Chapter 4
Tim Grant loved his Jeep. It had never let him down in the three years he’d owned it, but now he was swearing at it like a trooper.
The thing was a bloody tank and it had just had its big all-singing, all-dancing service, but it was coughing its guts up as if it had been a fifty-a-day smoker.
The engine cut out for the third time; the strain on the battery was audible when he had to restart it.
In short, it wasn’t going to make it up to Newcastle and he needed to be in Newcastle.
He hadn’t even a clue where he was because the satnav had decided that if the engine was going on strike, it was going to come out in brotherly support and the screen had died miles ago.
He’d come through a village and ended up in the back of beyond with nothing in front of him but snow and a thickening, darkening mist. He didn’t fancy the chances of a recovery vehicle finding him when he couldn’t even tell them where he was.
He made the decision to pull in at the next place which might offer him shelter and work out his plan of action from there.
The same thing had happened weatherwise five or six years ago when the country was blanketed in unforecast snow for the whole of the Christmas period.
He hoped whatever this was would be more short-lived, but it did pose the question: what Mickey Mouse course did meteorologists go on these days, and which bigger idiot was saying they were qualified at the end of it?
The engine cut out yet again and Tim muttered another choice expletive under his breath as he slipped into neutral and twisted the key in the ignition.
It fired, but under obvious protest. He pushed forward and saw something ahead at the side of the road: a sign, growing clearer the closer he got to it.
Hallelujah. There was a railway station nearby.
Change of plan then, not that he had much choice. He just hoped and prayed the station was one with shelter from these infernal elements.
The giant car rolled down the gentle slope of road by gravity and not by engine power because it popped, stopped and wouldn’t be started again, as dead as a dodo.
Tim twisted the steering wheel gently to the left, hoping he wouldn’t stall on the bend – he didn’t – and came to a halt in what he presumed was the station car park.
He jerked on the handbrake and watched the snow fill up the windscreen in seconds.
He was about to say This bloody country, when a rogue thought visited him about a potential life in a much kinder climate at the other side of the world, which was definitely not where his head wanted to go.
He gave it a rattle to shoo it away, before getting out to relieve the boot of his two suitcases.
Another car was drawing up beside his, albeit one with a working engine.
If he’d been as lucky, he’d have ploughed on.
Derringbury. He’d never heard of the place, not that it mattered.
There was indeed a waiting room and he could see people inside it which he took as a good sign that there was a train due.
He’d get to Newcastle one way if not the other.
He didn’t like to let anyone down. He’d done enough of that before now to last a whole lifetime.