Chapter 4: Meeting some new friends
Percy was puffing along the main line towards Tidmouth Sheds and the large motive power depot within which the sheds sat, and feeling very excited, with Ralph and his fireman with Carrie standing upon his footplate. Though Percy had been told of the many different reasons why Carrie had come to Sodor in the first place and was, quite understandably, very shocked to hear about what her life had been like back at home, he quickly reassured her that the other engines would understand everything and wouldn't think any less of her, something Ralph agreed to.
As they went along the line away from Knapford Station, Carrie couldn't help but look out from the sides of the cab and seeing all the sights that she normally wouldn't see if she was standing at a point away from the railway lines. She saw all the different trackside infrastructure, including trackside huts of various sizes, signal boxes, long steel rails stacked alongside the lines, as well as the familiar sights of engines with their trains going along the different lines. What amazed Carrie most of all was how different each engine was, with big ones, smaller ones, and even the sights of shunters working away at their jobs. Each engine was painted in a different colour, and a few were seen with their paintwork cleaned to a very high standard. Many of the engines they passed by often blew their whistles in greeting and called out "Hello Percy!" or "Good morning, Percy!" as the little green engine went on by, and Percy would always called out "Hello!" or "Good morning!" to the engines who greeted him, with Ralph always blowing Percy's whistle as they went past.
Whenever trains went by, Carrie was amazed by the sounds of different trains going past, as well as the sights of the locomotives and their trains going by, and not to mention the smells of smoke and steam that entered the cab. In fact, Carrie was so astonished by all the various different sights, sounds, and smells of everything that she was experiencing in the moment that she didn't notice when they approached a junction and went over the points and on the line that would take them to Tidmouth Sheds.
Soon, Tidmouth Sheds came into view ahead of them, and Percy puffed over the points and along the straight line that led up to the turntable sitting in front of the sheds, where Thomas, Edward, Henry, Gordon, James, Duck, and the Scottish Twins Donald and Douglas were all being readied by the fitters for their next turns of duty that morning. As they all chatted away with each other of what the day might bring, the other engines then saw Percy approach them with a loud toot of his whistle and it was then that they noticed that he seemed to be very excited about something, which interested them all.
"Hello, everyone." Percy said, as he came to a stop in the middle of the turntable.
"Hello, Percy." the other engines all said, as Ralph and Carrie stepped out from the cab and walked in front of Percy.
"Hello there, engines." Ralph said, greeting his steam engine friends, as he walked towards them with Carrie following closely behind him.
"Morning Ralph." the engines replied.
"You look particularly pleased about something, Percy; what's up?" asked Gordon.
"Yes, and who's your new passenger?" Thomas asked curiously, now that he and the others had seen Carrie with Ralph and his fireman.
"Thomas, everyone…not too long ago this morning, Ralph found out something incredibly unexpected; this girl that you see here before you all is Carrie White…the daughter that Ralph never knew he had." Percy announced to his friends excitedly.
The other engines were very surprised to hear that unexpected piece of news, and their mouths dropped in total astonishment.
"You have a daughter, Ralph?!" asked Duck, in surprise.
"Yes, Duck…Carrie is the daughter that I never knew I had. I know this as she has with her a photograph of her and her mother…who happens to be Margaret Brigham, my ex-wife." Ralph said, while trying to keep Carrie calm as she looked from one engine to another in awe.
"Well Carrie, how did…how did you get over here to Sodor?" James asked in concern, knowing how far away Sodor was from the United States.
"I…I came here because…I ran away from home." Carrie replied nervously, as she looked towards James. The engines gasped a little at this and looked towards each other nervously, wondering what could be wrong with what was going on in Carrie's life that she did something as drastic as that.
"Running away from home? But…from what at home?" asked Henry, also with some concern and nervousness as Carrie slowly turned her attention to him.
"Engines…let's...let's make no bones about it. Carrie came here for the very same reason that I first came here to the Island of Sodor nearly 17 very long years ago…my ex-wife, Margaret, had been badly abusing Carrie within the home where Carrie grew up." Ralph said, which caused the engines to gasp in shock upon hearing that.
