I searched the room for a door.
There was the doorway to the landing, the narrow door of the cupboard, and the door in the mirror. I tried the cupboard first. It contained three coats, a pair of muddy boots, and a small wooden box. Inside the box lay a railway ticket bearing the words PLEASE DO NOT DISTURB THE PASSENGER.
I put it back.
The knocking came again.
Three times. A pause. Two more.
I crossed to the landing and opened the door.
Beyond it lay the garden.
The tree stood in the middle of the lawn, its branches spread against a sky that seemed too low. The red sweater hung from the washing line. Near the tree, the gardener knelt in the earth, her back towards me.
I called to her.
She did not turn.
I went outside and approached her. She was digging with a small trowel, making a hole beside the roots.
“What are you looking for?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said.
I remembered the other time she had said this, and the little key she had planted.
“Have you found it?”
She stopped digging.
“Found what?”
“The thing you planted.”
She looked up at me. Her expression was neither surprised nor puzzled.
“I haven't planted anything.”
“But I saw you.”
“Yes,” she said. “You often do.”
She returned to her digging.
I watched for a moment, then looked towards the house. Every upstairs window was dark, except one. In it, a man stood with his back to the glass.
I knew him.
He raised his hand.
I raised mine in reply.
When I looked again, the window was empty.
“Who lives in that room?” I asked.
The gardener pushed the trowel into the earth.
“Whoever gets there first.”
“And who gets there first?”
She smiled without looking up.
“That's what the room is for.”
I left her to her work and went inside.
The staircase led upwards, but each landing brought me to the same door. Behind one lay the kitchen; behind another, the waiting room at the station. A third opened onto the submerged staircase, where water flowed upwards towards a light I could not reach.
At the fourth landing I found the room with the mirror.
The man was waiting for me.
He sat on the wooden chair, his hands folded on the table. The glass vessel stood before him, filled to the brim. The water was perfectly still.
“You took your time,” he said.
“I've been looking for you.”
“No,” he replied. “You've been looking for the door.”
“What's the difference?”
He glanced towards the mirror.
“The door is easy to find.”
I sat opposite him.
“Who are you?”
He considered this, as though the answer depended on where we were sitting.
“I was the person who stayed.”
“Where?”
He looked at the glass vessel.
“Here.”
I waited.
“Someone had to remain,” he continued. “The others were leaving. The train was ready, the water was rising, and the house had begun to close. So I stayed behind to make sure the door remained open.”
“Which door?”
He smiled.
“You see? You've already forgotten.”
I looked at the mirror. My reflection stood behind the chair, watching us.
“Why did you tell me not to stay?”
“Because you haven't stayed yet.”
“But you said you had.”
“I did.”
“Then how can I be here?”
He leaned forward.
“Perhaps you aren't.”
The water in the vessel trembled. A ripple travelled from the centre to the edge, then returned towards the centre, where it disappeared.
I watched it happen again.
“Is this a reflection?” I asked.
“Of what?”
“Of us.”
He shook his head.
“Reflections don't need us. They only need something to reflect.”
I looked down into the vessel.
For a moment I saw the garden, the tree, and the gardener kneeling beside the roots. Then the image changed. I saw the pool, the station, and the green train waiting beside the platform.
A figure stood on the opposite bank.
The woman.
She held a postcard in one hand and a brass key in the other. She looked towards the water, then towards the house.
“She knows we're here,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Can she get to us?”
The man shook his head.
“Not while you're here.”
I looked at him.
“Then let me leave.”
He stood and went to the mirror. He placed his palm against the glass, and the surface yielded slightly, like the skin of a drum.
“Go on,” he said.
I approached the mirror.
On the other side lay the waiting room at the station. The bench, the coat stand, the handless clock. Through the open door, I could see the platform and the green train.
I put my hand against the glass.
It was warm.
Behind me, the man said, “Before you go, there's something I must ask.”
I turned.
“Will you remember me?”
“I don't know.”
“Good,” he said.
He stepped backwards, away from the mirror.
The room began to shrink. The table grew smaller, the glass vessel became a bead of light, and the man receded into the distance. The mirror remained the same size, but its frame grew taller, extending upwards until I could no longer see its top.
I reached for the glass.
The man raised his hand.
Then he was gone.
I stepped through the mirror into the waiting room.
The stationmaster stood beside the coat stand, holding a small notebook.
“Did you find him?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Did he leave?”
“No.”
The stationmaster wrote something in his notebook.
“Then everything is as it should be.”
“What does that mean?”
He closed the notebook.
“It means the door is still open.”
I looked towards the platform.
The green train was waiting, its windows bright with afternoon sunlight. In the nearest carriage, the woman sat alone. She was holding a postcard, but she had stopped writing.
I went to her.
“Are you ready?” I asked.
She looked up.
“Ready for what?”
“To leave.”
She glanced towards the stationmaster, who stood in the doorway of the waiting room.
“I thought you were the one who had to stay.”
“So did I.”
She put the postcard in her pocket and took my hand.
We boarded the train.
As the doors closed, I looked back at the station. The stationmaster had opened his notebook again. He was standing beside the coat stand, writing carefully, while the handless clock watched him from the wall.
The train began to move.
The station receded into the mist.
Then, in the window opposite me, I saw the man who had stayed behind.
He was sitting in the waiting room, reading a newspaper.
He looked up and smiled.
I turned towards the woman.
“Did you see him?”
She shook her head.
“See whom?”
I looked back at the window.
The waiting room was empty.
On the table beside the glass vessel lay a postcard.
It was addressed to me.
And this time, the message was written in my own handwriting:
I will stay until the others have left.
The train entered the mist.
Beneath the carriage, water began to run.
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