The noon train

The young man woke up in a ragged armchair to the flicker of a candle lantern—an abrupt awakening of one who had fallen asleep against his will. It had been a long night, longer still when he had to fight his looming slumber for fear of missing his next move.

He lifted the lantern and pointed it at the foot of the divan, where lay two tanned leather suitcases; they were there, ready. He fished out from his waistcoat a gold-plated pocket watch and counted the time. Darkness still coated the night without. The frogs were louder than the rumbling storm and its sparks. In the dim light of the lantern, the young man plucked the watch from his waistcoat and stowed it in the front compartment of one of his suitcases. Presently he took the lamp and did the round of the shanty. His little brother was asleep in his room on a bed stripped bare of linen and pillows and blanket. The boy was sound asleep but dressed for excursion—trousers, oversized dress shirt and shoes. The young man tapped his brother’s shoulder gently. "Time to go," he said, "you need to wake up." The boy stirred in bed and laid there for a short while attempting to regain consciousness. The young man moved to the next room to check on his parents, who had stripped the shanty off all its essentials—save for its dreary furniture—and packed as much as they could into baggage that consisted of two suitcases, a tote and a basket his mother would carry around her waist. His father sat in an armchair facing the door. His mother slumped in her familiar side of the bed, which now carried naught but the thin old mattress.

"Must we run, son?" his father asked.

"Yes, father. They're coming, and everyone must leave by the earliest train today," the young man said.

"Why don't you come with us, lovey?" his mother asked.

"It's too risky. It’s safer for all of us if I leave later," the young man said. His mother nodded and sobbed into her handkerchief. Her husband said no more. He reached for her hand.

When dawn came, the family had been rustling about the shanty. The young man looked over the place one last time for things—sentimental things—they might leave behind in a hurry. Then he hurled every piece of luggage onto his back and together the family left home just before sunrise. The belated daylight shielded their getaway from neighbouring dwellings. Soon they huddled together on the platform riddled with flooded potholes. A musty gust washed over them. When the train creeped into a visible distance, his mother embraced him in haste; she was still sobbing. His father placed his hand on her shoulder and, with gentle taps, asked her to let go.

"Come back to us, son," his father said.

"I will, father. I'll come to you on the midday train," the young man said.

"We'll meet you there," his father said, "all of us," then turned away in silence when his voice trembled.

When the train tooted its imminent arrival, the young man ushered his family into the first carriage. He placed them in a three-seater closest to the exit and by one of the few windows with curtains. When the conductor sounded his whistle, the young man turned to his brother. "Take care of mom and dad for me," he said.

When the first shaft of light brightened the reddish country, the train took off into a northbound crawl. Its black smoke bid farewell to the young man, who stood waiting until the automobile picked up speed and sped out of sight.

At the shanty, he took off his waistcoat and put on a faded workwear jacket, which was a touch too small as it belonged to his father. He looked down at his feet, at the shiny pair of dress shoes of glossy quality material. He took them off and replaced them with a pair of dusty desert boots and tucked the dress shoes along with the waistcoat back into one of the suitcases, atop a neatly folded collection of pastel dress shirts, twill jackets and trousers.

A car skidded along the dirt road, foreboding upon him that a confrontation was near. Yet he stayed. The high sun had long turned his bedroom into a carton of heat and his sweat had drenched his shirt. Sunlight beat on the window panel and created a mirror in which he checked his composure then watched as the limo came to a stop and kicked up a cloud of dirt around it and into the shanty whose door he had left ajar. A woman opened the door of the motor car and—dressed in silk and organza—dipped her reluctant heels into the ragged neighbourhood; a move that exaggerated her riches.

Her riches were anything but exaggerated; the young man knew. He took a deep breath, then closed the lids of his two suitcases and slid them under the bed. When he came to the door, the woman hurried towards him but stopped short by a puddle of mud surrounding the shanty like a moat—put there by a downpour the night before. The young man stepped in the puddle and, with soiled boots, approached the woman's outstretched arms but kept his distance and deprived her of the gratification of a long-awaited embrace. She resigned to touching him on the arm. "Come home, son," she said.

"I am home," the young man said.

"No, our home, where you'll have a life and everything you've always wanted."

"And I suppose you know what I've always wanted?"

