Kate plus 10
“That explains it,” said Michael. “What effect would this have on the
gates?” he asked.
“Well, you couldn’t open them from the box,” said the man.
“Could you open them by hand?”
“Yes, sir. We’ve got a chap on duty now who does nothing but open and
shut them,” said the man. “While the current is on, they are locked.
They work like ordinary gates, except you have to be very careful when
you lock them.”
Michael waited until a train had passed and then experimented.
The gates opened and closed easily enough.
“What do you mean when you tell me that you have to be careful with
the catch?”
“Well, ordinarily, when you use it without the current,” said the man,
“the catch falls and cannot be lifted except by electric control.”
Michael made an inspection of the “catch.” It was a steel block
working on a pivot and obviously operated magnetically.
“It doesn’t go up or down, now,” said Michael after testing it.
“It looks to me,” said the man, “as though it has been forced up.”
There was no doubt that what he said was true for the detective saw
the unmistakable mark of a jemmy on the wooden casing about the lock.
But why on earth did they want to open the gate? If the train had been
rifled on this stretch of line the need for an open gate would have
been easy to explain. The train would have been stopped here and,
supposing they could force the locks of the safe, the thieves could
have loaded their gold and got away--but no train had been found.
Michael passed through the turnstile and examined the road for
something to guide him to a solution.
It had been raining throughout the night and more than one traction
engine had passed, as was evident from the wheel marks. He explored
the road for a hundred yards and found nothing. Then he tried the
other gate and found that there the catch had also been forced. The
first twenty yards of the road was soft and the wheel tracks were
indistinguishable. At the end of this patch, however, the going was
harder, the crown of the road had drained off the rain and even the
traction engine had left no great impression.
Michael walked a pace or two, then stopped and whistled, and well
might he whistle, for there plain to be seen and not to be confused
with any other track was the deep and narrow furrow and the broad
impression which could have only been made by railway wheels!
He followed the track for another hundred yards where it struck the
main road and a tram line and from there every trace disappeared.
Very weary and dishevelled he presented himself to T.B. Smith and made
his report.
“You don’t seriously suggest that they took a railway train off the
line and put it on the road, do you?” asked T.B. in wonder. “It’s
impossible!”
“Of course it’s impossible,” said Michael irritably; “the whole thing
is impossible. You can’t steal a railway train--but they’ve done it!”
He found with the assistant commissioner Sir Ralph whose agitation was
pathetic.
“It’s pretty rough on me, old man,” said the baronet with that
friendliness which the superior person invariably adopts in a moment
of his misfortune. “I have lost a wife and a railway train in
twenty-four hours. What the dickens are you laughing at?”
“Nothing,” said Michael recovering his gravity. “It was almost worth
everything to see your face!”
CHAPTER XIV.
THE REMARKABLE TRAIN THAT DID
STRANGE TRICKS
By six o’clock that evening Michael Pretherston was back again at
his work, passing down from station to station on a pilot engine,
questioning and cross-examining the officials concerned. T.B. Smith
picked him up at Maidmore going down by the ordinary train.
“Have you found anything?”
“I have a theory,” said Michael. “I’d like you to listen to what the
station-master here has to say.”
“Have you questioned him?”
“Not yet,” said Michael, “but I have an idea he will say exactly what
the man at Stanborn said.”
The inspector who had been on night duty at the time the train passed
proved to be a very intelligent and observant man. He told the same
story, that the rain was falling very heavily and that he had seen the
distant lights of the gold special which had flown through the dark
station at incredible pace.
“Is it not a fact,” said Michael, “that it passed you before you
realized it was gone?”
The man was surprised.
“That is so, sir. It seemed as though I had hardly seen the headlights
come into the station before I saw the tail-lights going out.”
“Did it whistle as it passed through?”
“Yes, sir,” said the man, “a deafening whistle. I remarked to my
porter at the time that it must be trying a new kind of siren. It made
the most fiendish row and you could hear nothing else.”
“It whistled through all the stations where there was somebody on
duty,” said Michael turning to T.B. Smith. “It is a curious fact that
at Stanborn Halt and Merchley which are closed for the night they made
no noise at all. Was the station in darkness?” he said, turning to the
inspector.
“Practically so, sir,” said the man; “there was one light on the down
platform where I was standing, but it was a very dark night and it was
impossible to distinguish anything on the other platform. All that we
saw was the flash of lights and the train had passed before one had
realized that it had gone.”
The inspector at Pinham Heights station had a similar story to tell.
But the Tolbridge junction signalman and the Tolbridge assistant
station-master did not report any whistle or any unusual happening.
T.B. and Michael spent the night at Tolbridge and resumed their
journey at daybreak. It was a slow and laborious business. Once
between Pinham and Beckham Beacon, Michael had stopped the train and
switched it on to a sidetrack.
“Why is there a sidetrack here?” he asked.
The railway official who accompanied him and who by this time was very
weary of the whole business, explained vaguely that it was partly to
provide a very necessary relief for any congestion on this section,
and partly to connect up a “chalk pit or something” which now,
however, was no longer used.
