The 2:10 car

Delphine caught the 2:10 at Louisiana Avenue every night that she worked, which was five nights out of seven and some weeks six. The car came rocking down St. Charles under the oaks with its windows lit yellow and its bell ringing for nobody, because there was nobody on the neutral ground at that hour except her and the cats.

The driver was always the same, an older man named Mr. Toussaint who nodded at her and never spoke. There was always a man asleep against the third window on the river side, head tipped back, a paper bag on his lap. She rode with her shoes off and her feet on the wooden seat in front of her, which was against the rules, and Mr. Toussaint had never once said anything about it.