Inspector Colbeck's Casebook (4 page)

He opened the door and found himself facing a determined Victor Leeming. Behind the sergeant were two uniformed policemen. Leeming doffed his hat.

‘Good day to you, Mr Stagg,’ he said. ‘I have a warrant for your arrest.’ His gaze moved to the art dealer. ‘And you, I suspect, sir, may be Ruthin Woodvine. You are also wanted in connection with the theft of a painting so you’ll have to come along with us. The game is up, I fear.’

Stagg was rooted to the spot but Woodvine thought only of escape. Opening his frock coat, he put a hand inside to
grab his revolver but he was far too slow. Leeming was on him at once, felling him with a single, uncompromising blow to the chin. As the art dealer collapsed at his feet, Leeming relieved him of the weapon.

‘Thank you, Mr Woodvine. I’ll take that.’

‘There must be some mistake,’ gibbered Stagg.

‘There was, sir, and it was your cousin, the coachman, who made it. If you tell barefaced lies to Inspector Colbeck, you’re bound to come to grief in the end.’

Edward Tallis was basking in the reflected glory of his officers. A crime had been solved, the perpetrators were behind bars and he had a glowing letter of thanks from Lord Stennard on the desk in front of him. He sought clarification.

‘What aroused your suspicion about the coachman?’ he asked.

‘It was that story about being held up on the way to the station,’ said Colbeck. ‘He claimed that the road was blocked. Yet when I drove a carriage along it, I couldn’t see any place where he could be impeded by an overturned cart. He could simply have driven around it. You see, sir,’ he continued, ‘there had to be collusion with someone at Stennard Court. It was the coachman. There was no second carriage that picked up the painting at the station. Lord Stennard’s coachman drove there at the agreed time with Woodvine as his passenger. Richmore wouldn’t have been able to identify the coachman again because it was raining and the man was hidden beneath a cape and hat. Stagg, of course, was part of the gang. The daring theft was only made possible by the fact that the coachman was his cousin.’

‘Remarkable!’ said Tallis, sitting back. ‘Turner’s original painting is back in its frame and the malefactors will each collect a very long prison sentence. There’s just one thing that puzzles me,’ he added, stroking his moustache. ‘Lord Stennard is an acknowledged connoisseur in the art world. Why didn’t he spot that the painting he bought back was a fake?’

‘Lord Stennard is blind in one eye and has such poor vision in the other that he uses a monocle. The coachman was aware of that. When the information was passed on to Woodvine, the art dealer saw his chance. I feel sorry for Lord Stennard. He can take in the sheer wonder of a painting in its entirety but his impaired eyesight means that he can’t appreciate the fine detail.’

‘So who
did
establish that the painting was a fake?’

Colbeck thought fondly of Madeleine. ‘We were lucky to have an expert at hand, Superintendent.’

Old age had sapped his strength and bent his back but Simon Gillard’s devotion to duty was unaffected by the passage of years. Indeed, now that he had retired, he was able to dedicate himself completely to his work as churchwarden. Gillard needed no encouragement to drag himself out of bed on the Sabbath. He was always up early, lifted by a feeling of importance and filled with pure joy. It was the one day of the week when his bones never ached. During the short walk to church that morning, he went through his usual ritual, reminding himself of what he had to do before the congregation arrived for a service of Holy Communion.

Gillard had to let himself into the church, unlock the cupboard in the vestry so that the sacristan could prepare the altar, slide the hymn numbers into the wooden display board above the pulpit, open the bible on the lectern at the appropriate page for the readings and set the offertory plate in position. There would be a number of other tasks to complete before the others turned up. Gillard knew the routine off by
heart and drew immense solace from the thought that he was doing God’s work and serving the community. As he turned the key in the lock, the door opened smoothly on well-oiled hinges and he stepped inside.

