Farringdon, late at night. The station was empty and for the first time in months, Ruth had been out after work with friends and was waiting for the last tube home. Since being followed she’d been so afraid she had always taken taxis.
Now she’d had enough.
Tonight it was time to reclaim the city for her own. She would not live in fear. She would use the streets at night and she would use the tube. She was not Chosen and Mr Scary Sniff-the-air Creepy Man was not going to stop her from enjoying the freedoms of a normal human being. The train was empty and as it pulled into the deserted station, the driver leaned out of the cab.
“Get in behind me, luv!” he called. “Any trouble, bang on the door an’ you can lock yourself in here with me.”
Great start. He was trying to be kind and reassuring but his words had the opposite effect.
“Thanks,” she said, climbed in and sat at the end of the first carriage where the driver had said. If the driver’s cab wasn’t safe, there was no way out and if that bloke came after her, she didn’t believe a couple of inches of London Underground Formica would stop him.
“Will you listen to yourself?” she whispered.
This was the twenty-first century goddammit! It was London and it wasn’t like that. Since she’d seen the scary sci-fi guys on her street, she’d kept imagining she saw them wherever she went. It was usually a glimpse, in the distance, out of the corner of her eye. In other words, never a certain enough sighting for her to be sure they were real. Somebody was either following her very badly or trying to send her mad. Nigel? Who knew? She had to get a grip and start doing the things she used to do again. Using the tube late at night, for example.
The train was the last one and Ruth would have to change to the Jubilee line at Finchley Road to get to Kilburn. That was OK, as all it entailed was a casual saunter from one side of the platform to another. Total journey time home from here, half an hour, tops. Five, six songs, she thought as she plugged in her earphones. She glanced up at the map above the window. She liked to mentally tick off the stations as the journey progressed. The Metropolitan Line train began to move.
King’s Cross, empty. Next, Euston Square.
“You alright in there?” said a disembodied voice from behind the driver’s door as they slowed to go through Euston Square.
“Fine thanks!” said Ruth with a cheerfulness she didn’t feel. The driver had asked her where she wanted to stop and since she was the only one on the train, unless the signal was red or somebody was waiting at the station he wasn’t actually bringing the train to a halt, merely slowing down. Probably against the rules, Ruth thought, but if it would get both of them home earlier it was OK with her.
From where she sat, she could see right down the train to the other end through the windows between the carriages. She liked the way their outlines receded into the distance; all half glassed, all the same, each one appearing to be a tiny bit smaller than the other. They moved to and fro or up and down as the track curved, creating geometric patterns and playing with the laws of perspective. She liked that, too.
Great Portland Street.
As the train crashed into the station, she caught a glimpse of two figures waiting at the end of the platform. The opposite end from her. It stopped, they got on and it continued on its way. She watched the long line of empty carriages moving.
Oooh. The door at the end opened and closed. The two figures moved from one carriage to another. Not surprising; people did that when they wanted to go to whichever carriage would be nearest to the exit at their station. Not so much in the day, but at night when they were less inhibited and there was more room. Londoners are like that. She took no further notice. They’d be at Baker Street in a moment anyway. Then the door of her carriage banged and she looked up.
Two of them. Dark glasses, uniforms, the military-style belts with the swords, walking down the carriage. The train hurtled into the station. There was somebody waiting here, too. Good. If she got out and ran up the platform she would be able to get into the driver’s cab. It might not be so obvious as banging on the connecting door; they might not even notice. She leapt up and made for the exit as they strode purposefully towards her.
The train slowed. Stop dammit. Stop! Now! And came to a halt.
They reached her exit and she backed away until she was pressed up against the glass partition between the door and the seats. They were right next to her, closing in.
The doors slid open with a squish and Ruth nearly collided with the passenger who was boarding the train.
“Oh I say! What a splendid surprise!” said a familiar voice. Sir Robin, complete with the ubiquitous shopping bags. The scary sci-fi dudes stopped where they were. “Oh! Are these friends of yours?” he asked her – or at least – half her and half them. It seemed he expected her to say they were not. He expected them to understand this, too and to leave her alone. Blimey! Was he going to take them on? Yeh right. Ninja pensioner.
“I’ve seen them about, I think they live near me but we don’t know each other,” she told him.
“My mistake. I thought they were going to talk to you,” his voice changed, he seemed to grow a little and he fixed them with a steely gaze. “Perhaps they are?” he added authoritatively. They stayed still. It made Ruth relieved he was on her side.
The strangers turned abruptly and their cloaks swished as, to her surprise, the two of them walked over to the nearest seats and sat down.
