Among the CC&S herd, engine 2105 proved to be the worst. It was born with slippery drivers, which even on a steady, dry and level pull, might inexplicably lose traction. Inferior drafting and mysterious timing maladies were common and the locomotive was prone to undetermined bouts of simply poor steaming.
Its logbook came to be speckled in blood, documenting a venomous existence of assorted cuts and scalds, severed fingers, and an eye lost to one crewman. After Joe’s wreck, though, 2105 gained a serious taste for blood. It later split a downstate yard switch while being backed to a waiting train, jumping the rails and crushing a front-end brakeman. Finally, came the baffling explosion of an entire side rod, speeding along the high iron late one night; sending it up through the cab and instantly dismembering an innocent fireman.
2105 was consequently moved to the company coalfields for low speed shuttle work. There, it’d settled in, becoming a docile engine. Still, veteran crews remembered, remaining watchful and suspicious, knowing well that the only real salvation for such a cursed machine was the sanctifying blue flame of a scrap man’s cutting torch.
And now here it was, back in Joe’s life and completing the yin to Baby’s yang, of his personal universe. Little about 2105 seemed to have changed. Somewhere along the line, it’d been reworked with a larger tender, but otherwise, basked innocently ahead.
Any peaceable illusions were shattered only seconds later, though, when Sunday Guzmán appeared. A freshly taped hunk of gauze webbing was cinched about his forearm.
“Careful of this one, compadre,” he warned. “She bites.”
The crew came up short.
“What’s with the bandage?”
Sunday bunched his shoulders.
“Beats the hell outta’ me. I was just passing through the cab on an hourly check and bang! The left seat water glass let go for no reason. Sprayed me a good one. Lucky, it didn’t hurt my pretty face.”
The hostler conjured a vengeful smile.
“Tell you what, José. When you come back, you can have the honor of parking her sorry ass over the ash pit and dropping her fire for good.”
Graczyk bowed to the offer.
“With pleasure.”
Spike cocked his head toward the door.
“Where’d the old four-wheeler come from?”
“Wescott. Their third-trickers brought it over for the last roundup. And it is one tired teapot.”
“No chance of using it, instead?”
Sunday rolled his eyes.
“That sorry junk pile barely made it here. You should’ve heard its rods clatter; sounded like a one-man band coming in.”
Starting up 2105’s steps, Joe offered his crew a final escape.
“You guys can still mark off this run. Union’d back your lay-off. And any heat that might come down would only be on me for demoting you.”
Vint spurned the offer with some quick logic.
“Shoot, Joebie. You’re the lion tamer! There’s no engine you can’t boss. Besides, with old Sunday there already hurt, any other bad luck’s got to be done for today. Right?
Guzmán eagerly endorsed the reasoning.
“Heck yeah! I’ll even take it outside for a better crack at me.”
But Joe thumped a claiming boot to the machine’s stirrup.
“No. She’s all mine.”
Headed out to work the turntable, Sunday came sharply about.
“By the way, compadre, you can be real proud of your kid last Friday night. Real proud.”
He glanced at the baffled engineer and crew.
“What? You guys ain’t heard? I thought word would be all over town by now, on how Jimmy tore into that jerk, DeLynne. Read him the riot act about bringing this engine here, just because of you, Joe, then went after him. Best send-off gift we could hope for.”
The concept was beyond Joe.
“My kid? Fight?”
“Oh yeah. If me and Boots didn’t pull him off, he might’ve ripped old Liplock in half. Seeing the bloody nose Jimmy gave the little rat was even sweeter than him getting the angle on beating your dyno rap.”
Joe’s silence heightened.
“That too, compadre. Like I said to you right after, we had a pat hand, going in. And all of it, Jimmy’s work. He took that clearance card and dug through the full rulebook, finding just what we needed to get you off. Even worded things for me to say. Your kid is one sharp guy and he never looks for any kind of credit.”
Joe trudged quietly ahead, feeling more burdened than ever.
