I detrained at a red signal north of Hornsey, climbed a low embankment, relieved myself behind a bush, then scrambled over a brick wall by a bridge and dropped onto a pavement in front of a surprised-looking Indian lady.  I tipped my hat to her and strolled away, feeling distinctly pleased with myself at getting to London in such a sanctified but relatively effortless manner.  I took it as a good omen that the first person I should encounter down south had been another person of sub-continental origin.

It was mid-morning; half past eight according to the clock displayed in the corner of a programme playing multitudinously in a TV-shop window.  Time for some Back Bussing.

Back Bussing is a way of minimising travel expenditure which we have used on buses for decades and which can occasionally be employed on other forms of transport.  It consists of getting on the bus and asking the conductor - preferably in a strange, alien accent - for a ticket for a stop in the opposite direction one is travelling in.  On being informed one is heading the wrong way, it is vital to look most confused and be extremely apologetic.  Usually one will then be allowed to get off (almost invariably without paying) at the next stop along the route, from where one may begin to repeat the process until one arrives at one's destination.

I waited at a bus stop on High Road, Wood Green, having selected a stop which served the route numbers I required.  The kit-bag was over my shoulder, my Sitting Board was in my hand.  I got onto the first bus that came along.  It had folding doors at the front and the driver seemed to double as the conductor; this threw me somewhat.  I mumbled unintelligibly and got off again, blushing.  The next few buses were all of the same sort.  I stood looking at the traffic, which was slow and noisy, and at the buildings, which were low and undistinguished.  After a while, and a few more one-person operated buses, I gave up and walked south, which was roughly the right direction for Kilburn, where my half-brother Zeb lived (I read my map as I walked and decided I would take the A503 south-west when I came upon it).  Eventually, however, I was passed by an old-fashioned bus with an open rear platform heading in the right direction.  I found the next bus stop with the relevant route-number and waited.

A bus came; I jumped on and went upstairs.  Unfortunately, the four front seats were already taken.  I chose the next row back, put my wooden Sitting Board down, and sat.  While still in the car on the train I had peeled the top four pounds off my roll of cash and stuck the notes in my jacket's inside pocket; when the conductor came I held out a pound note and said, 'A ticket to Enfield, plis.'

'What's this, then?' the conductor asked, taking the note and looking at it.

I glared at him; he was a small, grey man with thick glasses. 'It is beink vun off your pounds,' I told him, in a foreign-sounding accent.

'Not one of ours, mate.'

'I think it is.'

'Na, this is toy town money this is.'

'It is note of the realm, I think.'

'You what?' He held it up to the light. 'Na, look; it's Scottish, innit?  This here's some old Scottish one-spot.  Where'd you get that, then?  You been savin' them or sumfink?  Na, mate,' he said, handing the note back to me. 'Come on; I 'aven't got all day; where'd you say you was going?'

'Enfield, plis.'

'Enfield?' he exclaimed, laughing. 'Blimey, you are in a state, aren't you?  You're goin' in the wrong direction, chum… Oh, sorry, miss, is it?  Sorry; couldn't see for the 'at.  Should have known you was a girl from you wearing an 'at inside, shouldn't I?  Anyway, like I say - you're going in the wrong direction, love.'

'Excuse, plis?' I said, looking confused.

'YOU ARE GOING-GIH IN THE WRONG-GIH DOI-RECT-SHUN,' he said loudly. 'You want to get off at the next stop and - look; here we go.  You get up… come with me; get up; yes; you… that's it.' I stood up and let the man usher me downstairs to the platform as the bus slowed. 'We'll put you off 'ere… See that stop over there?  Na, na; other side of the street, love.  Yeah.  That's the stop for the bus to Enfield, right?  You catch bus there; it go Enfield, yeah?  There you go, then.  Mind out.  Bye now!' He rang the bell and disappeared back upstairs, shaking his head as the bus moved off.

I stayed where I was, grinning, and waited for the next bus.

Over the next two hours I moved a shorter distance than I could had I walked.  On two occasions, even though it was a couple of minutes before the conductor came to take my money, I still got off nearer to the stop I'd got on than to the next one down the route, due to the abominably clotted traffic.  Eventually I got onto a bus and met the same conductor I'd encountered originally.

'Bleedin' 'ell, darlin'; you still lost?'

I looked at him blankly, desperately trying to think what to say.  Finally I managed, 'This is Enfield, plis?'

He took me across the road himself and left me at the bus stop.

I admitted defeat and walked south to the Grand Union Canal.  I hiked along the towpath to Maida Vale, then headed north-west to the house where my half-brother Zeb lived, on Brondesbury Road.

The basement and the ground storey of the three-storey end-of-terrace house were boarded up and I had to go round the back and pull corrugated iron sheeting aside to gain entry to the rear garden.  I banged on the back door.  Eventually a voice rang out above.

'Yeah?'

I stepped back and looked up at a female face.  The sides of her head were shaved; long fair lengths of hair like skinny pigtails hung down from the back of her head.  She appeared to have several rings piercing her nostrils. 'Good morning,' I said. 'I'm looking for Zebediah Whit.  Is he here?'

'Zeb?  Dunno.  Who're you?'

'Isis.'

'Isis?'

'Yes.'

'Nice name.'

'Thank you.  Most people call me Is.  I'm a relation of Zebediah's.  Tell him I'm here, if you can find him.'

'Right.  Hang on.'

The door opened a minute later, and Brother Zebediah stood there, bare-footed, stuffing a crumpled shirt into tattered jeans.

'Wow.  Is.  Jeez.  Shit.  Brilliant.  Wow.' Zeb is two years older than me; he was even skinnier than I recalled, and his black hair both longer and much more tangled.  His face looked spottier, where it was visible between little tufts of black facial hair that probably signalled he was trying to grow a beard.

I made the Sign and held out my hand to him.  Zeb looked confusedly at it for a moment, then said, 'Oh.  Wow.  Yeah.  Sorry. 'Course.  Like.  Yeah,' and took my hand.  He kissed it and went down on one knee. 'Yeah.  Like.  Wow.  Beloved.  Blessed?  Beloved.  Isis.  Welcome.  Cool.  Yeah.'

The girl I'd talked to first stood in the hallway behind.  She stared open-mouthed at my half-brother, then at me.

'Brother Zebediah,' I said.  'I am pleased to see you.  Please - arise.'

He did so, grinning broadly.  He attempted to comb his fingers through his extravagantly untidy locks, but didn't get terribly far.  I handed him my kit-bag.  He took it, and - following my gaze - turned to the girl with the half-shaved, half-pigtailed hair. 'Oh.  Yeah.  Yeah.  Ah.  Beloved Is:  Roadkill.  Roadkill: the Beloved Is.  Yeah.' He nodded with his whole body and grinned, then made the Sign, and bowed, ushering me forward.

I entered the house, taking off my hat and handing it to Zeb.  The girl was still staring at me.  I nodded gravely at her. 'Charmed,' I said.