The Loss of the Jane Vosper (17 page)

French was not an expert, but to his amateur eye everything looked of excellent quality. The machined parts of the sets, so far as these could be seen, were admirably finished, and the green-enamelled castings were smooth and even. The cases looked as if they would stand any amount of knocking about.

French’s first care was to find out whether it would have been possible for inferior sets to have been loaded up. On this point he questioned indirectly the foreman, and when the latter excused himself to attend to another caller, the two packers. All three declared stoutly that all the sets they had loaded were of identical pattern, and that no cases contained anything different.

French then turned to a more ticklish point – whether anything which could have contained a bomb could have been loaded as well. Here the enquiry involved a good deal more work. Determined to be thorough, French went back to the assembly shops and saw both foreman and mechanics concerned. However, he soon satisfied himself that it would have been impossible to place a bomb inside either motor or dynamo castings, unknown to several of the men. Apart from the assurance of all concerned that nothing of the kind had happened, French was satisfied that no one would have taken the risk of such an act in circumstances of such publicity.

Similar detailed enquiries in the packing department led him to the same conclusion. Here, again, to have placed bombs in the cases would have been impossible without the connivance of at least six men. French interviewed all these, and he was convinced none of them had been party to any such action.

Nor, he believed, could the bombs have been put in at night. Cases were not left half packed in the evening, lest on taking up the work again some item which should have been included might be forgotten. They were filled and closed down, and if there would not have been time to finish one before the closing hour, it was not begun, and the man in charge occupied himself in getting forward stuff for the next day. Nor could a packed case have been opened without leaving traces. Besides all this, the sheds were locked at night and there was a watchman on duty close by.

French went into the whole question very thoroughly, and found himself forced to the conclusion that wherever the bombs had come from, it was not from the Weaver Bannister works. No doubt was left in his mind that 14 wagons of cases had left on the four days from the 13th to the 17th of September, containing 350 of the special sets and nothing else.

The papers Hislop had shown him proved conclusively that the cash value of the sets was as stated, so that French felt himself entirely satisfied that the Weaver Bannister people had acted correctly throughout, and were in no way concerned in the fraud. Also, it seemed beyond question that nothing that Sutton had learnt here could have had any connection with his fate.

Armed with the numbers of the wagons containing the cases, and the dates and hours at which they had left the works, French went to the stationmaster at Watford to pursue his enquiries. These cases had been consigned to the Haydon Square depot. How had they gone?

On this point French couldn’t get a great deal of satisfaction. It seemed they were first brought into the Watford goods yard and there lay until the evening, when they were picked up by a train going south. They did not go direct to Haydon Square. They were thrown into different goods yards and remarshalled, and it was not till they had passed through a number of stages that they reached their destination. The stationmaster himself could not give the exact details.

But on the essential point he was very clear. It would, in his opinion, have been absolutely out of the question for them to have been tampered with
en route
. While in the goods yard at Watford they were under the observation of a number of men, and it would have been impossible for anyone to have got into a wagon and opened and closed a case unseen. These conditions, further, obtained at all the stopping places, and the stationmaster supposed that even French would not suggest they had been opened while the wagons were actually moving.

A consideration of the general possibilities led French to agree with him. To have attempted any interference with a case – much less four – while in the Railway Company’s charge would undoubtedly have been out of the question. First it would have been necessary to ascertain in which particular yard the wagons were at the given moment. Then this private and well-fenced yard would have had to be entered unseen. Once inside, the wagons would have had to be located, involving a search along, perhaps, many miles of sidings. Then, still unseen, the wagons would have had to be entered, four cases opened, the bombs put in, and the cases closed, again without leaving any trace. Lastly the criminal would have had to leave the yard in the same secret manner as he entered it.

French saw that it simply could not have been done. As far as the rail portion of the journey was concerned, it was clear that Sutton’s conclusion had again been correct.