Michael walked along the rusted rails for a quarter of a mile. They
led toward a low line of hills about three miles away. Rank vegetation
grew between the sleepers, for it had been many years since its
private owners had taken the trouble to put this little branch line in
working order.
The road ended abruptly with a big buffer made of sleepers and behind
this the rail drooped limply over a great hole as though there had
been a subsidence of the earth.
Michael turned back and joined T.B.
“It could not have passed over here. The rail is rusty and runs into a
large-sized hole at the other end,” said Michael in despair. “Well, go
on, driver.”
It was a day of enquiries which led nowhere and Michael returned that
night to town, weary and sick at heart. Nevertheless, he had the dim
beginnings of a theory which, however, he refused to communicate to
his chief.
“It is rather fantastic,” he excused himself, “but then, the whole
thing is fantastic. It is obviously impossible to steal a railway
train and carry it through the streets of London without somebody
being attracted by the novelty of the spectacle.”
“Will you see Sir Ralph?” asked T.B. “He has been waiting here for an
hour to meet you.”
“Hasn’t he got a home?” asked Michael irritably.
He saw the distracted baronet but could offer him little hope.
“It is impossible they can get away with it,” said Sir Ralph; “my
expert tells me that it will take them two days to break through the
steel walls whatever they use.”
A thought struck Michael.
“Have you a large scale map of your southern railway system?” he
asked.
“I will have it sent round to you to-night,” said the baronet. “What
chance do you think there is?” he asked anxiously.
“I think a very poor chance,” said Michael frankly; “you see, Kate
doesn’t take any risk.”
“Kate?” said the baronet.
“You call her the ‘Princess Bacheffski.’ Flanborough calls her ‘Miss
Tenby.’ As ‘Miss Tenby’ she secured Flanborough’s code and through
some of her agents in the telegraph office learned about the shipment.
As ‘Princess Bacheffski’ she wheedled the whole of your wonderful
scheme for bringing gold from Seahampton and probably discovered the
nature of the steel you use.”
“Good heavens!”
Sir Ralph sank into a chair and turned pale.
“You don’t mean to tell me--?”
“That is what I mean to tell you. Didn’t you realize that the whole
thing was a put up job? Why should the car of the Princess break down
at your front door?”
“But she was so beautifully dressed.”
“Why shouldn’t she be beautifully dressed?” asked Michael mercilessly;
“she probably carried twenty thousand pounds’ worth of diamonds.
Wasn’t it worth it? Didn’t you give her information which she could
not have bought for the money?”
“Then you mean to say that she is a common swindler?”
“She is a very _un_common swindler,” said Michael. “There’s only one
thing that puzzles me,” he said, half to himself; “what did she want
of Reggie?”
Mr. Reginald Boltover was interrupted in the delicate business of
dressing for dinner by a peremptory demand that an officer of Scotland
Yard should be admitted. He was relieved to discover that it was
nothing more formidable than Michael.
“I have come to ask you about your friend Vera.”
Mr. Boltover winced.
“My dear fellow,” he said, “don’t mention that lady’s name. It is a
sore subject. Don’t mention her, dear old fellow, don’t.”
“Don’t be an ass,” said Michael good-humouredly; “you must give me an
idea of the questions which she asked you. What did she talk about?”
But Mr. Boltover’s mind was a blank.
It was his boast that he did not know there was such a thing as
yesterday.
“Did she ask you to give her any information about things you are
interested in?”
“My dear fellow,” said Reggie Boltover, shaking his head, “if she did
I have forgotten it. All I know is that she very seriously compromised
me. I have not been to Sebo’s since.”
“As you are such a perfectly hopeless person,” said Michael, “will you
give me a note to your secretary or your factotum or whatever human
substitute for mentality you possess, instructing him to give me a
full list of your properties?”
“With the greatest pleasure in life, with every happiness,” said
Reggie earnestly, “with the greatest alacrity!”
Armed with this, Michael called the next morning at the office of one
who was frequently referred to by journalists as a “merchant prince,”
and when he came out into Threadneedle Street his step was lighter and
his eye was brighter than it had been for weeks.
“Now, Kate,” he said between his teeth, “this is where you finish!”
He could have had all the men he wanted but he preferred making his
investigation without assistance. He went home and changed into a
knickerbocker suit, took his oldest overcoat, a walking stick and a
Browning pistol with two spare magazines. He did not ask for a special
engine, but travelled to Pinham Heights station by ordinary train. He
showed his authority to the station-master who, however, recognized
him.
“I don’t want anybody to know that I am down here,” he said, “and I
must rely upon your discretion to see that my wishes in this respect
are carried out. Am I likely to meet any plate-layers or people on the
line between here and Tolbridge?”
“You will meet nobody until you come to Tolbridge box, but be very
careful,” warned the station-master, “the down express goes through
the tunnel in ten minutes. I should advise you not to leave until that
has passed.”
This advice Michael thought it expedient to accept and not until the
rocking train had shrieked through the station and the receding red