The cars like the rest of public transportation, were as comfortable as any Hank knew. Traveling second class, as the Progressive Tours pilgrims did, involved four people in a compartment for the night, with one exception. At the end of the car was a smaller compartment containing two bunks only.
The Intourist guide who had shepherded them around Leningrad took them to the train, saw them all safely aboard, told them another Intourist employee would pick them up at the station in Moscow.
It was late. Hank was assigned the two-bunk compartment. He put his glasses on the tiny window table, sat on the edge of the lower and began to pull off his shoes. He didn't look up when the door opened until a voice said, icebergs dominating the tone, "Just what are you doing in here?"
Hank blinked up at her. "Hello, Char. What?"
Char Moore snapped, "I said, what are you doing in my compartment?"
"Yours? Sorry, the conductor just assigned me here. Evidently there's been some mistake."
"I suggest you rectify it, Mr. Stevenson."
Out in the corridor a voice, heavy with Britishisms, complained plaintively, "Did you ever hear the loik? They put men and women into the same compartment. Oim expected to sleep with a loidy in the bunk under me."
Hank cleared his throat, didn't allow himself the luxury of a smile. He said, "I'll see what I can do, Char. Seems to me I did read somewhere that the Russkies see nothing wrong in putting strangers in the same sleeping compartment."
Char Moore stood there, saying nothing but breathing deeply enough to express American womanhood insulted.