On Time

by Paul Kozerski

  “Have I got that campfire walking on you, Vintski?”

  “Nothing I can’t handle.”

  “How’s she doing on water?”

  Vint offered a reassuring wink.

  “Sippin’ it like a lady. And don’t you worry about me, boss! I’ll keep her hot! You just keep her hittin’ her lick!”

  With that Vint took his foot off the firebox treadle. Its clamshell doors slammed as he spun about, arcing the hot shovel back into place beside their hijacked auditor. But even Vint’s exaggerated motion brought no reaction from the young man. All of Bernard’s earlier bravado was gone. What lingered was ashen and mute, locked in place with bloodless talon-fingers clamped to his jump seat.

  Bernard’s eyes did reanimate a bit later, when the engine cab began a subtle lean to the right. Ever so gently, 2982 continued its sway, until its drivers skipped off the rail’s inside head and sent it slowly back, tipping far left. The Berkshire did so again and once more. Its ponderous oscillations gathered momentum. Soon, everything in the cab was rocking with wide pendulum swings.

  The engineering world called it, dynamic augment, an event that happened when a steamer’s drive wheel counterweights exceeded their balance parameter. A windup resulted, which could actually raise a speeding locomotive from its rails, swaying the entire machine to and fro, like some rambling mammoth.

  Since the motion could also derail a steamer, the general rule was to back off in speed when such augment occurred. But, with the rare combination of tight rail, strong engine, and champion driver, a speeding locomotive could be nursed through that threshold, after which it would settle back to a level and even greater powering of its train.

  Such was the case today. Since Joe and Vint understood the machine’s elephantine antics, they rolled with it, like accustomed sailors. But, it wasn’t understood by their unnerved cab guest, who cringed even more at the mounting insanity.

  Vint did call out in a moment’s kingly license.

  “Aw, don’t sweat it, Slim. The old gal just kicked off her dancin’ shoes. That’s all. She’s gonna do some barefoot stompin’ now.”

  His words brought no response from Bernard. But, Vint wasn’t done trying. A new deviousness colored his face and the fireman began rubbing his belly, speaking to Joe in a tone certain for their nauseous passenger to overhear.

  “Don’t know ‘bout you, Joebie. But, all this action makes me downright famished!”

  Joe took the hint and played along.

  “That so?”

  “Man, it sure does! And I mean big-time hungry; you know, for something fillin’, like Sunday dinner at old Georgee’s diner. When we get home I just might stop in and have her fix me up a big old greasy, fried chicken leg, with a plate-load of watery spuds, and some of them soggy green beans, just swimmin’ in melted butter. If that ain’t eatin’, I don’t know what is!

  “Umm-UMMM!”

  Vint’s ploy worked. That was it for the glassy-eyed auditor. Sealing off a last breath, Bernard lumbered to his feet. He forgot about his clutch of Ticonderoga #2 pencils and precious clipboard, which both fell disregarded, straight to the rolling cab deck.

  Perfectly honed tips shattered and carefully notated pages skidded facedown underfoot, as Bernard shuffled for the speeding gangway. There, he braced and hovered a bit, then gathered a woeful grunt that augured clear down to his socks. Moments later his pair of recent box lunch hoagies launched into the train’s churning slipstream. Joe and Vint winced at the backdraft misting their bookish rider. But, the poor creature seemed detached from his own soiling and dragged silently back to slump in his jump seat.

  One car behind, uneasy glances made the rounds. The town of Galatia zipped by at 118 miles per hour. Quillaia was barely a notion at 121. A technician straightened from his fevered analog readouts and voiced a fatal verdict.

  “Well, that’s it. From here on, any purposeful test data is dead and gone.”

  DeLynne muffled a knowing smirk. Yep, just dangle the right bait. Worked every time.

  “I got his sorry hide.” He muttered proudly. “Got ‘em good.”

  Another technician approached DeLynne, eyeing the emergency stop cord.

  “What’s that? Got who? Where?”

  DeLynne dismissed the man with a curt wave.

