Timetable of Death

by Edward Marston

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘All will be explained when you return,’ said Colbeck. ‘I daren’t even mention my theory to the superintendent. After what happened to him in there, he won’t listen to a single syllable about the Works. The place is anathema to him.’

  They were standing in the foyer of the hotel. A porter had brought down the luggage from Tallis’s room and stood ready to load it into the waiting cab. When the door of the manager’s office opened, Tallis hobbled out with the aid of a borrowed walking stick.

  ‘Ah, there you are, Leeming,’ he said. ‘Come and help me, man.’

  The sergeant went across to him and let Tallis lean on him.

  ‘I’m sorry to hear about your ankle, sir,’ he said. ‘Does it hurt?’

  ‘It hurts like blazes!’

  ‘You’ll be much better off in London.’

  ‘Pain takes no account of geography. It will hurt just as much there as here.’

  ‘We hope you have a swift recovery,’ said Colbeck, nodding to the porter to take out the luggage. ‘We’ll miss the benefit of your guidance here.’

  Tallis was curt. ‘Don’t lie any more than you have to, Colbeck.’

  ‘I hope that you have some pleasant memories of Derby, sir.’

  ‘The only thing that will give me pleasure – and soothe my ankle at the same time – is the news that you have finally solved this crime.’

  ‘That news will not be long in reaching you.’

  ‘I’ll hold you to that. Leeming?’

  ‘Yes, sir?’ said the sergeant.

  ‘Get me out of this accursed place.’

  ‘Lean on me, sir.’

  ‘Slow down, you imbecile!’ said Tallis as Leeming moved off. ‘Every step is a separate agony. Let me set the pace.’

  Colbeck watched them move gingerly towards the door. He was sorry to lose Leeming for several hours but consoled by the fact that the superintendent was going as well. Freedom of action had been restored. It was a vital factor because Colbeck could do what he wanted now. He escorted the two men out to the cab and helped to ease Tallis into it. Leeming was palpably unhappy about having to spend so much time in the company of the irascible superintendent but someone had to shoulder the burden. Inevitably, it fell on the sergeant. When the cab rolled away, Colbeck gave it a farewell wave then hurried back into the hotel and raced up the staircase.

  In trying to pass on information to the acting chairman, Maurice Cope only succeeded in annoying him. Donald Haygarth flapped a hand in the air.

  ‘You don’t need to take me stage by stage through the Works,’ he protested.

  ‘But that’s what the inspector wanted to do, sir.’

  ‘Colbeck likes trains. I only like them when they take me on a journey.’

  ‘Superintendent Tallis is of the same opinion,’ said Cope. ‘He did nothing but grumble and his accident will not endear him to locomotives. He’s gone back to London with the sergeant.’

  ‘Are you sure of that?’

  ‘I’m absolutely certain.’

  They were standing outside the headquarters of the Midland Railway. Wanting to know the bare facts of what had happened during the tour of the Works, Haygarth was irked when Cope brought in so much technical detail about the production process. He had sent him there to watch the two detectives and not to enjoy what he saw around him. They were about to part when Superintendent Wigg hailed them. Trotting up to them, he reined in his mount.

  ‘I didn’t know you were a horseman, sir,’ said Cope.

  ‘It’s the best way to travel sometimes,’ argued Wigg. ‘Trains run to timetables so there’s always waiting involved. A horse is there when and where you want him.’

  ‘You’ve no need to tell that to Cope,’ said Haygarth. ‘He rides everywhere.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve seen him on horseback.’

  ‘Do you have anything new to tell us, Superintendent?’

  ‘I will simply observe that your much-vaunted detectives have been as much use as a silk kettle. You have three of them on the case now and they’re still no nearer solving it.’

  ‘We have to correct you,’ said Haygarth.

  ‘Yes,’ added Cope, receiving a signal from the acting chairman, ‘the three detectives have now been reduced to one. Inspector Colbeck is the only survivor.’

  He described how the accident had occurred when Tallis was startled by the steam whistle. Wigg couldn’t believe what they had done.

