Subj: Strangers on a Train chapter one- the beginning
Date: 11/25/00 1:13:44 AM Central Standard Time
From: Melissa
The following story is based on the movie: Dr. Terror's House of Horror.
Barnabas Collins walked up the steps and into the train. He needed to get away from everything, he would have gone by plane, but he liked the train's laziness. It was soothed him to watch the world go by.
He looked at his ticket for the cabin number. "B-13, my lucky number," he said. He made his way down the narrow hallway, stopping often to let the person coming from the other direction to pass him.
That was the only downside to the whole train experience. He didn't like being in small spaces. He had nightmares of being locked in boxes, once he dreamt that he was buried alive.
He found the compartment and saw that another passenger was already inside. He pulled the door and walked in.
The young man looked up and grinned. "Hi," the man said. Somewhere in the New England area most likely, Barnabas thought.
"Hello."
"The names Burke Devlin, nice to meet you," the man said standing up, he was a good five feet taller than Barnabas. His dark eyes twinkled has he held out his hand to Barnabas.
"Barnabas Collins," he said shaking his hand, then sat down across from Burke, who went back to reading his newspaper.
The door opened and a young blonde woman came in to the compartment. She smiled at Barnabas and Burke as she settled herself down beside Barnabas. Behind her another woman came in.
She was older, but no less attractive, she had beautiful red hair and glasses covering green eyes. She took the seat beside Burke, and pulled out a book from her bag.
Burke lowered the paper, and looked at the blonde. "Hi, I'm Burke Devlin and he's Barnabas Collins."
"Nice to meet the both of you, I'm Angèlique Bouchard," she replied in a pleasant voice.
The other woman didn't look up from her book, Burke coughed and the woman looked up, and saw that they were all staring at her.
"Dr. Julia Hoffman, and it's a pleasure to meet all of you," she said in a business-like voice, which wasn't kind, yet not rude at all.
Burke looked at his watch, "Will we be leaving soon?" Angèlique asked.
"We'll be leaving the station in about ten minutes I suppose," Burke told her.
The door to the compartment opened once again, and a young man in his late twenties walked in, the young man began to close the door. As he began to close the door, another man was coming in, he wasn't looking at what he was doing, and the bag that he held fell to the floor.
"Oh I'm sorry," the young man said, "I hope you're all right."
"Yes, I'm thank you," the older man said picking up the bag and sat down beside Angèlique as the young man took the seat beside Dr. Hoffman.
"Are you sure you're all right Mr. ?"
"Dr. Dr. Schrek."
"I'm Peter Bradford, by the way. I should have looked where I was going."
The others in the compartment introduced themselves, and soon the train pulled away from the station, and the passengers of cabin B-13 paid no mind to anyone else in the compartment.
Dr. Schrek, however looked everyone over, the others felt his eyes on them, and they couldn't help but look up at him with discomfort. He stood up and got his bag down from the overhead berth, and sat back down.
He opened the bag and it slipped from his lap and fell to the floor, things spilling from it.
Peter knelt down and picked up some of the items. "What are these?" he asked holding up a funny looking deck of cards.
"Those are Tarot cards," Angèlique answered.
"What are Tarot cards?" Peter asked.
"Tarot cards can tell your past, your present, and your future," Dr. Schrek replied.
Julia looked up at him skeptically. While the others looked at him with interest, she looked around and said, "You don't believe that sort of stuff do you?"
"I've had some actuate readings before," Angèlique replied.
"That stuff is for the circus. What kind of doctor are you anyway?"
"I'd like to try it," Peter said.
Dr. Schrek set his briefcase on his lap and held the cards out to Peter. "Tap the cards five times." Peter did what the doctor told him Dr. Terror laid out five cards. He flipped over four of the cards.
"What do they mean?" Peter asked.
Dr. Terror began to tell Peter what the cards revealed.
to be continued. . .