End of the Line by David Ashton

Waverley Station lay quiet, the locomotives heaving softly like a herd of animals, flanks steaming as midnight struck.
    Two figures emerged in the lamplight, clanking towards the recently arrived Newcastle train. Their clothes proclaimed them to be railway cleaners, stoical and stocky, metal buckets bumping together as the two old women, Margaret Reid and Jenny Dunlop, reflected upon life, as they knew it.
    â€˜Ye wonder why folk come and go,’ Margaret announced in the stillness.
    â€˜I’ve never left Edinburgh,’ was the response.
    â€˜Some folk though,’ Margaret winced at a sudden ache; the dampness played merry hell with her bones at times. ‘All over the world, camels and ships and the Lord knows what.’
    â€˜I wouldnae put trust in the sea,’ said Jenny, and then let out a shriek. ‘My God, look at the size of it!’
    A large black rat picked its way carefully up the platform, oblivious to the disquietude it was creating.
    Margaret shook her head in remonstrance. ‘The place is rampant with the beasts – all these years and you’re still kicking up a fuss. If it doesnae have a ticket Mister Pettigrew will see it far enough.’ She had spotted the trim figure of the guard down at the front engine of the train and frowned for a moment. ‘That’s funny.’
    â€˜Whit is?’
    â€˜Nothing. Come on – all aboard!’
    They clambered into the rear carriage and with an ease born of long practice picked their way in the semi-gloom, eyes flicking left and right to register the state of the compartment and the necessary cleansing thereof.
    â€˜These late-night trains, dirty devils!’
    Margaret smiled grimly at the other’s remark.
    â€˜Wisnae for the dirt, we’d have no living – oh, oh.’
    Her nose wrinkled at the whisky and tobacco fumes, plus she had also spotted a figure slumped in one of the corner seats. ‘There’s always the one, eh?’
    â€˜A disgrace tae mankind,’ observed Jenny piously.
    â€˜Just inebriated.’ Margaret shook the figure roughly by the shoulder. ‘End of the line, sir. Rouse yourself!’
    A moment and then the entity slowly fell to land with a thud on the floor where it lay ominously still, the face staring up, eyes wide open and sightless.
    â€˜His neck is livid, see the mark!’ gasped Jenny.
    â€˜I see well enough,’ replied Margaret bleakly. She wrenched down the carriage window, stuck her head out and bawled down the platform.
    â€˜Mister Pettigrew – I think we have a dead body in Waverley Station!’
    â€˜That’s against regulations,’ came the prim response. ‘Don’t move a muscle!’
    A piercing whistle blast signalled bureaucratic alarm and Margaret sighed as she looked back to where Jenny was staring disapprovingly down at the corpse.
    â€˜It’s going tae be a long night, Jenny.’
    Her companion nodded, then a random thought struck. ‘D’ye think they’ll pay us extra?’ she asked.
    * * *
    Thomas Pettigrew was a worried official as he escorted the two police officers through the stale air of the railway carriage. A dry stick with small features and erect bearing, the very embodiment of a railway man.
    â€˜We had it moved to a siding,’ he remarked, moustache twitching unhappily. ‘But it’s played havoc with the timetable.’
    â€˜The timetable, eh?’ said Inspector James McLevy.
    â€˜Havoc.’
    By now they had reached the corpse where it lay covered over by a white sheet.
    â€˜Abracadabra!’
    McLevy whipped off the covering with a flourish and the two policemen bent over the cadaver.
    They made a strange contrast. The inspector grizzled, thickset, muffled up in his dark coat, low-brimmed bowler sitting on his head like a chimney pot, and Constable Mulholland a tall lanky figure, his cape billowing with the stooping motion.
    Two pairs of eyes stared down.