Was the maskless man in my carriage dying of Covid?

A man without a mask appeared to be dying of Covid, or something quite like it, on the London to Guildford train.

Hunched double in his seat across the aisle, he groaned as he coughed, gasped as he sneezed, and sniffed as a way of clearing the mess because he hadn’t got a tissue.

Sans mask, sans handkerchief he spluttered and spattered. His capacity to ignore my stare was magnificent.

I’m not a tolerant person, and when someone is sneezing at me during what is supposed to be a pandemic I cannot muster generosity. Sitting on the worn, red upholstery of the 1453 South Western train service from Waterloo, I looked daggers at this fellow to no avail.

He was a big man, dark and I would say swarthy but I don’t think you’re allowed to say that any more, even though in my book swarthy is a compliment meaning handsome in a rustic, Mediterranean way.