‘Can I get a taxi around here?’ The man standing behind the counter of the convenience store looked at the floor and slowly shook his head. ‘What about buses?’ I said. ‘Taxis? Buses? You’re joking, aren’t you?’ said a chap standing behind me. He was wearing bedroom slippers and clutching a tin of processed carrots.
‘Where are you trying to get to?’ he said. ‘Stanton St Bernard,’ I said. His knees gave way in a pantomime stagger of incredulity. ‘Stanton St Bernard! Taxis? Buses? Are you mad? It looks like you’ll be walking, my friend.’ He peered through the window at the blackening sky. ‘And — oh dear — it’s coming on to rain.’
I began to dislike this unselfconscious old man and his hearing aid and country accent. The convenience store was hemmed by newly built executive boxes on one side and a council estate on the other.
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