WWW UBO
The Mystery of the Shit Faced Man

My name is Daniel Rose and the tale that I am about to tell took place in the summer of 1927, as I was travelling to the annual Squirrel Taunting Championships in Wakefield. I do not claim, you must understand, to be an accomplished squirrel taunter myself, but there is something about those furry little gits that really sets my teeth on edge, so I feel that it is important that I should play a modest but important part in their downfall.

I recall that the train out of Weybridge was very busy. No doubt there were a few who were as eager as I was to get in on the squirrel action, although the local paper had just announced that the Prince of Wales was planning a visit to our humble town, and I imagine that it was this that prompted the mass exodus.

I had been fortunate enough to find myself a seat in a quiet compartment. My companions numbered three. There was a bluff looking fellow in the uniform of an air-vice-marshal, sporting a huge but aerodynamic moustache that extended for about a foot on either side of his face. The ends of this extraordinary structure appeared to be capable of independent movement and I would not have been the least bit surprised if they had shown evidence of an ability use simple tools.

To my right was a vicar, naturally. He was a tall, angular chap - a youngish man, but somehow he appeared frail. Almost transparent, in fact. The curious thing was that if I squinted at him it was almost as if I could see right through to the pattern of the seat in which he sat. I noticed that he was getting nervous and was fingering his crucifix restlessly, so I thought it wise to stop squinting at him for the present.

Finally, to my left was a richly upholstered middle-aged woman of ample proportions who had caked her face in so much makeup that I took it to be an attempt at weatherproofing. She was staring down her nose at me - a good trick if you can do it. I'm nothing if not civil and so I said hello, but the words dried to nothing in my throat and so I turned to look out of the window and resolved not to look at her again for the duration of the journey, if I could possibly manage it.

Moments later the door slid open. A man in a sharp suit and a felt hat leaned in, pointed directly at the seat where I was sitting and said, "I say, is anyone sitting there?"

"No, I don't think so," replied the woman.

"Yes," I replied.

"Excellent, then I'll pitch in with you good people." The man came in, hefted a travelling case into the luggage rack and sat in my lap. "The name's Benchley," he said with a smile. Or at least I assumed he was smiling. He was sitting on me, so it was a bit difficult for me to tell.

"Delighted, Mr Benchley," said the woman, who subsequently introduced herself as Miss Kershaw.

"Excuse me!" I protested indignantly, but my words were muffled as this man called Benchley leaned back further into his seat. Or rather, into my seat.

"Air-Vice-Marshal Sidney Totters," the RAF man introduced himself. "And the padre here is the Reverend Snoop."

Benchley leaned forward to shake their hands and as he did so I wriggled and prodded him in the back. This prompted a response, but only a minor one. "I say," he said. "This chair is dashed uncomfortable.

"I am not a chair," I protested.

"And it talks!" exclaimed Benchley.

"Gad! Now isn't that novel!" said the Air-Vice-Marshal. "A talking chair. What will they think of next?"

"I am not a talking chair," I insisted and I poked my passenger once more.

"Steady on!" he cried, twisted round and saw me for the first time. "Good lord, how did you get there?"

"I've been here all the time," I said. "You sat on me."

"What's that?" said the Air-Vice-Marshal. "What's that he's saying?"

"He's says that he's been here all along and that I sat on him," said Benchley, sounding genuinely confused.

"Ha! A likely story," responded the Air-Vice-Marshal. "I reckon that what you've got there is a stowaway. Must have smuggled himself on board in your trousers. What do you reckon, vicar?"

"Well I really don't know," Reverend Snoop replied, understandably. Clergymen are rarely given sufficient training to form opinions these days.

"I am not a stowaway," I retorted. "And I have never been anywhere near this man's trousers - not until he sat on me anyway."

"He's right about that," Benchley agreed. "I always make a thorough inspection of my trousers before I board public transport, and I always tuck my trouser legs into my socks precisely to stop this sort of thing happening."

"Perhaps he dropped out of a tree?" ventured the vicar. "When I was doing missionary work in Malaya, we would often get snakes dropping out of trees and sliding down your back. Very unpleasant."

"No trees in here, padre," said the Air-Vice-Marshal.

"Ah yes, I was forgetting. Must be the trousers then."