"Oh, my goodness…that's…that's just horrible." Edward said, with sorrow for Carrie.
"It's worse than that…because of how my momma treated me and raised me back home over the years…it made me an easy target for the bullies in my school…the worst of them all being Chris Hargensen…" Carrie said, and she spoke a little bit to the engines of what the school bullying had been like for her, including mentioning some of the most horrible things many of the worst bullies had done to her in high school, as well as the names of some of the bullies.
The engines were all horrified to hear some of the many disturbing details about Carrie's difficult past as well as to hear about how bad her school life had been for her. But Ralph then went a little bit further by explaining to them all a few more details about Carrie's life, including what Margaret, his ex-wife, had done to Carrie within the walls of the home she had grown up in for many years. This last piece of news made the engines very cross…but not with Carrie.
"That's just disgraceful!" said Gordon, grimly.
"It's utterly disgusting!" spluttered James, crossly.
"Those people are despicable!" added Henry, sternly.
Ralph felt himself smile a little at hearing that; whenever something really horrible or terrible happened to another person, or to another engine, that really shouldn't happen at all, Henry, Gordon and James would be quick to give their well-known opinions on the matter.
"To have such things like that being done to a young lass like yourself, it's to teach all of those people a jolly good lesson we'd be wanting!" Douglas said, sternly.
"Ach, aye Dougie!" said Donald, grimly agreeing with his twin.
"I just don't understand it…how on earth could so many people be so cruel in that sort of way...and just to someone like Carrie?" Thomas asked, in some sorrow for Carrie.
"Well…unfortunately Thomas, there's...there's just people out there in the world who just won't cop on and stop what they do…regardless of what you do with them or how much you try to anyway." said Ralph, with a heavy sign.
"Yes, sir." said Thomas.
"Well Carrie…don't you at all worry about running away from all of that nonsense. I think that you did the right thing for your own sake to leave that place if you felt your life was in danger." Edward said reassuringly, which helped to calm Carrie to down a little.
"Thank you...thank you." Carrie said, as a small smile came across her face, as she looked towards Edward.
"And if that was us in that same predicament as you were in that horrible old town, Carrie…I'm quite sure that we'd all have done the exact same thing that you did and gotten out of there while we had the chance to do so." said Duck, as the other engines murmured in agreement.
"Okay engine...engines, that's enough." Ralph said, as he brought his hands up to quieten the engines down before he spoke again. "Now…Carrie's been through quite a lot in her life so far already…as you've all just heard her say, but we all need to make her feel welcome here. For very soon, when Sir Topham Hatt's new apprenticeship recruitment scheme starts up in early January next year, Carrie will be one of the railway's new recruits."
The genuine sorrow that the engines all had for Carrie only a few moments before quickly turned to delight when they heard this news, knowing that she would soon be a part of their railway and a regular sight in the yards or out on the line.
"In that case, Carrie…welcome to the Island of Sodor!" said Thomas, as he and the other engines blew their whistles loud and long, giving Carrie a real heart-warming Sodor welcome. And for the first time in all the long years of misery that she could remember, Carrie smiled the biggest smile that she'd ever given before, really and deeply touched by the warm welcome she'd been given from the engines of Sodor.
(Back in Chamberlain)
Meanwhile, back in Carrie's hometown of Chamberlain, there was immense confusion, uncertainty and worry amongst everyone about the whereabouts of the missing Carrie White. The very first person to realise that something was wrong had been Carrie's abusive and religiously domineering mother, Margaret White, after she woke up later that morning. Looking into Carrie's room, she saw that she wasn't there at all, and so she went downstairs to see if she was there; she wasn't there at all. When she read the note Carrie had left behind on the kitchen table not too long after she got up, and realised in fact that Carrie wasn't in the house at all, she initially didn't believe Carrie would just run off like that. She then spent some time that morning looking round the different streets for her, including going round and asking other people if they'd seen Carrie at all…no one had. But as morning changed into afternoon, she knew that something far more serious might have happened.
