When he backed into the yard, Edward was again coupled up to 5702 and the rest of the train, and wanted to set off at once—5702 got the impression that he had friends at the Works, among whom he was hoping to take his break. But he was tired and overheated, with the banking job the capstone to a busy morning's work, and his driver wouldn't allow it.
"You'll catch your breath here, first. I'll tell Signal that we can wait. We'll be badgering them all afternoon, and it won't hurt to gain a little goodwill now."
Edward's crew brought 5702's, to show them the stationhouse and the workers' mess.
The two engines were silent for a while. Edward had indeed been panting when he'd returned. And 5702, sticky and sore and mind even busier than usual, did not trust himself to speak.
A through passenger train at last broke the quiet.
"I'm sorry about Donald," said Edward, after it had thundered by. "And sorrier still, to say that it probably won't be the last cold welcome you get. We do tend to be suspicious of newcomers, and with you being a diesel it will probably be worse."
5702 was beginning to think that it was more likely that Edward's niceness was sincere than not.
He hadn't trusted it in the least, before. Any engine with sense behaved well in front of the crews and workers.
To be sure, steam engines were generally rather deficient in sense. On the other rail this steam engine clearly knew a thing or two about survival. And a great many insults and threats could be made, even with an innocent smile and a willing manner.
But they were quite alone now. And Edward needn't have covered for 5702's breakdown at all.
"You lied to him for me," 5702 observed, voice flat and cold.
"Yes. It wasn't any of his business."
"I'll probably fail again," he said, brutally truthful, though it hurt. "My motor is faulty."
"We've been told that."
"Oh. Have you."
"My crews and me. Just as a heads-up, that we should expect to be sent for you sometimes. I don't plan to gossip about it."
"Well, we can't keep lying about it, either. It happens too often."
"Good," said Edward easily, "because I don't want to. I'm a bit surprised at myself, actually. But it did seem too bad, for them to all have a go at you for failing on your very first day."
"Your crew hadn't expected that… had they?" 5702 was still bitterly brutal.
Edward, for his part, remained matter-of-fact. "No. That did rather catch us by surprise. Cheer up! The engineers at our Works were quite eager to meet you, anyway. They're novices when it comes to diesels, of course, but I'm told they've been studying up. It's possible that they've actually learned newer methods than are in use right now on the mainland, and will be a great help to you."
5702 grew very silent, rather abashed… and not liking the feeling.
It wasn't a safe feeling, in enemy territory.
And he concluded that it was best to try and discharge it. "I meant no offense, before," he said, the words stiff. "And I… I regret my indiscretion."
It was probably for the best that 5702 couldn't see Edward's face just then.
"I'll get over it," the latter assured him, gravely.
5702 felt suspicious—and much more comfortable. "You are mocking me. Aren't you?"
Edward laughed. "Maybe a little bit."
"Right, then."
"Is it?"
"Well," and 5702 found himself tempted to smile, "it's not as though I have a wheel to run on."
"Oh, your wheels at least seem to run just fine," Edward teased. "I thought it was your motor that could use a little work? As for your indiscretion, I'm not shocked to discover what I must look like, to a mainland diesel. Anyway, we're virtually all main line certified! There's quite a lot of work here, with rather few of us to handle it. So they make sure to ready each of us as much as possible for anything… just in case."
"Oh." 5702 found himself on rather more hopeful ground. "Might I be picking up some main line work, too? I mean," he added, at once embarrassed again, "you know. Once I'm doing rather better."
"It's very likely. The main line engines mostly take our goods up line, towards the mainland. You'll see a good deal of that route, when we go to the Works. But our branch is generally responsible for moving things to and from the western end."
That made his immediate future a little brighter. 5702 knew it was a lot of gall, to immediately try to jump on such a chance, when he had broken down after an hour's work. But there were plenty of times he didn't break down, and the prospect of being confined to a single short branch had been rather claustrophobic for a locomotive who had once gloried in runs from London to Glasgow.
Yet, for this, and for all the reasons that he had rather dreaded this trial, he was still engine enough to want to give his hosts satisfaction. Better be stuck here forever, than to fail.
Looking for more silver linings in the assignment, he eyed the yard and station, which was all rather quiet just then, with no trains coming in, and but a few passing through. Midday tends to be the quietest hour of day even on more bustling junctions, and this one was still rather rural, albeit 5702 could see a good deal of town and roads beyond the station. Trucks four and five sidings thick obscured his view in most other directions, though after a while he discerned some sort of shed. Perhaps a rather small engine shed.
5702 was embarrassingly bad with his letters, but he could piece other things together.
"This is Wellsworth?"
"That's right."
"Good, then," said 5702, politely showing more enthusiasm than he yet felt. "I understand I'm stabled here."
