The Excursion Train

'A piece of wire, I think,' said Colbeck. 'Rope would never have bitten into the flesh like that. It would simply have left a red weal where the neck had been chafed. This man was garrotted with something much thinner and sharper.'

'Then we know one thing about the killer,' volunteered Leeming. 'He must have been a strong man. The victim would not have been easy to overpower. Judging by the size of him, there would have been resistance.'

'I found these in his pockets, Inspector,' said Horlock, handing over a wallet and a slip of paper, 'so at least we know his name.'

'You should have left it to us to search him, Mr Horlock.'

'I was only trying to help.'

'In tramping around the carriage, you might unwittingly have destroyed valuable clues.' He looked at the other railway policemen. 'How many of you went in there to gawp at him once the alarm was raised?' Half a dozen of them looked shamefaced and turned away. 'It was not a freak show, gentlemen,' scolded Colbeck.

'We was curious, that's all,' said Horlock, defensively.

'If you'd shown some curiosity during the train journey, the murder might not have occurred. Why did none of you travel in this particular carriage?'

'We never expected trouble in first and second class. Leastways, not on the ride here. It'll be different on the way back,' warned Horlock. 'There's bound to be some drunken idiots with third-class tickets trying to travel back to London in comfort.'

'Nobody can use this carriage,' said Galway, anxiously. 'Not with a corpse lyin' there like that. I mean, it's unwelcomin'.'

'The body will travel back in the guard's van,' declared Colbeck.

'I'm not 'avin ' that bleedin' thing in my van, Inspector!' protested the other. 'Gives me the shakes just to look at 'im.'

'Don't worry. Sergeant Leeming and I will be there to protect you.' Colbeck turned to the others. 'Some of you might find a means of carrying the murder victim along the track. There may be a board of some kind at the station or even a wheelbarrow. We need to move him before the passengers return, and to get this carriage cleaned up.'

Four of the railway policemen shuffled off. The rest of them stared resentfully at Colbeck, annoyed that he had taken over the investigation and relegated them to the position of bystanders. Colbeck's refinement, educated voice and sense of authority aroused a muted hostility. They did not like being given orders by this peacock from Scotland Yard. Aware of their antagonism, Colbeck chose to ignore it.

'Sergeant Leeming.'

'Yes, Inspector?' said his colleague.

'Take a full statement from Mr Horlock, if you will,' instructed Colbeck, 'and from Mr Radd. Meanwhile,' he added, pointedly, 'if the rest of you would be good enough to give us some breathing space, I'll make a more thorough examination of the body.'

Blaspheming under their breath, the knot of railway policemen drifted away, leaving only Sam Horlock, Ernest Radd and Tod Galway beside the carriage. Leeming jumped down on to the ground and took out his notebook so that he could question two of the men. Colbeck hauled himself into the carriage and took the opportunity to look at the two items that Horlock had given him. The wallet contained nothing more than a five-pound note and a ticket for the excursion train, but the piece of paper was far more useful. It was a bill for a supply of leather and it contained the name and address of the person to whom it had been sent.

'So,' said Colbeck with compassion, 'you are Mr Jacob Bransby, are you? I'm sorry that your journey had to end this way, sir.'

Putting the wallet and bill into his pocket, he looked more closely at the injury to the man's neck, trying to work out where the killer must have been standing when he struck. Colbeck then studied the broad shoulders and felt the solid biceps. Bransby might have a paunch but he must have been a powerful man. Evidently, he was no stranger to manual work. His hands were rough, his fingernails dirty. A livid scar ran across the knuckles of one hand. His clothing was serviceable rather than smart and Colbeck noticed that his coat had been darned in two places. The hat was shabby.

But it was the face that interested the detective most. Though contorted by an agonising death, it still had much to reveal about the character of the man. There was a stubbornness in the set of his jaw and protective quality about the thick, overhanging brows. Mutton-chop whiskers hid even more of his face and the walrus moustache reached out to meet them. Colbeck sensed that he was looking at a secretive individual, covert, tight-lipped, taciturn, unsure of himself, a lonely creature who travelled without any friends because they would otherwise have been on hand to save his life instead of rushing out of the carriage, leaving him to the mercy of his executioner.

Wishing that the man did not smell so much of excrement, Colbeck searched him thoroughly. Sam Horlock had already been through the pockets so the Inspector concentrated on other parts of his clothing. If Bransby had been as furtive by nature as the detective believed, he might have hidden pockets about his person. He soon found the first, a pouch that had been attached to the inside of the waist of his trousers to safeguard coins from the nimble fingers of pickpockets. Horlock had missed the second hiding place as well. Ingeniously sewn into the waistcoat below the left arm, the other pouch contained a large and expensive gold watch.

It was the third find, however, that intrigued Colbeck. As he felt down the right trouser-leg, his hand made contact with a hard, metal object that, on investigation, turned out to be a dagger strapped above the ankle. Colbeck removed it from the leg, unsheathed the weapon and inspected it. He glanced down at the murder victim.

'Well, Mr Bransby,' he said, raising an eyebrow, 'you're full of surprises, aren't you?'

He put the dagger in its sheath and concealed them in his coat. After completing his search, he left the carriage and dropped to the ground, relieved to be able to inhale fresh air again. Colbeck said nothing about what he had found, unwilling to humiliate Horlock in front the others and, in any case, not wishing to share information with railway employees. The four policemen who had walked off to the station came down the track, carrying a large table between them. Colbeck supervised the transfer of the dead body from the carriage to the guard's van. Tod Galway was not happy about the arrangement.

'I don't want 'im in there, Inspector,' he moaned, waving his arms. 'The dirty dog shit 'imself.'

'That was purely involuntary,' said Colbeck. 'If you had been killed in that way, I daresay that your own bowels would have betrayed you. Death plays cruel tricks on all of us.'

'But why did this 'ave to 'appen on my train?'

'Only the killer can tell us that.'

Leaving him there, Colbeck strolled back towards the front of the train. He was pleased to see that Leeming had finished taking statements from the two men. It allowed him to confide in the Sergeant.

Leeming was astonished. 'A gold watch and a dagger?'

'Both cunningly hidden, Victor.'

'Is that why he carried the weapon, sir? To protect the watch?'

'No,' decided Colbeck, 'I fancy that it was there for self-defence and with good cause. Mr Bransby feared an attack of some kind. He did not strike me as a man who slept easily at nights.'

'A guilty conscience, perhaps?'

'He certainly had something to hide. How, for instance, could a man who plied his trade afford such a costly watch? I venture to suggest that you'll find very few cobblers with the requisite income.'

'How do you know that he was a cobbler?'

'Who else would order that amount of leather?' asked Colbeck. 'And there was what could well be cobbler's wax under his fingernails. Not that he was the most dexterous craftsman, mind you. It looked as if a knife slipped at some stage and slit his knuckles open.'

'I see.' Leeming shrugged. 'What do we do now, sir?'