Grace and favour

The check-in queue was constrained by portable barriers into one of those snaking, pointless and unexpectedly intimate queues that are all the rage at British airports. Every time I made the 180-degree turn, I found myself once again face to face with these two elderly women. They were short and stout and festooned with gold chains, and one of them had the same kind of striking, deeply lined face that W.H. Auden had in later years. And they both had something unusual about them that I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

Finally I checked in my bag and joined the queue for security clearance. Someone touched me on the shoulder. A young, black-haired woman. Was I going to Malaga? I was, I said. She pointed out the two charismatic ladies, now standing just behind me in the security-check queue. They were Spanish, she said. They didn’t speak a word of English.