Death on the Last Train

by George Bellairs

  “He’s retiring from the local brass band and orchestra. As a matter of fact, they’re giving a concert for his benefit in the Memorial Hall to-night. I’d have gone if I hadn’t been on duty. Very decent fellow. …”

  “Seems as mild as milk from what I’ve seen of him.”

  “Yes. Until he’s roused. Then he’s difficult. A great man for moral indignation, is Hiss. Can’t stand to see the weak and ’umble bullied or put-on. I’ve seen him nearly go berserk with people hurting animals and children. Very big hearted. Can’t understand why he’s never been more ambitious. He’s been stuck here all his life. Porter, ticket collector. That’s all.”

  “Perhaps he was content. He’d his little shop in his wife’s name and a reputation for playing the trombone that anyone might be proud of.”

  “Yes, that’s true. . .”

  Blaze’s round blue eyes fixed themselves upon Littlejohn curiously. He wondered what the Inspector had called for. There was nothing, seemingly, in what they’d talked about. He was still turning it over in his mind when the first throes of dyspepsia come upon him and drove all thoughts of the interview out of his head.

  When Littlejohn got back to Salton, he put the case straight to Forrester.

  “It looks as if we’ll have to swear out a warrant and arrest Lambert Hiss … on suspicion, at least.”

  “On what grounds?”

  “I’d better just set out the facts as I see them.”

  “Draw up a chair and light your pipe.”

  “Our investigations seem to have cut out the matters of the stopping of the train and the anonymous letters from the case entirely. We’re therefore faced with a whole army of suspects, ranging from victims of the Salton Building Society failure to friends of the late Mrs. Bellis and other women he’s wronged.”

  “A hopeless job combing all that lot out. How did you hit on this Hiss fellow you’ve been talking about?”

  “Some time ago, a niece of Bessie Emmott came to stay with her aunt and Bellis met her. He must have taken a fancy to the girl and perhaps with no intention of doing anything more than give her a good time, he sent her stuff when she was in hospital and finally went and stayed a week at Brighton whilst she was there in a convalescent hospital pending her discharge.”

  “Where did you get all this?”

  “I’ve talked to Miss Emmott and the girl herself. Cromwell’s had a word with a former boy-friend she seems to have thrown over when Bellis started to be a fairy godfather.”

  “Sorry I butted in. Go on.”

  “When Bellis and Alice parted at Brighton, it seems Bellis bought her a present for which she forgot to thank him. So she wrote him a letter. Bessie Emmott burned the letter, so what we know of it is merely second-hand. From what we can gather, it just thanked Bellis for the bag, that was the present he gave Alice, and a very good time.”

  “Nothing much wrong in that.”

  “Bessie Emmott thought so. She didn’t like the tone and read more into the letter, I fancy, than there actually was.”

  “How did she get it?”

  “On the night he was killed, Bellis dropped the letter as he was taking out his ticket for Hiss to clip. Hiss, thinking she’d hand it to Bellis when next she saw him, gave the letter to Bessie.”

  “And she got mad. I see. But why Hiss, and not Bessie? She’s the one likely to take it badly, I should think.”

  “Quite right. After she left Hiss she boarded the bus and started to read the letter. It came as such a blow that she came over faint and had to get out of the bus at the first stop. That stop was the railway bridge and beneath the bridge was the train in which Bellis was sitting, halted in its course by some kids playing tricks.”

  “By gad!”

  “Now, Bessie could have gone down by the platelayers’ steps which lead from the bridge to the line and shot Bellis there and then. But I don’t think she did. We have the evidence of the conductor on that bus that Lambert Hiss was also on it and got off following Bessie.”

  “But why? What had it got to do with him?”

  “He’s in love with her. Has been for years, and was too backward or something to try to oust Bellis and marry the girl. He’s been hanging sentimentally and protectively around all the time, according to the neighbours.”

  “Oh. That gives him motive, certainly. But how did he know about Bellis and Alice?”

