Trains have always played a very memorable part in my life.
I can remember when I was a boy and the train meant going somewhere nice, going somewhere different.
We lived near London and some weekends in summer we might get the train and go down to the coast.
We used to go down on this train and the trains were different in those days.
These days they seem to be one long carriage and you sit wherever you like a bit like in a bus really, except obviously it's a lot longer.
In those days they used to be compartments.
We used to call them compartments, so you walk down a corridor on one side of the train And there would be doors that slide open.
Perhaps you see them on films, right?
And the doors would slide open and you would go into a compartment which you would share with other people.
In a way, it was rather strange, because you'd sit quite close to people that you'd never seen before.
And perhaps it's just you and somebody else in that compartment.
And it's quite a enclosed space, and the seats were always the same color.
They were kind of a green, dark green color with a the red logo of british rail, because they were all owned by british rail, which was a government-run company in those days.
And there were smoking compartments as well, so if you couldn't find a place on the train You might have to go to a smoking compartment and it was full of smoke.
I can remember
It was quite disgusting.
I can remember when my mother was sitting in the train, and somebody would start smoking.
And she would get up angrily and open the window, make some comment.
How disgusting it is, smoking.
Of course, it was a smoking compartment, and they had every right to smoke in those days.
But there's something...
Quite romantic, something quite wonderful, looking out of a window, watching the countryside go by.
And I can remember, I used to look at the telegraph poles.
I don't know why we call them telegraph poles, but telephone wires.
There was a wire that used to run all the length of the railway track on these wooden poles that would sag down in the middle.
And I realized that if you looked at one spot of the wire and you stared at it without moving your eyes, well then it appeared to go up and down, up and down as the train moved along.
And that was a fascination for me, I can remember in those days.
There were trains which were fairly slow, really.
And I remember they'd make a rattling sound as they went along the tracks.
A kind of a tickety-tack, tickety-tack, tickety-tack.
All that sort of sound as you went along.
These days, I don't think you hear anything.
It's all kind of very smooth, isn't it?
When you get on these super new trains.
And the reason I'm talking about trains is because I'm continuing with the B2 story, part two of the Signalman series.
And this is the Charles Dickens short story.
And this is part two and the final part of the story.
So here we go.
Hello and welcome to Practicing English.
My name is Mike Bilbre and these are podcasts for students of English at B1 or B2 levels.
For transcripts, please go to practicingenglish.com.
Would you like to see my books for learning B1 and B2 level English?
Then go to the show notes at your podcast app, and just below today's lesson you'll see a link to Amazon and there you'll be able to read about my new B1 book and my B2 book.
Check it out today.
Right, so here's some vocabulary from part two of the story, and I'll just... run over it quickly.
And these are expressions and words for you to listen out for while you're listening to the story.
And I'll try to squeeze in a quick test on the vocabulary at the end.
So the first one is without hesitation.
So it's like a little collocation.
To do something straight away without thinking, or You've thought about it enough and you do something and you don't think twice, which is another little beta expression actually.
To think twice about something is to hesitate.
So if you do something without hesitating, you do it straight away.
Example.
She accepted the job offer without hesitation because it matched her skills perfectly.
Accepted the job offer without hesitation.
My next one is to take pride in something.
Pride is the noun of proud, P-R-O-U-D, and pride is spelled P-R-I-D-E, so it's the noun, and it's used with take, to take pride in something.
And it means to do something very well.
And also, you feel good about doing that thing well.
Example sentence.
He takes pride in his work and always tries to do his best, even under pressure.
He takes pride in his work.
So you take pride in something.
It means you're very pleased with what you do.
My next one is to talk something over.
So if you talk something over, this is a phrasal verb, to discuss something.
Talk about something where there has been an issue or a problem and to talk it over.
You imagine the two people or two parties talking together and trying to resolve some issue that they have between them.
Talk it over.
It's a nice phrasal verb, a little bit more subtle and specific than just to discuss something.
OK, so because you get the idea there's some sort of problem that needs to be sorted out.
Another phrasal verb to resolve, to sort something out.
My example sentence is let's talk this over tomorrow. when we're both calmer and have more time okay so you get the idea there they've had an argument and it's better to talk about it the next day when they're kind of calmer right the next one is to shiver it's to shiver with fear now to shiver really means it's it's a reaction either when it's very cold and Involuntarily, your body moves, it shakes.
Okay, that's to shiver.
But also we shiver if we're frightened of something.
So this is about being frightened, to shiver with fear.
My example is, I shivered with fear when I heard footsteps behind me in the dark street.
Okay, so it's a frightening situation and your body kind of shakes and that's to shiver.
And my next B2 phrase is from time to time, which is a nice alternative to sometimes, occasionally.
My example phrase is from time to time, I like to turn off my phone and spend the evening reading.
From time to time.
My last one is haunted time.
Now, this is H-A-U-N-T, to haunt.
And this is the adjective, haunted.
Two uses, perhaps, which are kind of similar.
Haunted is often related to ghosts.
A haunted house is a house where people think there's a ghost living in.
Can a ghost live in a house?
A ghost is present in the house.
But also you can be haunted by something, by some thought, some memory which is in the back of your mind, in the back of your mind, which is in your thoughts, and it worries you.
