Train Follies

The frog that sat in the seat opposite Ostero licked its eyeball.

‘Exactly!’ Mr Morris slapped his knee and chortled at the frog’s insight. Ostero laughed politely. He was a dear old friend to Mr Morris but hardly an acquaintance to the frog, whose name he did not know. It had simply been sat there in the train cabin, when he had woken up. And he had no clue as to how he happened to be on the train either, the faint hint of questioning that he had put to Mr Morris upon waking, revealed only that he had agreed to a three-week holiday on the coast.

‘My man here knows all about that, eh Ostero?’ Mr Morris nudged. His long eyebrows twitched outward.

‘Yes! Of course!’ Ostero said defiantly. He did not know what it was that he was meant to know all about, but it was his custom to get by with pretending.

The Frog made a noise in its throat that was presumed by Ostero to be a note of approval, but he couldn’t be sure. He supposed that it was because of how the frog dressed: anyone dressed like that whould not be inclined toward the negative, he thought. It wore a bright sapphire coat that was layered with ruffle upon ruffle upon pleats, all stuffed and puffed with ruching. It was regal and fantastic, Ostero thought, but also approachable. It suggested something of the interior but gave no real hint as to the frog’s occupation. Ostero himself was a brown-haired, plainly dressed, chair maker.

‘You think you could hold down the fort for me, old man?’ Mr Morris addressed the frog and winked. The frog returned the serve by lolling out its tongue..

‘Ohoho! Rascal!’

With that Mr Morris saluted them both and then slipped out of the cabin. When the door had shut behind him, Ostero looked to the frog. It was staring out the window.

The train was passing through the treeless expanse of mountain and mire known as Lon Fach Valley. Ostero did not know to which coast they were heading but he recognised this barren landscape. He found the sparseness to be soothing. And it would stay like that for a while yet, with no inhabitants for miles that required the train to stop. Ostero looked back at the frog and fidgeted with his collar.

‘So, you work with Mr Morris, do you?’ he attempted. The frog made a throaty gurgle.

‘Oh, very nice! And have you been doing it long?’ Ostero asked. The frog turned back to the window.

‘Right, of course’ Ostero said. ‘Of course.’ He said again. And again. He repeated this mantra until finally he slapped his hands on his knees.

‘Well!’ He exclaimed ‘I should check what’s taking Mr Morris so long!’ He stood up and then added a short ‘haha’ as if to prove his statement. The frog stood up too. Or rather it hopped down. Ostero hadn’t noticed, but the frog’s feet had not touched the cabin’s carpeted floor until it had stood up.

‘Right, yes, of course’ Ostero began again.

The air in the wobbling corridor of the train was cooler than in the cabin. And the walls on either side were made up with cool, walnut panelling that added a further chilling effect. Underfoot, the plush burgundy carpet of the cabin was replaced by polished wooden slats, almost imitating the tracks they were running over.

Ostero shifted to the single window in the narrow space. It was round, like a porthole, but as large as a drawing room window. Ostero ran a finger over its seams and peered out. The view was much the same as before: the loneliness of Lon Fach circling past them. The frog sidled up beside Ostero. Only the top half of its face reached the windo. It blinked and its reflection blinked back.

‘Well, he’s not out here!’ Ostero said with as much enthusiasm as he thought was right.

‘Tickets!’ a call came from the next carriage over.

‘Tickets!’ cried Otstero and turned to the frog. He had been relying on Mr Morris for that. He didn’t even know what station to ask for.

‘Tickets!’ the call was getting closer. Thinking as fast as his frazzled mind could, Ostero opened the door to the neighbouring cabin and bundled himself inside, followed closely by the frog.

A bewildered elderly couple put down their bananas and raised their eyebrows.

‘Pardon us!’ Ostero bowed and looked nervously at the door.

‘What’s going on?’ The one with a large nose and a gardening bonnet asked.

‘You see,’ Ostero looked at them and then to the frog for inspiration. The frog moved past Ostero and got up on the seat opposite to Bonnet’s partner; a curly-haired man with no teeth. The frog deflated its cheeks and made something like a popping noise with its mouth.

‘Oh! I get it!’ Bonnet clapped her hands and smiled, her curly-haired partner did the same. Then the frog joined in and Ostero too, until they were all clapping and smiling.

‘It’s nice to have the company. Please, sit.’ Curly gestured for Ostero to take the seat next to the frog and he obliged.