  ‘What could they possibly learn there?’

  ‘It teaches you everything you need to know about the way that locomotives and rolling stock are made.’

  ‘That has no relevance at all to the murder inquiry.’

  ‘Inspector Colbeck believed that it did. Mr Quayle loved to go on a tour of inspection at the Works. The inspector was keen to follow in his footsteps.’

  ‘It’s a pity he doesn’t clear off back to London with his colleagues.’

  ‘What have you learnt, Superintendent?’ asked Haygarth. ‘We know that you have a high opinion of yourself as a policeman.’

  ‘Confidence is an essential part of leadership.’

  ‘And what have your men discovered under your leadership?’

  ‘The noose is slowly tightening around the killer’s neck.’

  ‘You don’t even know who he is yet.’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ said Wigg, looking down at them. ‘The murder was the result of a conspiracy. Someone was hired to do the deed because of his past association with Quayle. In my opinion, that “someone” is Gerard Burns. The people who suborned him are more difficult to unmask,’ he said, looking shrewdly at each of them in turn. ‘But I’ll soon have enough evidence to do so.’

  ‘Inspector Colbeck has been to Melbourne Hall twice,’ said Cope, ‘and the superintendent has also paid a visit to Burns.’

  ‘Then why is he not in custody?’

  ‘You’ll have to ask them, sir.’

  ‘And before you criticise Inspector Colbeck again,’ said Haygarth, ‘you might like to know that he provided us with a detail that passed by you and your men. In view of what you say about Burns, it might be significant.’

  Wigg was piqued. ‘What detail is this?’

  ‘Miss Lydia Quayle has returned home.’ He was rewarded by a look of surprise on the other’s face. ‘Events in Nottingham are important. You should have had the Quayle residence under surveillance.’

  ‘I don’t have the resources for that, Mr Haygarth.’

  ‘You have large numbers of men at your beck and call. Inspector Colbeck is acting entirely by himself at the moment yet he is gathering more telling evidence than you. That’s why I sent for him,’ said Haygarth, complacently. ‘When I wanted the best available man for this assignment, your name did not even cross my mind.’

  Wigg was furious. Tugging on the reins, he turned his horse in a semicircle then dug his heels in to send it cantering away. Haygarth grinned.

  ‘That should be enough to keep him away for a while.’

  Alone in their room, Colbeck was able to luxuriate in the company of his wife and to hear a fuller report of what she’d been doing in his absence. He could understand why Lydia Quayle had turned to her for help.

  ‘You obviously impressed her, Madeleine.’

  ‘My charm didn’t work on her friend, Miss Myler.’

  ‘Yes, Victor told me how unwelcoming she was.’

  ‘She was guarding Lydia like a mother hen.’

  ‘Then she wouldn’t have been in favour of her returning to Nottingham.’

  ‘No,’ said Madeleine, ‘I fancy that she’d have opposed the decision. Lydia has said very little about Miss Myler to me but there’s clearly been an upset between them. I’ll probably get the blame for that.’

  ‘Murder always causes upsets. It alters sensitive balances.’

  Madeleine explained how nervous Lydia had been and how uncertain she was about spending the night at the house. In the event of her leaving Nottingham, she planned to
come to the Royal Hotel to meet up with her new friend again. Colbeck was pleased at the prospect.

  ‘It would be good to meet her,’ he said. ‘She can tell me things about the family that neither of her brothers have deigned to do so.’

  ‘What sort of things?’

  ‘I want to hear more about her father.’

  ‘She despises him.’

  ‘I know that, Madeleine, but you’ve been telling me what an intelligent woman she is. I like intelligent women,’ he said, caressing her hair. ‘That’s why I married one. Like you, Miss Quayle will have keen intuition. She’ll have picked up signals that went unnoticed by her brothers.’

  ‘Something’s happened, hasn’t it?’ she said, taking his hand between hers. ‘I can sense your excitement.’

  ‘That’s because I’m with you,’ he said.

  ‘It’s something to do with the visit to the Works, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, Madeleine.’

