The Train to Impossible Places

by P. G. Bell

  “And there you are, at last,” she said, holding the object up to the light. She shook it and gave a grunt of satisfaction.

  It was a snow globe: a glass sphere, about the size of a tennis ball, set on a base of ceramic. Inside the sphere was a small, bright green ceramic frog. Multicolored flakes of glitter swirled around it, and Crepuscula held it to her face, so close that her breath fogged the glass.

  “You’d better be worth all the trouble I’ve been to.” She tapped a fingernail against the glass. “At least you look rather fetching. If all else fails, I can keep you on my mantelpiece. A nice little souvenir to see me through my twilight years.”

  She seemed to have forgotten Suzy altogether, and Suzy had to cough, politely, before she looked up again.

  “Could you sign for it, please?”

  Crepuscula rolled her eyes, but snatched the form from her. “Pen?” she demanded.

  Suzy froze. She hadn’t even thought about needing a pen. She patted her bathrobe pockets, but it was just for show. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Do you have one?”

  Crepuscula rocked forward on her toes, bringing her face almost level with Suzy’s.

  “Standards are slipping,” she said. Then, replacing the snow globe in its box, she pivoted on her cane and stamped away into the depths of the gatehouse. “Wait here,” she called back. Suzy watched her go, and got her first view of the tower’s interior. To her surprise, it wasn’t the darkened fortress she had expected. Instead of jet-black stonework, the walls were white and featureless. The floor looked like a chess board, all black and white squares, and a crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling, giving out a clear, cold light.

  Crepuscula set the box down on a small wooden table in the center of the room before retreating through an inner doorway and out of sight, muttering under her breath. It might have been a trick of the light, but the shadows in the room seemed to bend toward her as she went.

  Suzy waited, hugging herself against the cold. There was still no sign of movement from the train, but she gave a thumbs-up in the direction of the sorting carriage, in case Wilmot could see her. She doubted it, though—the wind was getting stronger, and the gusts of ice it carried were getting thicker. They hit the floor with a noise like distant wind chimes. The gargoyle still stared down at her from above, its teeth almost close enough to touch.

  She shivered and stepped inside the doorway, out of the wind.

  “Help me!”

  Suzy looked around in surprise. It was a boy’s voice, small and faint, and she hurried back to the door, thinking it must have come from the direction of the train. But before she had reached the threshold, it came again.

  “Over here! Quick! Please, help me!”

  The skin on her arms began to prickle. The voice was coming from somewhere inside the room, but there was nobody in sight. She was quite alone.

  “Hello?” she whispered.

  “Here! Over here!”

  She picked her way inside, letting the voice guide her until she reached the table. “Where are you?”

  “Where do you think? I’m in the box.”

  She looked around again, wary of a trick, but as impossible as it was, the voice certainly seemed to be coming from the box. She opened the lid. There was nothing inside except the snow globe, the ceramic frog sitting exactly as she had last seen it. She picked up the globe and gave it an experimental shake.

  “Oi! How is that helping?”

  The voice certainly seemed to be coming from the snow globe, but the frog remained motionless. Then, as Suzy looked in at it, it blinked.

  “You’re alive!” she exclaimed.

  “Yes, alive and trapped in here.” The frog spoke without moving its lips. “Please don’t let her take me. She’s evil!”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What do you mean, ‘What do you mean?’ The Lady Crepuscula put a curse on me! She turned me into this snow globe, and now she wants to take me prisoner!”

  “Wait, you mean you’re a person?” said Suzy.

  “Of course I am. How many snow globes do you know that can talk?”

  “Sorry,” she said. “I’m new here.” She gave a worried glance at the door through which Crepuscula had disappeared. “What should I do?”

  “Take me with you,” said the frog.

  “I don’t know…,” said Suzy. She could hear the distant sound of Crepuscula’s cane against the floor tiles. It was getting closer.

  “Please!” whispered the frog. “It’s more important than you know. The fate of all the Impossible Places depends on it.”

