Page 7 of The Secret Christmas Library

In what had already been an extremely surprising week for Mirren, this was perhaps the most surprising of all.

Immediately she was furious that he was seeing her with a tear-stained face, mascara all down it, a stupid neck pillow – a neck pillow – hanging off her, her coat dirty from the station and not warm enough for the weather.

Because she had forgotten how attractive he was.

Devastating: so pale and thin, those great big dark eyes, the clever eyebrows permanently arched as if he was on the brink of saying something wicked, which he generally was.

When Theo was about, with his courtly manners and sparkling black eyes, his quick wit and taste for adventure made him irresistible to be with.

Of course, Mirren had realised painfully over the last long months, she probably wasn’t the only one who thought so.

‘What are you doing here?’ said Mirren.

‘Miss Sutherland,’ he returned, in his overly formal way.

‘Why are you even . . . ’ She looked around. ‘Wherever the hell we are?’

‘Book business,’ said Theo, smiling. ‘My uncle sent me.’

‘I thought you weren’t working for him any more.’

‘Ah, one last job and all that, you know . . . You’re looking well.’

This was so clearly not the case that Mirren winced. She also suddenly wanted to say, Why didn’t you call me? Where the hell have you been? – but instead she found herself holding on to her drink hard as, with a judder, the train started up and slowly pulled out of the station.

‘What is this?’ she said. ‘Am I being kidnapped?’

‘I know,’ said Theo. ‘Isn’t it marvellous?’

‘But what is going on?’

‘It’s Jamie McKinnon,’ said Theo, as if this explained everything.

‘Yes, and ?’ said Mirren.

‘You don’t know?’

‘Wikipedia was not very useful.’

Theo smiled. ‘No, it wouldn’t be. That family is pretty good at keeping itself out of the papers.’

‘Okay, stop being so supercilious and posh,’ said Mirren, properly cross now. ‘Yes, blah blah, you know posh people.’

Theo’s uncle ran an incredibly smart bookshop in Kensington, acquired extraordinarily expensive books, often by dubious means, and had treated Mirren like something unfortunate he’d stepped in.

Theo was his penniless nephew who relied on him for room and board – which also meant sometimes carrying out his dirty work.

‘That’s not . . . well,’ said Theo. ‘I don’t know this guy. Except by reputation.’

‘Which is . . . the guy who owns a mad train?’

Theo looked around. ‘Oh, yeah. It’s pretty cool, eh?’

‘You’re pretending to be unimpressed when basically this is JAMES BOND VILLAIN stuff.’

‘I am not,’ said Theo, smiling. ‘I am very impressed. I’d heard it existed, but I couldn’t imagine they’d still let it run.’

‘What even is it?’

‘Well, Jamie’s family used to be incredibly wealthy. Owned half the Highlands.’

‘That sounds like a political minefield.’

‘Oh, well, absolutely, yes, quite right. Until Jamie’s grandfather, a great learned scholar.

He gave away a lot of the land and tried to make things right – but he kept the books and the libraries; he was a big fan of that.

So basically, the family was left with a lot of books but without a bean.

And the grandfather was quite tonto, estranged from Jamie’s mother, let the estate run to rack and ruin.

He died recently, practically a pauper.’

‘Oh,’ said Mirren. ‘But they still have the train . . . ’

‘Yes – private carriages used to be quite common. So the family allowed the railway to build through their land a hundred and fifty years ago if and only if they got a halt of their own, and a carriage at their disposal, for as long as the railway ran. And I suppose, one hundred and fifty years later, they still do.’

‘They just summon a train carriage, like getting a cab?’

‘Seems about the size of it.’

Mirren couldn’t help breaking out into a huge grin. Deciding she would reckon with Theo’s behaviour later, she plonked herself into one of the large, comfortable armchairs.

Theo for his part looked exactly as he had done a year ago: thin, tall and pale, with deep-set black eyes, rather like a vampire if that vampire wore Adidas Gazelles and a slightly cheeky expression.

Mirren informed herself quite sternly that he was a rat, and she was absolutely not under any circumstances going to find him attractive again.

She sipped her drink carefully and warmed her freezing feet. The toddy was delicious.

‘So, we just sit here all night?’

‘Oh, no,’ said Theo, rather smugly. ‘Go and have a look.’

Past the fire was a sliding door through which was a further part of the carriage, with a narrow corridor and compartments, like in old rolling stock, except here the compartments were neatly made-up single beds; there were three compartments, each with two beds.

Fresh white linen and a water bowl were laid out; at the end of the corridor was a bathroom with, astonishingly, a proper cast-iron bath in it. Mirren whistled.

By the time she returned to the main section of the carriage, a table had been set up, also with more white linen. Theo was already there, and she noticed he was wearing a suit and tie.

‘You’re dressed for dinner?’

‘Of course,’ he said with some surprise.

Mirren glanced down at her dirty shirt that she’d been wearing all day and rubbed her tear-stained face. ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Give me five minutes.’

She unpacked her suitcase on one of the pristine white-counterpaned beds, steadying herself as the train swayed along the tracks.

To be inside both a house and a train at the same time was a discombobulating but enchanting experience.

She stared out of the window in the dark, seeing, briefly, a lit-up platform, with ‘Watford’ just visible as it flashed past. This was not at all the way she normally thought of the signage for Watford.

She wondered what people thought when they saw the carriage.

Or perhaps they didn’t think a thing about it, didn’t even notice.

Perhaps there were private trains travelling all over the railway network all the time.

The royal family had had one, she knew. Maybe lots of people did, making their own way in the dead of night.

The room had a faded tartan carpet on the floor and dull green walls; the same lowlight brass wall lamps, and real dark red curtains with tassels on them.

