The Cheyne mystery

by Freeman Wills Crofts

He saw also how the men came to be seated in the train from Plymouth when it reached Newton Abbot, and here again he was lost in admiration at the way in which the pair had laid their plans. The first station on the Plymouth side of Newton Abbot was Totnes, and from Torquay to Totnes by road was a matter of only some ten miles. They would just have had time to do the distance, and there was no doubt that Totnes was the place to which their taxi had taken them. In the event, therefore, of an immediate chase, there was every chance of the scent being temporarily lost at Torquay.

These thoughts had scarcely passed through Cheyne’s mind when the event happened which caused him to congratulate himself on the seat he was occupying. At the extreme end of the coach, immediately in advance of his compartment, was the lavatory, and at this moment, just as they were stopping at Teignmouth, a man carrying a small kitbag passed along the corridor and entered. Approaching from behind Cheyne, he did not see the latter’s face, but Cheyne saw him. It was Price!

Cheyne took an engagement book from his pocket and bent low over it, lest the other should recognize him on his return. But Price remained in the lavatory until they reached Dawlish, and here another stroke of luck was in store for Cheyne. At Dawlish, at which they stopped a few moments later, his vis-à-vis alighted, and Cheyne immediately changed his seat. When, therefore, just before the train started, Price left the lavatory, he again approached Cheyne from behind and again failed to see his face.

As he passed down the corridor Cheyne stared at him. While in the lavatory he had effected a wondrous change in his appearance. Gone now was the small dark mustache and the glasses, his hat was of a different type and his overcoat of a different color. Cheyne watched him pause hesitatingly at the door of the next compartment and finally enter.

For some moments as the train rattled along towards Exeter, Cheyne failed to grasp the significance of this last move. Then he saw that it was, as usual, part of a well-thought-out scheme. Approaching Teignmouth, Price had evidently left his compartment—almost certainly the fourth, where Lewisham sat—as if he were about to alight at the station. Instead of doing so, he had entered the lavatory. Disguised, or, more probably, with a previous disguise removed, he had left it before the train started from Dawlish, and appearing at the door of the second compartment, had attempted to convey the idea, almost certainly with success, that he had just joined the train.

A further thought made Cheyne swing across again to the seat facing the engine. They were approaching Starcross. Would Lewisham adopt the same subterfuge at this station? But he did not, and they reached Exeter without further adventure.

The train going no further, all passengers had to alight. Cheyne was in no hurry to move, and by the time he left the carriage Price and Lewisham were already far down the platform. He wished that he in his turn could find a false mustache and glasses, but he realized that if he kept his face hidden, his clothes were already a satisfactory disguise. He watched the two men begin to pace the platform, and soon felt satisfied that they were proceeding by a later train.

They had reached Exeter at 5:02 p.m. Two expresses left the station shortly after, the 5:25 for Liverpool, Manchester and the north, and the 5:42 for London. Cheyne sat down on a deserted seat near the end of the platform and bent his head over his notebook while he watched the others.

The 5:25 for the north arrived and left, and still the two men continued pacing up and down. “For London,” thought Cheyne, and slipping off to the booking hall he bought a first single for Paddington. If the men were traveling third, he would be better in a different class.

When the London express rolled majestically in, Price and Lewisham entered a third near the front of the train. Satisfied that he was still unobserved, Cheyne got into the first class diner farther back. He had not been very close to the men, but he noticed that Lewisham had also made some alteration in his appearance, which explained his not having changed in the lavatory on the local train.