The Excursion Train

When he reached London, Colbeck had still not decided whether an innocent or a guilty man had gone to the gallows in Maidstone. The prison governor had insisted that the case was firmly closed now that Hawkshaw had been executed. The Inspector disagreed. It was time to resurrect the hanged man. One way or another – however long it might take – Colbeck was determined to find out the truth.

'How are you getting on, Maddy?' asked Caleb Andrews, standing behind her to look at the painting. 'Oh, yes,' he said, patting her on the back in appreciation, 'that's good, that's very good.'

'I'll have to stop soon. It's getting dark.'

'Sit beside the oil lamp.'

'I prefer natural light. I can see the colours properly in that.'

'You have a real gift, you know.'

'That's what Robert said.'

Madeleine stood back to admire her work, glad of her father's approval because he would not judge her work on artistic merit. As an engine driver, his concern was with accuracy and he could find no fault with her picture of a famous locomotive. After adding a touch more blue to the sky against which the Lord of the Isles was framed, she dipped her brush in a cup of water to clean it.

'You'll be painting in oils next,' said Andrews.

'No,' she replied. 'I prefer watercolours. Oils are for real artists.'

'You are a real artist, Maddy. I think so and I know that Inspector Colbeck does as well. He's an educated man. He knows about these things. I'm proud of you.'

'Thank you, Father.'

'That's the Lord of the Isles and no mistake,' he went on, slipping an arm around her shoulders. 'You've painted everything but the noise and the smell of the smoke. Well done!'

'It's not finished yet,' she said, moving away to take her paints and brush into the kitchen. She came back into the living room. 'I just hope that Robert likes it.'

'He'll love it, Maddy – or I'll know the reason why!'

Andrews laughed then watched her take the painting off the easel before standing both against the wall. He had always got on well with his daughter and enjoyed her affectionate bullying, but he knew that a time would come when she would inevitably move out.

'Has the Inspector said anything to you?' he wondered, idly.

'About what?'

'Well…' He gave a meaningful shrug.

'About what?' she repeated, looking him in the eye.

'Something that a handsome man and a pretty young woman usually get round to talking about.'

'Father!'

'Well – has he?'

'Robert and I are just friends.'

'That's all that your mother and me were until she let me kiss her under the mistletoe one Christmas,' he remembered with a fond smile. 'The trouble was that her parents came in and caught us. Her father gave me such a talking to that my ears burnt for a week. People were very strict in those days and I believe it was a good thing.' He shot her a quizzical glance. 'Do you think I'm strict enough with you, Maddy?'

'You're the person who needs a firmer hand,' she said, giving him a peck on the cheek, 'not me. And I've no complaints about the way you brought me up. How many other daughters have been allowed to sneak on to the footplate of a locomotive as I once was?'

'I could've lost my job over that.'

'You took the risk because you knew how much it meant to me.'

'And to me, Maddy. It was something we could share.' He sat down on the sofa. 'But you didn't answer my question.Have you and the Inspector got any kind of understanding?'

'Yes,' she replied with a touch of exasperation, 'we understand that we like each other as friends and that's that. Robert is too involved with his work to spare much time for me and I'm too busy running this house and looking after you.'

'At the moment.'

'Please!'

'Things could change.'

'Father, will you stop going on about it?'

'Well, I'm bound to wonder. He'd make a fine catch, Maddy.'

'Listen to you!' she cried. 'When I first met Robert, you kept telling me not to waste my time on someone who was out of my reach. He was above me, that's what you said. Too good for a girl from Camden.'

'That was before I got to know him proper. He may look fine and dandy but his father was only a cabinetmaker, a man who worked with his hands. I can respect that.'

'Try respecting me for a change.'

'I always do.'

'No, you don't, Father,' she said, vehemently. 'Left to you, I'd have been married off to Gideon Little, a fireman on the railway, somebody who suited you, regardless of what I felt about him. Now you're trying to push me at another man you like. Don't you think that I have the right to choose my own husband?'

'Calm down, calm down,' he said, getting to his feet.

'Then stop badgering me like this.'

'I was curious, that's all.'

'Robert and I are good friends. Nothing more.'

'It always starts out that way.'

'Nothing more,' she insisted. 'You must believe that.'

'Oh, I do, Maddy, but I can't ignore the signs.'

'What signs?'

'Him taking you out in that cab, for a start.'

'It was only for a ride,' she said, careful to say nothing about the visit to Hoxton. 'What was wrong with that?'

'Only that it's strange that a detective in the middle of a murder investigation can find time to take anyone for a ride in a hansom cab. Some of the neighbours saw him pick you up from here. They told me how attentive he was.'

'Robert is a gentleman. He's always attentive.'

'Then there's the other signs,' he pointed out, marshalling his case. 'The ones you can't hide, no matter how much you try.'

'What are you talking about?'

'The way your voice changes when you mention him. The way your face lights up when he calls here. And look at that painting you've been working on,' he added, indicating it. 'When someone spends that amount of time and effort on a present for a man, he begins to look like more than a friend.'

'Robert loves trains, that's all.'

'There – you have a bond between you.'

'Father-'

'I've got eyes, Maddy. I can see.'

'Well, will you please stop looking!' she shouted.

Caught on a raw spot, Madeleine was torn between anger and embarrassment. It was no use asking her father to accept the situation because she did not fully comprehend it herself. When her emotions were in a tangle, however, the last thing she needed was to be questioned about her friendship with Robert Colbeck. Unable to contain her fury, she snatched up the painting and fled upstairs. Andrews heard her bedroom door slam shut. Annoyed with himself for upsetting her, he nevertheless felt able to sit down with a wry smile.

'I must remember to get some mistletoe for Christmas,' he said.

Even in the uncertain light from the gas lamp, Colbeck could see the damage inflicted on his face and, when Leeming got up to greet him, the Sergeant let out a grunt of pain. It was late evening when the Inspector got back to his office in Scotland Yard and he was distressed to find his colleague in such blatant discomfort. There was also a faint but very unpleasant whiff coming from him.

'What happened, Victor?' he asked.

'I saw seven stars at the Seven Stars,' said Leeming, laughing at his own feeble joke. 'I was fool enough to mention the name of Jake Bransby and took a beating for it.'

'How badly were you hurt?'

'I'll live, Inspector – just about. The Superintendent was so worried that he wanted to call in a doctor to examine me. Mr Tallis also made me wash three times but I still can't get rid of that stink.'

'How did you acquire it in the first place?'

'The worst possible way.'

Leeming had been waiting for a chance to tell his story to a more sympathetic audience and he left no detail out. What he could not tell Colbeck was who actually assaulted him and how he got from the yard at the rear of the public house to a cesspit some streets away. As he described the attack itself, his injuries started to throb violently and his swollen lips felt as if they had been stung by wasps. Reaching the end of his narrative, he took a long sip from the glass of water on the desk.