  Suzy’s mind raced. This was all happening too quickly. But she remembered Crepuscula’s sneer as she waved her cane above her head, the threat to turn her to dust, and she stuffed the snow globe into her pocket, as if by instinct.

  “Hurry!” the frog squeaked.

  “Shhh!” hissed Suzy. Her mind was still racing, but it had at last chosen a direction. She snapped the lid of the box shut and ran back to the open courtyard doorway, her heart drumming a painful rhythm in her chest. The ice storm was worsening, and she could barely see the train anymore.

  She turned back to face the room and leaned against the wall, trying to keep the fear from her face as Crepuscula hobbled back toward them.

  “I should deduct another minute from you for making me fetch this,” she said, flourishing a quill pen fashioned from what looked to Suzy like an enormous black peacock feather. “But frankly you’re barely worth the raising of my wand, and I have more important matters to attend to. Consider yourself lucky.” She unfolded the delivery form, stabbed at it with the quill, and thrust it back in Suzy’s face. “Now get out of my sight.”

  Suzy took the form, and ran.

  The wind hit her sideways, cutting through her clothes as though they were damp paper. She leaned into it, hurrying onward with her eyes half-shut, clamping her postie’s hat to her scalp as ice crystals peppered her face and hands, every one of them a cold, sharp sting. It was like walking into television static, and after just a few yards she realized she had lost sight of the train.

  Don’t panic, she told herself. You know it’s in front of you. Just keep going and you’ll reach it.

  But it was hard not to panic with the guilty secret of the snow globe bumping against her thigh. She was sure the lump in her pocket stood out a mile. She glanced back, expecting to see Crepuscula watching her from the gatehouse, but the doors were already shut. She breathed a sigh of relief and pressed on toward the train.

  Then she realized what she had seen and stopped. Very slowly, her body shaking with fear now, rather than cold, she turned back to look at the gatehouse.

  The gargoyle was looking at her. Its head had been lowered, its eyes fixed on the spot in front of the doors. Now they were fixed on her. She stumbled backward, not daring to look away, and its head moved with her, keeping her in sight.

  Her lungs burned, and she only realized she had been holding her breath when her back collided with something cold and hard, and she let out a scream of surprise.

  She whipped around, ready to jump away from whatever danger she had unwittingly walked into. The figure of a knight loomed over her, its mouth open in a silent scream.

  She put her head down and ran, not thinking where she was going, just wanting to get away. Away from that thing over the doors, away from these awful statues with their twisted faces, and away from the cruel woman who collected people and years like trinkets.

  “When we reach the train, don’t tell them about me,” said the frog, its voice muffled by her pocket. “If they know you have me, they’ll send me back.”

  “They wouldn’t do that,” she protested.

  “They won’t have any choice. It’s their job.”

  She gritted her teeth as she felt everything spiraling out of control. How had it all gone so wrong, so quickly? But there was no time to stop and think, and she ran on until she saw the dark shape of the train ahead of her and, piercing the darkness like a la
nce, the welcome glow of a lantern.

  “Ahoy, down there!” came Stonker’s voice. “Hurry up, Postmaster. I want to put this blasted place behind us.”

  Suzy skidded to a breathless halt. She must have lost her way in her panic, because she was at the wrong end of the train—she was standing in front of the locomotive, not in the back, where the sorting car was. The spotlight of Stonker’s lantern found her.

  “Good grief! You again.”

  “Quick!” she called. “We have to get out of here.”

  “I’m going nowhere with a stowaway on board,” said Stonker. “What are you doing here?”

  Suzy didn’t wait to explain, but ran to the narrow ladder that hung down from the front end of the gangway on which Stonker stood. It was like a fire escape—she had to jump for it, but as she caught the bottom rung, the ladder folded down to touch the ground. She scrambled up it until she was face-to-face with the astonished troll.

  “I’m working,” she gasped, plucking her deputy’s badge from the front of her bathrobe and holding it out like a shield.

  Stonker gave it a long, black look. “I think I’ll be having words with our young Postmaster,” he said.

