Cut to the Chase

by Ray Scott

  They strolled up the line in the Stourbridge direction with the hammers over their shoulders. They heard a train hoot behind and they moved over to the right hand track and raised their arms in acknowledgement. The train driver gave a short double toot in response and thundered past.

  Wallace paused at one point, as a goods train approached in the opposite direction heading for Kidderminster. One of the wooden blocks supporting the track in the cradles had come adrift. He re-inserted it and hammered it into position.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’

  ‘Acting the part,’ Wallace answered coldly. ‘Not just for our benefit but for his.’ He jerked his thumb at the oncoming goods train, and changed it into a wave. The driver gave a short blast in response and waved as the train went past.

  The wooden block was slotted back into position easily and they walked on slowly. As they approached the Junction station they stopped and discussed what to do. Their disguises seemed adequate, not because of any dressing up; but because they were doing what anyone would expect them to do, namely, attending to track maintenance. Wallace always remembered John Buchan’s character, Richard Hannay, when on the run from the law and German spies in Scotland he acted the part of a road-mender. The theory was, if you assumed a disguise then also act the part. Similarly in their case, if acting as plate layers then be plate layers. Yet, walking through the Junction station could present problems, the plate layers of this particular gang would be well known to station staff.

  After some discussion, they came to a decision.

  ‘OK, we’ll have to walk through,’ said McKay. ‘It’s going to look even more suspicious if we start clambering down the embankment in full view of early morning commuters, and then through the station car park carrying sledgehammers.’

  They strolled along the track and passed the end of the platform. The sun was still low in the sky so the visibility was not over bright, but there was pleasant warmth when the sun’s rays landed on them. McKay made to walk up the sloping ramp of the platform but Wallace shook his head.

  ‘We’re supposed to be track men looking at the track, from what I can remember of Flinders Street Station the track is in a slightly worse state within stations than anywhere else, mainly because everyone knows trains are moving through them at slow speed or else they stop there.’

  A porter saw them and moved over to the edge of the platform, he was looking puzzled and cocked his head on one side.

  ‘Where’s Jack?’

  ‘On his way,’ Wallace answered, waving his arm vaguely behind them. ‘We were on early this morning, there’s trouble with the points further back.’

  ‘Oh! First we’ve heard of it.’

  ‘We had a call early this morning, been some vandalism there as well, kids chucking bricks at the signal light. Tell Jack we’ll be up there when he comes through, will you?’

  ‘Yeah…all right.’

  They continued on their way, hammers over their shoulders. For good measure, Wallace hammered in another loose block near the far end of the platform. There were a few passengers around while the Town Flyer was standing at the far platform and was preparing to move out. Wallace tried to read the headlines of some of the newspapers held by the waiting passengers but could see nothing of interest, nothing that related to any Australian fugitives.

  ‘That porter is still looking at us.’

  Wallace paused from hammering in the latest wooden block and looked up, sure enough he was. He gave him a wave and gave a last defiant bang at the wooden block, it reluctantly went in. The porter waved back, shrugged and then began pushing a trolley along the platform.

  ‘Think we’re all right?’

  ‘For the moment,’ McKay answered. ‘Until something crops up that will re-arouse his suspicions. All it needs is for our friend Jack to come rampaging up the track reporting that the plate layers shed has been broken into and two hammers are missing.’

  They continued up the track until the Junction station was well behind them and reached a point where the track forked.

  ‘Which way?’

  There was a siren blast behind them, there was a train approaching from the rear, from the junction. It looked like another goods train. They raised their arms in the usual salute, and then heard a banging noise as the points changed, directing the oncoming train onto the right hand fork. That made up their minds; the track to the right went up an incline.

  The train came towards them and then eased off prior to traversing the points. It swung onto the right hand fork travelling slowly. As the locomotive negotiated the fork it swung around a right hand bend and they lost sight of it and, more important, the occupants of the locomotive lost sight of McKay and Wallace. If there was a guards van, they couldn’t see the bogus plate layers either.

  ‘Sling your hammer onto the other tracks,’ Wallace panted. ‘Then if anyone finds them they’ll think we headed that way.’

  They did so; the hammers described parabolas as they went through the air and landed on the left hand fork tracks. Then they both grasped handles on the sides of passing trucks and hauled themselves aboard.

  ‘Get under the tarpaulins if you can…pull your finger out!’ snapped McKay.

  As the train slowly gathered speed they secreted themselves under the tarpaulin covers, they weren’t too sure where they were going but Wallace’s guess was that the train was heading for Birmingham. Nevertheless, they were prepared to allow the train to take them wherever it willed.

  The journey was uneventful as far as the outer suburbs of Birmingham, the train lumbered up the incline from Stourbridge until it reached the Blackheath tunnel, a long black hole which had similarities to the Blisworth and Braunston tunnels on the canal system. After it emerged from the other end it began to pick up speed as they passed through a station named Blackheath & Rowley Regis, clearly the track flattened out, and the train clattered its way through more of the industrial Midlands.