"Oh this is ridiculous," I said. "I've been here all along. You've all seen me." I looked to Miss Kershaw to corroborate my story, but her eyes were now pulsing with a strange demonic light, and so I turned instead to the Air-Vice-Marshal. "You remember me, surely? You can't have missed me, I'm sitting directly opposite."

The Air-Vice-Marshal twitched his moustache contemplatively and one end of it traced a line through the condensation on the window whilst the other playfully brushed Miss Kershaw's knee. "Hmm," he said. "I don't know. What did you look like?"

"What did I look like?" I repeated in exasperation. "You mean, what did I look like just a few moments ago? Well, I looked exactly like I do now, of course, only less crumpled and without a twelve-stone man sitting on me."

"Hmm," the Air-Vice-Marshal said again, his keen military mind churning over the facts of the case. "Well, now I come to think of it, there was someone sitting there before. Could be the same feller, I suppose."

"Of course I'm the same fellow," I replied. "Who else would I be?"

"Harvey Chumbles," said the vicar.

"What's that, padre?"

"Harvey Chumbles," Reverend Snoop repeated. "He said 'who else would I be?'. Well he could be Harvey Chumbles."

"And who is Harvey Chumbles?" the Air-Vice-Marshal asked.

"I have no idea," said Reverend Snoop. "I thought he was a friend of yours."

"Look, look here," I said. I'd had an idea how we might resolve this once and for all. I reached into my pocket, searching for the evidence that would exonerate me. This is a tricky manoeuvre when you have someone sitting in your lap and things did get rather confused. At one point I found myself fumbling through Mr Benchley's pockets by mistake - not something I would ever recommend as the contents of another man's trousers are so often an unpleasant surprise. Eventually I found what I was looking for and held up a small piece of paper. "My ticket."

The Air-Vice-Marshal examined it and found it to be genuine. Mr Benchley graciously apologised and asked me if I would like him to get off me. I told him I would like that very much, and he went and sat by the window. Moments later the door opened, a vicar craned in, pointed at my seat and said, "Is anyone sitting there?"

I was about to respond to this enquiry both clearly and forcefully, but the Air-Vice-Marshal beat me to it. "Sorry, padre," he said and he pointed to the Reverend Snoop. "We've got one already."

As I am sure you are aware, ever since the notorious harvest festival riots of '23 it has been illegal for two or more vicars to share the same compartment on a train. This new vicar noted that we had already reached our quota, blessed us all enthusiastically then shuffled off. Moments later the guard blew his whistle, the carriage shuddered and jolted and we were on our way.

* * *

Railway travel is in its infancy and the modern English gentleman is still acclimatised to passing his time quietly in his sitting room, staring at the walls and waiting for someone to invent television. It is not yet known exactly what hurtling along at speeds in excess of twenty or sometimes twenty-five miles an hour can do to a person. Stories are told of horrific injuries, terrifying episodes of mental confusion and excruciating lapses of etiquette. I once heard of one fellow who, by inadvertently boarding the wrong connecting train at Crewe, managed to end up in Bristol half an hour before he set out and was disowned by all his friends in consequence. Imagine that - Bristol!

I count myself fortunate that no such railway-related mishaps have ever touched upon my life - or at least they hadn't until I embarked upon this journey, for I found myself experiencing a most curious sensation. We had been sitting in silence for an hour. That is, I had been sitting in silence. My fellow travellers were happy to engage in light conversation but did not feel it necessary to involve me. I believe there may still have been some lingering animosity or suspicion, though I could not fathom why they should have been so aggrieved since it was I who had been so callously sat on and was therefore the injured party. Nevertheless, ignored I was, although this was no great hardship as it left me at liberty to practise my potato printing. I was just peeling my second spud when we went into a tunnel and everything went dark.

There are certain conventions that custom dictates when entering a tunnel, namely that no one says a word, everybody holds their breath and under no circumstances should anyone ever, ever fart. I held it all in and waited for the darkness to pass, but suddenly I felt a sharp stinging sensation on my cheek, just under my left eye. As we emerged from the tunnel I checked my reflection in the polished surface of my patent Whittley stainless steel potato peeler and saw a red mark on my face, rapidly ripening into a bruise.