At about 2pm that afternoon - by which time Carrie was already LONG gone - the Chamberlain Police Department were informed of Carrie's disappearance. A number of the local police officers, aided by some local volunteers, went round the streets making enquiries to see if anyone had seen Carrie, while in the countryside just outside of the town of Chamberlain a number of searches took place. Though many of the local people in Chamberlain had already left town for Thanksgiving week, rumours slowly went out among those remaining about how Carrie might have suddenly disappeared and the circumstances as to why.
It wasn't too long, less than a full day actually, before the local news stations in Chamberlain, as well as a smaller number of other news stations outside of town, got word of Carrie White's disappearance and came to the site of the White residence along Carlin Street in Chamberlain to report on this latest developing news story. Yet despite the slow growing media interest in Carrie's unexpected disappearance, Margaret White wouldn't give any interviews or give any statements or comments to the press about what may have happened to her daughter and stayed within her home, and thus out of sight of the cameras.
By the morning of Monday November 28th, which was the first day back to school after the Thanksgiving holidays, the news of Carrie's sudden disappearance had spread all round the state of Maine like wildfire, with many theories coming up within the press as to why she had suddenly vanished in the first place and how it may have happened. By then however, most of Carrie's fellow school mates had returned to Chamberlain after the Thanksgiving break, and it was the first time that some of them had heard the news of the disappearance of the school's outcast and scapegoat, with many of the others having only just heard about it on the news in recent days.
Initially, the first news reports that many of them had heard on the news in the last week, either on the television or on the radio, had stated that a sixteen-year-old girl from the town of Chamberlain, Maine had suddenly and unexpectedly disappeared, but at first Carrie's name wasn't mentioned in any of these early reports. It was only in the middle of Thanksgiving week that the news reports first mentioned Carrie's name and who she was as well as a few other selected details.
The news didn't initially worry many of the other students in Ewen High at first, particularly Chris Hargensen and most of the other girls who were in her group when they all heard the news about it, thinking that Carrie would be found relatively quickly…until they all heard that Carrie had been gone since the weekend before Thanksgiving. And it was that little fact that caused quite a few of them to start worrying a little. Chris and many of her group weren't too concerned, as they were hoping to play as many pranks and tricks as they could on the school's outcast after Thanksgiving, which Chris had planned personally to undertake against Carrie. Yet, what she was unaware of was that Carrie ran away from Chamberlain precisely to avoid becoming a victim of those potential pranks.
At the front of Ewen High School the first thing on Monday morning, many of the students who were arriving for school after the holidays had questions thrown at them by some small groups of reporters who were gathered outside the main entrance and eager for a good story, even something like a short quote or brief statement. However, most of the students simply ignored the reporters and made their way inside the building, and to their lockers, eager to start their classes after Thanksgiving and try to get some resemblance of normal life going again.
But when the students went over to their lockers and opened them, many of those among them couldn't help but take a glance or two over towards where Carrie's locker was. Normally, she'd be there getting her things to start another day of school just as they were. But now, with her not there…the other students knew things in the school were gonna be quite different from this point on…now that the school's main outcast, misfit and designated scapegoat wasn't gonna be around these corridors anymore.
At lunchtime on Monday afternoon, Chris Hargensen and the girls in her group were sitting at their usual table, which actually was not too far away from the table where Carrie would usually sit on her own. Chris, Tina Blake and Donna Kellogg were eating away and occasionally chatting with each other in between bites, as Sue Snell, the Watson Twins, Heather, Jessica Upshaw and a few of the other girls in the group, in between bites and chatting with each other, glanced every now and then over towards the empty table close by, where Carrie would always sit by herself. Strangely, and despite the numbers of people who would often come into the cafeteria for lunch, no one was sitting at Carrie's empty table just yet.
"I wonder what happened to her…" Sue murmured, to no one in particular.
"Happened to whom?" Tina asked, looking up from her bowl of soup.
"Well Carrie, of course. The thought of where she's gone and why she suddenly left." Sue said, looking towards Tina.
