The Night Train

The train left Dakar at nine in the evening and arrived in Bamako, if it wished, two days later. My father said the train was a country all of its own, with its own weather, its own rules, its own way of measuring time.

I took it once, as a young man, with almost no money and an unreasonable amount of confidence. I found a seat by the window and watched the city thin out into fields, and the fields thin out into small, brave lights, and the lights thin out into a darkness so complete that the train itself seemed to be swimming in it.

Across from me sat a woman with a basket of onions and a book in French. Beside her sat a boy who could not have been more than nine, who kept glancing at the book as if it were a small animal that might jump. She noticed him looking. She turned the book so he could see. She read aloud, quietly, so as not to disturb the other travellers.