Strange, I thought, this had never happened before. I looked at my companions but there did not appear to be anything troubling them. In fact, they all looked quite happy - the Air-Vice-Marshal in particular looked very pleased with himself. I shrugged it off and carried on with my potato printing. I had just carved a particularly splendid 'g' into a Maris Piper when we went through another tunnel and I felt that odd sensation again - this time on the side of my head. Emerging from the tunnel, I rubbed my sore ear and looked around the compartment. Again, none of my companions appeared to be suffering any ill effects. The Air-Vice-Marshal was even laughing.

I knew that there were two more tunnels on this stretch of the line and that we would be approaching the first of them very shortly. I braced myself, determined to get to the bottom of this matter and once more we were plunged into darkness. But this time I felt nothing. I did hear something though: a series of scuffling noises, then something heavy being dropped and then finally a belch (unpleasant, but the rules only apply to bottom vapours and make no mention of oral wind, so it is allowed). Once we were out of the tunnel I saw that we had been joined by another man. He looked worn and dishevelled, his clothes were dirty and torn, and judging by his ruddy complexion and the way he was leaning on the Air-Vice-Marshal, licking his face and calling him his best mate, he was as inebriated as a newt.

"Please desist, sir," the Air-Vice-Marshal demanded, to little avail.

"Aww, go on, don't be a..." The inebriated man paused to belch again. "You know what your problem is? You... you... you... Aw, poo." He fell back into the seat and started to giggle and dribble at the same time.

"Friend of yours?" I asked.

The Air-Vice-Marshal sneered at me and had he been able to call in a ground attack at that point, I'm sure I would have been for it. "How dare you, sir?" he declared. "To suggest that I am in the habit of associating with dipsomaniacs and - "

I was prevented from hearing about who else the Air-Vice-Marshal wasn't in the habit of associating with when we plunged into the final tunnel. This time we appeared to pass through it without incident - no one made a sound, no one got punched in the face - and yet, when we emerged, the drunkard had disappeared and Mr Benchley was sprawled dead in his seat, his lifeless eyes staring straight ahead, a gunshot wound on his forehead, a knife lodged in his chest and a noose around his neck.

Miss Kershaw screamed. "Who...?" she said, her voice quavering. She pointed directly at me. "Who are you?"

"What?" My heart sank. Surely we didn't have to go through all this again. "What do you mean, who am I? I've been sitting here this whole time. Don't you think we ought to be more concerned about the body?"

"What body?" Miss Kershaw asked.

I pointed to the body, despairing that this should be necessary. She didn't seem to be interested and asked me again who I was. And if that wasn't enough, the Air-Vice-Marshal got involved. "Stop trying to change the subject and answer the lady," he said, lightly prodding me in the chest with the tip of his moustache. "Come on laddie, account for yourself."

"I'm a legitimate passenger on this train," I said, becoming increasingly flustered. "You have already seen my ticket. I have been here the whole time. Now, don't you think it is rather more important that Mr Benchley has been murdered?"

"Mr Benchley?"

The Mystery of the Shit Faced Man

"Him! Him! Him!" I said, pointing at the corpse.

The Air-Vice-Marshal cast a brief glance at Benchley. "Oh yes?" he said. "And what makes you think he's been murdered?"

"Well, if all the noose did was to succeed in giving him a sore throat, then I'm pretty sure the knife and the gunshot wound would have finished the job."

The Air-Vice-Marshal seemed to accept this, but remained unconcerned. "Well, murdered or not murdered, it's really none of our business. If a man wants to get assassinated on a railway locomotive, in his own free time, of his own free will, then as long as he has a valid ticket I don't see that it's anyone else's business. What do you think, padre?"

The vicar nodded, smiled and said simply in a sing-song voice, "Ah, yes. Very true. Very true."

"Well there you have it," said the Air-Vice-Marshal. "If the vicar says it, then it's practically the voice of god."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. A man had just been murdered in front of us and of my three remaining companions, two couldn't care less and the third was clearly some kind of ecclesiastical imbecile. For what it was worth I was about to protest further when the door slid open and a dapper, dark suited man with a keen eye and a neat moustache leaned in. I recognised him immediately: it was Monsieur Anton La Cranque, the eminent Belgian detective. It is La Cranque's proud boast that he has never yet had a case that has defeated him, although the many individuals who have sued for wrongful arrest might dispute this. Nevertheless, his services are still widely employed by Scotland Yard - mostly when they need someone to clear out the drains, but occasionally they let him loose on a case. I had been fortunate enough to receive assistance from Monsieur La Cranque once before, so I recognised him immediately.

