Small cross on a finger

The fair pulled into Harrow Common on Tuesday, late, with the generator coughing like an old dog, and by the time the last wagon was chocked it was past eleven and raining sideways. Mr Vosper sent me up the Ferris wheel to check the bolts on the gondolas, which is the sort of job nobody argues about at midnight. Halfway up I found a cross cut into the paint of the number nine seat, small and neat, the lines so thin I thought at first it was a crack. Somebody had gone up there with a pin and a steady hand.

I asked the lad in the ticket hut who did it. He shrugged and said the wheel had belonged to a Mrs Anstey before old Vosper bought it off her, and she used to ride it every night of the season with her husband's ashes in a biscuit tin on her lap. He said she'd scratch a mark into any seat she liked, so she'd know which one was hers. I said she sounded like a stubborn woman. He said she was the only one who ever paid the full fare.

Last night I rode number nine myself, all the way round, three times. The rain stopped near the top and the whole valley lay out under the lamps like spilt coins. I put my finger on the cross and it was cold and smooth. I don't know what I expected. Maybe only to be the next person who sat there on purpose.

Write soon and tell me Dad's knee is better.

Love, Tom