  “Nothing. Sit back down and you forget that cord. We’ll be fine.”

  The only challenge to 2982 came not long after, in a dust cloud boiling out from a county road. The source was a ’32 Ford roadster and a machine eager to race.

  Its open engine bay housed a flathead V-8, crowned with snarling tri-power carburetors. Their wildcat growl veered the Deuce onto a brief stretch of parallel blacktop and in bold challenge of the thundering locomotive. Its pair of youthful riders grinned smugly, pacing, then briefly edging ahead of the Berkshire.

  But, their lead was destined to be slight and short-lived. Nothing was going to deny 2982 its day in the sun and after little more than a mile, the hotrod began running out of breath. Baby, though, drove on.

  Vint offered an acknowledging salute as the roadster conceded its loss and 2982 made for home.

  CHAPTER 38

  In sight of the finish line, Baby still hurtled at a full gallop. Yet, just moments later, it was unpowered. Sweetly coasting in, its hard exhaust beats slowed, grew longer, self-respecting.

  Noble, church-like peals issued from the engine’s bell, as if calling the faithful to service. Then, with a final, dignified sigh, the locomotive braked to a docile halt beside Sunday Guzmán and applauding yard workers.

  There were no white shirts on hand this time. They’d all relocated to a much more public locale downtown, where the triumphant second train entered an awaiting victory circle.

  But, it didn’t matter. For 2982, this was home.

  Sunday’s gloved hand skipped a damp shop towel across every crank journal, in a check for overheating. Yet, each blotting of the wet cloth merely offered a gentle vapor trail and no sputtering threats of damaged bearings.

  The roundhouse lead man proudly offered his lightly steaming rag in evidence, while nodding approval of the shredded engine flags dangling overhead.

  “Hardly winded!”

  Yardmen boisterously closed about the returned crew as Bernard Dooley untangled himself from the cab. Gathering up his personal effects, the auditor dismounted and shrank off in abject silence.

  “No hard feelings, Slim!” Vint cawed to his back. “You keep in touch, now!”

  But the collective cheer faded when DeLynne Leplak appeared, an awaiting Stosh Dombeck in tow. Dee’s smile was the mirthless grin of a homing shark and he had eyes only for Joe.

  “Well, Mister Zero Demerits. I hope you enjoyed your little afternoon jaunt. Because in one run you’ve busted more rules than most men do in a whole lifetime.”

  Dee then stepped aside, motioning for Stosh and the formal disciplinary machine to take over. Standing before Joe, Dombeck’s shoulders bunched against what seemed a nip of genuine regret. He was barely able to look at his longtime comrade when speaking.

  “Joe, I’m sorry. But, your crew is on official notice for breaking company safety and property rules as filed by Mister Leplak. Pending a formal investigation, you’re both suspended from work, until further notice.”

  There, Sunday elbowed his way between the accusers, barking at Stosh.

  “Hey! I’m the shop steward around here! How come I didn’t know of this? And shouldn’t you as a regional union rep defend hourly guys, not accuse them?”

  “You’re here now,” DeLynne snarled. “And you will get a copy of the formal charges, just like them. So, step aside.”

  The crowd’s festive mood curdled. Reacting as though a single organism, it bunched and crowded about the dual nucleus of Joe and DeLynne.

  Dee had figured on as much. To his credit, even surrounded
and outnumbered, he remained the master schemer. He was betting all he had on man number 5728 honorably accepting the disciplinary measures he knew were rightly deserved.

  Here though, an unexpected flare ignited in Joe’s gaze. It grew into a cold light and fed off the sullen crowd like a booster charge. Every molecule that was Joe Graczyk energized, seducing him into violent action.

  Enough of this crap. What do you have to lose? No cop in this town would put you in jail for waxing a jerk like this. So, go on. Do it. Hammer that face. Swell those eyes purple. Mash that nose into a stewed tomato and make it pay double for every single thing being done to this rail yard and town.

  The mob pressed tighter and Joe’s fingers clenched. Coiled hands drew to his sides, primed to unload a storm of wailing fists.

  Leplak began registering real fear.