"Monsieur La Cranque!" I exclaimed delightedly.

"Non monsieur," he said in his familiar Belgian tones. "I am not the eminent detective Monsieur La Cranque, whoever he might be. My name is Lemuel Crackers and I am a duvet cover salesman from York."

"But you're Monsieur Anton La Cranque," I insisted.

"Non, non," he insisted right back at me. "I am Mr Crackers. I am from York. I sell duvet covers. For duvets."

"But I don't understand," I spluttered. "I was sure you... Well, you look just like - "

"Please monsieur," said the man who looked like Mr La Cranque, with some urgency. "Please could I trouble you for a light? Out here in the corridor, where there is no draught and the fire will work better, please." He helped me firmly to my feet and led me out into the corridor.

"Monsieur Rose, it is good to see you again," he said, once we were out of earshot.

"It is you!" I said excitedly. "I knew it! I knew it was you!"

"Shush, please," La Cranque said in low, conspiratorial tones. "I am working under cover, hence the reason I have adopted an alias. I am an undercover duvet cover salesman."

"That's extraordinary!" I enthused. "Hang on though, have you got that right? Don't you mean that you're an undercover detective?"

"Yes Monsieur, that is what I have said."

"No, no," I corrected him. "You said that you are an undercover duvet cover salesman."

"Of course. I have said this. What is the difference, please?"

"Well," I explained. "If you were an undercover duvet cover salesman, you'd actually be posing as a detective in order to secretly sell people duvets. But what you're doing is - "

He stopped me at this point, held up his hand and rubbed his forehead. "Please monsieur," he implored. "I have had a most busy morning following a shitfaced man, who has - "

"Sorry, what did you say?"

"A shitfaced man. Ah... How do you say? An inebriate. A drunkard. An enthusiastic imbiber of the amber nectar."

"He was here," I said. "He was getting friendly with the Air-Vice-Marshal, just before the murder."

"There has been a murder?"

I told Monsieur La Cranque about the body, and expressed some surprise that he hadn't seen it when he had looked into the compartment. He explained that he had been distracted but that it probably wasn't important anyway. Then he suggested that we return to the compartment before we were missed and he implored me to remember his cover story. However, before we stepped back inside, I reminded him that he had asked me for a light.

"But of course," said La Cranque. "And it would look suspicious if I do not have a cigarette or a pipe. The problem is, I do not smoke. No matter - you had better light something else instead."

And so I set fire to Monsieur La Cranque's hat and we returned to our fellow passengers. "Well, what a great deal of interesting information you have given me about duvet covers, Mr Crackers," I said loudly as we sat down. "I really must get myself one."

"Oh yes, monsieur, you really should," Monsieur La Cranque said. "They are quite good. I cannot recommend them enough. And they are even better if you actually have a duvet."

And so we continued our journey, just two ordinary passengers, one on his way to a squirrel taunting competition and the other a keen-eyed duvet cover salesman in a smouldering hat. Of course, although Monsieur La Cranque had taken me into his confidence, the opportunity had not yet arisen for him to fill me in on the details of the case. It nevertheless became clear to me that he was hoping to extract information from the other passengers about the mysterious drunkard. I was in the enviable position of watching the master at work as, with skill and subtlety, he probed the Air-Vice-Marshal for information.

"So Monsieur Wing-Commander, who was your drunken friend?"

"You ask a lot of questions for a duvet cover salesman," observed the Air-Vice-Marshal.

"Ah monsieur, in my business it is important to ask many questions," Monsieur La Cranque replied, tapping the side of his nose conspiratorially.

"Really? Why is that then?" asked the Air-Vice-Marshal, not unreasonably. "I would have thought that the questions you would have to ask were quite limited. 'Would you like to buy a duvet cover?' for instance. Or possibly 'What colour duvet cover would you prefer?' That kind of thing, yes?"

"Ah yes, but in the end are we not all just duvet covers, Monsieur?" La Cranque said mysteriously.

