Murder At Deviation Junction (21 page)

    What
were the chances that I would be returning the following day with the whole
thing knocked and the case closed? Nil. For a start, I was most likely heading
in the wrong direction. This was a northern matter, somehow tangled up with the
iron-mining industry of the Cleveland Hills; it was in the slice of moon over
Stone Farm; the lonely pit tops; beacon fires burning on the cliffs; the
mineral train going between the legs of the Kilton Viaduct like a mouse between
table legs. I watched the telegraph wires rising and crashing into the
telegraph poles at an ever greater rate as we sped towards Peterborough, and
somewhere on that stretch I fell asleep, waking on arrival at London King's
Cross.

    I
walked along Platform One, going by a long line of trolleys piled with
mailbags. A barrier had been erected around the parcels office so as to make
extra space for working through the Christmas rush. Everybody who worked in
that station looked in need of a good night's sleep, and the ones not moving
about were shaking with cold. I stepped across the road from the station. The
constant flow of traffic had turned the snow into black slush, but some
remained on the pavements. I bought an orange from a bloke with a white beard
who sold oranges and chestnuts - he looked very Christmassy, but wouldn't have
thanked you for pointing it out. I looked along the Euston Road: it roared with
life. I glanced upwards, at the giant white face of the clock on the Midland
Grand Hotel, and it looked wrong for a moment. One hand had fallen off. But no
- midnight.

    I
would not be spending fifteen bob on a night in the Midland Grand. Instead, I
walked north to the small house-sized hotels that served King's Cross. The
first was called the Yorkshire Hotel. Well, London was anybody's, and this
place got custom by reminding folk of the places the nearby railways went to. A
notice on the door of the Yorkshire Hotel read 'Respectable Persons Only', and
I wondered whether that included me. For instance, I was probably out of a job
at that very moment, but I'd brushed most of the loose mud off my suit, and it
passed muster with the not very respectable customer who ran the place. He
showed me to a sooty room at the top that had no fire, but two beds, and he
advised me to take the bedclothes from one and pile them on top of the other.
That was the Yorkshireness of the place, I thought: the bitter cold. But after
putting my boots to air on the windowsill, I got my head down and slept through
until ten o'clock, when I pulled back the curtains to see a bright, bitter day.

    I was
too late for the serving of breakfast in the Yorkshire Hotel, so walked to a
stall near the station and drank a cup of Oxo and ate a bacon sandwich. I then
rode the Inner Circle line to Charing Cross. There were faster ways of getting
to Fleet Street, but I had time to kill until my midday meeting, and I liked
the Inner Circle. They'd put on electric trains since I'd seen it last, but it
was still a railway in a coal cellar; you were still looking up from below the
streets at the towering, blank backs of the buildings, many of them covered
with giant posters for Lipton's tea.

    I
stepped out of Charing Cross Underground into muddy snow, and the black shadow
of the Hungerford railway bridge. Having taken my bearings, I put up my collar
and walked north up Villiers Street, turning right on the Strand. I was under
the clock a quarter of an hour before time and I felt a proper ass for standing
still in that weather. Nobody else in Fleet Street stood still. They pushed on
fast in their good suits, clicking canes and highly polished boots - all the
dapper dogs, with many straw hats worn even in the extreme cold. Everyone
walking was really
working;
there were no loafers in Fleet Street.

    And
the ones in the shiniest boots and hats were the lawyers - the thoroughbred
black horses among the London nags. They were an exquisite lot, which made you
suspicious of them. As I watched, they came and went from the ancient alleyways
opposite in capes or fur-collared coats, and I thought of Marriott, the
barrister of the Travelling Club who was known to the Chief. Every brief in the
country came from that ancient place opposite - from it or other, similar
places near by. They came to York for the Assizes, and I pictured them riding
into the city like a pageant.

    At
twelve o'clock, about a dozen clocks struck, driving the people on to faster
walking, and the vibration of the air seemed to bring on snow, for it started
again now - just the odd, accidental snowflake, escaping from the dark, moving
clouds above. Where was Bowman? I tried to recall his looks: the red,
ridiculous face, the nose at once too big and too small. His head put me in
mind of a teapot, somehow. He was strange-looking - and as a clever man, he
knew
it. He didn't like to be stared at and would seldom meet your eye. It
would be wrong to take against him on that account.

    I
watched the road. I had the feeling that Bowman would cross it to get to me.
Fleet Street contained as many cabs as the pavement did people, and they could
only fit on to the road as long as they all kept moving - if one of them
stopped, they all would. None did stop, though. Anybody in a cab in this
weather would be inclined to stay in it, while the omnibuses, being open to the
snow, ran empty.

    A
hand touched my shoulder and I whirled around.

    He'd
already had one or two, I could tell. The cold had made his face extra-red.
Same green topcoat, same flat sporting cap, which was like a saddle on a
donkey, for he was not at all the sporting type.

    'Good
to see you,' he said, and his eyes settled on mine for longer than at any
moment during our time at Stone Farm, but even so, not for very long.

    'This
way, Jim,' he said.

    'Where
are we off to?'

    'Licensed
premises,' he said without looking back. 'He was there again last night. Looking
at the living-room window when I sat in the dining room, then at the bedroom
when I went upstairs ...'

    There
were pageboys everywhere, dashing about with great piles of newspapers - fresh
batches, newly made.

    'Snowing
up north, is it?' Bowman asked me, looking ahead.