  “Hiss told me he picked up the letter and simply handed it on to Bessie. Actually, Manners, who saw Claypott to the train that night, says Hiss was too engrossed in reading a letter even to notice their arrival. Said he looked fed-up about what he was reading, too. Now, let us say that Hiss has read the letter, learns what Bellis has done, or what he thinks he’s done, to Bessie, and then hands the letter to her as she comes out of the station. Both Hiss and Bessie live in the same direction and get the last bus. Hiss is watching Miss Emmott, to see the effects of the letter. She takes it badly. So badly that she has to get off the bus into the fresh air. Hiss follows. I don’t say they spoke at all. She may have just leaned on the parapet of the bridge and sobbed her heart out. She’s quite a one for copious weeping. But that was enough for Hiss. He’s usually a mild man, but with a fund of moral indignation that sometimes makes him go crazy …”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Blaze, the stationmaster at Mereton, and Hiss go to the same church. . . So, Hiss goes down the platelayers’ steps after finding the train’s still there. Whether it moves off when he’s once in it doesn’t strike him. All he wants is to get at Bellis. Down he goes and into the smoking compartment, first-class and not hard to find, that Bellis always uses. A fellow called Godwin, who opened his window to shout abuse at the driver for whistling, says he saw what he thought was the guard enter one of the compartments. Actually, the guard was on the other side of the train investigating the signal. Godwin thinks he made out a railway peaked hat and trousers. …”

  “Looks like Hiss, eh?”

  “Yes. He must have entered the carriage and Bellis must have pulled out his revolver. If they struggled at all, Bellis would have been helpless with his broken wrist.”

  “Looks good enough for an arrest on suspicion. I’ll see to the warrant right away, Inspector. I congratulate you …”

  When Littlejohn arrived back at Hiss’s shop to serve the warrant, he found it closed. Hiss and all his attendant women had vanished.

  The woman next door told Littlejohn they had all gone to the concert at the Mereton Memorial Hall. It was Hiss’s benefit night, and he was playing the trombone himself.

  “I’d ’ave gone meself perhaps,” the woman said. “But livin’ next door, I get quite enough trombone, thank you, without follerin’ it round the town.”

  CHAPTER XVI

  Swan Song

  The Mereton Memorial Hall was filled to capacity. Not even standing room. Mereton fancied itself as a local mecca of music. It boasted a brass band as well as a very tolerable amateur orchestra. Once a month in the winter season popular concerts were given by one or both of the bands and were moderately attended. Hiss was principal trombone in both. On this occasion the brass of the orchestra was considerably reinforced by members of the brass band, who had volunteered their services for Hiss’s benefit.

  But all that was not the attraction on this night. Sir Gilbert Drawbell, the eminent conductor, was coming to conduct the second half of the concert. That brought them from far and near. Sir Gilbert and Lambert Hiss had sat together at the trombone desk of the local orchestra forty years ago, and although the great conductor’s fame had come through his baton, he still loved, when alone, to unearth his old instrument and amuse himself.

  They were well under weigh with the Figaro overture when Littlejohn arrived. Mr. Miles Doubleday, the resident conductor, was giving them a rather uninspired effort. He was a timid, if capable, man who performed with his eyes glued to the score. His baton made a regular pattern on the right and his left hand blindly stabbed the air to give the leads. He dared no
t raise his head for a second from the written notes and poked his forefinger here and there like somebody playing blind-man’s-buff. He was good at rehearsals, however, and on the night of the performance, was supported by a crowd of first instrumentalists who carried the whole thing through.

  Hiss was in his place against doctor’s orders. This was his last performance and nobody was going to keep him away.

  Littlejohn had to show his warrant card to get in the hall. They found him a seat on the second row from the front, next to a large suit of Harris Tweed. The musical critic of the Mereton Clarion flaunting his brown checks like a banner to let everybody know he was there and would stand no nonsense. A few seats away sat the mayor and mayoress in their chains of office and several other notables trying to look critical. In front of Littlejohn a thin woman with long ear-rings jerked her head vigorously from side to side with the tempo like a metronome, now and then getting the ear-rings mixed up in the lace of her collar or the coils of her hair and skilfully unravelling them again without stopping her movements.