  ‘It’s the accident,’ she decided. ‘You’re overjoyed to get rid of Superintendent Tallis, aren’t you?’

  ‘Not at all – I’m heartbroken.’

  ‘I know you better than that, Robert.’

  He laughed. ‘Then it would be folly to try to deceive you,’ he said. ‘Though I’m sorry that the superintendent was injured, I regard the accident as providential. With his departure, a great cloud has lifted. But the real bonus of the visit was the chance I had to operate the turntable. It was a revelation.’

  ‘Father always says that you should have worked on the railways. That’s your real passion in life, isn’t it?’

  ‘No, Madeleine – it will always be secondary to you.’

  ‘Thank you for the compliment – now tell me about the turntable.’

  ‘It taught me how little effort is required to move an immense weight and it changed the direction of our investigation dramatically. We’ve been looking so intently at the murder victim that we completely ignored someone else.’

  ‘And who is that?’

  ‘Let’s go back to the start,’ he advised. ‘What do you remember?’

  ‘The body of Mr Quayle was found in an open grave in a village churchyard. Nobody could understand how it got there because he has no connection whatsoever with the place.’

  ‘That’s what we were told.’

  ‘It’s what Lydia confirmed. She couldn’t remember her father ever mentioning Spondon, let alone going there. His social life revolved around Nottingham.’

  ‘She was wrong, Madeleine. We all were.’

  ‘You’ve found a connection?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ he admitted, ‘but I know it’s there. The choice of that churchyard was not a coincidence. It was a deliberate statement by the killer. Mr Quayle was put in a grave reserved for a Mrs Cicely Peet. She is the person on whom we should be concentrating.’

  ‘Then you must believe there’s a link between her and Lydia’s father.’

  ‘Heaven knows what it is, Madeleine, but it’s there somewhere.’

  ‘What makes you think that?’

  ‘It’s something that Cleary said to me. He’s the coachman at the Quayle residence. On his last day alive, Mr Quayle was driven to Nottingham station by Cleary. As they parted, the coachman noticed that his employer had been crying.’

  ‘That sounds very unlikely. Lydia told me how stoic and hard-hearted her father had always been. He never showed any real tenderness to her and to her sister.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean he was incapable of it.’

  ‘No,’ she conceded, ‘that’s true.’

  ‘Can you see the way that my train of thought is heading?’

  ‘Yes, Robert, I believe so. Until now, you were baffled by the fact that Mr Quayle had somehow ended up in that village. You now think that he had a good reason to be there.’

  ‘I’d go further than that, Madeleine. My guess is that he wasn’t killed elsewhere and taken to Spondon so that the body could be disposed of there.’

  ‘How do you explain his presence in the village, then?’

  ‘He went there deliberately because he was drawn to do so.’

  ‘Was he set on in Spondon?’

  ‘It’s beginning to look that way.’

  ‘So who was the killer, Robert?’

  He leant forward to kiss her gently on the lips.

  ‘That’s the one thing the turntable was unable to tell me.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  As soon as she’d entered the house, Lydia Quayle had felt its suffocating effect. Any pleasant memories it might have held had been smothered beneath a pillow of pain and recrimination. Though he was no longer there, the place was still dominated by her father. She could hear his voice ringing in her ears. The reconciliation with her mother had brought Lydia a satisfaction fringed with despair at the old woman’s poor state of health. Except for Lucas, her relations with her siblings were uneasy. Agnes came close to resenting her return and Stanley had signalled his profound disapproval of what he saw as her air of independence. There was another blow to absorb. Vague hopes of hearing that Gerard Burns had been pining for her had been shattered by what the coachman had told her. The gardener was married and forever beyond her reach. Lydia was therefore in a house stalked by the ghost of her father and surrounded by an estate redolent of happier times with the man she’d loved and lost.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she announced, ‘but I can’t spend the night here.’

  ‘But your old room has been prepared,’ said Agnes, crossly. ‘When you turned up unannounced, I gave order for it.’

  ‘You must stay, Lydia,’ said Lucas.