    'It
was bitter when I left,' I said.

    We
were passing newspaper offices: the
Yorkshire Observer
, the
Irish
Independent,
the
Aberdeen Free Press.
The grander ones hung out a
clock, just as a rich man will show off his watch.

    '"Truro
as a Railway Centre",' Bowman was saying. 'That's the masterpiece I've
been slaving over this morning. Truro, you know, is one of the largest towns in
Cornwall . . . which is saying absolutely
nothing.
The station is
quite
modern; there is still
some
tin traffic.'

    He
was talking more than he had at Stone Farm - still sounding worried, but in a
different way. A newspaper placard read 'African Doctor Cooked and Eaten By
Natives', and the hundreds of people and the hundreds of cabs just flowed on
by. It took more than that to cause a sensation in Fleet Street.

    'In
the end I decided on leading off with the fact that every train on the main
line stops there, but then Fawcett walked up - he is the leading railwayac of the
office - and he told me of two that don't, including one that stops everywhere
but
Truro.'

    He
had stopped walking, and was standing before two pubs, weighing them in the
balance.

    'It's
champagne or beer,' he said.

    Both
pubs had black windows with white writing on them: 'Saloon Bar and Buffet',
'Luncheons and Teas', 'Dining Rooms First Floor'.

    'Will
you take a glass of champagne?' Bowman asked, pushing at the door of one of the
pubs. 'No thanks,' I said, as we entered, 'I had a skinful last night, and I'm
a little -'

    But
Bowman had already moved off towards the bar. It was a good-sized, jolly wooden
hall in full swing with a decorated tree just inside the door and giant beer
barrels end-on over the bar, like locomotive wheels. The customers stood at
tall tables - or just anywhere. Bowman was giving good morning to a man at the
bar; he held two glasses of champagne in his hand. As he turned away from the
man and approached me, I said, 'I didn't want a drink, thanks', at which he
just frowned.

    'It's
on expenses, for heaven's sake,' he said. 'You'd better force it down because
I'm getting you another in half a minute.'

    He
emptied his glass and folded his arms.

    'I
don't want to over-dramatise, but do you carry a gun?'

    'No,'
I said, downing the champagne.

    'What
do you do if someone fires at you?'

    I
shrugged.

    'I
get shot, I suppose.'

    'Well,
that's heartening,' he said. 'This fellow who stands outside our house always
has his right hand in his coat pocket. I'm sure he has a pistol there. I'm
sorry, but I can't talk about this without a drink . . .'

    He
was about to move off to the bar again, but I checked him by asking, 'The man
who keeps watch - he was definitely there again last night, was he?'

    Bowman
nodded. 'From eight to nine-thirty.'

    'Did
Violet not notice?'

    He
shook his head. 'We spend most of our time in the drawing room - at any rate,
the room that she
calls
the drawing room - and that's at the back of the
house. Fortunately, she's gone off to her mother's for two nights.'

    'Where's
that?'

    'Environs
of Hampstead Heath.' 'Eh?'

    'Strictly
speaking, it's Tufnell Park.'

    And
he went back to the bar again.

    He
returned with two more glasses and a bottle of red wine. The cork had been
taken out and put back loosely. It was 'finest Algerian wine' according to the
label.

    'This
fellow outside my house obviously thinks I know something about the death of
Peters,' he said, filling the glasses, 'and of course he's right. I'm sure the
only reason he hasn't acted is that the street's been busier than usual, what
with all the Christmas coming and going ... You said there'd been developments
in the case.'

    I
produced the photograph and explained how I'd come by it; told him as much as I
knew about it.

    'Is
the man outside your door one of these?'

    Bowman
looked, shook his head and saw off another great gulp of the Algerian red, and
looked again.

    He
said, 'You think Peters was killed for that picture?'

    I
nodded. 'I'm sure it's the one his killer was after - only it didn't come from
the Stone Farm camera, but the one stolen at Middlesbrough.'

    He
handed back the photograph, pulling a face, and saying, 'It looks just like
something that might appear in our magazine: an interesting new sidelight on
First Class travel.'

    'Well,
that's what it was meant for, wasn't it?' I said.

    'Of
course,' said Bowman. 'I'm not thinking straight.'

    I was
not surprised over that. Bowman's glass was at his lips, and the bottle was
half-empty. I myself had not yet tried the Algerian wine.

    'How
can you write, shipping all that stuff?' I said, pointing to the bottle.

    'You
might ask that of any man in here,' he said. 'I mean, it's all scribes in this
place. Every paper in London's carried into print on a wave of booze, you know
- it accounts for a lot of the rubbish you read and a lot of the best stuff
too.'

    Silence
for a space.

    'Well,
I'll come back to Wimbledon this evening with you and have a look,' I said.

    'What
will you do?'

    'Well,
I'll quiz him as to what he's about.'

    'Do
you have authority here in London?' he asked.

    'It's
a matter that began on North Eastern Railway lands,' I said. 'It would be a
poor lookout if all any villain had to do was flee the territory.'

    He
sighed.

    'One
more ought to do it,' he said, looking at the empty bottle. 'Will you not join
me in -' He was squinting at the label on the bottle,'- in Algeria, then?'

    But
he was already at the bar.

    'Do
you not take wine at luncheon?' he said, returning. He never so much as
grinned, but sometimes it was there in his voice; and I could tell that the
wine was now working in him.