Whiteout

Whiteout by Jonah

Those who have read my previous stories will need no introduction to Simon and Garret and their family. Those who haven't - why not? This is the latest in the series that began a couple of years back with "A Letter from America" and it fits in right after "Christmas in New England". If you haven't read the others, don't worry. It will stand on its own. It is a story of love - the real sort. Some of its characters are gay, though that doesn't matter. They are good people. They are not, however, real people. This is a work of fiction and every character is also a fiction - created by me, except for Garret, who was created by Jacob Lion, in the USA. I want to thank Jacob for permitting me to use his characters. This story is brought to you, free of charge, by Nifty. Nifty brings all these stories to you free of charge and he doesn't charge us authors either. The cost is borne by himself and our donations. To keep this site going please consider donating to Nifty at https://donate.nifty.org/

chapter 3

The following morning I was up and about at around six-thirty. I was rostered driver for the permanent way team at Sheringham, but I didn't know if it would be possible to get there. I decided to phone the ops office at Sheringham, on the offchance that somebody would be there at this time of the morning.

"North Norfolk Railway, Sheringham. Harry Wilkes speaking."

"Hi Harry, it's Simon. I'm your works train driver for this morning. Is there any point in my coming in."

"I don't know what we're doing this morning Simon but, if we're to do anything at all, we'll need a driver. If you're prepared to come, and if it's possible, come mate. We'll be glad to see you."

"OK, Harry. I don't know what time I'll get there, but I'm setting out in about ten minutes."

"Got that Simon. Thank you."

"Where are you going."

"Morning Ross. I'm supposed to be driving an engine on the North Norfolk Railway this morning, if I can get there. "

"Can I come?"

"I'd like to say yes Ross, but conditions are pretty bad out there."

"If they're as bad as that, you shouldn't be going."I hadn't heard Garret come downstairs either."And if you are going, it would be more sensible if there were two of you. I'd think about taking Ross up on his offer, if he still wants to do it."

"Yes," said Ross.

"You're telling me I'm outnumbered?" I queried.

"Yes, so you want warm clothes, two flasks of hot chocolate, and make sure your snow shovel is in your boot. Make sure Ross has a high viz vest as well."

"Yessir!" I replied. Well what was I to do?

It was no longer snowing. The snow on the ground was lit up by a gibbous moon. It certainly felt cold - below freezing - but it was still, clear and fresh. I ran my scraper over the windscreen and then started the engine. The rear window demister was working and Ross settled himself into the passenger seat as I cleared the side windows..

"You're sure you want to do this?" I asked as I slid in beside him.

"Mmmm Hmmm!".

I let the car run back off the drive and turned it to face the road. There was no more than about three inches of snow, but there would be next to no grip on the road. This called for extreme caution. My dipped headlights showed only virgin snow. It would be hard to tell where the road was. Gently I let in the clutch and we began to roll.

After only about twenty yards I could feel the back end of the car beginning to drift. The speedometer showed about fifteen but that was only how fast the wheels were turning. At least the front end seemed to be responding to the steering so it was best to keep going. As the houses fell behind bare trees stood stark in the moonlight. The whole world was monochrome.

"We're not going to make a lot of speed," I commented.

"No," he said. Well, so much for conversation.

I changed up, but kept the speed low. My touch on the throttle was so light that the engine was doing little more than idling. That was fine by me. It kept the front wheels following where I was steering. A sudden spin of the front wheels sent the back end drifting to the middle of the road. I was pointing for the verge as I took my foot off the throttle. I turned the wheel in that direction to bring both ends of the car into line and gently reapplied power. We were further out in the road but still moving in the right direction and the A140 was only yards ahead.

Once on the main road I got up through the gears quickly. I was still only doing about twenty miles per hour, but it was a clear road without other traffic. The trees on either side now filtered the moonight. The lightly iced surface could be deceptively treacherous, but we kept going. There were, at least, traces of rock salt on this road. The ghostly forms of the trees looked eery and the whole effect put me in mind of a poem by Alfred Noyes. The road was unquestionably a ribbon of moonlight that lay between the trees.

"It looks ghostly."

I was surprised to hear him speak.

"Yes, it does, but in a beautiful kind of a way," I replied.

"Maybe, but I'm glad I'm in here, and not out there."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence in my driving."

"What time does it get light?"

"It already is doing. With the snow, it never really got dark. It'll be about another hour to full daylight."

"Do you know where we are?"

"Yes. Everywhere looks different in the snow, but we just passed Hevingham and Marsham is not far ahead. I'd normally take the back roads from Aylsham but, in these conditions, I think I'll stay on here till Roughton, then cut across to the A148.

As we circumnavigated Aylsham we passed a gritter travelling in the opposite direction. That was the only other traffic we had seen so far.

It was almost eight o'clock when we drove down Holway Road into Sheringham. Daylight, of a sort, was beginning to establish itself. I parked in the staff car park and made my way to the ops office.