There were people in Wolverton who sneered at the church of St George the Martyr because it had been built fifteen years earlier by the London to Birmingham Railway Company to supply the spiritual needs of their employees and their families. Critics disliked what they saw as a church built on traditional lines with a decidedly utilitarian air about it. It blended in with the terraces of small, plain, relentlessly uniform railway houses. Some argued that the church had no history, no grandeur, no sense of being on consecrated ground and no right to be there. Gillard disagreed. To him, it was as inspiring as the greatest of medieval cathedrals. Alone in the church of St George the Martyr, he felt that he was in direct communication with the Almighty. Standing in the nave, as he did now, he looked towards heaven and offered up a silent prayer.

His gaze then alighted on the altar and he froze in horror. Stretched out in front of it was the body of a man. His head had been smashed open and was soaked in blood. He lay there like some grotesque sacrifice. It was too much for Gillard. He gasped, tottered then fell forward into oblivion.

The Sabbath was no day of rest for the detectives at Scotland Yard. If an emergency arose, they had to respond to it. Robert Colbeck and Victor Leeming had each attended services at their respective parish churches, only to return home to an urgent summons from their superintendent. Edward Tallis told them everything that could be gleaned
from the telegraph he’d received from Wolverton, then he dispatched them there. An unwilling rail traveller on weekdays, Leeming was even gloomier when he was forced to catch a train on a Sunday.

‘I’d hoped to spend some time with my children,’ he moaned.

‘I, too, had other plans,’ said Colbeck.

‘It’s unfair on Estelle. She looks after them during the week. It’s only right that I do my share whenever I can.’

‘Police work often occurs at inconvenient hours, Victor. It can be irritating but we must try to see it from the point of view of the victim. He didn’t get himself killed on a Sunday morning specifically to ruin our leisure time with the family.’

‘Why bother us?’ asked Leeming. ‘This is a case for the local constabulary.’

‘Because they’re aware of our reputation, the LNWR asked for us by name. Doesn’t that make you feel proud?’

‘No, sir, it makes me feel annoyed. We’re being imposed upon.’

‘This murder has a unique distinction.’

‘Yes, it’s made me miss the best meal of the week with the family.’

‘Take a less selfish view,’ advised Colbeck. ‘The crime took place in the first church ever built by a railway company.’

‘If you ask me,’ grumbled Leeming, ‘the railways are a crime in themselves.’

Colbeck laughed. ‘That’s precisely why I
don’t
ask you, Victor. Tell me,’ he went on, ‘are your children still playing with the toy train I bought them?’

‘That’s different, sir.’

‘Are they?’

‘Yes,’ said Leeming, reluctantly. ‘They play with nothing else.’

‘So the railway does have a useful purpose, after all.’

‘They’re too young to understand.’

‘And you’re far too old
not
to understand its value to us.’ He became serious. ‘A man has been slaughtered in a church – and on a Sunday. Doesn’t that make you want to track down the killer?’

‘It does, sir,’ said Leeming, roused. ‘What he did was unforgivable.’

When a brutal murder took place, there was, as a rule, universal sympathy for the victim. That was not the case with Claude Exton. Staff on duty at Wolverton station all knew and loathed the man. More than one of them seemed pleased at the news that he was dead. What they did do was to provide useful background details for the detectives. Leeming recorded them in his notepad. Exton was an unpopular member of the community, a shiftless man of middle years who lurched from one job to another. He’d been banned from one pub for causing an affray and was thrown out of another for trying to molest the landlord’s wife. Other outrages could be laid at Exton’s door.

‘In other words,’ said Leeming, ‘he was a real reprobate.’

‘That’s putting it kindly,’ muttered the stationmaster.

‘Was he a churchgoer?’ asked Colbeck.

‘No, Inspector. He always boasted that the only time they’d get him across the threshold of a church was for his funeral. It seems he was right about that.’