"So? That's nothing to be concerned about, Sue." Chris said, after swallowing a bite of her sandwich as Tina and Donna murmured in quiet agreement. Sue and most of the other girls in the group looked towards their leader in a stunned way. Even they were slightly aghast at Chris' unconcerned attitude to a missing person, though each of them was very careful not to let it show on their faces.
"You're not at all worried about Carrie?" Heather asked, slightly appalled at this, yet taking care not to look too concerned on the outside.
"Why should I be? To be honest, I think that things here in school will be much better, now that she's not around here anymore." Chris said, as she took a sip from her bottle of Coca Cola.
"Look she's a human just like everyone else here. Including you, Chris. Don't you think…we all may have bullied her too much and caused her to leave?" Jessica suggested.
"Look…wherever she's gone, she could use the extended time away to be honest." Chris said, starting to get a little annoyed her minions were starting to worry for the "freak of the school".
"You're not at all worried that something might happen to her?" said Sue, now even more appalled by her "friend's" opinions.
"No, I'm not. I'm sure that Carrie could easily take care of herself…wherever she is." Chris said, trying not to lose her temper from the constant questions her minions were asking about Carrie. Sensing this, all the other girls at the table turned back to their lunches, ending the conversation right there and then.
(Out in the corridor)
At Carrie's locker, Principal Morton, the school's gym teacher Rita Desjardin as well as two police officers from the Chamberlain Police Department, one of them female, watched as one of the school janitors opened the locker door. Rita, Principal Morton and the officers were all hoping that there might be some clue left inside there as to indicate why Carrie suddenly disappeared, particularly as the authorities had recently started an investigation into Carrie's disappearance and the events that had led up to it.
After opening the locker, the janitor stood back and allowed the others to have a look inside.
"Hang on a second…what's this?" Rita said, as she reached forward and pulled out a brown A4 sized envelope with a smaller white envelope stuck to it with sticky tape. Pulling off the white envelope while handing the larger brown one to the female officer, Rita opened it and looked at the letter contained within.
"What is it, Rita?" Principal Morton asked.
"It's a handwritten letter, sir." Rita said, and she read aloud to them all what was in the letter. By the time she was finished reading it, there was a stunned silence among the four of them.
"Oh, my god…" the male police officer said quietly, a few seconds after Rita finished reading the letter. The female officer opened up the brown envelope and pulled out the 400-page copybook that Carrie had left behind from inside it, before she then opened it to have a look at some of the pages in the middle of the book. After about 10 to 20 seconds or so, she looked up to the others with a slightly horrified look on her face.
"I think we've got the reason why Carrie suddenly vanished. Come on, John…let's get ourselves back to the station and have a good look through all of this." she said, as Rita handed her the letter.
After speaking with Principal Morton and Rita for a few moments, where they were asked not to reveal anything about this until the police had been given a chance to look at these papers, the two officers left the school and headed back to the police station, leaving Rita and Principal Morton the task of closing Carrie's locker back up and trying to decide what would be the best way to reveal everything to the other students in the school when the time for it arrived.
Rita turned her attention back to Carrie's locker and everything that was still inside it.
"Oh god...her mother's gonna want all of this." she said with a heavy sigh, as she and Principal Morton started the job of clearing out the locker.
(Meanwhile, back on Sodor; evening time)
Ralph had finished another day of work and had clocked out before going out to meet Carrie, who was standing around and waiting for him. She had her suitcase and all her things with her, as they'd already gone and gotten it from the Fat Controller's office over at Knapford Station.
"Well, shall we head on home, Carrie?" Ralph asked.
"Of course, dad." Carrie said and, with smiles on their faces, they headed out the gate and walked on down the street and into the town of Knapford a short way until they arrived at a bus stop near a crossroads with lots of shops along both sides of it.
"I don't live very far from here, Carrie…just a tad over a mile. But I always either take the bus in or sometimes I might even walk in if I've got some time on my hands before I have to start work. But obviously, it does depend on what time my next shift takes place, whether it's in the morning or if I have to take the night shift…which does happen at times." Ralph said.
