STAGE
1 One-Way Ticket –
Short Stories
Jennifer Bassett
Introduction
This ungraded summary is for the teacher’s use only
and should not be given to students.
The story
The Girl with Green Eyes. Bill and his wife Julie are
travelling by train to the southwest of England for
their holiday. It is a long, slow journey, and while Bill
exchanges endless stories with a man in a brown hat,
Julie – the girl with green eyes – is increasingly bored.
Opposite her sits a tall dark man in an expensive suit.
Julie looks at the newspaper he is reading, and then
catches his eye. Though they don’t speak, she learns
that he is going to catch a boat in Plymouth and travel
to Italy –-and Julie longs to travel to foreign places.
After the train leaves Plymouth, Bill discovers Julie has
left the train to join the tall dark man. The man in the
brown hat advises him to have his holiday and forget
Julie.
South for the Winter. Twenty-three-year-old Tom
likes travelling around Europe, getting jobs when he
needs them and moving on when he’s bored. On
the slow train to Sofia he meets two American girls,
Melanie and Carol. They like travelling too, and the
three young people talk and laugh together for hours.
The two girls are planning to spend a couple of days
in Yugoslavia, but they arrange to meet Tom in Sofia
in a few days’ time. Tom hasn’t got much money, so
Melanie buys him a meal in the train’s restaurant,
while Carol stays alone in the carriage. Later the girls
leave the train and it crosses into Bulgaria. Suddenly a
lot of policemen come onto the train. Several people,
including Tom, have to leave the train and have their
bags inspected. When the police look in Tom’s bag
they find $200,000. Though Tom protests it’s not his
money, he ends up in prison. But he has plans. When
he gets out, he and another prisoner are going to go
to Australia, start again . . .
Mr Harris and the Night Train. Mr Harris is alone in a
carriage on the night train from Helsinki. After the
train stops at Otava at midnight, two young people
come into his carriage. They are arguing loudly, which
annoys Mr Harris, but they pay no attention to him.
The young man, Carl, has taken a diamond necklace
belonging to his sister’s rich husband, because he
needs money. His sister Elena, frightened of her
husband’s reaction, threatens Carl with a knife and
then stabs him. Mr
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Harris, horrified, runs to get the guard, but when they
return the carriage is empty. When Mr Harris begins
to tell the story, the guard tells him that Elena di
Saronelli killed her brother on the train eighty years
ago near here, and then jumped from the train and
killed herself. The ghosts often return to the night
train in September. Mr Harris goes on with his holiday
in Finland – but he returns to Helsinki by bus.
Background to the story
Trains have been used to great effect as a setting
for novels and films. Complete strangers come
together in random combinations, spend a short or
a long time together, and part. The intimacy of the
train compartment can encourage the sharing of
confidences – or it can drive lovers or families to
screaming point. Strangers on a train and Murder on
the Orient Express are two films that use the meeting
of strangers on a train as their starting points.
Before Reading
Here are some ways to help your students approach
the story:
1 Give students the title of the book and show
them the picture on the cover. Ask them to try and
guess what kind of the story it is.
2 Give students a copy of the text on the back
cover of the book, and of the story introduction
on the first page. When they have read the texts,
ask them a few questions about the story, or use
the Before Reading Activities in the back of each
Bookworm.
3 Use the pre-reading activity in this worksheet.
4 If there is a recording of this title, play the first few
pages and stop at an interesting point.
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 STAGE

1 One-Way Ticket – Short Stories

Pre-reading activity

Word search

R P A S S P O R T L L

E P O D N I L Q B M E

S T A T I O N Y P C A

T R A I N D U F L H V

A B L C A R R I A G E

U O Q K Y F S L T U R

R A S E A T M U F A G

A T H T D A D O O R W

N C O R R I D O R D I
T H O L I D A Y M Z O

To the teacher

Aim: To introduce key vocabulary

many words as possible.
Time: 5–10 minutes
Key: passport, station, train, carriage, seat, door,
Organization: Give one copy of the word search to
corridor, holiday, restaurant, boat, ticket, platform,
each student or put the word search on an overhead
guard, leave.
projector. Give the students five minutes to find as

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 STAGE
One-Way Ticket – Short Stories
1 While reading activity
How does it end?
To the teacher
Where: At the break on page 20 in the story South
for the Winter.
Aim: To analyze plot and speculate about possible
development and conclusion of plot
Time: 10–15 minutes
Organization: Give a copy of the worksheet to each
student or show it on an overhead projector. Ask
a Tom travels to Sofia and goes
to the Hotel Marmara. When
he looks in his bag he finds a
lot
of money – $200,000. He waits
for the girls for a week, but they
never come. Tom decides to buy
a boat with the money and go
to the Greek islands for the
winter.
b Tom goes to Sofia and Melanie
and Carol meet him there. They
all go to dinner and eat and drink
a lot. Suddenly the two girls are
not there. Tom has to pay for the
meal but he’s got no money. He
works in the restaurant to pay for
the meal, and then he gets a job
there. He stays in Sofia for the
winter.
c The train stops in Bulgaria and
some policemen come onto the
train. Tom and some other people
have to get off with their bags.
A policeman looks in Tom’s bag
and finds $200,000. The money
doesn’t belong to Tom, but the
police don’t believe him. Tom has
to go to prison.
students in pairs or groups to read and discuss the
possible conclusions to the story and to choose the
one they think most likely.
Ask groups to give their choices with reasons. Do
not confirm any guesses or tell students whether
they have chosen the right one – their reading will tell
them that.
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 STAGE
One-Way Ticket – Short Stories
1 After reading activity

Order the events

Mr Harris and the Night Train

EVENT ORDER
a Mr Harris runs to get the guard.
b Mr Harris catches the night train from Helsinki.
c A young man and a young woman come into the carriage.
d He returns to Helsinki by bus.
e The guard and Mr Harris find nobody in the carriage.
f They argue loudly about a diamond necklace.
g The guard tells Mr Harris about the ghosts.
h He has dinner and reads until midnight.
i She kills Carl with the knife.
j Mr Harris stays in Finland for two weeks.
k Elena takes out a knife.

The Girl with Green Eyes

EVENT ORDER
a The tall man looks at Julie, and she looks into his eyes.
b The tall man leaves the carriage.
c Bill wants to stop the train.
d Three people get on the train in Plymouth.
e Bill and the man in the brown hat begin to tell each other stories.
f The man in the brown hat tells Bill, ‘Forget about Julie.’
g The guard looks at the tickets. The tall man’s ticket is to Plymouth.
h Bill looks for Julie, but she isn’t in the carriage.
i Bill and the man in the brown hat go to the restaurant.
j Julie is bored, and looks at the tall man’s newspaper.

To the teacher

Aim: To revise, summarize and remember what has

the correct order to make a summary of the story.
been read
They may refer to the book while doing this. Check
Time: 15–20 minutes
that they all have the correct order. As an extension,
Organization: Give each student a copy of the
students can retell the story in their groups.
list of summary sentences for The Girl with Green
Key: Mr Harris and the Night Train 1b, 2h, 3c, 4f, 5k,
Eyes and later for Mr Harris and the Night Train. In
6i, 7a, 8e, 9g, 10j, 11d; The Girl with Green Eyes: 1e,
small groups, students number the sentences in 2j, 3a, 4g, 5i, 6b, 7d, 8h, 9c, 10f.

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