第19章 The engine-burglar(5)

"We ain't so much CROSS," said the fireman, "as interested like.It ain't every day a little gell tumbles into our coal bunker outer the sky, is it, Bill? What did you DO it for--eh?""That's the point," agreed the engine-driver; "what did you do it FOR?"Bobbie found that she had not quite stopped crying.The engine-driver patted her on the back and said: "Here, cheer up, Mate.It ain't so bad as all that 'ere, I'll be bound.""I wanted," said Bobbie, much cheered to find herself addressed as 'Mate'--"I only wanted to ask you if you'd be so kind as to mend this." She picked up the brown-paper parcel from among the coals and undid the string with hot, red fingers that trembled.

Her feet and legs felt the scorch of the engine fire, but her shoulders felt the wild chill rush of the air.The engine lurched and shook and rattled, and as they shot under a bridge the engine seemed to shout in her ears.

The fireman shovelled on coals.

Bobbie unrolled the brown paper and disclosed the toy engine.

"I thought," she said wistfully, "that perhaps you'd mend this for me--because you're an engineer, you know."The engine-driver said he was blowed if he wasn't blest.

"I'm blest if I ain't blowed," remarked the fireman.

But the engine-driver took the little engine and looked at it--and the fireman ceased for an instant to shovel coal, and looked, too.

"It's like your precious cheek," said the engine-driver--"whatever made you think we'd be bothered tinkering penny toys?""I didn't mean it for precious cheek," said Bobbie; "only everybody that has anything to do with railways is so kind and good, I didn't think you'd mind.You don't really--do you?" she added, for she had seen a not unkindly wink pass between the two.

"My trade's driving of an engine, not mending her, especially such a hout-size in engines as this 'ere," said Bill."An' 'ow are we a-goin' to get you back to your sorrowing friends and relations, and all be forgiven and forgotten?""If you'll put me down next time you stop," said Bobbie, firmly, though her heart beat fiercely against her arm as she clasped her hands, "and lend me the money for a third-class ticket, I'll pay you back--honour bright.I'm not a confidence trick like in the newspapers--really, I'm not.""You're a little lady, every inch," said Bill, relenting suddenly and completely."We'll see you gets home safe.An' about this engine--Jim--ain't you got ne'er a pal as can use a soldering iron?

Seems to me that's about all the little bounder wants doing to it.""That's what Father said," Bobbie explained eagerly."What's that for?"She pointed to a little brass wheel that he had turned as he spoke.

"That's the injector."

"In--what?"

"Injector to fill up the boiler."

"Oh," said Bobbie, mentally registering the fact to tell the others;"that IS interesting."

"This 'ere's the automatic brake," Bill went on, flattered by her enthusiasm."You just move this 'ere little handle--do it with one finger, you can--and the train jolly soon stops.That's what they call the Power of Science in the newspapers."He showed her two little dials, like clock faces, and told her how one showed how much steam was going, and the other showed if the brake was working properly.

By the time she had seen him shut off steam with a big shining steel handle, Bobbie knew more about the inside working of an engine than she had ever thought there was to know, and Jim had promised that his second cousin's wife's brother should solder the toy engine, or Jim would know the reason why.Besides all the knowledge she had gained Bobbie felt that she and Bill and Jim were now friends for life, and that they had wholly and forever forgiven her for stumbling uninvited among the sacred coals of their tender.

At Stacklepoole Junction she parted from them with warm expressions of mutual regard.They handed her over to the guard of a returning train--a friend of theirs--and she had the joy of knowing what guards do in their secret fastnesses, and understood how, when you pull the communication cord in railway carriages, a wheel goes round under the guard's nose and a loud bell rings in his ears.She asked the guard why his van smelt so fishy, and learned that he had to carry a lot of fish every day, and that the wetness in the hollows of the corrugated floor had all drained out of boxes full of plaice and cod and mackerel and soles and smelts.

Bobbie got home in time for tea, and she felt as though her mind would burst with all that had been put into it since she parted from the others.How she blessed the nail that had torn her frock!

"Where have you been?" asked the others.

"To the station, of course," said Roberta.But she would not tell a word of her adventures till the day appointed, when she mysteriously led them to the station at the hour of the 3.19's transit, and proudly introduced them to her friends, Bill and Jim.Jim's second cousin's wife's brother had not been unworthy of the sacred trust reposed in him.The toy engine was, literally, as good as new.

"Good-bye--oh, good-bye," said Bobbie, just before the engine screamed ITS good-bye."I shall always, always love you--and Jim's second cousin's wife's brother as well!"And as the three children went home up the hill, Peter hugging the engine, now quite its own self again, Bobbie told, with joyous leaps of the heart, the story of how she had been an Engine-burglar.