A Station In Life

by James Smiley

  Élise gasped in horror at my joke.

  “Oh, Horace, and I kept you waiting,” she apologised, “but I was so busy in the shop I did not notice how bad it has become. I fear I have spoiled all our plans. How shall we reach Widdlecombe if the trains are stopped? Who can ride safely in this snow? Do you think we can hire a private carriage?”

  “Alas, all the roads across the valley will be impassable by now,” I replied grimly.

  Surprisingly, Élise’s reaction to this news was a suppressed smile, and by her next remark I learned the provenance of her son’s shocking sense of humour.

  “Then we shall have Mr Maynard construct a sleigh,” she suggested.

  I frowned, believing that I had not illustrated our predicament with sufficient gravity.

  “Forgive me, Horace,” she apologised. “I should not make light of the situation, I know, but over the years I have learned that good humour denies misfortune its trophies. What do you suggest we do?”

  “We must pin our hopes upon the Mail train,” I declared.

  “The Mail train?” she hushed with intrigue.

  “Yes indeed, the Mail train,” I affirmed. “You see, no railwayman readily abandons the Queen’s mail, and so it is sure to come through. It will be late, of course, but I can use the telegraph to monitor its progress. The telegrapher in Blodcaster lives near the station and will doubtless stay at his post.”

  “Horace, how very clever of you. Then we must hope all the wires stay up long enough for our needs,” she applauded me.

  “I have good news even now,” I revealed. “A party of labourers is aboard the Mail equipped with shovels, and the locomotive is to be crewed by none other than Percival Hiscox and Morgan Jones.”

  “Is that good?” she asked, her exuberance suspended briefly.

  “Driver Hiscox and Fireman Jones make an invincible combination,” I ventured. “Indeed, am quite certain that we shall see Widdlecombe before nightfall. Ay, and in good spirits too, I’ll be bound.”

  The outlook thus delineated, Diggory rebuilt the fire in the Waiting room to warm his mother while I toured the station to check doors and extinguish lamps. After this I filled my overnight bag and donned my Norfolk jacket and favourite hat, a brown felt Derby, then returned downstairs to join my travelling companions. With the pair warming themselves at the hearth, now a glowing enclave of comfort in a world drained of colour, I visited the Telegraph room one last time to see if the Mail train was on its way. Perhaps because the wires were down, or I was now the only operator using the system, I could raise no reply. It was ironical to think how silent telegraph apparatus had once been my greatest joy. But no more, for now I needed its sorcery to cement a developing relationship. I returned glumly to the Waiting room and stared out of the window while Élise found her dreams in the flicker of blazing coals. Diggory, still full of Christmas expectations, had settled to a trance with his eyes upon Spook.

  Our growing melancholy was broken by a faint whistle, prolonged and defiant, piercing the fickle swirls outside. We awoke from our hibernation with a restrained, almost disbelieving countenance, then roused ourselves to investigate. If there was a train to be flagged down, however, Spook had no care, for he remained undisturbed by the fire while the rest of us braved the storm’s icy arcade.

  A flickering locomotive lamp, crowned by the golden aurora of an open fire-door, brought rays of hope to the domesday gloom of the moor and educed a protracted sigh from Élise. As Briggs emerged into sombre view with the flecked silhouette of an iron phantom, I instructed Diggory to gather our bags while I dragged Upshott’s mail sacks to the edge of the platform where they would be seen by the driver. As luck would have it the loop points were stuck in favour of the ‘down’ line, which meant that even though the Mail was an ‘up’ train we had no need to brave the giddying squalls of the footbridge. Warming us briefly as it crawled past, Briggs came to a halt with four vehicles in tow, each one a testament to Driver Hiscox’s determination to reach Giddiford junction. Along with the Mail van and Guard’s ‘birdcage’ he had entrained a water bowser, complete with stirrup pump, and a truck filled to capacity with coal, the whole ensemble contrived to service the locomotive come what may. So carpeted with snow was the train that it looked like an illustration chalked upon a blackboard.

  Presently Hiscox leaned from the footplate with a word of guidance.

