A RED SIGNAL AT THIS JUNCTION OF THE STORY-TRAIN’S route.
Generations of thinkers have stood with notebooks open on coastlines, the endless spread of ties-&-iron before them—countless junctions, switches, possibilities in all directions—& insisted that what characterises rails is that they have no terminus. No schedule, no end, no direction. This has become common sense. This is a cliché.
Every rail demands consideration of every other, & all the branches onto which that other rail might switch. There are those who would issue orders, & would control the passage of all such narratives. They may, from time to time, even be able to assert authority. They will not, however, always be successful. One could consider history an unending brawl between such planners, & others who take vehicles down byways.
So, now. The signal demands the story stop. With diesel wheeze & wheel complaint, our train reverses. With a whack of trainhooks a story-switch is thrown, & our text proceeds again from days ago, from where it had got to. To answer a question bellowed, we might imagine, by moldywarpe critics as we took routes where the Siblings Shroake drove & the Medes hunted. Curious & impatient mole listeners raised heads from earth & shouted across the flatlands of untold things. Demanding attentions elsewhere.