Arrived in the birthplace of his longtime nightmare, the man paused. Yet, its cab gave no dark feedback. Maybe Vint was right. Maybe Sunday’s earlier run-in had shaken off the bad luck for today. With his crew settled in, Joe gave 2105’s whistle a couple fog-deadened toots and nudged it from the Mayhew shed.
CHAPTER 50
The clean-out crew arrived on site without incident. A bored, low energy security guard awaited them. Except for the languid and barely visible sweep of his dim flashlight beam, the man was nearly lost in the fog. Unlocking and swinging wide the broad property gate, his halfhearted motions hinted of him somehow feeling unduly imposed upon.
Spike dismounted the engine to work an overgrown spur switch. He motioned Joe across, then closed off the main. Returning, he rode its outside cab stirrup onto the factory ground.
“So, what’s exactly waiting for us down there?” He asked. “Didn’t understand the flimsies.”
“Paraffin flakes and toluene.” Joe replied.
The brakeman squinted.
“Paraffin. You mean like candle wax?”
“Guess so.”
“And tol-you-what?”
“Paint thinner stuff. Flammable.”
Spike sucked a low breath.
“Wonderful.”
2105’s downhill roll brought an immediate protest from the weary siding. Shriveled crossties moaned beneath its weight transfer. Anchor plates rang out in a brittle chorus and rail joints popped like stiff backbones. Joe cranked his headlight onto high beam, hoping that it might help melt through the milky cloud bank. But, the dense aerosol only fed off his effort, firing a blinding glare right back at him.
Across the cab, a toothpick shot uneasily from one corner of Vint’s mouth to the other. He watched Joe’s agile hands flitter between the engine brake and sanders. Darting among both, they dwelt on neither.
“How’s she feel, Joebie?”
Graczyk kept his eyes locked on the barely visible terrain, in reply.
“Greasy, brother. Soft and greasy.”
A growing number of business sidings shared a similar fate from their general lack of maintenance these days. Yet here, something more felt at play. An icy finger of portent tickled down the engineer’s spine that made Joe instinctively pat his lucky coin pocket, feeling its empty pleat go helplessly flat.
Still poised in his futile vantage point, Spike yanked a fresh cigar from his shirt. He ripped it in half with a fierce chomp, offering a truculent huff between bites.
“Horse shit! Damn front office loves them freaken’ dee-zels so much. Why the hell didn’t they send one of their precious little downtown switchers out for this two-bit, high wire act?”
Joe allowed himself an overdue bit of chiding.
“Now, now, what’s this? Mister, Gotta Change With The Times, is attacking company thinking? We can’t have that.”
Even at a crawl, 2105 dipped and swayed. Gnawing a ponderous trail through the snarl of descending ground cover, the engine’s pilot took on a hog-like quality; a steel snout plowing through the tangled weed bed, in search of those rails lost below.
Dense legions of tinder-dry sorrel, thistle, and goldenrod fanned out before the locomotive, then crowded back in. Their tasseled ranks scraped along the engine’s sides like eager torches in waiting, tickling dan
gerously at the open flame depths of its ash pan.
Vint batted at gouts of weedy fleece flooding the cab, continuing his study of the engineer.
“Sure hope this soupy air at least wets down all that dead stuff. She feelin’ any better, Joebie?”
Graczyk’s eyes never left the engine’s sweated window glass.
“Like the middle of a sponge cake.”
Chilled rails endured the new burden of wheels and weight. Slowly rising and settling, their ends shifted about like the heads of groggy snakes. A mulch of crushed vines soon had engine running gear doused in green wads of thick, pungent sap. Watching it brought another and now completely insubordinate objection, from Spike.
“Aw hell, Joe! The rails might as well be smeared with Grandma’s homemade jelly. We’ll never get a load out of here. Why not sit tight, until some sun comes out to burn off this fog? Or, just back out now and refuse the whole damn job on grounds of safety.”
Joe took another good-natured swipe at his friend.
