THE RAILWAY CHILDREN
PART 4
Chapter IV. The engine-burglar.
What was
left of the second sheet and the Brunswick black came in very nicely to make a
banner bearing the legend
SHE IS NEARLY WELL THANK YOU
and this
was displayed to the Green Dragon about a fortnight after the arrival of the
wonderful hamper. The old gentleman saw it, and waved a cheerful response from
the train. And when this had been done the children saw that now was the time
when they must tell Mother what they had done when she was ill. And it did not
seem nearly so easy as they had thought it would be. But it had to be done. And
it was done. Mother was extremely angry. She was seldom angry, and now she was
angrier than they had ever known her. This was horrible. But it was much worse
when she suddenly began to cry. Crying is catching, I believe, like measles and
whooping-cough. At any rate, everyone at once found itself taking part in a
crying-party.
Mother
stopped first. She dried her eyes and then she said:—
“I'm sorry
I was so angry, darlings, because I know you didn't understand.”
“We didn't
mean to be naughty, Mammy,” sobbed Bobbie, and Peter and Phyllis sniffed.
“Now,
listen,” said Mother; “it's quite true that we're poor, but we have enough to
live on. You mustn't go telling everyone about our affairs—it's not right. And
you must never, never, never ask strangers to give you things. Now always
remember that—won't you?”
They all
hugged her and rubbed their damp cheeks against hers and promised that they
would.
“And I'll
write a letter to your old gentleman, and I shall tell him that I didn't
approve—oh, of course I shall thank him, too, for his kindness. It's YOU I
don't approve of, my darlings, not the old gentleman. He was as kind as ever he
could be. And you can give the letter to the Station Master to give him—and we
won't say any more about it.”
Afterwards,
when the children were alone, Bobbie said:—
“Isn't
Mother splendid? You catch any other grown-up saying they were sorry they had
been angry.”
“Yes,”
said Peter, “she IS splendid; but it's rather awful when she's angry.”
“She's
like Avenging and Bright in the song,” said Phyllis. “I should like to look at
her if it wasn't so awful. She looks so beautiful when she's really downright
furious.”
They took
the letter down to the Station Master.
“I thought
you said you hadn't got any friends except in London,” said he.
“We've
made him since,” said Peter.
“But he
doesn't live hereabouts?”
“No—we
just know him on the railway.”
Then the
Station Master retired to that sacred inner temple behind the little window
where the tickets are sold, and the children went down to the Porters' room and
talked to the Porter. They learned several interesting things from him—among
others that his name was Perks, that he was married and had three children,
that the lamps in front of engines are called head-lights and the ones at the
back tail-lights.
“And that
just shows,” whispered Phyllis, “that trains really ARE dragons in disguise,
with proper heads and tails.”
It was on
this day that the children first noticed that all engines are not alike.
“Alike?”
said the Porter, whose name was Perks, “lor, love you, no, Miss. No more alike
nor what you an' me are. That little 'un without a tender as went by just now all
on her own, that was a tank, that was—she's off to do some shunting t'other
side o' Maidbridge. That's as it might be you, Miss. Then there's goods
engines, great, strong things with three wheels each side—joined with rods to
strengthen 'em—as it might be me. Then there's main-line engines as it might be
this 'ere young gentleman when he grows up and wins all the races at 'is
school—so he will. The main-line engine she's built for speed as well as power.
That's one to the 9.15 up.”
“The Green
Dragon,” said Phyllis.
“We calls
her the Snail, Miss, among ourselves,” said the Porter. “She's oftener
be'ind'and nor any train on the line.”
“But the
engine's green,” said Phyllis.
“Yes,
Miss,” said Perks, “so's a snail some seasons o' the year.”
The
children agreed as they went home to dinner that the Porter was most delightful
company.
Next day
was Roberta's birthday. In the afternoon she was politely but firmly requested
to get out of the way and keep there till tea-time.
“You
aren't to see what we're going to do till it's done; it's a glorious surprise,”
said Phyllis.
And
Roberta went out into the garden all alone. She tried to be grateful, but she
felt she would much rather have helped in whatever it was than have to spend
her birthday afternoon by herself, no matter how glorious the surprise might
be.
