Chapter Thirty Three
Murder On The Rome Express
Having been woken up by the guttural sound of several men's voices speaking, he thought, in French and coming not only from just outside the window of the carriage, but also from yet closer still, out in the corridor of the sleeping car, young Danny Branson sat up in bed and shone his torch round the darkened compartment shared by himself and his cousin Robert. From his night time eerie of the upper of the two berths, he grinned as the beam of light from his torch momentarily illuminated the sorry sight of Oscar; Simon's much loved teddy bear, still hanging by his neck from the improvised noose prepared especially for him by both Danny and Robert.
Well, thought Danny, reflecting on what had occurred earlier on in the night, Simon and Bobby had only had themselves to blame for having chosen to ignore the anonymous ransom note, pushed under the connecting door of the two compartments, announcing that Oscar had been kidnapped. That handwritten note also threatened the unfortunate teddy bear with all kinds of fiendish torments, and failing that systematic dismemberment courtesy of Robert's Schweizer Offiziersmesser, his Swiss officer's knife, if a ransom for the hapless bear's safe return was not duly and promptly paid. So, the matter could have been resolved there and then and poor Oscar's life subsequently spared.
After all, the price for the unfortunate bear regaining his freedom, and in one piece, really had been quite modest: set very precisely at four bars of Fry's chocolate which just happened to be the very same brand of chocolate as well as the very same number of bars, which had been purchased for Simon and Bobby by Da at Victoria station earlier in the day.
When the four bars of chocolate were not pushed back forthwith under the connecting door, despite the two younger boys threatening all manner of dire retribution upon their elder brothers, there now arose a series of hushed, albeit bloodcurdling cries of pain, purporting to come from poor Oscar, but in fact emanating first from Danny, and then from Robert. However, these still did not do the trick, Thereafter, a further anonymous note was pushed under the same connecting door from Oscar's brutal kidnappers. This announced that a court of law had now been convened, for, said Robert to Danny, as the son of a former solicitor he insisted that everything was done "strictly according to due legal process" a phrase that he had heard his father, the earl of Grantham, use many times in the past.
Not that it was of course.
With the odds so heavily stacked against him from the very outset, poor little Oscar never stood a chance of receiving any semblance of a fair trial. In this regard, he was never made aware of the charges he faced, if indeed any had actually been preferred against him; neither was he permitted any representation in court, and nor was he allowed to speak in his defence, which given the fact that he was mute was hardly surprising; nor was anyone permitted to say anything on his behalf. Not, of course, it would have done Oscar any good if they had been permitted to speak; the outcome of the proceedings, which bore all the hallmarks of a show trial in Soviet Russia, was a foregone conclusion.
All these minor legal irregularities apart, the sentence of death was duly passed upon the hapless Oscar shortly thereafter. Ably prompted by Robert, it was announced, in suitably grave and sonorous tones by Danny in the guise of the judge presiding over the proceedings; his neatly folded, albeit grubby, white handkerchief taking the place upon his head of the customary square of black silk.
"Oscar Bear, you will be taken from this place, to another place…"
It has to be admitted that the otherwise chilling effect of all this was rather spoilt when both the presiding judge and the prosecuting counsel each had an unaccountable and prolonged fit of the giggles.
Once they had both stopped laughing, Danny announced that the execution was to be carried out immediately, there being, he said, no right of appeal; Oscar Bear's crimes were far too "heinous".
Of course, neither Danny even as the presiding judge, nor indeed Robert who had acted so ably for the prosecution, were quite sure as to just what heinous meant. However, with Robert having heard his father use the word recently and in connection with the decidedly grisly case of Alfred Rouse, they both knew it had to be something serious. Besides which it had rather a nice legal ring to it and gave the decidedly shady courtroom proceedings, held by flickering torchlight in a darkened compartment on board the speeding Rome Express, some minor semblance of legality.
The verdict of the court was duly notified to Oscar Bear's waiting "friends" on the other side of the connecting door by means of yet another anonymous note. Moments later, accompanied by the hummed, menacing strains of Chopin's Funeral March, as well as a series of further giggles and sniggers, apart from emitting a low growl when he was unceremoniously punched in his tummy, Oscar the teddy bear went calmly and silently to his "death". His threatened dismemberment was postponed, albeit only temporarily, until the morning upon the entirely and eminently sensible pretext that he could only be cut up once; all of which explains how it was that he now came to be hanging by his furry neck from the central light fitting of Danny and Robert's sleeping compartment.
The prosaic tones of his uncle's voice now filtering quietly in from the corridor outside the boys' compartment brought Danny instantly out of his reverie.
"Pssst! Rob! Are you awake?" Danny leaned down from the top berth. When reply came there none, Danny leant over again and this time walloped his cousin soundly with his pillow. Several wallops later, Danny achieved the response he wanted
Like Danny, young Robert was now also more or less awake, which in itself was something of a surprise. For, after kidnapping poor Oscar, in the hours since they had gone to bed, neither of the two older boys had slept much, if at all; having spent most of the time since Oscar's staged trial and execution, chatting in hushed whispers about who they believed might be hiding in one of the two empty compartments further back along the sleeping car; or else by taking it in turns to read under the bedclothes by the light of Danny's torch, more about the devilish doings of Fu Manchu and his fiendish accomplices.
"Ow! Stop it! Feckin' hell, Dan; that really hurts!"
"Don't let your Ma catch you saying that! She'll skin you alive". Danny laughed.
"Well what… what the feck is it, Dan?" asked Robert, thoroughly unabashed and who, despite the battering he had just received, was yet, in reality, still half asleep. He stretched, yawned, and flopped back on his pillow and in a manner of which, as the prospective next earl of Grantham, his aristocratic mother would have thoroughly disapproved.
"Jaysus! Wake up, Rob! Can't you hear your Da? He's out there in the corridor now, talking to the steward. Someone's put a bomb on the line! That's why we've stopped".
"A what?"
"A bomb! That's what he said!"
"Never!"
"Yes he did!"
"Cripes!"
"Cross my heart, Rob, it's all true. Tell you what; I'm goin' to tell Da and Ma. You comin'?"
So saying, clad in his vest and pyjama bottoms, Danny swung himself nimbly down from the top berth and landed lithely on the floor below. A minute later and Robert had clambered out of bed and, likewise in pyjamas and also barefoot, now followed Danny out of the door of their compartment.
Unseen by either of the boys, it was now that the door of one of the two empty compartments further along the sleeping car softly opened and but a matter of minutes later then closed.
Author's Note:
The Schweizer Offiziersmesser, Robert's Swiss officer's knife is the same as the Swiss Army knife of today. However, the latter name, coined by American GIs unable to pronounce or speak German, did not become current until after the end of World War Two.
Until the death penalty was abolished in Great Britain, it was customary for the judge announcing a capital sentence to have a black square of fabric, often made of silk, with one of its four corners facing outward, placed upon his head.
Alfred Rouse (1894-1931) was a travelling salesman, convicted and hanged in March 1931 for the brutal, gruesome murder of an unknown man in Northamptonshire, England; a hitchhiker, who he had picked up, bludgeoned to death and then burnt beyond recognition in his own motor car, in an attempt by Rouse to fake his own death and escape his own financial and matrimonial problems. Even with the advent of DNA, the identity of his victim has never been established
Piano Sonata No 2 in B-Flat minor, Op. 35, by Chopin, and better known as The Funeral March, is often played at state funerals.