My train arrived at one of the low numbered platforms at the terminus station

 

I was in a rush but needed a coffee before I travelled further into the silver city and was trying to remember where the buffets were located

 

It was as I was approaching the barriers that I saw a scruffy fox emerge from beneath a train

 

The creature stared at the people on the platform for a while and after deciding that they were not ghosts disappeared from where it came

 

Later as we shared a coffee in the buffet on Platform One it explained to me that it was an urban fox and had been commissioned by the BBC to compose a song in praise of the new electric trains

 

But it suffered acutely from stage fright and every time it emerged to perform its song it was gripped by an unconscious panic and ran away

 

It asked me if I knew how to overcome this affliction

 

I suggested that it might be an idea to imagine itself as a Ragtime composer and adopt a stage name

 

The fox listened to me without interruption and then ordered another coffee for each of us

 

When my coffee arrived I noticed that the blind but beautiful waitress had left a silver spoon in the china cup

 

This simple mistake moved both the fox and I to tears