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offensive in Falluja if local leaders can persuade guerrillas to turn in their heavy weapons . The conductor stepped down the aisle while removing ticket stubs from the blue vinyl seats 127 Hurt As Train Hits Another Near Penn Station and reminded Janet that her stop was next. The color picture of commuters lying on stretchers while EMS workers attend to them above the caption Emergency teams set up a triage area in Penn Station yesterday as injured passengers awaited ambulances as the man on his cell phone seated behind Janet insisted that his boss never had the ability to listen. An empty Amtrak train crashed into the back of a Long Island Railroad train full of commuters about a half mile short of Pennsylvania station yesterday morning hurling passengers down aisles or into the seats in front of them and injuring 127, the authorities said . She folded the paper in half and placed it on the aisle seat as the man behind her continued complaining.
    Mark regarded Janet as she became yet another person subjected to his convoluted predicaments, “I was supposed to be meeting a client and his wife went into labor on my way up here,” with a weary nod to his cell phone on the bar between them, “of course my secretary didn’t bother relating the message until I got here.” She was wearing a short pleated gray skirt, a semi-transparent black blouse, “well,” and a pair of black knee-high boots, “that sounds like a reasonable excuse to me.” He nodded thoughtfully, “let’s hope all his capital doesn’t wind up in her college fund.” “Oh,” her warm smile, “it’s a girl?” “Who knows… there’s a fifty-fifty chance,” gently rapping his broad knuckles on the bar, “assuming it wasn’t a blatant lie. Anyway that’s how I ended up here.” The doubts and presumptions that had made her anxious, “well,” the way hunger and fatigue often did, “it might be the perfect excuse for us to have dinner together,” had begun to dissipate, “that is if you—” “—That sounds great,” he interjected with a grin, “my name is Mark.” They shook hands. “I’m Janet.” He looked closely at her dark brown eyes, “it’s a pleasure to meet you.” She smiled, “Likewise,” before noticing that her glass was nearly empty, “So what are you investing in?”
    Janet crossed to the sleigh bed, sat on the edge of it and removed her boots. A framed reproduction of Sanford R. Gifford’s “Hook Mountain, near Nyack, on the Hudson” was hanging on the wall above the maple roll-top desk. She pulled down her stockings and tugged them off her feet before standing to step out of her skirt. The perspective in the painting was from the eastern shore near Croton-on-Hudson where the Metro North station was now located. She crossed to the chair in front of the desk while unbuttoning her blouse. The late September woods reached the bended shore in the foreground as the still river proceeded between a thicket of trees on the right while the mountain range in the distance blended into the yellowing horizon. The clothes she draped over the back of the chair were the only ones she brought to wear. Four sailboats and a steamer were suspended in Hook Mountain’s distant reflection. She turned back the patchwork quilt and lay beneath the covers. A cloudless, cerulean blue sky mirrored the river beneath it. The smell of recently laundered sheets mingled with the perfume on her neck and perspiration beneath her arms. She thought of the conversation she had with Cindy the night before while adjusting the thick feather pillow. They cautiously discussed Cindy’s decision to have lunch with Andrew and what she should wear. The warm breeze scattered dust motes away from the sunlit window as she closed her eyes and listened to the southbound train arriving, and then