The dining car has lost its roof and walls. The wind has blown the smoke away, so they can see now in the clear air but the tables, benches and hooks left at their places, and also the pile of cases of beer. At the same time they can see the locomotive with its high chimney not very far ahead. The cook has disappeared. Cathy's face is covered with soot. She looks rearward and what she sees makes her smile amusedly: the cook is just barley able to rise from between the crashed walls and roofs, near the railroad bed, and menacingly shakes his fist in the air.
Cathy bursts out laughing when she turns her eyes to Mister Joseph: his face is all covered with soot.
Mister Joseph reaches forth to grab a bottle of beer, than reaches up to the hook and opens the bottle. He raises the bottle to his lips. In that moment a noise like dropped pans comes from outside, and Mister Joseph sees a pretty big black cylindrical object rolling along the railroad bed: the locomotive chimney.
MISTER JOSEPH
(pretty apathetically)
That too didn't hold up any longer.
CATHY
Who didn't hold up?
Mister Joseph, rather tired, signs by his head the locomotive chimney that lies by the railroad bed. A smoke thread rises slowly from an end of the chimney.
The train is now, from one end to another, a train of platform trucks except having benches and, here and there, luggage racks.
MISTER JOSEPH
There's nothing left to crash now.
Mister Joseph takes a sip of beer.
CATHY
Yes. (Sighs.) Nothing left to crash.
They can see ahead the small locomotive from the old times industriously jolting to pull the cars. Cathy comes and sits beside Mister Joseph, facing the locomotive.
MISTER JOSEPH
Wouldn't you like to take a sip of beer?
CATHY
No, thank you, Mister Joseph, I don't like beer.
MISTER JOSEPH
Right. You don't like it.
CATHY
(amazed with something around)
But...
Cathy's eyes are strongly caught by what is going on around.
The train moves down an apple tree orchard. The apple trees are weighted of fruit, which makes Cathy happy.
CATHY
(turning to Mister Joseph, all radiant)
Apples, Mister Joseph! You see? Apples!
MISTER JOSEPH
I don't see why are you so happy. Of course they are apples! It's not for the first time you see them, do you? I hope you remember that I too...
CATHY
I remember, Mister Joseph, that you also once sold apples! How should I forget?
In its impetuous run, the locomotive hits branches full of apples and lots of them roll on the ground. Cathy painfully watches all this devastation.
CATHY
Oh! I can't look at what's going on!
The locomotive keeps breaking branches and spread apples over the ground. Some of the apples are hit by the benches in the dining car. A branch of an apple tree hits Mister Joseph's arm making him drop the bottle of beer.
MISTER JOSEPH
Damn it!
Fallen apples roll across the car floor where glass shards are spread all over. The apples roll between the table and bench legs. Cathy kneels down and picks up a few apples that she puts in her dress lap.
MISTER JOSEPH
(sharply)
Oh, young lady! Leave the apples alone! Why do you need them? Take care not to cut yourself with the shards of glass!
A branch having an apple right at its end hits Mister Joseph's forehead, which makes the apple fall and roll over the floor.
CATHY
(melancholically)
I was thinking you could go back to apple trading.
MISTER JOSEPH
(rubbing his hit forehead)
It was my worst business. I don't want even hear about it!
Cathy picks up one more apple which she puts in her lap. Some ten apples she has gathered in her lap.
The train left the orchard behind it.
MISTER JOSEPH
Anyway, the time of apple trading is over. Besides, the orchard has remained behind. And with what you have gathered there I think, dear young lady, you couldn't begin a serious business.
CATHY
(looks regretfully at the apples in her lap)
Maybe you'd like to eat one, now that you don't have beer any more.
She gives him the most beautiful apple of those she gathered in her lap.
MISTER JOSEPH
(accepting the apple)
Oh, yes. I won't refuse your offer. (He bites heartily from the apple.) As for the other ones, I think you could set them free. After keeping one for yourself, of course.
Cathy lowers the skirt, so the apples roll gently over the floor falling beyond the edge.