Now that
she was alone, she had time to think, and one of the things she thought of most
was what mother had said in one of those feverish nights when her hands were so
hot and her eyes so bright.
The words
were: “Oh, what a doctor's bill there'll be for this!”
She walked
round and round the garden among the rose-bushes that hadn't any roses yet,
only buds, and the lilac bushes and syringas and American currants, and the
more she thought of the doctor's bill, the less she liked the thought of it.
And
presently she made up her mind. She went out through the side door of the
garden and climbed up the steep field to where the road runs along by the canal.
She walked along until she came to the bridge that crosses the canal and leads
to the village, and here she waited. It was very pleasant in the sunshine to
lean one's elbows on the warm stone of the bridge and look down at the blue
water of the canal. Bobbie had never seen any other canal, except the Regent's
Canal, and the water of that is not at all a pretty colour. And she had never
seen any river at all except the Thames, which also would be all the better if
its face was washed.
Perhaps
the children would have loved the canal as much as the railway, but for two
things. One was that they had found the railway FIRST—on that first, wonderful
morning when the house and the country and the moors and rocks and great hills
were all new to them. They had not found the canal till some days later. The
other reason was that everyone on the railway had been kind to them—the Station
Master, the Porter, and the old gentleman who waved. And the people on the
canal were anything but kind.
The people
on the canal were, of course, the bargees, who steered the slow barges up and
down, or walked beside the old horses that trampled up the mud of the
towing-path, and strained at the long tow-ropes.
Peter had
once asked one of the bargees the time, and had been told to “get out of that,”
in a tone so fierce that he did not stop to say anything about his having just
as much right on the towing-path as the man himself. Indeed, he did not even
think of saying it till some time later.
Then
another day when the children thought they would like to fish in the canal, a
boy in a barge threw lumps of coal at them, and one of these hit Phyllis on the
back of the neck. She was just stooping down to tie up her bootlace—and though
the coal hardly hurt at all it made her not care very much about going on
fishing.
On the
bridge, however, Roberta felt quite safe, because she could look down on the
canal, and if any boy showed signs of meaning to throw coal, she could duck
behind the parapet.
Presently
there was a sound of wheels, which was just what she expected.
The wheels
were the wheels of the Doctor's dogcart, and in the cart, of course, was the
Doctor.
He pulled
up, and called out:—
“Hullo,
head nurse! Want a lift?”
“I wanted
to see you,” said Bobbie.
“Your
mother's not worse, I hope?” said the Doctor.
“No—but—”
“Well,
skip in, then, and we'll go for a drive.”
Roberta
climbed in and the brown horse was made to turn round—which it did not like at
all, for it was looking forward to its tea—I mean its oats.
“This IS
jolly,” said Bobbie, as the dogcart flew along the road by the canal.
“We could
throw a stone down any one of your three chimneys,” said the Doctor, as they
passed the house.
“Yes,”
said Bobbie, “but you'd have to be a jolly good shot.”
“How do
you know I'm not?” said the Doctor. “Now, then, what's the trouble?”
Bobbie
fidgeted with the hook of the driving apron.
“Come, out
with it,” said the Doctor.
“It's
rather hard, you see,” said Bobbie, “to out with it; because of what Mother
said.”
“What DID
Mother say?”
“She said
I wasn't to go telling everyone that we're poor. But you aren't everyone, are
you?”
“Not at
all,” said the Doctor, cheerfully. “Well?”
“Well, I know
doctors are very extravagant—I mean expensive, and Mrs. Viney told me that her
doctoring only cost her twopence a week because she belonged to a Club.”
“Yes?”
“You see
she told me what a good doctor you were, and I asked her how she could afford
you, because she's much poorer than we are. I've been in her house and I know.
And then she told me about the Club, and I thought I'd ask you—and—oh, I don't
want Mother to be worried! Can't we be in the Club, too, the same as Mrs.
Viney?”
The Doctor
was silent. He was rather poor himself, and he had been pleased at getting a
new family to attend. So I think his feelings at that minute were rather mixed.
“You
aren't cross with me, are you?” said Bobbie, in a very small voice.
