Service With a Smile

I was ensconced on the 9.05 from Paddington en route for the Dartington Literary Festival with seven magazines, a chamomile tea and my current favourite sweet treats which are the shiny blackcurrant pastilles, completely unmedicinal, sold only in chemists. The train was crammed with authors making last minute alteration to their texts. The air bristled with exasperation and the scent of angst. After a while I spied the writer Dan Jacobson-one of my all-time heros- and he came and talked to me. (I had to sit on my copy of Heat) ‘How’s the new book going?’ he asked.

‘ Not good.’ I explained the problems with structure, with plot, wth character and he casually made one or two dazzling suggestions which in an instant changed everything for the best. After this extremely fortuitious mini travelling masterclass I made my way to the buffet for more water passing a carriage which was empty apart form one man. ‘Will you be coming along with teas and coffees in a moment’, he asked.

No, not really, I replied, but there is a buffet three carriages down.
Oh,he said. Then, ‘You’re not with the train, are you?

Well, I’m with the train but not of it, I did not say, instead I smiled and carried on mysteriously. Then I remembered something. On the way back from Venice recently a man seated towards the rear of the plane handed me a big pile of rubbish and said, ‘Get rid of these for me please.’

‘I suppose so’, I murmered clasping his dinner tray, slicked with mayonnaise and dotted with globs of melted chocolate tart, clutching his plastic beaker which dripped worcesterer sauce muddied tomato juice from its lip.

Have i morphed into some sort of central casting voyager’s help mete?

I like to be helpful. I like to say yes, certainly. When I used to work in a bookshop in Covent Garden in my twetnies I fielded all sorts of enquiries on a regular basis. I made it my business to know the answers. ‘Freddie Mercurey buried near here? (No, Holland.) Do you really need butter when you made a bread and butter pudding with panettone? (I’d give it a miss.) Once in Du blin I even found myself taking three rolls of wedding photographs for a nervous groom who offered me his camera as I was passing through St Stephen’s green and said, ‘I need a favour.’.

Yet why was it , all of a sudden, that the whole world wanted my services.?

There was one explanation. The culprit was navy.