table dutifully returned.
“Wow!” Box cried out in amazement, and especially so at the simplicity of it all. “And you never even used any of the buttons!”
“No – none,” Harry said frostily.
Continuing with her demonstration, Harry waved the wand close to Box, almost touching his face, but this time she said, “Hocus-Pocus.”
Waiting for something to happen, but seeing nothing, Box said, “Nothing happened!”
“Are you sure?” she asked, folding her arms with a sense of growing satisfaction.
Looking around, in case something had happened that he had missed, Box was as puzzled as before, because nothing seemed different. He was stumped, so he said, “Yes, I am sure of it.”
Without betraying any sign of emotion, Harry said, “Look at your reflection in the windowpane.”
Gazing at his reflection, Box jumped back in fright, horrified to see that he, like the smiling waiter in the buffet carriage, had two noses. “Get rid of them!” he bellowed. “GET RID OF THEM!”
The nearby couple, looking over their divider, tried to see what all the fuss was about. Sliding down in his chair, Box avoided their gaze. Whispering, he said, “All right, Harry, you have made your point. Now, will you please return my original nose – and only the one, mind you?”
Laughing, Harry waved her wand, saying, “Sucop-Sucoh.”
“Is it done? Have you changed it?” he asked, afraid that she hadn’t, that she was still teasing him.
Returning the wand to the safety of her pocket, Harry said, “Why don’t you take a look for yourself?”
Studying his reflection Box was relieved to see that his original nose had returned, and having thus learnt a valuable lesson, he humbly mumbled a ‘thanks’.
“Pardon?”
“I said, thanks, okay?”
“Yes, it’s fine,” said Harry, her frosty tone of voice beginning to thaw.
For a while the two cousins said nothing more; Box preferring to keep his thoughts to himself, and Harry keeping hers set on the task ahead. As daylight faded Box began twisting and turning in his armchair, trying to get as comfortable as was possible for the approaching hours of darkness. Placing his feet onto the small table that he had pulled up in front of him, he closed his eyes and tried to settle down and get some much-needed sleep.
Giving her cousin a most peculiar look, Harry asked, “What are you doing?”
Opening an eye, Box replied, “I’m trying to get some sleep.”
Standing up, she said, “Not here, come on we have a sleeping compartment.”
Opening his other eye, Box asked, “Really?”
Without bothering to reply, Harry made her way through the connecting door of the carriage. In his rush to follow her, Box fell out of his armchair, banging his head sharply on the small table. Rubbing his head, he opened the door and followed Harry through to the next carriage. Once again admiring the furnishings of this carriage, Box was undecided which of the two styles he preferred – Victorian or Art Deco, then seeing his cousin passing through the connecting door he quickened his step. The next carriage, the buffet, was deserted, and the two cousins passed through it without comment.
“This is where we sleep,” Harry explained, opening the door to their sleeping compartment, when Box finally caught up with her. “Go on,” she said, “After you.”
Inside, there were two bunks; Box chose the top one. After taking off his shoes and socks, he climbed the narrow ladder and slipped beneath the freshly laundered sheets, instantly falling fast asleep. Lying in her bunk, beneath, Harry remained awake, on guard against possible attack.
When Box next awoke it was still dark, and the train was trundling along the tracks, through the inky depths of the night, to a place that he knew without a shadow of a doubt was going to be, at best, different and, at worst, extremely dangerous.
“Are you awake?” he called down.
“Yes,” Harry replied in a voice so quiet Box thought she feared someone was listening.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Go on.”
“It’s about those Necro – what was it you called them?”
“Necromancers.”
“Yeh, that’s it,” he said. “I know it means wizards, but can you tell me a bit more, like why they are so intent on stopping you, dead or alive?”
For a while Harry remained silent, as she chose her words carefully, seeking enough to keep Box onside, but not enough to allow him a full grasp of her plans. When she replied, she said, “Necromancer is, as you have already surmised, a fancy name for wizard…”
“But what exactly are these Necromancers?” Box asked, “And why are they so desperate to get you?”
There was another pause, before Harry said, “It’s like I told you – I left something behind.”
