The Body on the Train

by Frances Brody

  Patiently, Mr. Greenwood explained how this hole in the ground would eventually be transformed into a mine that would provide good quality coal.

  I made a few notes. It was a unique experience to be brought here and shown how mining begins, how the earth is scarred and opened so that its black gold can be brought to the surface to keep us warm.

  “I suppose the subsidence will help, because you won’t need to dig so far down. Nature will do it for you.”

  He frowned. “What subsidence?”

  “Subsidence at the other side of the wood—where a building stood.” Something told me not to name that building. “It became unsafe.”

  He shook his head. “Well if there had been subsidence, it would have been unsafe, but there wasn’t. We would have found that out when we did the exploratory tests. That building would have stood for a hundred years or more, but they’re shocking houses to maintain. Built in the days when there was a lot more money to be made, in mills and mines and everything else. Fancy villas were all the rage. You could pick one up for a song now.”

  One of the workmen called to him, and our conversation came to an end. Who should I believe? Gertrude who had told me that children had to leave the home because it was no longer safe, or the engineer who said it would last another hundred years?

  After a few moments, Gertrude and I retrieved our horses and set off.

  “Thank you for showing me this, Gertrude. It’s an extraordinary sight. How long will it take to open the new pit?”

  “Search me, Kate. I don’t usually have much to do with this, but I thought you’d find it interesting—for your article.”

  Either she said those last three words in a way that let me know she mistrusted my story of an article, or I was imagining her distrust.

  “It’s a pity there hasn’t been someone taking photographs from the time the building was demolished, creating a photographic record.”

  “I suppose so. But it doesn’t do to be sentimental, or to look back. There’ll be decades of work here. The miners made a mistake, going on strike. They won’t do that again in a hurry—let themselves be led astray by hotheads.”

  “I thought they simply wanted more pay.”

  “They preached that the coal in the ground and the plenty of the land is there for everyone. They didn’t understand how much outlay, how much investment is needed. Not that I have much to do with it.”

  I thought of Commander Woodhead’s suspicions about a representative of a foreign power bringing money to foment unrest. Perhaps that was not a chimera, dreamed up out of desperation. If men who had suffered great hardship to the point of starvation met a man who said, “Let’s do it all again,” he might receive a savage welcome.

  Think of something practical to ask, I told myself. Don’t give yourself away.

  “How will you transport coal from here?”

  “It’s not difficult to lay an extension to the rail line, apparently. There’s nothing between here and the main line except waste ground and a few trees.”

  A few trees.

  She meant Bluebell Wood.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Back at Thorpefield Manor, Gertrude and I ate a light lunch and went to our rooms, agreeing to meet before dinner.

  Feeling like a character from a girls’ adventure story, I left the house and strolled about the walled garden, admiring the daffodils. From there, I slipped through the gate and along to the bee boles, holding a short note for delivery by Philip.

  Mrs. Sugden, Please visit Stoneville on York Street, Wakefield. Enquire about the children from Bluebell Children’s Home, Thorpefield. Also, the shop is now with an agent.

  As I slid the note into the space in the wall, my fingers touched something hard and round. It was a pebble—a message from Philip that he was as good as his word and had called again.

  As I turned away, ready to stroll back the way I had come, I heard a low whistle.

  Philip gestured to me from the trees.

  Quickly I grabbed the note and casually walked into the wood. “How long have you been here?”

  “Ages.”

  I handed him the note. “It’s a job for Mrs. Sugden, my housekeeper.”

  “Shall I take it to her?”

  “Yes, if you want a ride to Leeds. Or you might telephone.”

  He frowned, and read the note. “I could say exactly what you have written.”

  “Yes.”

  He nodded.

  “Philip, when you said you’d keep an eye on the bee boles, I didn’t think you’d camp out in the wood.”

  “I’m not camping out.”

  “What then?”

  “Mam wanted me to go see Mr. Battersby again about that garage. I told her I’m helping you.”

  “It won’t hurt to look.”

  “I can’t look at a garage yet. I’m helping you.”

  “A telephone call to Mrs. Sugden will do. You might still look at the garage.”

  “I told Mam I’m helping you. She’ll know that’s a good thing.”

  It was no use arguing with him. Mouth set tight, eyes full of hurt, he looked away.

  I relented.

  “Yes, it’s a good thing that you are helping me. Perhaps you could take the message to Mrs. Sugden in person. She won’t know anything about the Bluebell Home or why it is called that. She would like to know.”

  His mood changed in an instant. Poor Mrs. Goodchild. She tried so hard to make Philip’s life the best it could be. And she had succeeded. Perhaps the Battersby Garage was a step too far.

  “I’ll do that now, Kate.” He took a sheet of paper from his pocket. “Here is a list of two hundred rhubarb growers. Which have you seen so far?”

  He was pointing out the blindingly obvious. I hadn’t visited a single one. “Mr. Sykes has been visiting growers. But I do have an acquaintance at one of the farms in Rothwell. I’ll talk to him.”

  I glanced at my watch. Hours to go before dinner.

  Philip shifted his gaze. He looked over my shoulder at someone or something.

