Early Riser

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Mrs Tiffen could play the bouzouki. Not well, and only one tune: ‘Help Yourself’ by Tom Jones. She plucked the strings expertly but without emotion while staring blankly out of the train window at the ice and snow. She and I had not exchanged an intelligent word since we first met five hours before, and the reason was readily explained: Mrs Tiffen was dead, and had been for several years.

‘It’s going to be a mild winter,’ said the grey-haired woman sitting opposite Mrs Tiffen and me as the train pulled out of Cardiff Central. ‘Average low of only minus forty is my guess.’

‘Almost balmy,’ I replied, and we both laughed, even though it wasn’t funny, not really, not at all.

After some thought, I had concluded that the woman was most likely an actor, part of the extensive Winter Thespian Tradition. Audiences were small, but highly appreciative. Summer players had to make do with the diluted respect of the many whilst Winter Players commanded the adoration of the few.

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