The Sudrians: The Salvation Collection

The Truth

May 1978

Jinty puffed cheerfully along the line, his wheels clattered along the rails smoothly and the sound of birds chirping around the bright blue sky seemed to make everything so cheerful.

"Hello Jinty!" called a voice, Jinty grinned even more as he slowed and then came to a halt right in front of the station where BoCo sat with a passenger train.

"Where are you going?" asked the big diesel, "shouldn't you be staying in the yards?"

"Naaah, not today mate!" smiled Jinty, "Stephen's requesting me to go to Brendam Docks and help Salty for the day! Busy day for him I'm afraid and he needs my help! Quite glad to help the lad, haven't seen him for a while and love to hear his tall tales about the sea again."

"That's good to know," laughed BoCo, "Salty will enjoy the company other than those bees."

Jinty knew exactly what he meant, he gave a wink at BoCo, then said farewell and puffed cheerily away to continue his journey to the end of the line.

When he got there, Salty was thrilled to see him and both worked hard all day shunting trucks around the docks, full of China clay ready to go out to other parts of the island, the United Kingdom, or other parts of the world.

Just as evening began to show across the docks, the foreman came walking over to Jinty and the crew. "A freight is due to go up to Suddery tonight," he said, "I was wondering if you could go up instead of Salty, it would save him the hassle and you're a much better runner with pulling trucks anyways."

"Oh yeah, of course!" smiled Jinty, he didn't mind one bit, as long as he could help Salty a little longer.

Soon, all the work had been done early thanks to Jinty staying longer and both he and Salty began talking about the news in general.

"I heard one of the warehouses in London was broken into last night," said Salty darkly.

"Was it now?" said Jinty, "yeah, I remember hearing about that too, don't really care to be honest. All a bunch of rubbish!"

"Do ya even know what was stolen matey?" asked Salty.

"...No..." said Jinty meekly, giving the dockside diesel a hearty chuckle.

"Apparently from reports," continued Salty, "the only thing stolen was a diesel."

"A diesel?" repeated Jinty in amazement, "you mean a railway diesel. Like BoCo or yourself?"

"Aye, that be true matey," Salty sighed, "I don't know the class of the diesel or what number he bears, but what I do know is that that warehouse holds diesels who have done terrible things."

"Terrible things?" said Jinty, trembling a little.

"Aye," said Salty gravely, "terrible things, they only go outside when they are needed and once that is that, they go inside again, not to be seen until a train needs pulling, or a shunter is needed in a yard for a few days, and once their class isn't needed anymore, they are the first to be cut up."

Jinty shivered at the thought. "Good story there Salty," he said with a nervous smile.

"ARRRRRGHHHH!!" shouted Salty all of a sudden, almost making the shunting engine jump, "pleasure to give ya me tales!"

***

When it was time for Jinty to go, he buffered up to his train, ready to head up to Suddery. "Thank you for the lovely day!" called Jinty, "hope to help here again!"

"Argh," Salty said, "pleasure to have you here all the time Jinty me lad! Ya welcome back anytime!!"

And went the guard blew his whistle, the shunting engine puffed off up the line back towards his own shed where Edward and BoCo would be waiting for him. Whilst travelling along the line, Jinty couldn't help but think about what Salty had said to him, it played on his mind so much that he almost missed the stop at Suddery.