The Silver Locomotive Mystery (9 page)

As the guests began to disperse, Carys thanked her hosts and withdrew. But she did not return to her cottage even though it was less than a hundred yards away. Instead, she got into a waiting chaise and was driven out of the town in the direction of Llandaff. It was a pleasant night for a drive
with the moon conjuring trees out of the darkness. Largely hidden behind a copse, the house was near the cathedral. Gaslight burnt in the ground floor windows. When she let herself in, Carys was pleased to see that the fire in the drawing room had also been lit to ward off the evening chill. Wine and glasses stood on the table. Everything was in readiness. Slipping off her stole, she closed the curtains then settled down on the couch, arranging her crinoline with care. While she waited, she read through the theatre programme, reviving memories of a performance that had stirred her to the marrow. Nigel Buckmaster had been striking at close quarters but had been far more arresting onstage. It was a Macbeth to lodge in the brain for a long time. Kate Linnane, too, as his wife, had had some magnificent moments and Carys had also been moved by Laura Tremaine in the small part of Lady Macduff. The Porter, she felt, had been deliciously vulgar.

It was almost an hour before someone let himself into the house and locked the door behind him. As he entered the drawing room, he was given a welcoming smile.

‘What have you brought me this time?’ she asked.

It had been a full day for Madeleine Andrews. She was up early to prepare breakfast and to make her father sandwiches to take to work. Once she had seen him off on his walk to Euston Station, she picked up a large basket and went off to do the first of her chores. She spent a couple of pleasant hours, haggling in the market, window-gazing among the shops, buying some artists’ materials and talking to friends and neighbours she encountered along the way. The afternoon was largely taken up with a visit to relatives in Chalk Farm, consoling her aunt over the recent death of a much-loved family pet and chatting with her uncle, a retired stationmaster, about her latest lithographs. It was not until early evening that Madeleine was finally able to do some work at her easel.

By the time that her father returned home, she had a meal ready for him. Caleb Andrews followed a regular pattern. At the end of his working day, he liked to have a pint or two of beer in a public house frequented by railwaymen before
strolling back to Camden. More often than not, he brought the day’s newspaper with him. His daughter therefore never got to read it until late evening. As he came into the house, he gave her his usual cheerful greeting before hanging up his coat and his hat. The newspaper remained folded up in his coat pocket.

‘Where have you been today?’ asked Madeleine.

‘Crewe was the farthest we went,’ he told her, ‘and we had an hour or more to look around. It’s a railway town in the best sense, Maddy. I really feel at home there. I wouldn’t mind living somewhere like that one day. Mind you,’ he went on with a chuckle, ‘the station does have one problem. If you’re not careful, you can trip over a severed head on the platform.’

‘That only happened once, Father.’

‘It pays to keep your eyes open in Crewe.’

Madeleine understood the jocular reference. The previous year, a hatbox had burst open on the platform when a porter accidentally dropped a trunk on it. Out of the hatbox came a human head. The incident provoked a murder investigation led by Robert Colbeck and culminating in some arrests in the wake of the running of the Derby. Madeleine had been directly involved in the case, finding out vital information for Colbeck and being taken to Epsom on Derby Day by way of thanks. Unfortunately, it was different this time. She could not contribute. A new case had taken him across the Welsh border and excluded her in every way.

‘What about you, Maddy?’ asked Andrews. ‘What have you been doing all day?’

‘I’d like to say that I’ve been sitting down with my feet up,’ she replied, ‘but there was far too much to do.’

‘Did you get across to Chalk Farm?’

‘Yes, Father – Uncle Tom and Auntie Dolly send their love.’

‘Have they got over losing that mangy dog of theirs yet?’

‘Uncle Tom has but Auntie Dolly is still very upset. They had Chum for twelve years and he was like one of the family. Auntie Dolly says that she can’t sleep properly, knowing that Chum is not curled up at the foot of the bed.’

Andrews wrinkled his nose. ‘It was unhealthy,’ he said with disgust, ‘having that smelly old dog in their bedroom at night. A kennel is the proper place for an animal like that. Chum should have been in the back yard, guarding the property, not snoring away on the bedroom carpet. Apart from anything else, Chum had fleas.’

‘His death distressed Auntie Dolly, that’s all I know.’

‘My sister should have had him put down years ago.’

‘Father!’

‘People get too sentimental about animals.’

‘You worshipped Blackie when we had him,’ she recalled.

‘Cats are different,’ he said. ‘They don’t wag their tails at you all the time and expect to share your bedroom. They’ve got self-respect and they know how to look after themselves. Blackie was easy to have around the house but a dog takes over your life.’

