A/N: A big thanks yet again to CutCat for the beta read. Helpful input from ZeroethDog also much appreciated.
4: Foreign Relations
As Maryport and Carlisle No. 13 groaned to a halt, two of her vans were opened; the guard disembarked and checked the train; porters hopped to it, throwing in one package after another; one of the footplatemen darted to the facilities while the other went to consult the stationmaster and guard about some matter.
But amid this flurry of activity the engine herself underwent a strange transformation. Almost as soon as she had come to a stop, her eyelids dropped in an odd fluttery sort of way. For a moment Coppernob was concerned that she might be sick. Then she gave something between a yawn and a simper as she let off billowing, extravagant clouds of steam.
Despite her show of lassitude, she was eying the whole station… but eying it as if she did not want anyone to realise that she was looking. But looking 'round while at a stop is a perfectly ordinary activity that railway engines do all the time, and so utterly harmless that it was not even proscribed in whatever edition of the Regulations-Book that the stationmaster had committed to memory.
Coppernob found this behavior bizarre, and no less puzzling when—days later—he related the episode to Poppet, who wound up nearly bursting with a shriek of laughter; she would go on to explain that "the silly old bint" had been hoping to catch 15 at the station! ("Our 15?" "Of course. Or any Sharp or 'Gull she could have made an idiot of. But yes, 15 is her first choice." "Her first choice for what?") But Poppet would refuse to elaborate further, eyes sparkling and smokebox flushed—and that would be that.
In any case, it was only after the Carlisle engine confirmed the absence of much other activity that she favored Coppernob with a languid smile.
"No, no, don't ask me, luv," she insisted, before he could get very far in his appeal. "If I were to take him along all the way up the line to my depot someone would be bound to ask questions. My crewmen both like their jobs and I can't risk them for no good reason."
"No good reason?" Coppernob repeated, incredulous.
13 watched the head porter take a package to a uniformed man before answering. (It did really seem to him that her eyes were more pronounced than usual. Was he imagining it? Perhaps there was simply a smudge on the glass between them.) "Well, dear Coppernob, it's really none of their business. Mine neither…"
"More than once we helped your old coneys! Some might say it's time to return the favor."
"Yes, one day," said 13 vaguely, "but why now, luv? As you said, they were old and they were given no options besides the—erm—knife. This creature is in no such danger. He'll be made a pet somewhere, and if he goes to the front he won't be the first one…"
"Thirteen, what were you doing when you were a month old?"
"I go by 'Mary' now, actually."
"I beg your pardon," said the old engine dryly. "I didn't see a nameplate. But I'm asking, really."
"Ohhhh…" 13 trailed off, staring ahead unseeing. It appeared to take a moment. 13 was no young engine herself—a 2-4-0 whose designer had retired even before Coppernob had. But now, evidently to her own surprise, a wistful smile spread across her smokebox. "I was still being run-in, warn't I? The Maryport men didn't know how to handle my design. I remember they used to throw sugar cubes in my firebox. Even though I had the most embarrassing habit of sometimes lurching forwards when I was meant to go backwards!"
"That's what our young friend ought to be doing. Finding his bearings, being made much of. Not seeing human bodies mangled in half on the daily."
13 gasped, looking around with reflexive panic at the humans in their collared shirts and caps. But people must make an effort to listen in to the speech of engines, particularly when the engines are doing their best to be indistinct and low and hissing, and just then the humans were all too busy to take any mind. "Coppernob! Don't be horrible…" She shuddered, water shaking loose from her cylinders in sudden nervousness. "Gawd… It's a sad business, luv, but from everything I've seen, naval men are thick on the ground here. It's an awful tight net they have around you just now—and really, let us be pragmatic. With this war, there are horrors all over. If you were somehow to spare this young thing, another would be sent over in his place."
"We can't do anything for the others," argued Coppernob. "But we have the power to rescue this one and that makes him our responsibility."
"I'm not sure you have that power," said 13 seriously. She seemed quite wide-awake now. (But no—he wasn't imagining it—someone had taken the trouble of smearing soot around her eyes? Yes, indeed they had. A baffling procedure on a number of counts!) "I hardly see why it's worth bringing such trouble upon our men. You very well mightn't mind if they find out what you're doing, but our men need their pay or else they—"
Coppernob snorted. "Workers are needed everywhere right now! No willing man is going to be without a job for very long."
"Darling, if a young man can't afford an apprenticeship, then your railway is the best job he can get in all the county. It is not to be lightly thrown aside. Anyway, there are the dock shunters, and whatever other engines must be drafted into your scheme. And dear Poppet. You must think of her; she'll do anything for you. But if you're found out she'll be in deep disgrace. Likely banished to the Joint Lines. Isn't her future worth—oh," she added, as her guard whistled, "we're off. But," she added, over the sounds of her first slow chuff or two, "think about what I've said, luv!"
