The station was quiet, apart from a few isolated characters I assumed were also waiting for the seven o'clock train to Paris. I looked around in case I was being watched. A few more people arrived as the train pulled into the station. I hurried to the far end of the platform, to the carriage just behind the tender and the engine at the front of the train. The brown envelope remained inside my shirt. I looked along the windows of the carriage hoping to catch a glimpse of the man who was to take delivery of the envelope.

Carriage doors opened and shut as people stepped off the train while others stepped onto it. The great engine let out a prolonged blast of steam that billowed along the platform. A whistle sounded to warn people at the station of the train’s departure.

We were lucky to have our own railway station in Champs de Pavot and although it served residents of other small villages in the vicinity it just so happened that our village, Champs de Pavot, was closer to the station than the rest, so we considered it our station.

            Who will collect the envelope? The stationmaster raised his flag and blew his whistle again, signifying it was time for the train to continue its journey to Paris.

‘Stand away!’ he shouted, waving the flag wildly from side to side. He blew the whistle one more time and as he did so, the door of the carriage next to me opened. A man in a black beret and white raincoat leant forward, extended his right hand and whispered the phrase I had been expecting to hear: ‘Blood Red Poppy.’

He looked nervously over his shoulder and repeated it again. ‘Blood Red Poppy!’

It was difficult to see his face in the dimly lit interior of the train but this was the man to whom I had to pass the document, one which I longed to read but knew I couldn’t. I pulled it from my shirt, stepped up to the carriage door and slipped it into his hand in such a way I was sure no one saw what I was doing. He grabbed it from me.

‘Now go quickly and well done.’

‘Stand away! Stand away!’ shouted the exasperated station master, walking briskly towards me.

‘Go!’ commanded the man, as he slipped the envelope into his briefcase.

I stepped back from the carriage door as it was slammed shut. A cloud of steam from below the train, spiralled upwards wrapping itself around the legs of the few people still on the platform. The pistons began their raucous work and the wheels, slipping at first, began to turn and move the train forward.

The stationmaster approached me.

‘I thought you were catching that train to Paris, young man, why didn’t you get on board?’

I remembered what Mister Tomas had told me.

‘I'm not going to Paris this evening,’ I replied.

The stationmaster looked at me suspiciously.

‘Then what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be at home with your parents?’

‘I came to greet my uncle; he's on his way to Paris. I knew the train would be stopping here. He said he’d be at the front of the train. He always travels in the front carriage.’

The well-nourished stationmaster, not far off retirement, shook his head in silent acceptance, shrugged his shoulders and waddled slowly up the platform, tapping his flag by the side of his leg. I didn’t recognise the tune he was whistling.

            While walking along the platform I spotted a woman. Her gaze followed me to the exit and although she had an open newspaper in front of her I knew she was pretending to read it. When she noticed I was looking at her, she raised it quickly to hide her face. I felt uneasy but guessed she wasn't a threat. After all, only men are spies, aren’t they?’