The bold sans-serif lettering rose and fell over the spiked iron gate. “CEMETERY STATION.” Waterloo’s own River Styx. Sebastian checked his pocket watch. The face told him there was no longer time to procrastinate. He was content to re-read the large sign a couple dozen more times, but the train schedule wouldn’t allow it. He decided to open up his trunk and take inventory. His clothes and hats were all in place, appropriate summer wear for the season. His stationery was packed, neatly stacked and smoothed. It sat under the crumpled summons from his master. The letter was sent from the retreat itself, meaning Sebastian was already behind on his studies. The only thing missing was his adventure novel. 

He cut through the entry hall en route to the staircase, where he caught a glimpse of the open waiting room. Already cleared out. He had missed the early wake, which was fine with him, as he had never met the deceased. He knew his father certainly wouldn’t care. He wasn’t sent here to mourn. 

Two grim iron engines sat parallel on either side of the platform. A clattering steam-powered lift brought the guest of honor to station level. Her cold pine palanquin was carried aboard by attendant pallbearers. The empress of the hour was brought to her car, a suite of luxury spiriting her to final rest. 

The scuffle of the mourning party was drowned out by the waking engine of the train they were boarding. Sebastian met them at the entrance to the passenger car. His condolences were long-winded by design. 

He took a seat at the back of the train car. The trip from Waterloo to Brookwood was only a little over half an hour, but the journey would feel a fair bit longer traveled with such tragic nny. 

If only he’d remembered his novel. 

He became a piston, tapping the heel of his leather shoe up and down against the floor of the train car. After several revolutions, his ears caught a sound. A tap tap tap in time with the motion of his leg. He glanced over his shoulder to see a man in the car behind him tapping a wooden pipe against the glass. “Come on,” the man mouthed as he gestured for Sebastian to enter the rear car. He was glad for the intrusion, and excused himself for the man’s company.

“There’s a good lad,” said the man. “Yeh can set yer trunk and yer arse down right over there.”

This car, one step back from the primary procession, was vacuous. It traded proper seating for wooden benches along the length of the walls, creating a large, unadorned central aisle. The number of warm bodies in this car was far fewer, and the number of cold bodies was one less, which felt far more significant.

The liveliest aspect of the car was undoubtedly the man who occupied it. If Sebastian were to guess the man’s profession, it would unequivocally be that of a sailor or fisherman. He wore a grey guernsey jumper and twin Wellingtons stained with long-dried mud. He entertained himself with a wooden pipe, which Sebastian could tell from the scratches was well-loved. He wore no hat, with short hair the same reddish-brown hue as his beard. His face was wrinkled and weathered, particularly around his dull green eyes. A large trunk rested on the bench beside the old mariner. The two lonely travelers sat across from one another, partitioned by the dust-speckled aisle and air. A spell of empty staring passed between them, the creaking and clacking of the train the only sound. 

“So what’s yer purpose fer travellen’?” 

“I’m sorry?” 

“Ye’ve got a trunk with yeh. Funeral guests don’t travel with trunks.” 

“My name is Sebastian Taylor. I’m a legal apprentice traveling to Brookwood to meet with my master. He’s currently on a country retreat.” The mariner glanced towards the car with the mourning party, wordlessly inquiring why Sebastian was traveling on this train. “The funeral is for a relative of my cousin. My father asked them to allow me on board to save the ticket fare.” 

The mariner gibed at the stark irreverence. An English son studying law, and his father’s a penny-pincher. 

“They say yeh don’t know a man till yeh know ‘is name, and a great deal good it does a man to know the name of the one ‘e’s saved.” “Saved?” 

“Boredom’s a killer, Taylor. Look at poor Eutychus.” 

Sebastian raised an eyebrow. 

“You’re a religious man?” 

“I’ve been many men. A clergyman, a bohemian, and even a sailor if yeh could believe it.” 

Sebastian couldn’t help but scoff at the man’s lack of self-awareness.

“Now I’m travellen’ fer me current charge.”

“You work in Brookwood?” 

“I work at the necropolis. Diggin’ and tendin’ graves is meh lot.” The sentence hung in the air, mingling with the dust. The light played tricks on it, manifesting illusions of unsavory rumors. Gravediggers mutilating bodies to make room. Mauve miasmas creeping out of broken coffins and seeping into the bones of the living. Maggoty cadavers stacked stiff mere inches from the surface. The writings of George “Graveyard” Walker.

“I think I’d prefer to hear of your other professions.” 

“The young lawyer is of too mild a temperament? Perhaps Taylor should find a new calling.” 

An idea that he’s considered before, but the opportunity is too profitable to scuttle. 

“You certainly found one. It’s an interesting career change, especially for a clergyman.” 