He did. And he felt even more frustrated than he had when the directors had left.
One didn't expect much from them—but this was a fellow engine!
She was wrong, completely wrong. Just grasping for excuses.
(Wasn't she?)
He thought about it as the commuter trains discharged their passengers. He thought about it as the stationmaster bored the head porter with war bulletins from the paper, interspersed with the usual complaints about how his back ached when the wind was in the east. He was still thinking about it after the rush, when 'Sharpie' number 15 somehow wrangled permission to pop in, and shewed great disappointment at hearing that the Carlisle engine had already gone up north.
She had made him see what this thing must look like to anyone outside their circle: a thoroughly overblown affair. A small and common injustice, only by chance catching the attention of an ancient, idle, lonely engine who had probably gone soft in the boiler.
Perhaps it was too easy for him to forget, sheltered and stationary, what the world was like. The effects of war were hard for anyone to escape and, anyway, even in peacetime friendless new engines were pushed beyond their limits every day. Nor was it only engines who suffered in that way; somehow the pain of humans and their machines alike had a price, and it was paid for and exchanged, and that was Trade: Trade, the humans' true god, who was worshipped six days a week instead of one… likely because she seemed to put food in mouths and clothes on bodies much more reliably than the Sabbath deity. Oh, surely there must be more to it than that, but they were only engines and that was as much of the picture as they could see. Sweat and steam and suffering went in one end; goods in plenty came out the other. That was the best the humans could come up with; it was how the world worked. Why should E2160 be spared?
(That bright voice, full of cheek but not yet acquainted with malice, piping up—because to the humans, perhaps, it was simply a number but to him it was his name and it was unthinkable that anyone could get it wrong: 106!
As you say, son. As you say…)
In the early evening light Poppet, who had scurried about all day to get everything shipshape, backed down on a train of empty stock. She was spic and span, leaving even Stationmaster with nothing to criticize, and thus visibly pleased with herself as she sizzled and waited for the men to make the final checks. She relished these 'jaunts' down to the harbour.
Coppernob watched her goings-on with an odd ache of fondness. It was clear that she had not for these past hours spared one thought for their secret refugee. Yes, he knew what 13 had meant. Poppet was eager to help because she was proud to be trusted and keen to test her wits, but, with the innocent selfishness of a happy engine, she did not have much worry or sympathy to spare.
And yet.
Deep in his cold firebox, something rebelled, and despite a lack of steam his wheels and axles clenched. The Carlisle engine had been wrong to use their Poppet as an argument against his scheme. Poppet, who was old enough to know the risks. Poppet, who was old enough to know her own mind. Perhaps this were a foolish undertaking—but they had undertaken it, and God and Lady alike despised a quitter.
The happy face and whistle of his young friend when she departed was incentive only to make sure they did not get caught.
Nevertheless, as the sun began to fall, he tasted the beginnings of despair. No. 13 had been right about one thing: the net was tight, and time was short. He really did not see what was to be done.
And then, an unexpected arrival. Another foreign train. The sometime-passerby from the Great Western was coming through the cleared and quiet station with his return.
(It was almost too good to be true?)
The goods station being packed, the foreign engine's faster freight was routed to platform three so that one of Poppet's shunting deputies could add to the train. The engine was a Mogul, and quite mannerly and dignified when Coppernob bid him a good evening.
There was something very… contained about the engine, which could either spell good or ill. But with the steelworks inspection on Thursday, Coppernob would have to find out.
"Do I have the honor of meeting one of the Western Aberdares?"
The Mogul eyed him through the gathering dim with mild surprise. "No, sir. But I see you are properly informed of our doings up here. No, sir, I'm newer than Mr Dean's Aberdares. Hrrmph—4300 class, I am. Designed by Mr Churchward. There are over sixty of us now—and more come out of Swindon every day."
"I see. And you're heading home now?"
"Hrrmph—hem—yes, sir, that's right. I went up with guns for France—I go down with provisions for Brazil—and tomorrow—well, sir! Who knows, but I shan't be here, sir. Midlands proper, more likely. They send us all about these days, sir. But I oughtn't say much more. Discretion is part of the Great Western way, sir—always has been."
"Ease up a bit on the 'sir.' They didn't knight me when they gave me this plinth."
"No, sir," agreed the Mogul. There was not one hint of humor on his face. It might have been all right, if he hadn't kept on biffing those Rs in that grating West Country manner. "I know of you, though. Yes, sir, everyone knows there's an old Bury engine preserved under glass at Barrow-in-Furness, up beyond the North Western. Hrrmph—hem! It is an honor to speak with you, sir."