"Do you have a car?" Carrie asked.
"Yes, I do. But I usually only drive into work if the weather's bad, such as if there's heavy rain or snow about." said Ralph.
Then a moment later, there was a horn sounding from down the road. Carrie and Ralph turned their heads to see a bright red single decker bus coming towards them and, just like the engines she'd already met earlier, Carrie could see this bus had a very cheery face with a big smile on its front. Taking a deep breath while keeping calm on the outside, she got ready to meet this new personality.
"Good evening, Ralph…shall I take you home?" the bus asked, whose name was Bertie, as he came to a stop.
"Certainly Bertie, but first I want to introduce you to someone I met earlier today. This is Carrie…my daughter. Carrie, this is Bertie…one of the buses I use to get from my house to here and back each day." Ralph said.
"H-hello there." Carrie said, staying calm on the outside but unable to believe that she was speaking to a road vehicle which had a real living face on it.
"Hello Carrie, welcome to Sodor." Bertie said, cheerily.
"Well come on, Bertie. Take us home." Ralph said, as he climbed aboard with Carrie following along behind. Once he and Carrie were seated, Bertie set off down the road.
It wasn't too long before they arrived at the bus stop round the corner from where Ralph lived and he and Carrie got off.
"Thanks for the ride, Bertie." Carrie said.
"No problem, Carrie…I'll see you when I see you!" and with a cheery toot of his horn, Bertie set off down the road to the next bus stop.
"That Bertie's quite a character." Carrie said, as she watched Bertie drive off down the road before he turned round the bend and vanished from sight.
"He is, and one of Thomas' best friends. They had a race together along Thomas' branch line quite a few years back and Thomas won it. They've been friends ever since." Ralph said.
"Will I get the chance to meet other people my age around here very soon?" Carrie asked, as they walked down the road to Ralph's house.
"You will, and I'm sure many of them will want to befriend you." Ralph said reassuringly, and Carrie felt herself smile, knowing now that she would soon get to have friends, something she'd never had back home and ones that she could, hopefully, rely upon.
After a short walk of about two or three minutes, they arrived at Ralph's house. Carrie was impressed with it; it was a wide two-story building painted white with black windowsills and a garage connected at one end of the building. The front yard had a straight driveway down the middle with two areas of grass on both sides of it.
"Wow, this is a nice place." Carrie said, as she looked over her father's home.
"Thanks, I bought it thanks to a really substantial nest egg that my late parents, your grandparents, left to me after they died, as well as doing a lot of hard work back in Chamberlain before I came over here. Margaret never knew anything about the amount of money that I had." Ralph said.
"I dread to think about what might've happened had she known about it." Carrie said quietly, as Ralph opened the door, and they stepped inside and turned on the lights.
Looking round, Carrie was impressed by her father's place; it was much larger and so much brighter than her old place back in Chamberlain. The lights in the hallway were much brighter and the yellow painted walls helped to reflect the light and make the room brighter. The carpet on the floor was a navy blue with yellow stars, and covered the whole floor going into the living room.
Yet, the fact that surprised Carrie most of all after the front door was closed was the total lack of ANY form of religious iconography mounted on the walls; there were no bible quotes, crucifixes, sayings in picture frames, pictures of bible scenes, or anything along those lines at all, and certainly no form of any religious-style knick-knacks sitting on any of the shelves or spare open spaces. But then again, as her father had said to her earlier in the day, he'd given up believing in all that religious nonsense years before, as he felt it hadn't been worth being a religious person to begin with.
Off to her right was the living room, one of two in the building, with another being inside a closed door to her left at the foot of the stairs; lining the back wall around and above the large T.V. and stretching from floor to ceiling was a bookshelf that was filled with many books, almost all of which seemed to be about British railway history, and amongst the books on the shelves, there were also quite a few different manuals of how certain mechanical components on different varieties and types of steam locomotives worked.
"Where can I sleep, dad?" Carrie asked, as she looked round.
"You can stay in one of the guest rooms, Carrie. Just go upstairs, turn right and it'll be the first door on the left." said Ralph, as he took off his coat and hung it up on the coat stand in the corner.