"No," said the Air-Vice-Marshal. He leaned back in his seat and studied La Cranque for a moment or two through narrowed eyes, then said, "Do all duvet cover salesman talk rot like this, or have you made a speciality of it?"

Monsieur La Cranque tried to meet his eye but he was distracted when Reverend Snoop reached across and tapped him urgently on the knee. "Excuse me," the vicar said. La Cranque ignored him.

"But, Monsieur Biggles," La Cranque continued. "Has it not been said that when a man is tired of duvet covers... "

"Mr Crackers, excuse me," the vicar continued. Again, he was ignored.

"... when he is tired of duvet covers, a young man's gaze will turn to..."

"Do you think I might just ask a question?" asked the vicar.

"... A young man's gaze will turn, if he is not cautious, to the question of what..."

"Only I have this duvet, you see, and it's a king size, or so they say, and - "

"Yes, what is it?" Monsieur La Cranque snapped angrily. "What is it, Monsieur, that you disrupt me in this way?"

"Well, you see, I really can't find a duvet cover to fit anywhere," said the reverend pathetically. "So I wondered what sizes do you do?"

"Many sizes," La Cranque replied impatiently. "All of the sizes that you can imagine. But enough of duvet covers. I think it is time we all started to address the elephant in the room, yes? I refer, of course, to this!" He pointed dramatically at the body of Mr Benchley.

"No, that's not an elephant, old boy," the Air-Vice-Marshal corrected him. "I know an elephant when I see one, and that isn't one."

"I remember when I was doing missionary work in central Africa," the vicar reminisced. "Saw an awful lot of elephants out there. They used to eat fruit with their noses. Frightfully unhygienic."

"I refer to a metaphorical elephant, you silly man," said La Cranque.

"Ah well these were African elephants," the reverend mused.

"Listen, old man," the Air-Vice-Marshal interjected. "I have to say that this is really not on. Now, I don't know what the form is where you come from."

"I am from York, monsieur. I am a Yorkshireman. From York, non?"

"Well, whatever funny part of York you come from," said the Air-Vice-Marshal, "where I come from we have the good manners to keep ourselves to ourselves and not interfere in other people's business. Just because Mr Benchley here has, for whatever reason, got himself murdered, it does not mean that he should be made the subject of gossip and tittle-tattle. How would you like it if you got yourself impaled on an ice pick and then people started openly discussing your affairs? You should be grateful if the entire matter was treated with discretion, I imagine."

"Curious, Mr Airman," Monsieur La Cranque said, fixing him with a suspicious glare. "You are keen, I see, that we should not delve too deeply into the matter of this man's demise. Why is that, I wonder?"

"Simple manners," the Air-Vice-Marshal replied briskly. "A matter of breeding. I wouldn't expect someone like you, a foreigner from 'York', to understand that."

If Monsieur La Cranque had intended to respond, the opportunity was now lost when the train guard appeared at the door, looking flustered and distressed. "There's been an incident," he wheezed as he fought for his breath. "Would any of you gentlemen happen to be a duvet cover salesman?" La Cranque signalled that he was and the guard displayed evident relief. "Thank heavens sir. Would you come this way, please? We urgently need your help."

* * *

The guard led the eminent Belgian duvet cover salesman down the line of clanking, rattling carriages to the goods van at the rear. Naturally, I followed, keen to offer what assistance I could. Opening the door we were met by racks and cages full of packing trunks, cases, crates and numerous parcels, including a horse which had been wrapped head to hoof in brown paper and which whinnied irritably as I inadvertently stumbled against it.

Hanging from the roof, to which it had been nailed by its feet, was the lifeless body of an unknown man. The guard pushed his way past it and drew our attention to a suitcase that had been prised open, half of the contents strewn haphazardly across the floor. "Here we are sir," he said. "I had come down here for a cough and a drag - me being on my break, you understand - and when I opened the door I disturbed this bloke rifling through this here case."

"This bloke?" I asked, pointing not unnaturally to the dangling corpse.

"What?" said the guard. "No. Some other bloke. Going through the case like something not right, he was. Well, I thought, that's not on, is it?

"Indeed not, monsieur," Monsieur La Cranque agreed. "You challenged this fellow, of course?"

"You bet your life I did, sir," the guard replied. "I said 'Ere! 'Ere, I said. You got no business going through them cases. Clear off, I said."

