Inkerman Writers - John Dean

Clinging to the Wreckage

There are times when you do not know if you are dead or alive. This was one such time. Actually, it had been an uneventful journey on the 7.48. They ’re all uneventful journeys on the 7.48. Stations slip past, harassed passengers get on, harassed commuters get off. Just another day. Just another train ride. Each person in their own little world, journeying from A to B, from B to A. But not this day. No, this day was different.

The incident which made it different actually happened three weeks previously but nobody realised it at the time. Had they done so, things might have turned out better. All those people's lives would have been saved, for a start.

The culprit, if you wish to use that word, and many have, was Bob Fordham. Thirty-eight-year-old, family man, doting father, much-loved son. Nothing special, yet everything special. A hard-working man. Been around a bit. A spell down the last North-East colliery then, when the pit wheels stopped turning, time at an engineering factory and a carpet-makers. Then he delivered pizzas. Anything to make a crust, he used to say with that crooked smile of his. He often told that joke to his friends. Seemed funny the first couple of times but they stopped laughing after a bit. It was his only joke.

Bob stopped laughing as well. Times were hard, money was short and the bills were all red so it became a bad joke anyway. Bob Fordham was not really earning a crust. Tough for an honest working man to admit but it was true. The money coming in didn't cover the money going out, not helped by the demands of a new baby, two teenage sons who always seemed to need new trainers and a wife sinking under the pressure.

Bob didn't realise she was sinking at first. You don't. It's like floating on a bit of wrecked ship; you are too busy hanging on for your own dear life to realise that the other survivors are losing their grip. Then they are gone. Slipping beneath the dark waters without a sound. You turn round and they have disappeared and you hadn ’t done anything about it. That's what happened to Bob Fordham's wife. He should have noticed something was wrong, of course he should. And yes, he did notice the empty bottles he wasn't supposed to see. And yes, he did notice that she wasn't talking to him any more or looking after the baby properly. So did the hospital after the two incidents when the little one was rushed in with unexplained bruises. But Bob Fordham did nothing. A recurring theme in his life, you might think.

Anyway, the child protection workers came on the Friday night and took the kids away when Bob was out delivering margheritas and piccantes. By the time his mother contacted him, his wife had lost her grip on the wreckage. Drunk herself into a stupor and taken some pills. She lingered for three days on a life-support machine before the doctors suggested it be turned off. No decision really. She died the moment the door closed behind her children. Some said she died even before that.

Then, when things were at their blackest and Bob Fordham felt his own grip on the wreckage loosening, there came the job with the railway engineering company. He was not a man given to romantic notions, but he surprised himself by telling friends it felt like a hand reaching down, a strong, powerful hand which gripped his own and pulled him clear. A sort of absolution, a delivery from past failures, he said. And the money was good. Even if the hand was not sent from on high, the job was still a Godsend; so long as you did not worry about the truth behind the public image carefully constructed by the company ’s flashy PR people.

And why worry anyway? His debts had disappeared, the smiles of pride had returned to his parents' faces, he had found love with a delightful young woman from the canteen. Social services were even contemplating the return of his children on a trial basis. And that was worth so much more than money.

Bob Fordham was on the up again. Of course, he knew - all the lads on the job knew - that the company was not a good one. Knew that to secure the railway maintenance contract, the company told lies about its financial position, knew they cut costs, knew safety was not the highest priority. To start with, it was not too bad because there were nine on Bob Fordham's crew. Then there were seven, then five, then just three. Three of them to cover 124 miles of

railway track, working all the hours God gave, and some he was only prepared to provide on a short-term loan. Yes, the lads were uneasy but the money was good. Whatever you said about the company, the money was good. They made the cuts in other ways, fewer employees, less frequent safety checks, cheap materials, turning the proverbial blind eye, that sort of thing.

Sometimes Bob Fordham thought he should say something. Mistakes were being made. He saw them being made. Made them himself. Didn't have time to correct them all because he knew his crew had to keep up with the schedule. If that meant leaving them and crossing their fingers then so be it. He did complain once when one of his crew's mistakes caused the derailment of a cargo wagon but was told he could leave if he felt that strongly about it.

And the money was good, Bob Fordham's girlfriend had moved in with him and the children had already enjoyed two trial weekends back with their father. They went to the park and Pizza Hut and got a video out from Blockbuster. Actually, he should have been working but with the contract up for annual review, the company had abolished the weekend shifts to keep costs down. Bob Fordham did feel uneasy but after so much tragedy he figured he deserved some good fortune, the weekends with his children were wonderful and two more months and the last of his debts would be paid off.

The wait ended for the accident waiting to happen - as Bob Fordham knew it had to - when the luck ran out for his crew. And those people consigned to another world by one mistake too many. It happened on a Friday morning as the 7.48 was twenty minutes away from the last station. Journey's end. The carriage was packed as usual: dark-suited businessmen tapping away on laptops, well-scrubbed schoolchildren giggling and drawing squiggly shapes on the condensed windows, the ubiqitious man behind the newspaper whose pages never seemed to turn. Coughs, sniffs, chirruping mobile phones, the sounds of another day.

Then other sounds. A piece of track, which should have been replaced by Bob Fordham's crew, sheared off as the leading wheels of the high-speed engine thundered across it. Ninety times out of a hundred it would not have caused a problem. This was time one hundred. The first carriage derailed and the rest of the train behind it. Shattering glass, twisting metal, whining, screaming, screeching. No need to describe it. The television pictures of the wreckage said it all. Thirteen dead, seventy nine injured. Could have been worse. Three minutes later and the express would have been coming the other way. They stopped it in time. Not worth thinking about what would have happened if they hadn't, the coroner said at one of the many inquests.

The accident inspectors did not take long to discover the cause. A broken track which should have been replaced by Bob Fordham ’s crew. A fatal oversight by a man who should have known better. But there was more, facts which did not come out in their report; Bob Fordham was forced to take short cuts by stressed-out managers driven by complacent company directors creaming off the huge profits for themselves.

Bob Fordham knows he made a terrible mistake and will have to live with the consequences for ever. Just as the mothers and fathers who died in that carriage will never see their children again, neither will he; social services have made that clear enough. His girlfriend has left him, his friends will not talk to him, he is in debt again, his house is about to be repossessed and the pain is back in his elderly parents' eyes once more. Bob Fordham is clinging onto the wreckage and can feel his grip weakening. There are times when all he wants to do is let go and sink beneath the dark waters and never come up again.

So, members of the jury, I ask you to find my client not guilty of manslaughter. There is no way you can punish this man as much as he has been punished already.