Goodness, Mirren thought, looking longingly at the bed. She could get used to this.

She washed quickly and redid her make-up and pulled out the only dress she had brought, a lovely brick-red one, which she had figured could work for a Christmas event or a formal business meeting depending on what exactly was required.

She pulled down her curly hair and added a bit of lipstick, then crossly took it off again.

She wasn’t putting it on for this guy, who last year had been absolutely charming, absolutely as interested in books as she was – and then had walked off without a second glance, back to his rich family and cosseted life.

There was a wonderful smell when she re-entered the main salon, the train jolting quietly along.

She found herself wondering how the drunk lads’ party was going on, then found she didn’t care, because, here, tinkling music was playing and the table was laid with white linen and it was all so very lovely she could cry, again, but for different reasons from how her evening had started out.

The barman, who was clearly, in fact, a butler, drew out her chair. ‘Madam.’

She glanced at Theo, half-grinning, but his face was fairly straight; no doubt he was a bit more used to this kind of thing.

Because he was an entitled doughnut, she told herself sternly.

She had just forgotten what great hair the entitled doughnut had: a bit too long, sticking up here and there, little sideburns which might be out of fashion but she couldn’t help liking them anyway. Argh. She had to stop this.

‘Some wine, madam?’ said the butler, uncorking a crystal decanter.

Well, that was well known to help her make good decisions, Mirren thought with a sigh.

‘Yes, please.’

The delicious smell turned out to be French onion soup.

‘You can have another course if you want it,’ said Theo, ‘but it’s after nine.’

‘No, no, this is fine,’ said Mirren, taking in the delicious smell. It was covered in toasted French bread with melted Emmental and masses of black pepper. ‘Oh, my goodness,’ she sighed. ‘This is so good.’

‘Isn’t it?’ said Theo. ‘It’s basically a late-night cheese-on-toast delivery system.’

She smiled. The butler came and refilled their glasses and set the decanter down between them.

‘There is cranachan in the fridge, and help yourself to anything, of course,’ he said, indicating the bar area. ‘But if there’s nothing further?’

‘Thank you,’ they both said, and watched as he left the carriage, back into the main section of the train. For a moment, as the door opened, there was a noisy rattling sound of the wind, then all was sealed and quiet again.

They looked at one another.

‘Did he just . . . completely vanish?’ said Mirren.

‘Oh, yeah, I think, every time they have one of these journeys, the butler has to throw himself off the moving train rather than get in the way.’

‘Oh, stop it,’ said Mirren, smiling despite herself.

She finished the soup, which was warming, with a good slug of brandy in it, and found herself scouring the bowl with the very good bread. Theo looked at her, smiling.

‘You were hungry.’

She frowned. ‘I’m not, usually, this time of night. But I’ve had a tough day.’

She explained about the mugging and Theo made sympathetic noises in all the right places, even though Mirren was still thinking, Well, that guy stole my phone from me. You stole my self-confidence, my faith in myself as someone worth dating.

‘So,’ she said, abruptly changing the subject. ‘Tell me about this missing book.’

‘Absolutely not,’ he said, sipping his wine with an amused expression on his face. There was a rattle at the windows and Mirren glanced over. Hail.

‘How can you lose a book in your own house?’

He shrugged, infuriatingly straight-faced. ‘Oh, well,’ he said, ‘you know . . . ’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Well, that’s good,’ said Theo suddenly. ‘Stop you getting to it first and taking all the credit.’

‘What?’ said Mirren.

‘Nothing,’ said Theo. ‘Nice plaque with your name on it at the British Museum by the way. You know, for the book we both found.’

‘You didn’t find it, I did! You’d given up and gone home!’

‘I helped!’

‘Well, they didn’t ask me for a line about people who helped!’

‘Would it have made any difference if they had?’

They sat there in silence for a few more seconds as the train’s whistle blew.

‘You never contacted me,’ said Mirren in a small voice. ‘You ghosted me.’

‘I was getting round to it,’ said Theo. ‘Then, I didn’t want to interrupt your publicity tour.’

‘I didn’t do a publicity tour!’

‘Hope you did well out of it.’

‘Are you kidding? I waited for you to call; you didn’t. I messaged you; you didn’t get back to me. There’s a word for that, Theo.’

He looked sulky. ‘Well, I didn’t know everyone was going to make such a fuss of you.’

‘Oh, boohoo,’ said Mirren. ‘And it wasn’t a fuss. It was one picture.’

‘And a plaque.’

‘I’ll make you a plaque.’

There was a further silence.

‘I see they didn’t give you enough money to buy a new coat.’

‘Oh, my God, shut up!’ Then, after a moment. ‘No, they didn’t.’

‘Well, that’s one good thing.’

‘Oh, yeah, thanks, yes, I’m still skint and I’m glad you’re glad. I thought you were working in a bookshop anyway.’

‘I am,’ said Theo. ‘This is an extra job.’

‘For your uncle?’

He shrugged.

She looked at him again in the soft light. He looked even hotter when he was pouting, if that was even possible.

‘So you don’t know anything about this book either,’ she said.

He wouldn’t answer either way, which she took to mean he absolutely definitely didn’t know any more than she did.

‘Fine,’ she said finally. ‘I found the last book first; I’ll find this one too.’

‘Good for you,’ he said. Then he picked up his glass and wandered over to the nearest shelf, selecting an Edward Gibbon with a look of happy recognition and taking it to the armchair next to the fire. Obviously their conversation was over.

Mirren looked around to see if there was anywhere obvious to tidy up the plates – there wasn’t.

Then she remembered that this was a stupid posh world for stupid posh people who never considered even for a second clearing their own bloody plates, so she simply left things where they were and headed off for bed without saying goodnight.