"Very good, monsieur guard," La Cranque said approvingly. "And what did this man say?"

"He told me to clear off," said the guard. "Only, he put it a bit more colourfully than that, so I went for my whistle and that's when he panicked, pushed past me and ran off."

Monsieur La Cranque nodded knowingly. "Ah yes," he said. "There is very little that the criminal fears more than a railwayman's whistle. Did you recognise this man, monsieur guard?"

The guard shook his head vigorously, dislodging a small colony of head lice as he did so. "Never seen the bloke before. He looked the worse for wear though. I reckon he'd been drinking."

"Ah ha! The shitfaced man!"

"Well, if you want to put it in those terms, then yes, I suppose so."

It was my turn to question him now. "And what about the body?" I asked.

"What body?" said the guard. At this point the train swung around a gentle bend. The body of the man nailed to the roof swung sideways and lightly bumped the guard on the shoulder. "Oh that body," he said. "Sorry, I don't know anything about that."

"I see. Well, presumably the inebriated man had been here for some time if he had had time to nail this man to the roof," I pondered, but Monsieur La Cranque quickly interrupted me.

"Do not be so quick to jump to conclusions, Monsieur Rose," he warned me. "We have no reason to suppose that the shitfaced man is responsible for this unfortunate gentleman's current condition. It may be simply coincidence."

"Coincidence?"

"Indeed yes," said La Cranque. "He might have been nailed up by someone completely different. Or it could be suicide."

"Do people usually commit suicide by nailing themselves to train roofs?" I asked.

"Wouldn't be the first time," the guard muttered.

"Well, there you have it," said La Cranque. "Tell me monsieur guard, when was the last time you were in this room?"

"Well now, just before the train departed, I reckon," the guard replied. "Yes, I came in to check that everything had been stowed away securely."

"I see, yes," said La Cranque. "Think carefully now - was there a body nailed to the roof then?"

The guard thoughtfully rubbed his chin and looked around. La Cranque told him to take his time. "Now then," he said at length, "I'm not sure I can really say one way or the other. I certainly can't say for definite that there wasn't."

"I see," said La Cranque. "Let us therefore concentrate on what we do know." He started to poke through the contents of the open case, casually tossing items aside. "What do we have here? Half a kilo of unsalted butter, a pair of dried kangaroo testicles, some novelty spats bearing the legend 'I Love Leighton Buzzard', an enamelled wrought iron cake stand, a letter of introduction from the Polish ambassador, a set of playing cards with pictures of naughty ladies on them, a single glove with six fingers on one hand and a book describing how to build scale models of famous European cathedrals out of pasta. Well, I see nothing very unusual here." He glanced at the name tag on the case then dismissed the guard and bid him return to his duties.

Once the guard had left I took the opportunity to check the name tag for myself. "Reverend Snoop!" I said.

I was astonished. Monsieur La Cranque, however, hadn't registered any surprise at all, and this astonished me further. "But of course," he said to me. "I knew from the moment I saw the kangaroo's testicles that this case must belong to a man of the cloth. Plus, there is an unmistakable odour of religion - I could smell it a mile off. My friend Mr Rose, I think it is about time I filled you in on a few details. You have heard of the great turnip of Hinkley Parva, yes?"

I had indeed, although I had not yet had the opportunity to visit it. The Hinkley Parva turnip first came to prominence two summers ago when it was reported by The Times to have reached a size of about six feet in circumference. Such an extraordinary vegetable was rightly considered a miracle of our age and crowds had been flocking to visit it ever since.

"Not a miracle," Monsieur La Cranque corrected me. "A product of science. The Hinkley Parva turnip is the result of an experimental formula - a compound called Massivo, which has been developed by Professor Ernest Fluke."

"You mean the inventor of the double-decker jam sandwich?" I gasped.

"The very same," confirmed Monsieur La Cranque. "Massivo can cause any organic matter to grow to extraordinary dimensions: turnips, carrots, chickens, cows, wheelbarrows."

"Wheelbarrows are not organic."

"Very well, not wheelbarrows," said La Cranque. "But many other things that are not wheelbarrows can all be made bigger by Massivo. You can see how this would be of great interest to farmers, gardeners, manufacturers of wheelbarrows and such like."

