Bron-38

Continued from Chapter 37: Bron-37 | ABCtales

‘This is the 08.03 from London Euston to Holyhead. Calling at Rugby, Tamworth, Stafford, Crewe, Chester, Flint, Pres-tattin, Rhyl, Colwyn Bay, Lan…er, Lan-dude-no Junction, Bangor and Holyhead. Change at Lan-dude-no Junction for Degan-why and Lan-dude-no and stations to…Blare-noo fester…fest-teen-yog. Also change for Pen mine-moor and Lan..Lan…’

The tannoy tailed away in series of rasps and hisses.

“Poor sod’s given up,” said Bron, half rising from her seat to nudge Petouche’s pink carrier a couple of inches from the table. “Must be one of the Wembley guards, not the Holyhead guys. Even the Crewe ones would have some idea.”

“Say the name of your village again. Slowly.”

“Llan-vire-ungh-moch-nant. And the farm’s called Tan-ur-Brun. Hillside, in Saesnag.”

“Chelang-fire-ung-moch-nant. Tanny-brin.”

“Better. Better than last night, anyway. Family will be dead impressed.”

Bron unzipped the front of the holdall a couple of inches. Petouche thrust her head, a small black triangle topped by enormous ears through the gap and regarded the occupants of the train carriage with suspicion.

“Is that a cat?” said the small, mop-topped fair-haired boy opposite.”

“No, it’s a man-eating gorilla, captured from the mountains of the Serengeti. We’re taking him to my mam’s farm so we can breed a race of killer-sheep …”

Grace broke in. “Yes, love, it is a cat. Her name’s Petouche.”

The parents – possibly grandparents – beamed approvingly, looking up from their magazines. By now the train was underway, sighing and clattering over the pointwork.

“Can I stroke her?” said the boy.

“I wouldn’t. She’s not really tame – it doesn’t always end well,” said Grace. “But you can come and say hello, if you like.”

“Alloo, Petooge!”

Petouche wrinkled her nose and twitched her huge whiskers; she didn’t seem overly impressed. Perhaps she’d been expecting First Class.

“Is it very far, Holyhead?” said Jamie.

“Oh yes,” said Grace. “Getting on for what, two hundred-and fifty miles?”

“How long’s it take?”

“Oh, about three days,” Bron broke in. “If we get a good run.”

“Three days! But that’s – where are we going to sleep?”

“Here, I suppose. Or you can sleep in the brake van, if you like…”

“My Nan says Holyhead’s on an EYE-land. So how’s the train get there?”

“There’s a guy with a coracle, rows everybody across, in twos and threes…”

“What’s a crockle?”

“It’s a kind of small boat, made out of skins.”

“Out of skin? But doesn’t the water come in?”

“Sometimes. Sometimes it tips over, so you lose all your luggage. Have to swim for it.”

“But I can’t swim!”

“Maybe one of the grown-ups’ll be able to help you.”

“Will YOU help me?”

“No.”

Grace gently kicked Bron’s shin under the table.

 

 

The intercity was getting into its stride. Hemel Hempstead, Berkhamsted, Tring all flashed by. Grace felt emboldened enough to unzip Petouche’s holdall full, while keeping a firm grip on her leash.

“I think we did the right thing, giving her a bit of R&R at your Mam’s Giving us all a bit of R&R.”

“Yeah. Funny how she just stopped wanting to go after the mice.”

“Losing her touch?”

“P’raps. Or maybe moving into Geoff’s flat had something to do with it.”

“But she was fine at first. Maybe she just got…sated. Or bored with it all.”

“Could be. Anyway, be a nice break for all of us, before we move into Acton.”

“Into Acton, into Action…”

“Hardly. Bit of a comedown after Bayswater.”

“Nice of Geoff to let us have his flat like that.”

“Y-e-e-r-s. Mmmm … Well, as it’s a special occasion, I thought I’d treat us both. No thermos - coffee from the buffet?”

“You DO know how to treat a girl, Bron…”

 

“Look, change out of a fiver. Drink it while it’s lukewarm.”

Bron let the coins clatter onto the table.

“Does Wales issue its own money? Seen the odd Scottish note here in London, never any Welsh ones.”

“Nah! No such thing as Welsh money.”

“Wonder why not?

“Maybe they don’t trust us. Or we’re too thick.”

“Don’t say that!”

“True, though…”

 

At Crewe, Bron insisted that they get out onto the platform and watch the loco-change, from electric to diesel. “Look, he’s isolating the air; now he’s disconnecting the hose …”

As the electric loco sighed and headed off to the sidings, the shunter joined them on the platform. “You a train-spotter, then? Don’t got many lady ones…”

“Nah! Ex-shunter, New Birch Moor …”

“Don’t get many lady shunters either, come to that. Not even women shunters, for that matter. Did you say -EX-shunter? What made you give it up?”

