Trolley No. 1852 Read Online Free PDF

approached directly, eyed Erwin with a nod, and waved
him aboard. “This here’s my friend,” Erwin softly informed. “Not a
trouble-making bone in his body, I can vouch for it…”
    The conductor, like the driver, wore a
regulation cap and heavy, brass-buttoned jacket as was the fashion.
He stared at me, or seemed to, for the car’s irksome darkness
forbade any details of his face, much in the same manner as the
motorman. My skin crawled, however, in what I can only describe as
a most abrupt accession of dread; for whatever unhealthful reason,
I imagined I was being evaluated by either a mask of the most
pallid parchment or the face of a dead man .
     
    The moment locked in stasis.
    “How do you do?” I bid with a bit of a
stammer.
    The conductor waved me aboard, then returned
with lugubrious steps back to the vicinity of the motorman’s
station.
    Sparks burst overhead in a brilliant
blossom, and then the trolley lurched once and commenced down the
nearly lightless street.
    Erwin showed me the way down the aisle;
carefully, we stepped over the heavy-iron coupling and passed into
the rear car. “We’ve got to keep our voices down,” came his
incessant whisper. “That’s why I brung us back here.” I could
hardly object; we both took seats at the car’s rearmost
section.
    As I sat, I stared
astonished into the grim, nighted city. The trolley clattered along
the rusted rails to traverse unknown streets of ballast-cobble and
past cramped lay-bys of various municipal departments that seemed
long out of service. Was it my suspicious fancy or did each
successive street-lamp put out less and less illumination? Brick
facades and lichen-encrusted stone walls pressed ever inward; at
one point we crossed what I believe was Amsterdam Avenue but as we
did so, the sinister car rose to a clamour as the motorman
increased speed, almost as if to pass through the dimly peopled
intersection with as much haste as the motor would allow. Along
this dismal way, we stopped on several occasions along similarly
unfamiliar and quite ruinous corners to pick up additional
passengers. As each boarder stepped up, he was assayed by the
conductor for what I could only guess were traits of “approval”:
the smell of liquor on one’s breath, loose talk, and perhaps even a
subjective air of rowdiness would, of course, be disqualifiers. But
as each man was allowed to come aboard, I noted quite readily that
all possessed likewise bodily characteristics. These were all men
of brawn and muscle, wide-shouldered, pillar-legged men of a solid
working caste, much like Erwin. The only oddity to be admitted thus
far was myself; with shoulders stooped, frail-bodied, and but 146
pounds, I hardly bore any commonality with these strong, ox-necked
young men. (As a child, my mother perpetually referred to me as her
“little waxbean.” How complimentary…) But it was then the notion
insinuated itself—in a manner I cannot explain by any
substance—that the conductor was indeed “sizing up” potential
visitors to the mysterious 1852 Club in hopes of selecting the most
virile, the most sexually potent candidates. I couldn’t imagine what might cause
me to make such a conjecture. Two or three times, however, thinner
and less-fecund-looking chaps were turned away. So…
    Why on earth would a
spindly-form such as myself be let aboard? Evidently the club held much stock in Mr. Erwin’s
credulity.
    The car clattered onward for a time,
then—
    We were swallowed into darkness.
    It was a musty, dripping tunnel we’d darted
into, whose arched walls were eerily webbed by the faintest
luminescent fungi. When I turned to look Erwin full in the face, I
could make no trace of him. Ahead, in the forward car, did a
passenger gasp in sudden startlement?
    “I told ya, Mr. Phillips. There be a tunnel
or two.” He chuckled nervously. “Hope you’re not one to be afraid
of the dark.”
    “I daresay even a man of the stoutest heart
might be timid in darkness this