Forest in a sunny day, in mid-summer. The little train from the old times stops: the locomotive buffers gently touch the end line buffers. The locomotive gives off two puffs, a short one, then a second one, long and expiring.
The area is deserted: no railroad station, no human settlement, just the woods.
There is no one in the locomotive either.
Mister Joseph and Cathy got down from the car and now approach the locomotive. Cathy mounts the ladder to there.
CATHY
(happily)
We've finally got to the locomotive!
MISTER JOSEPH
Get down, missy. Let's find a place to wash the soot off our faces. Because I can't show myself in public so wretched.
CATHY
What public are you speaking of, Mister Joseph?
MISTER JOSEPH
I can figure we'll find a public, won't we.
He and Cathy step silently down the woods.
CATHY
Won't you take your coat off, Mister Joseph? I could carry it.
MISTER JOSEPH
No, thank you, missy. Why should I take it off?
CATHY
I was thinking that maybe you're warm.
MISTER JOSEPH
Even if I was warm, I'm not the type to lament all the time, I'm sure you know that.
CATHY
What a pity you didn't take a couple of bottles of beer. That would have been good for you now, isn't that true, Mister Joseph?
MISTER JOSEPH
(sighing as he remembers)
So much beer left not drunk! — What a pity indeed. I could have established a pub around here near the station.
CATHY
What station?
MISTER JOSEPH
Well, dear young lady, it's clear you're not experienced in trading. If I established a pub, right away there would be people to build a station. Wouldn't be a pity that trains passed by such a beautiful restaurant without halting? Maybe you don't know — and of course you cannot know, though you are such a traveled person, as it were — that not only stations but also whole towns, and even cities have been established around pubs.
CATHY
But you never dealt in alcohol.
MISTER JOSEPH
Hem! Yes, sure, I never did. But is there anything one restrains from in order to settle a station? Because, I'm not sure you noticed, there are very few stations in the world yet. And what could ever be more pleasing than a station, where you could stay and watch trains passing by? I have in view those people who are less busy, of course. Because as for me, I hope you realize this, I couldn't afford wasting my time at a station. Or in other place whatsoever. So, dear young lady, to return where I began with, why should I not admit it would be nice they established a station next to my restaurant? — A station bearing, why not, my name. — I hope you have nothing against it.
CATHY
I would be very pleased, Mister Joseph! I'd give up my red car and I would travel only by train just for passing through the station bearing your name!
MISTER JOSEPH
Just passing through, dear lady? Would you abide to pass through, knowing that near the station, at the pub, namely behind the counter, there is a person a little bit aged, so to speak, who misses you?
Cathy takes him by the hand and sticks tenderly to his side. Mister Joseph is pleased by her proof of affection and so they both keep walking down the woods...
...Until, at a time, Cathy startles at seeing something unusual ahead.
CATHY
What that could be?
The woods is rather sparse in that area. An old trolley lies at some distance in front of them, overgrown by weeds. They can scarcely perceive a narrow railroad under its rusty wheels. Other trolleys can be seen a little further, as rusty and still as the first one, among old slag masses of different sizes, on which sparse weeds grow. But for Mister Joseph all these are not a good reason to be surprised.
MISTER JOSEPH
This one, dear young lady, is a trolley that is of no use any longer. And what you can see a little further is masses of slag.
Cathy scrutinizes delightfully all these. An old factory can be seen at some distance, having red brick walls, embattled pediment in the late 19th century style.
MISTER JOSEPH
Well, dear young lady, it sounds like we've got to.
Cathy stares at his face without understanding.
Following the narrow railroad, Mister Joseph and Cathy go in through the gate of the abandoned factory. Cathy looks around, very interested: thick pipes lying in piles, pieces of a metal mast, a huge wheel leaned against a wall rail — all these rusty and overgrown by weeds. The narrow railroad leads inside the factory through a widely open gate.
MISTER JOSEPH
I suppose you know where we are.
CATHY
No, Mister Joseph, I have no idea.
MISTER JOSEPH
Too bad, young lady, too bad. — You have a factory before you.
