Why should he care what had happened to Helga? He would never know anyway, since this journey on the fabulous Orient Express was almost over for him, something of a wasted experience, since he realised he would remember little but his own frustrations.
Ten minutes later they were approaching Stuttgart, gathering together their luggage, as they prepared to wait on the branch line where the Luxorian train would collect them.
A tap on the door announced the ‘chef de train’. 'Sirs, I have bad news,' he said, handing Dieter a piece of paper which he read, his face expressionless.
'What is it?' demanded Faro anxiously.
Dieter sighed. 'The storm we have come though has done widespread damage. There has been a landslide. The royal train will be delayed for a few hours until the line can be cleared.'
'I have a suggestion, sir,' said the ‘chef de train’, eager to be helpful.
'In English, if you please,' said Faro, determined not to miss any of this vital information.
'Yes, sir. About ten kilometres distant there is an alternative route. The old railway line to the Luxorian border which was closed as unnecessary when the Orient Express took over. It is now used only for freight trains.'
'And?' said Dieter.
'We pass by, a mere half kilometre from the old station. It would be possible to halt there and for you to disembark. It is just a short distance to walk over to the siding, which you will be able to see from the train.'
Dieter frowned, clearly put out by this new suggestion, and Faro decided that knowing even less about the terrain he had better keep his thoughts to himself. Dieter was leader of the party, decisions were in his hands.
'What sort of station facilities are there?' he asked.
'Unfortunately none, sir. It is no longer in use for passengers. They need to keep the line open as the freight trains move a lot slower than our express train. There is a waiting-room, and a porter in attendance. It will be for only a very short time,' he added encouragingly.
As he was speaking, the great train came to a halt. 'Over there, sir, you can see the siding.'
There had been a fall of snow and the black-and-white world, with a wood and a slight hill, was a very unappealing sight.
'It looks like the middle of nowhere,' whispered George.
It did indeed.
The siding had long since ceased to be dignified as a railway station. The Orient Express would have passed it by without being aware of its existence. The recent heavy snowfall did nothing to soften the bleak dreariness and isolation of a tiny hut alongside the platform, the waiting-room a somewhat extravagant description.
Steps were provided to set them down on the track.
The ‘chef de train’ was full of apologies. He was very polite but, to anyone carefully observing his expression, hardly able to conceal his impatience to get his train safely under way again. And not only for the delays to his scheduled timetable. There was another much more important reason: safety.
And that was uppermost in his mind at this moment as he looked anxiously down the track at the lovely gleaming length of his train. He did not know the identity of the two boys, but guessed that the party must be important Luxorian nationals to be able to afford such a journey. He did not want trouble from some irate official in London, so he would make ample provision that they did not go hungry while they waited.
Beside their luggage, a large picnic hamper appeared. ‘This with our compliments, sir. We hope it will make your waiting more pleasant.'
What the Luxorian nationals did not know, and the ‘chef de train’ did not care to impart or brood upon, was that this was a notorious area with greater dangers to life and limb than a heavy snowfall and going hungry for a few hours. There were brigands, notorious killers who would have shot a man for considerably less than the picnic hamper and a few pieces of luggage.
He was already looking over his shoulder as he talked, praying that this wild and apparently empty countryside would not suddenly erupt with whooping gun-firing horsemen, tempted to descend on his precious Orient Express by the prospect of so many treasures within their grasp. In this dangerous territory the freight trains carried guns and the guards went armed. On his train, so civilised and fashionable, there was nothing so vulgar as an armed guard, no soldiers with a gun-carriage at the ready. The thought of his passengers made him want to weep. The ladies, such wealth, such jewels. Such pickings.
Already conscious of illustrious countenances bearing irate looks staring out of windows and standing on the train's steps, demanding to know what the delay was all about, he realised he had lingered too long already. He looked at the little group with their luggage and the picnic basket. Two young boys, he thought sadly. Then he remembered he had daughters that age. Not privileged girls, but ones who would need good dowries.
Should he warn the two men of the possible dangers that lay ahead, just out of sight perhaps? If anything happened to his train he thought of all those other illustrious passengers who would not hesitate to bring an action against La Compagnie Internationale. He shuddered, thinking of the tears and tirades of his wife, the miseries of his children should he be held responsible, brought before a company tribunal, downgraded or worse, dismissed.
No. He must not linger. And bowing quickly, he boarded the train and left their fate in God's hands. He hoped.
Chapter 16
Faro watched the train disappear snail-like into the gathering nightfall, its smoke a series of pale exclamation marks against the darkening sky.
Left stranded by the empty railway line, he felt suddenly angry and resentful. He should by now have seen George and Anton safely aboard the Luxorian train in the custody of Dieter and, with a telegraph sent to Imogen, be waiting on a platform in Stuttgart for the Heidelberg train. He looked in exasperation at the little group for which his responsibility was not yet ended, the two boys scared and vulnerable and considered the landscape with a jaundiced eye. As far as he could gather, they were the only humans visible in a desolate land, a world in mourning, where spring's rebirth was a forlorn hope in the wilderness which nature had forgotten.