“But what was it? – You never did tell me!”
“It’s no concern of yours,” she replied abruptly, “Go back to sleep, we have a long day ahead of us.” After that Harry remained silent. Box did try speaking again, but she totally ignored him.
“Wake up sleepy head,” said Harry, poking her whimpishly thin cousin in the ribs. “It’s time to get up.”
“W, what happened?” Box mumbled, still half asleep.
“I said it’s time to get up.”
“What time is it?”
“Five thirty.”
“Five thirty?” Box bemoaned. “I need more sleep! Give me another thirty minutes I’ll be all right by then.”
“No, I won’t!” she scolded. “We will have arrived at our destination by then.”
“At six o’clock?”
“Yes, I did tell you yesterday evening. Can’t you Muddles remember anything?” With that she opened the compartment door, saying, “I’ll see you in the buffet car.”
As the door banged closed, Box jumped out of bed, forgetting that he was in the top bunk. Slamming hard into the floor, he cried out, “Argh! What else can happen to me?”
Hagswords Bound
After a most enjoyable breakfast of kippers, freshly baked bread and creamy smooth butter, washed down with lashings of piping hot tea, the speed of the train began to slow.
The waiter, the same two-nosed man who had served them the evening before, came over, and asked, “Was everything to your satisfaction?”
“Yes it was wonderful,” Box reassured him.
Turning to Harry, the man offered her the same peculiar smile that had so unnerved Box at dinner the evening before, and thus begun that unfortunate incident.
Offering him two gold coins, she said, “Thank you, and hopefully we will be seeing you again in the near future.”
Taking the money, the waiter cleared the table, bowed, and left them. Watching a gloriously red sun inch its way slowly above the horizon, Box gazed onto the landscape, realising how high they had travelled during the night, above the tree line, where the only things growing were gorse and peculiar, blue coloured shrubs.
Turning to Harry, he asked, “What are they?”
“What are what?”
“Those shrubs,” he said, returning his gaze to the outside. The shrubs, however, were gone, replaced by the concrete and tar macadam of the approach to the station. “Oh, never mind,” he muttered.
When the train had come to a halt, Harry opened the door and jumped down to the platform. Box, however, took an altogether more cautious approach, negotiating the steps like his life depended on it.
“What’s wrong?” Harry asked, bemused by Box’s peculiar behaviour.
“I’m not taking any more chances,” he replied, “I’ve had enough falls of late to last me a lifetime. A jet of steam shooting out from beneath the carriage scared Box and he jumped high into the air. Harry laughed.
Waving his green flag, the guard at the far end of the train awaited the engine driver’s reply. Hearing it, a shrill toot on the whistle, he stepped into the carriage, closed the door and disappeared from sight. As the train pulled
away from the station, and it was a considerably small station, Box admired his favourite steam locomotive as it hauled the shiny black carriages away into the misty distance. Then noticing that no one else had alighted, he asked, “Are we the only ones?”
Looking up and down the lonely platform, Harry said, “It looks like it, but wasn’t Hagswords always an unpopular spot?”
“Was it?” Box asked quietly, hoping she didn’t answer, thinking it perhaps better that way.
Exiting the eerily silent platform, Box wondered at the lack of station personnel, the people who attended the day-to-day activities of running such a place. “Where is everyone?” he asked, “You know, the workers?”
“There are here, of course,” Harry replied, rather surprised that he had asked such a nonsensical question. Then remembering that he was a ‘silly muddle’, she said, “You might think you see no one, but look again, really concentrate – you will see them.”
He tried, Box really tried to believe her, and to see them, but he was still unable to see anyone. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but I can’t see one living person.”
“Then try looking for those who aren’t living,” she replied matter-of-factly, like it was nothing unusual.
“Not living?”
“Yes, we’re not in your world now,” she explained. “Look again, and then tell me what you see.”
Looking again, but with new eyes, Box soon spotted an old man whom he presumed was the ticket collector. Touching the peak of his cap, the man approached him and said, “Good morning, sir, can I be of any assistance to you?”
Another man, dressed in an altogether more grand uniform (Box was sure he was the stationmaster), appeared, and coming