Ruth shuddered. What was going on? Sir Robin, on a train, in almost the small hours, at a completely different station from the one where he usually got on, in a situation where he might have saved her bacon. No! She was turning into Ms Paranoid. It was a straightforward coincidence. It had to be. She gestured to the bags in his hands. “Do you want a hand with those?” she said in order to give her brain a little time.
“Why yes, thank you very much.”
Nope. Still not computing.
The bag he handed over was lighter than it looked, lighter than usual. She peered in and saw it contained an old jumper, a pair of shoes and some rolled-up newspapers. It was the kind of thing you’d find in prop shopping bags for a play, or if somebody who needed to have a bag with them had stuffed whatever they found to hand into one as they left their house in a rush. She glanced up at him quizzically.
“Where have you been shopping today, the bins on Embankment?”
“My dear, I promised I’d take these to the charity shop tomorrow for a friend. Said I’d had a clear-out and before you know it he’s given me much of the junk in his wardrobe to take along as well.”
She glanced over at the two large gentlemen opposite. They had swords and guns! It wasn’t as if an old dodderer like Sir Robin was going to be a match for them. If they were going to kidnap her they’d have dealt with him and gone right ahead, except that one comment from him when he’d boarded the train, only half directed at them, and they had backed off.
They weren’t doing anything, just sitting there opposite her like a couple of clones with their legs crossed in the same direction, staring straight ahead, each one holding the sword with his left hand, the right hand resting on his holster. They weren’t as scary as the first evil, sniffing-out-prey one. Sir Robin and Ruth travelled to Finchley Road in companionable silence. She smiled and did a thumbs-up at the kindly driver as they walked across the platform to the Jubilee line and clambered onto a waiting train. The two sci-fi men followed but stayed in the carriage when she and Sir Robin got out at Kilburn. She watched, with relief, as the doors closed and the train carried them away to Willesden Green.
Her mind was racing. Had she imagined it or had Sir Robin rescued her from a mugging? Possibly. The two strangers had been heading straight for her so, at the very least, he’d saved her from having to have a conversation. He interrupted her thoughts.
“How’s work?” he asked her, congenially, as they walked down Kilburn High Road.
“Pretty good.” Small talk, but Ruth had the impression his mind was on greater things. He slowed down and turned towards her.
“My dear, are you happy in your job?” He stopped, and as she was about to say she was he added, “Are you committed, do you feel it’s what you were put on this Earth to do?”
“Oh c’mon. Nobody does what they were put on Earth to do. Well ... maybe people with vocational careers do, but I don’t. No calling for me.”
“And yet you enjoy your work?”
“Oh yes, a great deal.”
“You believe what you are doing has a purpose?”
Blimey! This was all a bit deep.
“Er, I love my job, that makes me pretty jammy—most people don’t, after all.” She tried to lighten things up, “Most people do their jobs to earn money so they can do the stuff they want to do, but they end up never doing it because they’re working all the time.” Sir Robin adopted a disapproving expression. Hmm, he must be expecting a serious answer, then. “OK. Honestly?”
“If you please.”
“I get to help people sell themselves or what they do. If that means they can give up some dead-end career they hate and be happy doing something they enjoy it must be a good thing. In the grand scheme it’s probably not that important, but it feels,” she shrugged, “warm and fuzzy.”
He chuckled and started to walk again.
“Do you think, you will be in the same line of work in ten years’ time?” he asked.
“I hope not. For starters I’d like to be promoted and secondly it’d be very boring to do the same thing forever. Who knows what I’ll be doing by then?” She gave him her best appraising stare, “Are you interviewing me?”
As he smiled his gold tooth flashed in the sodium lights.
“Not exactly.”
“Not exactly. Partially then?”
“No. I was merely curious. I must apologise, I didn’t wish to be over inquisitive. I am interested,” he waved one arm casually, “you wouldn’t mind then, if your life changed?”
“It’d be a bit annoying right now, because I’m learning so much—not only my trade but, you know, about dealing with people, being tactful and diplomatic that kind of thing. If I lost my job tomorrow, I’d be gutted, but I’d get over it, I expect. Changes are always interesting, even scary ones, although I prefer to initiate them myself!”
“Yeeees.” He sounded a little doubtful, as if he was the bearer of bad news.
“You think my life’s about to change, don’t you?”
“All things are possible,” he said.
She eyed him with her best pointy-brained expression.
“You believe it though,” a statement of fact since he obviously did, “are you psychic?”
“No. I’m not.” Emphasis on the ‘I’m’ though, as if somebody else was. Strange. Who? “Fate can be an odd creature.”
“Yeh. I tried and tried to get my career started and nothing happened until I gave up on it. I guess the trick is not so much coping with things changing as not worrying,” she thought for a moment, “and being happy with what you have, too, I guess.”