  I heard the crunching footsteps before I saw Raynor, coming from the wood. He tipped his hat. Philip and I watched as Raynor walked towards the gate in the walled garden.

  When he had gone, Philip said, “Was he hiding? Was he earwigging?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Kate, I wish you would go somewhere else. I don’t like this place.”

  He stopped to listen. More footsteps crunched through the wood.

  This time it was Alec. Had we had an audience of eavesdroppers?

  “Oh hello,” Alec said.

  He wasn’t talking to me.

  Philip tilted his head. “I’ve seen you before.”

  “When you came to our garage for spare parts.”

  “You work at Battersby’s?”

  “I work there on Thursdays, learning the trade. Mr. Battersby calls you the best mechanic in Wakefield.”

  Philip perked up. “A lot of people say that.”

  “He’s going to live in Morecambe but I wish he wasn’t.”

  “Why?”

  “I still have things to learn.” Alec looked at me, and then at Philip. “Do you know each other then?”

  I got in first. “Mr. Goodchild takes care of my car.”

  Well, wasn’t this cosy? So much for my being undercover. But credit to Philip. He turned away, saying. “I’m just out testing a van. I have to go now.”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Most of the time, these roads are empty of cars. I did not think much of it at the time, but on the road to Rothwell another car followed mine at a consistent distance. When I slowed down, so did that car. When I speeded up, it also increased its speed.

  After that odd sensation of having been followed, it was a relief that the black car continued on its way when I turned onto the lane that led to Whitwells Farm. I left the car in the lane and walked along the muddy track.

  Ahead of me were the low rhubarb sheds, each with its own chi
mney, and with tracks leading from shed to gate.

  I first met Josh Whitwell, the family’s younger son, when Rothwell Camera Club put on an exhibition. He is a good photographer. One particular image stayed in my mind. It was the interior of a forced rhubarb shed, lit by candles. He modestly said that it was trickery. Much of the rhubarb had been picked, and there was a certain amount of light from the open door. He had taken the photograph from an angle, to make the shed appear full of a regiment of rhubarb soldiers.

  As I neared the first big shed, a stocky farm labourer, work trousers tucked into his boots, came over, to see what I wanted.

  “Is Josh Whitwell about?”

  “He’s packing. We’re expecting the van soon.”

  “I’m a friend, and I just want a quick word.”

  The man directed me to a large shed whose doors were wide open. The rhubarb had all been picked from the forcing sheds and brought here. It lay in heaps on a long table. At one end a woman was lining small crates with blue tissue paper, and passing them along. Another woman and three youngsters were filling the boxes with rhubarb. Josh was at the end of the table, placing them onto a cart. He waved when he saw me, and called to the man who had shown me in to come and take over.

  Josh grinned. “I heard you were here, Kate.”

  “Who told you?”

  “Half a dozen people who know I’m in the camera club. A lady photographer, they said, writing an article about the area. I’m jealous.”

  “Don’t be. I want to include your rhubarb shed photograph.”

  “Really?” He leaned forward as if waiting for me to pin a medal on his chest. “I’d love that.”

  “I’ll need the negative.”

  This was going too far. If I didn’t interest a magazine in this article, that was becoming both real and surreal, I should have to publish it myself and bear the cost. If I didn’t solve this case for Scotland Yard, I could see myself having to wave a wand over my bank balance.

  “When do you want the photograph?”

  “No great rush. We can meet when it’s convenient. This is a busy time for you.”

  “Not now we’re into March. Things are quietening down.”

  If this was quietening down, I’d hate to see the place when they were busy.

  He called to the woman at the table. “Mam, are you all right without me?”

  I offered to get stuck in alongside them, but his mother called back that they were nearly done.

  “Mam, this is Kate Shackleton, the photographer I told you about.”

  “Well as long as she doesn’t want to take a snap of me she’s welcome.”

  He and I sat on stools at the side of the shed. We chatted about the photographs I had taken, and he suggested other views that I might include.

  I turned the conversation.

  “Josh, what’s all this business about a body on the rhubarb express?”

  “It’s bizarre.” He waved at the boxes of rhubarb. “Rhubarb is delicate, perishable. A grower wouldn’t risk damaging his crop by adding a sack of potatoes, much less a body.” He listened for a moment, heard the noise of an engine, and jumped up. “That’s the railway van. Give me a minute.”

  Men wheeled the carts to the door, and when Josh saw he wasn’t needed, he came back.

  “What you were asking me about, that body, it just wouldn’t happen. It’s got to be a fairy story. Some cockney porter knocked off his worst enemy and pretended he fell out of a rhubarb truck.”

  He explained how the vans would now take the rhubarb to Ardsley station. The produce would be booked in and packed on railway trucks. The trucks would be shunted into the siding at Ardsley station—trucks from Ardsley, Carlton, Stanley, Morley and all the other places in the district where rhubarb was grown. The man on duty would telephone the full list of rhubarb van numbers to Leeds Central, and the Leeds rhubarb trucks would start from there, behind the engine that would continue on to Ardsley to link up with the rest. By quarter to nine, all the trucks would be marshalled and ready to be coupled to the engine.