“And give old Liplock one last chance to write us up before he’s even out of town?”
“Aw, let him get his panties in a bunch! He’s not the one out here in this spook-house crap. Cars loaded with just dead weight would be bad enough. But ones full of flammable stuff, when we can’t hardly see . . .”
“Don’t matter, what I think,” declared Joe. “We’re here now and the morning paper said no real sun until late tomorrow. Besides, I told you to mark off of this run more than once.”
Spike grumbled, settling back.
“Yeah. I know. I know.”
The track ahead finally leveled out and a first hopper car congealed. Spike tucked his tobacco quid in a far corner of mouth, while Joe brought 2105 to a surgically precise stop. The brakeman snatched up his lantern bail and tools, muttering a last time, before dropping into the tinder bed of chest high weeds.
“Damn spook house crap.”
“Want me to walk the other side?” Offered Vint.
“Nah. I got it. You just stay ready to get us the hell out of here.”
Spike fired a few pointless swats at the grainy air and weeds crowding him. Lamp and brake bar then raised high, he stepped off like a fly fisherman testing the current of an unfamiliar stream. In the span of a half dozen steps, the man’s burly form was reduced to a smudge and lost. But, Joe could hear his testy rhythm of fog-muffled clanks and thuds as he went about examining axles, air hoses, and couplers on the long-idled cars.
“All gear and rigging are okay,” he reported on his return.“Tamper seals, still in place. A couple wheel boxes are low on oil, so their journal tops are rusty.”
“We don’t have that far to go,” reasoned Joe. “They should polish themselves clean in a few revs. Let’s put some air to ‘em and get this deal over with.”
“Yeah,” Spike agreed. “Maybe the old witch’s compressors won’t pump up and we can leave light.”
He punctuated his scorn with a demeaning squirt of tobacco juice that hissed angrily on the locomotive and made Joe call out in mock warning.
“Hey, don’t go tickin’ her off! She’s been behaved up to now!”
Joe eased the engine ahead. Couplers locked and Spike connected the lead car’s airline. 2105’s compressors then kicked in, the yards of stagnant plumbing gushing with new breath. All cars held brake pressure, offering the day’s first promising sign.
Fingers crossed, Spike next motioned Joe out. He momentarily remained behind, watching each passing car for signs of trouble as the locomotive began its retreat. Ever so slowly, a parade of logy axles broke free. Their rusted wheels squealed in a raspy choir, but soon warmed to life and began a compliant roll.
Spike hurried back aboard, for another gangway ride off the eerie property. Now under load, 2105 felt its way backward and uphill. Again, it dipped and swayed. Beneath a full train’s weight, the burdened ties and rails groaned even more.
Then, midway back, Joe felt a twitch different from anything prior. A quick tremor of his headlight beam confirmed something bad was taking place. Before he could voice concern, the length of old, flawed steel below shuddered and shifted. A bitter moan of tearing metal took flight. With it, the rail crown supporting Joe peeled free like a fruit rind. Substance turned to mush and 2105 began a heavy-shouldered lean to its right.
Joe confirmed the wide eyes of his crew.
“SHE’S GOING OVER - JUMP!”
Though braced for the inevitable, neither Spike nor Vint moved, galvanized by both the moment and reluctance to abandon their friend.
“I SAID GO!” Graczyk thundered. “JUMP! RUN!”
“Joe . . .”
“GET OUTTA HERE! NOW!”
His crew obeyed. They leapt from the rising side of their slowly tipping engine and were gone. Left alone, Joe raced to address the unveiling catastrophe.
He flattened the engine throttle, yanked open the wheel sanders and swung the airbrake system into emergency. This he hoped, would lock the locomotive’s drivers, while some portion of them still contacted the rails. One of the strained couplers should then overload and break, sending the flammable freight cars back downhill and clear of any possible fire up here.
The gamble paid off. 2105 caught long enough to dig in. Joe heard a shotgun blast of its exploding lead coupler and felt the half dozen freight cars break free. They rumbled away in the fog, shaking the entire hillside as they separated from the locomotive and each other.