Why was she telling him all this?
“Wise words,” said Sir Robin.
“Not really. Sensible, more like.” Ruth was tired, her nerves were pretty much shot and the old boy was so easy to talk to. “Those blokes on the train.”
“Yes?”
“You asked if I know them.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t—but would it sound mad if I told you I’m beginning to think they’re following me?”
A sharp intake of breath which surprised her. She glanced at him. He was concerned.
“You’ve noticed them before?” he asked her.
“Loads of times.”
“I see,” he said in that patient manner, like a doctor listening to a long-winded patient. Had he seen them too, or more to the point had they seen him somewhere else, somewhere a long time ago, perhaps, before Ruth had met him and before he had grown old? What would he have been, a general? No, unlikely. A captain of industry, a politician? Somebody important enough to command their respect, even scare them? Maybe.
“Is that a bad thing?”
He cocked his head on one side and looked at her quizzically.
“Perhaps.”
“Who ...?” No. Start again, “What are they?”
He seemed almost proud of her.
“Now that’s an astute question. It’s a long story,” he said.
“I have time.”
“Hmm.” A nod.
“Are they from this planet?”
“Oh yes,” a pause, “in a roundabout way.” They had reached the door of her flat and he stopped, even though officially she was carrying a bag for him and his flat was down at the end of the street. He took it from her. “Please allow me to walk you home tonight, Ruth. These bags are very light and you look tired; you need to get some sleep.” She nearly giggled, partly because she was mightily relieved, on this particular evening, not to have to walk back up the street on her own and partly because sometimes, he behaved as if he was her dad. Or would that be her grandad?
“Sir Robin, can I tell you something in confidence?”
“My dear girl, of course you can.”
“Three months ago one of them followed me, a different one, not those two,” she shuddered, “I think he wanted to kidnap me. He was grim.” Unconsciously she hugged her arms across her chest, as if to comfort herself. It was the way he watched her that made her realise what she was doing. “He was tall, and even though it was about, well ... about this time of night, he was wearing sunglasses, and he had this evil voice. Most of the time, I think they’re watching me, following me, making sure they know where I am, but I don’t know why. I wondered if they were here to protect me from him.”
She told him how she had hidden in the bushes from the first one and how he had searched for her.
“He called me ‘Chosen One’,” she explained. “He said,” and she did an impression of the stranger’s voice, “you will not evade me forever, Chosen One. I will find you.” So I know it can’t be me he’s looking for, because if I were Chosen, I’d realise wouldn’t I? Somebody would tell me. But I keep seeing them, and on the one hand I’m too frightened to go up to them and explain, on the other, I’m afraid that if I don’t, he—Mr Darcy’s Evil Twin—may find me.” She felt on the brink of tears. “I know I should ignore it all and eventually they’ll either go away or tell me what they want, but it’s so hard to keep it together, to carry on being normal. I’m scared I’m cracking up.”
“Quite the contrary, I’d say, you seem perfectly in control of your faculties in the face of a great deal of provocation. You realise, don’t you, that if you would like to have a chat I am always ready to listen?”
The authoritative I-have-people-who-will-fix-this tone again.
She nodded.
“I would.” Her voice sounded small.
“Capital!” He looked at his watch, “but now is not the place or the time,” he said kindly. “First, a decent night’s sleep will do you the power of good. Would you do me the honour of dropping round for tea tomorrow? Say, six o’clock?”
“I can’t—I’m managing an event, a concert at the Barbican.”
“Oh dear. Are you happy to wait a day before we sort this out?” He spoke with total confidence as if a simple conversation between the two of them would fix everything. Whether or not it would, Ruth felt considerably happier. Perhaps her life wasn’t out of control after all. Yes. It would be OK. Sir Robin would be able to help. She rallied.
“Would you like a ticket? I can get you a freebie if you like, Lucy and Nigel are coming.”
“Please, not Nigel,” said Sir Robin, “when will she stop seeing him? He is quite insufferable.”
“I know, but Lucy’s lovely and at the moment he sort of comes with the territory.”
“Yes, I appreciate that.”
“If I got two tickets you could bring a friend.”
“You are kind—and I thank you—but no.”
“Could I come round the night after?”
“Why of course. Splendid! Let’s make it a date.” He made to go and then stopped, “Ruth, don’t worry yourself, you have nothing to fear.” Again a reassuring aura of absolute confidence. He smiled, waved and strode off down the street. She watched until he had gone into his flat on the corner and waited until the light went on and she saw him silhouetted in the window as he drew the curtains, before she closed the door and went to bed.