  Nighty-night, Deeeeee-Lyneeeee.

  “PA! NO!”

  The cry doused Joe like a splash of icy water. It tore his rabid eyes off target and toward the daring interruption - a lone, approaching figure.

  For a moment, rage masked its source. Then, his son’s imploring face registered. The man’s powerful arms relaxed. His anvil fists uncoiled. No, he wouldn’t let the yard he cared so much about be cheapened by a riot bearing his name.

  The situation was defused. Logic returned and order prevailed.

  Joe looked back to an equally alarmed Stanley Dombeck and resumed the conversation which’d ground to a halt all those centuries before.

  “Not your fault, Stosh. Got no one to blame, but me.”

  DeLynne hurriedly retook command of the matter.

  “That’s a fact. Now, you two enginemen are to exit this property immediately. Do not return, until you receive official written notification instructing you to do so.”

  Lifting his overnight bag, Joe’s eyes touched again on his son. As usual, nothing betrayed what was going on in the man’s head. But Jim did sense a blink of gratitude as he departed.

  CHAPTER 39

  For 150 years the iron horse had been a mechanical embodiment of what was strong and proud and true. Its rumble and chug offered the magnetism of faraway places and high adventure to an indigent society, mostly anchored to the soil of its birth. It was a thing of power and romance, lording over the landscape and tying distant cities together for generations before the newfangled aeroplane was ever out of diapers.

  To command such a brute might’ve been most every red-blooded kid’s dream. Yet, Joe Graczyk never fooled himself with any romantic notions of railroading. His profession in it had come along simply as a job alternative to stoking blistering foundry cauldrons or lugging steaming beeves about a gut-slick slaughterhouse floor. But, as in some cases, where a durable relationship blossoms from the practicality of a happenstance marriage, Joe came to revel in his role and to be proud of his membership within the railroading community.

  Born literally a stone’s throw from the CC&S tracks, his affiliation with the company had begun long before there was any suggestion of actual train work. As a youngster, he’d tramped Mayhew’s weedy slopes many times, in hopes of clubbing a mangy stew rabbit for the family’s meager supper. And Joe’s first actual railroad pay had come with construction of the yard’s roundhouse, earning him five cents a day as an eight-year-old water boy, during the hottest summer of the fledgling century.

  At that time store-bought bread was just pennies a loaf, so Joe’s labors kept his mother, stepbrother and stepsister fed, while the family boozer was off somewhere, out of work and squandering their rent money on a fall-down drunk.

  It had been one rotten, scalding season. Yet, that same heat kept Joe working for ten, six day, weeks. And he embraced every single day of employment, hustling the heavy wooden pail and its galvanized dipper about the broad construction site, to the never-ending laborer’s tune, “Water boy! Bring that bucket on down!”

  The yard guys liked the way Joe worked. From time to time afterward, they gave the youngster other menial chores that subsidized family coffers. Even better, both management and railroad police looked the other way while he periodically trespassed on company property, scrounging precious waste coal for the family’s wintertime stove or grain spills for feeding their few, disinterested chickens.

  When he’d finally grown large enough to dare intervene in a drunken Saturday night slap-fest of his mother and take on his abusive stepfather, it was a CC&S slow freight that spirited Joe away, to a random downtown street crossing and its Marine Corps enlistment office. On his return from war, the railroad had also presented him with the love of his life.

  Unemployed Joe found CC&S personnel rosters depleted from the deadly Spanish Flu epidemic and he hired on as a laborer. Again, the work was demanding, but what was that to a man expecting nothing much from life? And again, his willing, hardworking nature grew to be known and respected, until one day when he was approached by the road foreman about joining an engine crew.

  Joe wasn’t sure. He was born of common laborer stock and unlike other young men of his generation, never harbored a love of the smoky machines. Crewing one would mean a lot of time spent faraway. But, a fireman’s pay was many leagues better and with the encouragement of his bride-to-be, he signed on.