The Doctor
roused himself.
“Cross?
How could I be? You're a very sensible little woman. Now look here, don't you
worry. I'll make it all right with your Mother, even if I have to make a
special brand-new Club all for her. Look here, this is where the Aqueduct
begins.”
“What's an
Aque—what's its name?” asked Bobbie.
“A water
bridge,” said the Doctor. “Look.”
The road
rose to a bridge over the canal. To the left was a steep rocky cliff with trees
and shrubs growing in the cracks of the rock. And the canal here left off
running along the top of the hill and started to run on a bridge of its own—a
great bridge with tall arches that went right across the valley.
Bobbie
drew a long breath.
“It IS
grand, isn't it?” she said. “It's like pictures in the History of Rome.”
“Right!”
said the Doctor, “that's just exactly what it IS like. The Romans were dead
nuts on aqueducts. It's a splendid piece of engineering.”
“I thought
engineering was making engines.”
“Ah, there
are different sorts of engineering—making road and bridges and tunnels is one
kind. And making fortifications is another. Well, we must be turning back. And,
remember, you aren't to worry about doctor's bills or you'll be ill yourself,
and then I'll send you in a bill as long as the aqueduct.”
When
Bobbie had parted from the Doctor at the top of the field that ran down from
the road to Three Chimneys, she could not feel that she had done wrong. She
knew that Mother would perhaps think differently. But Bobbie felt that for once
she was the one who was right, and she scrambled down the rocky slope with a
really happy feeling.
Phyllis
and Peter met her at the back door. They were unnaturally clean and neat, and
Phyllis had a red bow in her hair. There was only just time for Bobbie to make
herself tidy and tie up her hair with a blue bow before a little bell rang.
“There!”
said Phyllis, “that's to show the surprise is ready. Now you wait till the bell
rings again and then you may come into the dining-room.”
So Bobbie
waited.
“Tinkle,
tinkle,” said the little bell, and Bobbie went into the dining-room, feeling
rather shy. Directly she opened the door she found herself, as it seemed, in a
new world of light and flowers and singing. Mother and Peter and Phyllis were
standing in a row at the end of the table. The shutters were shut and there
were twelve candles on the table, one for each of Roberta's years. The table
was covered with a sort of pattern of flowers, and at Roberta's place was a
thick wreath of forget-me-nots and several most interesting little packages.
And Mother and Phyllis and Peter were singing—to the first part of the tune of
St. Patrick's Day. Roberta knew that Mother had written the words on purpose
for her birthday. It was a little way of Mother's on birthdays. It had begun on
Bobbie's fourth birthday when Phyllis was a baby. Bobbie remembered learning
the verses to say to Father 'for a surprise.' She wondered if Mother had
remembered, too. The four-year-old verse had been:—
Daddy dear, I'm only four
And I'd rather not be more.
Four's the nicest age to be,
Two and two and one and three.
What I love is two and two,
Mother, Peter, Phil, and you.
What you love is one and three,
Mother, Peter, Phil, and me.
Give your little girl a kiss
Because she learned and told you this.
The song
the others were singing now went like this:—
Our darling Roberta,
No sorrow shall hurt her
If we can prevent it
Her whole life long.
Her birthday's our fete day,
We'll make it our great day,
And give her our presents
And sing her our song.
May pleasures attend her
And may the Fates send her
The happiest journey
Along her life's way.
With skies bright above her
And dear ones to love her!
Dear Bob! Many happy
Returns of the day!
When they
had finished singing they cried, “Three cheers for our Bobbie!” and gave them
very loudly. Bobbie felt exactly as though she were going to cry—you know that
odd feeling in the bridge of your nose and the pricking in your eyelids? But
before she had time to begin they were all kissing and hugging her.
“Now,”
said Mother, “look at your presents.”
They were
very nice presents. There was a green and red needle-book that Phyllis had made
herself in secret moments. There was a darling little silver brooch of Mother's
shaped like a buttercup, which Bobbie had known and loved for years, but which
she had never, never thought would come to be her very own. There was also a
pair of blue glass vases from Mrs. Viney. Roberta had seen and admired them in
the village shop. And there were three birthday cards with pretty pictures and
wishes.
