Barrow-in-Furness

June 1915

"Peep pip peep!"

Coppernob's eyes wrenched open in the smoggy pre-dawn darkness. Perhaps because he could often tell when there was something in a whistle meant especially for him. Perhaps because the whistle was quite unlike the ones he usually heard around his station.

Jerked out of his doze, he saw by the station lamps a fairly bulky six-coupled sidetank at platform two, gazing over at him avidly. "Excuse me! Er… Mr Engine Number Three? Can you hear me in there?"

He blinked again, hoping to resolve the tank engine apparition beyond his glass encasement into something that made more sense. But no; there he still was, painted in not much more than a teal undercoat, and sounding quite southern. "Clearly," said Coppernob, his own voice even drier than usual.

"Whoops." The strange sidetank grinned in a very winning way. Oh, this new young engine was going to be the sort to get away with all sorts of nonsense; that was quite apparent. "Did I wake you?"

"You did."

"Ah… sorry."

"Never mind," said Coppernob, still very dry. "It's not as though it's difficult, for me to fall asleep here."

"Really?" The sidetank was charmingly oblivious. "I can't imagine! We can still hear all the noise from the docks, and they're bustling about day and night! Why are you in there? Were you naughty?"

Coppernob noticed the sidetank's crew trying to conceal themselves from sight within the cab, but unable to hide that they were amused indeed, listening to their engine making so many innocent faux pas. It was clear that for them this was high entertainment.

"As a matter of fact they told me I had been quite good." From within his glass shelter on the station platform, Coppernob's voice was its driest yet. "Where have you come from, son? This isn't your territory."

The tank engine still rather gaped for a moment. Coppernob couldn't blame him. Even vehicles from his own railway, eight years into his public display on the center platform, often shot him sidelong glances of dismay or horror when they thought he couldn't see them do it. One could hardly expect a visitor to take the sight of a spotless, idle old engine in a rather large greenhouse with perfect equanimity.

"Eh?… oh umm… I'm from Brighton! E2106, at your service." The sidetank winked, but his own curiosity was not to be so easily deterred. "So it was a reward, being put in there? Do you like it?"

The question was an amazing bit of cheek, from a young stranger. And, of course, there was hardly any answer appropriate for an engine so new and wide-eyed and eager.

"It's one of the few ways left to be useful, when you're my age. However did you come up here, all the way from Brighton?"

The sidetank puffed up proudly. "I'm being sent to the front, I am!"

Coppernob's tubes had last been used before the turn of the century, and his system was then clean of any ash or clinker, but somehow he still coughed nearly to choking. "To—to what front?"

It was a foolish question, to be sure—but then, it was an unbelievable answer.

"To France!" sang the brand-new tank engine. "To help bring supplies to our boys in the trenches!"

Coppernob had been around long enough that not much could make him stare in this blank, baffled way. "That sort of duty is supposed to be voluntary," he croaked at last. "Even for our kind…"

"Eh? Well, of course! They told me I would volunteer. I'm awfully keen to aid the Effort. I'll get to be really useful, and I'll get to see the world. My ship should be calling here in just a day or two. That big dome of yours is pretty funny. Did all engines have those, when you were made?"

The old engine had gotten over his shock—how much more surprise could he have left, to know how people might treat their machines? Living or not. No, he was quite past shock, and sallying directly forth into anger.

It wasn't easy for him to get too worked up, not when his boiler had been cold for so long. But this just about reminded him what it felt like, to be sizzling with indignation.

"You're in steam," he observed, his neutral, stupid words belying his fury.

"Yes, sir! I'm making myself useful while we wait, I promise you. Yesterday I helped pull the supply train to get up north—" It was quite obvious that this had been his first-ever train; he beamed with pride. "—and now I'm here I've been working all night. That's why Driver said I might come over and visit you, as a little break. I've been shunting in those docks over there. You've seen them before, right? Back when you were on the rails?"

"Son, I helped build them." Coppernob still spoke automatically, not even seeing the tiresomely familiar horizon of platform and roofs ahead of him, thinking as fast as he could make himself think.

"What! Fancy that. I didn't know docks had to be built! I thought that was just engines and people." The sidetank was also peering ahead, but much more intently, his nose scrunched as he thought it over. "You mean there was once nothing here? Just rails?"

"Rails must be laid down too."

"… WHAT."

It was clear this revelation would keep the new engine occupied for days.

Until he was over at the front.

Coppernob coughed again, this time with purpose and decision. "Well, young E2160—"

"106."

"As you say. 106, I am glad for the time being to have you at our dockyards. It's a great help, having such a hard worker as I am sure that you are."

The sidetank beamed, his boiler swelling once again.