  “Pshaw!” said the critic as the French horn muffed a note. They were, by this, well into Jarnefelt’s Praeludium.

  The place was fearfully hot, and the seats were hard. If you tried to change your position on your chair, it creaked so loudly that everybody muttered “Shhhh.”

  The critic had long legs; so had Littlejohn, and they frequently kicked each other in avoiding cramp. By the interval they were at daggers drawn, and ready to quarrel about it.

  Looking round between items, Littlejohn spotted a block of women in the body of the hall whom he plainly recognised as what Mother Shipton called “The Horebers.” They were all trying to catch the eye of Lambert Hiss, to let him know they were there. They whispered together behind their programmes and smiled at their prey when they thought his eyes were in their direction. But Mr. Hiss had eyes for nothing except his music and the front row of the balcony. He appeared to the Horebers to be looking heavenwards for inspiration whilst actually he was gazing at Bessie Emmott, to whom he had anonymously sent a free ticket.

  Bessie knew most of the players and wondered who had been so kind to her. She never thought of Lambert, and never once caught his adoring eye.

  The Praeludium ended, there was a general shuffle of anticipation among the women of Mount Horeb. They dug themselves more firmly in their seats, composed themselves for a treat, their hands folded in their laps. Bessie Emmott looked at her programme and observed that Mr. Hiss was going to play two solos. The first was Un Peu d’Amour. She didn’t know what that was all about, except that Amour was in her line and it should be all right. The next, Love’s Old Sweet Song, was more to her taste.

  The critic next to Littlejohn, who was occupying Mrs. Critic’s free seat in her absence, turned for lack of someone better to complain to, and pointing to the solos, said, “Ridiculous!” From which the Inspector gathered that Harris Tweeds thought popular sentimental ballads to be inappropriate at such a concert, and would have preferred something more lofty.

  “Why ridiculous?” asked Littlejohn, testily, for he had just emerged from an inconclusive battle of feet with the critic. The Inspector’s taste in music was not very advanced, and he rather fancied the next two items, although hardly in the frame of mind to surrender himself completely to their charms in view of his present mission. The Harris made no reply to this, but jotted a memo in the little notebook he held, presumably a reminder to pass unfavourable comment on the arrangement in the next edition of the Clarion.

  Lambert Hiss descended to the front of the platform amid volleys of applause. His paunch would not allow him to bow from the waist so he acknowledged with a series of quick little forward movements of his head. He didn’t look well, and his smile was melancholy. He glanced up to the centre of the balcony and bobbed. Bessie must have smiled, for his face suddenly glowed and he looked ready for anything.

  Littlejohn had always regarded the trombone as a comic instrument, suitable for helping knockabout comedians at a music hall, or adding a vague and weighty background to a lead of cornets or strings. He changed his mind when Lambert Hiss got going.

  During solos, as a rule, even by world-famed celebrities, the brass, at least, of the orchestra silently stole away and poured into the Bishop Blaize next door, where the landlord kept the window open on the side nearest the hall to enable them to follow the proceedings and get rid of their pints in time to appear in the orchestra again when they were due. But to-night, they all stayed in their places, much as their thirsts racked them. The landlord of the Bishop Blaize, himself a musician through associating with so many instrumentalists off-stage, was surprised.

  “None of ’em comin’ out to-night?” he said, scratching his bullet head, and looking angrily at the tankards of ale he had drawn in readiness. Through the window percolated the succulent notes of Un Peu d’ Amour.

  The barmaid, elbows on the counter, eyes liquid with sentiment answered: “Mr. ’iss is playin’ his last tonight. That’s ’im.”

  “Why didn’t you say so?”

  “You ’ad a programme … ought to’ve known …”

  The Horebers were weeping openly. Mellow as old wine, the notes of the trombone floated over their heads, out of the open doors and into the street, where passers-by stopped in the rain to listen. Lambert was playing his farewell for Bessie, and nobody knew it. Bessie thought the first piece lovely, but it moved her to no outward show of feeling. The second did the trick, however.