It worries you over a long period of time.
And we say to be haunted by something.
And that would always be something negative.
Not by a fond memory, but something ominous, something frightening, something worrying.
She was haunted by the memory of the accident and found it hard to move on.
Okay, so an accident is obviously something which is quite traumatic or very traumatic.
And she found it difficult to move on, to continue with her life.
Right, lots of language there, right?
You've got to listen out for those phrases as I read the story of part two of Charles Dickens' The Signalman.
The signalman explained to me that every signal had to be written down with the exact time.
Even during the quietest hours of the night, he had to remain watching.
As he spoke, the bell rang sharply.
He stopped mid-sentence, moved quickly to the wall, and rang back without hesitation.
Then he returned to the desk. and carefully wrote the time and signal in his book.
You see, he said, accuracy is everything.
A single mistake can have serious consequences.
We continued talking, but twice he suddenly stopped, his face turning pale.
Each time he opened the door and stared towards the tunnel, though the bell had not rung.
"'Did you hear something?'
I asked.
"'No,' he said, "'but I thought I might.'
When he stood to leave, I said, "'You sound like a man who once took pride in his work.'
"'I did?' he replied quietly, before the trouble started.
I returned the following night, exactly as arranged.
I did not call out.
He was waiting for me, holding his white light steady.
I'm glad you came back, he said.
I need to talk this over with somebody.
We sat by the fire, and he leaned forward, speaking in a low voice.
One night, he began, I was sitting here alone when I heard a voice cry, Hello, below there!
Without wanting to, I shivered.
I went to the door, he said. and I saw a figure near the danger light.
One arm was waving wildly, as if in warning.
The other arm was held across the face.
What did you do?
I asked.
I ran towards it, he said.
I believed an accident had happened.
And then?
It disappeared.
He told me that within hours there was a terrible accident on the line.
Trains were stopped.
People were injured.
Some were killed.
I told myself it was a coincidence, he continued.
But months later, the figure returned.
It said nothing.
It stood with both hands before its face, like someone in deep sadness.
And that same day, I said, a young woman died on a passing train, he finished.
I tried to convince him of my point of view.
I spoke of stress, imagination, and long hours alone.
I wish I could accept that, he said, but the figure keeps coming back How often?
I asked.
From time to time.
Sometimes nights pass without it.
Sometimes it appears again and again.
And the bell?
I asked quietly.
It rings, he said, not like a normal signal.
It's a strange vibration.
I feel it more than I hear it.
We stepped outside together.
The tunnel lay dark and silent.
The danger light burned steadily.
It's not here now, he said.
But you believe it will return, I asked.
Yes, he said.
And I don't know what action I'm supposed to take.
His voice shook.
His anxiety was painful to watch.
Follow the rules, I said gently.
That's all anyone can do.
The next evening, I arrived early.
From above I looked down towards the tunnel.
There was a group of men talking down below.
I had the sensation something terrible had happened.
I ran down the path as fast as I could.
What has happened?
I asked.
The signalman was killed this morning, one of the men replied.
But I knew him.
I whispered.
How did it happen?
He was struck by a train.
The driver tried to warn him.
I am the driver, said another man.
I am so sorry for what happened.
I came through the tunnel at great speed.
There were no warning signals.
I had no reason to drive slower.
I suddenly saw the signalman up a ladder, adjusting the red warning light.
I shouted down to him, Hello, below there!
I shouted it again and again.
I waved my arm wildly like this and I put my other hand across my face like this so as not to see the horrific accident I could not avoid.
It was as though he didn't hear neither the train nor me.
Hello below there.
The same words, I thought to myself, the same words that had haunted him these past weeks.
Even the same words I had used myself on my first visit to the signal box.
I have written this story for others to decide what actually happened in that cold and lonely place.
Is coincidence believable?
Perhaps some supernatural force was involved, attempting to warn the signalman of his approaching death.
I leave the reader to make up their own mind.
Right, that's the end of part two and the story, The Signalman.
You can read this text at my website at podcast295.
If you want to read the story at my webpage, well then, you can see where those expressions were used in the story.
So they were without hesitation to take pride in something.
Talk this over.
I shivered with fear from time to time and haunted.
Okay, so I'm going to test you on those now.
I'd like you just to say which of those expressions are missing when you hear the bleep.
Okay, so number one is When I saw the train accident on the news, I... with fear.
Because only the day before, I had taken that train.
Shivered.
I shivered with fear.
2.
I spend a lot of time trying to get some quality podcasts out there to my listeners.
I...
Take in the work that I do for my students.
Pride.
I take pride in the work I do for my students.
Number three.
Yeah, I can see we've got something here which we need to sort out.
I suggest that we both sit down and we this over.
Talk.
Talk this over.
Have you been going down to the gym, Mike, recently?
Well, I've just been so busy.
I go from time to time.
I go from time to time.
Well, Mr. Mike, after recording that podcast, would you like a nice cup of tea?
Oh, yes, I would, I said, without... Hesitation.
I said without hesitation.
Right, that's all from me for this week with my B2 podcast.
I'll be back later in the week with a B1 podcast for you with Treasure Island.
Goodbye for now.