  “There’s a stove aboard the Guard’s van,” he shouted, squinting quizzically through huge snowflakes.

  Élise took his advice readily and climbed aboard the train with her box of documents, followed by Diggory carrying my overnight bag and a sleepy puppy. Before joining them I helped the Guard stow the mailbags for the journey, tipping my hat to a handful of navvies who were slouched among the bags already aboard, then trudged my way along the platform to go aboard myself, each of my footfalls collapsing with a ‘crump’ in the deepening snow. I found my travelling companions huddled around the Guard’s pot-bellied stove drawing what little comfort they could, for melt-water had run down the chimney and dampened the coals. Indeed, the heat from the flames was so feeble that we looked to the Guard, Mr Hayward, for an explanation.

  “Yer’ve never seen an icicle like it,” he recounted with an insalubrious wheeze and phlegm laden cough. “It knocked the stove-pipe cover clean off as we came out of Splashgate tunnel.”

  Bent by another fit of coughing, Mr Hayward made for the window to wave his green flag to the driver. There was a pop of acknowledgement from Briggs’s whistle, a violent jolt from the couplings, and motion followed, but with compacted snow and ice trapped in the mechanisms beneath our feet the wagons rumbled like millstones. Though outwardly calm, in truth I feared derailment. The Guard, having heard the commotion before, returned to his corner seat and sank into it with the grunt of discarded bagpipes. I took a poker to the stove and attempted to stir more life into the flames but succeeded only in filling the van with damp, grey smoke. Having created the atmosphere of a Chinese laundry I decided to turn up my collar and observe progress from the veranda.

  The train was reluctant to advance even as we passed over Natter lane bridge, and our progress through Exmoor’s storm-sculpted landscape remained pitifully slow. I observed in awe a valley so deeply subsumed by swathes of white linen that all was obliterated by its undulations, even the main thoroughfares passing beneath the railway.

  Leaning further over the handrail I observed the line ahead, where it traversed Fallowfield common. Slightly elevated, the rails here had been swept clean by powdery gusts and a little more speed was possible, whereupon friction began to thaw the train’s axles. Yet even without accumulated snow to overcome, Briggs was prone to chatter occasionally as its wheels slipped, and whilst confident that Driver Hiscox would control the engine expertly over level rails I wondered how he would manage the steep descent beyond the common. Here lay the danger of us slithering all the way to the viaduct, for Nineteenth Century carriages had no connecting brakes and their momentum could coerce an engine forward against the driver’s will. Should this happen we would probably come to rest halfway across the viaduct, rocked by a howling crosswind, the engine ruined. Spending Christmas huddled aboard a footplate was not my idea of rapture.

  Eyes weeping, ears aching, and face chafed by icy squalls, I allowed myself one last attempt to gauge our progress before going inside. Looking out for the Upford road I could see no landmark bigger than a half-buried gate post in the honeycomb of white ridges that had once been hedgerows, all beyond being obliterated by the blizzard’s maculose twilight. Unsure that the road crossing was still to come I cast my eyes upwards into the frenzied cascade to see if I could find my bearings among Exmoor’s high tors, but nothing was visible beyond Briggs’s dense breath swirling wildly in all directions.

  The falling snow was both entrancing and surreal, the albino prairie that it created being punctured only by the slow passing of telegraph poles. I could see why Upshott had lost communications, for each pole had acquired a w
hite mane with its insulators seized by claws of ice. Wires that were not lying coiled and broken upon the ground remained aloft as knife blades honed to ghostly white powder. We were, it seemed, the last living souls at large in the world, mankind’s greatest works of civilisation erased with indifference. I shunned the maelstrom in favour of stillness and convivial company by returning to the cabin.

  While exchanging tales of gentler Christmases, a series of alarming knocks and bumps brought the train to a halt. Albeit it only a brief commotion, leaving in its wake nothing bar the crackle of snow against glass and the faint hiss of a locomotive at rest, it gagged us all with dread. Mr Hayward was the first to stir, he lowering a window to investigate. Bracing myself, I returned to the veranda to make my own observations.

