“Hold on,” said John, glaring from where he stood in the doorway, “if you’re moving to another train, who’s going to be conducting this one?”
Adele hesitated. In her frustration, she hadn’t realized the obvious question. She felt a flash of gratitude at John’s words. They both regarded the conductor.
“My second,” he said, as if the answer were obvious.
“Hang on,” said Adele. “No one said anything about a second.”
The conductor shrugged. “I don’t know who you’ve been talking to. But all trains have a second. They take over for the conductor when he needs rest, or sometimes will take over when he has to switch trains. As in this case.”
“There was no mention of a second on the staff manifests.”
“Sometimes they’re not listed. Especially if they’re not going to be needed. Think of it more like a backup plan. My second’s been riding around on trains for three days without having to do anything.”
“You sound reproachful,” John said.
The straight-postured man grumbled and shook his head. “Gets paid nearly as much as me to do what? Sleep around in the dormitory car? Please. Regardless, the German authorities want to catch the killer as well. They’ll be waiting for you at the station. That’s the best we can do. That’s all I have. And as you said, you’ve got little more than a quarter hour left.”
“The second,” Adele said, quietly, “you say he’s been riding around for three days?”
“Not on this train. He only just boarded earlier this morning. But he’s been on other trains for the last three days, without actually having to put in any work.”
“He’s been on other trains in the last three days? You know which ones?”
The conductor hesitated, pausing for a moment, then he nibbled on the bottom of his lip. “I don’t know all of them. But I think one was the LuccaRail, you know it?”
Agent Leoni perked up at this answer. “This second of yours, is it possible he was on the Normandie Express as well?”
At the earnest tone in the Italian’s voice, the conductor looked over, frowning deeply. “I don’t know. Like I said, I don’t keep track of all his trains. All I can tell you is he hasn’t had to put in a day’s work for the last three days—lucky him.”
“And where is he now?” Adele said, her voice insistent. She felt a prickle along her spine. A second? Someone who didn’t appear on the staff list. She’d cross-referenced staff from both trains. Only two hits. But if the name hadn’t shown up, if he had been on the LuccaRail, the train from Italy where the first victim had been killed, then possibly he’d been on the Normandie as well. Maybe this was their connection point.
Through the windshield, she glimpsed the quickly approaching city in the distance. Soon, they’d arrive at the station. Soon, she knew, the killer would have a chance to get away. But maybe they’d been gifted a lead just in time.
“Where is he?” Adele demanded.
She stared, hard-eyed, at the conductor. She felt her stomach twist, though, as he gave an indifferent shrug. “I wish I could tell you. But I don’t keep track,”
“Dormitory car,” said the white-uniformed man who was reading a book.
Adele glanced over. The man was still engrossed in his novel, and he didn’t look up.
“Excuse me?” Adele asked.
A bit of irritation crept into the reader’s voice. “Johnson is in the dormitory car and has been there for the last ten hours since he transferred from the Normandie Express.”
Adele felt her stomach twist. “Hang on, the Normandie? So he was on the French train?”
But the man reading his book seemed to have decided he’d already said enough. He flipped the page and ignored the agent staring at him. Adele felt a rising sense of frustration, but she didn’t have time to make an issue of it. “Where’s the dormitory car?”
The conductor blinked and said, hesitantly, “Next to the sleeper car. Dormitory cars are where the staff hangs out between shifts. But I have to advise you that I don’t think it’s possible Johnson had the nerve to commit—”
“Thank you for your time,” Adele interrupted.
Fifteen minutes until they reached the station.
John was already on the move. “I know the dormitory car. I was just there,” he growled as he brushed past Adele, gesturing for her to follow.
Leoni limped after them, not complaining, but moving slowly on his injured ankle and struggling to keep up.
Adele broke into stride next to John and they hastened back in the direction they’d come.
“LuccaRail, Normandie, and now here,” John said with a mutter. “Think it’s a coincidence?”
Adele set her jaw and shrugged one shoulder as she marched hurriedly forward. “Mighty big coincidence if so,” she said. “A second. He didn’t even show up on the manifests. It might be our guy, John.”
“He’s our killer,” John said, nodding firmly. “I’d bet everything. We just have to find him before the train stops.”
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN
“Hang on,” came Agent Leoni’s gasping voice as they crossed the remodeled car with the body. Adele whirled around, her heart hammering from where she’d been half jogging next to John in her effort to reach the dormitory car and the reserve conductor.
Now, she stopped next to the tall Frenchman and regarded the Italian agent where he gasped at the floor and leaned against the wall, his face very pale all of a sudden, a thin film of sweat slicking his brow.
“What is it?” Adele said, concern stretching her words.
“My ankle,” he murmured, gritting his teeth. “I think it might be broken.”
John grunted. “Sprained more like. Putting weight on it isn’t going to help in either case.”
Adele cursed and glanced around the compartment helplessly, searching for…for what, exactly? A first aid kit? A doctor? A miracle in a bottle? Leoni was injured. He’d be of no further use like this, and as much as she hated thinking it, right now, he was just slowing them down.
“Do you think you can stay here?” she said, urgent. “We don’t have long until we reach the station. We’re running out of time.”
“I’m fine,” Leoni gasped. He pressed his back to the wall and began to slide down, his eyes flitting around the compartment, fixing on everything except for the body in the center of the room. Leoni’s ice pack in his sock had graduated from mere droplets and was now leaking water onto the floor. A small puddle quickly formed beneath his sodden shoe.
“All right,” Adele said. “Be safe. Call if you need anything.”
Leoni made a shooing gesture toward both of them, reaching down and probing gingerly at his ankle. “I’ll be fine, you go. Hurry.”
Adele winced sympathetically, but felt a sudden jolt of anxiety and turned, with John moving after her. To her surprise, though, the Frenchman hesitated, and then, muttering darkly, stomped back toward where Leoni was resting.
“Here, use your sock, wrap it around the ice, and get some compression on your ankle. Elevate it as well; take off your shoe, if you can, and place your heel on it.”