Hyde Park Headsman

“Who was he?” Pitt asked slowly. “Anything else we know?”

“That’s just it.” Tellman screwed up his face. “He was a bus conductor.”

Pitt was startled. “A bus conductor! Not a gentleman?”

“Definitely not. Just a very ordinary, very respectable little bus conductor,” Tellman repeated. “On his way home from his last run—at least, not on his way home: that’s the odd thing.” He stared at Pitt. “He lives near the end of the line, which is out Shepherd’s Bush way. That’s what the omnibus company said.”

“So what was he doing in Knightsbridge near the park?” Pitt asked the obvious question. “Is that where he was killed?”

Memory of past conversations flashed across Tellman’s face, of Pitt’s insistence, and then his own failure to find where Arledge had been killed.

“No—at least it doesn’t look like it,” he replied. “There’s no way you can chop a man’s head off without leaving rivers of blood around, and there’s very little in the gig he was in.”

“Gig? What gig?” Pitt demanded.

“Ordinary sort of gig, except no horse,” Tellman replied.

“What do you mean a gig with no horse?” Pitt’s voice was rising in spite of himself. “Either it’s a vehicle to ride in or it’s a cart to push!”

“I mean the horse wasn’t there,” Tellman said irritably. “Nobody’s found it yet.”

“The Headsman let it loose?”

“Apparently.”

“What else?” Pitt leaned back, although no position was going to be comfortable today. “You have the head, I presume, since you know who he was and where he lived. Was he struck first? I don’t suppose he had anything worth robbing him of?”

“Yes, he was hit first, pretty hard, then his head taken off cleanly. Much better job than Arledge, poor devil. He was coming home from work, still had his uniform on, and he had three and sixpence in his pockets, which was about right, and a watch worth about five pounds. But why would anyone pick a bus conductor to rob?”

“Nobody would,” Pitt agreed unhappily. “Have you been to the family yet?”

Tellman’s narrow mouth tightened. “It’s still only half past eight.” He omitted the “Sir.” “Le Grange is on his way, just to inform her, like. Can’t see as she’ll be any help.” He put his hands in his pockets and stood in front of the desk, staring down at Pitt. “We’ve got another lunatic. Seems he attacks anyone, as the fit takes him. No sense to it at all. I’m going to try Bedlam again. Maybe they refused someone, or let a maniac go a while back …” But his dark flat eyes registered no hope that it would produce anything. Then suddenly the emotion was there, raw and violent. “Someone’s got to know him!” he said passionately. “All London’s snapping at itself with suspicion, people are jumping at shadows, no one trusts anybody anymore—but someone knows him. Someone’s seen his face afterwards, and known he wasn’t right. Someone’s seen a weapon, or knows about it—they’ve got to!”

Pitt frowned, ignoring the outburst. He knew it was true, he’d seen the fear in the eyes, heard the sharp edge to voices, the distrust, the defensiveness and the blame. “This gig, where did it come from? Whose is it?” He sat down.

Tellman looked slightly taken aback, but he hid it immediately.

“Don’t know yet, sir. Not much in it, no easily identifiable marks.”

“Well you’ll know soon enough if it was his, although I can’t see a bus conductor going home in a gig,” Pitt said thoughtfully. “Which raises the question as to why he was in it at all.”

“But it would be too much to hope it belonged to our lunatic.” Tellman curled his lip. “He’s far too fly for that!”

Pitt leaned farther back in his chair. Without thinking, he asked Tellman to sit down. “It raises the question of why use a gig at all,” he went on. “Let us assume it was stolen, if it did not belong to either of them. What did he want a vehicle for?”

“To move the body,” Tellman answered. “Which means he could have killed him anywhere—like Arledge.”

“Yes, but more probably either somewhere which would in some fashion betray him or—or somewhere which would be inconvenient to leave him,” Pitt said, thinking aloud.

“You mean where he would be found too soon, maybe?”

“Possibly. Where would this bus conductor have left the last bus?”

“Shepherd’s Bush station, Silgate Lane.”

“Long way from Hyde Park,” Pitt observed. “Is that where he lived?”

“Quarter of a mile away.”

“Well he certainly didn’t need a gig for a quarter of a mile. See if someone had a gig stolen from that neighborhood. Shouldn’t take long.”

Tellman preempted his next question, leaning back a little in his chair.

“Don’t know where he was killed yet, but should be somewhere around there. Unless he hit the poor fellow on the head and took him somewhere in the gig, so he could do the job in private. It’s not actually so easy to cut a man’s head off. Needs a swing and a lot of weight behind it.” He shook his head unhappily. “Wasn’t done in the gig. Could have taken him somewhere and tipped him out, cut off his head, then put the head and the body back in the gig and driven it to Hyde Park. But why? It doesn’t make sense any way you look at it.”

“Then there’s something about it we don’t know yet,” Pitt reasoned. “Find out what it is, Tellman.”

“Yes sir.” Tellman rose to his feet, then hesitated.