Crime at Christmas (37 page)

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T
HE
Inspector arrested the Guard for the wilful murder of Arthur J. Kilmington.

Kilmington's
pocket had been picked by Inez Blake, when she pretended to faint at 8:25, and
his gold watch was at once passed by her to her accomplice, Macdonald.

Now
Kilmington was constantly consulting his watch. It is inconceivable, if he was
not killed till after 9 p.m., that he should not have missed the watch and made
a scene. This point was clinched by the first-class passenger, who deposed that
a man, answering to the description of Kilmington, had asked him the time at
8:50: if it had really been Kilmington, he would certainly, before inquiring
the time of anyone else, have first tried to consult his own watch, found it
was gone, and reported the theft. The fact that Kilmington neither reported the
loss to the Guard, nor returned to his original compartment to look for the
watch, proves he must have been murdered before he became aware of the loss,
i.e. shortly after he left the compartment at 8:27. But the Guard claimed to
have spoken to Kilmington at 9 p.m. Therefore the Guard was lying. And why
should he lie, except to create an alibi for himself? This is Clue A.

The Guard
claimed to have talked with Kilmington at 9 p.m. Now, at 8:55 the blizzard had
diminished to a light snowfall, which soon afterwards ceased. When Stansfield
discovered the body, it was buried under snow. Therefore Kilmington must have
been murdered while the blizzard was still raging, i.e. some time before 9
p.m. Therefore the Guard was lying when he said Kilmington was alive at 9 p.m.
This is Clue B.

Henry
Stansfield, who was investigating on behalf of the Cosmopolitan Insurance
Company the loss of the Countess of Axminster's emeralds, reconstructed the
crime as follows:

Motive.
The Guard's wife had been gravely
ill before Christmas: then, just about the time of the train robbery, he had
got her the best surgeon in Glasgow and put her in a nursing home (evidence of
engine-driver: Clue C): a Guard's pay does not usually run to such expensive
treatment; it seemed likely, therefore, that the man, driven desperate by his
wife's need, had agreed to take part in the robbery in return for a substantial
bribe. What part did he play? During the investigation, the Guard had stated
that he had left his van for five minutes, while the train was climbing the
last section of Shap Bank, and on his return found the mail-bags missing. But
Kilmington, who was travelling on this train, had found the Guard's van locked
at this point, and now (evidence of Mrs Grant: Clue D) declared his intention
of reporting the Guard. The latter knew that Kilmington's report would
contradict his own evidence and thus convict him of complicity in the crime,
since he had locked the van for a few minutes to throw out the mail-bags
himself, and pretended to Kilmington that he had been asleep (evidence of K.)
when the latter knocked at the door. So Kilmington had to be silenced.

Stansfield
already had Percy Dukes under suspicion as the organiser of the robbery. During
the journey, Dukes gave himself away three times. First, although it had not
been mentioned in the papers, he betrayed knowledge of the point on the line
where the bags had been thrown out. Second, though the loss of the emeralds had
been also kept out of the Press, Dukes knew it was an emerald
necklace
which had been stolen; Stansfield
had laid a trap for him by calling it a bracelet, but later in conversation
Dukes referred to the 'necklace'. Third, his great discomposure at the (false)
statement by Stansfield that the emeralds were worth £25,000 was the reaction
of a criminal who believes he has been badly gypped by the fence to whom he has
sold them.

Dukes was
now planning a second train robbery, and meant to compel the Guard to act as
accomplice again. Inez Blake's evidence (Clue E) of hearing him say
"You're going to help us again, chum," etc., clearly pointed to the
Guard's complicity in the previous robbery; it was almost certainly the Guard
to whom she had heard Dukes say this, for only a railway servant would have
known about the existence of a platelayers' hut up the line, and made an
appointment to meet Dukes there; moreover, to anyone
but
a railway servant Dukes could have
talked about his plans for the next robbery on the train itself, without either
of them incurring suspicion should they be seen talking together.

Method.
At 8:27 Kilmington goes into the
Guard's van. He threatens to report the Guard, though he is quite unaware of
the dire consequences this would entail for the latter. The Guard, probably on
the pretext of showing him the route to the village, gets Kilmington out of the
train, walks him away from the lighted area, stuns him (the bruise was a light
one and did not reveal itself to Stansfield's brief examination of the body),
carries him to the spot where Stansfield found the body, packs mouth and
nostrils tight with snow. Then, instead of leaving well alone, the Guard
decides to create an alibi for himself. He takes his victim's hat, returns to
the train, puts on his own dark, off-duty overcoat, finds a solitary passenger
asleep, masquerades as Kilmington inquiring the time, and strengthens the
impression by saying he'd walk to the village if the relief engine did not turn
up in five minutes, then returns to the body and throws down the hat beside it
(Stansfield found the hat only lightly covered with snow, as compared with the
body: Clue F). Moreover, the passenger noticed that the inquirer was wearing
blue trousers (Clue G); the Guard's regulation suit was blue; Duke's suit was
grey, Macdonald's a loud check—therefore the masquerader could not have been
either of them.

The time is
now 8:55. The Guard decides
to reinforce his alibi by going to
intercept the returning fireman. He takes a short cut from the body to the
platelayers' hut. The track he now makes, compared with the beaten trail
towards the village, is much more lightly filled in with snow when Stansfield
finds it (Clue H); therefore it must have been made some little time after the
murder, and could not incriminate Percy Dukes. The Guard meets the fireman just
after 8:55.

They walk back to the train. The Guard is taken aside by Dukes, who has
gone out for his 'airing,' and the conversation overheard by Inez Blake takes
place. The Guard tells Dukes he will meet him presently in the platelayers'
hut; this is vaguely aimed to incriminate Dukes, should the murder by any
chance be discovered, for Dukes would find it difficult to explain why he
should have sat alone in a cold hut for half an hour just around the time when
Kilmington was presumably murdered only 150 yards away.

The Guard now goes along to the engine and stays there chatting with the
crew for some forty minutes. His alibi is thus established for the period from
8:55 to 9:40 p.m. His plan might well have succeeded but for three unlucky
factors he could not possibly have taken into account—Stansfield's presence on
the train, the blizzard stopping soon after 9 p.m., and the theft of Arthur J.
Kilmington's watch.

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