The Excursion Train (6 page)

‘The only crime I want to solve is the theft of my paper,’ he complained, extending a hand. ‘Give it here, Maddy.’

‘When I’ve finished with it.’

‘Who went to the shop to buy it?’

‘Eat your breakfast, Father. You don’t want to be late.’

‘There’s plenty of time yet.’

She surrendered the newspaper reluctantly and sat opposite him. Madeleine was delighted to see that the Railway Detective was involved in the case. When the mail train had been robbed the previous year, her father had been the driver and he was badly injured by one of the men who had ambushed him. Robert Colbeck had not only hunted down and arrested the gang responsible for the crime, he had rescued Madeleine when she was abducted and used as a hostage. As a result of it all, the two of them had been drawn together into a friendship that had grown steadily over the intervening months without ever quite blossoming into a romance. Colbeck was always a welcome visitor at the little house in Camden.

Andrews remained buried in the newspaper article.

‘We should be seeing the Inspector very soon,’ he observed.

‘I hope so.’

‘Whenever he’s dealing with a crime on the railway, he drops in for my advice. I know that you like to think he comes to see you,’ teased Andrews, ‘but I’m the person that he really
wants to talk to, Maddy. I’ve taught him all he knows about trains.’

‘That’s not true, Father,’ she responded, loyally. ‘Be fair to him. Robert has always taken a special interest in trains. When you first met him, you couldn’t believe that he knew the difference between a Bury and a Crampton locomotive.’

But she was talking to herself. Andrews was so engrossed in the newspaper account that he did not hear her. It was only when he had read every word about the murder on the excursion train three times that He set the paper aside and picked up his spoon. He attacked his breakfast with relish.

‘One thing, anyway,’ he said as he ate his porridge.

‘What’s that?’

‘You’ll have a chance to wear that new dress of yours, Maddy.’

‘Father!’ she rebuked.

‘Be honest. You always make a special effort for the Inspector.’

‘All I want is for this dreadful crime to be solved as soon as possible.’ She could not hide her joy. ‘But, yes, it will be nice if Robert finds the time to call on us.’

Once he had set his mind on a course of action, Inspector Colbeck was not easily deflected. The search for William Cathcart took him to four separate locations but that did not trouble him. He simply pressed on until he finally ran the man to earth at Newgate. He did not have to ask for Cathcart this time because the hangman was clearly visible on the scaffold outside the prison, testing the apparatus in preparation for an execution that was due to take place the next day. Colbeck understood why extra care was being taken on this occasion.

Cathcart had bungled his last execution at Newgate, leaving the prisoner dangling in agony until the hangman had dispatched him by swinging on his feet to break his neck. Reviled by the huge crowd attending the event, Cathcart had also been pilloried in the press.

Colbeck waited until the grisly rehearsal was over then introduced himself and asked for a word with Cathcart. Seeing the opportunity for a free drink, the latter immediately took the detective across the road to the public house that would be turned into a grandstand on the following day, giving those that could afford the high prices a privileged view of the execution. Colbeck bought his companion a glass of brandy but had no alcohol himself. They found a settle in a quiet corner.

‘I can guess why you’ve come, Inspector,’ said Cathcart, slyly. ‘The murder of Jake Guttridge.’

‘You’ve obviously seen the newspapers.’

‘Never read the blessed things. They always print such lies about me. Criminal, what they say. Deserves ’angin ’ in my opinion. I’d like to string them reporters up in line, so I would.’

‘I’m sure.’

‘Then cut out their ’earts and livers for good measure.’

‘I can see why you’re not popular with the gentlemen of the press.’

William Cathcart was an unappealing individual. One of eleven children, he had been raised in poverty by parents who struggled to get by and who were unable to provide him with any real education. The boy’s life had been unremittingly hard. Cathcart was in his late twenties when he secured the post of public executioner for London and Middlesex, and the capital provided him with plenty of practice at first. Notwithstanding
this, he showed very little improvement in his chosen craft. Coarse, ugly and bearded, he was now in his fifties, a portly man in black frock coat and black trousers, proud of what he did and quick to defend himself against his critics with the foulest of language. Conscious of the man’s reputation, Colbeck did not look forward to the interview with any pleasure.

‘How well did you know Jacob Guttridge?’ he began.

‘Too well!’ snarled the other.

‘In what way?’

