Page 126 - sons-and-lovers

‘There’s plenty of time,’ she answered.
‘There’s not so much as I can see on,’ he answered, turn-
ing crossly in his chair. She began to clear her table. The
kettle was singing. They waited and waited.
Meantime the three children were on the platform at
Sethley Bridge, on the Midland main line, two miles from
home. They waited one hour. A train came—he was not
there. Down the line the red and green lights shone. It was
very dark and very cold.
‘Ask him if the London train’s come,’ said Paul to Annie,
when they saw a man in a tip cap.
‘I’m not,’ said Annie. ‘You be quiet—he might send us
off.’
But Paul was dying for the man to know they were ex-
pecting someone by the London train: it sounded so grand.
Yet he was much too much scared of broaching any man, let
alone one in a peaked cap, to dare to ask. The three children
could scarcely go into the waiting-room for fear of being
sent away, and for fear something should happen whilst
they were off the platform. Still they waited in the dark and
cold.
‘It’s an hour an’ a half late,’ said Arthur pathetically.
‘Well,’ said Annie, ‘it’s Christmas Eve.’
They all grew silent. He wasn’t coming. They looked
down the darkness of the railway. There was London! It
seemed the utter-most of distance. They thought anything
might happen if one came from London. They were all too
troubled to talk. Cold, and unhappy, and silent, they hud-
dled together on the platform.

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