She brushed his lips with a tender kiss. Though his face was contorted with pain, he managed a faint smile of thanks and reached up with his free hand to touch her arm. Still hazy, torn between fatigue and anger, puzzled and comforted by his daughter’s presence, he struggled to piece together what had happened to him but his memory was hopelessly clouded. All that he could remember was who he was and what he did for a living. When he heard a train steaming through the nearby station, a sense of duty swelled up in him.
‘I must get out of here,’ he decided, attempting to move.
‘No, Father,’ she said, using both hands to restrain him gently.
‘Frank and I have to take the mail train to Birmingham.’
‘It was robbed yesterday. You were assaulted.’
‘Help me up, Maddy. We have to get there on time.’
‘There is no mail train,’ she said, trying to break the news to him as softly as she could. ‘The men who robbed you removed a section of the track. When you were knocked unconscious, Frank Pike was forced to drive the engine off the rails. He told me that it’s lying on its side until they can get a crane to it.’
Andrews was appalled. ‘My engine came off the track?’ Madeleine nodded sadly. ‘Oh, no! That’s a terrible thing to hear. She was such a lovely piece of engineering. Mr Allan designed her and I looked after her as if she was my own daughter – as if she was you, Maddy.’ His eyes moistened. ‘I don’t care what happened to me. It’s her that I worry about. I loved her like a father. She was mine.’
Caleb Andrews sobbed as if he had just lost the dearest thing in his life. All that Madeleine could do was to use her handkerchief to wipe away the tears that rolled down his cheeks.
The train that had sped through Leighton Buzzard Station continued on its journey to Birmingham, passing the spot where the robbery had occurred and allowing its passengers a fleeting view of the scene of the crime before taking them on into the Linslade Tunnel. Among those in one of the first class compartments was Inspector Robert Colbeck, who took a keen interest in the sight of the wrecked locomotive that still lay beside the line. He spared a thought for its unfortunate driver.
Though it had given him a very late night, he felt that his visit to the Devil’s Acre had been worthwhile and he had been struck once again by the fact that one of the most hideous rookeries in London was cheek by jowl with the uplifting beauty of Westminster Abbey. Rising early the next day, he had travelled by cab to Euston Station where he bought two different newspapers to compare their treatment of the story.
Edward Tallis had been right in his prediction. For anyone involved in law enforcement, reports of the robbery did not make happy reading. The stunning novelty of the crime and the sheer size of the amount stolen – over £3000 in gold sovereigns – encouraged the newspapers to inject a note of hysteria into their accounts, stressing the ease with which the robbery had been carried out and the apparent inability of either the mail guards or the railway policemen to offer anything but token resistance. The Detective Department at Scotland Yard, they told their readers, had never mounted an investigation of this kind before and were therefore operating in the dark.
Robert Colbeck was mentioned as being in charge of the case and he was surprised to read a quotation from Superintendent Tallis, who referred to him as ‘an experienced, reliable and gifted detective’. When he remembered some of the less flattering things that his superior had called him in private, he gave a wry smile. One point made by both newspapers was incontrovertible. No crime of this nature had ever before confronted a Detective Department that, formed only nine years earlier, was still very much in its infancy. They were in uncharted waters.
While the newspapers used this fact as a stick with which to beat the men at Scotland Yard, the Inspector in charge of the investigation saw it as a welcome challenge. He was thrilled by the notion of pitting himself against a man who had organised a crime of such magnitude and audacity. Most of the offenders he had arrested were poor, downtrodden, uneducated men who had turned to crime because there was no honest way for them to make a living. London had its share of seasoned villains, desperate characters who would stop at nothing to achieve their ends, but the majority who trooped through the courts were pathetic figures for whom Colbeck felt a sneaking sympathy.
This time, however, it was different. They were up against a man of clear intelligence, a natural leader who could train and control a gang of almost a dozen accomplices. Instead of fearing him, as the reporters were inclined to do, Colbeck saw him as a worthy adversary, someone who would test his skills of detection and who would stretch the resources of Scotland Yard in a way that had never occurred before. Solving the crime would be an adventure for the mind. However long it might take, Colbeck looked forward to meeting the man behind the train robbery.
Meanwhile, he decided to catch up on some lost sleep. The train was moving along at a comfortable speed but there were stops to make and it would be hours before it reached Birmingham. He settled back in his upholstered seat and closed his eyes. It was a noisy journey. The chugging of the locomotive combined with the rattling of the carriages and the clicking of the wheels on the rails to produce a cacophony that tried to defy slumber. There was also a lurching motion to contend with as the train powered its way along the standard gauge track.
Because it offered more stability, Colbeck preferred the wider gauge of the Great Western Railway and the greater space in its carriages but he had no choice in the matter on this occasion. The company whose mail train had been robbed was the one taking him to Birmingham, and he was interested to see how it treated its passengers. His compartment was almost full and sleep would offer him a refuge from conversation with any of his companions. Two of them, both elderly men, were scandalised by what they had read in their newspapers.
‘A train robbery!’ protested one of them. ‘It’s unthinkable.’
‘I agree,’ said the other. ‘If this kind of thing is allowed to go on, we’ll all be in danger. Any passenger train would run the risk of being ambushed and we would be forced to hand over everything we are carrying of value.’
‘What a ghastly prospect!’
‘It might come to that.’
‘Not if this gang is caught, convicted and sent to prison.’
‘What chance is there of that?’ said the other, sceptically.
‘Detectives have already begun an investigation.’
‘I find it hard to put much faith in them, sir.’
‘Why?’
‘Because they have almost no clues to help them. According to the Times, these devils came out of nowhere, stole what they wanted, then vanished into thin air. The detectives are chasing phantoms.’
‘Yet they claim that this Inspector Colbeck is a gifted policeman.’
‘It will need more than a gifted policeman to solve this crime.’
‘I agree with you there, my friend.’
‘My guess is that this Inspector will not even know where to start.’
On that vote of confidence in his ability, Colbeck fell asleep.
The Devil’s Acre was almost as menacing by day as by night. Danger lurked everywhere in its narrow streets, its twisting lanes and its dark alleyways. There was a pervading stink that never seemed to go away and an unrelenting clamour. Bawling adults and screaming children joined in a mass choir whose repertory consisted solely of a sustained and discordant din that assaulted the eardrums. Scavenging dogs and fighting tomcats added their own descant. Smoke-blackened tenements were built around small, shadowed courtyards, thick with assorted refuse and animal excrement. In every sense, it was a most unhealthy place to live.