He turned sharply and squinted through his spectacles at Fenchurch. Arthur steered her away and could feel her silently quaking.
“Next guess,” she said, when she had stopped giggling, “come on.”
“All right,” he said, “your elbow. Your left elbow. There’s something wrong with your left elbow.”
“Wrong again,” she said, “completely wrong. You’re on completely the wrong track.”
The summer sun was sinking through the tress in the park, looking as if – Let’s not mince words. Hyde Park is stunning. Everything about it is stunning except for the rubbish on Monday mornings. Even the ducks are stunning. Anyone who can go through Hyde Park on a summer’s evening and not feel moved by it is probably going through in an ambulance with the sheet pulled over their face.
It is a park in which people do more extraordinary things than they do elsewhere. Arthur and Fenchurch found a man in shorts practising the bagpipes to himself under a tree. The piper paused to chase off an American couple who had tried, timidly to put some coins on the box his bagpipes came in.
“No!” he shouted at them, “go away! I’m only practising.”
He started resolutely to reinflate his bag, but even the noise this made could not disfigure their mood.
Arthur put his arms around her and moved them slowly downwards.
“I don’t think it can be your bottom,” he said after a while,” there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with that at all.”
“Yes,” she agreed, “there’s absolutely nothing wrong with my bottom.”
They kissed for so long that eventually the piper went and practised on the other side of the tree.
“I’ll tell you a story,” said Arthur.
“Good.”
They found a patch of grass which was relatively free of couples actually lying on top of each other and sat and watched the stunning ducks and the low sunlight rippling on the water which ran beneath the stunning ducks.
“A story,” said Fenchurch, cuddling his arm to her.
“Which will tell you something of the sort of things that happen to me. It’s absolutely true.”
“You know sometimes people tell you stories that are supposed to be something that happened to their wife’s cousin’s best friend, but actually probably got made up somewhere along the line.”
“Well, it’s like one of those stories, except that it actually happened, and I know it actually happened, because the person it actually happened to was me.”
“Like the raffle ticket.”
Arthur laughed. “Yes. I had a train to catch,” he went on. “I arrived at the station …”
“Did I ever tell you,” interrupted Fenchurch, “what happened to my parents in a station?”
“Yes,” said Arthur, “you did.”
“Just checking.”
Arthur glanced at his watch. “I suppose we could think of getting back,” he said.
“Tell me the story,” said Fenchurch firmly. “You arrived at the station.”
“I was about twenty minutes early. I’d got the time of the train wrong. I suppose it is at least equally possible,” he added after a moment’s reflection, “that British Rail had got the time of the train wrong. Hadn’t occurred to me before.”
“Get on with it.” Fenchurch laughed.
“So I bought a newspaper, to do the crossword, and went to the buffet to get a cup of coffee.”
“You do the crossword?”
“Yes.”
“Which one?”
“The Guardian usually.”
“I think it tries to be too cute. I prefer the Times. Did you solve it?”
“What?”
“The crossword in the Guardian.”
“I haven’t had a chance to look at it yet,” said Arthur, “I’m still trying to buy the coffee.”
“All right then. Buy the coffee.”
“I’m buying it. I am also,” said Arthur, “buying some biscuits.”
“What sort?”
“Rich Tea.”
“Good choice.”
“I like them. Laden with all these new possessions, I go and sit at a table. And don’t ask me what the table was like because this was some time ago and I can’t remember. It was probably round.”
“All right.”
“So let me give you the layout. Me sitting at the table. On my left, the newspaper. On my right, the cup of coffee. In the middle of the table, the packet of biscuits.”
“I see it perfectly.”