  “Fine!” she said. “But not here.”

  She picked Stonker up by his collar and, ignoring his protestations, ran with him along the gangway to the cab’s open front door, where she bundled him inside. Before she followed him in, she glanced back across the courtyard, and immediately wished she hadn’t.

  Crepuscula was just visible silhouetted between the open gatehouse doors, the light from her living room casting her shadow across the flagstones. She made no move toward the train, and for a tantalizing second, Suzy thought she might let them go.

  Until the old woman raised her hand toward them, and her shadow began to move. It stretched out from her across the courtyard, sliding like a snake between the statues. Suzy watched, horrified, as it began to pull itself hand over hand toward the train.

  6

  A FIRST-CLASS ESCAPE

  Suzy leaped into the cab and slammed the door behind her, only to find herself face-to-snout with Ursel, who reared up and bared her fangs.

  “Young lady!” Stonker said, dusting himself down. “I have never been handled in such a fashion. And on my own locomotive! Why, the indignity of it.”

  “I’ll apologize all you want once we’re out of here,” Suzy said, wondering whether she should be more scared of Crepuscula’s creeping shadow or Ursel’s dagger-like claws. “Just, please, hurry!”

  “We’re not going anywhere until you give a full account of yourself,” he said. Ursel growled in agreement.

  Suzy leaned past Ursel to argue with him and got her first view of the inside of the cab. It looked like a neat little sitting room, complete with floral wallpaper, a battered old armchair, and even a small bookcase in one corner. Another door was set into the rear wall, with a window on either side through which she had a clear view of the tender, which was coupled immediately behind the cab. Stonker and Ursel were both facing her, so she was the only one to see the long, skeletal fingers of the shadow creep slowly up the tender’s side. She flinched, but clamped her mouth shut. She was determined not to cry out. If the others saw it, they would know something was wrong, and she would have to give up her secret.

  But the hand was growing, its fingers as long as tree branches, and within a few seconds it had blotted out everything outside the rear windows. She had to act, before panic overtook her.

  “We’re still half an hour late,” she said, trying to keep the tremor from her voice. “Maybe Wilmot’s right.”

  Stonker narrowed his eyes at her. “Right about what?”

  With a tremendous effort of willpower, Suzy leaned against the door and sighed. “Oh, nothing. He just told me the Impossible Postal Express isn’t as fast as it used to be, that’s all.” She saw the flash of anger in Stonker’s eyes. She would probably feel guilty about this later, she reflected, but right now she needed that anger. “I’m sure it’s not your fault,” she went on. “I mean, this train does look pretty old, after all.”

  “Old.” The tips of Stonker’s ears had turned red. “Old!”

  “It’s fine,” said Suzy. “I’m sure you’re doing your best.”

  She caught her breath as the shadow started to seep in under the back door, spreading like spilled ink.

  “Here’s my best, young lady.”

  Stonker threw a large red lever, and the locomotive jumped forward. Suzy was thrown to the floor, but looked up just in time to see the shadow sucked back out of sight beneath the door. She had a glimpse of the courtyard and the distant figure of Crepuscula beyond it through the window, before the whole world tipped on its side, and the train plunged over the edge of the tower. There was another momentary sense of vertigo, which was only made worse as she struggled to her feet and looked out the front window. The rails stretched down the tower to the desert, which raced closer as the train rocketed down, down, down, faster than free fall.

  Stonker laughed in triumph and threw himself at the mass of brass pipes, valves, and levers that covered most of the front wall. They twisted around a wrought iron hearth, in which a dazzling blue fire burned. A mantelpiece stood above it, supporting a carriage clock, a telephone like the one on Wilmot’s desk, and what looked like an old-fashioned flip-page calendar in a polished wooden frame.

  Behind her, meanwhile, Ursel was reaching into an iron hatch she had opened in the rear wall and was pulling out … bananas?

  Yes, bunches of bananas, but instead of eating them, she was throwing them onto the fire, where they fizzed and ignited in showers of blue sparks.

