Chapter 50
300 Words
50
Alfie Little sat on the cold metal bench and sipped at a cup of sweet tea. He’d never had a jumper before. He was the only one on his shift who hadn’t, in fact.
One of the things that was drilled into him while he was training was that he’d almost certainly come across a situation like this, but no number of fair warnings could ever prepare you for it. He was shaking as he recounted what he saw to the police constable, who was jotting it all down in his notepad.
He was just glad the guy hadn’t actually jumped. If Alfie had reacted so badly to that close call, what would have happened if the guy had gone through with it, fallen through the air and smashed into the front of the speeding train, exploding in a bloody mess?
Fortunately, he’d seen the man on the bridge as he approached the station and had immediately begun to slow the train down. It had eventually stopped almost a hundred yards past the station. He’d seen the man throw something onto the tracks, and had a duty to stop the train and report the incident immediately. That would ensure that no other trains would pass through the station, and would instead be halted a few hundred yards shy of it.
Another police constable, a woman, came over to speak to the man who was taking his statement.
‘Karim, we’ve just had an update. He took a cab from here into Mildenheath. Driver dropped him off round the corner from where he lives. They’re en route to his home address as we speak. They’re pulling back the search units.’
‘Sounds like he’s gone home,’ PC Rashid said to Alfie Little. ‘Looks like it might be his and your lucky day.’
Alfie raised his eyebrows and blinked a few times. It certainly didn’t feel very lucky to him.
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