Harry sat there on his own.

"Not a lot of troops then Harry?"

"No, but things have changed a bit anyway. I'm glad you could make it."

"What are we doing then?"

"Well we were going to use one of the pilots to drop sleepers off on the 1 in 80, but we couldn't get enough men in to do it and it wouldn't have been safe anyway. We were just deciding what we could do when the police rang and said were we running a service. We said we weren't and they asked if it would be possible to."

"What do they want it for?"

"Weybourne's completely cut off. No supplies, no access for emergency services and, of course, no shops. We've a pilot up this end that we were going to use for the works train, but we'll need heating, so Ben and Ralph have gone to Weybourne to see if they can get Ring Haw out." If they can get her back here, can you use the pilot to top/tail him so that we don't need to run round?"

"I'll need a second man on the diesel for that job in this weather."

"Simon, we haven't got... Oh..."

He had finally spotted Ross.

"Well I don't want to know nothing about that," he muttered.

"Well I do," I replied. "I'm not sneaking him up on the footplate while nobody's looking. We'll do it properly. Have you got a membership form and a consent form."

"Are you his guardian?"

"Yes."

"How old is he."

"Fourteen,"

"Well that put a different complexion on it. Do he have a name."

"Ross."

"Ho, well welcome to the railway Ross."

The boy nodded, but said nothing. I quickly filled in the forms and then led the way to our 350 horse-power charge for the day.

There were oil-fillers in the cab so together we began oiling round the beast. Once we had oiled everything that could be oiled I put in the battery isolating switches on each side. Then I went to the cab and put the start handle in place. I installed Ross in the cab, with instructions to start operating the fuel transfer pump. I went to the front of the loco and started working the oil priming pump. Once I felt it go stiff I ran to the cab and operated the starter handle. The big diesel shuddered and then burst into life. I moved the start handle from E.O. to ON then nipped forward to close the front engine room door. I had the handbrake off and the air brake holding us by the time a cloud of steam up by golf Links Level Crossing indicated that Ben had Ring Haw on the main line and nearly at Sheringham.

I sat back on the driver's side and watched the green saddle tank approach platform 1 and buffer up to the maroon coaches. I watched Ralph Povey leave the cab and crawl underneath to couple up. Ralph climbed out and walked to the back of the train. That figured. Harry was going to come with us as guard on the train, but Harry is in the signal box as we don't have a signalman rostered, so Ralph is going to do a brake test and release the van's handbrake. Hopefully he'll also put a tail lamp on the last coach. Since our cab was toward Weybourne Ross could watch from his side of the cab.

"Drop your window open," I told him. "In a short while, when he's pulled those coaches out, we're going to go on the back of them. Before we move we need to know that nobody is going to be hurt by us doing so. I can check this side, but I can't see your side of the engine. As soon as we're ready to move, check down the side of the loco. If there's anybody there, I want to know about it. If there isn't, you tell me it's clear on your side."

There was a toot from the saddle tank and the train began to draw forward. I waited until the last coach was clear of the signal box, then saw the ground signal clear. I pressed the whistle button once.

"Clear this side," called Ross.

I pulled the reverser to REV and released the air brake.

"Thanks," I called as I clicked the power controller to "ON".

That was as far as I moved it as we were running over pointwork. As we neared the last coach I shut off again and let the loco roll. It only took two applications of the air brake to bring us to a stand with the buffers touching. I screwed down the handbrake and told Ross to touch nothing. Then I climbed down from the cab and removed the tail lamp from the back coach. I stood clear and pointed with arm outstreched, to the gap beneath the buffers. I saw Ben Pigeon lean out from the steam engine and hold out his own arm. That told me all I needed to know. I crawled under the buffers and quickly pulled the pin on the back coach's vacuum hose and pulled it from its dummy. Turning, I pulled the hose on my loco from its dummy. Leaving the two hoses dangling, I lifted the coupling on the loco and dropped the link over the drawbar hook of the coach. I threw the shackle handle over a few times to screw it up tighter. I checked that the steam heat cock on the coach was closed, then took both vacuum hoses and wrestled them together, finally putting in the pins to secure them. That done, I crawled out and walked forward to the steam loco.

I called up to Ben,

"Do you want to put your ejector on?"

"Right Ho!" he called back.

"You can keep it on," I told him. "Both ways. I won't use the exhauster on the diesel at all - unless you're strapped for steam of course. Then we'll talk about it some more."

"Fair enough, I'll do all the sucking," Ben acknowledged.

I stomped back to my own engine placed the tail lamp on the back of it, climbed to the cab and screwed off the parking brake. The vacuum gauge showed 21, so I pulled the vacuum brake handle to emergency and watched the needle drop to zero. After a short pause I put the handle back to "Running" and watched the needle climb back. I clicked the reverser back into reverse gear and whistled, releasing the air brake as I did so. Standing in the doorway on Ross' side of the cab, I saw Harry hold his arm out. The steam engine whistled and we were under way.