But the trip away also set their cargoes in violent motion. Stored liquids and solids broke loose within the careening transports. Tons of paraffin and solvent pounded at restraining bulkheads and braces. Welded seams split. Bolted joints tore open. Heaps of loose chips sprayed high and wide, dusting the terrain like the heavy flakes of an early frost and somewhere below, Joe imagined a lethal splashing of freed liquids.
His immediate concern rested with shutting down the crippled locomotive and he was determined to ride over with it, if need be. But, continuing in its lean, his fire was also shifting. Before the man could start any further emergency action, its strangled airflow reversed and turned on him.
Searing stack gases back-drafted. They erupted in the cab, engulfing Joe like a mad hornet swarm. Superheated air stung his flesh. Sparks and cinders raked his throat, clawing at his eyes. His legs threatened to buckle under the assault, only the man’s hardheadedness keeping him erect.
Joe steeled against the cruel blowback, groping his way through its blistering stench. Across the angled cab he found Vint’s abandoned controls. Their valve collection swam before his mounting hypoxia, as he blindly pawed at those needing attention.
His hands recognized the stoker control first and Joe rammed it to full power, attempting to smother the firebox with excess fuel. To bleed off boiler pressure, he slammed open the mud ring blow-down and cylinder petcocks, even lashing the whistle back, loosing the rage of a wounded animal into the heavy, poisonous air.
With everything done, he climbed the nearly vertical face which his locomotive floor had become. The engine dwelt a time in its graceless tip-over and Joe bunched trembling legs, set to follow his crew’s retreat. Some last bits of steam still pulsed in the throttle lines of the man’s escape path, though. It powered 2105’s loose wheels with futile, yet dangerous, jerks that he gauged a jump across and beyond, between the angled engine and still upright tender. But finally springing out, his leap proved ill timed.
The man’s launch coincided with a last, wheel journal sweep; one that caught and snagged the weedy ground. His dying locomotive lurched a bit and shifted. Its full and still connected tender snapped loose with the action, allowing the steamer to complete its lethal tip-over.
Firebox doors sprang wide on impact. An avalanche of iridescent coals spewed from the machine’s ruptured belly, out and onto the unprotected hillside. Joe’s deck plate perch was likewise, yanked away. It d
umped the engineer unrehearsed, into the smothering abyss and a headlong crash with a dark wall of heavy tender rivets. His head whiplashed aside, scalp splitting to the bone.
A swarm of brilliant stars briefly peopled the man’s collapsing universe. They flared in wild, sloppy orbits before burning out, drawing all form and substance with them. Joe’s senses blunted and swooned. He sank in a well of blackness, vagrant thoughts touching on a wife and son and things left undone.
CHAPTER 51
Jim awoke layered between a stiff hunk of grimy shipping canvas and the hard, cold bunk of a chilly caboose. He struggled up from under the makeshift wrap, which’d been carefully tucked, blanket-style, about him. Ahead, Ulees stood framed in the car’s doorway, watching a gloomy dawn laboring to be born.
The big man spoke without looking.
“Feelin’ any better?”
Jim nodded provisionally.
“Except for the ax buried in my forehead.”
“Sorry ‘bout not havin’ a fire. Thought one might draw us some bad attention.”
Eyes clenched, Jim worked his thick and parched tongue.
“What’re you doing back here, anyway? You should be long gone.”
“I was; clear down to old Cairo town. Then I saw Mister Moon start up his antics a couple nights past and knowed I’d best turn around and get on back.”
Jim recalled a bit of last night’s curious sky. But, he made no connection as he rubbed his aching forehead.
“Huh?”
“Him and me, we had us an old bargain that just came due,” Ulees answered. “Let it go at that.”
Jim didn’t try understanding.
“Whatever the reason, thanks - for everything.”
The man gave his friend a quick study.
“Well, with you okay now, I guess I’ll catch me the next outbound that comes through.”
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