A few weeks ago, I got an email from a listener called Lisa. She and her daughter have been watching their way through all the Agatha Christie movies and shows. They're really enjoying them. And she wondered whether there might be an episode idea in it. Well, that email sent me straight back to being a teenager. I had my first job. It was a part-time job in this little tiny bookstore in our town's dying shopping mall. It was pretty quiet and empty. And I spent most of my time after school in that store by myself, sitting behind the counter, reading through their entire Agatha Christie collection. I must have been about 16, which is such a weird age to love those books. But I guess now I understand the appeal. When you're young, a lot is usually going on with family and friends and your complicated feelings about everything. And these books, they kind of reduce the world to something very simple. There's a crime, the usual suspects, and of course, a brilliant detective. It makes a very complicated world suddenly feel quite simple and easy to navigate. That's soothing. So that's where we're going tonight. There's a woman on a train going home, reading one of these books. And you really don't need to follow any of it. It doesn't matter if you lose track of who's who or whether we're in the book or the train. All that matters is that this sleep story will help you sleep, because you already know how it ends. Somebody did it. It might be the butler or the brother-in-law or the nice lady who's been serving the tea. And whoever it turns out to be, it will be explained. Everything will be accounted for. You don't have to stay awake for it. Just let the rhythm and the pacing and the words allow you to sleep. But before we start, as always, please ensure that you are somewhere safe when listening, preferably your comfortable bed and not anywhere you need to stay alert. And a big thank you to Lisa who gave us this idea. And if you ever have an idea for an episode or you just want to say hi, reach out. I love hearing from you. Let me know where you're listening from, what's keeping you awake, and any ideas you might have for the show. But now, let's help you get settled. Start with the light. If it's still on, turn it off. And your phone. Put it somewhere you can't reach it without sitting up. This is the last time you'll look at it tonight. And it's the last time you'll look at the clock as well. Whatever time it is, it doesn't change anything. And then your pillow. Fluff it up if it's gone a little flat. Pull up your blankets. Some people like that weight right up under their chin. And some people need one foot out. There's no right version of this. Only the one that's right for you tonight. Get your legs where they want to be, unless there's a dog on them. In which case, the dog's comfort is always your priority. That is the rule of sleeping dogs. Take your time with this. There's no hurry. And in just a few seconds, we're going to take a nice long breath together. I want you to let that breath go all the way in. Down into your belly. So that your stomach rises and your chest barely moves at all. And when you're ready, take a nice long breath in. Feel your stomach rising as you breathe in. And then let it out slowly. Nice. Let's do that one more time. Breathe down right into your belly. Feel it rising. And then out. Long and slow and unhurried. One more time. Nice long breath in. And then that beautiful long exhale. And as the air moves through your body, feel yourself truly starting to relax. And then eventually let your breathing find its own pace. In and out. Notice the breath going in. The coolness of the air as you inhale. And the warmth of it as you exhale. And at the same time, notice how your body feels. Notice the small muscles around your eyes and mouth. And if there's any tightness at all, let it go. Notice your shoulders and that ridge of muscle running from the side of your neck out to the point of your shoulder. There's often tension here from driving, from looking down at your phone. From every time you braced against something. And a little further back, where your neck meets the top of your shoulder blade. There's a narrow band that pulls tight every time you turn your head. Just notice. And if there's any tightness at all, be conscious of that muscle becoming loose and soft. And notice warmth and relaxation moving down through your arms now. Through your elbows, into your wrists, and into your hands. Your fingers loose and curling open. Notice how your chest is rising and falling without any effort from you at all. Your back is sinking into the mattress. Every point of contact is taking a little more of your weight. And you feel heavy now. Warm and still. And you're ready to go somewhere. A station in London. There's a woman about to catch a train home. And a book that she hasn't bought yet. And a house at the end of a long lawn. Two worlds tonight. You don't have to keep hold of either one. She arrives at the concourse at ten past six. And the doors at the far end are standing open to the darkness. High above, the departure board turns over one