  “Once in the dear dead days beyond recall …”

  It shook the whole of the audience. A sort of pentecostal flame burned them up. Hiss was at the top of his form and his rendering brought to some memories long past, to others an intensification of existing emotions, and to those without any sentimentality at all, an asthmatic constriction of the throat and chest. The orchestra was visibly moved. One of the Horebers fainted from emotion and was hustled out by two angry companions whom she awoke from their trances of ecstacy.

  Bessie Emmott broke down completely, buried her face in her handkerchief and sobbed.

  “Just a song at twilight, when the lights are low, And the flickering shadows softly come and go.”

  She was remembering Tim Bellis and his nights at the off-licence.

  Lambert Hiss, seeing her so torn, had to turn away his head. The rising lump in his throat wouldn’t do at all. It would impair his technique just as much as if you sucked a lemon before him.

  The critic crossed out the pungent comment he’d made a note of, and Littlejohn sank his head on his chest in despair at the thought of what he’d got to do after the show.

  “Bally Music from Fawst,” read the landlord of the Bishop Blaize from the programme. “None of ’em’ll get out for that, dammit. Them beers’ll be flat at the interval if we don’t look out.”

  The barmaid didn’t reply. Two large tears fell on the zinc of the counter and she wiped them away with a beery thumb.

  “Back’s Brandyburg Concerto … Concerto?” said the landlord. “That means a couple more rounds for the brass and wood-wind,” he continued with expert knowledge. “Hope they don’t all scutter back becoss Sir Gilbert’s conductin’. He could shift it with the rest of ’em when he was plain Gilbert. Now, I suppose, plain beer ain’t good enough …”

  “Pleese, Mr. Prouse. I’m tryin’ to listen to ‘Just a Song at Twilight’ …”

  Littlejohn left his seat at the interval merely to stretch his tortured legs. Hiss had caught his eye once or twice, and looked puzzled, but the Inspector was not greatly disturbed thereby. Hiss would not run away, of that he was sure.

  Sir Gilbert Drawbell looked pleased at the thunders of clapping which welcomed him to his native town. He smiled at the audience and bowed his white head and then turned his tall, lean form to the orchestra. He nodded familiarly to them, many of them friends of his youth, and then he fixed them with a steely eye. You could feel the discipline suddenly grow tight. The individual players were welded into a body by th
e magic of Sir Gilbert’s personality and he held them with a grip which did not slacken. He had had two rehearsals on the previous night and when he had finished with them, many of them thought they would never be able to slake their thirsts again.

  “And, by the way,” he had said. “See that you’re all at your desks from the start of The Damnation … No sitting in The Bishop through the Dance of the Sylphs and then shuffling back in penny numbers for the March.”

  The harpist, who was the biggest soak among them, was very pleased about it. He always played The Sylphs resentfully, thinking of the brass getting in another pint.

  So they were all on as the oboe gave out that beloved tuning note and the instruments responded each after its fashion in a little inharmonious medley of sounds.

  Sir Gilbert rapped on his desk like an angry woodpecker.

  They went through Damnation of Faust like men possessed. Hearing them tripping with the Sylphs or beating out the Hungarian March you’d have thought they were an orchestra from heaven, faultless, fresh from accompanying the Eternal Choir. Who would have guessed the keen relish with which the brass were getting ready for the beer whilst the strings dealt with the Brandenburg? Listening to Lambert Hiss’s tromboning as the Hungarian March crashed its way to a finish, it was as much as the Horebers could do not to rise in a body and tramp round the room in sympathy. The critic was writing. “In this death trap to the brass of an orchestra, the players, especially the tombones, used commendable restraint, bringing the whole to a masterly conculsion …”

  (The misprints made by an apprentice compositor, are as they appeared in the Clarion later.)

  General good feeling was restored by a Strauss Waltz and then Lambert Hiss finished up on a top note in the Tannhäuser overture. This had been specially selected for his benefit and crowned the evening.

  Piling climax on climax, Tannhäuser had the audience spellbound before it came time for Hiss to show his mettle. Here and there he played a passage, but the finale covered him with a shower of glory.