Mother said, “But Wally only found out about Morella and Creed this afternoon at the meeting.”
“Did he? What if Paula knew and used that information to recruit Wally, insinuating that the pastor killed his daughter?”
“Dear, you may have it,” Mother said, getting to her feet. “But I’m going to have to sleep on your theory—I’m knackered, as the Brits say.” She was so tired, she didn’t bother saying that in her UK accent. “We’ll explore all your excellent theories some more in the morning.”
Sushi trotted after Mother, preferring the comfortable bed to my couch-bound presence.
Not bothering to change into pj’s, I turned out the light and curled up.
Outside the rain was pouring, the wind howling, rattling the windows and shaking the Pullman. With all that clamor, I didn’t think I could fall asleep, my mind still buzzing around possible solutions to my theory. But the rocking of the train car from the wind and the drumming of the rain were actually lulling. Even the breathy, wolflike howl of it served to soothe me. . . .
Sushi woke me up, licking my face. Which only momentarily startled me, because that was what she always did when she had to piddle. In the dark, I looked at my cell phone—3:13—and groaned.
“Can’t you wait?” I asked her, and tried to stuff the little dog under my blanket, but she wiggled out.
I got up, joined Sushi at the front door, opened it, and she scurried out onto the platform and down the few stairs.
I followed, glad that the rain had stopped, a half moon glowing and a few stars shining between dark clouds.
But when I stepped to the ground, something was wrong. My feet had landed funny. And nothing looked familiar.
Was I dreaming?
I couldn’t make out any streetlights, and where was the driveway? But there was no driveway, no Explorer, and no house! Only trees and train tracks extending into the dark horizon. The Train That Went Nowhere had gone somewhere!
In the distance I heard a lonesome whistle blow, like the old song says. Then it blew again, louder, and I for one did not feel at all lonesome. I only wished I did!
We were sitting on the main line tracks!
I yelled to Sushi, who came scampering up a slope, and grabbed her, ran up the stairs and inside, then down the narrow hallway and into the bedroom.
“Wake up!” I screamed at Mother.
She bolted upright. “What? Where?”
As I threw back her covers, the train whistled again, sounding way too close.
“We’ve got to go or we’re dead!” I shouted.
With Sushi tucked under one arm, I grabbed Mother with the other, pulling her roughly out of bed.
“Move, move, move!” I yelled.
As I shoved her toward the bedroom’s exit door, Mother reached out and snatched her glasses off the nightstand.
Then we were outside, on the rear platform. But at this end, there were no stairs.
“Jump!” I commanded.
Befuddled, she hesitated, so I jumped holding Sushi, pulling her along with us, and we tumbled onto the hard gravel on the track.
The train whistle was earsplitting, the roar of its powerful engine unmistakable, Mother now fully cognizant of the danger.
Grabbing on to each other, we scrambled off the track and tumbled down into a wet, weedy gully just seconds before the train collided with the Pullman.
A Trash ’n’ Treasures Tip
One ploy a dishonest Internet bookseller will do is to trim the edges of a book jacket or a paperbound edition, where most wear and tear occurs, to make it seem a better copy in a photograph. Mother fell for this once. The cover of her Avon 1958 paperback edition of The Case of the Red Box just says Red Box at the top—a very tricky trick on the bookseller’s part, since the book’s real title is The Red Box and The Case of was added on the paperback.
Chapter Eleven
Poe Dough
The Pullman exploded into so much flying kindling on impact with the train, the crunching and snapping of wood accompanied by the screech of metal wheels braking against sparking metal tracks.
As the debris came raining down, I covered Sushi, and Mother covered me. Luckily, most of the projectiles had been propelled forward, away from us, and what did hit was splintered wooden shards and nothing metallic.
Slowly, we unfurled ourselves.
“Well, that wasn’t reminiscent of any Poe work I know of!” Mother said as if mildly outraged, sitting up with her legs out in front of her, straightening her cockeyed glasses.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
She nodded. “In one piece, apparently. You, dear?”
I took stock of myself. Other than a scraped knee and a few cuts on my bare feet, I appeared intact.
Mother asked urgently, “And little Sushi?”
I nodded. Sushi seemed unharmed, too, though her expression asked, What was that all about?
Above us a God-like voice boomed, “Anyone down there?”
But the figure with a flashlight, standing above us, was decidedly earthly, if silhouetted dramatically against the night sky.
“Two of us!” I called out.
“And a dog!” Mother added.
We were both still sitting on the grass amid smoking debris.
The figure descending the slope proved to be a man in a cap, denim shirt, and overalls.
Mother and I squinted as his light beam passed over us.
He asked with gruff concern, “You girls all right?”
“I believe we have all our parts,” Mother said, “and they appear to still be connected to us.”
He helped us to our feet, Mother first.
“What was that we hit?” he asked. “Not a car?”
“A railroad car,” I said. “Not auto-type car.”
His eyes were large now. “You were inside?”
“Dear,” Mother said to him, “might I suggest we discuss this in your engine cab? Over coffee, perhaps?”
“Why, yes—of course.”
He assisted Mother up the slope; I followed with Sushi in my arms. The little darling’s expression continued to raise the question of how and why we humans got into such messes.