letter at a time. She's happy to be heading home. She had enough of the hotel with its trouser press bolted to the wall. And the breakfast room where the toast came out of a little conveyor belt. Her lanyard is still in the side pocket of her bag. With her name spelled almost right. The conference is over now. The luggage runs along beside her on four wheels. Platform eleven. Departure in twenty minutes. She goes into the shop for a sandwich. And then turning towards the till, she stops. There's a wire rack by the door with mostly the same six bestsellers over and over. But halfway around, there's a paperback with a painting on it. A house at the end of a long lawn. A woman's figure very small on the terrace. And a shadow falling the wrong way across the grass. She's seen this cover before. Her mother had it. On a shelf in the back room. The whole row of them in order with the spines cracked white. The same picture. That must have been forty years ago. On impulse, she takes the book to the till with the sandwich. Platform eleven. And the train's already in. With the doors open and the windows lit. All up its length. She lifts the case into the rack and sits down in a window seat with a table. Facing forward is a paper tab in the headrest opposite. With a station name printed on it. And no one sitting under it. Across the aisle, a man has hung his jacket on the hook. And is typing on a laptop with two fingers. A young woman further down has her feet up on the seat opposite. And her headphones on. And every so often she hums along to something she's listening to. Then the doors close. One after another. All down the train. There is a whistle. And then they move. Out through the back of the city. Brick walls. The blank sides of buildings that were never meant to be looked at. A canal. The color of tea. Wet roofs holding the orange of the streetlights. And then gardens. Washing lines with nothing on them. A trampoline with the netting. Gone. And then fewer gardens. And not very much. At all. She takes her shoes off under the table. And puts her feet on the metal foot rail. There's a red line across the top of one foot. Where the straps spin all day. She picks up the book. She turns past the title page. And past the list of characters. Because there's always a list of characters. And she'd forgotten that. And it makes her smile. As she starts to read. The man across the aisle is still typing. The girl is still humming. The train rumbles. And she's gone. Lost. In the pages. In the book. There is a dinner party going on. And everyone at it is behaving strangely. The table sits fourteen. And there are fourteen people at it. In front of each one. There is more cutlery than any one person could need. Three forks on the left. Two knives and a spoon on the right. And something small and pointed. Laid across the top. For a course no one has come to yet. At the head of the table. Lord Carraway. Old. Rich. And down one side. A woman in green with three feathers in her hair. Which is the fashion. She is a film star. Beside her. The man who pays for things. He's American. Perfect teeth. Opposite them. The vicar. Vicars in these books are always at dinner. Further down is the nephew. He's very interested in his glass. And he's been very interested in his glass since the soup. There is a young woman from South America. Who has been engaged to help Lord Carraway with his work. Whatever the work is. And it's never quite clear. She's beautiful. And she says almost nothing. And everyone has decided that this. Means something. The butler comes around. With the wine. He's a large calm man. Who has been in this house for 22 years. And there is absolutely nothing suspicious about him. But he pauses. Very slightly at the movie star's shoulder. And in a book like this. That's enough. He'll be under suspicion. By chapter 9. During dinner. Someone mentions a will. Somebody else says something about Cairo. And two people exchange meaningful glances. And that's how they all are. 14 people. Being slightly odd. At the same table. And every single one of them. Looking like they've got something to hide. In the hall. The long case clock. Swings over and back. With a small catch in it. At the end of each swing. Somewhere at the end of the train carriage. There's a door. That hasn't caught properly. And it swings over and back. With a small knock. At the end of each swing. It's later now. But our reader. As she moves through the night. On the train. Doesn't know how much later. The seats down the far end are all empty now. With their headrests slightly askew. Somebody's newspaper has been left folded on a table. The overhead lights have gone down a notch. The way they do on the late trains. The heating is coming back under the seat. And around her ankles. And the window beside her is cold. When the back of her hand touches it. Her coat is over her knees. She didn't put it there to be a blanket. But that's what it's turned into. Outside there's nothing to see anymore. A farmhouse light. A long way off. And then nothing again. And then the orange smear of a town. That isn't near enough to