"Yes, indeed. You'll find that it's generally just the two of us here at night."
"Oh, that makes sense. I think I can see the engine shed, then, behind those vans."
"You can? How?—Oh! Can you see from both ends?"
"Not at the same time," chuckled 5702. "And if we're being driven we lose control of it, somehow, and can only look in the direction of the occupied cab. But right now, with my system down, I can look all around, just as I like."
"That's awfully handy!" Edward laughed in frank admiration.
"It's not really so useful as you might think," admitted 5702. "But it is nice, and we can't imagine how anyone lives without it. I mean my own class," he clarified. He wondered if he sounded a bit dotty, saying 'we', when after all no one here would know about his family.
"It is a right pain, sometimes, being stuck looking in the wrong direction from whatever's happening."
"I reckon so. But not all diesels with two cabs are like us. Something about the motor arrangement. A few double-cabbed locos are actually two personalities, one at each end."
"Oh, of course. Like the double Farlies."
"That… that might have been before my time."
Edward chuckled. "It was before my time, too, I think—at least, I never met any. But one of the old engines on this line had known quite a few. Sounded like the steam version of what you're describing. What else can you see, then?"
"Don't take this the wrong way. But mostly just trucks."
"Ah. Right."
Edward sighed resignation, and for a moment 5702 was inclined to offer some reassurance that he really would be some use to them with their backlog, once he was repaired.
But long habit made him stop before saying something that could be so misinterpreted.
After thinking it over, though, he reminded himself that this engine didn't seem to be easily offended.
Though his voice was uncharacteristically timid when he asked: "Erm… Edward? Would you mind very much, if I asked, who they sent for me to—replace?" If you could find a safe way to hear the story, it was always better to know than to blunder about blindly, just guessing, and often saying all the wrong things to engines who were still grieving their own.
But then a wild thought struck him, as various hints and pieces fell into place. "... If I am?"
"Why, no one." Edward sounded surprised at first, but then he spoke warmly. "You needn't worry about that. There's been no one based here but me since the last war, except for other trial engines."
"Oh." It was 5702's turn to sigh, a bit dazed. It was such an abrupt load off his buffers. "I mean, that's good. I thought… especially when Donald…"
"You must understand, Donald hasn't been here so very long, himself. He lost a lot when his old region was dieselized. I'm sure a couple of the others will be nervous about you too, at first, but just you remember—you're not taking anyone's place. Our controller's bringing in more engines because we need more. We've never been busier 'round here, and there's plenty of work for us all."
5702 needed some time to process and savor the feeling. Expanding. 5702 had come to assume that expansion was simply a myth. He and his had only ever known rail traffic to be lost—never gained. The Midland region was littered with closed-down lines, and still their numbers just got worse and worse, year after year. Yet here, right over the strait, was this fairy-tale world where a transfer didn't mean someone else had been sent or was en route to the scrapyards.
Almost all he'd ever heard was that this very region was backwards, and even something of a loonybin. But, though he still wished another engine had been chosen to be sent instead, he was coming to find the prospect of his time here to be quite a bit more bearable than they had all assumed.
The Sudrians returned without the mainland crew.
"Don't you worry, old Co-Bo," said the fireman easily. "We'll get you up to the Works safe and sound, and they'll come to pick you up tomorrow."
5702 supposed that one o'clock was approaching.
"Are we ready to go, then?" asked Edward, a bit pettishly. 5702 smiled to himself, hidden behind the billows that had grown thicker and thicker during their wait. However long ago his shedmate had been made, he sounded as impatient as any of his kind, when they were idle but in steam.
"We won't have a path for at least twenty-five minutes, Signal says," said the driver. (This stirred up another resigned cloud of steam.) "But that's all to the good. Fireman says he and I have something to take care of."
5702 was bemused when the fireman uncoupled him. "Nothing to worry about," the man said. "Name's Heaver, by the way. And this is Driver Sand."
"You're right, Sid," said the driver, from 5702's other side. "Wish you'd said something earlier. Hardly have time to deal with it properly, now."
"Would it have killed you to leave off with just 'you're right, Sid'," muttered the fireman, coming around to join the driver.
5702 felt his face freezing in embarrassment and annoyance as he realized what they were looking at. It was such a familiar sensation that he hadn't even paid attention—but of course, to those who didn't know the Metrovicks, their tendency to leak water and oil from their side seams was all too conspicuous.
He'd been afforded a good wash-down the day before, in preparation for his departure… but whenever any of his motors failed the inevitable drip accelerated to a deluge. Much less when multiple failed. He had spent much of his long wait on the branch line siding gushing hopelessly and, although now he had lost most of the fluid from his system, the stains of course would remain.
No wonder the fireman had stared, before.