  McKay took the opportunity to get some sleep and Wallace was left to his own thoughts. He checked to see that the two computer flash drives were still in his shirt pocket, they were. He had the fear that he may have lost them or that McKay may have decided Wallace was not to be trusted and had taken them while he slept. Why he entertained these doubts about McKay’s loyalties at that time he really didn’t know, if McKay had been intending to cast him to the wolves and abandon him he could have done so long ago. In view of recent events it wasn’t altogether surprising that Wallace suffered from paranoia.

  Whether the arrival of this computer data at the Australian High Commission would alleviate Wallace’s problems he wasn’t sure, he still had a murder charge hanging over his head, but if they were likely to do harm to Kalim that was good enough for Wallace.

  McKay awoke shortly after the train had emerged from the tunnel, it was stifling hot under the tarpaulin and they clambered onto the top of the open truck. The sun was shining and it was not unpleasant. It occurred to Wallace that they could be easily seen from passing signal boxes but nobody appeared to give them a second glance. It was when the train reached Smethwick West that Wallace tensed. The train passed under a road bridge as the line curved to the right and went down a slight incline. As they went under the bridge he saw three heads peering over the parapet. McKay saw them at the same time.

  ‘Christ! The bastards are on to us!’

  ‘Who? The police?’

  ‘Police my arse! That was bloody Rivera.’

  They could see signs of activity and somebody using a mobile telephone as the train passed under the bridge and emerged on the other side.

  ‘Christ…I must be getting old and careless,’ lamented McKay. ‘The bastards have traced our progress right from that blasted plate layers hut, we even left the hammers on the track to show them where we’d been.’

  ‘How could they know?’

  ‘They’ve got tongues in their head, they must have asked the station staff at Stourbridge Junction, remember that porter? They were proba
bly posing as police. People will always recall facts when confronted by the law.’

  The train continued swinging to the right and they lost sight of the bridge.

  ‘We’ve got to get off; we’re joining another track further on, we’ll get off there.’

  ‘Agreed, we’ll stay on until the train reaches the other main line and then jump. OK?’

  ‘OK.’ Wallace said.

  ‘There’s a canal down there as well. Head down the bank for that when you get off and I’ll meet you further on. Right?’

  The train swung around the right handed bend, as the embankment eased down on the left hand side of the track the other track that that the train was joining came into sight. The train clattered over the points, Wallace looked to the left as it moved onto the other tracks, the land fell away and down in the draw lay the canal, probably the one Wallace had used on the way out. He looked back and could see two men running down the bank behind the train and then they disappeared, it didn’t take long to work out what they were at. Clearly it was time to go, if they boarded the end of the train and worked their way forward then McKay and Wallace were in trouble, they could only move forward as far as the locomotive and then Kalim’s men would be onto them. All they had to do was work their way systematically up the train from truck to truck.

  Wallace’s calm astonished him, it was as though his system had been stimulated so much that he was immune to panic. As the train began to pick up speed he cast himself off and began to run down the bank towards the canal, followed by McKay. Wallace tripped and fell, but had the presence of mind to bend forward and roll and finally stopped when he reached a small bush. He gasped with pain as a branch jabbed into his ribs, then quickly crawled around so that the bush was between him and the moving train that was now well above them.

  Wallace lay doggo, and as the rear of the train clacked past saw a man on the last truck but one, just hopping onto the next one. He clambered onto the tarpaulin and then Wallace saw his companion who was a truck behind him, it could have been Fino. That was all he saw as the train moved on. There was no guards van on the train, like Australia these had been discontinued when vacuum braked trucks were introduced.

  Wallace and McKay watched it go, waiting to see if their two followers jumped off, if they did they saw no sign of them. Wallace looked back up the canal, it was tranquil.

  He descended to the tow path and began to move cautiously in the Birmingham direction, the further on he managed to move the better. McKay followed him down and joined him.

  ‘How much money have we got?’

  They sat down under a bush on the cutting bank, explored their pockets and had a further audit. McKay had done most of the purchasing since their flight from the house – wherever it had been – was it that place called Albrighton? -and Wallace’s own cash was virtually intact, his cache of £30 had dropped marginally to £25. McKay had less.

  They started walking again, casting glances behind them to see whether Kalim and Rivera and their men were around.

  After walking for about half an hour they saw a bridge ahead crossing the canal, they could see pinheads on it – heads peering over the parapet. They headed for the nearest bush, praying that they had not been seen. It could have been small boys or idlers chewing the cud, or it could have been their pursuers after having abandoned the train further ahead. They decided to stay put.

  It was just as well that they did. They must have been there for a few hours, but nevertheless alert, though taking it in turns to take a nap. The sun sank lower in the sky and the shadows began to lengthen. As dusk began to gather they emerged from the bush and headed up the bank back to the railway.

  They crossed the track and headed for another line of bushes that were on the next slope up to the roadway, and clambered under those. Wallace had barely settled himself into their new haven when McKay gave a warning hiss, and he saw shadowy figures walking along the canal bank far below. They were carrying torches and were playing the beams along the bank. They paused and investigated the bush where Wallace and McKay had been for much of the day. Then Wallace saw another man with a torch moving along at a higher level alongside the railway line.

