The Edge (17 page)

‘Maybe someone doesn’t like the Lorrimores,’ I suggested.

‘We’ll find the bastard,’ he said, not listening. ‘There can’t be many in Cartier who know trains.’

‘Do you get much sabotage?’ I asked.

‘Not like this. Not often. Once or twice in the past. But it’s mostly vandals. A kid or two throwing rocks off a bridge. Some stealing, eh?’

He was affronted, I saw, by the treachery of one of his own kind. He took it personally. He was in a way ashamed, as one is if one’s countrymen behave badly abroad.

I asked him about his communication system with the engineer. Why had he gone up the train himself to get it stopped if he had a walkie-talkie?

‘It crackles if we’re going at any speed. It’s better to talk face to face.’

A light flashed on the ship-to-shore radio and he replaced his headset.

‘George here,’ he said, and listened. He looked at his watch and frowned. ‘Yes. Right. Understood.’ He took off the headset, shaking his head. ‘They’re not going to go along the track looking for a rope until both the Canadian and the freight train have been through. If our saboteur’s got an ounce of sense, by that time there won’t be anything incriminating to find.’

‘Probably not already,’ I said. ‘It’s getting on for an hour since we left Cartier.’

‘Yeah,’ he said. His good humour was trickling back despite his anger, the gleam of irony again in his eye. ‘Better than that fellow’s fake mystery, eh?’

‘Yes …’ I said, thinking. ‘Is the steam pipe the only thing connecting one car to the next? Except the links, of course.’

‘That’s right.’

‘What about electricity … and water?’

He shook his head. ‘Each car makes its own electricity. Self contained. They have generators under the floors … like dynamos on bicycles … that make electricity from the wheels going round. The problem is that when we’re going slowly, the lights flicker. Then there are batteries for when we’re stopped, but they’d only last for forty-five minutes, eh?, if we weren’t plugged into the ground supply at a station. After that we’re down to emergency lighting, just the aisle lights and not much else for about four hours, then we’re in the dark.’

‘And water?’ I asked.

‘It’s in the roof.’

‘Really?’ I said, surprised.

He patiently explained. ‘At city stations, we have water hydrants every eighty-five feet, the length of the cars. One to each car. Also the main electricity, same thing, eh? Anyway, the water goes up under pressure into the tanks in the roof and feeds down again to the washrooms by gravity.’

Fascinating, I thought. And it had made unhitching the Lorrimores’ car a comparatively quick and easy job.

‘The new cars,’ George said, ‘will be heated by electricity, not steam, so we’ll be doing away with the steam pipe, eh? And they’ll have tanks for the sewage, which now drops straight down onto the tracks, of course.’

‘Canada’s railways,’ I said politely, ‘will be the envy of the world.’

He chuckled. ‘The trains between Montreal and Toronto are late three-quarters of the time, and the new engines break down regularly. The old rolling stock, like this train, is great.’

He picked up the headset again. I raised a hand in farewell and went back to the dining room where the real mystery had easily usurped Zak’s, though some were sure it was part of the plot.

Xanthe had cheered up remarkably through being the centre of sympathetic attention, and Filmer was telling Mercer Lorrimore he should sue the railway company for millions of dollars for negligence. The near-disaster had galvanised the general consciousness to a higher adrenaline level, probably because Xanthe had not, in fact, been carried off like Angelica.

Nell was sitting at a table with a fortyish couple who she later told me owned one of the horses in the box-car, a dark bay called Redi-Hot.
The man beckoned to me as I stood around vaguely, and asked me to fetch cognac for him, vodka with ice for his wife and … what for Nell?

‘Just coke, please,’ she said.

I went to the kitchen where I knew the coke was, but made frantic question mark signals to Nell about the rest. Emil, the chefs, Oliver and Cathy had finished cleaning up and had all gone off duty. I had no alcohol divining rod to bend a twig in the direction of brandy or Smirnoff.

Nell said something to the owners and came to join me, stifling laughter.

‘Yes, very funny,’ I said, ‘but what the hell do I do?’

‘Take one of the small trays and get the drinks from the bar. I’ll explain they have to pay for them.’

‘I haven’t seen you for five minutes alone today,’ I complained.

‘You’re downstairs, I’m up.’