  This must be information that Alec Taylor had recorded in his missing notebook.

  Josh paused. His eyes widened. “Oh, oh, don’t tell me. Let me guess. You’re investigating the death.”

  “I’m curious that’s all.”

  He laughed. “A lady detective turns up at what might be the scene of a crime and all she’s interested in is –”

  “Writing and illustrating an article, with her own photographs and those of a brilliant local photographer.”

  “Rhubarb growers don’t have time to go around murdering people. Mind you, I might make an exception for our Tom.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s gone to teach agriculture at a college near York.”

  “Your parents must be proud?”

  “Proud? They’re devastated. He’s betrayed the family. There’s no way I’ll escape now.”

  “And do you want to?”

  “What do you think? I was hoping you’d take me on as a private detective.”

  “I’m here for my article, Josh, photographer’s honour! But you can’t blame me for being curious. I think someone went to the sidings and put the body on the train.”

  “Have you seen the sidings?”

  “I know what sidings look like.”

  “Then you’ll know that there’s a foot difference in height between the sidings and the platform level where the loading’s done. If the killer was a big fellow, eight feet tall and with an identical twin as his accomplice, he’d be in with a chance.”

  “But it’s possible.”

  “Well, yes, especially if the tall burly murderers aren’t spotted by the clerk as he plods up and down the sidings swinging his paraffin lamp.”

  Sometimes it is useful to ask a question to which you know the answer, or part of the answer.

  “Just out of curiosity, were there any strangers in the area over the last few weeks?”

  “The wrecking men, demolishing the children’s home, there were plenty of them. And now the men who are sinking the pit.”

  “Were the demolition men local?”

  “They were from a company in Pontefract. They’ve gone now. One stayed about, looking for work, big brawny chap, nickname Giant Jack. He’d worked on a farm in Ireland and had a fancy to be on the land again.”

  “And could you give him work?”

  “We have enough workers now. I told him to come back at harvest time.” He grinned. “We don’t just grow rhubarb.”

  “Do you think he might still be around, looking for work? I’d like some link in my article to the demolition.”

  “Doubt it. He’ll have moved on. He wanted to earn extra money to take back to Ireland, to his family.”

  “What was his real name?”

  “Kevin O’Donnell. I took his photograph, because of his size really. I got him to stand next to my mam.”

  “Can you show me?”

  He stood. “Come on then, and your secret is safe with me. If there’s a reward for catching this murderer, and you find him, I want my cut.”

  We walked across a muddy track to the farmhouse. He went to the dresser, opened a drawer full of albums and envelopes. From the topmost envelope, he took out a photograph and passed it to me. “There he is. Six feet four if he’s an inch, but the most gentle and polite fellow you could meet. I sent him to the Dell Estate. Nothing came of it.”

  “Do you have a copy of this photograph?”

  “Take this, if you’ll give it me back.”

  I tucked the postcard size photograph in my satchel. It was an unlikely possibility that a transient worker was involved. This odd and contradictory murder appeared both totally ludicrous and carefully planned.

  * * *

  In the local post office, I penned a note to Sykes, enclosing the photograph of Kevin O’Donnell, nickname Giant Jack, an employee of a demolition firm in Pontefract, and now looking for work. I asked him to have an extra copy made.

  J
ust as I was about to pop it in the box, the postman came and so I handed him the letter. Sykes would have my message by tomorrow’s first post.

  As I turned to go, I practically bumped into Raynor. He was holding several letters, which he also handed to the postman.

  “I could have done that for you, Mrs. Shackleton. Mr. Brockman says if you have any post or messages, you might just give them to me.”

  He had come an awfully long way to post letters.

  I thought of Commander Woodhead’s suspicions that some agitator was murdered for his Russian gold. He was wrong, that was my overwhelming feeling. This murder was home-grown.

  But Josh Whitwell was right. The killer wasn’t a rhubarb grower. It was someone who didn’t know how tricky it would be to put a body on the rhubarb express.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The cold of the cellar rose to meet me as I went down the stone steps to my makeshift darkroom. Gertrude and I would meet an hour before dinner, so I had sufficient time to begin work on developing my photographs. When turning my attention to an absorbing activity, I sometimes come up with a solution to a problem. Developing and printing might help me find a way into the puzzle of why two murders occurred around the same time in this quiet spot.

  I was close to something, had gathered threads. It was a matter of holding a kind of stillness inside while staying alert. Waiting for some chink of light to crack open an investigation can be difficult.

  The cellar runs the length and breadth of the house, with large rooms, such as the wine cellar—which looked more sparsely stocked than I had ever seen it—and smaller rooms, cold stores, pantries and other mysterious places.

  I pinned a note on the door of the little room that had been cleaned and prepared for me.

  Do Not Disturb.

  I do not always have time to do my own developing, but it feels like cheating to hand the film on to be done by a professional’s apprentice.

  As I poured in the fixer solution, I heard footsteps, and the sound of something being dragged across the floor.

  “Don’t come in!” I called.

  No one answered.