Coppernob didn't particularly like that thought, but he took a little heart. He hadn't known, if this foreign engine would know the little code words and work-arounds they used in this region to speak of these things. But it seemed their railways shared more knowledge than he had realized. He'd never had the opportunity to know. "The pleasure is mine. We didn't often have other engines come by, before the war. Now, do you suppose you would have room on your train for a little more?"
"A little more, sir?" The Mogul sounded wary, though not resistant. "A little more what?"
Coppernob eyed him with just as much wariness. "A little lost hare, say."
The Mogul's eyes widened, and then he affected ignorance.
"Hare? Sir, this is a war supply train. I've nothin' to do with animal stock!"
This bit of play-acting got under Coppernob's paint. He had always despised cowardice, and would at least force the Mogul to say no properly. "It's quite a young hare. Too young. Yet its life is in danger, if it stays."
"Beg pardon, sir. But that has nothin' to do with me and mine."
"Perhaps some of yours may find it useful. The rails are very busy these days. And he is a strong, industrious sort of coney."
"Now look here." The Mogul was starting to sound angry. "I don't wish to contradict. And I'll say nothin'—this ain't my region, nor my place to. Respectin' our elders is part of the Great Western way. But so is followin' orders, see? Useful engines don't go 'round messin' with—hrrmph! 'hem—livestock ."
It was a clearly a bad job. But, if Coppernob had any steam, his valves would have been standing on end. Even the Carlisle engine had been more reasonable than this.
"And who—may I ask—taught you this 'Great Western way'?"
"Why, our managers, sir. Hrrmph—hem! Smartest management on all the British isles—meaning no disrespect to your own railway, you understand. I'm sure, sir, you engines here must have been taught similar. Nothin' under-wheeled, you see. Nothin' against the Schedule. Everything that a good engine needs to think about, it's in the Regulations-Book, see…"
Coppernob tuned out what promised to be something of a production. And eyes fell on what they always did: the hazy fog that obscured the industry of the docks.
When you were an old and idle, you weren't to try to make anything better. Leave the world to the new lot, let it go on as it would. You were to be a testament to the old ways, not a challenge to them.
But, when you were in service, you weren't to try to make anything better because… well, didn't you have enough work to be getting on with?
An engine might begin to think it was all a load of crock.
"Our first manager," he interrupted.
The Mogul didn't seem to mind. Likely he was very used to being cut off. "Yes, sir."
"Sir James Ramsden. All this city was scarcely nothing, when first I was made."
This was usually the point in his memoirs when young engines of his own railway started to roll their eyes, groan, and attempt to derail a familiar narrative.
But deference was indeed clearly part of the Great Western way. "Hrrrmph—hem! He sounds like a great man, sir."
"He was extraordinary. There is no industry in this entire district he did not build. An engineer, too. Understood our kind very well. Mind you, he was a hard man to please. You were not allowed to disappoint his plans. Fearsomely strict."
"As is good and proper," put in the Mogul.
"As is good and proper," agreed Coppernob. "Only, there was one thing I remember him saying. He was scolding one of our drivers, and of course we were all quite surprised, for he was reversing a matter of shed discipline. The driver attempted to defend himself, to little avail. 'All the don'ts in the world can't be added up to give a useful engine,' Sir James said to him, with great vehemence. The poor man looked confused. I think we all were, for he added, most emphatically: 'It's not the don'ts that make a useful engine. It's the dos."
The Mogul looked unimpressed, but thought it over and tried to make sense of the elderly engine's train of thought before venturing to speak.
"So—hrrmph!—your old manager would have been all right with you… roundin' up hares."
"Eh?" Coppernob, misty with reminisce, was startled. "Dear Lady, no. My axles are even now seizing up at the very idea. But then," he added softly, "he'd have never allowed this to happen to begin with."
The Mogul did not appear to return to the Great Western particularly enlightened by his stay up north.
It wasn't long, yet it wasn't soon enough for either of the two engines, before the train was cleared. Coppernob sighed and closed his eyes, thinking he was now quite alone… and unprepared for the loud cough from somewhere behind him.
Luckily it wasn't Stationmaster. It was a much shorter and stouter man. He was vaguely familiar to Coppernob, but he couldn't place him before the man gave him a hard, long stare. It was almost a glare.
"How many legs?" he demanded.
Coppernob was temporarily thrown back in time. Certainly it had been a long time since he'd felt so stupid. "… What?"
"How. many. legs. on. the. hare?"
"Erm… six. Ah—the door unlocks…"
The man glanced to the left and the right, then entered. There was not much room in the glass house beyond Coppernob's frames and the man was quite round, so the fit was uncomfortable for them both.