‘Yes, it is lovely,’ Bonnet agreed ‘but it does get a bit stuffy in these old cabins. Would you mind?’ she pointed to the window clasp under the frog’s elbow. The window was opened and the cabin was topped up with chilly mountain air.

‘Wonderful.’ Said Bonnet.

‘Oh, yes, yes!’ Said Ostero.

‘Tickets?’ said the conductor at the door.

Bonnet and Curly dutifully produced their well-kept tickets and then returned them safely to a purse. The conductor then turned to Ostero and the frog.

‘Tickets?’ She asked. The conductor was lean, with a collection of well-polished buttons on her jacket.

‘Right, yes. Yes, yes, yes . . .’ Ostero carried on, until the conductor clicked her tongue.

‘Tickets,’ she said. Ostero looked about frantically. If he got kicked off now, he’d be trapped in a friendless landscape with no way home. He had to come up with something before that happened. Then, his eyes clocked the breast pocket under the frog’s frills. There was a ticket inside! Without a second thought, Ostero grabbed the slip of paper and waved it in the conductor’s face.

‘Sir, that is clearly his ticket.’ She said, pointing to the frog.

‘Perhaps they are lovers?’ Curly suggested.

‘Lovers!?’ exclaimed Ostero.

‘As lovers, sir,’ the conductor explained ‘the gentleman can take charge of you and see to it that he pays for you at the station. See, we do not to pry into the intentions of those who have paid, nor question the nature of the company they keep.’ The conductor then continued on, reeling off the many sub-set terms surrounding the rules of the rails, all the while Bonnet, Curly and the frog nodded respectfully.

‘We are lovers then, yes. That’s right.’ Ostero declared when she was done.

‘How long?’ asked the conductor.

‘Twelve months, six days’ he retorted.

‘Such a new couple!?’ exclaimed Bonnet ‘Why, you’re just babies!’

‘Babies,’ Curly agreed.

‘Yes, babies.’ Ostero said, naturally. The conductor relented.

‘I shall entrust him to you, then.’ She said, as she handed the ticket back to the frog and then left. When she was gone, Ostero let go of the breath he had been holding in and deflated, floating down to the floor.

‘Awww,’ Bonnet was looking at the pair ‘such sweet babies.’ she smiled and put a hand to her cheek.

‘Of course, you’ll be looking to get married.’ Curly observed.

‘A wedding!’ Bonnet cried at an astonishing volume. Then suddenly overcome with tenderness, she pulled her partner and the frog down on to the floor to hug with Ostero. The frog was gentle but Curly was unfortunately very enthusiastic.

‘Ope. Very nice, thank you, but . . .’ Ostero ducked his head out from under Curly’s armpit. ‘These lovers have places to be. So we better be off. We have that a- thing, urm . . .’ Ostero struggled to think. He looked at the frog. It pulled its eyes away from the ceiling, paused and then burped. Bonnet gasped at it.

‘I never!’ she cried ‘Is that really true?’ she was looking at the frog through an elbow.

‘And he does that to you, does he?’ Curly said to Ostero, his eyes wide.

‘What? Urm, yes. Sometimes.’ with that, Ostero wrenched himself free of the hug on the floor and rushed the door, he called back a rough goodbye and then slammed the door shut just as the frog slipped out. They were in the walnut hallway again. Ostero slid down the wall. Where the blooming heck was Mr Morris?

‘Say, my darling’ a whisper leaked from under Bonnet and Curly’s cabin door, ‘do you think I should go and talk to that nice young couple about . . . you know?’ it was Curly’s voice.

‘I suppose . . . we have always wanted to try it’ Bonnet giggled.

‘Right!’ Ostero stood upright, took the next available door by the handle and swung it open.

Inside the next cabin they were met by four young children with exceptionally long hair, all cut into the shape of a bowl. These mops of hair completely covered their faces so Ostero could not discern if they were welcome. Fortunately, these children, all sat on one seat, were accompanied by their upright protector in a lily white dress. Her face was uncovered and rather beautiful.

‘Are you the betrothed?’ she smiled.

‘What?’ Ostero breathed.

‘Beg your pardon, it’s just we heard that there was a couple on board who are to be married.’ she pointed to the open window.

‘No! No, no, no’ Ostero laughed ‘you’ve got it wrong; we are not to be married.’ he waved his hands (rather frantically) in front of his face to disperse any such notions still lingering on the air.