Mother
fitted the forget-me-not crown on Bobbie's brown head.
“And now
look at the table,” she said.
There was
a cake on the table covered with white sugar, with 'Dear Bobbie' on it in pink
sweets, and there were buns and jam; but the nicest thing was that the big
table was almost covered with flowers—wallflowers were laid all round the
tea-tray—there was a ring of forget-me-nots round each plate. The cake had a
wreath of white lilac round it, and in the middle was something that looked
like a pattern all done with single blooms of lilac or wallflower or laburnum.
“It's a
map—a map of the railway!” cried Peter. “Look—those lilac lines are the
metals—and there's the station done in brown wallflowers. The laburnum is the
train, and there are the signal-boxes, and the road up to here—and those fat
red daisies are us three waving to the old gentleman—that's him, the pansy in
the laburnum train.”
“And
there's 'Three Chimneys' done in the purple primroses,” said Phyllis. “And that
little tiny rose-bud is Mother looking out for us when we're late for tea.
Peter invented it all, and we got all the flowers from the station. We thought
you'd like it better.”
“That's my
present,” said Peter, suddenly dumping down his adored steam-engine on the
table in front of her. Its tender had been lined with fresh white paper, and
was full of sweets.
“Oh,
Peter!” cried Bobbie, quite overcome by this munificence, “not your own dear
little engine that you're so fond of?”
“Oh, no,”
said Peter, very promptly, “not the engine. Only the sweets.”
Bobbie
couldn't help her face changing a little—not so much because she was disappointed
at not getting the engine, as because she had thought it so very noble of
Peter, and now she felt she had been silly to think it. Also she felt she must
have seemed greedy to expect the engine as well as the sweets. So her face
changed. Peter saw it. He hesitated a minute; then his face changed, too, and
he said: “I mean not ALL the engine. I'll let you go halves if you like.”
“You're a
brick,” cried Bobbie; “it's a splendid present.” She said no more aloud, but to
herself she said:—
“That was
awfully jolly decent of Peter because I know he didn't mean to. Well, the
broken half shall be my half of the engine, and I'll get it mended and give it
back to Peter for his birthday.”—“Yes, Mother dear, I should like to cut the
cake,” she added, and tea began.
It was a
delightful birthday. After tea Mother played games with them—any game they
liked—and of course their first choice was blindman's-buff, in the course of
which Bobbie's forget-me-not wreath twisted itself crookedly over one of her
ears and stayed there. Then, when it was near bed-time and time to calm down,
Mother had a lovely new story to read to them.
“You won't
sit up late working, will you, Mother?” Bobbie asked as they said good night.
And Mother
said no, she wouldn't—she would only just write to Father and then go to bed.
But when
Bobbie crept down later to bring up her presents—for she felt she really could
not be separated from them all night—Mother was not writing, but leaning her head
on her arms and her arms on the table. I think it was rather good of Bobbie to
slip quietly away, saying over and over, “She doesn't want me to know she's
unhappy, and I won't know; I won't know.” But it made a sad end to the
birthday.
* * * * * *
The very
next morning Bobbie began to watch her opportunity to get Peter's engine mended
secretly. And the opportunity came the very next afternoon.
Mother
went by train to the nearest town to do shopping. When she went there, she
always went to the Post-office. Perhaps to post her letters to Father, for she
never gave them to the children or Mrs. Viney to post, and she never went to
the village herself. Peter and Phyllis went with her. Bobbie wanted an excuse
not to go, but try as she would she couldn't think of a good one. And just when
she felt that all was lost, her frock caught on a big nail by the kitchen door
and there was a great criss-cross tear all along the front of the skirt. I
assure you this was really an accident. So the others pitied her and went
without her, for there was no time for her to change, because they were rather
late already and had to hurry to the station to catch the train.
When they
had gone, Bobbie put on her everyday frock, and went down to the railway. She
did not go into the station, but she went along the line to the end of the
platform where the engine is when the down train is alongside the platform—the
place where there are a water tank and a long, limp, leather hose, like an
elephant's trunk. She hid behind a bush on the other side of the railway. She
had the toy engine done up in brown paper, and she waited patiently with it
under her arm.
