The Stories of John Cheever

The Nor’easter is a train the railroad christened at a moment when its directors were imbued with the mystery of travel. Memory is often more appealing than fact, and a passenger who had long ridden the train might overlook its noise and dirt each time he entered the Grand Central Station and saw there the name of a northerly three-day rain. This, at least, was the case with Paul Hollis, who rode the Nor’easter on nearly every Thursday or Friday night of his summer. He was a bulky man, who suffered in all Pullmans, but in none so much as he did on this ride. As a rule, he stayed in the club car until ten, drinking Scotch. The whiskey ordinarily kept him asleep until they reached the tumultuous delays of Springfield, past midnight. North of Springfield, the train fell into the balky and malingering stride of an old local, and Paul lay in his berth between wakefulness and sleep, like a partially anesthetized patient. The ordeal ended when, after breakfast, he left the Nor’easter, in Meridian Junction, and was met by his gentle wife. There was this to be said about the journey: It made one fully conscious of the terrestrial distance that separated the hot city from the leafy and ingenuous streets of the junction village.