‘Oh,’ the lady in the lily-white dress looked down at her interlocked fingers ‘I see. It’s just the children, they’ve wanted to attend one for so long,’ she looked at the mops with a sad smile ‘for you see, none of them are permitted to marry.’ she shook her head and indeed, upon learning that the wedding they had eagerly awaited was not to be, the children began to weep.

‘Oh dear, oh dear.’ Ostero flustered. Then, suddenly there was a crashing and banging heard from the next cabin over. The ruckus was apparently caused by something rather heavy because for a split moment, the whole train leaned to the left and squealed on the tracks. Then all was still. The children juddered their shoulders as if to resume crying but were snapped out of it by the cabin door crashing open.

‘Right! Who’s making these babies cry?’ a large, red-faced lady demanded from the doorway. She was wearing a long, once-whitish tunic with very thin shoulder straps.

‘He says . . .’ snivelled one of the mops, pointing right at Ostero ‘that they aren’t getting married.’

The large lady took pause. Then, having seemingly recalculated the cause of her anger, she turned to Ostero.

‘No, I’m not having that,’ she said.

‘Excuse me?’ said Ostero.

‘Well, I think it’s plain wrong to refuse the ceremony’ she said, ‘You’d do right to honour it.’

‘But I don’t . . .’ Ostero uttering these syllables of rebuttal caused the large lady to bristle all over and she slammed her fist into the walnut wall. Ostero jumped and stammered. The mops and Lily were looking to him. The frog was looking out the window. And then a small, polite ‘excuse me’ got past the large lady and into the cabin. The large lady retreated from the doorway and out into the hall, revealing Bonnet, with Curly stood behind her.

‘We understand the truth of it now,’ said Bonnet ‘and we think you ought to have a word.’ From her gestures, Ostero understood that she meant for him to speak to Curly alone.

The train was winding out of the tail end of the valley when Curly brought Ostero out on to the gangway. They were leaving behind the screes and crags of Lon Fach and moving on to the more populated and verdant dells. Soon they would be reunited with civilisation and the train would pull into a station.

‘What’s to do, son?’ Curly asked, invoking his most fatherly tones. Ostero sighed and leaned his elbows on the railing. He watched the train’s tracks rushing away beneath them and then came out with it.

‘It’s just, no one has been listening to what I have been saying, and I think it’s all run away from me. I do not know that frog, I do not know how I got on this train, and I do not have a ticket.’ He hung his head. Everything felt hopeless.

‘Sounds to me,’ curly said ‘like you’re talking a lot about ‘do nots’ and not enough about . . . dos.’ pleased with this bit of wisdom, Curly added a satisfied, lopsided smile at the end. Ostero glared at the little man, but he couldn’t be angry.

‘What do I have?’ he asked, exhausted.

‘For starters,’ Curly began ‘there’s us.’

‘Us?’ Ostero repeated. Curly pointed to himself and then to the door that led back inside the train, where Bonnet and the large lady could be seen standing in the hallway. ‘A nice bunch of people, all wanting what’s best for you. And you have that nice frog.’

‘Mm,’ Ostero mumbled ‘he does dress well.’

‘There you go! And he’s a good listener, I’ll bet.’

‘Oh, yes, yes,’ said Ostero.

‘And he does that thing.’ Curly elbowed Ostero.

‘Right . . .’ Ostero was losing the picture.

‘Do you have other marriage offers?’ Curly asked.

‘No, no, nothing like that.’

‘Well, here you are with a fine-looking frog and some fine people around you, why not make a go of it, eh?’ Curly put his hand on Ostero’s back and smiled a proud, toothless smile.

‘Make a go of it?’ Ostero looked inward ‘Yes, I suppose, yes I could . . .’

‘There we go!’ Curly patted him on the back again ‘Isn’t that swell? You’re getting married!’

‘I’m getting married!’

Before they went in from the cold rushing air, Curly dusted off Ostero’s shoulders. He did so for several minutes and only stopped when he had given a conspicuous thumbs up to someone inside the carriage.

‘Are you ready?’ Curly asked.

‘Yes, I think I am.’ Ostero linked his arm with Curly’s and was escorted back inside the carriage. The large lady was waiting for them outside of Curly and Bonnet’s cabin door. She looked a little less angry but still hurried them furiously down the hall and issued them both inside.

