On hearing that two of her children had arrived, Cassandra came downstairs to embrace her daughter and to scold her son for his disreputable appearance. All five of them adjourned to the drawing room and found a seat.
‘Whatever brought you here?’ asked Cassandra.
‘We have something to tell the inspector,’ replied the artist. ‘It could have a bearing on the case.’
‘On the other hand,’ said Emma, ‘it might be irrelevant. I have my doubts.’
‘I don’t.’
‘Be quiet, George,’ said his mother. ‘Let your sister tell her tale.’
Emma looked around the ring of faces and began to lose her confidence. It took some prompting from her mother and some gentle persuasion from Colbeck to get her to speak. She plunged in.
‘Some time last year,’ she said, ‘Aunt Paulina and Imogen came to stay with us in Oxford. I think it was February or March because there was snow on the ground. Imogen and I went for a walk one day in Christ Church Meadow. It was a glorious morning with the sun turning everything bright and shiny.’
‘We don’t need to hear that,’ complained her brother.
‘Don’t interrupt,’ said Cassandra, sharply.
‘But Emma needs to get to the point.’
‘Let her proceed at her own pace,’ said Colbeck. ‘There’s no hurry.’
‘I think that there is,’ grumbled Sir Marcus. ‘If Emma has any information that will help us in the search for Imogen’s kidnapper, I want to hear it now.’
‘Then you shall, Uncle,’ said Emma, spurred on by the rebuke. ‘We were enjoying our walk when this ruffian suddenly leapt out from some bushes to accost us. He demanded money. Imogen was so frightened that she was ready to hand over some coins just to get rid of him. He was a fearsome man, old, dirty, bearded and wearing tattered clothing that looked as if he’d slept in it. Also, he gave off the most noisome stink.’
‘Why did you never mention this incident to me?’ demanded Cassandra.
‘Now who’s interrupting?’ said her son, smirking.
‘We thought it would alarm you, Mother,’ explained Emma, ‘and it would certainly have upset Aunt Paulina. We were afraid that you’d stop us going out alone together and we didn’t want that.’
‘It’s a fair assumption,’ observed Colbeck. ‘How did this business end?’
‘A soldier came to our rescue, Inspector. He grabbed hold of the man and pitched him back into the bushes. Then he introduced himself and insisted on escorting us back to the safety of the college.’
‘What happened then?’
‘Nothing,’ said Emma. ‘We went into the college and never saw him again.’
‘You never saw him again,’ her brother reminded her. ‘What about Imogen?’
‘I can’t believe that she had any further contact with him. If she had, then Imogen would certainly have told me.’
‘She’d have told her mother as well,’ declared Sir Marcus. ‘Our daughter has been brought up properly. She’d never encourage the interest of some stranger she met in a chance encounter, especially if he was a mere soldier. What was his rank?’
‘He was a captain, Uncle. The name he gave us was Captain Whiteside.’
‘Would you recognise him if you saw him again?’ asked Colbeck.
‘Oh, yes, Inspector — he was very dashing.’
‘But he was not the soldier you saw on the platform at the station?’ Emma shook her head. ‘What about the second soldier, the one who got off the train.’
‘I didn’t really take much notice of him.’
‘We were too busy looking out for Imogen,’ said Cassandra.
Sir Marcus was sceptical. ‘None of this sounds remotely germane to the kidnap,’ he decided. ‘It was all of eighteen months ago and Imogen has probably forgotten all about it.’
‘That’s what I did,’ volunteered Emma. ‘Being pounced on by that ruffian was so distressing that I tried hard to put it out of my mind.’
‘I was the one who dug it out again,’ boasted her brother. ‘You should have saved yourself the trouble, George,’ said his uncle.
‘I’m glad to hear about the incident,’ added Cassandra. ‘One thinks of Oxford as a seat of learning but we have plenty of vagabonds in our midst as well. You should be more careful where you walk, Emma. Male company is always advisable.’
‘I believe that Emma and her cousin were entitled to be on their own,’ said the artist. ‘The presence of a man — even one as sensitive as me — would only serve to inhibit their conversation. What happened was unfortunate but they survived intact.’ He turned to Colbeck. ‘I felt that it was important for you to hear about the incident, Inspector,’ he went on. ‘Were we justified in making the effort to get here?’
‘I’m not entirely sure about that, Mr Vaughan,’ said Colbeck, ‘but I’m grateful that you came and I’m very glad to make your acquaintance.’
Convinced that they had something crucial to report, George Vaughan was downcast. Colbeck’s lukewarm response had also upset his sister. Emma was self-conscious about the fact that she’d described an event that she’d have preferred to stay hidden. Not only had it been more or less dismissed as irrelevant, it had given her mother ammunition to use against her. Emma’s freedom to come and go from the college would henceforth be supervised more closely.
Colbeck was sorry to upset the two of them. Privately, he was delighted to hear about the encounter and certain that it was directly related to the kidnap. In admitting that, however, he would be alerting Sir Marcus to the possibility that his daughter had had a clandestine friendship with Captain Whiteside. If and when Imogen was released, it would sour relations between father and daughter and Colbeck was very keen to protect her.
‘There has to be a connection,’ emphasised George Vaughan. ‘A soldier came to their rescue and a soldier was seen waiting at Oxford station.’
‘There’s a regiment stationed near the city,’ said Sir Marcus, dismissively. ‘It’s not surprising that redcoats appear from time to time at the station.’
‘Exactly,’ said Colbeck, endorsing the remark. ‘What we’ve been told was very interesting but of no practical value. The fact that a soldier greeted the train that day is pure coincidence.’
CHAPTER TWELVE
Since she knew for certain that her husband would not return home that evening, Madeleine Colbeck elected to visit her father. Light had faded from the sky so it was impossible for her to work at her easel and, in any case, she wanted some company. It was several weeks since she’d gone back to the little house in Camden Town and, as the cab drew up outside it, she felt a nostalgic pull. It disappeared the moment that she stepped inside. Now that she lived in a much larger and more comfortable abode, the house in which she’d been born seemed impossibly cramped. As her horizons had broadened, her old home had diminished in size. Yet she’d enjoyed her childhood there and, after the death of her mother, virtually ran the house. Caleb Andrews was very pleased to see her and she, in turn, was glad to find the place looking as neat and tidy as it had been during her time there.
‘Where’s Robert this evening?’ he asked.