Then when
the next train came in and stopped, Bobbie went across the metals of the
up-line and stood beside the engine. She had never been so close to an engine
before. It looked much larger and harder than she had expected, and it made her
feel very small indeed, and, somehow, very soft—as if she could very, very
easily be hurt rather badly.
“I know
what silk-worms feel like now,” said Bobbie to herself.
The
engine-driver and fireman did not see her. They were leaning out on the other
side, telling the Porter a tale about a dog and a leg of mutton.
“If you
please,” said Roberta—but the engine was blowing off steam and no one heard
her.
“If you
please, Mr. Engineer,” she spoke a little louder, but the Engine happened to
speak at the same moment, and of course Roberta's soft little voice hadn't a
chance.
It seemed
to her that the only way would be to climb on to the engine and pull at their
coats. The step was high, but she got her knee on it, and clambered into the
cab; she stumbled and fell on hands and knees on the base of the great heap of
coals that led up to the square opening in the tender. The engine was not above
the weaknesses of its fellows; it was making a great deal more noise than there
was the slightest need for. And just as Roberta fell on the coals, the
engine-driver, who had turned without seeing her, started the engine, and when
Bobbie had picked herself up, the train was moving—not fast, but much too fast
for her to get off.
All sorts
of dreadful thoughts came to her all together in one horrible flash. There were
such things as express trains that went on, she supposed, for hundreds of miles
without stopping. Suppose this should be one of them? How would she get home
again? She had no money to pay for the return journey.
“And I've
no business here. I'm an engine-burglar—that's what I am,” she thought. “I
shouldn't wonder if they could lock me up for this.” And the train was going
faster and faster.
There was
something in her throat that made it impossible for her to speak. She tried
twice. The men had their backs to her. They were doing something to things that
looked like taps.
Suddenly
she put out her hand and caught hold of the nearest sleeve. The man turned with
a start, and he and Roberta stood for a minute looking at each other in
silence. Then the silence was broken by them both.
The man
said, “Here's a bloomin' go!” and Roberta burst into tears.
The other
man said he was blooming well blest—or something like it—but though naturally
surprised they were not exactly unkind.
“You're a
naughty little gell, that's what you are,” said the fireman, and the
engine-driver said:—
“Daring
little piece, I call her,” but they made her sit down on an iron seat in the
cab and told her to stop crying and tell them what she meant by it.
She did
stop, as soon as she could. One thing that helped her was the thought that
Peter would give almost his ears to be in her place—on a real engine—really
going. The children had often wondered whether any engine-driver could be found
noble enough to take them for a ride on an engine—and now there she was. She
dried her eyes and sniffed earnestly.
“Now,
then,” said the fireman, “out with it. What do you mean by it, eh?”
“Oh,
please,” sniffed Bobbie.
“Try
again,” said the engine-driver, encouragingly.
Bobbie
tried again.
“Please,
Mr. Engineer,” she said, “I did call out to you from the line, but you didn't
hear me—and I just climbed up to touch you on the arm—quite gently I meant to
do it—and then I fell into the coals—and I am so sorry if I frightened you. Oh,
don't be cross—oh, please don't!” She sniffed again.
“We ain't
so much CROSS,” said the fireman, “as interested like. It ain't every day a
little gell tumbles into our coal bunker outer the sky, is it, Bill? What did
you DO it for—eh?”
“That's
the point,” agreed the engine-driver; “what did you do it FOR?”
Bobbie
found that she had not quite stopped crying. The engine-driver patted her on
the back and said: “Here, cheer up, Mate. It ain't so bad as all that 'ere,
I'll be bound.”
“I
wanted,” said Bobbie, much cheered to find herself addressed as 'Mate'—“I only
wanted to ask you if you'd be so kind as to mend this.” She picked up the
brown-paper parcel from among the coals and undid the string with hot, red
fingers that trembled.
Her feet
and legs felt the scorch of the engine fire, but her shoulders felt the wild
chill rush of the air. The engine lurched and shook and rattled, and as they
shot under a bridge the engine seemed to shout in her ears.