  In those pre-stoker days, firing a locomotive meant hand feeding many tons of coal during the course of a wee hours trip. Toss in a poorly steaming engine, inferior load of fuel, and one of the many, seniority-sanctioned dictators ruling an engine’s right seat and a promising rookie’s life could truly be hell on earth.

  Still, Joe realized a certain instinct and ease in a locomotive cab that he’d never felt in any other labor. So, he bided his time and watched and listened and learned, patiently honing his efforts into the beginnings of a true craft.

  To Joe Graczyk railroading became a constant, a hedge against the uncertainties of a fluxing world. Foreign borders might wax and wane, the economy, ride high or bottom out. But the distance between rails always remained unchanged; the mileage from one yard to another, unaltered. And it was in his being counted upon, to move things from place to place, regardless of the weather, disposition of a crew or equipment, and getting it done on time, that made the work ever so rewarding.

  There’d been some noteworthy trips in his career. A time or two, Smokin’ Joe had the pleasure of hauling the Chicago Cubs to St. Louis for a game series. There’d been the bittersweet honor of chauffeuring proud, confident young men off to defend their country, later, sharing in the remorse of transporting their broken bodies back home. And late in World War II, there’d been that one creepy, two car train of Tommy-gun-toting, government G-men, technicians, and a load of what he’d later learned was something called uranium steel, as it passed through the Midwest on its way from the Oak Ridge research labs to the Los Alamos test ground and creation of the war-ending atomic bombs.

  Joe conducted his labors well enough to have been offered some prestigious jobs through the years. But, he’d always considered himself just a simple working stiff and turned them all down. An engine cab had been his life. Now though, for all that he and railroading had ever shared, it looked like Joe Graczyk was nearing the end of the line.

  His days on suspension were the worst thing Joe could imagine. Until then, he’d always been invested in some form of purposeful labor. To be abruptly severed from it and plunked amid no meaningful agenda was bewildering.

  Time dragged on in excruciating increments that Joe futilely tried filling with the home maintenance jobs he so used to enjoy. But now, the resetting of cabinet runners and leveling door hinges were empty chores. Fine tuning the car’s engine gave no joy.

  Any talk was desultory; mealtimes spent soberly stirring his plate. Sarah’s suggestions for trips around the horn fanned no sense of purpose and fell on deaf ears. The only times Joe could be mobilized were by wifely commands.

  “Bring those full clothes baskets up from the basem
ent, will you?”

  “Take that trash out, okay?”

  Each time Joe dutifully obeyed, conducting whatever new task Sarah assigned him in a robot-like manner. Only the clicking mailbox lid brought any animation to his daily movements. Yet, each new day’s post continued to hold no word from the company and the man plopped down whatever sundry letters were delivered, before dropping into the back-porch rocker, where he burned through packs of Pall Malls.

  One week to the day of his suspension, Joe’s formal hearing notice finally arrived. It came with a firm knock on the front door and special delivery by mailman Casimir Voss. Rosco greeted Joe with a pair of nearly identical envelopes. The first was registered and came bearing a stiff green receipt for Joe to endorse. The other was regular mail and addressed to him, as well.

  The last time both men had faced off in such an official manner was to perform a similar duty regarding a government formality of Mike’s combat death, and respectful of such private matters, they now, as then, merely exchanged silent nods, departing without comment.

  Joe saw that the regular letter was in an envelope similar to the first, though, oddly addressed by hand and sent without any return label. Something in the script also looked curiously familiar. But, he set it aside to focus on the only registered correspondence he had ever gotten from the company and one he’d never have dreamt possible - discharge proceedings levied against him.

  Sarah observed indirectly from her shredding of old linen into dust rags as Joe plunked down in a kitchen chair. Unfolding his pocketknife, he sliced open the envelope.

  Inside, was a sheet of elegant stationery. Similar to the one he’d all-to-recently received from his old pal, Chester, its stately letterhead bore the company’s name in thick block type and was ironically set to the noble likeness of a Berkshire locomotive. Just below that stately illustration, though, lurked the whack of a sledgehammer. Splashed across the page, boldly inked type left no doubt as to the letter’s purpose.