The guard supposed not. He was slightly, yet discreetly, amused to see
Mr. Skidmore glance under the seats of the first-class carriage.
Certainly there was nobody either there or on the racks. The carriage
at the far side was locked, and so, now, was the door next the platform.
The great glass dome was brilliantly lighted so that anything suspicious
would have been detected instantly. The guard's whistle rang out shrill
and clear, and Catesby had a glimpse of Mr. Skidmore making himself
comfortable as he swung himself into his van. The great green and gold
serpent with the brilliant electric eyes fought its way sinuously into
the throat of the wet and riotous night on its first stage of over two
hundred miles. Lydmouth would be the first stop.

So far Mr. Skidmore had nothing to worry him, nothing, that is, except
the outside chance of a bad accident. He did not anticipate, however,
that some miscreant might deliberately wreck the train on the off chance
of looting those plain deal boxes. The class of thief that banks have to
fear is not guilty of such clumsiness. Unquestionably nothing could
happen on this side of Lydmouth. The train was roaring along now through
the fierce gale at sixty odd miles an hour, Skidmore had the carriage to
himself, and was not the snug, brilliantly lighted compartment made of
steel? On one side was the carriage with the coffin; on the other side
another compartment filled with a party of sportsmen going North.
Skidmore had noticed the four of them playing bridge just before he
slipped into his own carriage. Really, he had nothing to fear. He lay
back comfortably wondering how Poe or Gaboriau would have handled such a
situation with a successful robbery behind it. There are limits, of
course, both to a novelist's imagination and a clever thief's process of
invention. So, therefore....

Three hours and twenty minutes later the express pulled up at Lydmouth.
The station clock indicated the hour to be 11.23. Catesby swung himself
out of his van on to the shining wet platform. Only one passenger was
waiting there, but nobody alighted. Catesby was sure of this, because he
was on the flags before a door could be opened. He came forward to give
a hand with the coffin in the compartment next to Skidmore's. Then he
noticed, to his surprise, that the glass in the carriage window was
smashed; he could see that the little cashier was huddled up strangely
in one corner. And Catesby could see also that