“It gave me up. Well, I’m suspended, sort of.”

“Ever think of going back to it? They’re looking for people at Willesden, I’m told.”

“Would if they’d have me, but … left New Birch under a bit of a cloud. Near-miss.”

“Have to be a pretty big cloud for Willesden to say ‘no’. Got family on the Railway?”

“Uncle’s a senior guard at Holyhead.”

“Oh, well, you’re in there!”

“Thanks for the tip.”

 

The train growled and clattered its way through the lush, quiet Cheshire landscape towards Chester, diving under small brick bridges, more like something on a canal than a railway. The pace was slower now, the elderly diesel working hard to get up to over 70 on the winding track. By the time they’d reached the closed station at Calveley, the spring sunshine was slowly elbowing aside the thin cloud. A new guard on the tannoy, his Welsh crisp and confident: ‘Chester, Fflint, Prestatyn …”, the long list of stations on the Blaenau branch a Celtic incantation: “Llanrwst, Betws-y-coed, Dolwyddelan, Pont-y-Pant…”

Petouche patrolled up and down the aisle on a short leash, held by Grace.

“We’ve booked a B&B in Holyhead, from Exchange & Mart,” the kid’s grannie was telling Grace. “Porth-y-Bryn Road. Know it?”

“I don’t, but my partner’s from near there. Bron – Porth y Bryn Road. In Holyhead?”

“What about Porth y Bryn Road?”

“They’ve booked a B&B there.”

“Is it close to the beach – or the Prom? Thought Tommy here would like a seaside holiday. We’ve booked it for a week ..”

“You’ve booked a seaside holiday in Holyhead? You out of – AH!” Another kick under the table, harder this time. “It sounds lovely,” Grace broke in. “And Holyhead’s not a big place. It can’t be far.”

 

 

“Wow! Someone left a ship lying around!” The hulk of Duke of Lancaster in its concrete dry-dock  loomed out of the marshland mist on the right of the train.

“Oh yeah. The Fun Ship.”

“Don’t look like anyone’s having much fun on her now. Not unless your idea of run is loads of rust…”

“Owner went bust, I think.”

Tommy’s eyes were agape. “Nan! Grandpa! Can me go. Please, please, please!”

“Think you’re a few years too late, Tommy. Anyway, it’ll be full of rats…”

 

 

The static caravans closed in on the line just before Prestatyn. Rows and rows, and rows, terraces and avenues. After Rhyl, rows of bungalows, retired couples pottering around their back gardens in their mid-morning routine, oblivious to the hundreds of eyes watching them from the train.

At Pensarn, just beyond Abergele, a small, solitary girl scooped muddy sand into her green plastic bucket, absorbed, a line of footprints marking her progress to her spot in the middle of the beach.

“Why’s she on her own?”

“Got leprosy. Don’t want her to infect the other kids.”

“How do you KNOW she’s got leprosy?”

“I’m an adult. We know everything.”

 

 

Llandudno Junction, the clamour and sudden blackness as the train disappeared inside the Tubular Bridge – Petouche quickly scurried back to the safety of her holdall - then the train elbowed its way insolently around the ramparts of Conwy Castle, diving through a crenelated arch in the city walls cut by the railway builders 150 years ago.

“Wow!” said Grace. “Never been so up close to a castle, in a train, before. How come they were allowed to do that?”

Bron shrugged. “Different times. Guess they said, ‘we want to build the railway here’, so they did. Who was going to stop ‘em?”

 

 

The sea was closer now; they glimpsed waves breaking on the grey rocks of the seawall at Pen-Y-Clip before plunging into yet another tunnel. The train seemed to be racing across the flatlands between the mountains and the sea, the grey hulk of Penrhyn Castle looming and growing on the seaward side.

After Bangor, the line swung away from the road in a wide curve to meet the Britannia Bridge, road traffic thundering along the upper deck on its way to meet the Holyhead ferry. Grace held both Bron’s hands tightly as they crossed the Menai Straits; Bron stared straight ahead, without glancing left to the Suspension Bridge. Grace gazed intently into Bron’s eyes but she didn’t return her gaze. “Be there in fifteen minutes,” said Bron as they clattered off the bridge. They gathered yp bags, zipped Petouche safely inside her holdall.

 

 

 

They’d have a little while to wait at Holyhead; John-John had forewarned them that he’d be a little late arriving from Maesgeirchen with the minivan. Tommy, a beaming grandparent either side, headed away up Station Approach.

“There’s no collackle!” cried Tommy, turning as they passed. “I thought you grown-ups knew everything!”

“We do. But then we always lie.”

To be continued in Chapter 39