close to my ear.
“We’ll go down one at a time now,” he whispered. “You go first. When you get to the ground turn right, away from them, and walk, walk, mind you, slowly and quietly along by the trucks. Keep close in to them. They’ll miss this poor sucker any minute now, and we’ve got to get clear. I’ll catch you up.”
With infinite care and feeling as conspicuous as an aeroplane caught in searchlights, I swung my legs over the edge of the roof, rolled over on my face and felt with my toes for the staples. A moment or two later I reached the ground. I gave one glance at the torches still flashing about twenty-five yards away. I wanted badly to run; but I controlled myself carefully. Zaleshoff had said walk. I turned and walked. I heard a slight sound behind me and Zaleshoff had caught me up. We reached the cover of the engine shed in safety.
It was possible by this time to distinguish something of our surroundings. Far away to the right of us was the weighbridge office. Facing the engine shed about a hundred yards away was a long low building that looked like a warehouse. I remembered what I had overheard.
“I heard the foreman say that that way was guarded,” I said quickly, for he was peering in that direction.
“So did I. We’re not going that way. We’ve got to get across those lines on to the station side, and I guess there’s only one way to do it. Come on. We’ll see what we can find in here.”
I felt suddenly irritable. My nerves were raw. He was treating me, I thought, like a child. And I was feeling sorry for the man he had clubbed.
“What do you expect to find? Are you planning to pinch an engine and ride out on that?”
“Don’t be damned silly. Come on.”
We walked to the end of the cinder path and turned into the engine shed. It was a large building constructed on a slight curve so that the lines on which the engines ran under cover converged on the turntable. The glass roof was practically obscured by soot deposits and it was very dark inside. There were five or six engines in it.
Zaleshoff led the way round behind them. Then I heard him give a grunt of satisfaction. We stopped. I could see him fumbling with something in the darkness near the wall. Suddenly he straightened his back and thrust something greasy and soft into my hands.
“What is it?”
“What I was looking for. A driver’s coat. Get your overcoat off and put it on. There’s a cap here, too.”
I put the coat on. As my eyes got used to the darkness I could see that he was doing the same. On his head was a beret. He handed me a cap with a shiny peak. The coat smelt strongly of coal, grease and sweat.
“Have you kept your scarf?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Give me your overcoat and hat.”
I did so and he stuffed them behind a steel locker.
“I don’t,” I said, “see the point of all this. Do you imagine that we’re going to get past the police on the strength of a couple of coats?”
“No. What we are going to do is to walk across the lines into the station and…”
“And hide in the lavatories, I suppose,” I supplemented ironically.
“Maybe. Let’s go.”
A minute later we broke cover and began to walk across the tracks towards the end of the line of trucks that separated us from the main lines.
It was a nerve-racking business. Out of the corner of my eye I could see that Zaleshoff’s victim had been found. They had lowered him from the roof of the van and he was sitting on the ground, his hands clasping his head. A group of them, including the foreman, was standing round talking excitedly. The policeman with his revolver at the ready was stalking rapidly in the direction of the warehouse. A railway official was trailing anxiously in his wake. We passed the line of trucks safely and started to cross the main lines diagonally towards the station. It may have been my nerves or it may have been that the driver’s coat was a good deal thinner than my overcoat, but by the time we had reached the station I was shivering violently.
The station platforms were practically deserted; but there were two bored-looking militiamen leaning against the wall by each exit. There was also a man with a trolley buffet talking to a porter on one of the eastbound platforms. Zaleshoff changed direction suddenly and began to walk towards it.
“What’s the idea?” I muttered.
“That buffet means that there’s a night train due in. If it’s got third-class coaches, we’ll jump it.”
“What about tickets?”
“We’ve got uniforms on. We can go third-class free.”
We reached the platform.
I think that those ten minutes we had to wait for the train were the worst part of it.
The sky was grey and a thin drizzle had begun to fall; but it was now light. The goods yard seemed very near. The station was very quiet, and small sounds, the scraping of a foot, a cough, echoed from the curved roof. To my overwrought imagination, the porter, the buffet attendant and the militiamen seemed all to be staring at us suspiciously.
“For God’s sake,” muttered Zaleshoff, “don’t look so darned sinister. You look as though you’d just made arrangements to blow up the station. Don’t look at them, look at me; and look as if you liked it. Come on, we’ll try a slow walk towards the buffet. We can’t stand here all the time. It looks too exclusive. Have you got your cigarettes?”
“Yes.”
“Break one in half in your pocket, stick one end in your mouth and light up. If those two start talking to us, keep your mouth shut and leave it to me. They’ll spot your accent.”
My fingers were shaking so much that it took me over a minute to light the cigarette. By that time, Zaleshoff was sauntering, hands in pockets, towards the buffet. Suppressing a desire to run after him, I followed slowly. I caught him up as he was nearing the buffet. The porter and the buffet attendant had stopped talking and were watching our approach. I felt sick with apprehension. Then the porter nodded to Zaleshoff.
“Trouble over at the goods yard, they tell me,” he said.
He was a youngish man with quick blue eyes.
Zaleshoff shrugged. His voice when he spoke was thick, as though he had a cold, and he slurred his words. It would have been difficult to detect any accent.
“They found a couple of tramps hiding in a truck,” he said. “One of them hit one of our chaps with a bottle and they got away. They must be hiding in another truck now. But they won’t get out of the yard.”
The porter leaned forward confidentially. “We’ve had a message here to look out for them. It is said that they may be the two foreigners that escaped from Milan.”
Zaleshoff whistled softly.
The porter smacked his lips. “Ten thousand lire! That’s something, isn’t it?”
“Not so bad. But”-he looked puzzled-“I thought there was only one of them.”
The porter whipped a newspaper out of his pocket. “No, two. The police think that he has another man with him, this foreigner. They were seen in a caffe near Treviglio the night before last. The padrone recognised one of them from the photograph in the paper. Look, here it is. No photograph of the second man, but a description. You know, I think that these are not Englishmen, but French, or perhaps English spies working for the French. The French will stab us in the back if they can. Yesterday I carried the baggage of a Frenchman, three heavy suitcases, and found him a good corner seat with his back to the engine as he wished. He gave me five lire. Five lire only!” He gazed at us in bitter triumph.
“Ah, the French!” said Zaleshoff. He glanced at the paper idly and laughed. “Well, it won’t be you or me that’ll collect that ten thousand. It’ll be a policeman. You mark my words.”
“Policeman!” chimed in the buffet attendant suddenly. He lowered his voice. “A man was telling me in the caffe last night that it was not the police whom these men escaped from in Milan, but-well-you know who I mean.” He looked from one to the other of us meaningly.
Zaleshoff shrugged again. “Perhaps.” He turned and dug me jovially in the ribs. “Hey, what about ten thousand lire, Beppe?” He turned again to the other two. “He’s sulking. His woman is at home in Udine, and he’s thinking that there will be a couple of his mates underneath the bed when he gets back.”
The three of them roared with laughter. I scowled. Zaleshoff dug me in the ribs again.