CATHY
Oh, yes? What kind of factory?
MISTER JOSEPH
(sharply)
What kind of factory! — How should I know? I could tell you it's a plane factory... or of flat iron one. These tools are both useful alike, but that doesn't mean I should know what it is, just like that, at a single glance! Let's take a closer look.
Mister Joseph pulls a handkerchief from his pocket, a large white one, and thoroughly wipes the soot off his forehead and his face. Then he gives Cathy another handkerchief, a smaller one, which she uses to wipe the soot of her face as well. Finally they scrutinize each other's face and come to the conclusion that they look acceptable.
MISTER JOSEPH
Well, that's better, isn't that?
Mister Joseph, his hands in his pockets, having the appearance of an owner, head for the open gate of the factory.
They both enter a dark factory room, where seemingly there isn't much to see at first glance: a lot of chains, some of them having hooks at their ends, hang from the high ceiling. Down on the ground: industrial pieces of all kinds.
MISTER JOSEPH
(turned to Cathy, in a harsh tone while getting through the gate)
Please, dear young lady, mind carefully your feet. You can see what's on the ground. I wouldn't like you stumble over something and then blame me for not preventing you. So, before you stare at what's up, as your habit is, mind your feet.
A sound like from a cracked bell tolls: Mister Joseph knocked his forehead against a hanging hook and now he is rubbing his forehead grimacing of pain, while the hook slowly swings by his head.
MISTER JOSEPH
Damn it!
Cathy runs, scared, to him and takes him by the hand.
CATHY
Mister Joseph! Are you OK?
MISTER JOSEPH
Never mind, miss! couldn't you see! What an oversight on their part leaving such monstrous hooks to hang everywhere.
Mister Joseph touches the hurt place and searches his fingers to see whether his forehead bleeds or not.
CATHY
It doesn't bleed.
A MAN'S VOICE
(from a distance)
Never mind, you'll be OK.
Mister Joseph and Cathy startle and raise their heads to...
...A worker in coveralls who is climbing down a vertical iron staircase fastened to a huge tank.
There are many old tanks of different heights in that workshop, linked by tubes and pipes of all kinds with big and small faucets.
The worker in coveralls reaches the ground. He has a long twisted moustache.
THE WORKER IN COVERALLS
Where did you leave the donkey? I don't want anything to fall upon it again, just like the last time.
The Worker in Coveralls steps closer to Mister Joseph and Cathy. Cathy discreetly plucks Mister Joseph by the sleeve and reaches up to whisper in his ear.
CATHY
This is a moustache in the Francis Joseph's style, too, isn't it, Mister Joseph?
Mister Joseph angrily jerks his arm, concentrated on what the Worker in Coveralls told him.
MISTER JOSEPH
I don't understand what donkey are you speaking about, mister.
THE WORKER IN COVERALLS
Didn't you come for the beer delivery?
His eyes move quickly from Mister Joseph to Cathy and back.
MISTER JOSEPH
I'm afraid, mister, it's a misunderstanding here. I just came to...
THE WORKER IN COVERALLS
Then what do you want me to tell my fellows?
MISTER JOSEPH
What fellows?
THE WORKER IN COVERALLS
My fellows! I told them, "Come tomorrow even if it's Sunday, and I'll give you beer to your hearts' content."
MISTER JOSEPH
You are the boss here?
THE WORKER IN COVERALLS
Sort of.
MISTER JOSEPH
(confused)
What do you mean, "tomorrow is Sunday"?
THE BOSS OF THE WORKERS (THE WORKER IN COVERALLS)
Today is Sunday, mister! So my fellows have come!
MISTER JOSEPH
Have they? — But... where they are?
Staring reproachfully at him, The Boss of the Workers points upwards. Mister Joseph and Cathy raise their eyes...
...And see up high a worker with a twisted moustache sitting on a tank edge. The worker wears Sunday clothes and friendly smiles at them while raising a mug of beer.
THE WORKER ON THE TOP OF THE TANK
Your health!
Mister Joseph and Cathy look astonished.
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