While we walked alongside the stopped train, our rescuer introduced himself as Lionel Erickson, the engineer, and Mother introduced us as the sheriff of Serenity County and her deputy, and did anyone ever point out to him how “Lionel” was the name of the famous model trains?
“First time today,” he said.
When we’d reached the red Canadian Pacific engine, I asked Mr. Erickson if this train would be safe sitting here on the tracks, and the engineer said he’d notified the National Response Center right after the impact to shut down this line.
The cramped interior of the cab included two padded chairs on small risers in front of the double windshields, the one on the right facing a control panel with switches and gauges and a built-in phone; the one on the left, for a co-engineer (none on this trip, apparently), had a small work area.
Soon, Mother was seated in the latter chair, and Erickson was in his, swiveled toward her. I perched behind them in a little jump seat with Sushi on my lap. Her attitude had changed to interest, as this was a whole new setting for her. And us, for that matter.
With the cab’s lights on, I got a better look at our host: midthirties, handsome and studious in his dark-framed glasses. He seemed a more likely engineer of buildings than trains.
“Where are we?” I asked.
“About five miles north of Antiqua,” he said. “What were you doing in a boxcar on the tracks, anyway?”
“Not a boxcar,” Mother said. “Although I’ve often dreamed of what it might have been like to ride the rails and eat beans from a can warmed over a fire, but that would seem dangerous in a wooden boxcar, wouldn’t it?”
“Mother. Stay on point.”
She nodded. Her glasses, still slightly off-center, jiggled. “A Pullman car is what we were in.”
He frowned, blinked. “What
?”
“An old Pullman turned into lodging as part of a bed-and-breakfast, although frankly breakfast appears more an honorary designation in this instance.”
“Mother . . .” I said. Maybe she’d been shaken up worse than I realized.
But Erickson was nodding. “Ah! That converted Pullman over in Antiqua?”
“Exactly, dear,” Mother said, nodding. “That’s where my daughter and I were staying.”
“I thought she was your deputy.”
“She’s both. Brandy is a versatile young lady.”
He smiled, chuckled. “You know, I stayed there once with my wife, in that Pullman. She’s into antiquing, weekend getaway. But how in the world did it get onto this track?”
I said, “Someone must have pushed us during the night. Maybe with a car. Auto, not Pullman.”
“Apparently,” Mother added ominously, “someone wishing to do us harm.”
You think?
“Well, whoever did it,” Lionel said, “they went to a lot of trouble manually switching the track, then back again.” He shook his head slowly. “A pity. All that beautiful woodwork and those lovely antiques . . . destroyed. What a loss. My wife will cry. Ah . . . but at least you’re okay.”
I was just beginning to wonder if we rated. “What happens now?” I asked.
“The dispatcher at the CAC will by now have contacted the Accident Analysis Branch,” he said, “and they’ll be sending a cleanup crew and notifying the Federal Railroad Association to see if they want to get involved.” He paused. “The FRA usually won’t send investigators unless there’s a death, or derailment . . . but they may want to get involved in this. It’s a crime—attempted homicide. But I’ve never heard of a train being used as a murder weapon before.”
Mother said, “You simply must watch Double Indemnity sometime, dear.”
Glumly, I asked, “Then we have to stay here?”
“Yes. Sorry. I’ll do my best to make you ladies as comfortable as I can.”
Mother asked about coffee, which Lionel was able to provide, and I inquired about a place to lie down, which he couldn’t provide, because sleeping or even napping on the job was not permitted. But I was informed of a small padded bench I could use, across from the lavatory in the back of the engine.
Mother, sipping java from a thermos lid: “So, tell me, Lionel—may I call you Lionel?” She didn’t wait for a confirmation. “How long have you wanted to be a train engineer? Ever since you got your first toy trains as a boy?”
His eyes sparkled behind the glasses. “How did you guess?”
“I can just picture how wide your young eyes became when you saw the words ‘Lionel Trains’ on, what? The classic Blue Streak set?”
“I never had any Lionel trains.”
“Oh?” she said, disappointed.
“But,” the engineer said, “my parents gave me a Brio set when I was three.”
How could Mother engage in such small talk after what just happened to us? Or should I say, how could I expect her not to?
I vacated the jump seat, handed the furry little package that was Sushi to Mother, went through the small passageway to the back, located the airplane-style bathroom, used it, found the little bench, and made like a pretzel.
Later, the muffled voices of the cleanup crew outside woke me, and I unwound myself. Crikey, my neck! (Do not read the prior remark in a UK accent, please.)
I wandered back to the cab, early morning sunshine streaming through the double front windows now. Ahead, workmen were walking the line, Erickson among them, looking for stray debris, most of it having already been cleared from the tracks.
Mother, in the engineer’s chair, looked up from reading a thick manual, with no greeting.
“I believe I could operate this train,” she announced. She wiggled her shodden feet. “Look, dear—I’ve gotten back my shoes and duty belt!”
She looked comical in the pink robe with the bulky belt cinched at her waist. Her badge had been found as well—the five-pointed blue-trimmed gold star was pinned to the chenille garment.
