The elderly woman was reading The Blind Assassin. The younger man was making a series of phone calls.

The two activities were incompatible on a train travelling to London on a sunny weekday morning.

Something, or someone, was going to have to give. My money was on the elderly woman, although she was not the only one in the carriage to find it hard to do what she was trying to do, due to the noisy level of the younger man's inane phone conversations.

"Mark, John," barked the young man, omitting the verbs from his speech to make himself sound harder. "Still on for tomorrow. . . great. Tomorrow then . . . bye."

The old lady looked up from her book and glared at him. She was obviously finding it impossible to get to grips with the complex plot of Margaret Atwood's Booker Prize winner with half a phone conversation being yelped out from the seat opposite her. But the young man ignored her icy stare and began dialling again.

"Terry, John," he said. "Right . . . I've got a job on. It's a 150 quid a day for two days. Pick up the car from Haywards Heath Thursday morning, drive us to Manchester. Overnight in a luxury hotel and back late Friday. How are you fixed?"

Terry, it seemed, was fixed all right - that is to say appropriately fixed to be able to do the job. "Great. Sorted then. I won't go into the details now. Give Amanda a call and she'll fill you in with all you need to know. Thursday then. Bye."

The woman opposite put down her book, looked John in the eye and very slowly - so as to deliberately demonstrate to him that she had not been able to take in any of the last two pages of the book that she had been reading, because his phone calls were intruding on her thinking space - she turned the pages backwards and then picked the book up and began re-reading them.

Which gave John the chance to call Amanda. "Amanda, John," he said. "Just spoken to Terry. He's fine for Thursday and Friday. Should be calling you later for all the details . . . Great. Thanks . . . Yep, I'm on my way now . . . See you later, babe!"

"Excuse me," said the elderly woman, sitting opposite John. "Would you mind going into the corridor to make your phone calls. I'm trying to read my book."

"I'm not stopping you Grandma," replied John. "Go ahead and read it." He picked up the phone and started to dial again. But 'Grandma hadn't finished with the young whippersnapper yet.

"Actually," she said. "You are stopping me. It's virtually impossible to take in anything I'm reading when someone is shouting down a mobile telephone. I don't believe I'm the only one here who is finding your conduct irritating."

John looked around the carriage, daring anyone else to challenge him and everyone else buried their heads in their papers, pretending not to have heard either the above conversation or any of John's previous phone calls.

"No one else seems bothered, Gran," said John and began dialling again.

"Terry, me again. Spoken to Amanda. She's in the office so give her a call now."

That was it, the pointlessness of the conversation was the final straw and having failed to elicit support from the rest of the carriage in her battle with the mobile menace, the old lady decided to take him on single-handedly.

She did as he had suggested and went ahead with reading her book - out loud.

"The room is small and close and dim, with one window, open a few inches, the blind pulled most of the way down, white net curtains sloped to either side."

She read impeccably and at such a level that it was impossible for anyone trying to make a phone call in the immediate vicinity to hear themselves talk.

"The afternoon sun is hitting the blind, turning it golden. The air smells of dry rot, but also of soap......"