The
fireman shovelled on coals.
Bobbie
unrolled the brown paper and disclosed the toy engine.
“I
thought,” she said wistfully, “that perhaps you'd mend this for me—because
you're an engineer, you know.”
The
engine-driver said he was blowed if he wasn't blest.
“I'm blest
if I ain't blowed,” remarked the fireman.
But the
engine-driver took the little engine and looked at it—and the fireman ceased
for an instant to shovel coal, and looked, too.
“It's like
your precious cheek,” said the engine-driver—“whatever made you think we'd be
bothered tinkering penny toys?”
“I didn't
mean it for precious cheek,” said Bobbie; “only everybody that has anything to
do with railways is so kind and good, I didn't think you'd mind. You don't
really—do you?” she added, for she had seen a not unkindly wink pass between
the two.
“My
trade's driving of an engine, not mending her, especially such a hout-size in
engines as this 'ere,” said Bill. “An' 'ow are we a-goin' to get you back to
your sorrowing friends and relations, and all be forgiven and forgotten?”
“If you'll
put me down next time you stop,” said Bobbie, firmly, though her heart beat
fiercely against her arm as she clasped her hands, “and lend me the money for a
third-class ticket, I'll pay you back—honour bright. I'm not a confidence trick
like in the newspapers—really, I'm not.”
“You're a
little lady, every inch,” said Bill, relenting suddenly and completely. “We'll
see you gets home safe. An' about this engine—Jim—ain't you got ne'er a pal as
can use a soldering iron? Seems to me that's about all the little bounder wants
doing to it.”
“That's
what Father said,” Bobbie explained eagerly. “What's that for?”
She
pointed to a little brass wheel that he had turned as he spoke.
“That's
the injector.”
“In—what?”
“Injector
to fill up the boiler.”
“Oh,” said
Bobbie, mentally registering the fact to tell the others; “that IS
interesting.”
“This
'ere's the automatic brake,” Bill went on, flattered by her enthusiasm. “You
just move this 'ere little handle—do it with one finger, you can—and the train
jolly soon stops. That's what they call the Power of Science in the
newspapers.”
He showed
her two little dials, like clock faces, and told her how one showed how much
steam was going, and the other showed if the brake was working properly.
By the
time she had seen him shut off steam with a big shining steel handle, Bobbie
knew more about the inside working of an engine than she had ever thought there
was to know, and Jim had promised that his second cousin's wife's brother
should solder the toy engine, or Jim would know the reason why. Besides all the
knowledge she had gained Bobbie felt that she and Bill and Jim were now friends
for life, and that they had wholly and forever forgiven her for stumbling
uninvited among the sacred coals of their tender.
At
Stacklepoole Junction she parted from them with warm expressions of mutual
regard. They handed her over to the guard of a returning train—a friend of
theirs—and she had the joy of knowing what guards do in their secret
fastnesses, and understood how, when you pull the communication cord in railway
carriages, a wheel goes round under the guard's nose and a loud bell rings in
his ears. She asked the guard why his van smelt so fishy, and learned that he
had to carry a lot of fish every day, and that the wetness in the hollows of
the corrugated floor had all drained out of boxes full of plaice and cod and
mackerel and soles and smelts.
Bobbie got
home in time for tea, and she felt as though her mind would burst with all that
had been put into it since she parted from the others. How she blessed the nail
that had torn her frock!
“Where
have you been?” asked the others.
“To the
station, of course,” said Roberta. But she would not tell a word of her
adventures till the day appointed, when she mysteriously led them to the
station at the hour of the 3.19's transit, and proudly introduced them to her
friends, Bill and Jim. Jim's second cousin's wife's brother had not been
unworthy of the sacred trust reposed in him. The toy engine was, literally, as
good as new.
“Good-bye—oh,
good-bye,” said Bobbie, just before the engine screamed ITS good-bye. “I shall
always, always love you—and Jim's second cousin's wife's brother as well!”
And as the
three children went home up the hill, Peter hugging the engine, now quite its
own self again, Bobbie told, with joyous leaps of the heart, the story of how
she had been an Engine-burglar.