The collective portrait of the deceased was unflattering but it gave them a starting point. Colbeck and Leeming walked swiftly to the church. Everyone had heard the news. People were standing outside their houses discussing the murder with their neighbours. A noisy debate was taking place on a street corner. There was a small crowd outside the church itself and a uniformed policeman was blocking entry to the building. When he saw them approach, the vicar guessed that they must be the detectives and he rushed across to introduce himself. In the circumstances, the Reverend John Odell was surprisingly composed. He was a short, tubby man in his fifties whose normally pleasant features were distorted by concern.

‘This is an appalling crime,’ he said. ‘A church is supposed to be a place of sanctuary against the evils of the world. I thank God that I got here early enough to stop any of my parishioners seeing that hideous sight.’

‘Were you the first to discover the body?’ asked Colbeck.

‘No, Inspector. That gruesome task fell to the warden, Simon Gillard. When I arrived here with the sacristan, we found the poor fellow prostrate in the aisle. He’d fainted and injured his head as he hit the floor.’

‘We’ll need to speak to him.’

‘Then you’ll have to go to his house. As soon as he’d recovered, I had him taken straight home. Then I sent for the police.’

‘Is the body still inside the church?’ wondered Leeming.

‘Yes, it is,’ replied Odell. ‘I want it moved as soon as possible, obviously, but I thought you might prefer to see it exactly as it was found. Claude Exton was not a churchgoer but he nevertheless deserves to be mourned.
Since we couldn’t use the church, I conducted a very short, impromptu service out here and we prayed for the salvation of his soul. Then I urged the congregation to disperse to their homes but, as you see, the news has attracted people of a more ghoulish disposition.’

‘Human vultures,’ murmured Leeming. ‘We always get those.’

‘I’m assuming that the warden unlocked the church this morning,’ said Colbeck. ‘Who else has a key?’

‘Well, I do, naturally,’ said Odell, ‘and so does the other warden but he’s ill at the moment. Between us, we hold the only three keys.’

‘So how did the killer and his victim get inside the church?’

‘That’s what puzzles me, Inspector. It was locked overnight.’

‘Is it conceivable that any of the keys went missing?’

‘Oh, no,’ said Odell, firmly. ‘The other warden and I are extremely careful with our keys and Simon Gillard is so dutiful that I wouldn’t be surprised if he takes his to bed with him. How two people got inside the church is a mystery. Only one, alas, came out alive.’

After plying the vicar with some more questions, the detectives asked the policeman to let them into the church. He stood aside so that they could open the door. Some of those lingering nearby edged forward to take a peek but Colbeck shut the door firmly behind him. The atmosphere inside the church was eerie. It was quite warm outside but both of them shivered involuntarily. Consecrated ground had been violated by a foul murder. There was a strange sense of unease. They walked down the nave and into the
chancel to view the body. Though both of them had seen many murder victims, they were shocked. Colbeck was also curious.

‘What does it remind you of, Victor?’ he asked.

‘That man in Norwich, sir,’ said Leeming. ‘He’d been battered to death with a sledgehammer. His head was just like pulp.’

‘Look at the way the body has been arranged in front of the altar.’

‘That’s just the way he fell.’

‘I don’t think so. There’s something almost … artistic about it.’

Leeming frowned. ‘Is there?’

‘It’s reminiscent of those medieval paintings that depict the slaughter of Thomas Becket. He was hacked down in front of the altar by four knights who thought they were doing the king’s bidding.’

‘It doesn’t look like that to me, sir. And if what they say is true, he’s certainly no saint like Becket. Exton was a real sinner.’

‘Then we could be looking at the
punishment
for his sins.’

Colbeck knelt down to examine the corpse. Around the mouth were traces of vomit. He searched the man’s pockets but they were empty. He then gently pulled back the sleeves of Exton’s jacket.

Leeming was perplexed. ‘What are you looking for, Inspector?’

‘Something I expected to find,’ said Colbeck, ‘and you can still see traces of the marks on his wrists. As we’ve heard, Exton abhorred churches. He’d never have come in here and stood obligingly in front of the altar so that someone
could bludgeon him to death. I think that he was knocked unconscious elsewhere, tied up and gagged, then brought here to be killed.’

