Edward Marston - Inspector Colbeck's Casebook

‘The money is still inside,’ said Maud, piously. ‘We’re not thieves. We just like the thrill of relieving people of whatever they have in their pockets and handbags.’

‘It’s a sort of hobby,’ said Lilian, stroking a stolen cigar case. ‘Maud and I are well provided for, as you can see, but our lives lack excitement. Since our husbands died, life became very dull until we discovered how light-fingered we were. We take it in turns to pick pockets then pass it on for safekeeping to whoever is acting as a lookout. You’ve no idea how careless people are in a crowd.’

‘Yes, I do,’ said Leeming. ‘I’ve seen too many examples of it.’

‘I was careless,’ admitted Andrews. ‘I never felt a thing.’

Maud beamed. ‘That’s because I lifted your wallet when you were listening to that old man on the harp. Unbeknownst to him, he’s been very helpful to us.’

‘All this will be advertised,’ said Leeming, indicating the display. ‘A lot of people are going to be very glad that we’ve recovered what was stolen from them.’

‘I’m one of them,’ said Andrews, holding up his wallet. ‘It never crossed my mind that I’d been robbed by a woman.’

‘Nor me,’ confessed the sergeant. ‘You fooled me completely. I was looking for two hardened criminals, not a pair of respectable ladies who happened to be sisters.’

‘That was our disguise,’ boasted Lilian. ‘Nobody suspected us.’

‘It was wonderful while it lasted,’ added Maud. ‘It was a family business, so to speak. I’m sorry that it’s over but we always knew it would have to end one day.’

‘It’s finished for good,’ said Leeming, bluntly. ‘You’ll have to come with me to the police station. Oh,’ he went on, turning to Maud. ‘There’s one thing I’m curious to know. Was your husband really an archdeacon?’

‘That’s exactly what Arthur was,’ replied Maud with a nostalgic smile, ‘and Lilian will confirm it. He was the light of my life in every way. I would never lie to you about his eminent position in the church. There was, however, some deception involved,’ she conceded. ‘Unfortunately, Arthur was not my husband. We simply pretended that he was.’ Her eyes twinkled. ‘He and I had an understanding, you see.’

As they walked hand in hand beside the rippling stream, they felt the early morning sun on their backs. Alaric and Liza Bignall had been married for over nine months now but they still had the glow of newly-weds. The route was among their favourites and held a special significance because it was beside that same stream that Bignall had proposed to her. Since they’d both been overwhelmed by excitement at the time, they could not remember the exact spot where the event had taken place. All that Bignall could recall was that it was near a point where they’d been able to cross the stream by using a series of small boulders as stepping stones. The problem was that boulders were strewn everywhere in the water, creating eddies and miniature cascades at irregular intervals.

‘I think that it was here,’ he said, coming to a halt.

‘No, it wasn’t, Alaric. It was much farther on than this.’

‘It feels like the right place, Liza.’

‘Not to me, it doesn’t,’ she said.

‘Look at the way the stepping stones are set.’

‘That’s what I am doing and they’re wrong. There was a very large boulder in the middle of the stream, much bigger than the one here.’

‘Your memory’s playing tricks on you.’

‘When we find the right place,’ she said, firmly, ‘I’ll know it at once.’

Their discussion was interrupted by the sound of an approaching train. It was travelling at full speed. They turned to look up the embankment and watched the train thunder past. From an open window, a top hat suddenly shot out and rolled crazily down the embankment. The door of a compartment was then flung open and a man dived out, hitting solid earth and tumbling helplessly towards them. Gathering pace, he fell on and on until he reached the stream itself, plunging into the water and striking his head against a jagged rock.

By the time they got to him, the blood gushing from the wound was being carried away by the stream. Liza was aghast.

‘He’s dead!’ she cried.

When they eventually got to Sheffield station, they alighted from the train and hired a cab to take them to the outskirts of the town. Victor Leeming was not at all convinced that their journey was necessary.

‘All this fuss over a top hat,’ he moaned. ‘When carriages had no roofs on them, hats were being blown off all the time and there were dozens of cases of people chasing after them. That’s obviously what happened here, sir.’

‘Unlike you,’ said Colbeck, wryly, ‘I’m not gifted with second sight so I can’t make such an authoritative judgement. Neither, it seems, can the railway company that asked us to investigate. They want an answer to a simple question — did he jump out of the train or was he pushed?’

‘He jumped out after his hat, sir.’

‘When the train was going full pelt?’

‘Some people are very vain about their appearance,’ said Leeming, pointedly. ‘They’d die rather than be seen in public without a hat.’

‘I’m one of them,’ said the other with a laugh, ‘and I freely admit it. But even my vanity doesn’t extend to risking my life in order to retrieve a top hat. Headgear can be easily replaced, albeit at a cost. I’m conceited enough to believe that Detective Inspector Robert Colbeck would not be so easily substituted.’

They lapsed into silence and watched houses, civic buildings and factories slide past. Earlier in the century, Sheffield had been a pretty South Yorkshire town with the most famous cutlery industry in England. The advent of railways had increased its population markedly, pushed out its boundaries and given its burgeoning enterprises an international market. Cutlery remained its main product but steel, carpets and furniture were also produced. The invention of the silver-plating process enabled the town to manufacture Sheffield Plate, another claim to fame. Growth came at a price. Billowing smoke and industrial clamour seemed to be everywhere.

‘Do you know what a hat trick is?’ asked Colbeck, resuming the conversation.

‘Yes, sir,’ replied Leeming with a grin. ‘It’s keeping the thing on your head instead of letting it blow off.’

‘I can see that you don’t follow events in the world of cricket.’

‘Tug-of-war is the only sport that I was any good at. When I was a young constable, I was part of a winning team.’

‘To some degree,’ said Colbeck, ‘you still are. We’re engaged in a non-stop tug-of-war against the criminal fraternity. We have to fight hard to retain our footing. However,’ he continued, ‘I ask about a cricketing term because it recently came into being in this very town. Sheffield has a long association with the sport. Does the name H. H. Stephenson mean anything to you?’

Leeming shook his head. ‘I’ve never heard of the man, Inspector.’

‘His remarkable feat has introduced a new phrase into the English language. A mere fortnight ago, Stephenson was playing for the All-England Eleven here in Sheffield. With three consecutive balls, he bowled out three of the opposing batsmen.’

‘Is that unusual?’

‘It’s extremely unusual, Victor. I daresay that it’s happened before but it’s never been accorded its full merit. In this instance, a hat was taken round the spectators and they tossed coins into it in appreciation of what they’d seen.’

‘Nobody did that when we won a tug-of-war. The most we got was a free pint of beer and — if we were lucky — a stale pork pie.’