Джозеф Киплинг - The Day's Work - Volume 1

"Can't get all them twelve on to the flat. Break 'em in half, Dutchy!" cried Poney. But it was.007 who was backed down to the last six cars, and he nearly blew up with surprise when he found himself pushing them on to a huge ferry–boat. He had never seen deep water before, and shivered as the flat drew away and left his bogies within six inches of the black, shiny tide.

After this he was hurried to the freight–house, where he saw the yard–master, a smallish, white–faced man in shirt, trousers, and slippers, looking down upon a sea of trucks, a mob of bawling truckmen, and squadrons of backing, turning, sweating, spark–striking horses.

"That's shippers' carts loadin' on to the receivin' trucks," said the small engine, reverently. "But he don't care. He lets 'em cuss. He's the Czar–King–Boss! He says 'Please,' and then they kneel down an' pray. There's three or four strings o' today's freight to be pulled before he can attend to them. When he waves his hand that way, things happen."

A string of loaded cars slid out down the track, and a string of empties took their place. Bales, crates, boxes, jars, carboys, frails, cases, and packages flew into them from the freight–house as though the cars had been magnets and they iron filings.

"Ki–yah!" shrieked little Poney. "Ain't it great?"

A purple–faced truckman shouldered his way to the yard–master, and shook his fist under his nose. The yard–master never looked up from his bundle of freight receipts. He crooked his forefinger slightly, and a tall young man in a red shirt, lounging carelessly beside him, hit the truckman under the left ear, so that he dropped, quivering and clucking, on a hay–bale.

"Eleven, seven, ninety–seven, L. Y. S.; fourteen ought ought three; nineteen thirteen; one one four; seventeen ought twenty–one M. B.; and the ten westbound. All straight except the two last. Cut 'em off at the junction. An' that's all right. Pull that string." The yard–master, with mild blue eyes, looked out over the howling truckmen at the waters in the moonlight beyond, and hummed:

.007 moved out the cars and delivered them to the regular road–engine. He had never felt quite so limp in his life before.

"Curious, ain't it?" said Poney, puffing, on the next track. "You an' me, if we got that man under our bumpers, we'd work him into red waste an' not know what we'd done; but–up there—with the steam hummin' in his boiler that awful quiet way…"

"I know," said.007. "Makes me feel as if I'd dropped my Fire an' was getting cold. He is the greatest man on earth."

They were at the far north end of the yard now, under a switchtower, looking down on the four–track way of the main traffic. The Boston Compound was to haul .007's string to some far–away northern junction over an indifferent road–bed, and she mourned aloud for the ninety–six pound rails of the B. & A.

"You're young; you're young," she coughed. "You don't realise your responsibilities."

"Yes, he does," said Poney, sharply; "but he don't lie down under 'em." Then, with aside–spurt of steam, exactly like a tough spitting: "There ain't more than fifteen thousand dollars' worth o' freight behind her anyway, and she goes on as if 't were a hundred thousand—same as the Mogul's. Excuse me, madam, but you've the track…. She's stuck on a dead–centre again—bein' specially designed not to."

The Compound crawled across the tracks on a long slant, groaning horribly at each switch, and moving like a cow in a snow–drift. There was a little pause along the yard after her tail–lights had disappeared; switches locked crisply, and every one seemed to be waiting.

"Now I'll show you something worth," said Poney. "When the Purple Emperor ain't on time, it's about time to amend the Constitution. The first stroke of twelve is—"

"Boom!" went the clock in the big yard–tower, and far away.007 heard a full, vibrating "Yah! Yah! Yah!" A headlight twinkled on the horizon like a star, grew an overpowering blaze, and whooped up the humming track to the roaring music of a happy giant's song:

The last defiant "yah! yah!" was delivered a mile and a half beyond the passenger–depot; but .007 had caught one glimpse of the superb six–wheel–coupled racing–locomotive, who hauled the pride and glory of the road—the gilt–edged Purple Emperor, the millionaires' south–bound express, laying the miles over his shoulder as a man peels a shaving from a soft board. The rest was a blur of maroon enamel, a bar of white light from the electrics in the cars, and a flicker of nickel–plated hand–rail on the rear platform.

"Ooh!" said.007.

"Seventy–five miles an hour these five miles. Baths, I've heard; barber's shop; ticker; and a library and the rest to match. Yes, sir; seventy–five an hour! But he'll talk to you in the round–house just as democratic as I would. And I—cuss my wheel–base!—I'd kick clean off the track at half his gait. He's the Master of our Lodge. Cleans up at our house. I'll introdooce you some day. He's worth knowin'! There ain't many can sing that song, either."

.007 was too full of emotions to answer. He did not hear a raging of telephone–bells in the switch–tower, nor the man, as he leaned out and called to .007's engineer: "Got any steam?"

"'Nough to run her a hundred mile out o' this, if I could," said the engineer, who belonged to the open road and hated switching.

"Then get. The Flying Freight's ditched forty mile out, with fifty rod o' track ploughed up. No; no one's hurt, but both tracks are blocked. Lucky the wreckin'–car an' derrick are this end of the yard. Crew 'll be along in a minute. Hurry! You've the track."

"Well, I could jest kick my little sawed–off self," said Poney, as .007 was backed, with a bang, on to a grim and grimy car like a caboose, but full of tools—a flatcar and a derrick behind it. "Some folks are one thing, and some are another; but you're in luck, kid. They push a wrecking–car. Now, don't get rattled. Your wheel–base will keep you on the track, and there ain't any curves worth mentionin'. Oh, say! Comanche told me there's one section o' sawedged track that's liable to jounce ye a little. Fifteen an' a half out, after the grade at Jackson's crossin'. You'll know it by a farmhouse an' a windmill an' five maples in the dooryard. Windmill's west o' the maples. An' there's an eighty–foot iron bridge in the middle o' that section with no guard–rails. See you later. Luck!"

Before he knew well what had happened, .007 was flying up the track into the dumb, dark world. Then fears of the night beset him. He remembered all he had ever heard of landslides, rain–piled boulders, blown trees, and strayed cattle, all that the Boston Compound had ever said of responsibility, and a great deal more that came out of his own head. With a very quavering voice he whistled for his first grade–crossing (an event in the life of a locomotive), and his nerves were in no way restored by the sight of a frantic horse and a white–faced man in a buggy less than a yard from his right shoulder. Then he was sure he would jump the track; felt his flanges mounting the rail at every curve; knew that his first grade would make him lie down even as Comanche had done at the Newtons. He whirled down the grade to Jackson's crossing, saw the windmill west of the maples, felt the badly laid rails spring under him, and sweated big drops all over his boiler. At each jarring bump he believed an axle had smashed, and he took the eighty–foot bridge without the guard–rail like a hunted cat on the top of a fence. Then a wet leaf stuck against the glass of his headlight and threw a flying shadow on the track, so that he thought it was some little dancing animal that would feel soft if he ran over it; and anything soft underfoot frightens a locomotive as it does an elephant. But the men behind seemed quite calm. The wrecking–crew were climbing carelessly from the caboose to the tender—even jesting with the engineer, for he heard a shuffling of feet among the coal, and the snatch of a song, something like this: