It was unfortunate for Sergeant McTavish who was first on the scene. The Chief Inspector was the second person to arrive at the train and saw through the carriage door window someone bending over the woman. He wrenched the door open. ‘What the devil do you think you are doing?’
McTavish turned round with a roughly torn piece of paper in his hand.
Sergeant McTavish introduced himself as the man that Scotland Yard were expecting and he stated he had just left the railway station when a porter ran up and asked him to come back to the train.
‘Honest, I found the girl in this state,’ said Sergeant McTavish who had been working on a series of murders that had started in Scotland and now had found its way to Paddington Railway Station. ‘This piece of paper was in her hand and I needed to remove it. At first I thought it was a suicide note but it turned out to be a made up cryptic crossword.’
The girl was still alive and the marks of someone’s fingers and thumbs had made their mark around her neck. She was in a bad way and an ambulance was called.
* * *
The Chief Inspector straightened out the piece of paper and placed it on his desk. ‘Now let me see, hmm! We need to solve the clues to see what it is. But first we need to place the clues in the right order to get the symmetrical pattern and we need to put our thinking caps on. This is going to be very tricky to solve. This is not an ordinary villain we are dealing with!’
1 Across Is God going in the right direction? (9)
1 Down The man going East goes to Church with 50 (6)
18 across Horse running backwards won three grand races? (6) ‘I think I
know that one said McTavish – it’s Red Rum, the horse won three
Grand National races and spelt backwards it reads MURDER!’
‘All we’ve got to do now is fill the other squares in and we will know the
message.’ said the Chief Inspector. ‘I think I’ll leave it to you to do
McTavish – you seem to know what you’re doing. But before you start trying to decipher this puzzle I’ll photocopy a few copies and hand them around in the main office and see if anybody there can come up with some answers which you can compare.’
‘I don’t think I’ll know all the answers Sir.’
‘Just do what you can and we’ll all chip in later.’
‘One thing for sure Chief Inspector this puzzle is not symmetrical.’
The chief Inspector left the office as Sergeant McTavish bent over
and looked keenly at the other questions. ‘Now heres another clue: “A vehicle you might go on holiday in or in the desert?” McTavish sat down and wrote down the answer – that must be CARAVAN. He loosened his tie as he settled down to a day of questions and answers. He also recognized that apart from 1 across and 1 down all the other answers were randomly placed somewhere in the puzzle.
McTavish had a theory that needed to be tested. His thoughts wandered away from the puzzle, perhaps he was going in the wrong direction. At this point the office door opened and the Chief Inspector poked his head round the door.
‘Well, any progress?’
It was evident to McTavish, that the Chief Inspector had never done a crossword in his life – it was only ten minutes ago he had left him to do the crossword.
‘No Chief Inspector, this puzzle will need some deep thinking. All the clues are cryptic. Perhaps I can leave you with this one to solve – One Across Is God going in the right direction? Nine letters. I’m not sure whether this is going to be part of the message.’
The Chief Inspector denied having done any crosswords and shut the door.
One down: The man going East goes to Church with 50. McTavish paused then a gleam came into his eyes as he worked out the answer = A man = (chap) goes East = (E) and fifty – (L), the answer is CHAPEL. That means one across begins with a C; surely it can’t be CHRISTMAS or is it CHRISTIAN. McTavish was racking his brains for a sensible answer. Perhaps CHRISTIAN was the killer’s first name, but how strange a coincidence it was McTavish’s first name was Christian. He needed to solve the puzzle quickly. There was a sort of panic in his eyes. Apart from one across and one down, nothing else seemed to point to anything that made sense
15 across was equally baffling “The MCC Panel shortened the list of players!”
13 down was also baffling: His vat was expensive (see fifteen across) anag.
6 down started with letter A – Also known as Red Rum (4,2)
25 Across Tried to bet on! 18 across & 21 down
21 down The end of RED RUM, deem it so (2) see 18 across
McTavish only just noticed that those clue numbers were underlined, so the clues must be pointing the way to the killer but he didn’t know how.
* * *
Some bright spark in the main office worked out all the answers to the puzzle – it wasn’t all the answers that gave the message, some were the clues, when rearranged they read out.
(T H E M A N) 1. Down
(K N O W N A S) 6 Down
( M C T A V I S H) 15 across and 13 down
(T R I E D T O) 25 across
( M U R D E R M E) 18 across and 21 down