Briskly waving off 5702's muttered there's no need, the men formulated a plan. Twenty-five minutes wasn't much for such a job, but it was clear they intended to give it a go, and 5702 saw it would do no good to object further.
He himself was too used to going 'round in this state to care very much... but there was a small part of him that was something besides cross about all the fuss.
Besides, Donald hadn't seen the leak stains, but if they were indeed heading east then they were about to give anyone they passed or who passed them an eyeful. Problematic, given Edward's cover story that the new diesel was off for a mere routine inspection. Edward, once moved off their siding, clearly realized this too, wincing when he saw the giveaway stains for the first time.
So 5702 submitted to the blast of water, but the fuel and coolant had by now been given hours to dry, and water alone proved to do nothing fast.
"No good," Sand called over to Heaver, from where he was supervising atop Edward's tender. "Needs decent cleaning solution, and even then some elbow grease and a good hour's work."
Heaver sighed. "Sorry," he said to 5702, with real regret, "but, truth is, we just haven't the t—"
"Maybe it's time to try the potion?" Edward suggested. He looked a little abashed, especially when Sand burst into laughter.
"Oh, that old yarn! Never mind, Sid. Long story."
"I've heard it!" objected Heaver. "Hell, I know where they keep the stuff."
He was off like a shot before the driver, or indeed 5702, could make any objection.
"Erm," said 5702. "What is a… potion?"
It transpired that a potion was a liquid concoction with magical properties, typically brewed by witches. As 5702 wrestled with the several new concepts embedded in this definition, he largely missed Sand's assurance that this potion was just an unmarked bottle of cleaner that had been sitting 'round in the sheds so long that the lads had spun fanciful tales, to explain its origin, and to justify why it was simply too good to be lightly used.
It seemed these tales involved an old underground currency based on divination stones, domestic strife in a former stationmaster's marriage, and a fatal curse leveled by a certain shadowy "witch of Wellsworth," indignant with how her product had been stored—
"But that part's not true," Edward interrupted, earnest.
His driver snorted. "That part?"
"The part about the curse, yes. That's an unfortunate bit of slander. Mrs. Stationmaster died because of the Great 'Flu. The timing was unlucky—but there's no 'supposedly' about where she got the bottle of potion. It was made by Miss Cats-Eye, all right."
"You're so sure, then," scoffed the driver.
"And why not? I was here!"
The driver laughed. "Right. You do like to play that card. But there are no such things as witches, Metrovick, so you needn't look like you're trying to turn your own motor and bolt out of here."
"Oh!" Edward clearly hadn't realized that 5702 was getting more, rather than less, apprehensive as he listened, and as the fireman hurried back across the yard, hopping rail ties with impressive vigor and grace. "Well, there may be and there may not be. But even if she was, there's no harm in this. Old Cats-Eye was awfully nice. Peculiar, but her potions never caused any harm. It'll work just fine!"
"Oy," said Heaver cheerfully, seeing 5702's expression, "you two quite done making the diesel's eyes bug out? Never you mind them, mate. Let's give it a go."
Using a cleaner's pole, Heaver applied the solution and left it as the driver ran Edward back to the train. For all his skepticism, the driver proved not above examining the pink remnants in the glass bottle. Meanwhile the fireman coupled the engines together again, and dutifully checked the rest of the train. Then he checked his watch. They intended to let the 'potion' sit for as long as possible before finishing the job and advancing to their signal.
5702 was just as pleased to watch the fireman's proceedings, and to tune out the spirited and extremely confusing debate, which Heaver himself had joined, as to the accuracies and inaccuracies of five decades' worth of local folklore.
So maybe all this was why they said Sodor was a loonybin.
But 5702 didn't contemplate this very long. His mind was on something more prosaic. Edward's earnest insistence on the virtue of Cats-Eye and the efficacy of the old bottle of cleaner, plus the evidence of how very long he'd served here, had given the diesel pause.
He couldn't deny the charm of his new colleague's optimism—but just now it had sparked a sudden, sinking suspicion, too.
In 5702's experience, those sudden yet sinking suspicions tended to come to pass with terrible regularity.
There's been no one based here but me since the last war. Such a fact could have a very different interpretation than the one Edward had so confidently put on it. 5702 knew that all too well, and oughtn't have let himself forget…
"Sid, wait," hollered the driver, just as the fireman was about to hose off the solution.
"We have much time to wait, driver?"
"No. But didn't you see there are instructions written on here?"
5702 raised his eyebrows. Edward gave a simmer of amusement.
"In Sudrian!" Heaver sounded most defensive and aggrieved. "Besides, it was only a few words."
"And you supposed they weren't important?"
The fireman sighed, and pulled a face of apology at the bemused diesel.
"Right, then," he said, all resignation. "What did I foul up this time."