  ‘Yes,’ added Stanley, peremptorily. ‘The funeral is the day after tomorrow. We need you on the premises.’

  ‘I’ll be here for the funeral,’ promised Lydia, ‘but I won’t spend a night under this roof.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous – you must.’

  ‘No, Stanley. I will not.’

  Lydia’s robust response led to an uncomfortable silence. The four of them were seated in the drawing room. Stanley had been reminding them about the arrangements for the funeral and assuming that Lydia would fall into line with the rest of them. Her minor act of rebellion angered him.

  ‘All that we’re asking is that you behave in a civilised manner.’

  ‘That’s what I’ve been trying to do,’ she said.

  ‘Life in London has obviously coarsened your manners.’

  ‘That’s unfair,’ insisted Lucas. ‘Lydia didn’t deserve such a comment.’

  ‘I agree with it,’ said Agnes.

  ‘Then you should have more sense.’

  ‘There’s no point in Lydia’s coming back unless she becomes one of the family again and she can’t do that if she refuses to spend a night here.’

  ‘I’ll come back tomorrow,’ said Lydia.

  ‘What use is that?’

  ‘You should be here, mourning with us,’ said Stanley.

  ‘All that we’re doing at the moment is arguing,’ said Lucas. ‘Lydia has her reasons for not wishing to remain here tonight and we should respect them.’

  ‘Thank you, Lucas,’ said Lydia.

  ‘Your return has made a world of difference to Mother.’

  ‘I haven’t noticed it,’ said Agnes, waspishly. ‘If anything, Mother is even worse since Lydia came back. I’ve had to give her some of her tablets.’

  ‘Well, I think that Lydia rallied her.’

  ‘That’s what you want to think, Lucas, because you were the one who got in touch with her again. Stanley and I would never have done such a thing.’

  ‘It’s true,’ confirmed Stanley.

  ‘Thank you for the warmth of your welcome,’ said Lydia with light sarcasm.

  ‘You see what I mean about her coarseness?’

  ‘Oh, don’t be so pompous, Stanley. You’re too young for pomposity.’

  ‘I disagree,’ said Lucas with a grin. ‘He’s been pompous since the age of five.’

  ‘And you’ve been fri
volous since the day you were born,’ his brother retaliated with a sneer. He turned to Lydia. ‘Where will you stay?’

  She did not wish to admit that she was going to the Royal Hotel in Derby to see her friend, Madeleine Colbeck, because they would wonder what the inspector’s wife was doing there and how she’d befriended their sister. That might cause problems for Colbeck and his wife, so Lydia feigned uncertainty.

  ‘I’ll find somewhere,’ she said.

  ‘You could always go to Aunt Dorothea,’ Stanley pointed out.

  ‘I could but I certainly won’t.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  ‘It’s because it would defeat the object of my leaving here. Aunt Dorothea is family. She lives less than five miles away. I’d still be trapped overnight in a part of the county with unfortunate associations for me,’ said Lydia. ‘I’d rather get well away from here.’

  ‘We should accept that,’ suggested Lucas.

  ‘I don’t accept it,’ said Stanley. ‘It smacks of desertion.’

  ‘Lydia always had to be different to the rest of us,’ said Agnes. ‘Let her go.’

  ‘I’d prefer her to stay.’

  ‘You’ve no call to stop me from leaving,’ said Lydia, looking from one to the other. ‘I’ve already sent word to the coachman to harness the phaeton. Cleary will take me to the railway station and I’ll make my decision there.’

  During his many appearances in court, Victor Leeming had watched the reaction of criminals as they were sentenced. Some were impassive and others attempted boldness but the majority were plainly terrified. When he was told to accompany Tallis back to London, he’d belonged to the third category, responding to his dire sentence with a quivering fear. The superintendent was in a vengeful mood. Suffering pain and deprived of the pleasure of leading a murder investigation, he’d be a scary companion on the train journey. Leeming prayed that they’d occupy a compartment with other passengers so that Tallis’s fire would be banked down somewhat. In fact, the superintendent chose an empty compartment in which he could, if he so wished, rant and rave at will.