The Silver Locomotive Mystery

returned to the Railway Hotel. Stockdale ambushed them in the foyer.

‘I wonder if I could have a word with you?’ he asked in a voice that made it clear they had no alternative.

‘Why, it’s you, superintendent,’ said Buckmaster with a flamboyant gesture. ‘I didn’t recognise you out of your uniform. You cut a fine figure in evening wear, I must say. Was this transformation brought about for any particular occasion?’

‘Yes, sir – I attended a performance of Macbeth.’ The others traded an uneasy glance and began to mouth excuses. ‘Perhaps we should discuss this in private,’ Stockdale said, interrupting them. ‘I promised the manager that I wouldn’t arrest you in public.’

Buckmaster goggled. ‘Arrest!’

‘We’ve done nothing wrong,’ protested Kate.

‘That’s exactly the point, Miss Linnane,’ said Stockdale. ‘Nothing wrong was done. I have been investigating a crime that never actually took place.’ His smile was glacial. ‘Shall we go upstairs?’

Followed by the superintendent, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth went up to Buckmaster’s room. They were not acknowledging an ecstatic audience now nor were they garnering praise from their enthusiastic well-wishers at the stage door. They were compelled to produce a very different performance and it was one they had never rehearsed. When they reached the room, Buckmaster unlocked the door with his key. After helping Kate remove her cape, he took off his top hat and cloak before turning up the gaslight to brighten the room. Taking a stance in the middle of the carpet, he launched into his defence.

‘We are deeply sorry, Superintendent,’ he said, one hand to his breast. ‘Common courtesy dictated that we should have told you of Miss Linnane’s miraculous escape from her kidnapper. The truth of the matter is that we simply didn’t have the time. Twenty minutes before the curtain was due to rise, Miss Linnane burst into the theatre and announced that – in spite of the appalling trial she’d had to undergo – she would honour her commitment to the company and take on her role. I’m sure you’ll agree that she did so with the brilliance we’ve come to associate with her.’

‘Thank you, Mr Buckmaster,’ said Stockdale, curtly, ‘but I’ve heard enough speeches from you this evening and I don’t propose to listen to any more – even though you no longer wear that kilt.’ He turned to Kate. ‘What have you to say, Miss Linnane?’

‘I’m still haunted by the memory of it,’ she claimed, looking anguished. ‘I was snatched from my room, forced to travel to London and kept in a dark cellar for hours on end. When I managed to escape, I hastened back to Cardiff to play the part for which I’d been engaged. All else went from my mind.’

‘Who abducted you?’

‘It was a crazed fellow who has been stalking me for months, Superintendent. When he saw his opportunity, he pounced.’

‘Then I must ask you the question that Inspector Colbeck first put,’ said Stockdale. ‘Why did you not resist and call out? You almost screeched down the walls of the castle on stage tonight so I know that your lungs are in good order. What happened to your voice during the kidnap? Did he threaten to kill you if you raised the alarm?’

‘Yes, yes,’ she said, clutching at the suggestion. ‘That was it.’

‘Now you know the full story,’ concluded Buckmaster, ‘so you must excuse us. We are very tired and Miss Linnane has been through a very harrowing day.’

‘So have my men,’ said Stockdale. ‘Constable Roberts and Constable Parker made a totally unnecessary trip to London in pursuit of this mythical kidnapper and several other policemen went searching for witnesses in Cardiff itself. I put it to you, Miss Linnane, that this whole episode was devised by you for some personal reason, as a result of which the Cardiff Borough Police were needlessly distracted from pursuing real criminals.’

‘I was abducted!’ she cried, falling back on defiance.

‘Do you subscribe to this lie, Mr Buckmaster?’

‘I stand by what Miss Linnane has told you,’ said the actor.

‘Then perhaps you’d explain something to me, sir. When Miss Linnane returned to Cardiff after her dramatic escape from a dark cellar, why didn’t you inform us immediately of her return?’

‘I told you – we didn’t have time.’

‘The performance was delayed by half an hour. That gave you plenty of time to send someone to the police station. One of your underlings could run the distance in less than five minutes.’

‘We are actors, Superintendent,’ said Buckmaster, grandly. ‘The play must always come first. Our public awaited us.’

‘I’ve been awaiting you as well,’ said Stockdale, grimly, ‘and I got into conversation with the manager while I did so. Mr Pugh is a shrewd gentleman. He suggested that it was unlikely that anyone would simply charge in off the street and drag Miss Linnane out. To begin with, how would this fellow know where to find her room? Mr Pugh had the answer to that. He wondered if the kidnapper was already staying here as a guest.’ Kate clenched her teeth. ‘He allowed me to look through the register and do you know what I found? There’s someone who booked in two days ago by the name of Michael Linnane.’ The two of them wilted under his glare. ‘Do I need to say anything more?’

After a night at home in the bosom of his family, Victor Leeming looked much happier and healthier. The bandaging around his head obliged him to wear his top hat at a rakish angle and he collected some curious stares as he and Colbeck walked along the platform at Paddington Station, but he was unperturbed by the attention. When they found an empty carriage, they removed their hats then sat down opposite each other. Leeming’s good humour was not only occasioned by the fact that he was hoping to arrest the man who assaulted him. He was relieved that they would not be staying away overnight and that he could return to the comforts of the marital couch in due course.

‘I’ve been looking at a map of where we’re going,’ he began.

Colbeck patted his pocket. ‘I’ve brought one with me, Victor.’

‘The one I saw had part of South Wales on it and what puzzled me was this. Why didn’t they build a railway bridge across the River Severn? That would have been the most direct route.’

‘The most direct and the most sensible,’ agreed Colbeck, ‘which is exactly why it was suggested when the line was first mooted. There was a proposal for a long bridge across the river west of Gloucester. Local objection, alas, was so powerful that the scheme had to be abandoned. The line was diverted through the Forest of Dean so Mr Brunel had no need to bridge the Severn. His engineering skills were, however, put to the test.’

‘Yes, Inspector – I saw the viaducts at Chepstow and Newport.’

Colbeck was amused. ‘You’re improving, Victor. There was a time when you hardly looked out of the window of a train.’

‘I’m usually too busy praying that we’ll arrive safely.’

‘Accidents on the railway are not that common.’

‘Tell that to the passengers on the Brighton express,’ said Leeming. ‘The ones who survived the crash last year, that is.’

It was a case that still troubled Leeming. The express had been involved in a head-on collision with a ballast train. He remembered the devastation caused. Though the accident had been deliberately engineered, Leeming’s fears were not stilled. Whenever he was tugged along at high speed by an iron monster breathing fire and pulsing with energy, he thought about the Brighton express and longed for the more leisurely days when the stagecoach was the principal mode of transport.

‘Where do we start, Inspector?’ he asked.

‘In Gloucester,’ replied Colbeck. ‘It’s a cathedral city with a pleasant aspect. It could well attract two refugees from London.’

‘You can see why they told nobody where they were going.’

‘They wanted to cut their ties with the past and start afresh. At least, that’s the way it looks. There was nothing to keep Stephen Voke in London and we must assume that the same is true of the young lady who went with him.’

‘All that we have is her Christian name – Bridget.’

‘I’m not convinced of that,’ said Colbeck. ‘If she did set out to entrap Hugh Kellow, she might well have given