Hitchhiking through England an old guy picks us up in a red Datsun pickup asks us where we're going notices & comments on our American accents & we climb in the back of the truck huddled in our jackets watching the green countryside & slate-roofed houses & black & white cows flashing by & when we finally reach the roundabout just outside of London where he's heading south he stops on the side of the road & we climb down from the bed of the truck & he comes around back with a thermos bottle in his hand asking if we’d like a cup of coffee before we continue on our way & we both nod eagerly at the same time wondering why all the extra hospitality but not wanting to seem suspicious or ungrateful & as we drink from the steaming plastic cups he offers us cigarettes as well which we also gladly accept & we stand there drinking strong black coffee & smoking Marlboros & wondering what it is with this guy standing there watching us with such obvious satisfaction & pleasure & as we return the empty cups & make a move to go he starts telling us a story about how he’d been a soldier in World War Two & how he’d been cut off from his division behind enemy lines somewhere in Belgium & went into hiding with no radio no food no nothing for days & was finally discovered by some American soldiers who gave him hot black coffee from a thermos & American cigarettes for which he was forever grateful & that he’d been waiting forty years for a chance to return the favor.