matter. Mostly. What's out there is her own face. Floating in the glass. With the dark. Going past behind it. She's read the same lines twice now. She looks up once more at the window, and for a second, there's something behind her reflection that isn't dark, warmer, shaped like a lit room with people in it, arranged, and then it's just glass again, in her own face, and she returns to the story. They're all here.All the suspects are here. They've been gathered together. The film star, still looking glamorous in satin with long, white silk gloves.The American is beside her with his hat on his knee. The vicar has come, of course. The nephew is by the window, and he still can't keep still, and he's still not fooling anyone.The young woman from South America is sitting slightly apart, and the butler is standing by the door with his hands behind his back. He was asked to sit, but said he'd rather not. The French windows are open onto the terrace.The light is long and low across the grass now. Somewhere out in the hall, the clock swings over and back, and by the fireplace, there's a man who has been in this house for four days and seems to have spent most of it doing nothing at all. He's been in the garden.He's been in the kitchen. He's asked the maid three questions about the stairs, and he's about to explain everything. He starts with the dinner. He goes back to the fourteen of them, the order they came in, who was where, and who got up, and when. He mentions the wine. He mentions the fish.His voice goes up and comes down. It's not a fast voice. He's in no hurry at all.He's been waiting four days for everyone to be sitting in one room, and he is not going to rush it now, and at some point, the sentences stop arriving whole. The words have gone soft at the edges, and they're not carrying anything anymore. The train knocks twice and pauses.The voice goes on, rising, falling, explaining everything, and her coat has slid down over her knees. The book is tipped in her hand. Her eyes close, and the voice goes on without her.It doesn't need her. It's been going for eighty years, and it will still be going tomorrow, and the day after, and the light will still be on the lawn, and the man by the fireplace will still be taking his time. She's asleep now, properly asleep. In a warm carriage with the dark going past outside, and the book has closed itself on her thumb and slid down into her lap. Her head has gone over towards the window. The train is doing the rest of the work.It knows where it's going, and it will get there, whether she watches or not, and someone will come down the aisle before the last station and say the name of the place, and she'll wake up in plenty of time, and the book is still there in her lap with everything in it. The house, the lawn, the fourteen chairs, and the clock in the hall, going over and back. It'll all still be there tomorrow, exactly as she left it.Not a thing moved, and that's what these books give people. We live in a world that changes underneath us, constantly. The rules shift.The thing that was true last year isn't quite true now. Most of us spend a good part of the day working out where we stand, and what's expected, and whether we've got it right, and it's tiring, and then you open a book where a person who is very good at their job works out who and why and explains it, and every strange little detail turns out to have a reason. Nothing is left over.Nothing left hanging. You knew that was coming when you started, and it came. There's nothing wrong with reaching for that, with wanting to know how something ends before you begin.It's a thing people have always done and always will, and it's a large part of why we tell each other stories in the first place. You've got your own version of it. Everyone has. The movie you've seen so many times that you can say the lines along with it. The mug you reach for when there are four clean ones in the cupboard, and the route you drive because you know it. They're not habits exactly.They're places you go to get your bearings, and there's wisdom in knowing which ones work for you, and keeping them close, and going to them when you need them, and your bed is one of them. So notice how it feels tonight. The weight of the blankets over you, holding you down just slightly.The pillow taking the whole weight of your head so your neck doesn't have to. The warm hollow you've made that's shaped like you and nobody else. Sleep is coming. That heaviness in your arms and your legs, that thickness in your thoughts, where the words are still there, but they've stopped meaning very much. And if it doesn't come straight away, that's all right. Lying still in the warm and in the dark is doing you good on its own. Your heart is slowing. Your breathing has already gone deeper than you asked it to. Sleep comes to people who stop looking for it, and it always comes eventually.And it will come tonight. Let the day be finished now. It's done, and you did what you could with it. The house is still there with the light on the lawn. The train still going. The clock in the hall swings over and back, and you can let go of all of it.