  Leaning over the van’s icy handrail again I observed the cause of the stoppage. The impediment was Upford cutting. It was impassable. More than impassable, it was unrecognisable. So deeply banked with snow was its northern slope that it had been reduced to a furrow in the hillside. Personally I was convinced that we should now have to reverse the train to Upshott, yet the Mail van door swung open and out spilled eight labourers brandishing shovels, a lineside drift claiming them to their waists. I failed to see how they could even dig a path to the cutting, still less excavate one wide enough to pass a train, yet none appeared daunted by the task. Indeed, as I watched the men start work they proved surprisingly effective and made anything look possible. Infected by their industry I passed word to my shivering companions that we would probably be on our way again in a few hours. Sneering at my optimism the Guard snatched a lamp from behind a bucket of coal and lit it to break the gloom. Élise hugged Spook for warmth.

  The Guard’s scepticism was well founded, for the labourers’ Herculean efforts soon slowed with fatigue, their progress stalling about halfway through the maw they were creating. Wondering if I could help, and noticing that the snow had settled thinner on the leeward side of the train, I dropped to the ballast to speak with Driver Hiscox.

  My walk to the locomotive was flanked tightly by carriage wheels and a precipitous slope above an anonymously gurgling watercourse. Indeed this route proved more hazardous than the one taken by the labourers, for as I approached the engine I lost footing and slithered like a wet fish towards the hidden drainage ditch. Bracing myself to smash into its ice capped ravine I yodelled with horror, but managed to halt my descent by placing my foot in a badger scrape. Hiscox looked out of his cab and shook his head at my ungainly flailing.

  Reaching the driver I found him standing atop the snowplough, a cast-iron latticework bolted to the locomotive’s buffer beam, issuing new instructions to the workmen.

  “At this rate we shall be here until Judgement day, so I suggest we dig a narrow channel about the width of one man,” he advised the foreman from his makeshift podium.

  The navvies misunderstood this proposal and became disgruntled, taking it to mean that the remainder of the journey was to be walked. Hiscox clarified his meaning.

  “If I come into the channel hard enough I can smash the rest of the snow aside,” he bellowed with a fierce gesticulation.

  Viable or not, the idea rallied the men and they hurried their refreshments to resume work. Assisted by a fairy-tale array of lamps glimmering in the glaucous light, their silhouettes faded quickly into the frigid white walls of their workplace where the hours muffled their shouting. Eventually the sound of their toil vied not even with the whisper of an idle steam engine.

  Despite this renewed activity my optimism faltered, for it seemed to me that a valley cloaked to complete anonymity would present the Mail crew with far greater challenges than this between here and Giddiford. Our grand little railway, despite all its purposeful contours, had been buried beneath fallen sails and in response could field just one small steam engine. Though this doughty little locomotive did make a bold contrast to nature’s colourless onslaught, enshrouding itself in steam occasionally as if to survive by camouflage, it amounted to a forlorn statement of intent.

  As the navvies continued to apply their shovels in search of the company’s metals, their progress hidden beyond the blizzard’s tall curtain, I wondered what preparations would be wise should we be stranded here. Keeping warm being my chief concern, and finding myself alone with the driver, I sought permission to put Élise aboard the footplate. The cab of a tank engine being small, I doubted this would be granted but to my surprise the driver allowed both Élise and myself to join him as long as we did not obstruct his work. Impatient to impart the good news I made my way back to the van, stopping about halfway to look back at our British bulldog. There it was, standing upon lost rails, steadfastly shrugging off the storm’s trill agitations, too obstinate to quit and too vibrant to be frosted, and I prayed that its ability to make slush of all the snow that drifted beneath it would deliver us safely to Widdlecombe.

  “Driver Hiscox has invited us aboard the footplate,” I told Élise. “However, he must first plough the snowdrift, which will give the wagons a very rough ride so I suggest we alight and observe events from the lineside.”

  Élise’s face shrank with concern.

  “Can he not uncouple us from the engine and leave us here?” she asked.

  Before I could answer, Diggory taxed me with a question of his own.

  “Can I go on the footplate instead, Mr Jay?”

