Prompt Words: Regard / Draw
Minervie and Chip 44
Gungan was mostly just staring out the window of Minervie’s private cabin, while Minervie was flipping through the newspaper. “I find it hard to believe how much of the paper is dedicated to horse racing,” Minervie commented.
He regarded her nonchalance, and wasn’t sure to be thankful for the change of subject. “Them colonists have been horse racing since before they started trying to kill us all,” then he looked down on the bruises visible across his own arms.
“Not that they truly stopped,” Gungan completed his thought.
Minervie was not deaf enough to try to engage her friend’s grandchild in his righteous anger. Nor would she tell him of the plans she had drawn for herself. Past that exchange, there were only the sounds of the train. The distant pulses of the steam engine, the occasional progressive clacking along rail transitions, the creaking of the Formica finishes in the new air conditioned car.
This train was long distance service, but was still stopping at all stations, so it took 3 hours to get to their destination. Minervie finished the included Champaign bottle herself, wanting to get as much as she could from her overpriced train ride.
They quickly got off the train at the Beerburrum depot, and Gungan suddenly was worried again, “Are we going straight to Tibrogargan?”
Minervie answered his concern instead of his question, “I have an acquaintance who lives nearby, you’ll stay there.”
Gungan didn’t like the sound of that, “Me? But what about you?”
“I have different arrangements. I promise, no harm will come of you by staying with my friend for a night.”
Meta
Skipped yesterday, so dropping the last two wss366 words into this entry.
In a slight departure, I wasn’t able to find any surviving train timetables for the East coast run from Brisbane going North, so I estimated the timing based on the trains of the time with padding because there were several stops.
Link to first post: https://wandering.shop/@vollink/115833584915084635