Going upstairs and turning right, Carrie went along and came upon the door, opened it and switched on the light; the room was painted in a light cream yellow with a white ceiling. In the room was a double bed with four pillows and a quilt, all covered with light coloured covers. On both sides of the head of the bed were bedside lockers with reading lights on them. There was a writing desk in one corner with a comfortable looking chair by it with a chest of drawers against the wall to the right of the entrance door.
At one end of the room was a door that led to an ensuite bathroom, complete with a combined bathtub and shower. The windows of both bedroom and bathroom looked over the backyard, which had a shed tucked into one of the corners by the fence, and on the other side of that fence was a double tracked railway line.
Taking in a deep breath, Carrie turned, sat down on the bed and took a long look at her new surroundings; it was only now starting to settle into her mind that she really was finally free from the previous difficult life she had known back in Chamberlain only a few days before. She also realised that the future which had once seemed very uncertain and foggy at best was now open and clear for her to see. Yes, it wasn't the career that she initially had in mind when she was growing up, but at the same time though, it was certainly going to be a very interesting kickstart to whatever the future held for her…and she was looking forward to it.
She took the opportunity not long after to strip off and have a much-needed shower; having gone without a wash for close to two weeks, she didn't need to be told by anyone that she smelt a bit. Once she had turned on the hot water and it came up to temperature, she stepped under the hot water and allowed it to flow over her body. As she washed herself up, rubbed shampoo into her hair and scrubbed nearly a fortnight's worth of grime off of herself in the hot running water, she began to feel more human again.
Stepping out from the ensuite bathroom a short while later, all wrapped up in soft white towels, Carrie set about getting herself dried off and then changed into fresh clothes. Once that was done, she went out to the main bathroom outside her room, and put her dirty clothes into the wash-basket. Now her shower was completed, and she was all cleaned up, Carrie felt much better than she had for the last few days.
A little while later, Carrie and her father were sitting at the table in the kitchen having a hot dinner. They were talking with each other about what their lives had been like over the last few years. Carrie, for her part, was telling her father about what Chamberlain was like now and how much of the town had changed over the last few years, as well as mentioning all the different parts of town that had stayed more or less the same during that time.
Ralph, for his part, told Carrie about what his life on the Island of Sodor had been like for the years he'd been living on the island, and that he'd been given a chance to drive many of the steam locomotives on various different jobs, and what his fondest memories were of working on Sodor over the last few years, as well as how he started working on the Sodor Railway system and what he had to do to work his way up. He first came to Sodor back in the summer of 1995, and joined the railway not too long after he had settled in, first starting off as an engine cleaner, as well as doing various maintenance work on engines, rolling stock and such, including the most difficult tasts. As time went on, he had worked his way up through the ranks, eventually becoming a fireman and doing all sorts of work on the different steam engines. He eventually qualified to be an engine driver in late 2002, after having been living on Sodor for a little over seven years by that point, and had been working within that position ever since. It was a job he really loved, and wanted to keep on doing it for as long as he could.
He also told Carrie quite a bit of what his marriage to Margaret had been like for the time they were together, and what Ralph had gone through with Margaret's questionable mental state until the accident at Ralph's workplace gave Ralph the opportunity to leave Chamberlain quickly and quietly. Ralph revealed to Carrie that it wasn't until three months after the wedding had taken place that he realised he'd made a mistake in marrying Margaret, especially when he mentioned all the things she'd done to him in their house, including Margaret assaulting him with things and him trying to defend himself. In the time between realising his mistake and quickly leaving Chamberlain, Ralph mentioned that, in his spare time and while at work, he'd been thinking of ways that he could try and end his marriage to Margaret without too much loss of face. He told Carrie that it was those thoughts and the effect of what Margaret was doing to him that caused him to avoid many people in Chamberlain, and thus cause them to think that he was a fanatical religious person like Margaret.
At the same time, he mentioned to Carrie that it was in that time that he realised that it wasn't worth it to be a fundamentally religious person, and the experience of being married to Margaret had caused him to abandon religion and the beliefs he previously held entirely, and be who he wanted to be in life and choose what career he really wanted to have.
