There was a sudden cessation of sound from the end of the diner and through the smoke haze I saw the man in the scarlet bush shirt standing in the doorway. The boss of the steel-laying gang was with him and they were looking down the length of the table.
‘Who’s that?’ I asked the Italian.
‘The guy in the red shirt?’ he asked. ‘You don’t-a-know?’ He seemed puzzled. ‘That’s Dave Shelton. He’s in charge at Head of Steel.’
I glanced quickly at the doorway again. The two men were still standing there and Shelton was looking straight at me. He turned and asked the other man a question and I saw the gang foreman shake his head.
‘You wanna keep clear of him,’ the Italian was saying. ‘He drive all-a time. Last week he bust a man’s jaw because he tell him he drive-a the men too hard.’
Shelton glanced in my direction again, and then the two of them were pushing their way down the diner, and I knew I was trapped there, for there was nothing I could do, nowhere I could go, and I sat, staring at my mug, waiting.
‘You work here?’ The voice was right behind me, and when I didn’t answer, a hand gripped my shoulder and swung me round. ‘I’m talking to you.’ He was standing right over me, broad-shouldered and slim-hipped, with a sort of thrusting violence that I’d only once met before, in an Irish navvy. ‘You’re the guy I saw gawping at the steel-laying gang, aren’t you?’
The men round me had stopped talking so that I was at the centre of a little oasis of silence.
‘Well, do you work here or don’t you?’
‘No,’ I said.
Then what are you doing in this diner?’
‘Having a meal,’ I said, and a ripple of laughter ran down the table. The line of his mouth hardened, for it wasn’t the most helpful reply I could have made, and in an effort to appease him, I added quickly, ‘I’m an engineer. It was supper time when I got here, and I just followed the others — ‘
‘Where’s your card?’ he demanded.
‘My card?’
‘Your card of employment as an engineer on the line. You haven’t got one, have you?’ He was smiling now, suddenly sure of himself. ‘What’s your name?’ And when I didn’t answer, he said, ‘It’s Ferguson, isn’t it?’
I nodded, knowing it was no use trying to deny it.
‘Thought so.’ And he added, ‘What do you think you’re playing at, pretending you’re an engineer? Alex Staffen’s mad as hell about it.’
‘I am an engineer,’ I said.
‘Okay, you’re an engineer. But not on this railroad.’ His hand fastened on my shoulder again and he dragged me to my feet. ‘Come on. Let’s get going, feller. I’ve instructions to send you back to Base just as fast as I can.’ He jerked his head for me to follow him and led the way towards the door.
There was nothing I could do but follow him down the diner, feeling rather like a criminal with the gang foreman close behind me. Once outside, away from all the men, I could probably get him to listen to my explanation. But I didn’t see what good it would do. Staffen had set the machinery of the organization in motion to get me returned to Base, and unless I could make this man Shelton understand the urgency of the matter, he’d stick to his instructions. He’d have to.
Halfway down the diner he stopped abruptly. ‘Your speeder still on the track, Joe?’ he asked one of the men.
He was a big fellow with a broken nose who looked as though he’d been a heavyweight boxer. ‘Sorry, Mr Shelton,’ he said. ‘I cleared it just before — ‘
‘Well, get it back op the track right away. You’re taking this guy down to Two-twenty-four.’
‘Okay, Mr Shelton.’ The man scrambled to his feet, not bothering to finish his coffee.
‘He’ll have to wait till we’ve dumped the empty steel wagons,’ the foreman said. ‘The train’ll be backing up to clear the cut any minute now.’
‘Well, see if you can get your speeder on the track and parked down the line before they start. Otherwise, you won’t get started for an hour or more.’
‘Okay, Mr Shelton.’ The man headed for the door and pushed his way through the group gathered about the swill bin. Shelton stopped to have a word with one or two of the other men seated at the table, and by the time he reached the door the men were leaving the diner in a steady stream.
‘Could I have a word with you in private?’ I asked. ‘It’s important.’
He was pushing his way through the men, but he stopped then. ‘What’s it about?’
‘I had a reason for coming up here,’ I said. ‘If I could explain to you …’
‘You explain to Alex Staffen. I got other things to worry about.’
‘It’s a matter of life and death,’ I said urgently.
‘So’s this railroad. I’m laving steel and winter’s coming on.’ He forced his way through the doorway. ‘People like you,’ he said over his shoulder, ‘are a Goddamned nuisance.’
I didn’t have another chance to make him listen to me. We were out on the platform now, and as we reached the door to the track a voice called up, ‘That you, Dave?’ The earth of the cut was yellow in the lights of the train and there were men moving about below us, dark shapes with here and there the glow of a cigarette. ‘They want you on the radio,’ the voice added. ‘It’s urgent.’
‘Hell!’ Shelton said. ‘Who is it?’
‘They didn’t say. But it’s Two-two-four and they’re asking for the figure for track laid today and a schedule of shifts worked…’
‘Okay, I’ll come.’
‘Sounds like the General Manager’s there,’ the foreman said. ‘He was due at Two-two-four today, wasn’t he, Dave?’
That’s right. And one of the directors, too. I guess they’re going to turn the heat on again.’ And he added, ‘Christ Almighty! We’re laying more than one and a half miles a day already. What more do they expect?’
‘I guess two miles would sound better in their ears,’ the foreman muttered dryly.
Two miles! Yeah, that’d be sweet music. But the men can’t lay it that fast.’
‘You could try paying them a bonus.’
‘It’s not me. It’s the Company. Still, with the freeze-up due …’ Shelton hesitated. ‘Yeah, well, maybe it’s an idea.’ He turned to me. ‘You wait here in the diner. And you better wait with him, Pat,’ he told the foreman. And he jumped out and disappeared up the track.
The men were streaming out of the diner now and the gang foreman and I stood back to let them pass. I wondered whether it was worth trying to explain to him about Briffe being alive, but one glance at his wooden features told me it wouldn’t be any good. He hadn’t the authority to help me, anyway.
In fact, at that moment I think I had lost the will to do anything more. Now that instructions about me had been sent up from Base, there didn’t seem any point. The whole organization had probably been alerted, and in that case there was nothing I could do. And yet I would like to have talked with Darcy. Perkins had said he knew more about Labrador than anyone else on the line, and there were things I wanted to know, things that perhaps he could have told me.
‘Go on back to the diner,’ the foreman said. ‘It’ll be warmer in there.’ The stream of men had thinned and he pushed me forward. I checked to let two men come out, and as they reached the exit door, a voice from the track called up, ‘Take this, will you?’ One of them reached down, grabbed hold of a suitcase and dropped it on the platform almost at my feet.
I don’t know what made me bend down and look at it — something about its shape maybe or perhaps subconsciously I had recognized the voice. At any rate, I did, and then I just stood there, staring at it stupidly. It was my own suitcase, the one I’d left in the bunkhouse train ten miles down the line when I’d jumped Lands’ speeder.
And then I heard Lands’ voice, outside on the track. ‘Okay, but we can’t do that till we’ve seen Dave. Anyway I want to get a radio message through to Two-sixty-three. My guess is …’ The rest was drowned in a prolonged hoot from the locomotive. And when it ceased abruptly I heard somebody say, ‘Why bring Darcy into it?’ And Lands answered impatiently, ‘Because they’re all construction men up there. They got a target on that grade. Ray’s the only guy with a vehicle who’s got the time I didn’t hear any more and I guessed he’d turned away. Peering out, I could see his padded bulk moving off up the train. There was somebody with him, but I couldn’t see who it was for he was in the shadows, close under the next coach.