1. Winter
The young woman stood and reached upwards to pull a coat from the metal rack above her head. The guard had made his announcement and the train had begun to slow. Soon the train would be gliding through the darkness of the tunnel to the station waiting on the other side.
Outside, looking through the carriage windows, the night had a sort of luminescence as the moonlight reflected white off the snow. It was a cold winter's night. The carriage warm but outside the frost was hard and it would be crisp and icy underfoot.
Slowly the woman began to wind her long scarf around her neck. A green woollen scarf Harris noted as he had noted everything about the women's clothing since she had joined the train. The coat, the dark blue coat, was pulled on over the woman's Fair Isle jumper. She would certainly need to be wrapped up warm when she alighted from the train. The contrast between the warmth of the coach and the cold of the night would be marked. Her breath would be before her.
Harris had been pleased to see a below the knee pleated grey skirt—not trousers—plenty of material there to keep the girl warm; her black woollen tights looked sensible and defensive against the cold—what little was exposed between skirt and boots and, then, only visible just as she got up from her seat . Not simply shoes, sensible or otherwise, but sturdy long black leather boots to below her knee, probably lined.
One by one the buttons were slipped into their button holes as her hand ascended until the last one brought the lapels together and they were secured leaving a little of the scarf showing around her neck. From her bag a green woollen hat, not the practical sort with a bobble on the top but one with more shape and style—nonetheless warm and practical. And from her coat pockets green woollen gloves were extracted and the first carefully pulled on over fingers.
Harris too rose to his feet, stepped into the aisle and stood, facing towards the woman.
The train entered the tunnel.
Without power, gliding without braking, the train slid through the tunnel, gently slowing with each passing second but as it slowed the lights dimmed until the carriage was in pitch blackness. The moonlight did not penetrate far into the tunnel.
And still the train slowed until it was at rest. Not in the station but seemingly still in the depths of the tunnel, the dark tunnel. There was no sound. It was strangely quiet.
"I'm not sure I like this." The woman spoke, her words clear in the silence and directed at Harris; the last person she had seen. "I hope we soon move on into the station."
There was no movement but a chill came over the air, a deepening chill as if they were no longer in the carriage but already on the platform.
The woman moved, Harris could hear the sound of boots as if she was stepping on frosted snow; and with the sound came a brightening of light around them but not the yellowish light of the carriage's electric lights returning: instead the cold white light of the moon.
In the gathering light Harris—and the woman—could see not the windows of the carriage but trees, many trees; dark bare trees with snow covered branches and, below them covering the ground, a carpet of white snow. The snow virginal, untouched by footsteps except where the woman had moved her boots.
The snow was falling gently in the silence of the wood.
The woman was wide eyed above her scarf, her head and then her body turning around, first one way and then the other, her dark blue coat swinging with her. "The train..."
Harris watched her unmoving, seemingly unperturbed by the change of events.
"What...where... where are we?"
It was the two of them alone. Very much alone. Two figures standing in the silence of a winter wood or, indeed, a forest. The few other people seated in the carriage had disappeared or perhaps had simply not come with Harris and the woman.
"We seem to be in a wood in the snow. No lamp post though." If meant as a joke it did not seem to amuse the woman.
"Where is the train?"
The snow was starting to fall faster. It was cold. Harris did not answer.
The woman was agitated. "There's a light." She said.
Away off into the trees it showed to their right, or was it their left, or was it straight on? It had been behind them at first. A feint yellow light.
"Perhaps it's the lamp post."
The comment was clearly not well received.
"This is not poss..."
The woman started walking towards it, her boots moving evenly. Harris followed in her footsteps: clear marks in the untouched snow. Their feet made a scrunching noise. That and their breathing the only sound. The steadily increasing snow was silent as it fell to the ground.
It was not a lamp post but a weak glimmer from a small cottage window. Small indeed, single storied, made of timber, as might reasonably be expected in a wood, and mud: but with a brick chimney and window. The thatching looked sound. A door, oaken and solid.
There was little hesitation from the woman, a glance back at Harris and then she knocked. The sound harsh in the quiet of the falling snow. She waited.
Harris noted the snow now lying across the woman's shoulders like a mantle; her green hat dusted with snow.
The woman turned with a shrug of her shoulders, "I don't think..."
Standing there looking out into the night, the dark night, the snow swirling and darker clouds coming to obscure the moon they seemed utterly alone. Not a hint of light from anywhere else, just the dark bare surrounding trees; not a sound from a person or animal, just the falling snow. The woman knocked again. There was still no answer.
"It is very cold." She tried the door. It was locked.
There was real alarm in the woman's eyes now.
"I don't understand... and the door is locked."
Harris nodded and stretched out his hand. He was pointing and the woman followed his gaze to a large round stone by the left side of the door jamb.
"Do you think?"
She did not wait for an answer but moved the stone with her gloved hand revealing a key.
"How did you know?"
"It is often so," replied Harris.
The woman looked puzzled but was quick to insert the key and turn. The door opened easily and they stepped inside.
Earth floored it may have been but it was not unhomely. On a plank table by the window a single candle burned in a brass candlestick, the fireplace was neatly laid ready to burn and in the corner of the cottage a stout bed was neatly covered in a blanket. Upon another table a pitcher of water, fresh bread and cheese.
From his coat pocket Harris produced a box of matches and set to lighting the fire. The woman stood in the middle of the cottage as if unsure what to do next. The fire crackled as the tinder and then kindling caught.
"I don't understand. What has happened—to us?"
"It will be a good fire."
Already there was just the hint of warmth from the quick burning kindling, smoke was already—at least mostly—already making its way up the cold chimney.
"I wish there was more light."
"A candle and a fire are good enough to see by."
Clearly the woman was not exactly happy with Harris' conversational skills or his less than helpful answers. She moved to look around the room, even flicking the blankets on the bed back to see what the bed was like. It was a single bed. Just the one. It must have passed through her mind the important question: if they were to spend the night there in the cottage then who was going to sleep in the bed?
Harris sat on a stool by the fire gazing into its building light. It was clear his prognostication about it was being realised.
"Who do you think lives here? When will he be back?"
Harris shrugged his shoulders." May not be a permanent abode."
It did not really answer the question. Again the woman walked around the cottage looking at things. It was not a large cottage and it only had the one room. There was not much to see.
The woman picked up a small iron pot and looked at its congealed contents.