"Not wheelbarrows," I corrected him again.

"Mr Rose, will you please desist in this preoccupation with wheelbarrows!" La Cranque snapped irritably. "Anyhow, during the course of a burglary at the home of Professor Fluke, the formula was stolen and I was called in to investigate. I chanced across the shitfaced man behaving suspiciously and followed him onto this train, disguising myself as duvet cover salesman. Shortly afterwards, I entered the compartment in which you were travelling, at which point you recognised me."

"Ah yes," I said. "And we know what happened next."

"Yes, I asked you to step outside on the pretext of asking for a light," Monsieur La Cranque said.

"Yes, yes, I know, I was there."

"I asked for your assistance in my subterfuge and - "

"Please, Monsieur La Cranque," I interrupted. "I am aware of what happened next. What I don't understand is why the shitfa... the inebriated man was going through the vicar's case?"

"Indeed," Monsieur La Cranque replied. "Here is a mystery that needs to be solved. Let us go and ask Reverend Snoop why someone should be so interested in riffling through his knickknacks."

* * *

We returned to my compartment to find that Air-Vice-Marshal Totters was now reclining lifelessly in his seat, staring open-mouthed at the ceiling with an arrow through his neck. "Tut tut," said Monsieur La Cranque. "How typical it is that a man such as this should shirk his responsibilities in so cowardly a way by being dead. I fear that traditional values such as honour and duty are very much things of the past, more is the pity."

Monsieur La Cranque gently pushed the body aside and sat down opposite Reverend Snoop, fixing him with a keen gaze. "Monsieur vicar, I am greatly interested in the contents of your case."

"I've never seen those photographs before in my life," Reverend Snoop responded precipitately. "They are nothing to do with me, they are a gift. In fact, what photographs? I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Monsieur, I know nothing about any photographs," said La Cranque. "What I am interested in was why someone should break your case open and scatter its contents over the floor."

Reverend Snoop relaxed slightly. "I've no idea," he responded, watching Monsieur La Cranque suspiciously. "For a bet?"

"I think not."

"Well, it's possible," said the vicar. "One fellow says to another fellow, I bet you can't break open that case and throw the contents all over the floor. And then the other fellow says, oh yes I jolly well can, and then he goes and does just that."

"I think maybe he was looking for something, yes?" La Cranque suggested. "What do you think that might have been, hmm?"

Reverend Snoop looked nonplussed. He frowned, grimaced, shrugged then after a pause he answered, "Sandwiches?"

While all this had been going on I had made a discovery of my own, right there in the middle of the floor between the two seats. It was a vaulting horse. "I say, Monsieur... er... Mr Crackers," I said, quickly remembering the eminent detective's cover story. "What do you think this is?"

"What?" La Cranque said. I thumped the side of the vaulting horse to indicate the obstruction. La Cranque took off his spectacles, cleaned them and replaced them on the bridge of his nose. Actually, La Cranque did not wear spectacles but like all his countrymen he was an accomplished mime artist. "A vaulting horse! This was not here before, no? I thought not. Interesting. Now then, wherever you find a vaulting horse you quite often also find... "

He put his shoulder to the vaulting horse and firmly slid it aside, revealing a black, gaping hole in the floor of the train.

"... a tunnel. It seems as though someone has tried to effect an escape from this railway locomotive."

"Astonishing!" I replied. "Is it actually possible to dig your way off a speeding train?"

"If a man is desperate enough, all things are possible," Monsieur La Cranque said. "Come, let us see where it leads."

Lighting a flare from his still burning hat, Monsieur La Cranque led the way down into the tunnel. It took us through the bowels of the train, along a twisting, roughhewn passageway that led us past bubbling oil sumps, swinging chains, pounding pistons, half-buried dinosaur bones and the body of the guard who appeared to have been crushed to death in a giant vice, then folded up neatly and slid behind a water tank. Eventually we came to a hatchway above us and, pushing our way through, emerged into the buffet car.

"Outrageous!" Monsieur La Cranque exclaimed, examining the menu. "To charge this much for a pork pie is inhuman."