‘Jake was my blinkin’ shadow, weren’t ’e? Always tryin’ to copy wor I did. ’Cos I was an ’angman, Jake takes it up. ’Cos I earned a crust as a shoemaker, Jake ’as to be a cobbler. Everythin’ I did, Jake manages to do as well.’ He smacked the table with the flat of his hand. ‘The bugger even moved after me to ’Oxton, though ’e couldn’t afford to live in Poole Street where I do. I’d never ’ave stood for that, Inspector.’

‘I get the impression that you didn’t altogether like the man,’ said Colbeck with mild irony. ‘You must have worked together at some point.’

‘Oh, we did. Jake begged me to let ’im act as my assistant a couple of times. Watched me like an ’awk to see ’ow it was done. Then ’e ’as the gall to say that ’e can do it better. Better!’ cried Cathcart. ‘You’re lookin’ at a man who’s topped some of the worst rogues that ever crawled on this earth. It was me who ’anged that Swiss villain, Kervoyseay.’

‘Courvoisier,’ said Colbeck, pronouncing the name correctly. ‘He was the butler who murdered his employer, Lord William Russell.’

‘Then there was Fred Mannin’ and ’is wife, Marie,’ boasted the other. ‘I strung the pair of ’em up at ’Orsemonger Lane a few years back. They danced a jig at the end of my rope ’cos
they killed ’er fancy man, Marie Mannin’, that is. Nasty pair, they were.’

Colbeck recalled the event well. He also remembered the letter of protest that was published in
The Times
on the following day, written by no less a person than Charles Dickens. An execution that Cathcart obviously listed among his successes had, in fact, provoked widespread disapproval. There was a gruesome smugness about the man that Colbeck found very distasteful but his personal feelings had to be put aside. He probed for information.

‘Does it worry you to be a figure who inspires hatred?’ he asked.

‘Not at all,’ returned Cathcart with a chuckle. ‘I thrives on it. In any case, most of the cullies who come to goggle at an ’angin’ looks up to me really. They’re always ready to buy me a drink afterwards and listen to my adventures. Yes, and I never ’ave any trouble sellin’ the rope wor done the job. I cuts it up into slices, Inspector. You’ve no idea ’ow much some people will pay for six inches of ’emp when it’s been round the neck of a murderer.’

‘Let’s get back to Jacob Guttridge, shall we?’

‘Then there’s another way to make extra money,’ said Cathcart, warming to his theme. ‘You lets people touch the ’and of the dead man, see, ’cos it’s supposed to cure wens and that. Don’t believe it myself,’ he added with a throaty chuckle, ‘but I makes a pretty penny out of it.’

‘Some of which you give to your mother, I understand.’

As Colbeck had intended it to do, the comment stopped Cathcart in his tracks. Two years earlier, the hangman had been taken to court for refusing to support his elderly mother, who was in a workhouse. Though he earned a regular wage
from Newgate, and supplemented it by performing executions elsewhere in the country, he had had the effrontery to plead poverty and was sharply reprimanded by the magistrate. In the end, as Colbeck knew, the man sitting opposite him had been forced to pay a weekly amount to his mother, who, though almost eighty, preferred to remain in a country workhouse. It was a case that reflected very badly on the public executioner.

‘I’m a dutiful son,’ he attested. ‘I done right by my mother.’

‘It’s reassuring to hear that,’ said Colbeck, ‘but it’s Mr Guttridge that I came to talk about. You claimed just now that you don’t mind if people hate you because of what you do. Jacob Guttridge did. He was so nervous about it that he used a false name.’

‘That’s why ’e’d never be another Bill Cathcart.’

‘He obviously tried to be.’

‘Jealousy, that’s wor it was. Jake knew, in his ’eart, that I was the master. But did ’e take my advice? Nah!’ said Cathcart with contempt. ‘I told ’im to use a short drop like me but ’e always used too much rope. Know wor ’appened at ’is first go?’

‘No,’ said Colbeck. ‘Tell me.’

‘Jake allowed such a long drop that ’e took orff the prisoner’s ’ead, clean as a whistle. They never let ’im work at Norwich again.’

‘Were there other instances where mistakes were made?’

‘Dozens of ’em, Inspector.’

‘Recently, perhaps?’

‘There was talk of some trouble in Ireland, I think.’

‘What kind of trouble?’

‘Who knows? I don’t follow Jake’s career. But I can tell this,’
said Cathcart, slipping his thumbs into his waistcoat pockets. ‘If I was in the salt-box, waitin’ to be took to the gallows, I’d much rather ’ave someone like me to do the necessary than Jake Guttridge.’

