Transcript/Two Shovels Are Better Than One

**Narrator:** Early on the morning of the milk incident, the Clay Pits manager came to see Bill, Ben and Marion. They yawned sleepily as he came to the sheds, the twins louder and longer than Marion.

**Clay Pits Manager:** “The rain had loosened so much clay last night, that there are landslides everywhere. There’s too much of it for Marion to move on her own, so I just telephoned the Construction Company to hire some diggers. Bill and Ben? Please go over to their yard and collect Jack and Oliver please.”

**Bill & Ben:** “Yes, sir.”

**Narrator:** But then, Bill realised something.

**Bill:** “Wait a minute, where’s Timothy?”

**Marion:** “That’s strange. I don’t remember him coming back to the shed.”

**Narrator:** When the engines left the shed, they could see huge piles of clay all over the place, covering a lot of tracks.

**Bill & Ben:** “Oh, no!”

**Narrator:** They didn’t like having to do so much work. But Marion didn’t feel the same way.

**Marion:** “Wow. Just look at all this clay. That can only mean one thing, of course: a lot of clay means a lot of digging! Oh yes!”

**Narrator:** Just then, they all heard a voice.

**Timothy:** “Uh, hello? Marion? Are you out there?”

**Marion:** “Timothy? Is that you? Where are you?”

**Timothy:** “Over here.”

**Narrator:** Not too far away, the engines could see Timothy, right behind a particularly big rockslide.

**Timothy:** “I was shunting some trucks here last night, ready for the morning, but the rain suddenly made this cliff unstable and it all collapsed in front of me.”

**Marion:** “Goodness gracious me. Now don’t you worry, the Pack is on the way. They’ll be able to free you. You’ll see.”

**Narrator:** A few hours later, Max and Monty drove into the site, Nelson drove in carrying Byron and Bill and Ben puffed in, pulling Jack and Oliver. Miss Jenny and the foreman inspected Timothy’s situation.

**The Foreman:** “Most of these rocks are too big for Jack and the others to lift. We will need Oliver’s drill. Quickly now.”

**Narrator:** While Oliver’s banksman fitted his drill attachment on, the other machines set to work at once. Jack was digging away one pile of clay into Max, Byron was helping to clear away some tracks with his blade and Marion was making a start with loading some clay into Bill and Ben’s trucks. But soon, it was becoming too much work even for Marion.

**Marion:** “Oh my goodness. This is going to take longer than I thought.”

**Narrator:** Just then, Nelson arrived back on the scene. He was delivering another machine to help. Marion was rather surprised at who it was. It was Ned the Steam Shovel.

**Ned:** “I’m sorry it took so long. You see, Nelson can only haul one machine at a time and-”

**Marion:** “Hold on. You’re a… a steam shovel? Like me?”

**Narrator:** She had never seen Ned before.

**Ned:** “Um, yes. Though I can run on roads and things.”

**Marion:** “No way. That is so amazing! You can go absolutely anywhere and dig absolutely anywhere. You’re really lucky. You don’t have silly old rails holding you back.”

**Narrator:** Ned was baffled.

**Ned:** “Well, I don’t know about going anywhere, but do like a fair bit of digging. Oh, my name is Ned, by the way.”

**Marion:** “Hm? Oh, I’m Marion and I usually-”

**Narrator:** But then, she was interrupted by two impatient, grumpy tank engines.

**Ben:** “Oh, will you two hurry up already?!”

**Bill:** “How will these tracks be cleared if you’re going to be chattering all day?".

**Narrator:** Ned was taken aback. He didn’t think he did anything wrong.

**Jack:** “Hey! You leave Ned alone! You know how sensitive he is. Besides, steam shovels can only work so fast.”

**Narrator:** The twins grumbled some more and continued waiting some more.

**Marion:** “Oh, just ignore those two. They’re usually this upset when there’s a rockslide to move.”

**Narrator:** While the steam shovels continued to load the trucks, they talked about nothing but troublesome twins.

**Marion:** “Did they really? Right onto the railway line?”

**Ned:** “Yeah. They thought the brick bridge was a wall.”

**Marion:** “At least Max and Monty don’t threaten to dump unusual engines into the sea.”

**Narrator:** Timothy was trapped behind a lot of big rocks, so it took a long while for Oliver to drill them all. But eventually, he had managed to drill those huge boulders into smaller rocks. Although, after he turned his drill off, Oliver still felt as if he was shaking. He had been drilling for too long.

**Miss Jenny:** “Spot on, Oliver. You can go and help Byron now.”

**Oliver:** “Thanks Miss.”

**Narrator:** He drove away to detach his drill, still feeling a little dizzy.

**Miss Jenny:** “Now all we need is someone to dig all of these rocks away.”

**Foreman:** “Hmm. It seems Jack is too busy with Max and Monty.”

**Ned:** “Oh, uh, we can do it, sir. Bill and Ben just left for the station.”

**Marion:** “That’s right. With two shovels, we’ll have Timothy out in a jiffy.”

**Narrator:** The foreman looked at the steam shovels, then to the rescue area.

**Foreman:** “Very well then. Go ahead.”

**Narrator:** Luckily, the cliffs were far enough away from each other for both steam shovels to fit through together and come to the rescue. There were enough rails for Marion to move clear the right side of the pile and enough ground for Ned to clear away the left side. Their shovel couldn’t hold as much as Jack’s bucket, but thanks to Oliver’s drilling, the clay pile wasn’t that big anyway. Once they cleared enough clay away from the line, Marion reversed away and Timothy came puffing away to her and freedom. Workmen cleared away the rest of the clay with their own smaller shovels. Timothy was glad to be moving again.

**Timothy:** “Oh, thank you so much, you two.”

**Ned:** “It’s alright. Who knew we’d work so well together.”

**Marion:** “I know, right? We work SO well together, I think we should call ourselves ‘The Two Shovel-teers’. Oh, no wait, there’s usually three. Oh, how about ‘Double Shovel’? … Yes. Yes, I really like the sound of that.”

**Narrator:** While Ned chuckled warmly at the idea, Timothy grinned and rolled his eyes. By evening, all the tracks in the Clay Pits were cleared.

**Miss Jenny:** “Great job, everyone. I’m very pleased with you all. You’d make a mother proud.”

**Narrator:** As the machines were making their way back to the yard, she thought to herself.

**Miss Jenny:** “I wonder if Isobella has been doing a good job.”

**Narrator:** A little later, as it was getting darker, Marion and Timothy puffed slowly and tiredly back to the sheds. Marion had done a lot of digging, of course, and Timothy was looking forward to having a roof to sleep under again. But before either of them could close their eyes, they could see two white engines coming towards them.

**Marion:** “Oh, no! Ghosts! There are ghosts in the shed! They’re much scarier than dinosaurs!”

**Narrator:** She closed her eyes tight, but Timothy took a closer look.

**Timothy:** “Bill? Ben? Why on earth are you both white?”

**Bill:** “We… just crashed into a milk trailer, that’s all.”

**Ben:** “We were going to have a wash, but there was no water left at the wash down.”

**Timothy:** “Milk? Well, you certainly fooled us. Marion just thought you were ghosts.”

**Marion:** “Go away, evil spirits! Go away!”

**Narrator:** But then, a cheeky grin crept on Ben’s face.

**Ben:** “Hey, Bill. I just thought of this amazing trick we can play on Salty and Porter tomorrow.”

**Timothy:** “Oh, no. Here we go again!"