‘We’re not getting any forrader,’ he said to Carter as they stepped into a train for Euston.

Carter agreed that things were not looking any too good and said that it was much more likely to have been the shipping people.

‘That’s not what we want to know,’ French reminded him. ‘It’s what happened to Sutton that we’re up against.’

Carter agreed again and skilfully led the conversation to the question of lunch. He supposed they were going to the Haydon Square depot, and it would be a pity to have to break off in their enquiries there to have it.

French, who was himself hungry, decided to notice the hint, and said he knew a restaurant near Euston that would suit.

After lunch they went to Haydon Square. It looked a very old place with the sidings on ground level and the main line overhead. It was jammed with vehicles of all descriptions, waiting their turn at the cranes. French asked to see the agent.

He proved civil and helpful. Sutton had been to see him and had been given all the information possible. But the agent was afraid it hadn’t helped him in his enquiry.

‘Well,’ said French, ‘I’m sorry to trouble you to go over it again, but I’m afraid that’s what I want.’

The agent was quite willing to repeat himself. He said the wagons containing the cases came in during the early morning and were shunted beside the cranes before the yard opened for outside traffic. The cases were booked forward to the depot only, to be handed over to Messrs Waterer & Reade, for cartage to the docks. Two of Messrs Waterer & Reade’s 5-ton lorries were on the job, and the cases were loaded on these lorries and taken away by them. He admitted he had not known these details at the time, but had obtained them for Sutton.

This was convincing, but not convincing enough for French. He went down to the sheds, saw the foreman who had assisted with the unloading, and questioned him thoroughly. His replies, however, put the matter beyond doubt. Not only were all the cases removed on the lorries, but it would have been utterly impossible for anyone to have tampered with them while at Haydon Square.

Every step in this chain of investigation was making more and more perplexing the two puzzles with which French was dealing. Every step made the blowing up of the
Jane
Vosper
more inexplicable, and the disappearance of John Sutton more unaccountable. It was true French had still to go into the cartage to the docks and the loading on to the ship, but it was unlikely, on the face of it, that the explanation of either mystery would be found there. It was, indeed, beginning to look as if a second investigation into the actions of the Southern Ocean people would be necessary.

But Sutton surely hadn’t had time to make such an investigation? Surely it was while still engaged on the Weaver Bannister enquiry that he had met his fate? French put the point to Carter, and was surprised to find that he wholly disagreed. Sutton, in the sergeant’s opinion, must have switched over to the question of Southern Ocean guilt. ‘We’re wasting time with these sets,’ Carter continued. ‘The thing was done by the steamer people – must have been. At least that’s what I think, sir,’ he added hastily.

‘You may be right,’ French admitted. ‘However we’ve got to finish what we’re at. What’s the address of these blessed carriers?’

‘Ten Otwell Street, off Cannon Street,’ Carter answered, glancing at his notebook.

Twenty minutes later the two men reached the premises, which bore a large sign: ‘Waterer & Reade. General Carriers.’ The office facing the street was small, but through a covered entry they could see an enormous yard, stretching back into mysterious distances and filled with vans and lorries of all shapes and sizes. French pushed his way into the office and at a window marked ‘Enquiries’ asked if he might see the manager. His official card worked wonders, and without delay they were shown into that gentleman’s private room.

Mr Keene was a sharp-looking man with an aggressive jaw, thin, clean-shaven lips, and very light-blue eyes. He greeted his visitors briefly and asked what he could do for them.

French delivered his usual opening address and asked for all details possible about Sutton and about the transit of the cases.

Keene seemed slightly bored, but answered without objection, though sparing his words. He had heard of Sutton, but had not met him. The detective had rung him up on the Wednesday – the day he disappeared, French noted – asking could he see him that afternoon if he were to call. Keene had enquired at what hour, and Sutton answered 4.30, if that would suit. It had suited Keene, and he had noted the engagement. But Sutton had not turned up, nor had he sent any message of apology or explanation.