Madeleine did not argue. Her father had a deep dislike of dogs, fuelled by the fact that he was often bothered by stray mongrels on his way to and from work. It explained why he so rarely visited his sister and brother-in-law in Chalk Farm. Now that Chum had passed away, Madeleine hoped, he might feel able to enter their house with a measure of enthusiasm.

‘Is there anything interesting in the paper today?’ she asked, glancing across at his coat.

‘Not really, Maddy,’ he answered. ‘I don’t know why I buy it sometimes. There’s another report about the Crimean War and that looks as if it might drag on for years. Oh, yes,’ he added, casually, ‘there was a brief mention of someone called the Railway Detective.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ she scolded, hurrying across the room to pull the newspaper out of his coat pocket. ‘What does it say?’

‘Very little – it’s barely a mention.’

She opened the paper. ‘Where is it?’

‘Turn over the page. It’s at the bottom.’

Madeleine turned to the next page and ran her eye down the left-hand column. The item at the bottom was short but explicit. It informed its readers that Inspector Robert Colbeck had been called to the Railway Hotel in Cardiff to investigate the murder of a young man from London who had been on his way to deliver a silver coffee pot in the shape of a locomotive. It had been stolen. The victim’s name was not given but Madeleine nevertheless felt a surge of pity for him. She was also worried that the crimes might keep Colbeck away from London for some time. When her father had read the item, however, he had been less concerned about the fate of the victim. What interested him was the object that had been stolen.

‘A silver locomotive!’ he said with a whistle.

‘It’s supposed to be used as a coffee pot, Father.’

‘That would only tarnish the inside.’

‘It must have cost an absolute fortune,’ she observed.

‘I’m sure it did, Maddy – what a wonderful thing to own! I couldn’t bear to have a dog in the house but a silver locomotive is another matter altogether.’ He gave a cackle of delight. ‘Now that’s something that
would
stay at the foot of my bed at night – if not on the pillow beside me!’

Expecting to find her still distraught, Colbeck was pleased to see that Effie Kellow was a little more composed on the following morning. She was clearly making an effort to be brave in the face of tragedy. Though small and almost frail, she seemed to have an instinct for survival. She and her brother, he reminded himself, had been orphaned at a young age yet had managed to find a life for themselves that had some promise on the horizon. Robbed of her brother and deprived of her dreams of escape from service, Effie somehow gave the impression that she would not surrender to the vicissitudes of Fate. There was a muted determination about her.

She and Colbeck had breakfast together. While she was patently unaccustomed to eating in a hotel, she had regained her appetite and munched her food gratefully. Leeming joined them at their table, relieved to see that Effie was managing to control her anguish.

‘Has the inspector explained what’s happening today?’ he asked after placing his order with the waiter.

‘No,’ said Effie. ‘I want to take Hugh’s body back with me.’

‘That’s what I’ve arranged,’ Colbeck told her. ‘Superintendent Stockdale will have the coffin put on the eight o’clock train and there’ll be a ticket bought for you.
Constable Roberts will then travel with you to London.’

She was upset. ‘But I want to be alone with Hugh.’

‘I think you need company, Miss Kellow, and the constable will have the necessary documents. He’ll supervise the transfer of the coffin from Paddington to Wood Street where you and Mr Voke can discuss details of the funeral.’

‘Very well,’ she said, meekly accepting the decision.

‘If you wish, Constable Roberts will make sure that you get back safely to your place of work.’

‘No, Inspector – he doesn’t need to do that. It’s not where I want to go, you see. Not at first, that is. I prefer to go to Mrs Jennings’ house.’

‘Of course,’ said Leeming. ‘Anything belonging to your brother is your property now. It’s a sort of inheritance.’

‘All I want are the books that Hugh showed me,’ she said. ‘They fired him to be a silversmith. I’d like to keep them because they meant so much to him.’ She looked up deferentially at Colbeck. ‘May I ask you a favour, Inspector?’

‘Of course, Miss Kellow?’

‘Could you write me a letter, please? If I tell the landlady that I’ve come for Hugh’s books, she might not believe that I’m his sister. Hugh said that she was very wary of strangers.’

‘That’s true,’ Leeming put in. ‘I had a job persuading her who I was. Mrs Jennings would be suspicious of her own shadow.’

‘I’ll happily jot a few lines down on paper for you,’ said Colbeck. ‘You won’t lose anything of your brother’s, Miss Kellow. I daresay there’ll be property belonging to him at Mr Voke’s shop as well. That will be rightfully yours.’

‘It’s those books that I really want,’ she said, turning to
Leeming. ‘Can’t
you
take me back to London, Sergeant?’ she asked, plaintively. ‘You so were kind to me on the way here. I don’t know this other policeman.’