At his side, Dieter wearily picked up the valise and the picnic hamper. The two boys had swiftly deserted the luggage and, waiting for someone to tell them what to do next, were pelting each other with snowballs.
'It will soon be dark,' said Dieter. 'We should get settled for the night. Delays in this area can be lengthy. We must not expect too much.'
'Then we had better see what the building over there has to offer,' said Faro with little hope as they set off in the direction of the old railway siding.
They stumbled over the rough ground. The recent heavy snowfall, unmarked by human footfalls, might have appeared beautiful in any other context. Nothing, however, could soften the bleak dreariness of the scene around them, broken by one solitary building. By no stretch of imagination could this small wooden hut be dignified as the waiting-room, Faro thought grimly.
They pushed open the door. By a flickering stove, a dejected-looking porter, with only a red and rather dripping nose visible above the swathe of shawls in which he was huddled against the cold, picked up a wavering lamp to inspect the new arrivals.
Perhaps expecting an influx of would-be passengers, he went to the door and, peering into the gloom, he raised the lamp and shook his head by way of acknowledgement, since greeting seemed a gross exaggeration in that expression of woeful melancholy.
‘The Luxorian train?' Cupping his hand to his ear, he answered Dieter's question and stared up and down the line. 'No, Excellencies, I have been told nothing about any engine from Luxoria. It is not on my station schedule,' he added sternly. 'We deal only with freight trains.'
Dieter translated before embarking on a detailed explanation in German which Faro gathered related to the landslide emergency. The porter clearly understood not one word but was intent on argument. Exasperated, Dieter turned to Faro.
'This is getting us nowhere.' And turning back to the porter he suggested tele
graphing Luxoria to let them know that expected passengers are waiting for the train to collect them.
The man shook his head triumphantly at that. 'No, Excellency, you cannot. For the simple reason that we don't have one. It broke down years ago and was never replaced.'
'Then where is the nearest office?'
'Two kilometres down the line.'
Dieter translated this new disaster briefly for Faro's benefit.
'I will go,' Dieter added finally. 'I must let them know where we are.'
'Let me come with you,' said Anton.
'No. You stay with Mr Faro. It isn't far and I will be back as soon as I can.'
Faro admired the man's courage. He did not fancy the inactivity of waiting but someone had to remain with the boys. He was painfully conscious of his limitations in this emergency, helpless to deal with the intricacies of sending telegraph messages in a language only half understood in a German zone with a difficult local dialect, if the porter was anything to judge by.
'There must be houses somewhere not too far off,' said George.
'What makes you think that?' asked Faro hopefully.
'When we were playing in the snow out there, we heard dogs barking, didn't we Anton?'
Dogs? Faro and Dieter exchanged anxious looks. Guessing that it was more likely the distant howl of a wolf pack, Faro followed the bodyguard outside. 'You will take care.'
Dieter looked towards the woods, a thick black impenetrable mass. 'Yes. But do not trouble yourself on my account. Wolves will not attack me. I will borrow the porter's lamp. Fire will keep them at bay. And I have a gun. I will be quite safe.'
'I think you should wait until daybreak.'
'And spend all night just waiting, doing nothing?' Dieter laughed harshly. Faro understood that this emotion was one they shared and any further argument was useless. With George and Anton, he watched Dieter walking down the track until the swinging lamp was swallowed up by the darkness.
Inside the tiny hut the two boys huddled close to the stove, while the old porter applauded his good fortune in sharing the travellers' hamper of excellent food. The only item which he recognised instantly was cold roast chicken. But his palate happily accommodated all the new tastes, the like of which he had never before experienced and had little hope of ever doing so again. And such wine too!
At last he bedded down on what was little more than a straw pallet in a corner farthest from the door. The comfort of the travellers was not his concern. Wrapped in his voluminous cape, he was soon snoring and Faro wondered if he had a home somewhere and what had brought an old man long past retirement age to such a comfortless existence.
Yawning, the two boys looked helplessly at Faro as he considered two long wooden benches facing each other on opposite walls in what must have been a cold and inhospitable waiting-room even in its better days. At least the porter had indicated that there were plenty of logs to keep the fire going all night, mostly old sleepers from a broken-down platform.
'We must be thankful for small mercies,' Faro told the boys, setting Anton to sleep on one bench and George on the other. ‘We are well-fed and warm,’ he added. Rubbing his hands, he smiled encouragingly. ‘We will survive until morning very well indeed.'
'Where will you sleep, sir?' asked George.
Faro indicated a wooden chair.
'You may have my bench, sir. I will sleep there.'
Faro smiled. 'Thank you for the offer, but as it is five feet long and I am over six feet tall, I think it is better adapted for your needs than mine.' He nodded towards the chair. 'I will do excellently in that.' He refrained from adding that in any case he would be unable to sleep until he saw Dieter safely back.
And so he began his vigil. The two boys were silent, probably exhausted, and he hoped asleep, for outside the barking they had mistaken for dogs became unmistakably wolves howling.
It grew noisier, hungrier and bolder. And nearer.
After a while, George sat up. 'I cannot sleep, Mr Faro. I am too excited. Seeing Mama tomorrow, I expect. I can hardly believe it. I am so glad to be going home again. I never realised it until now. I do wish you could meet my mother, sir. You would like her very much.'
