“The underwear was a type widely available.”

“How did he die?”

Now Mr. Woodhead spoke with a trumpeting pomposity that made me wonder what my lovely aunt ever saw in him. “Shot through the stomach don’t you know. Bad business.”

So there would have been blood at the scene, but not as much as if he had been shot through the heart. The killer had taken no chances.

“Mr. Woodhead, what is it that you think I might do that the railway police, Scotland Yard and the local CID cannot?”

“You have a reputation for winkling out information.” He once more turned to his constable.

“Up to two hundred growers from across the rhubarb growing area despatch goods on that train. That night, there were crates from just seventy-five growers—the season is drawing to a close. Officers from Wakefield and Leeds have questioned every grower, as well as railway staff. No one knows a thing.”

Then somebody must be lying, or be very cunning. “Does the train stop anywhere after Ardsley?”

The commander shook his head. “No scheduled stops, being an express. It was held up for signals outside Grantham, but the signalman saw no suspicious activity.”

“And what about King’s Cross, might the body have been put on the train there?”

“We have sworn statements from the porter who found the body, and from his fellow porter who was by his side within minutes.” He turned to his DC.

Yeats handed me a photograph of the interior of a railway goods truck stacked with boxes, the sort used for oranges, and with a bulky sack in the foreground.

Whatever the unfortunate man weighed in life, he would have been a dead weight once life ebbed. “It must have taken two strong men to put him on the train.”

Yeats seemed reluctant to speculate. “There may have been a clumsy attempt to make the sack look like a sack of potatoes, which doesn’t suggest careful planning.”

There had been nothing in the press. Here was an artist’s portrait of the deceased, and yet secrecy surrounded the death. That seemed odd. Somewhere in the back of my mind was a connection, evading me now, but it would come.

“You must have questioned growers, and the railway staff, and showed the portrait.”

The commander moved a cup from desk to windowsill. “There were the usual enquiries. It would be unwise to reveal the full facts. The portrait was shown to a few trusted individuals with a stake in the area.”

“Then I need the names of these trusted individuals, and the full facts.”

The commander lit a cigarette. “You will have all the information you need.”

That was not the most satisfactory answer. “Mr. Woodhead, that might be interpreted as all the information you believe I would need.” I gave him a smile. “I need to be fully briefed.”

Woodhead glanced at DC Yeats with what seemed to me to be a shifty look. “Yeats, you will ensure that Mrs. Shackleton is fully briefed.”