Outside, night had fallen and it was now fully dark. Many of the houses in the area had their lights on, as well as some buildings that already had their Christmas lights up a little bit early, and streetlights illuminated the deserted empty streets, as many of the town's residents had already gone home for the night. From the double track railway lines just on the other side of the fence in the back garden, the sounds of the nocturnal trains, including many of the slower freights, could be heard going along every now and then as they went by on their nightly work, transporting things like fish, steel, coal, iron ore and oil, various types of aggregates, stone, mail and newspapers, china-clay, slate, construction materials, timber, and many other things that needed to run at night when the railway wasn't anywhere near as busy as it was in the daytime.
At one point, Ralph looked over at Carrie and noticed she had a look on her face that seemed as if she wanted to ask him something.
"What's on your mind, Carrie?" he asked, as he took a sip of water.
"Well…there's this rumour about you that I heard back home and…I'm just trying to work up the courage to ask it." Carrie said.
"Which is?" Ralph asked, as he raised one eyebrow and leaned in a little.
"Well…the rumour is that when you went off to work each day back home, you would carry a bible and a 0.38 calibre revolver with you." Carrie said.
Ralph looked at Carrie for what seemed like ages, but in reality, it was only for about ten or fifteen seconds – much to Carrie's slight discomfort - and then he chuckled heartily for a few seconds - much to Carrie's relief - before he shook his head and looked at Carrie again.
"No Carrie, that's not true at all. I think that's just another of the set of rumours people back in Chamberlain made up about me, no doubt, because I was married to a woman as righteous and religiously domineering, and not to mention as strange, as Margaret. Besides…I see no use for me to have something like a gun anyway...apart from maybe a few books about them." Ralph said.
"Oh...I see." Carrie said, now understanding it was just more rumours about her father and not actual facts.
And also, I actually NEVER carried a bible to work either…I've no use for such a thing…either then or now…though I DO know that one of my co-workers at that construction site did carry a bible to work each day…and somehow I can see how that could've easily gotten morphed into a story about me taking a bible to work. Also, I did hear a rumour that one of the lead foremen of the construction site I worked at back then did have a revolver or a hand-held firearm of some sort and calibre securely stowed somewhere within the confines of his office, but I never believed a word of that. But then again...I suppose all of that doesn't really matter too much now...not all these long years later." he said, as he sighed while memories of his past life flooded through his head.
"Oh…sorry, I just wanted to know." Carrie said.
"It's all right, Carrie. I'm sure there were lots of rumours like that about me, but none of them are true. If you have any questions about me from that time, don't be afraid to ask me about them. Okay?" Ralph said.
"Okay, dad." Carrie said, and they carried on eating their dinner.
(Later that evening)
That night when Carrie went to sleep, she had the best night's sleep she'd had for many years and even the bed seemed to be quite welcoming with the softness of the mattress on which she slept, the duvet that covered her, and the pillows on which her head lay. The radiator along the wall under the window was still quite hot from earlier, though the central heating was now turned off for the night, and was helping to keep the room toasty warm. At different times during the night, trains would come and go on the lines at the end of the garden, the sounds of which would cause her to open her eyes and sit up a little as the trains rattled by.
First off, there would come the whistle in the distance and then, after a short time, the locomotives would come by with the hiss of steam, sharp chuffs from the chimneys and the clanking of the valve gear followed not long after by the sounds of rolling stock along with the sound of many sets of buffers clanking off of each other, before the sounds of the trains would disappear into the distance with the sound gradually fading out the further away the train got from the house.
Carrie was unsure as to whether or not she would get used to this night after night, but she quickly remembered a piece of advice that one of her teachers back in Ewen High School in Chamberlain had told the class one day only a year or so before, "You can get used to anything over time" and keeping that in mind, Carrie went back to sleep again, settling her head down onto the soft white pillow as the sound of another train, and the rattling of what sounded like the wagons of a loose-coupled freight went on by.