Buzz Nausea, king of the aircraft-men.
I don't know what made me peer up the spiral staircase.
Probably the same free lager that had sent me lurching towards the bogs at the back of the 747. If the door at the base of the stairway hadn't been open, and if I'd not looked up and around the bend of the steps, I wouldn't have seen the moulded plastic I was expecting turn into rusty tread-plate worn shiny with use.
I looked back down the cabin; curved plastic, quietly farting passengers packed into uncomfortable seats, no crew in sight. I ducked into the narrow stairway and followed it upwards.
Upwards into a busy machine-shop. There seemed to be a lot of boiler-suited men engaged in several different and impenetrable jobs at once. In the centre of the space, where the curved roof was highest, was what looked like an oil derrick. A great steel lattice extended through the roof, surrounding a massive rotating shaft.
There was a hoot from behind me. I turned, then stepped smartly sideways to avoid being run over by a small locomotive hauling a piston engine the size of my car. It trundled past the derrick, then reversed over a set of points to shunt its cargo into a housing at the base of the steel tower. When the loco pulled away, a crew of workmen armed with huge spanners set to securing the engine to its mountings.
One of them looked up and waved at me.
"Oi! Don't just stand there! Make yerself useful and bring that barrow here!"
I looked about and discovered a wheelbarrow to my left, containing a pile of assorted tools. Instead of scarpering back down the stairway like a sensible person, I heaved the thing over the railway tracks and parked it at a useful angle to the big engine block. The same man dropped his spanner in the barrow with a satisfying crash and then pointed at a similarly over-sized torque-wrench.
"Right. Go round the mounting bolts and pinch them up proper, then check the head bolts. I've to connect up the fuel system."
I looked at him gormlessly. He rolled his eyes and waved a hand at the brass plate riveted to the engine block.
"The settings are listed there. Hop to it, lad. We need this motor on-line before we get to the Greenland Junction."
I was swinging on the last of the head-bolts when he returned with a handful of braided hose, which he began plumbing into the fuel-system.
"9/16ths open-ended spanner," he said over his shoulder.
I put the torque-wrench back where I'd found it and pulled out a far smaller spanner. He glanced up when I handed it to him.
"Cheers, lad. I've not seen you before. What section are you from?"
"Um. Economy," I said.
He froze for a moment.
"Oh bugger."
He must have remembered Greenland Junction, because he started working much faster. Eventually, he turned the fuel-tap to the 'on' position and hand-primed the injector pump. He reminded me of my dad, working on one or other part of his stationary engine collection.
He turned and handed me the spanner.
"Bring the barrow, will you? We need a chat."
I followed him to a Quonset hut hidden behind a row of stacked pallets. Most of the hut was filled with long steel racks, bearing what looked like six or eight of every spare part that the machine-shop might need. At the very far end there were several sets of airliner seats arranged around a Tortoise stove and an old sideboard.
My companion made tea. I stared at the poster titled 'Regulations concerning high-pressure electricity'
"Sugar?"
"One, ta."
He handed me a surprisingly clean mug with a BOAC logo and waved me into one of the economy-looking seats.
"Here you go. Oh, I'm Dave."
"John. Pleased to meet you."