‘His elder son didn’t know, sir. His father was always away somewhere on business, he said. Stanley Quayle and his brother were working at one of their pits. They assumed that their father would have been involved with the Midland Railway.’
‘Yet neither Haygarth nor Cope saw him that day.’
‘That’s what they claim.’
‘The appointments diary was probably kept in the office where the self-appointed acting chairman now sits so he could have been in the best position to take possession of it.’
‘The finger points at Haygarth once again.’
‘That doesn’t mean we forget the other suspects,’ warned Colbeck. ‘Did Stanley Quayle admit that his father had particular enemies this time?’
‘Yes,’ said Leeming, ‘but he added no new names to the list and he missed out Superintendent Wigg. When I mentioned him, Mr Quayle had a long think then said that we should keep the superintendent in mind. Talking of which …’
‘Don’t worry, Victor. I sent another report to Superintendent Tallis. He would have got it today, after you’d left London. I gave the impression that I’d made slightly more progress than I actually had while you were away but it should be enough to pacify him. Our superintendent is like a caged tiger,’ said Colbeck with a nostalgic smile. ‘The only way to stifle his roar is to feed the beast on a regular basis.’
Edward Tallis returned to his office after a testing interview with the commissioner. While he exercised power over his officers, he was answerable to Sir Richard Mayne, the man who’d run the Metropolitan Police Force since the death of the other joint founding commissioner four years earlier. Though Tallis and Mayne had a mutual respect for each other, the meeting that day had been highly uncomfortable for the superintendent. He was roundly criticised for his lack of success in the fight against crime. It was only when he reached the safety of his office, and was smoking a consolatory cigar, that he realised why the commissioner had been in such a bad mood. The satirical magazine, Punch, had somehow got hold of Mayne’s standing orders to uniformed policemen and made much of the fact that the commissioner had decreed that, however inclement the weather, his men were not to carry umbrellas. Mayne was lampooned mercilessly. Having himself been ridiculed in cartoons, Tallis had some sympathy for the commissioner but it didn’t lessen the sting of the barbs directed at him. The superintendent wanted to pass on the pain.
As he looked at the pile of documents on his desk, he saw that the latest letter from Colbeck was at the very top. Tallis read through it again. It was a model of how a report should be delivered. Written in a neat hand, it was literate, well organised and informative. No other detective at Scotland Yard could have sent such a crisp yet apparently comprehensive account of an investigation. At a first reading, it had been very satisfying. But the superintendent knew Robert Colbeck of old. The inspector could use words to beguile and distract. When he looked at the report again, Tallis read between the lines before slapping it down on the desk and drawing on his cigar. After he’d exhaled a veritable cloud of smoke, he spoke aloud.
‘What are you up to this time, Colbeck?’
Much as he liked to see his daughter, Caleb Andrews rationed his visits carefully, mindful of the fact that Madeleine needed time to work on her paintings. For the most part, therefore, he called on her by prior arrangement so as not to interrupt her time at the easel. When he came to the house that day, he knew that she’d finished her daily stint and would give him a welcome. Over a cup of tea, he told her about the visits he’d made to other retired railwaymen and how they’d all agreed that the standard of driving a locomotive had fallen since they’d ceased to occupy a footplate. Madeleine listened to it all with an amused tolerance.
‘Is there any word from Robert?’ he asked.
‘Yes, I had a letter from him yesterday.’
‘What’s the latest news about the case?’
‘He said very little about that,’ replied Madeleine, trying to guide him off the subject. ‘He’s still collecting evidence.’
‘Did you pass on my offer of help, Maddy?’
‘Robert knows that you’re always standing by.’
‘Why hasn’t he sent more details? I need something to work on.’
‘Let him do his job, Father,’ she advised.
In fact, the letter she’d received from Colbeck that morning had been full of details about the case but Madeleine didn’t wish to divulge any of it to her father. She would certainly never admit that Victor Leeming had recruited her help and that she’d been directly involved in the inquiry. Powered by envy, her father would pester her for every morsel of information. Instead, therefore, she talked about the locomotive that she was currently putting onto canvas. Since it belonged to his beloved LNWR, he waxed lyrical about its features and asked to see it. Madeleine told him to wait, preferring to show him a finished painting.
‘Why do you never put me on the footplate?’ he asked, tetchily.
‘I never put any figures in my paintings.’
‘Are you ashamed of your old father?’
‘No,’ she replied, squeezing his arm, ‘I’m proud of what you did as an engine driver. But when you’re an artist, you have to do what you do best and keep away from things you’re not good at. I’m not a figurative artist.’
‘You’re the best artist I’ve ever seen, Maddy.’
‘You wouldn’t say that if you’d seen some of the figures I’ve tried to paint. I’m much safer with locomotives and rolling stock. Somehow I just can’t make people look real on canvas.’
‘You could make me look real.’
‘I’ve tried to put you in a painting many times, Father, but it never works.’
‘Is that my fault or yours?’
‘It’s mine,’ she confessed. ‘That’s why I stick to what I can do.’
‘But you can do anything if you really try,’ he argued. ‘You’re like me, Maddy. I worked on the railway but I also found that I had a gift for solving crimes so I developed that gift.’
Madeleine had to suppress a smile. She heard the doorbell ring and, since she was not expecting a visitor, wondered whom it could be. Moments later, a servant came into the room to say that a lady had asked to see her but would not give her name. Madeleine excused herself and went into the hall. When she saw who her visitor was, she was grateful that her name had not been divulged in her father’s hearing.
Lydia Quayle was standing there.
Victor Leeming was delighted to see him again. Apart from the landlord at the Malt Shovel, the reporter was the only person he’d befriended in Spondon. The vicar had been helpful to him but it was Philip Conway with whom the sergeant had formed any sort of bond. Since he was staying at the hotel at the Midland Railway’s expense, Leeming had no compunction about putting the cost of two more drinks on the bill. He and Conway found seats in the lounge. After giving the sergeant an attenuated account of his day, the reporter told him about the friction he’d experienced with Jed Hockaday.
‘Yes,’ said Leeming, ‘it was the cobbler who caused me a headache as well.’
‘I thought he was going to assault me.’
‘Did he actually hit you?’
‘No, but he certainly wanted to. Hockaday was angry because I told you things about him. He warned me to keep my mouth shut. But what happened to you?’ asked Conway. ‘When we saw him walk past the Malt Shovel, you went after him.’
‘I tried to, anyway.’
Leeming repeated the story he’d told Colbeck but it had a deliberate omission. There was no reference to the fact that Seth Verney claimed to be the cobbler’s father. While he was a friend, Conway was not a detective who could be trusted with every item of interest that was unearthed. In the light of Hockaday’s threat to the reporter, Leeming didn’t want him to confront the cobbler about his parentage. It was a treat that the sergeant was reserving for himself.