  “Is this fast enough for you, m’dear?” said Stonker, flashing Suzy a triumphant smile as she clung to the nearest windowsill. She only half heard him—she was more concerned by the wall of desert that was still rushing toward them at incredible speed. She could see the rails ahead of them; they performed a ninety-degree turn at the foot of the tower and stretched off across the sands again. But the train could never hope to make the turn, could it? Their momentum was too great.

  Momentum equals mass times velocity, she thought, as a detached part of her mind set about reviewing the details of her impending death. In other words, the heavier you are, and the faster you’re going, the longer it takes to change direction. She had no idea what the train’s mass was, but it was big. And their velocity? Fast. They would crash headfirst into the desert with the speed of a rocket. There would be nothing left of them.

  “Ready…” Stonker poised himself at the controls, his fingers hovering over a large dial labeled THIS WAY UP. The fireplace belched more flames, painting the cab an unnatural hue. The sand rushed up to meet them. Suzy sank to the floor and hugged herself.

  Stonker turned the dial a second before disaster struck, and Suzy’s stomach did a funny little flip. She picked herself up and looked back out the windows. Sure enough, they were racing along the ground at the same terrific speed, the shadow of the tower now receding behind them.

  “Voilà!” said Stonker. “That’s given us a bit of a kick. An angry dragon couldn’t catch us now.”

  Suzy had no idea how fast an angry dragon could be, but she was tempted to believe him. The whole world was a blur, and the tower was already a tall pencil of shadow on the horizon.

  Before she could wonder at their speed any further, the phone rang. Without being asked, Ursel reached out and plucked the receiver from the cradle. “Growlf?” she said, raising it to her ear. She nodded, then extended the receiver to Suzy. “Urf.”

  “For me?” said Suzy in confusion.

  “That’ll be the Postmaster,” said Stonker. “Do please thank him for his wise counsel. I don’t know how we’d cope without him.” He busied himself with the controls again.

  Suzy put the phone to her ear. “Hello?”

  “Postal Operative Suzy!” Wilmot sounded breathless. “Thank goodness! I was afraid we’d left you behind. I don’t want to go down in
history as the Postmaster who lost his entire staff on their very first delivery.”

  “You won’t,” she said, wondering if he would ever know just how close he had come.

  “Did you deliver the parcel?” he asked. “Did you get the signature?”

  Suzy patted the bulging pocket of her bathrobe and felt a fresh twinge of anxiety. “Well, yes, I did, but—”

  “Splendid! In that case, I congratulate you on a successful delivery. I’m sure it will be the first of many.”

  “I don’t know if it was really successful,” she said, twisting the phone cord around her fingers. She felt trapped and guilty. She had stolen the snow globe and broken her vow on her very first delivery. But the snow globe had asked to be stolen, and if it was being delivered against its will, it was hardly a crime, was it? At the very worst, it was a little crime, to prevent a bigger, much worse one. Probably. All she was sure of was that she couldn’t have left the frog with Lady Crepuscula. Nobody deserved that.

  “Not successful?” A note of caution crept back into Wilmot’s voice.

  “Lady Crepuscula was still cross when we left,” said Suzy. “Very cross, actually.”

  There was a pregnant pause on the end of the line. “Do you think she’ll file a complaint?”

  Suzy pinched the bridge of her nose as she tried to figure out what to say. Surely Wilmot could help her—he was the Postmaster, he must know what to do in this sort of situation. But what if the frog was right? What if Wilmot was duty bound to return the package? Could she take the risk?

  “I think she might complain, yes,” she said at last.

  “Oh dear,” he sighed. “I’ve never had a complaint before. A black mark against our names and reputations.” He sighed again. “But I suppose it was inevitable. And you should still be very proud of yourself. You’re part of the team now.”

  “Great,” said Suzy, biting her lip against another stab of guilt. “What happens next?”

  “Ah yes, our next job. Let me check the itinerary…” She heard the shuffling of papers down the line. “It’s a collection, rather than a delivery, and—oh! It’s this lot.”