  ‘How many did we see on that bridge, when we were still on the train?’

  ‘Three, I reckon,’ McKay answered. ‘So this makes four which probably accounts for all of them, unless they’ve called up reinforcements.’

  The torch beam flashed all over the rails and up the bank, it hit the bush where they were hiding but they lay low and then it passed further on. Wallace heard a curse from someone and a sulky response and the torch went out.

  ‘You tell zem we are comin’…eh? You cretin!’

  The cretin responded with some spirit, and used a descriptive term that cast some doubts upon his companion’s sexuality and parentage. They continued on up the track, still bickering, while their colleagues down below moved in the same direction.

  ‘Stay put,’ hissed McKay. ‘Sound carries at night.’

  It was past midnight when they decided to move, there had been no further signs of activity, but they decided that the best way to go was down, the area where the others had already searched. They had probably deemed it likely their quarry would head for the road and civilisation, so Wallace and McKay decided to head for the bridge over the canal and cross it onto the other bank. Accordingly they slipped down the bank, crossed the railway and then down to the canal. If the worst came to the worst Wallace decided he could immerse himself in the canal, he had no doubts about his ability to swim across it if necessary, though he wasn’t sure about McKay.

  It took over half an hour to reach the bridge, Wallace crossed over it after a long look around, and walked along the opposite bank, McKay had hesitated, then he decided to follow. There was a tow path there and they started walking. Wallace saw a flash of light on the other side of the canal, it could have been Rivera and company but they presented no problem as yet.

  After another half hour or so Wallace became aware of some dark smudges ahead, they were on the water and as they approached he saw they were canal boats.

  ‘I suggest we stay here awhile,’ said McKay. ‘Boats mean people and people mean some degree of protection. They might think twice before starting a fracas here, what do you think?’

  ‘Yes, I reckon,’ Wallace answered shortly, he was dog tired and needed sleep. He curled up in a bush and closed his eyes.

  It was still dark when he woke feeling as raw as hell and very cold but nevertheless refreshed. There was no sign of activity from the boats; they were clearly pleasure craft moored for the night. McKay was further along the tow path; Wallace thought he had been emptying his bladder behind a bush. Wallace continued walking and joined him, leaving the boats behind then they came to another bridge, a road bridge this time. Wallace decided to take the chance, clambered up and reached the road, crossing over the canal but keeping a watchful eye open. He signalled to McKay and he followed over the bridge, they descended the other side and found another collection of canal barges, this time they looked like commercial craft.

  Then Wallace looked upwards and gave a gasp of horror. He nudged McKay and he cursed angrily. There were three men up there, as yet they hadn’t spotted Wallace and McKay in the gloom, but it wouldn’t be long before the sun came up. Then Wallace realised where he was. He was near to the pub where he had joined the brawl that had erupted around Fred Hackett and his friend Bert.

  ‘Good Grief!’ Wallace crawled down the bank towards the moored craft; there was sufficient light now to pick out detail on the moored craft. The second one he came to had “Thomas Jeavons & Co” emblazoned on its side.

  ‘Come on!’ he hissed, and cautiously climbed onto the decking.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Here…but slowly, don’t rock the boat.’

  McKay hesitated, then slowly climbed aboard, taking care not to rock the craft too much. Wallace crawled around to the cabin door and slowly crawled in, McKay followed. Wallace heard
the sound of stirring within. He cast a glance around the canal banks, in the gloom he couldn’t see any sign of their pursuers, but didn’t think they were far away. He motioned to McKay to keep quiet and elbowed his way to the door to the cabin.

  ‘Fred!’ he whispered hoarsely and then louder. ‘Fred!’

  There was some movement within, and he called again, knocking on the door with his knuckles.

  ‘Fred!’

  The door opened slowly and Fred Hackett peered through the crack, he was holding a heavy screwdriver.

  ‘Fred! It’s me,’ Wallace suddenly realised he had never given Fred his name and so couldn’t identify himself. ‘Fred, remember the fight at the pub up above?’

  Fred Hackett pulled the door wide open, in the heavy gloom Wallace could just make out that he was wearing trousers, and was stripped to the waist.

  ‘What am yo’ a doin’ ’ere?’

  ‘We need help, Fred, can we come in? There’s two of us.’

  Chapter 26

  Fred let them into his cabin; there wasn’t much room to move about. Being the man he was he didn’t waste time initially asking questions, he closed the door. As he did so he peered through the narrow ports in the cabin, and indicated with his thumb.

  ‘Who’s them blowks out theer?’

  ‘They’re looking for us – and they’re not nice to know.’

  ‘Yo’d best tell me what this is about…’ Fred turned and filled up a kettle, which he placed on the stove. ‘Now, whassup?’

  Wallace realised he would have to come clean with Fred Hackett. He had backed Wallace up when he wanted to get out of the pub when they had met before, and though curious in the subsequent meeting on the lock, had forbore from pestering with questions. Wallace looked at McKay, but he shrugged, he hadn’t met Fred Hackett before so he was leaving it up to Wallace.