The noise hit him first. The unmistakeable rattle of a train taking points and level crossings at speed, into the night with fire burning, steam billowing behind, wafting into half-opened windows. The smell of a steam engine, the roar of the crowd.

Kramer was in the narrow corridor of a passenger train, the 9.15 to oblivion and all stations between. It old-fashioned, pre open-plan, the type with compartments, separate little cells of intrigue, the type Kramer liked best.

He opened the door of one compartment, moved in and sat down. It was full of the types of people one usually finds in this situation. The blonde near the window obviously a spy, an agent for the K.G.B. The seedy little man next to her, a de-frocked bishop, reading a well thumbed copy of Playboy, an issue of the Daily Mail, rushed to him in a plain brown envelope, by his side. An absconding bank manager, his case stuffed with his ill-gotten gains was filling in the Times crossword in Arabic. Opposite a bald, bespectacled, and slightly overweight man, his clothes pressed and immaculate, studied a map of Italy that was upside down.

No one spoke. The blonde ignored the no-smoking sign that had slipped down in the condensation and was lying at a 45 degree angle at the bottom of the window, and lit a long, slim panatella cigar.

Government warning: blondes have more fun. Marlboro country, track 29. Night train to Munich.

Now the carriage was different. Open plan, with sofas and easy chairs. Kramer sat down in the biggest and most comfortable and glanced out of the window. The train was passing through open country, filled with cacti and tumbleweeds. And then a city. The ugly part of town that all trains are compelled to go through. Backs of factories, coal yards, refineries, rusting metal, piles of debris, pools of toxic liquid, pipes caked with grease and oil. Then a forest, the pipes turning to trees, reaching up over the train creating a living, organic tunnel. Faces stared out of the branches and the roots laughing at Kramer as he watched.

Now crossing a high viaduct, looking down on rooftops and gardens, peeking into bedroom windows.

Now a desert and Lawrence of Arabia. Sand dunes stretching as far as he could.

But only on one side.

On the other, the carriage was under water. Multi-coloured fish, calling silently for Bob, swam through strands of sliver seaweed, through coral that brushed against the window and vanished. Manta rays swam upwards towards the surface and broke through into free flight. Neon dreams with x-ray eyes of an x-ray fish.

But not tonight Josephine.

Onwards.

The carriage was now a bare goods wagon, its floor strewn with damp straw. A hobo jumped aboard and sat in a corner and beckoned Kramer to join him. He declined and moved to the open door. He looked out, now seeing lakes, pine woods, snow covered mountains, palm fringed beaches, Niagara Falls running backwards and the Nile Delta in full flood.

Then the Rockies crumbled, Gibraltar tumbled and the Golden Gate Bridge opened just enough to allow the train to squeeze through.