The Victim in Victoria Station Read Online Free Page A

my spirits. I’d never had my house broken into before, and the shattered window was a disquieting reminder. Last night I’d been afraid of the intruder. This morning, I was pleased to discover, I was angry, a much more useful emotion. My house had been invaded, or nearly invaded, and damaged in the process. I had been terrified. How dare someone do that! How DARE they!
    The last straw was the tiny overlooked shard of glass that had somehow flown across the room to the kitchen counter, where I managed to run it into the pad of my thumb as I tidied up. That did it. For five minutes I was simply, gloriously furious, indulging in language I hadn’t known I knew.
    Pounding my fist on the counter, however, was the final gesture of my tantrum. It jarred the sliver of glass in my thumb, which hurt—a lot. The pain jolted me back to my senses. I looked around a little guiltily for the cats. They had fled when the storm broke. My wrath hadn’t seemed to be directed at them, but a cat can’t be too careful. I had the fleeting, foolish thought that I was glad they didn’t understand enough human speech to know what I’d been saying. Then I went up to the bathroom to find the tweezers.
    I’d managed to pry the sliver out of my thumb when the phone rang. I picked it up in the bedroom. It was Inspector Morrison’s secretary.
    â€œThe chief inspector asked me to say he’s sorry he couldn’t ring you back himself, Mrs. Martin. He’s been called away to an incident.” Which could mean anything up to murder. “However, he was able to talk to the Metropolitan Police. They state that no bodies were found in trains coming into London yesterday, nor for months. They checked all stations for good measure. There were no such reports. In fact, it was a quiet day at the stations; the police were called to two pickpocket incidents and one stolen luggage. That was the extent of it.”
    â€œBut that can’t be true! I saw the man myself! And the doctor told me he was going to report it to the police right away.”
    â€œPerhaps the man was only comatose, Mrs. Martin. To the layman—”
    â€œBut the doctor wasn’t a layman, and he quite definitely said the man was dead!”
    A silence fell, a silence that became, imperceptibly, quite heavily tactful.
    â€œI see,” said the secretary finally. “Quite a mystery. When Inspector Morrison returns—”
    I pulled myself together. “No, don’t bother. He’s busy. I expect I made some sort of mistake. Thank him for me.”
    I hung up before I lost my temper. On the whole, I thought it was a good thing I’d expended all that emotional energy on the sliver of glass and my intruder. I was left with less to waste on an impervious Scotland Yard.
    Mistake! Of course I hadn’t made a mistake. That man had been dead as—as a coffin nail, Dickens would have said. So why didn’t the police know about him?
    Because they weren’t notified
, said the other half of my brain calmly.
    But the doctor said—
    What doctor? Do you believe everything you’re told?
    My temper deflated rapidly. I had, hadn’t I? Oh, my, how naive of me. At my age, and with my somewhat unusual background, one would have thought I’d be more critical. The respectable-looking man had called himself a doctor. I’d believed him. He had said he was going to call the police. I’d believed that, too.
    He’d also said the dead man was the victim of a heart attack. That, I was beginning not to believe at all.
    I went slowly downstairs, picked up the telephone pad, and sat down at the kitchen table. What did I know about the dead man? I started to make a list.
    I knew his first name.
    Bill?
went down on the list.
    American.
    First time in England.
    Here on business.
    Here I paused. What kind of business? He’d told me, I was sure. It’s one of the standard set of questions strangers ask each