The frog turned to Ostero as he entered and slowly deflated its throat. When they locked eyes Ostero blushed. The frog was dressed in the lily’s white dress. The fit of it was rather too big, but this only added a draping effect that Ostero found to be quite elegant. It also revealed some of the frog’s shoulder. There was a veil too; a strip of some rag that was once-whiteish in colour.

The ceremony began when the frog took its place in front of Bonnet. They stood before the window. Curly pushed Ostero into place beside the frog and then for himself, he climbed awkwardly over the mops to sit on the back of their seat. The lily, now dressed in a becoming shade of pale blue, was sat on the opposite seat. The large lady looked in from the hallway.

‘Here, on this day, bear witness to young love,’ she gestured to the couple. A giddy reflux erupted from one of them mops. ‘They shall be united, never to part, unless someone present would now wish to advise against it.’ Bonnet paused. Ostero gulped and grabbed the frog’s hand.

‘Perfan station! Next stop! Perfan station!’ the conductor walked past the door ringing a hand bell, ‘take all luggage with you and mind the drop!’ she called.

‘The train is going to stop!’ cried the pale-blue lily.

‘Oh no,’ Bonnet looked frightfully to Curly.

‘Why should that matter?’ Ostero asked.

‘Why should it matter!?’ the large lady fumed ‘Get here!’ she grabbed Ostero by the collar and dragged him in to the hallway. Before he could turn around to protest, he was being dragged down the train carriages by the raging woman. She bulled her way through, knocking down any passengers unfortunate enough to be out of their cabins, until they reached the driver’s cab up front.

‘Okay you,’ she said to a man in a neat uniform and peaked cap ‘where is the driver?’

‘I am he, m’aam,’ said the man in the uniform.

‘Right,’ the large lady squeezed herself through the cab and got a hold of the driver. She dragged the man away from his post and on to the gangway between carriages.

‘What are you doing!?’ shouted Ostero.

‘Saving your wedding!’

‘How!?’

‘By making sure the train don’t stop!’ and then she lifted the driver into the air and swiftly threw him over the guard rail. He skipped like a stone on water, bouncing over a patch of heather and moss before disappearing into the landscape.

‘That should do it,’ the large lady dusted her hands off.

‘But . . .’ Ostero pointed to the train controller ‘the train.’

‘The train!?’ the large lady scoffed ‘I just saved your wedding!’ she yanked Ostero by the collar and dragged him back through the train.

The frog had waited patiently in the spot where Ostero had left him.

‘All sorted now?’ Bonnet asked cheerily. The large lady nodded.

‘NO!’ shouted Ostero. He turned behind him and slammed the door on the large lady’s face. ‘That lunatic has thrown the driver overboard!’

‘That would be a boat.’ the pale-blue lily said ‘overboard, that’s for a boat,’ she explained.

‘Listen to me! The train is not going to stop! There is no driver!’ Ostero was incredulous. Bonnet looked at him, concerned.

‘What’s brought all this on, love?’ she asked.

‘What!?’

‘Are you trying to stop the wedding again?’

‘No! No no no no no no no . . .’ Ostero got stuck on the syllable, turning away from each disapproving face in the room. And then the frog that had been beside him ran out of the cabin.

‘Now look what you’ve done!’ reproved the large lady from the now open doorway.

‘Runaway bride!’ cried one of the mops.

‘Don’t stand there like a prize goose, go after him!’ cheered Curly.

When Ostero reached the walnut hallway, the frog had just disappeared into Mr Morris’ cabin, leaving its veil to float to the floor.

Behind him, the sound of the large lady’s foot tapping told him he was still being watched. So, with a shaking hand, he opened the cabin door.

Inside the cabin, the frog was back in his usual garb (the sapphire coat and frills) and sitting in his original seat. Ostero approached with light steps.

‘Look, it’s not you . . .’ but before Ostero could come out with an explanation he did not know he had, Mr Morris came back through the door.

‘Oi, oi, chaps!’ he blustered into the small space like no one else was in it. He sat down next to the frog and slapped its knee.

‘Cor! That was a fierce battle,’ he declared.

‘Battle?’ Ostero blinked.

‘Aye, thought I’d be on that lav for the rest of my life. Got the better of the beast though,’ he jeered. The frog swelled and gurgled.

‘Ohohoho! That’s the truth,’ Mr Morris laughed.

‘Where are we, by the by?’ he asked, ‘only, I thought I heard our station being called.’

‘Right, yes, the thing is . . .’ Ostero began.