I was rather more interested in the group of people assembled there than the price of the food. We had seen most of them elsewhere just moments ago. Three of them were dead: the Air-Vice-Marshal, Mr Benchley and the man from the goods van, who had now been nailed into a new position hanging from the buffet car roof. They were joined by the Reverend Snoop, Miss Kershaw and, finally, the inebriated man, all of whom were still alive for the moment. Monsieur La Cranque strode up to this latter individual, a triumphant gleam in his eye.

"Sir, I must inform you that you are under citizen's arrest, for whatever it is you have done," La Cranque announced. "We will fill in the details when we find out just what that is. For the meantime it is sufficient for you to know that you are arrested."

"Steady on there, old boy," said the inebriated man, although he suddenly seemed much more sober now. "We're on the same side, don't you know. The name's Featherstonhaugh - British intelligence."

"There's no such thing," spat La Cranque.

"There very much is, old chap," said Featherstonhaugh. "And I'm it. I've been hot on the trail of the miscreant responsible for pinching the formula for Massivo, posing as a sozzled wastrel to throw off suspicion. Rather good, wasn't I?"

"Very good, monsieur," La Cranque agreed. "Being shitfaced must be second nature, yes? But I think you have not got to the bottom of this mystery, no?"

Featherstonhaugh beamed. "Oh, don't be so sure, old boy," he said. "I've been on to this crowd from the beginning."

"All of them?" I asked.

"Most of them," confirmed Featherstonhaugh with a smile. "Miss Kershaw I believe to be entirely innocent. But Mr Benchley here worked for one of the country's biggest suppliers of agricultural fertiliser."

"A bullshit merchant?"

"Precisely," said Featherstonhaugh. "Massivo would have had dire consequences for his business so he was tasked with preventing the formula from ever entering into production. The Air-Vice-Marshal, on the other hand, was fully aware of the military potential for the compound. Imagine a giant armoured marrow, twelve feet long and impervious to all forms of attack."

"Why, with such a marrow you could rule the world," I said.

"Precisely," Featherstonhaugh agreed. "And every foreign power in the world knows it too, which is why the Air-Vice-Marshal decided to steal the formula and sell it to the highest bidder. Which leaves the vicar here."

"Ah hem!" Monsieur La Cranque coughed to gain Featherstonhaugh's attention. "I think you are forgetting someone, yes? The man nailed to the roof."

"Oh him," said Featherstonhaugh. "He's irrelevant. He's been nailed up there for weeks. I think the railway company really need to look at replacing their cleaning crews. No, I'm afraid we're left with the vicar here, who just happens to be on the judging panels of most of the parish vegetable competitions throughout the south east of England. Vegetable competitions are big business, aren't they vicar, and there are no prizes for guessing how much Massivo is worth to someone in his position. Enough to make it worthwhile to bump off the competition, isn't that right, Reverend Snoop?"

"Superb!" I responded eagerly. "Why, Mr Featherstonhaugh, your deductive skills are almost on a par with Monsieur La Cranque himself."

La Cranque was somewhat less enthusiastic. "I would not say this, Monsieur Rose. Not at all. Oh no, not at all."

"Indeed," agreed Featherstonhaugh modestly. "I'm sure I could never hope to match the peerless Monsieur La Cranque. Your reputation precedes you sir."

"Ah, it is nothing," La Cranque responded with an airy wave of the hand.

"Why, I'm sure Monsieur La Cranque would have got there in the end," continued Featherstonhaugh. "After a few weeks or so, once everybody else was dead, the truth would have dawned on even the great detective."

"Ah, I see - this is your English sarcasm, yes?" La Cranque took me by the elbow and gently led me to the door. "I think it is time we left, Monsieur Rose," he said. "We must, how to do you say, 'chalk this case up to experience'."

"Not to worry, La Cranque," we heard Mr Featherstonhaugh say behind us. "No need to be so hard on yourself."

La Cranque muttered something ungentlemanly beneath his breath.

The Mystery of the Shit Faced Man

"It was a really tough case," Featherstonhaugh continued. "I expect - "

His words ceased abruptly. Monsieur La Cranque didn't pause nor even break his stride; he swept out of the buffet car. But I stopped for a moment to look over my shoulder and saw that Mr Featherstonhaugh appeared to have been impaled on a pike and that, against all odds, the Reverend Snoop had been flattened under an anvil. Miss Kershaw was now the only person left alive in the carriage and the really odd thing was that for the first time ever, I thought I saw her smile.