  I answered them in turn.

  “It is a matter of momentum,” I told Élise. “And you, young man, must remain here to pacify Spook. He is too inquisitive to take outside so you must stay aboard and comfort him during the impact.”

  The boy became sullen, for he was missing an opportunity to ride a locomotive, and in very dramatic circumstances.

  I assisted Élise from the Mail van, the descent involving prolonged but gentlemanly contact, and was equally pleased by an arm-in-arm walk along the lineside to Briggs. As Upford cutting was not yet open for the charge, Hiscox invited us aboard the locomotive immediately. Élise’s apprehension at having to climb the engine’s vertical step-plates was soon forgotten when she reached the searing yawn of the firebox. Its twisting flames mesmerised her instantly.

  “I may have been a farrier’s wife but I have never seen a fire like this one,” she remarked above its welcoming roar.

  The brittle wilderness outside forgotten, I reflected how fitting it was that we should harness the power of boiling water to combat ice, but with only trivial conversation to offer I soon became uneasy. I interrupted Élise’s wondrous gaze at the engine’s valves and gauges to express my embarrassment.

  “I shall assist the navvies,” I declared abruptly, “As an able body I cannot stand idle in such circumstances.”

  Receiving a series of cautions from Élise I stepped down and stumbled into the blizzard, soon to be invited by two brawny men to dispose of snow loosened from the workface. It was back-breaking work with compacted ice underfoot threatening my balance at every step, the loaded shovel becoming heavier with each wield, but here at the mouth of the slit trench was where I worked until my extremities seized with cramp. My only comfort during this time was to look back at the engine periodically and reflect that my new companion, the lovely Élise, was safe and warm.

  Bent over a drainage ditch, discharging what I prayed would be my last slab of snow, l noticed Élise standing alongside Briggs, Hiscox having ejected her in preparation for the assault. The engine was now a beast snorting with impatience, the light of its igneous belly making volcanic embers of the falling snowflakes. Soon I would discover what like of Christmas I had in store. Would it be shared with Élise in the comforts of her cottage or a mob of strangers huddled together amid frozen desolation?

  Proud to have done my bit, I returned to my travelling companion. Nearby, Hiscox and Jones were sprinkling sand upon the rails. Here, the footplate deck was at eye level and the glowing fire-hole continued to entrance Élise, as if by this faithful observance she might continue to keep warm. After stamping my feet to detach h
eavy clods of snow from my boots I suggested that she warm her hands upon one of the engine’s many pipes, and applied my own hands to demonstrate. The nodules of snow dangling from my gloves caused her much amusement.

  “Horace, you are decorated for Christmas,” she giggled most uncharacteristically.

  Élise laid her gloved hands upon mine and unwittingly created an indelible moment in my soul, engraving forever her charming presence. Her rubescent smile in the dancing rosebuds of light beneath that furiously speckled sky, as green as an ocean, filled me with the realisation that I was falling in love.

  The eight workmen filed past us on their way back to the Mail van and Hiscox beckoned his mate to the footplate. With the snow-plough charge about to commence I prayed that a path could be struck through to the viaduct, this guaranteeing the train’s penetration at least as far as Widdlecombe. As we watched Hiscox release the handbrake and grasp the regulator with determination set upon his face, Élise’s excitement collapsed to shivers and I placed my overcoat around her shoulders.

  Now shivering myself, I was treated to Fireman Jones’s recollection of a disastrous misadventure while assisting Driver MacGregor in similar circumstances some years ago. Apparently the Scotchman had attempted to ram through a snowdrift a few miles south of Blodcaster.

  “Leapacott cutting, it was,” the Welshman expanded with questionable timing. “These Beattie engines are just too light for such antics. The snow knocked Lacy right off the rails.”

  Driver Hiscox, possessing greater skills than MacGregor and in no mood for conversation, told us to ignore the tale of horror and stand back. I placed my arm around Élise for support as Briggs’s cylinders filled with steam, for I could only imagine her discomfort wearing dainty, lace-up shoes. My own toes were numb even inside the fur lining of mid-calf boots.