek spoke to control and the train-crossing gates came down once more, and this time, without anyone in the way, the train moved off smoothly.
Marek had insisted on wrapping Nina up in a blanket and putting her on the seat. After everything they’d been through, she felt almost sleepy, but she couldn’t fall asleep. She had never sat in the front of a train before, if you didn’t count the Docklands Light Railway once when she was little. The windows were big and wide with—she was surprised, although she realized she shouldn’t have been—perfectly normal windshield wipers on them. As the great tender started gradually to move, and then to pick up speed, she leaned forward eagerly to watch. The night sky wasn’t, in fact, all black as they passed through the woods and out into open hills; the black was in the great curve of the land, but the sky itself was an array of dark velvety colors, spotted with stars, the moon almost full. In the bushes beside the train, watchful eyes lit up; there was a scurry of movement in the hedgerows; here and there across the track, little rabbits hopped so quickly Nina gasped, but they were never caught.
“Like you, heh?” said Marek, his voice deep, standing carefully at the handle as the train rattled its way across the night.
“They gave me a fright,” said Nina.
“I think you nearly killed Jim,” said Marek. “With the fright.”
“I really didn’t mean to.”
“I know, I know,” said Marek. The cab was dark, for better visibility outside; Nina could only make out his profile, his stubbly chin against the moon shining through the window as they sped on through towns and villages shut down tight against the night.
“So what are you doing out like this at night, huh?” said Marek. “You’re not Scottish, no?”
Nina shook her head.
“Birmingham.”
“I’m from Chester, but I live in Birmingham. Yes. Where are you from?” she asked out of curiosity.
“Latvia,” he grunted.
“So we’re both far from home,” said Nina. Marek didn’t answer.
“I was . . . I was bringing the van home,” she said. “For work.”
“What is your work? You drive van?”
“Not very well,” said Nina. “I was . . . I wanted to open a bookshop.”
Marek turned briefly to look at her. “Ah,” he said. “Bookshops. Very good. People like bookshops.”
Nina nodded. “I hope so. I wanted to . . . you know. Bring books to people. Find the right kind of thing for them to read.”
Marek smiled. “And where is your shop? Birmingham?”
Nina shook her head. “No. I thought I’d have it . . . in the van.”
“Inside the van? A shop inside a van?”
“I know,” said Nina. “Maybe it’s a terrible idea. I’m not having much luck with it so far.”
“So you drive and look for people who need books?”
“Yes.”
“What book do I need, huh? No Russians.”
She looked at him and smiled. “Well,” she said, “I would recommend something about people who work nights. There’s Ovian Falls. It’s about a man in a war who stands watch all night before the signal to advance in the morning, and about what goes through his head before they have to go over the top and fight. He thinks about his family and when he was a child, and it’s funny and sad, and there’s a sniper who he thinks is trying to kill him. And the sniper is trying to kill him. It’s good and sad and exciting and it feels like all of life in a night.”
Marek nodded his head. “That is what it is like for me sometimes,” he said. “Only the clock is the sniper. Not real sniper. That sounds like just the book for me. I will buy. Very good.”
Nina smiled. “Really?”
“Yes. I think so. You have convinced me. Perhaps we should turn this train to books, huh? Have a book train?”
“I love that idea!” said Nina. “But, uh, maybe best start small.”
“But you will be in Birmingham and your van will be in Scotland.”
“Yes, I know,” said Nina. “I’m going to figure it out soon.”
“That does not seem to me very good way to run a bookshop.”
Nina looked at him to see if he was teasing her, but his face was inscrutable.
“No, not particularly.” She sighed. “But I can’t park it in Birmingham. I don’t really know where I’m going. My life is just full of problems.”
Marek smiled sadly in the darkness, and she could see his white teeth gleaming.
“Oh, you think you have problems?” he said.
“Well, I don’t have a job, all my assets are parked in a turnoff in a place I don’t even know, my roommate is going to evict me in case I bring the ceiling down, and I just nearly got run over by a train. So, yes, I think I’ve got problems.”
He shrugged.
“What, you think I’ve spent all my savings on a van I can’t drive for fun?” She huddled more tightly into her blanket. “How can you not think I have problems?”
Marek shrugged again. “You are young. You are healthy. You have van. Many people from my country would think you were very lucky.”
“I suppose,” said Nina quietly.
They racketed across a bridge, startling a group of herons that had been crowding around a lake. They took off in flight, silhouetted across the moon.
“Wow,” said Nina. “Look at that.”