‘I could easily hate you.’

‘But do you?’

‘Not yet,’ I said.

‘If you’re a good little waiter, I’ll leave you a tip.’

She went back to her place with a complacent bounce to her step, and with a curse, but not meaning it, I took the coke and a glass to her table and went on into the dome car for the rest. After I’d returned and delivered the order someone else asked for the same service, which I willingly performed again, and yet again.

On each trip I overheard snatches of the bar room conversations and could hear the louder buzz of continuing upheaval along in the lounge, and I thought that after I’d satisfied everyone in the dining room I might drift along to the far end with my disarming little tray.

The only person not wholly in sympathy with this plan was the bartender who complained that I was supposed to be off duty and that the passengers should come to the bar to buy the drinks themselves; I was syphoning off his tips. I saw the justice of that and offered to split fifty fifty. He knew very well that, without my running to and fro, the passengers mostly wouldn’t be bothered to move to drink, so he accepted fast, no doubt considering me a mug as well as an actor.

Sheridan Lorrimore, who was sitting at a table apart from his parents, demanded I bring him a double scotch at once. He had a carrying voice, and his sister from two tables away turned round in disapproval.

‘No, no, you’re not supposed to,’ she said.

‘Mind your own business.’ He turned his head slightly towards me and spoke in the direction of my tie. ‘Double scotch, at the double.’

‘Don’t get it,’ Xanthe said.

I stood irresolute.

Sheridan stood up, his ready anger rising. He put out a hand and pushed my shoulder fiercely.

‘Go on,’ he said. ‘Damn well do as I say. Go and get my drink.’

He pushed again quite hard and as I turned away I heard him snigger and say, ‘You have to kick ’em, you know.’

I went into the dome car and stood behind the bar with the bartender, and felt furious with Sheridan, not for his outrageous behaviour but because he was getting me noticed. Filmer had been sitting with his back to me, it was true, but near enough to overhear.

Mercer Lorrimore appeared tentatively in the bar doorway and came in when he saw me.

‘I apologise for my son,’ he said wearily, and I had a convincing impression that he’d apologised countless times before. He pulled out his wallet, removed a twenty dollar note from it and offered me the money.

‘Please don’t,’ I said. ‘There’s no need.’

‘Yes, yes. Take it.’

I saw he would feel better if I did, as if paying money would somehow excuse the act. I thought he should stop trying to buy pardons for his son and pay for mental treatment instead. But then, perhaps he had. There was more wrong with Sheridan than ill-temper, and it had been obvious to his father for a long time.

I didn’t approve of what he was doing, but if I refused his money I would be more and more visible, so I took it, and when he had gone off in relief back towards the dining car I gave it to the barman.

‘What was that all about?’ he asked curiously, pocketing the note without hesitation. When I explained, he said, ‘You should have kept the money. You should have charged him triple.’

‘He would have felt three times as virtuous,’ I said, and the barman looked at me blankly.

I didn’t go back to the dining car but forward into the lounge, where again the sight of my yellow waistcoat stirred a few thirsts, which I did my best to accommodate. The barman was by now mellow and helpful and said we were rapidly running out of the ice that had come aboard in bags in Sudbury.

Up in the dome, the uncoupling of the private car had given way to speculation about whether the northern lights would oblige: the weather was right, apparently. I took a few drinks up there (including
some for Zak and Donna, which amused them), and on my way down the stairs saw the backs of Mercer and Bambi, Filmer and Daffodil, as they walked through the lounge towards the door to the private car. Mercer stood aside to let Bambi lead the other two through the short noisy joining section, and then, before going himself, he looked back, saw me and beckoned.

‘Bring a bowl of ice, will you?’ he said when I reached him. ‘To the saloon.’

‘Yes, sir,’ I said.

He nodded and departed, and I relayed the request to the barman who shook his head and said he was down to six cubes. I knew there were other bags of cubes in the kitchen refrigerator, so, feeling that I had been walking the train for a lifetime, I went along through the dining room to fetch some.

There weren’t many people still in there, though Xanthe was still being comforted and listened to by Mrs Young. Nell sat opposite Sheridan Lorrimore who seemed to be telling her that he had wrapped his Lamborgini round a tree recently and had ordered a new one.

