He wheezed some more in Joshua’s direction, until he realized that neither his brakeman or engineer were going to respond. Martell was starting to get mad. A man making a joke deserves some kind of answer, even if the joke’s an old one. He’d put up with this silence too long.

The dark engulfed them, the yellow light from the cab flickering on the irregular shapes of the rough rock walls, but the entrance to the tunnel was clearly visible ahead.

Martell leaned forward in his chair.

‘Guess you’re keepin’ it shut ’cause you know that whole livin’ rock thing was a crock of shit, Tennent. That right?’

Joshua kept his eyes on the growing arch of light.

‘Guess so, Wesley.’

It was shaking a stick at a steer, a hoghead calling Martell by his first name.

‘Well let’s us just stop in the upper tunnel and check it out. Clear it up for good.’

Joshua dared not look at him. He sat motionless, his throat dry.

‘You heard. Hit the brakes. Now.’

He heard all right. Why not? Joshua knew it would get him one day. Every time he dreamed of that rushing, hungry darkness, he knew it would get him. Why not now? Now was as good a time as any.

Turning slowly to look at Martell, he pulled back the brake and watched the conductor’s florid face as the train began its laborious process of halting.

Forty-five seconds later, they stopped just inside the mouth of the upper tunnel.

Joshua Tennent held his conductor’s eyes in a gaze like a mongoose holding a snake. Martell twitched. Maybe the engineer was really crazy. Maybe this was where he went Charlie Manson and they’d all end up being stencils for a cop’s chalk outline. But then again maybe not. There was face to be saved here, and when all was said and done he was the guy in charge, and crazy or not, Tennent had better understand that, and understand it good.

Henry was open-mouthed, looking from Joshua to Martell and back again, as though the secret of why a substantial portion of BC’s coal supply came to be stationary in the mouth of the upper Corkscrew Tunnel, lay in the air somewhere between them.

‘Want to get out and say hi to the rock?’ The conductor spat the words.

A pause.

‘Sure. After you, Wesley.’

The delay in the reply was deliberate, the tone of voice imitating Joshua. ‘After you, son.’

Joshua stood. It would get him. Of course it would. He would face it now, it would get him, and the thing would be done. Over.