Django Durango

“Ready to be scrapped?” The younger engines gasped in horror.

“Yes,” said Culdee calmly. “It was a strange thing. It’s very sad to us, but he was relieved once he’d decided. One morning, he asked for the Manager to come to the Shed. They had a long talk after the rest of us left for our jobs. When we came back that evening, Godred wasn’t sad anymore. The Manager, he said, had made Arrangements for him the next day.”

“Didn’t you try to talk him out of it?” asked Alaric in alarm.
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Edward chuffed into Wellsworth shed, feeling more his age than usual. He was glad to be home and was ready for a nice rest. Duck was already there, but he looked about as tired as Edward felt.

“What’s the matter, Duck?” asked Edward earnestly.

Duck hesitated a moment, unsure how to answer. Edward was patient and gave him time to collect his thoughts.

“I may have stressed the tension in my buffer springs when I helped Henry with a heavy load of cars today,” said Duck, averting his eyes. “I’ll have to get them checked tomorrow.”

Edward laughed, but it wasn’t unkind. “Oh I see!” he said. “You pushed hard at the start of the hills and all the way to the top.”

“I couldn’t tell how much help he actually wanted,” said Duck, lowering his voice a little. “He wouldn’t say what he wanted done.”

“You shouldn’t take that personally,” said Edward.

“They’re not speaking to me at all.”

“They don’t speak to me either when I’m banking them. We’ve all been doing it so long we don’t need to anymore.” Duck was not convinced by this answer, but he didn’t argue. Edward went on.
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He didn’t recognize her all at once. Her voice hit him first, just like it had four years earlier when it knocked him right out of his mundane life as a beat reporter and sent him into a tailspin. Yes, that was what had done it. Her posh affectation, the slight slur of a child’s unpracticed speech that she never quite grew out of, and how she had used it to ask all those chemistry questions to show off her intelligence and yet look needy and helpless at the same time.

Since he’d gone off his Joy, he had remembered her, certainly, but only in terms of their youth. He knew beyond that, but he’d been careful not to let himself land on that topic. He’d distract himself with a deft tangent if he edged too close to thinking about Sally who left in that green and white checked dress and used that voice and everything else she had to win herself helpful new friends at every turn, how she had never used those things on him.

And look, here was a helpful new friend now! Didn’t Sally’s latest companion look spiffing with his hat tilted at a jaunty angle to belie what carefree and lighthearted company he must be. He was fit and fashionable and not too tall as well, not awkward and gangling like Arthur was. He’d look just right with his arm interlocked with Sally’s. Glasses too, of course. Sally always did love an intellectual, didn’t she?

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As soon as Sally was clear of the fence, James started in on Roger.

“Dr. F said not to tell anyone she was alive. She said she didn’t want anyone to ask her for anything.”

“But she likes Sally,” Roger scoffed. “Everyone does.”

“Yes, I noticed you putting on your little show for her.”

“You can not be serious. We just had this argument thirty minutes ago!”

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Though he had been conscripted into the role long ago, Jack Worthing took his responsibility to Wellington Wells seriously. “Uncle” Jack was the face of optimism and stability. He acted as master of ceremonies through the good times and saw the town through the bad, emboldening them when prudent, encouraging them to endure when it was not – or rather he would have if indeed they’d ever had any bad times. When anyone wrote to him about their worries and concerns – which was surely a symptom of having too few problems – he allayed any doubts or questions and set them back at ease. He saw it as his duty to be the very embodiment of keeping calm and carrying on, a shining example of stalwart English spirit that Wellington Wells could rely on and emulate.

He didn’t have much of a memory of how his fellow entertainers felt about their similar standing in the world. So many of them left the industry at some point between the indeterminate then and now, preferring a life of anonymity. Jack was very nearly the only one left, save for some hobbyist musical acts. He had the vague feeling though, that the way Nick Lightbearer was fidgeting and looking unsure of why everyone else seemed so pleased to be in his presence was not becoming of an entertainer of his notoriety.

Read on…