Above his desk in the staffroom at a busy station HI Ot Toe had a poster showing James Dean with a rifle slung across his narrow shoulders

The actor was adopting the pose of a crucified saint

HI Ot Toe was a railwayman of fifteen years and had worked at various main line stations during that time

In his modest flat HI Ot Toe had a large painting of Ophelia lost in a forest hung prominently on a vacant wall

He had purchased the painting at an auction ten years previously as he was interested in the contrast between the pale doomed girl and the dark malevolent forest that was surrounding her

Many of his friends commented on the painting and the clever use of the greens pinks and brilliant whites to achieve a sense of deep menace

But none of them were aware that he kept a poster of James Dean above his desk at the main line station in the town

The Swindon Bus Crash

Judith Burton had always admired the vacancy of the bus shelter opposite her first floor flat and was a little upset when it was demolished by a defective bus although she gave first aid to the shocked but uninjured driver

Her husband was attending to a bonfire on his allotment two miles away which could be seen clearly by the driver’s brother as he descended the steep hill into Wroughton in his colourful bus

Gideon Gibbs was sharing a bath with his Thai bride and was watching the reflections of the bonfire dance on her boyish breasts

He had been in the army for many years and had travelled the world but had not engaged in relationships with women as he was always aware that his death in a fire fight might harm their delicate emotions and he did not want to carry the responsibility for this on his broad and haunted shoulders

Judith Burton was interviewed by the police but as she had not witnessed the actual crash she was unable to supply much detail

It was soon apparent that the only witnesses to the accident did not speak English so an interpreter was requested

But he was suffering from a viral condition in his Bristol bed and declined the offer of employment

The two men who witnessed the accident then faded into the bleak January night without further reference to the incident

The damaged bus was removed with great uproar in the early hours of the night of the following day and was towed back to the depot

The remains of the shattered bus shelter were demolished without emotion and the local buses were rerouted

Judith Burton was not sleeping well as her husband had not returned home again

She knew that he was staying with his brother and that both were blind drunk

Gideon Gibbs had died in the slender arms of his Thai bride after making love for the first time in sixteen years

She had called the authorities without success as her English was poor and sat looking at his stiffening corpse whilst drinking milky cocoa to settle her shattered nerves

As a precautionary measure the bus driver spent the night in the new hospital on the edge of the town

The driver considered it unnecessary and only agreed to the stay when his wife and two daughters began weeping

What nobody knew in Swindon was that the bonfire had not been fully extinguished by its drunken owner and that it had ignited a small wooden shed that was full of gas bottles that were being illegally stored by a petty thief

Who was in the cells at the police station after being arrested for fighting in the street

In January 2018 a bus crashed into a shelter in Swindon

No injuries were reported

This is a fiction