Train slowing, coasting to a crawl, conrods lazy, snow caked on the front of the locomotive and thick along the carriage roofs — someone moved at the edge of the vision field and I looked back at the clock and down again, porter, not one of them, not one of Foster's men. Three more paces and I stopped, filling the gap, the wider gap towards right centre, the one I would use.

Of course they might have put someone into the platform area and it was a risk but a calculated risk so discount. Discount and wait.

And don't muck it.

Wait for the first door, the first one, not till then. When it swung open I moved.

16: FOXHOLE

He shouted at me but that was anticipated and there was nothing he could do because he couldn't leave his post at the barrier and within the first ten seconds I was behind reliable cover as the passengers began filling the platform between the train and the ticket-gate area and then I heard him again but the nearest official was two carriages away on the forward end and by now I was walking, taking my time, keeping to cover but nearing the mid-section carriage where most of the passengers had got out.

'She'll be here. She said she would meet us.'

A woman wept, a fat woman buried in her thick coat, the tears bright on her face, no, she won't be here, it said in the paper, you saw the paper.

'I tell you she couldn't telephone because the lines were down at Inowroclaw and besides they don't arrest the students, they know there's no harm in them.' Snow on the wet platform where boots had dislodged it from the footboard. I climbed and turned left, away from the head of the train, edging along the corridor with my back to the windows, then a clear run for the length of half carriage, then people again, and baggage.

'But it was in the brown one, I remember putting it in here.'

'I haven't got the brown one.'

'Then you've left it in the compartment.'

'We'll have to go back.'

They were so slow, so slow, they moved slowly, they had arrived, but I was just starting. Somewhere behind me a guard was using his whistle. Assumption: there were ten of them and they'd deploy in open formation with the flank men covering Platforms 2 and 4 and the centre group concentrating on 3 and working the narrow area limited by the train's length and the two adjacent lines. Estimation: I had another ninety seconds and there were two more carriage lengths to go. I would need to hurry now.

'Mind what you're — '

'Sorry, I've left something — '

'There's no need — '

Oh yes there was need.

Sweating badly, the limits so very fine, calculated but hazardously fine, the centre group through the barrier by now and working their way along. One or more would check underneath the train and that would slow them a bit but it wasn't a bonus, it was allowed for, part of the ninety seconds, eighty, seventy.

Baggage stacked in the coupling bay, climb over it, not so many here now, one more carriage, stifling, the heat full on and the windows misted, watch for the orange-colour poster through the misted glass, get a bearing on that.

Bloody well think.

Back the way I'd come, five seconds, the top bag from the stack in the coupling bay, a big one with retaining straps, two seconds, forward again with a total loss of twelve seconds but with the advantage of an altered image-component. Orange glow on the window. Fur kepi tilted to the back of the head, coat unbuttoned and hanging open, swing the bag down first on to the platform, the breathing heavy and the gait shortened to a fat man's waddle, look directly towards the barrier, nowhere else.

From the main hall the acute-angle perspective had given something like a ten-yard error and although I'd allowed for it I now found that the entrance to the subway was well beyond the orange poster but there was nothing I could do about it. The last of the passengers from this end of the train were giving their tickets in and going down the steps and I waddled after them, puffing a lot, stopping halfway to drop the bag and change it to the other hand, coat flapping open, picking up the bag and going on. Impression of people near, some would be passengers moving up the platform to this end of the train, destination Rzeszow, one or more would be Foster's men but discount proximity, whole thing depended on the altered image.

It was a single gate, concertina trellis and half open but with enough room to go through at a run. I wasn't going to run.

'I have come from Bydgoszcz. I have no ticket.' Heavy Berlin accent. The bag made a thump as I put it down, getting my breath.

'Didn't you have enough time?'

'Please?'

'Were you late for the train?'

'Ah, yes.' I found my wallet.

'You are prepared to pay?'

'But yes of course.'

He nodded, a stocky man with his peaked cap set conservatively straight, a man without imagination but with a sense of responsibility, too old now to be stirred by the rumours of a fight for freedom in tomorrow's streets, a stolid man prepared to weather the strictures of a regime he'd come to accept since middle youth, a man to whom I couldn't say the police are looking for me, let me through quickly in the cause of Sroda.

'I must see your papers.'

'Here they are.'

He opened my passport at the first page, his thumb misshapen by an old accident, the nail split and clogged with the grime of years, of trains.

'How much is the fare?'

'We shall see.'

I listened to the footsteps. They had started hurrying: the people who walk all the way to the rear of a train are people who like a compartment to themselves. They hurried past me, behind me.

'You must pay one hundred and thirty zlotys.' He stood over his fares schedule, reluctant to close it and put it away, a priest devoted to his bible. 'The single fare is one hundred and twenty zlotys, and there is the obligatory supplement of ten zlotys for failing to purchase a ticket at the — ‘

'Here are one hundred and forty. Please keep the change.'

I lifted the bag.

'I cannot do that. I am an official of the Polish State Railways.' He turned towards his booth. 'Besides, you will require a receipt.'

'I do not wish for one. I am in a hurry.'

'Just the same, I have to make out a receipt.'

If I pushed past him through the gate he probably wouldn't shout after me because he'd be too surprised. The notes lay on his fare schedule so there was no question of failure to pay, but I'd still be committing a breach of the rules and he would try to stop me, raising his voice. It couldn't be risked. They were behind me now, directly behind or to the right or left, concentrating on the train, searching for a man in hiding. They mustn't be distracted. I put the bag down. He had found his receipt pad.

'Point of departure, Bydgoszcz. That's what you said?'

'Yes'

They would make a thorough search, delaying the train until they were satisfied. They could take their time because they were certain I couldn't leave the station: a call would have gone out not later than a minute after I'd made the break and the station police would have been told to phone for M.O. assistance and a net would already be extending around the area.

'And your reason for not purchasing a ticket was because you had no time?'

'Yes.'

It was an oblong form with eight or nine blanks, Point of Departure, Time of Departure, Intended Destination, Particulars of Personal Identification, Amount Paid (Fare), Amount Paid (Supplement), Total Amount Paid, Remarks. I watched him write, the ball-point pen sloping at an odd angle because of his thumb.

'I must see your passport again.'

I gave it to him.

They knew I would never get through the net. It would remain in place until the reinforcements of civil police had searched the station and questioned everyone in it. They would be ordered particularly to look for a man who might try to pass a barrier without a ticket.