‘Christ! I dunno, Tennison.’ Stanley sounded groggy. ‘They don’t sit until after ten, so just make your way over there. It could be hours before you get called so you’ll just have to wait it out.’
Jane had a strong suspicion that Stanley had spent the night in the office sleeping off a hangover. She thought he had a nerve talking about Spencer Gibbs’ drinking when it was obvious he had been hitting the bottle himself.
Jane went into the newsagents and paid fifty pence for her advertisement card to be displayed in the window for one week. As she walked to Baker Street tube, she decided that, as the magistrate’s court was close to Bow Street station, she would pop in and maybe have breakfast with Edith in the canteen.
Jane took the Circle line from Baker Street and changed at King’s Cross St Pancras to take the Piccadilly line to Covent Garden. From there it was just a short walk to the Bow Street station.
It was eight thirty when Jane arrived at Covent Garden station, right at the peak of the early morning rush hour. There were groans from the other passengers when they saw that the lift wasn’t working, but Jane didn’t mind as she wasn’t in any great hurry. She followed the throng of people walking up the 193 steps of the spiral staircase, trying her best not to bump into the people heading down the stairs in the opposite direction. Behind her was a woman with a pushchair and a baby in her arms.
‘Can I help you?’ Jane asked.
‘Oh, yes please, thank you, love. These lifts here are always out of order.’
Jane carried the pushchair, and as there were so many people up ahead of her, they moved very slowly. On reaching the top stair she unfolded the pushchair so the woman could put her baby in the seat. Jane paused at the ticket barriers to search her handbag for her warrant card. The area surrounding the faulty lift was heaving with people moving in both directions, and a guard was on duty checking and taking tickets. Behind Jane were queues of passengers waiting impatiently to show their tickets so they could leave the station, and she found herself being pushed forward.
The guard shouted, ‘Please do NOT push! We apologise for the lifts being out of order and ask for your patience. Please proceed in an orderly manner through the ticket barriers!’
Jane made her way through the ticket barrier and out into the packed foyer.
‘Excuse me, sir, you forgot your bag.’
Jane turned to see an elderly woman pointing to a rucksack that had been left on the floor next to the ticket box.
‘Hey, you left your bag!’ the woman repeated. Jane followed her gaze and caught sight of a man wearing a hooded winter coat, walking away with his head down. Instead of turning to acknowledge the old lady he pushed people out of his way as he hurried towards the Long Lane exit.
‘I just saw him put it down!’ the woman said loudly.
Jane hesitated. Was it just a mistake, and the man had simply not heard the woman calling out to him? She hurried after him, in the hope of stopping him and reuniting him with his bag.
‘Excuse me, sir! I’m a police officer and…’
The man kept on moving quickly through the throng of people and Jane picked up her pace as she called out for him to stop. Just as he reached the exit, Jane managed to grab hold of his sleeve. He half turned towards her and she had a momentary glimpse of his profile, but he twisted out of her grasp, batting her away. He pushed people aside as he ran out of the station. Jane stumbled backwards, and then turned to look for the abandoned rucksack. She could feel the panic rising as she realised it had gone, but then calmed down as she reassured herself that the old lady must have been mistaken and the real owner had picked it up.
Jane turned around in a circle, searching for anyone carrying the rucksack. Then she saw the ticket barrier guard holding it against his chest, heading towards the guards’ office. She immediately sensed that something was very wrong. For a second she was paralysed with fear, but then she started pushing people aside and screamed at the guard to put the rucksack down, shouting for everyone to evacuate the area. Some people began to run. But it was too late.
The sound of the explosion was horrific. A ball of flame mixed with shattered glass and metal filled the air, followed by dense smoke which consumed the lift and ticket area.
A huge man blocked Jane and unintentionally shielded her from the blast and flying debris, but his weight pushed her to the ground. Jane was completely dazed, and her ears throbbed with a high-pitched whine. A thick cloud of black smoke quickly filled the air, making it hard to breathe. There were screams of terror from people trying to escape and the pitiful cries of those who had been injured was like a terrible nightmare.
Choking, Jane staggered to her feet, pulling a handkerchief from her pocket to cover her mouth. The ticket guard’s body had been blown apart, and amongst the mass of gasping, terrified people, Jane could make out the body of the old lady lying on the ground. She was badly injured, her leg virtually severed below the knee. Jane stumbled towards her but stopped as she spotted the overturned pushchair that she had carried up the stairs. The woman lay face down in a pool of blood with what looked like a severe head injury. Jane looked around frantically for the baby. She turned the pushchair over, but it was empty. She looked around anxiously and suddenly heard muffled cries from near the woman’s body. She had to push her way past people who were still desperately trying to get out of the station. Jane bent down and turned the woman over. The baby was beneath her, covered in its mother’s blood. Jane felt for the woman’s pulse — she was still alive. She eased the infant out from underneath its mother’s body and held it in her arms. There were no obvious injuries.
It wasn’t long before uniformed officers were at the scene and herding terrified people out of the station, and Jane shouted that she was a police officer. She put the baby into the pushchair and took one of the baby’s blankets, folding it to place beneath the mother’s head. A man bent down to assist her as more officers entered the station, and in the background she heard the sound of ambulances and fire engines approaching.
Now she was sure that the baby was safe and that the mother was being looked after, Jane made her way towards the old lady. She was bleeding profusely from her injured leg. There was too much blood. Jane took off her belt and used it as a tourniquet, wrapping it tightly around the old lady’s thigh. She was conscious but in great pain.
‘What’s your name?’ Jane asked.
‘Daphne. I’ll be all right, love,’ the old lady murmured. ‘You go and help the woman with the baby.’
Jane looked back and saw two ambulance attendants lifting the young woman onto a stretcher. She called out to let them know that it was the mother of the child in the pushchair. One of the attendants acknowledged Jane and rushed over to lift the baby into the ambulance with the mother. Then she used all her strength to tighten the belt some more around Daphne’s thigh.
‘Did you see the man who left that rucksack?’
‘Yes, I called out to him… I saw him,’ she whispered.
‘Would you be able to recognise him again?’
‘Yes…’ she gasped, and her head fell forwards as she passed out.
Jane knew they had to get Daphne to hospital quickly as she had lost a lot of blood.
‘Over here!’ Jane shouted to an ambulance man who came over and knelt beside the victim. ‘I made a tourniquet the best I could to try and stem the blood flow.’ As they lifted Daphne on to a stretcher, she added, ‘I’ll come with you.’
She shouted to another police officer that she was going with the old woman to hospital. She climbed into the ambulance next to her as she was being given CPR. Daphne’s eyes flickered open and she reached for Jane’s hand.