“Every man in London’s a clergyman. Eutychus is no King David, but yeh still knew of whom I spoke.” 

“The word of God is easy to come by, but what isn’t is a position in his house. What could’ve caused you to leave that behind?”

“Same thing caused yeh teh step back ‘ere and set with me.”

“Dour company?”

“As I said, boredom’s a killer. It wasn’t yet meh time teh die. The ceremony, and certainly the people, were beginning teh be too much.”

Despite his best efforts, a soft smile played across Sebastian’s face. It was evident that this man was choosy for company. At the moment, Sebastian was wanted. “So you were searching for something you enjoy?” 

“A man ought to do what ‘e loves if e’s offered the opportunity teh search fer it. That way he never ‘as teh werk. That’s what philosophy’ll tell yeh.” 

“Now you’re speaking like a bohemian.” 

“It was meh second life. Saw the many lands and flags of Europe and beyond.” 

“I’m sure you met plenty of interesting people.” 

One word hooked the ear of the gravedigger like a well-sunk fishing lure. Interesting. He was stuck on it, but eventually maneuvered his way off. 

“Aye. Lords, ladies, beggars, and whores. Yeh experience sights and smells wholly unlike dreary London, and meet peoples who think in ways wholly alien to what yeh’ve ever known.”

The old vagrant went on, but Sebastian could well imagine it himself. Verdant greens and misty mountains. Curious cities flickering under the light of foreign lamps. The life of the tramp had long held a tight grip on his boyish fancies. He longed for the excitement of France, the vistas of the new world’s frontier, and the mystique of the far east. He would slowly come to master the world’s art, literature, music, and folklore, becoming himself a piece of it all. He closed his eyes and listened to the clacks and creaks of the train, donning the mask of a stowaway traveler at the outset of yet another grand adventure. The words of his old mentor were deafened by his daydreams. Unheard whispers became sage wisdom. A cough was cryptic counsel in his prophetic delusion. 

His fantasies were altogether laid to rest when his attention, conjured from the dark inventiveness of his closed eyelids, turned back towards the gravedigger’s scowl. 

“…Run away teh join the circus, yeh find yeh can’t stand the elephants…” 

The man’s conduct in finishing his story was not wistful. His expression was not idyllic. He spoke particularly, with a dry tone and dissatisfied cadence. His eyes remained dull. 

Sebastian shifted in his chair. The train clattered along. 

“I went on a journeh’ ‘cross the lands o’ the earth teh find meself, and didn’t find nothin’ in what all the lands o’ the earth ‘ad teh offer, so gettin on in years, I decided teh see what the sea had fer meh.” 

Sebastian could not believe how quickly the tale had ended. Years of one’s life, and an exciting one at that, spat out in a paltry anecdote. It was a verbal book burning. 

The gravedigger’s attention had turned away from his guest. He spoke to the dust and the passing countryside of his pelagic third life. “Sailing is the most dangerous thing ah’ve ever done. At sea yeh’re closer teh death than even you and I are now, and those who die aren’t given the dignity of the boxed-up sod in the other car. The waves’ll erode yeh like the stones till there’s naught left but shiverin,’ bloodshot fear.” 

His gaze lingered a while at the stretching landscape overcast by opaque slate clouds. No rain fell, sparing the waterlogged man his painful memories. Dull pity permeated Sebastian’s chest as he looked on his poor master. 

“It took no time at all fer this old man teh discover he weren’t no sea dog. So I jumped ship fast as I could and returned ‘ome. Thought about returning to the clergy too fer a while, but couldn’t fer memory of why I’d left in the first place. But codgers gotta eat too, so I found meself takin’ up shovel an’ spade as I do now, and as I’ll likely do till a successor puts me in meh own box.”

His guest waited in patient reverence for the parable to conclude, but the once-sailor held his tongue, looking on at the rolling countryside. The hills wound their way up and down across the glass. They were the turning pages of a catechism. They were the rollicking hinterlands of foreign nations. They were fearsome waves cascading through a stormy sea. They were every life he’d lived. They were reminders of those he hadn’t. Little grays stood out amongst the reds on his chin. The kinship between the two men seemed inauspicious now. Frightening. 

“Ah’ve yet teh do it. Find that thing. Ah feel as though Ah’ve tried everything. Makes yeh wonder if the philosophers thought that one through. Yeh try and do what yeh love, but what if there isn’t a damned thing yeh do.” 

The man scratched his nose, coarse wrinkles on his face now contextualized. His emerald eyes were moist, but he had no tears to shed. “Forgot teh offer meh name to yeh Taylor. It’s Gruffud. Gruffud Fardd.” 

The brakes sent up screeching sparks as the engine reached Brookwood, Surrey. Sebastian was the last one off the train.

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