It made me glad I’d slept in my clothes, although by now they weren’t exactly fresh.
“Any sign of my sandals?” I asked.
“Not so far.”
“How about our cell phones?”
She shook her head, then gestured to the flat counter in front of the co-engineer’s chair. “Have some fresh donuts and coffee that the nice men brought.”
I hoisted myself into the seat, then reached for an old-fashioned.
“How much longer till we’re sprung?” I asked, chewing.
“Not until we’re cleared to move. Then Lionel is going to drop us at the crossing at Antiqua, which is just a hop, skip, and a jump to the bed-and-breakfast—rather, the site of what once was the B-and-B, that is.”
I groused, “I’m not hopping, skipping, or jumping anywhere in bare feet.”
Mother put the manual down in her lap. “Dear, you can wear my shoes.”
You would bet, when the time came, that I’d take her up on that.
I asked, “Can’t someone give us a ride?”
“We are getting a ride, darling girl, on this train.”
“And then we walk.”
“And then we walk,” she agreed.
“Fine,” I said, sounding like the whiny teenager she often reduced me to. “Do you have the extra key to the Explorer?” My set was in my purse, probably in Timbuktu by now.
Where is Timbuktu, anyway?
Mother patted a pocket on the belt. “Right here.”
She meant the keys, not Timbuktu.
I looked around, frowning, mildly panicked. “Where’s Sushi?”
“The little darling is off helping us find our things.”
I started to get out of the chair, “Oh, I don’t know if that’s such a good idea—she’s not exactly Rin Tin Tin.”
Mother waved me back. “Sit, sit, sit. She’s fine. Having a lovely time.”
Glad someone was.
Erickson climbed into the cab, followed by Sushi, who had one of my sandals in her mouth. She trotted over and dropped it at my feet.
“Good girl,” I said. One was better than none.
“I’ve been given the okay to go,” he told us. “Are you sure you don’t want one of the men from the cleanup crew to drive you over to Antiqua in one of the trucks?”
“No,” Mother said, simultaneously with my “Yes.”
“Thank you all the same,” she said, smiling but firm.
“Well, all right, if that’s what you prefer.”
Mother remained seated in his chair. “Lionel, dear,” she cooed, coquettishly. “Mightn’t I drive the train? Just for this teensy while? With your supervision, of course! I’ve read the manual cover to cover, twice.”
So that’s why she didn’t want a lift back.
“I’m afraid,” Erickson said, “that would be against regulations. Company and federal.”
She batted her eyelashes, which twitched like a spider’s legs behind the magnified lenses. “I am the county sheriff, after all. If we were caught, you could blame me. You could say I commandeered the vehicle!”
“Ah . . .” He looked to me for help.
I might have informed him that Mother wasn’t licensed to drive a car, although she would only say that her revoked license said nothing about locomotives. Loco was right.
So I merely smiled.
You see, I just love these situations. Look forward to them. To watching people squirm when they get caught in Mother’s web (the eyelashes should have been a warning). Or, to put it succinctly, welcome to my world.
“All right,” Lionel said with a sigh. “But I’ll be right next to you.”
“One question,” Mother asked, as she swiveled to face the control panel.
“Yes?”
“Might I wear your cap?”
I settled into the co-engineer’s chair with Sushi, noting the lack of a seat belt. Wouldn’t it be just my luck, and Su
shi’s, too, to narrowly escape being hit by a train only to get derailed on the trip to safety?
But you know what? Mother turned out to be a pretty decent engineer, driver’s license or not—although she overdid it a little with the whistle approaching the crossroad. And pouted, at the end, when she had to give the cap back.
We bid our new, somewhat bemused friend good-bye, Lionel promising to make sure any more of our belongings that turned up would be sent to us. From there it was a short jaunt (I wore the one sandal and one of Mother’s shoes) to the Explorer, which she unlocked and climbed into. From the passenger’s seat she used the radio transmitter to call Deputy Chen.
While she was doing that, I revisited where the Pullman used to sit, Sushi tagging along.
The ground was muddy from the overnight rain, revealing tire tracks leading up to the train tracks. But I doubted any usable castings could be made, because the rain had continued through the night and obliterated details.
Sushi and I returned to Mother.
“Hop in, dear,” she said, just a woman of a certain age in a pink chenille robe who was sitting in a police vehicle. She might have been just your average everyday, run-of-the-mill mental patient, escaped from an institution and recovered by the cops. “I want to see if Myron is at city hall.”
I handed her Sushi, then came around and got behind the wheel.
As we drove the few blocks, Mother told me that in addition to filling in Deputy Chen, she had also reached Tony, who’d be returning to Antiqua as soon as possible.
“That’s all he said?” I asked, disappointed that he apparently hadn’t expressed concern for our latest narrow escape.
“Well,” she said, “naturally, he was relieved we were all right. He was so droll.”
“Droll?”
“Yes, he said something about wringing my neck. Isn’t he a stitch?”
At city hall we found the door locked, but just as we were about to return to the SUV, a plump woman in a white blouse, navy shirt, and jacket ran up to us.
“Ah,” Mother said to me, “here’s the bank manager. I don’t believe you’ve met.”
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