"However, our docks are pretty well looked after. I know for a fact that it's our steelworks that are running short-wheeled. Have you seen them, son? Right by the old station."

The sidetank looked willing, but dismayed. "It's the big one with a gate in front of it, in'it? It looks so dark and hot in there…" he added unhappily.

"There's nothing to be frightened of," Coppernob reproved, "it's quite a safe operation. A little dreary, to be sure, but then if you are expecting a tour of duty at the front to be a pleasure trip then you are about to be sorely disappointed."

"Oh, 'course not!" The tank engine was indignant. "I'm not afraid of hard work, let me tell you!"

"Good lad. Well, while you are here you would be most useful at the steelworks. They are working 'round-the-clock to keep up with the naval demand. You go on over there and ask for number Twenty. Tell him old Coppernob sent you."

The sidetank now looked less dejected, unable to help a giggle. "Old Coppernob? Is that you?"

"That's right," said the old engine, so severely that the sidetank got himself under control again, and quieted down, ready for further instruction. "Tell that to Twenty, or to Twenty-one if he's not available. All the saddletanks there used to be engines of ours, and they're a good lot. They'll put you to work, and look after you too."

"But how will I know when my ship comes in? I mustn't miss it."

"Of course you mustn't," agreed Coppernob gravely. "You just tell Twenty to let you know. He'll have his own ways of finding out. And in the meantime we will be grateful for your service, E2106."

"I'll get over there at once, then," said the sidetank. "Thanks awfully for the tip. Say, you know a lot, don't you?"

"It would be quite a waste to keep me around if I didn't. Take care of yourself, youngster."

"I will! Good-bye!"

The tank engine whistled farewell, and scurried off in a rush.

But not in so much of a rush that his fireman didn't have time to hop off. He and the driver waved at each other in understanding, and then the fireman, glancing around the near-deserted platforms and the stationmaster deep in conversation with an inspector, strolled over to Coppernob's glass house in what he obviously and fondly believed to be an innocent, unobtrusive sort of way.

"Driver and me owe you a great debt, number Three," he said, taking his cap off.

It was a mark of respect that no human had ever paid the engine before, and he blinked at it. But there were more important matters to be settled. "They didn't really ask him?! Are there no engines left in Brighton?"

The fireman made a face. "They did, that. Of course 'e agreed. Doesn't have a clew about anything in the world. To be sure, engines are scant just now—they're needed everywhere—but that don't make it right, that they took advantage of 'im. Innocent an' obliging as the day is long. Me an' Driver'll be damned before we let 'im get on that ship! I'm a loyal man—an' I don't 'old with shirkers nor cowards—but then again! I'd not let my own small nevvy be pressed into service overseas! A tot running errands with all the grenades and bombs and shouting and death all about—no, that's taking King an' Country a little too far, I think. Don't see why it's diff'rent with an engine. Not even a month old, that one is! Though 'e's not wrong about you, number Three. You are a clever old engine. We was 'oping to find 'elp 'ereabouts—been taking him 'round, lettin' him turn on the charm and mebbe find some allies—but we never dreamed you'd catch on so fast."

"You have friends now," Coppernob assured him. He liked this fireman very well; he was one of the better specimens that humanity had to offer. "The Twenties will keep him safe."

"We can't thank you enough." The fireman was twisting his cap in his hands. "But we're not out of the woods yet. You don't know that engine. It'll be 'ard going, keeping him in that big old steelworks for h'any length of time. 'e'll go spare in there. Too curious an' 'eadstrong for 'is own good!"

"I can see that," Coppernob agreed slowly. "I am not sure yet what is to be done. We have found new homes for some of our friends before—but never with Admiralty men crawling all about, as they are now. At any rate, the first thing is, to make sure he misses that ship."

"Yes—quite right. That much we'll do. We'll stick with 'im, too, Driver an' me. If we can find 'im a place, I suppose we can have 'im repainted, and blend in, like. Mebbe the steelworks—we'll try an' see if we can keep 'im steady. It's too close to the docks, though. Me an' driver 'ave to sleep sometime, an' I don't trust that engine to not talk someone else into letting him on some other ship while we're off-duty! Too much charm for 'is own good, that one. So long, number Three," he added, in a pointedly casual voice, as the stationmaster, now free, began to take notice of them. He waved and began to march off, the picture of a punctual footplateman, hastening to his duties, and certainly not scheming to steal one of his company's engines. "Clever old engine—much obliged. Much obliged…"

Coppernob watched him go rather blearily. It wasn't often he had such an exciting quarter-hour.

He closed his eyes, and muttered under his breath to Lady herself that he was prepared to revoke all his old prayers that something finally happen, should they have contributed even one bit to this mess.