‘Why do you say that, Mr Cathcart?’

‘Because I tries to give ’em a quick, clean, merciful death and put ’em out of their misery right way. It’s not ’ow Jake did it.’

‘No?’

‘That psalm-singin’ fool made their sufferin’ worse before they got anywhere near the scaffold. A condemned man needs peace and quiet to fit ’is mind for the awful day. Last thing ’e wants is someone like Jake, givin’ ’im religious bloody tracts or readin’ poetry and suchlike at ’im. All that a public ’angman is there to do,’ announced Cathcart with the air of unassailable authority, ‘is to ’ang the poor devil who’s in the condemned cell. Not try to save ’is blinkin’ soul when the likelihood is that ’e ain’t got one to save. Follow me, Inspector?’

Even allowing for natural prejudice, Colbeck could see that the portrait painted of Jacob Guttridge was very unflattering. Driven to take on the job by a combination of need and religious mania, he had proved less than successful as a public executioner. Yet he still had regular commissions from various parts of the country.

‘Have you never been afraid, Mr Cathcart?’ he asked.

‘No, Inspector. Why should I be?’

‘A man in your line of work must have had death threats.’

‘Dozens of ’em,’ confessed the other with a broad grin. ‘Took ’em as a compliment. Never stopped me from sleepin’ soundly at nights. I been swore at, spat at, punched at, kicked
at, and ’ad all kinds of things thrown at me in the ’eat of the moment, but I just got on with my work.’

‘Do you carry any weapons?’

‘I’ve no need.’

‘Mr Guttridge did. He had a dagger strapped to his leg. You and he are as different as chalk and cheese,’ said Colbeck, stroking his chin. ‘Both of you did the same office yet it affected you in contrasting ways. You walk abroad without a care in the world while Jake Guttridge sneaked around under a false name. Why did he do that?’

‘Cowardice.’

‘He was certainly afraid of something – or of someone.’

‘Then the idiot should never ’ave taken on the job in the first place. A man should be ’appy in ’is work – like me. Then ’e’s got good reason to do it properly, see?’ He held up his glass. ‘Another brandy wouldn’t come amiss, Inspector. Pay up and I’ll tell you about ’ow I topped Esther ’Ibner, the murderess, ’ere at Newgate. My first execution.’

‘Another time,’ said Colbeck, getting up. ‘Solving a heinous crime like this takes precedence over everything else. But thank you for your help, Mr Cathcart. Your comments have been illuminating.’

‘Will you be ’ere tomorrow, Inspector?’

‘Here?’

‘For the entertainment,’ said Cathcart, merrily. ‘I always work best when there’s a big audience. Maybe Jake will be lookin’ down at me from a front row seat in ’eaven. I’ll be able to show ’im wor a proper execution looks like, won’t I?’

His raucous laughter filled the bar.

Louise Guttridge had been unfair to her neighbours. Because
she shut them out of her life, she never really got to know any of them. She was therefore taken aback by the spontaneous acts of kindness shown by unnamed people in her street. All that most of them knew was that her husband had died. Posies of flowers appeared on her doorstep and condolences were scrawled on pieces of paper. Those who could not write simply slipped a card under her door. Louise Guttridge was deeply moved though she feared that more hostile messages might be delivered when the nature of her husband’s work became common knowledge.

As in all periods of crisis, she turned to her religion for succour. With the blinds drawn down, she sat in the front room, playing with her rosary beads and reciting prayers she had learnt by heart, trying to fill her mind with holy thoughts so that she could block out the horror that had devastated her life. She was dressed in black taffeta, her widow’s weeds, inherited from her mother, giving off a fearsome smell of mothballs. Her faith was a great comfort to her but it did not still her apprehensions completely. She was now alone. The death of her husband had cut her off from the only regular human contact she had enjoyed. She had now been delivered up to strangers.

Closing her eyes, she offered up a prayer for the soul of the deceased and coupled it with a plea that his killer should soon be caught, convicted and hanged. In her mind, one life had to be paid for with another. Until that happened, she could never rest. While the murderer remained at liberty, she would forever be tortured by thoughts of who and where he might be, and why he had committed the hideous crime.

Hoxton was to blame. She was fervent in that belief. Disliking and distrusting the area, she wished that they had
never moved there. The tragedy that, from the very start, she felt was imminent had now taken place. The irony was that it had prompted a display of sympathy and generosity among her neighbours that she had never realised was there. In losing a husband, she had gained unlikely friends.