Murder on the Brighton Express

‘I expected Superintendent Tallis,’ he said, frostily, ‘if not the commissioner himself.’

‘I’m in charge of the investigation into the train crash, sir,’ said Colbeck, firmly, ‘and I’m interested in anything whatsoever that may have a bearing on it. I’ve already established to my satisfaction that the collision was no accident so I’ve turned my attention to the likely motive behind this crime.’

‘You may be looking at it, Inspector.’

‘Indeed?’

‘Sit down and I will explain.’

Colbeck took a chair at the other end of the table and glanced around the library. It was a large, rectangular, high-ceilinged room with bookshelves on three walls. Light flooded in through the windows on the other wall and made the marble busts gleam and the crystal chandelier above Colbeck’s head sparkle. Before resuming, Thornhill subjected his guest to a searching glare.

‘The true motive for what happened on Friday will not even have crossed your mind, Inspector,’ he said, ‘because it would never occur to you for a moment that the accident was intended to kill someone who was travelling on the express.’

‘You malign me, I fear,’ Colbeck told him. ‘I considered that possibility as soon as I learnt that Mr Horace Bardwell was a passenger on the train. He struck me as being a potential target for someone in search of revenge.’

Thornhill was peeved. ‘Bardwell was not the target,’ he insisted, resenting the very notion of a competitor. ‘That crash was engineered to kill me. Don’t you understand, Inspector Colbeck? It was a clear case of attempted murder.’

‘Attempted and actual murder, sir,’ corrected the other. ‘To date, there have been nine murder victims.’

‘They were incidental casualties.’

‘I don’t think their friends and families will take any comfort from that thought,’ said Colbeck, pointedly.

‘If anyone was supposed to die, it was me.’

‘Do you have any evidence to support that, sir?’

‘You must have read my letter to the superintendent. I laid out the evidence in that. I’ve had two death threats. Whenever I’ve been in London, I’ve been followed, and I always travel on the Brighton Express on Friday evenings. I’m a creature of habit,’ said Thornhill. ‘Somebody must have been studying those habits.’

‘May I see the death threats you received?’

‘No, Inspector – I tore them to pieces.’

‘That was unwise of you, sir. They could have been valuable evidence. Were they both written by the same hand?’

‘Yes – and it was elegant calligraphy at that. It made them even more menacing somehow.’

‘Can you remember the actual wording of the missives?’

‘Both were short and blunt, Inspector. The first simply warned me that I had weeks to live. The second told me to make my will.’

‘What precautions did you take?’ asked Colbeck.

‘Only the obvious ones,’ replied Thornhill. ‘I made sure that I never travelled alone and remained vigilant at all times. The problem is that, until the train crash, I wasn’t entirely sure that the threats were serious. As a politician, I’m rather used to mindless abuse. Those were not the first unpleasant letters to be delivered here.’

‘So they were sent to your home?’

‘Yes, Inspector – that’s what unsettles me. Most of my mail is addressed to the House of Commons.’

‘Were the letters sent from Brighton?’

‘No – they bore a London postmark.’

‘Can you think of anyone who may have written them?’

‘I have a lot of enemies, Inspector,’ said Thornhill with a touch of pride, ‘because I’m a man of principle and always speak robustly in Parliament. Politics, I daresay, is a closed world to you.’

‘On the contrary,’ said Colbeck, ‘a few years ago, it fell to me to arrest Sir Humphrey Gilzean, who organised a train robbery. I believe he was a close friend of yours.’ Thornhill shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘Since then, I’ve taken a close interest in the activities of the House of Commons. I know, for instance, that you were highly critical of Sir Robert Peel when he repealed the Corn Laws and that you broke with his wing of the Conservative party. Since his death, you’ve aligned yourself with Mr Disraeli.’

‘What our late prime minister did was unpardonable,’ snapped Thornhill. ‘As for Gilzean, he was never more than an acquaintance who happened to share my views. He was certainly not an intimate of mine. I was thoroughly shocked by what he did.’

‘There may be something of a parallel here,’ suggested Colbeck, noting how keen he was to distance himself from Gilzean. ‘Sir Humphrey was so obsessed with his hatred of railways that he was driven to commit dreadful crimes. It could well be that we are dealing with another case of obsession – a person consumed with hatred of a particular individual.’

‘And that individual,’ said Thornhill, ‘appears to be me.’

‘I’d need more proof before I accepted that conclusion, sir.’

‘It’s as plain as this black eye of mine, Inspector. I’m warned, I’m watched then I’m wounded in that horrifying train crash.’

‘The same things may have happened to Mr Bardwell.’

‘This is nothing to do with him!’

‘He’s a director of the LB&SCR.’

‘I have the honour of representing Brighton in Parliament so I am identified far more closely with the town than Horace Bardwell. Also, I have political rivals who would be very happy to see me dead.’ He slid a piece of paper across to Colbeck. ‘I’ve made a list of them for you. Forgive my shaky writing. With my right arm in this sling, I had to use my left.’

‘The names are perfectly legible,’ observed Colbeck, eyeing them with interest. ‘It’s a rather long list of suspects, sir.’

‘I didn’t become a politician to make myself popular.’

‘That’s palpably true.’

‘I suggest you make discreet enquiries about every man there.’

‘I have my own methods,’ said Colbeck, evenly, ‘and I’ll stick to those, if you don’t mind. Meanwhile, you seem to be perfectly safe here. I can’t think you’ll be in any danger in your own home.’

‘That’s why I discharged myself from the county hospital. As long as I was there, I was vulnerable to attack. In the event,’ said Thornhill, ‘the attack turned out to be a written one.’

‘In what way?’

‘See for yourself, Inspector Colbeck.’ He slid another piece of paper across the table. ‘This was delivered to me in hospital. I regard it as incontestable proof that the train crash was arranged solely for my benefit.’

Colbeck read the mocking obituary of the politician.Giles Thornhill MP was killed in a railway accident on Friday, August 15th, on his way back to his constituency in Brighton. His death will be mourned by his family but celebrated joyously by those of us who know what a despicable, corrupt and mean-spirited person he was. May his miserable body rot forever in a foul dunghill!

‘Well,’ said Thornhill, ‘have I convinced you now?’

CHAPTER SEVEN

Victor Leeming’s search began badly. The first person he had to find was Jack Rye, a porter from London Bridge station who had been dismissed on suspicion of theft in spite of vociferous protestations of innocence. The address that Leeming had been given was in one of the poorer quarters of Westminster. When he called there, he learnt that Rye had quit the premises months earlier. As the city echoed to the sound of church bells, a long, arduous trudge ensued through some of the rougher districts of the capital as the sergeant went from tenement to miserable tenement. Rye had kept on the move, changing his accommodation as often as his job. Time and again, he had departed with a landlord’s curse ringing in his ears.

When Leeming finally tracked his man down to one of the rookeries in Seven Dials, he discovered that Jack Rye could not possibly have caused the train crash because he had been stabbed to death in a tavern brawl a week before the tragedy occurred. The very fact that Rye had ended up living in such a vile slum was an indication of how