‘At what hour did he telephone?’ French enquired.

‘Let’s see,’ the manager hesitated. ‘Some time about the middle of the morning. About eleven, I think.’

French took a note to try to trace the sending of that call and asked Keene to proceed.

‘That’s all I know about Sutton,’ he said. ‘You also want to know about our handling of the Weaver Bannister cases? I can tell you that in a few words.

‘For some time we have been anxious to develop our business, and I have been paying personal calls on likely firms to try to obtain their custom. Messrs Weaver Bannister was one of these firms. I called there about a month ago, and they promised us a trial order. For some time they made no move, then we received a request for a quotation for conveying these 350 cases from the LMS depot at Haydon Square to the Southern Ocean boat
Jane
Vosper
in the London Docks.

‘We knew we should be up against the cartage departments of both the railway and the steamer companies, so we quoted a very low rate. In fact, I may say it didn’t pay us. But we got the order.

‘In due course we received the advice from Haydon Square that the cases were beginning to come in, and I arranged for two of our 5-ton lorries to start the job immediately. They worked -’ He broke off and pressed a button on his desk. ‘I’m not sure how long it took them, but I’ll get the sheets.’

A clerk brought the papers and Keene passed them over.

‘You see,’ he explained, ‘these are the timesheets of the lorrymen in question, Joseph Grey and William Henty. They began to cart on Saturday, 14th September, and continued on the following Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Four days they were at it. Perhaps you would like to see the correspondence and the receipts from the Southern Ocean people?’

French hesitated. He would like to see the documents, but he could not claim that it was essential to his case. ‘I should, if convenient,’ he said.

‘It’s convenient enough, though I don’t know that I understand how it’s going to help you to find Sutton,’ Keene responded. ‘However, that is your affair.’

He rang for a file and passed it across. All the papers he had referred to were there, the original request for a quotation, the quotation itself, its acceptance, a note from Weaver Bannister saying that loading of the cases would begin on the Friday, a note from the goods depot that they were beginning to come in, the number of cases carried by each carter on each load, and the steamer people’s receipts for these. It was all very complete and satisfying.

French indeed was strongly tempted to accept this mass of evidence without further enquiry as covering the carting transaction. But training, habit and experience all urged him to be thorough, not to accept
any
evidence without first obtaining all the checks upon it that were possible.

Accordingly, when he had extracted what he wanted from the papers he asked if he could complete his job by a word with the two carters.

‘You can with one of them,’ Keene answered, ‘if you like to wait till he comes in. The other I’m afraid has left, and I don’t know that I can give you his address. They were temporary men, those two, taken on to cover a sudden rush of work. Grey has left, as I said, and Henty will be leaving in a day or two, as the rush is now over.’

Once more Keene rang for his long-suffering clerk. ‘Take these gentlemen to the yard,’ he directed, ‘and find Henty. They wish to speak to him. Also look up and see if you can find Grey’s address – you know, the lorryman who left recently.’ He turned to French. ‘If you go with Mr Paine, he’ll do what he can for you.’

French expressed his thanks and he and Carter followed the clerk. The latter asked them to wait at the entrance to the yard, vanishing instantly among the mass of vehicles.

‘Seems to me we’ve overshot the mark,’ French remarked as they moved out of the way of a lorry which had just turned in from the street. ‘Sutton hadn’t got as far as this in his enquiry.’

‘He’s heard something,’ Carter returned. ‘Something about the Southern Ocean, I should say. He’s given away what he’s heard to the wrong parties, and so-’ Carter made a significant gesture.

‘I dare say you’re right,’ French admitted. ‘All this part of the business looks correct to me. However, I’m going to make certain. I’m not going to leave a loophole for error.’

‘It’s the best way, sir; then you’re sure.’

French glanced suspiciously at his sergeant, but the clerk returning at that moment, the conversation ceased.