Faro did not doubt that as he nodded politely.
'And she will like you and want to thank you for bringing me safely home.' Pausing, he looked at the book open on Faro's knee. 'But I am disturbing you, sir. I have finished ‘Treasure Island’, I enjoyed it but real life is much more exciting, isn't it?'
Faro could only agree to that too. There were few moments in most boys' lives, and he hoped there would be none in this particular lad's existence more exciting and dangerous than the present one of being stranded in an old railway-hut with a starving wolf pack howling outside the door.
'I should like to read more books by Mr Stevenson,' said George. 'Has he written anything else I might like and find interesting?'
Faro did not think there were many books more exciting and interesting than ‘Kidnapped’ which had a curious parallel in George's life and his own at this very moment.
'It is the story of a man and a boy on a terrific adventure and the friendship that grew between them in danger. Mr Stevenson, someone wrote, had a genius for friendship. And he knew what he was talking about, he has a young stepson.'
'I should like to read that book, sir.'
'Then I shall send you a copy as soon as I get back to Scotland.'
'Oh, thank you, sir. I shall look forward to that.'
'Some of their adventures are in the Highlands. You'll enjoy that part, I'm sure.'
George sighed sadly. 'And I will keep it to remind me of my time at Glenatholl.' He looked at Faro. 'I do wish I had the chance to see your islands, Mr Faro, your Orkney.'
'So you shall when you come to Britain again.'
But he knew, and he thought that George also knew, how remote the possibility was of his return to school or even to Scotland in the foreseeable future.
George looked at him. 'I would be greatly obliged, sir, if you would tell me a little more about the Vikings.'
And so, by the embers of a dying stove that cracked and sparked as Faro fed it more logs, with George at his side, he retold stories from the ‘Orkneyinga Saga’ of the Norse chieftains, of Vikings and trolls and mermaids.
And of how his own grandmother was reputed to be a seal woman. 'She had webbed toes and fingers and people said she had magic powers of foretelling the future. She came from the kingdom of the sea, so folks believed.'
George listened enthralled as Faro told him the legend of the seal woman, not his grandmother this time, one who was taken in a fisherman's net and, falling in love with her captor, shed her skin and became mortal. They married and had children. Then one day she found, hidden in an old chest, her seal skin. When she took it in her hands, the sea called her home again.
He looked down at George, his head resting against his shoulder. He was breathing deeply, fast asleep and Faro pushed back his hair and kissed his forehead gently. As he did so he whispered in his heart the words he must never utter aloud, 'Goodnight, my son - my dear son.'
As he was settling him on the bench, George opened his eyes momentarily, sighed and with a shiver closed his eyes again. Faro, fearing that he was chilled, threw his Ulster coat over him and returned to his wooden chair and ‘Edwin Drood’.
With so many mysteries of his own since he had begun the book, he found his concentration wandering.
Where was Dieter? Why was he taking so long?
Determined to keep vigil, to stay awake until he returned, he read a few more pages.
Sleep seemed impossible as the old porter's snores deadened even the wolves' hungry howling outside the door.
Chapter 17
Sometime around daybreak, Faro awoke from a bad dream. For a moment he had not the least idea where he was, then every aching bone in his body reminded him that he had spent the night sitting upright on a hard wooden chair.
The faint light from the window reveale
d that the two boys still slept and the porter snored as gustily as ever.
But Dieter had not returned.
The fire was dead ashes, the room bitterly cold, and ice had formed on the window pane clouded by the sleepers' breaths.
Faro opened the door and walked along the snowy platform. Animal pawmarks everywhere indicated that the wolves had been very active, hungrily pacing back and forth outside the door.
He shuddered. Why had Dieter failed to return? What had become of him? Faro stared down the track in the direction the man had taken, certain now that he could not have survived. He had fallen victim to the wolves or some other dire misfortune.
Faro shook his head sadly, full of sudden remorse, never having thought it possible that he would long to see the man he had instinctively disliked. And, it now appeared, quite irrationally distrusted.
Obviously the personality of a killer also had of necessity the thread of fierce courage required to face the inevitable. This was no new discovery for Faro. In a lifetime of dealing with hardened criminals, he'd often found that no man is totally evil. The human soul bears its redemption clause.
He walked back into the hut, a haven in comparison with the hostile landscape outside. The porter, still swathed as he had slept, was already relighting the fire, grumbling to himself as he did so.
The boys had awakened and announced that they were very hungry. As they went outside to relieve themselves, George said cheerily, 'Come along, Anton, remember the rules in Glenatholl. We would have been ordered in the absence of water to use the snow to wash our face and hands.’
They did not linger over their ablutions and returned indoors shivering as Faro opened the picnic hamper. He had not expected it to have to last another day and was glad to see that the contents had been generous and there was still bread and cheese remaining from the night before.
Strangely, perhaps because of his hidden fears, he wasn't hungry and settled for coffee, which the old porter brewed up on his spirit stove.
The Final Enemy. An Inspector Faro Mystery No.12. Page 10