‘Tree?’ Nell said, smiling.

He looked at her uncomprehendingly. Sheridan wasn’t a great one for jokes. I fetched a bag of ice and a bowl from the kitchen, swayed back to the bar and in due course took the bowl of ice (on a tray) to the saloon.

The four of them were sitting in armchairs, Bambi talking to Daffodil, Mercer to Filmer.

Mercer said to me, ‘You’ll find glasses and cognac in the cupboard in the dining room. And Benedictine. Bring them along here, will you?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Filmer paid me no attention. In the neat dining room, the cupboards had glass fronts with pale green curtains inside them. In one I found the bottles and glasses as described, and took them aft.

Filmer was saying, ‘Will Voting Right go on to the Breeders’ Cup if he wins at Winnipeg?’

‘He’s not running at Winnipeg,’ Mercer said. ‘He runs at Vancouver.’

‘Yes, I meant Vancouver.’

Daffodil with enthusiasm was telling a cool Bambi that she should try some face cream or other that helped with wrinkles.

‘Just leave everything,’ Mercer said to me. ‘We’ll pour.’

‘Yes, sir,’ I said, and retreated as he began the ultimate heresy of sloshing Remy Martin’s finest onto rocks.

Mercer would know me everywhere on the train, I thought, but none of the other three would. I hadn’t met Filmer’s eyes all day; had been careful not to; and it seemed to me that his attention had been exclusively focused upon what he had now achieved, a visiting-terms acquaintanceship with Mercer Lorrimore.

There was now loud music in the lounge, with two couples trying to dance and falling over with giggles from the perpetual motion of the dance-floor. Up in the dome, aurora borealis was doing its flickering fiery best on the horizon, and in the bar there was a group playing poker in serious silent concentration. Playing for thousands, the barman said.

Between the bar and the dining room there were three bedrooms, and in one of those, with the door open, was a sleeping car attendant, dressed exactly like myself.

‘Hello,’ he said, as I paused in the doorway. ‘Come to help?’

‘Sure,’ I said. ‘What do I do?’

‘You’re the actor, aren’t you?’ he asked.

‘It’s hush hush.’

He nodded. ‘I won’t say a word.’

He was of about my own age, perhaps a bit older, pleasant looking and cheerful. He showed me how to fold up the ingenious mechanism of the daytime armchairs and slide them under a bed which pulled out from the wall. A top bunk was then pulled down from the ceiling, complete with ladder. He straightened the bedclothes and laid a wrapped chocolate truffle on each pillow, a goodnight blessing.

‘Neat,’ I said.

He had only one more room to do, he said, and he should have finished long before this but he’d been badly delayed in the car on the other side of the dining car, which he had in his care also.

I nodded – and several thoughts arrived simultaneously in a rush on my mental doorstep. They were that Filmer’s bedroom was in that car. Filmer was at that moment with the Lorrimores. The only locks on the bedroom doors were inside, in the form of bolts to ensure privacy. There was no way of preventing anyone from walking in if a room were empty.

I went along to the sleeping car on the far side of the kitchen and opened the door of the abode of Julius Apollo.

By virtue of having paid double and possibly treble, Filmer had a double bedroom all to himself. Only the lower bunk had been prepared for the night: the upper was still in the ceiling.

For all that he could be expected to stay in the Lorrimores’ car for at least fifteen more minutes I felt decidedly jittery, and I left the door open so that if he did come back unexpectedly I could say I was merely checking that everything was in order. My uniform had multiple advantages.

The bedrooms were small, as one would expect, though in the daytime, with the beds folded away, there was comfortable space. There was a washbasin in full view, with the rest of the plumbing in a discreet little closet. For hanging clothes there was a slot behind the bedheads of about eight inches wide, enough in Filmer’s case for two suits. Another two jackets hung on hangers on pegs on the wall.

I searched quickly through all the pockets, but they were mostly empty. There was only, in one inner pocket, a receipt for a watch repair which I replaced where I found it.

There were no drawers: more or less everything else had to be in his suitcase which stood against the wall. With an eye on the corridor outside, I tried one of the latches and wasn’t surprised to find it locked.

That left only a tiny cupboard above the hanging space, in which Julius Apollo had stored a black leather toilet bag and his brushes.