I Found a 15-Year-Old Boy Hiding in the Nose of My Locomotive, 200 Miles From Anywhere in the Rocky Mountains. He Said If I Stopped the Train, He’d Jump
There are rules on the railroad for a reason.
A minor on a freight train is a federal problem. Liability. Insurance. The railroad’s lawyers would have my job, my pension and probably my head. If anything happened to that boy, I’d never drive a train again.
I called the dispatcher at 1 a.m., from the cab, when we came out of the tunnel and got a signal.
I told her everything.
She was quiet for a long time. Her name was Gloria. She’d been a dispatcher in Denver for thirty years.
“Tom,” she said. “Rules say you stop at the next siding and the railroad police take him.”
“I know.”
“Then they take him back to his mother.”
“I know.”
“And then she sends him back to that man,” Gloria said. “I’ve seen it a hundred times.”
“So have I.”
There was a long pause on the radio.
“Here’s what I’m going to do,” she said. “I’m going to call the Grand County sheriff’s office, the state’s child welfare hotline and the railroad police, in that order, and I’m going to take my time doing it, because it’s the middle of the night and people are slow. You keep that boy warm. And Tom?”
“Yeah?”
“You never told me his grandfather’s name.”
“Raymond Tso,” I said. “Green River, Utah.”
“I’ll see if I can find a phone number,” she said. “For the welfare people. Just for the welfare people.”
We drove through the night.
Glenwood Canyon. The Colorado River in the moonlight. Grand Junction at dawn.
Eli fell asleep on the jump seat around four, with his head against the window and Darnell’s jacket over him. Darnell watched him for a while. Then he looked at me.
“My oldest is fifteen,” he said quietly.
At 7 a.m., the radio crackled.
It was Gloria.
“Tom. I found the grandfather.”
“And?”
“He’s waiting for you,” she said. “At the Green River depot. He’s been there since four in the morning. With a sheriff’s deputy, a caseworker from Utah and a lawyer. He says he’s been fighting for custody for six years.”