"I've just come from your sheds," he told Coppernob crossly. "They say there are no engines who can be spared. And here you have one you are trying to give away?"
"Wait—you're a No-Where manager?"
The phrase escaped from the engine before he could help it. The slip-up did not improve the man's mood.
"So they say," he said grimly. "Why am I being held out on, then? I'm an admirer of the Great Western myself—but I'm a good deal nearer! Ship it over to me. Tank or tender engine?"
Coppernob was quite stunned, and replied automatically.
The answer didn't seem to please the man. Nevertheless, he folded his arms. "Better than no engine. Your people do not seem prepared to offer me as much. What has this mad world come to! I do not normally stoop to do business with engines, but a crisis is a crisis. If you have it shipped over to me, I'll put it to work, and you'll not hear any awkward questions. I hope we have a deal."
"We wanted to send him your way. But the Admiralty is inspecting all ships."
"Of course they are. Bother!"
He began to tug at his collar, growing quite red in the face, and seeming at peace with the risk of absent-mindedly strangling himself.
"Sir," said Coppernob abruptly.
The man glared outright this time, looking unimpressed. There was command rather than deference in the engine's tone.
"Tell them you'll take a 4-4-0."
"Hang the 4-4-0s! We need long-haul goods, too."
"An engine's an engine and nothing special is needed, for us to take trucks."
"Yes," said the man, with killing sarcasm. "You're all quite interchangeable, you engines. Obedient sort of machines. Nary a thought in your smokeboxes."
Coppernob forged ahead. "They will not be giving up their 3 class, sir. We only have four of them, ourselves, and I doubt the Admiralty will think they're needed more your way than hours. Take the 4-4-0 and close the deal! A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. Besides, if you move quickly I am promising that you will get two birds."
The man's shoulders were squared, almost as wide as his waist. It was, Coppernob saw clearly, sheer stubbornness. He hadn't watched a couple hundred engines over the years get their wheels trimmed without knowing how to recognize contrariness when he saw it.
"Are they good engines, your 4-4-0s?"
Coppernob snorted weakly. "Good as in like me or good as in not like me?"
"That last one. Are they steady and biddable? Do they do their work without fuss? Are they of use with anything besides fast trains and photoshoots?"
Normally Coppernob did not believe in lying.
But then, did human managers ever really want the truth?
"Of course," he said stoutly.
"Like what?"
If one must lie, there was really very little point in holding back. "Piloting, light goods, shunting—the usual sort of things. They've all done a bit of it."
The man looked sceptical. "Every last one of them?"
"As alike as a set of china teacups." At least that much was true. As was the next statement or two he plucked from the air: "Quick learners, too. Anyway, so long as you get your services underway and show you're truly in business, the Midland should be willing to send some goods engines. They have plenty."
The man was too canny to admit the truth of this, but his expression lightened, and Coppernob, who had watched Sir James drive many a hard bargain, knew it was the moment to finish it off. "So we have a deal. If you agree to let my managers choose the engines, I'll throw in a brand-new sidetank. But you must get take receipt your first train by Wednesday."
"Wednesday! That will be a problem."
"The engines and stock we'll send you should help you finish your line," argued Coppernob, but the man was shaking his head.
"Well, truth is—I can't get that bally bridge to lower itself again!"
He made this stunning admission almost casually.
Coppernob looked after him in amazement when the man said good evening and departed to catch a tram back to the steamer. He really wasn't sure the Sodor engineer hadn't been an apparition.
He was still dazed when 'Sharpie' number 18 whooshed in, whistling a greeting. "Any word yet about the first No-Where train, Nobby?"
"Oh, goodness me, Eighteen."
"Goodness indeed! Have a heart. Ain't I a pretty decent sort of engine, Nobby? Keep out of trouble an' all? Do pass on any news. I know I shan't be sent over with anything special, but I'm still awful keen to get over there sometime, I don't mind telling you."
"No, son," said Coppernob, still absently. "You don't want to go over that bridge."
"I surely do! I only spend half my life waiting to get loaded at the pier and staring at that island all the while. 'Sides, Firelighter swears up and down there are great, knowing, murderous boulders over there. I want to see!"
18 said this with relish, and Coppernob raised his eyebrows.
"Perhaps I was wrong," he allowed, seeing that the younger engine remained earnest and unabashed. "Perhaps you wouldn't have minded testing that bridge, after all…"
18 was no fool. He caught the tense.
"Wouldn't have minded? No, I should not have. What's that then, Nobby—they've decided at last?"
Coppernob would say nothing more. He closed his eyes, and worked on his imitation of a sphinx.
"Oh, no!" 18 knew better than to start spitting at station, but his tone was emphatic as a hundred boulders. "It's going to be another bleedin' Seagull, innit?!"