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in appreciation, then it gave a start and darted away. Simon peeped around the roller.
    The door to the greenhouse was open. The metal frame had buckled; slats of glass were missing. Shelves were filled with flower pots and seed boxes. No one was there, dead or alive.
    He ventured further along the path, the weeds so high it was like a tunnel. Justin liked tunnels; he said he was going to be an engineer when he grew up. Simon had asked if an engineer drove engines and Justin had laughed and said he was stupid. Simon turned a corner and saw Justin sitting on the ground in the middle of a patch of sunlight.
    ‘You’re trespassing!’ Relieved to find him, Simon grabbed Justin by the shoulders. He was surprised by the feeling of sharp bones.
    ‘Let go!’ Justin wrenched free. He was pouring water into a hole in the side of a pile of earth. The pool shrank as water soaked into the ground.
    ‘I need to get more.’ Justin spoke as if to himself.
    ‘What are you doing?’ Simon expected that Justin would be sorry and accompany him to the library where they were meant to be.
    ‘This reservoir has to feed two towns. There’s no need for a pump or a water tower, it’s higher than the settlements, I’m using gravity.’ Justin waved a hand. The ground had been cleared of weeds, earth flattened and marked with stones like a railway track. A gutter had been cut into the raised earth through which a tunnel ran. Justin had constructed it with lolly sticks and mud. Simon poked at the mound with his bad hand.
    ‘Careful!’ Justin grabbed Simon’s wrist. ‘It could collapse. I had to measure the sides, make sure the rolling stock can pass through.’ Justin’s father was an engineer. Simon’s father worked with mad people and never smiled. Simon didn’t want to be mad when he was grown up.
    ‘Get off me, Stumpy!’ Justin glared at him. ‘Go away.’
    ‘Your mummy’s dead.’ Simon said and was immediately horrified. He hadn’t meant to say it.
    ‘She’s not. And anyway your mummy doesn’t love you. That’s worse. Mine loves me very much.’
    Simon felt his eyes sting. Dashing at his face with his sleeve, he pulled out of the tunnel a red locomotive attached to three carriages.
    ‘What’s in here?’
    The carriages uncoupled and crashed on to the tracks. He picked them up and peered in through the windows of one of them.
    ‘Gosh, it’s a dining car!’ he exclaimed. ‘Look, that’s you and me having our lunch. Let’s pretend we met there. I’ve got steak and French fries like the man in Strangers on a Train . Have you read it? It’s my mum’s favourite book. It’s really for grown-ups. What are you eating?’
    ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Justin replied as if he didn’t care either.
    ‘Two men meet and become friends.’ Simon chattered on happily, his mood recovering as he warmed to his idea. His mum had been impressed that he had read the book from beginning to end. ‘Do you like tomato ketchup?’ He imagined shooting it all over his chips like the man in the story.
    ‘I am about to drive my train through the tunnel,’ Justin said.
    ‘I’ll do it.’ Brought rudely back to the present, Simon was terribly sorry to have made a mess, but this was all against the rules. He reattached the carriages and, lifting the engine, ran the wheels over his palm, making them spin. He pushed it on the impacted soil, wheels whirring, and watched with satisfaction as it sped into the tunnel. It shot out of the other side, carriages twisted and buckled, and veering off the tracks smashed into the watering can.
    ‘You went too fast.’ Justin rubbed his hand on his shorts.
    Simon was horrified; he had wanted to help. He pulled on his bad finger and pretended he was a racing driver who didn’t care about going fast.
    ‘Can I have a turn?’ Perhaps Justin had forgotten it was his own train.
    ‘Unfortunately you cannot. I need to perform more test runs.’ Simon pressed too hard on the