‘Then we’re looking for a strong man, sir. Exton was heavy.’

‘Let’s get him out of here,’ said Colbeck, standing up. ‘He’s defiling the church. Tell the vicar to summon the undertaker and ask that constable to frighten the crowd away. We don’t want an audience when we move him. However much of a rascal he was, Exton is entitled to some dignity.’

Simon Gillard was propped up in his armchair with bandaging around his head. Still shocked by the ghastly discovery in the church, he was in a complete daze. When his wife admitted Colbeck to the house and took him into the parlour, her husband was staring blankly in front of him.

‘This is Inspector Colbeck from Scotland Yard,’ she explained. ‘He needs to talk to you, Simon.’ There was no response. ‘I’m sorry, Inspector,’ she went on. ‘He’s been like this for hours.’

‘That’s understandable,’ said Colbeck. ‘Perhaps you can help me instead.’

‘It was my husband who found the body.’

‘Does he enjoy being a warden?’

‘Oh, yes,’ she said, ‘he loves it. Since he retired, the church has taken over his life – both our lives, in fact. I’m one of the cleaners and I organise the flower rota.’

Winifred Gillard was a short, roly-poly woman with grey hair framing an oval face that still had traces of her youthful
appeal. She talked fondly of her husband’s commitment to the church since his retirement from the railway, and she spoke with great respect of the vicar.

‘Does your husband ever lend the key to the church to anybody?’

‘Only to me,’ she replied. ‘Simon guards his bunch of keys like the family jewels – not that we have any, mind you. When he first became warden, he used to sleep with them under his pillow.’

Colbeck smiled inwardly. The vicar’s earlier comment had some truth in it.

‘So nobody else would have access to the keys?’

‘Nobody,’ she insisted, ‘nobody at all.’

Victor Leeming was asking the same question of the other warden, Adam Revill, an emaciated man in his sixties with a few tufts of hair on a balding head. He was patently unwell and sat in a chair with a blanket around his shoulders. Every so often, he had a fit of coughing.

‘No, Sergeant,’ he asserted. ‘I never lend the key to the church to anybody. If I’m not using it, it stays on a hook in the kitchen. Maria will tell you the same.’

‘It’s true,’ she said. ‘Uncle Adam takes his duties seriously. It grieves him that he’s been unable to carry them out for a while. The doctor told him to stay indoors and rest.’

‘I’d be lost without Maria,’ said Revill, giving her arm an affectionate squeeze. ‘She’s been a godsend. Since my wife died, I’ve had to fend for myself. The moment I was taken ill, Maria began popping in to look after me.’

‘I only live four doors away,’ she said.

Maria Vine was an attractive woman in her thirties with
a soft voice and a kind smile. Fond of her uncle, she wanted no thanks for keeping an eye on him.

‘I take it that you both knew Claude Exton,’ said Leeming.

‘Yes, we did,’ replied Revill, curling a lip. ‘We knew and disliked him.’

‘That’s not entirely true,’ said his niece.

‘He was a good-for-nothing, Maria.’

‘I know – and he was a nuisance to everybody. But he wasn’t that bad when his wife was alive.’ She turned to Leeming. ‘She was killed in a railway accident, Sergeant. It preyed on Mr Exton. That’s when he took to drink.’

‘He seems to have had a lot of enemies,’ observed Leeming.

‘I’m one of them,’ said Revill.

‘Yes, but you didn’t hate him enough to kill him, sir. And even if you did, you’d hardly do it inside a church.’

‘That’s true, Sergeant. A church is sacred.’

‘I feel sorry for Mr Gillard,’ said Maria. ‘He actually found the body.’

‘Yes,’ croaked Revill, ‘I pity Simon. But don’t ask me to shed any tears for Claude Exton. He’s gone and I’m glad.’