‘I’m afraid that I have to stay here in Cardiff,’ said Leeming, ‘but I’m sure that Constable Roberts will look after you – and he won’t be wearing his uniform. He’ll look like just another passenger.’

‘Oh, I see.’

That appeared to allay her fears somewhat and she continued to eat her food. When the meal was over, Colbeck probed for information.

‘Did you brother have any enemies, Miss Kellow?’ he asked.

‘None that I know of,’ she returned. ‘Hugh was a very friendly person. He could get along with anybody.’

‘What about Stephen Voke?’

‘They worked together quite well for a time then things changed. Hugh thought that Mr Voke’s son was jealous of him. He was always bickering with his father,’ she remembered. ‘Then one day, he was gone without any explanation. Hugh said that old Mr Voke would never talk about him after that.’

‘Did your brother ever mention Stephen having a close female friend?’

‘No, Inspector. He told me very little about him. We only met now and again and we had more important things to talk about than Mr Voke’s son.’

‘What about your own brother?’ enquired Colbeck. ‘He seems to have been a handsome young man. Was there anyone special in his life – apart from his sister, that is?’

‘Yes,’ she replied, ‘I think there was. Hugh mentioned her in one of his letters,’ she said, opening her reticule to look inside. ‘He didn’t write very often and only when he had something important to say. I carry all his letters around with me.’ She took one out and passed it to Colbeck. ‘This came over a month ago, Inspector.’

Colbeck read it through. It contained some gossip about his work and about his landlady then it ended on a hopeful note. Hugh Kellow confided that he had met someone called Bridget and that they had become good friends. Colbeck handed the letter to Leeming so that he could read it as well.

‘I’ve no idea who Bridget is,’ admitted Effie, ‘and I’m worried for her. She ought to be told what’s happened to Hugh. I’d hate her to find out the way that I did – by reading the newspaper.’

‘But she may already have done just that,’ Colbeck pointed out. ‘If they were good friends, the chances are that your brother told Bridget he was going to Cardiff with that coffee pot.’

‘Mr Voke forbade him to tell
anyone
about that, Inspector. Hugh may have told me but he wouldn’t have said a word to anyone else. Well,’ she added, searching for another letter, ‘I can prove it. I showed this to Sergeant Leeming and the superintendent.’

‘That’s right,’ agreed Leeming, returning one letter to her as she was giving the other to Colbeck. ‘The funny thing is that there’s no mention of any Bridget in his last letter. Perhaps the friendship didn’t last. What do you think, Inspector?’

‘We can only speculate,’ said Colbeck, reading the letter
before handing it back to Effie and noting the care with which she put it into her reticule. ‘Mr Kellow was obviously very secretive about his visit to Cardiff and rightly so. Carrying a valuable item made him a target. What continues to puzzle me is how he ended up in this very hotel.’ He turned to Effie. ‘Can you throw any light on that?’

‘I’m afraid not,’ she said.

‘Did he ever mention this hotel to you before?’

‘Hugh had never been to Cardiff, sir – though he once did some work for a customer here. He was called Sir-Somebody-or-Other and he told Hugh what a good job he’d done.’

‘Do you know what the item was?’

‘Oh, yes,’ she said. ‘It was a large silver brooch in the shape of a dragon. Hugh made it last year. He showed me a sketch of the design. It was a wonderful piece of jewellery.’

Colbeck had a strong feeling that he could confirm that. He believed that he had seen that particular brooch being worn by the beautiful woman for whom it had been made – Carys Evans.

Carys Evans alighted from the chaise and went up the steps to the front door. When she pulled the bell rope, there was a loud, jangling sound from somewhere inside the house. The door was eventually opened by the butler. He recognised the visitor at once.

‘Good morning, Miss Evans,’ he said.

‘Good morning, Glover,’ she answered. ‘Is Mrs Tomkins at home?’

‘Yes, but I’m afraid that she’s not available to callers.’

‘I’m not a caller,’ said Carys, easing him aside with a hand
so that she could walk across the hall. ‘I’m a close friend and I want to know how she is.’ She knocked on the door of the drawing room and went in. ‘Ah, there you are, Winifred!’

‘Carys!’ exclaimed the other woman in surprise, leaping to her feet. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I came to see how you were, of course. When you didn’t make an appearance at the play last night, I feared that you might be ill or something. You’d never miss an occasion like that as a rule.’

‘We didn’t feel like coming,’ said Winifred.

‘This business with the coffee pot has upset us both,’ said Clifford Tomkins, who had been reading the newspaper when they were interrupted. ‘We didn’t want to spend an evening at the theatre, fending off questions about the theft.’