Unwilling to relent in his headstrong denial of her affection, the young man trod past the woman towards the motor car that had been sitting idle with its back door ajar and looked inside. There sat an old man dressed in fine tweed, all in blue, head to toe, a gold pin held in place the bulging jacquard cravat. There sat the only figure the young man should fear. The old man's cigar had engulfed the white, leather interior of the limo and the chauffeur, who barely moved and always dutifully kept his dove-gloved hands on the steering wheel. "What must I do for you to leave them in peace?" the young man asked.

"It's not what you must but what you mustn't do," the old man said and replaced his cigar between his thin, pigmented lips.

The young man remained silent for a short while then returned to the shanty. Presently, he reappeared at the entrance and approached the limo with his suitcases and asked the chauffeur to open the trunk. The chauffeur obliged forthwith and he placed his belongings inside the trunk and closed the lid. He came to the door.

"I want to say goodbye. Come back in one hour and I will be here waiting," he said to the old couple, to which the old man sighed.

"You're trying my patience, boy," he said.

The woman placed her hand on her husband's arm. "It's ok, love. He's coming back and that's all that matters," she said. Soon, the limo rolled away and left the young man behind with a promise bound to be broken.

When the next train departed, the young man was on it, heading northbound. The sun was high and he was half way to his destination and had felt less anxious in his knowledge that trouble had long since drifted hundreds of miles into the past. What was left was the new life rid of the burden he was escaping from; and he looked forward to it with so much joy even the sight of ordinary commuters travelling to and back from their heated hard work at the mine elated him.

As the train approached the midway station, a horde of workers stood up, ready to get off. The young man kept his curtain drawn to block out the glaring sun, and through a small gap between the curtains he saw what put him on high alert; out from the station walked the rich man with his cane, a cigar hanging from his stern lips and a pair of round sunglasses hid behind them what manner of conspiracy no one could guess. The miners lifted their berets as they crossed the old man's path to greet him, who made no response, no move; yet they kept greeting, one after another. The young man shifted in his seat. His nervous hands rubbed together with such force they whitened his knuckles. He watched as the old man handed the train conductor a small notecard. The latter gent placed the card in his pocket and concluded the exchange with a slight bow.

Soon the whistling signalled once more the departure of the train for the next station another one hundred miles from there. The young man allowed himself to breathe a sigh of relief when the locomotive kicked into gear. The old man remained on the platform with his cane and his cigar and sunglasses. He didn't move, but his gaze—though hidden behind dark lenses—looked to be directed at the young man, or so he thought. The expression on the old man's face and the rest of his body language never changed; yet it stirred in him an unsettling feeling. When the train left the platform, the young man put the whole event down to happenstance.

A few miles into the trip, the sun had turned the carriage into a glasshouse. The young man took off his jacket and placed it in his lap. He lowered his beret to cover his eyes, and slumber—which had hung low above his spirit—took hold of him forthwith.

When the train sounded its alarm and released its smoke as it saw the encroaching station, noon was at its peak. The young man woke up to the train almost deserted. He was among the only three passengers left in his carriage. Through the gap in the curtain he could see the name of the station—North End, his destination. He opened the curtains and scanned the length of the platform for the familiar faces of his family as the train screeched to a halt. He exited the carriage carrying nothing but a jacket in one hand and a punched ticket in the other. On the platform, a few passengers and staff scurried back and forth, but no one—no group of three—was there waiting for him or waving at him or running towards him.

His family wasn't there.

He found refuge at a small seat-bench on the platform, determined to wait a while longer lest his father was tied up in his travel. He knew how travelling could be; transportation, after all, used to be his sole responsibility when he still had a seat at the high table, before he relinquished it.

Hours passed and he waited and waited, until the sun made its descent on the other side of the station and it was dusk and the young man's shadow fell into a long shape next to where he sat. He lifted his jacket to hide his despair when a hard object caught his eyes—a sharp corner of what looked like a piece of paper. He removed the object from his pocket and recoiled at the sight of the white notecard he saw exchanged between the old man and the train conductor, who might have slipped the thing into his pocket when he was asleep. He turned it over. A short message in intricate hand told a truth that had frightened him ever since he woke up in the shanty that early hour.

A feeble light illuminated the centre of the office. Through the large casement of the open window, the soft light fell upon the young man's face, which grimaced from the pain of defeat churning in his guts. He crumbled the note and tossed it on the bench then got up and walked away. Through its folds and crevices that were damp from the young man's sweat, the message remained visible: "You have made it clear your family is not so important as keeping your choices."