Страница 37 из 61
Joe remembered the pathetic plaques on the older bungalows. He remembered Kitty lost in a past which to her was only a touch away.
‘Who will forget Memsahib Chambers, a young wife and pregnant, cut to pieces, the first victim. The first of hundreds of Englishwomen to die hideously at the hands of the mutineers. And because their women and their children had suffered so badly the English reprisals were equally hideous. The hangings, the sepoys tied to ca
‘And it would not need much to bring that horror back. Already we have the same pattern – many grievances, many suspicions. Let it be suggested in the bazaars that there is a movement, a movement to dislodge the British, and many – often ignorant – people would follow. The situation is once again extremely dangerous.’
‘Again,’ said Joe, ‘I am asking where you are leading me?’
The room fell silent while they awaited his reply until at last he said, ‘I think, Commander, you believe, as I do, that all these tragedies are linked? And looking at the evidence it would seem that in each case there was present a mysterious and disappearing figure. Consider the wife of Carmichael Sahib. Who was it who killed the cobra? People would assume a native. The wife of Forbes Sahib. Where now is the saddhu – a material witness if ever there was one? And the ferryman who made so gallant a rescue attempt when the wife of Simms-Warburton Sahib was drowned? And, most recently, the native box-wallah who came forward so helpfully to say that, though he had been in the alleyway by the bungalow of Memsahib Somersham at the time of her death, he had seen and heard nothing suspicious?’
Naurung cleared his throat deferentially, obviously with something to say but reluctant to interrupt his father who turned to him, however, in enquiry.
‘I have made a small investigation, if you will pardon me, in respect of this death. Perhaps you will recall this disappearing witness – a merchant, a representative of Vallijee Raja. I have a friend who works for this firm and I asked him if he could find out who was the box-wallah in Panikhat who came a couple of weeks ago to sell the products of this firm. They have no record of any representative of the firm in Panikhat at that time or indeed at any time this year so this too is a figure of mystery.’
The silence which greeted this revelation was broken by Naurung senior. ‘Now I will tell you something which is not generally known. That is to say it is no secret but it is not widely spoken of. Six weeks ago at Bhalasore, that is twenty-five miles from here, the wife of a post office official was killed when she was out riding. It was thought that she had been kicked by her horse. Fractured skull. Three weeks ago the wife of a planter who lives ten miles from here was killed “accidentally” by misreading the label on a medicine bottle. Such things happen. They are not what you would call the “stop press news”. But for those with eyes to see a co
‘Sandilands Sahib, you know that I am a letter-writer. We letter-writers hear things spoken in confidence – secrets, policies, mysteries. We speak little but we know a great deal. When we are concerned we share our knowledge and our fears. And there is a fear, a great fear in the bazaars and in the corridors of Government House that the country is on the point of another and greater rebellion than the one sixty years ago. Then the Sikhs stood with the British against the mutineers. If terrible times should come again, the Sikhs would stand with you once more. It is their way. But many fear the powder keg is in place.’
‘And the spark that could ignite it?’ asked Joe, already knowing the answer.
‘A fuse. A trail of murdered memsahibs. Already it is spoken of. One thing is lacking, sahib. The match. And that you hold in your own hand.’
‘Joe Sandilands holds it?’ Nancy said sharply. ‘What do you mean, Naurung?’
‘He means,’ said Joe, ‘that when the great detective from Scotland Yard finishes his investigations and declares to the Governor of Bengal that five English ladies, wives of officers in a smart cavalry regiment, have each been murdered with much malice aforethought by Indians or even a single Indian, there will be reprisals. There will be token arrests, there may even be executions. And with a dedicated and implacable Colonel like Prentice in command of the regiment, who knows how far it will go? We all know what his reputation is for exacting revenge.’
‘And then there will be retaliation and overreaction from native groups,’ said Nancy, white-faced. ‘The Congress wallahs could seize on this and use it! Just what they need as a battle flag to wave in our faces! Oh, Joe…’
Naurung, who had stood in almost total silence throughout the exchange, now spoke quietly.
‘Sandilands Sahib says when he makes his revelation. May we know if it is indeed his decision to incriminate Indians in the deaths?’
Joe looked at the three strained faces around him and shook his head, smiling bleakly. ‘You must think that so far I have done very little to justify my professional status and the confidence the Governor has shown in me. You may well even be recalling the title the press frequently gives us at Scotland Yard – the Defective Force. It is difficult to take over cases years old, badly managed from the outset, cases in which I ca
Naurung nodded in understanding.
‘No fingerprinting, no blood-typing, no door-to-door enquiries, no string of informants. I’ve been forced back on to a dependence on reason and common sense… but something more.’
He paused for a moment, wondering how receptive his audience would be to what he had to say next, and then plunged on.
‘I was billeted in the war with a very clever man – a well-read man. He’d brought two books to the war with him – the works of an Austrian psychologist, Sigmund Freud, and a Swiss called Carl Jung. I had snatched up the works of Shakespeare and Kim. When war isn’t being instant noisy death whizzing past your ears it’s being a boring longueur and my companion and I whiled away the waiting between pushes by reading each other’s books. I don’t know which of us had the better bargain! I learned much about the science of psychology of the unconscious mind, about psychoanalysis and the development of character. My friend didn’t believe in the existence of evil and he laughed at the policeman’s idea of the “criminal type”. He believed that a man’s character was set for life – moulded if you like – by circumstances in the first seven or so years of his existence. If he is born into poverty and crime, he is likely to grow up poor and a criminal, through no fault of his own.’
The Naurungs looked at him alertly and nodded. Naurung senior said, ‘We have a saying in Bengal – “The Rajah’s son does not exchange shoes with the cobbler’s son.” ’
‘Just so,’ said Joe a little deflated. ‘I have also made a study of a phenomenon in the history of crime in Europe and America which began with the slaying of five ladies of the night – five prostitutes – in the East End of London fifty years ago.’
Naurung senior listened with heightened attention and his son nodded eagerly. It was clear they were both aware of the case.
‘Jack the Ripper?’ said Nancy. ‘Are you talking about the Whitechapel murders? The police never solved those crimes, did they?’
‘No,’ said Joe. ‘But, with the help of my friend in the trenches, I do believe I have worked out Jack’s identity. The motive, I think, is very different in the sequence of murders we’re investigating but there are aspects in common. We’re not looking here at a frenzied attack carried out through an overriding sexual motive but at a carefully executed pattern of killings. The victims have been selected. They didn’t just happen to stray into range of the killer when he was experiencing a maniacal urge to destroy. Their habits were well known to him. He could follow them, even into their bathroom in the case of Peggy Somersham, murder them and instantly disappear. Like Jack, he could disappear with ease because he was at home.