The Excursion Train

'Do you disapprove?'

'Not in the least. But how did you know where to find me?'

'Your name was on the front page of the newspaper. The report said that you were conducting an investigation in Ashford.'

'Ah, well,' he said with a sigh, 'I suppose it was too much to ask to keep my whereabouts secret for long. We'll have a batch of reporters down here in due course, assailing me with questions I refuse to answer and generally getting in my way. I'd hoped to avoid that.' He feasted his eyes on her. 'I'm so pleased to see you, Madeleine.'

'Thank you.'

'Where were you going when I saw you in the high street?'

'To the Saracen's Head.'

'You knew that I was staying here?'

'No,' she replied, 'but I guessed that you'd choose the best place in the town. When I asked at the station where that would be, they directed me here.'

He laughed. 'You're a detective in your own right.'

'That's what brought me to Ashford.'

Mary interrupted them to see if they required anything. Colbeck ordered a pot of tea and some cakes before sending the girl on her way. He switched his attention back to Madeleine again.

'I'm a detective by accident,' she explained. 'I don't know why but, when I saw that Jacob Guttridge's funeral was being held today, I took it into my head to go to it.'

He was stunned. 'You went to Hoxton alone?'

'I do most things on my own, Robert, and I felt perfectly safe inside a church. Unfortunately, there was hardly anyone there for the service. It was very sad.'

'What about Michael Guttridge?'

'No sign of him – or of his wife. That upset his mother.'

'You spoke to her?'

'Yes,' said Madeleine. 'I didn't mean to. I kept out of the way during the ceremony and didn't think that she even knew I was there. But Mrs Guttridge did notice me somehow. She said how grateful she was to see me then invited me back to the house.'

'What sort of state was she in?'

'Very calm, in view of the fact that she'd just buried her husband. Mrs Guttridge must have a lot of willpower. After my mother's funeral, I was unable to speak, let alone hold a conversation like that.'

'I put it down to her religion.'

'She told me that her priest, Father Cleary, had been a rock.'

'Why did she invite you back to the house?'

'Because she wanted to talk to someone and she said that it was easier for her to speak to a stranger like me.'

'So you were a mother-confessor.'

'Mrs Guttridge seemed to trust me,' said Madeleine. 'She didn't admit this but I had the feeling that she was using me to get information back to you. She's not an educated woman, Robert, but she's quite shrewd in her own way. She knew that you only took me to the house because she was more likely to confide in a woman.'

'I'm glad that I did take you, Madeleine,' he said with an admiring glance. 'Extremely glad.'

'So am I.'

'Much as I like Victor, you're far more appealing to the eye.'

'Oh, I see,' she said with mock annoyance, 'I was only there as decoration, was I?'

'Of course not,' he replied. 'I took you along for the pleasure of your company and because I thought that Mrs Guttridge would find you less threatening than a Detective Inspector from Scotland Yard.'

'She did, Robert.'

'What did you learn this time?'

'Quite a lot,' said Madeleine. 'After we left the house that day, she prayed for the courage to go into the room that her husband had always kept locked. It was a revelation to her.'

'I took away the most distressing items in his bizarre collection but I had to leave some of his souvenirs behind – and his bottles of brandy.'

'It was the alcohol that really upset her. She only agreed to marry Jacob Guttridge because he promised to stop drinking. She firmly believed that he had. But what disturbed her about that room,' she went on, 'was how dirty and untidy it was. She called it an animal's lair. You saw how house-proud she was. She was disgusted that her husband spent so much time, behind a locked door, in that squalor.'

'Gloating over his mementos and drinking brandy.'

'It helped Mrs Guttridge to accept his death more easily. She said that God had punished him for going astray. When she saw what was in that room, she realised that her husband's life away from her was much more important to him than their marriage. I tried to comfort her,' said Madeleine. 'I told her that very few men could meet the high moral standards that she set.'

'Jacob Guttridge went to the other extreme. He executed people on the gallows then gloried in their deaths.' Colbeck chose not to mention the hangman's passion for retaining the clothing of his female victims. 'It gave him a weird satisfaction of some sort. But I'm holding you up,' he said, penitently. 'Do please go on.'

'It was what she told me next that made me come here, Robert. On the day when he hanged Nathan Hawkshaw, his wife expected him home that night. But he never turned up.'

'He was probably too afraid to leave the prison in case the mob got their hands on him. What explanation did he give her?'

'That he was delayed on business.'

'Had that sort of thing happened before?'

'Once or twice,' she said. 'Mrs Guttridge was vexed that, as soon as he got home on the following day, he went straight out again to see some friends in Bethnal Green.'

'He must have been going to the Seven Stars.'

'What's that?'

'A public house where fighters train. As an avid follower of the sport, Guttridge knew it well – though he called himself Jake Bransby whenever he was there. Over a hundred people from the Seven Stars went to that championship contest on the excursion train.'

'How did you find that out?'

'Victor Leeming visited the place for me,' said Colbeck, 'though he was not exactly made welcome.' He flicked a hand. 'However, I'm spoiling your story. I'm sorry.'

'It was what happened afterwards that puzzled Mrs Guttridge,' she said, 'though she thought nothing of it at the time.'

'Of what?'

'That evening – when he got back from Bethnal Green – her husband seemed to have been running and that was most unusual for him. He was out of breath and sweating. For the next few weeks, he never stirred out of the house after dark. He used to go off to these "friends" regularly, it seems, but he suddenly stopped altogether.'

'Did she know why?'

'Not until a few days after her husband had been murdered. One of her neighbours – an old Irish woman – was leaving some flowers on her step when Mrs Guttridge opened the door and saw her there. They'd never talked properly before,' said Madeleine, 'but they'd waved to each other in the street. The old woman lived almost opposite.'

'And?'

'She remembered something.'

'Was it about Guttridge?'

'Yes, Robert. She remembered looking out of her bedroom window the night that he came hurrying back home. A man was following him. He stood outside the house for some time.'

'And Guttridge said nothing to his wife about this man?'

'Not a word. I thought it might be important so I made a point of calling on the old lady – Mrs O'Rourke, by name – when I left.'

'That was very enterprising.'

'She told me the same story.'

'Was she able to describe this man?'

'Not very well,' said Madeleine, 'because it was getting dark and her eyesight is not good. All she could tell me was he was short and fat. Oh, and he walked in this strange way.'

'With a limp?'

'No, he waddled from side to side.'

'Age?'

'Mrs O'Rourke couldn't be sure but the man wasn't young.' She smiled hopefully. 'Was I right to pass on this information to you?'

'Yes,' he said, 'and I'm very grateful. It could just be someone he fell out with at the Seven Stars but, then, a man spoiling for a fight wouldn't have gone all the way back to Hoxton to confront him. He would have tackled Guttridge outside the pub,' he went on, recalling what had happened to Leeming. 'It sounds to me as if this man was more interested in simply finding out where Guttridge lived.'