The Damascened Blade (Joe Sandilands Murder Mystery)

by Barbara Cleverly

  A waistcoat. Judging by its retained warmth, a recently worn waistcoat. Wrinkling her nose at the smell of the hairy afghan poshteen, Lily gratefully slipped it on, holding the reins in her teeth as she manoeuvred.

  Enveloped in the warmth of the garment and comforted by the thoughtfulness of the man who had handed it to her and whom she assumed to be Iskander, Lily began to relax and almost to enjoy her experience. But she wasn’t going to be just an unwanted part of the baggage train – no sir! She looked up at the night sky and tried to find the Pole Star. She wished she had listened more carefully to her father when he had explained about navigating by the stars. Having no son, Carl Coblenz had taken his daughter with him and his hands when he patrolled the wide acres of his ranch and it was with senses trained and quickened in the wilderness of Dakota that Lily set about keeping a mental map of her journey into the foothills of the Hindu Kush.

  After an hour’s steady slog someone in the leading party lit up a flare. Two more were ignited and positioned half-way along the column in a formation that Lily guessed would have looked like the head of an arrow if observed from a crag overhead. At a signal from the hills and unseen by Lily, the head torch bearer appeared to swing his light around in a particular pattern and the convoy moved ahead. ‘He’s showing his passport,’ Lily thought. The next time, she heard the signal – a high-pitched, short whistle – which precipitated the answering wave of the flare. ‘We’re being passed down the line! But what line? Going where?’ She looked at the sky again and tried vainly to catch a glance at her wristwatch. ‘Sure as eggs, it’s not Afghanistan we’re headed for!’

  Plodding along in the moonlight at an easier pace, Lily had time to speculate on the reasons for abducting poor old Rathmore. What on earth did Iskander want with him? He obviously disliked the man and Rathmore qualified as a credible hostage on account of his wealth and influence but Lily was afraid there was more to it than simple banditry. Iskander must have some dark reason for making off with him. Iskander, she knew, had not been satisfied with the official account of his kinsman’s death. He must have reasoned or got evidence that Rathmore was responsible. Lily thought back to the evening of the feast and to Zeman’s challenge to Rathmore’s calculated rudeness. Rathmore’s self-esteem had been badly dented. He had lost face before an audience of military men and the enemy but also, and perhaps more importantly, he had come off worst in her eyes and Lily was in no doubt that Rathmore had set out to impress her. Had Rathmore taken it into his head to punish Zeman? To kill him? She couldn’t see how this could have been managed but Iskander seemed to have worked it out.

  And now he was taking him off somewhere into the wilderness to kill him. Probably to torture him to death. Lily remembered with a shudder the appalling treatment meted out to captured prisoners by these men of the hills. In Simla Edward Dalrymple-Webster had embarked with relish on a highly coloured account of the staking-out, the emasculation, the eye-gouging and the skinning-alive suffered at the hands of the Pathan. Lily had assumed he had exaggerated in his desperate attempt to make an impression but she had been chilled by something James had said – ‘We never leave a wounded man behind in Pathan territory. Oh, no. The whole gasht will risk its life to carry every last man – and his rifle – to safety.’ And she had pushed him further with a question. ‘But suppose you couldn’t get back to him? What then?’ And James had replied with slow matter-of-factness, ‘Then we’d shoot him where he lay. Quick and clean. It’s what we would all want. It’s what we all expect.’

  The troop ahead seemed to have called a halt at last. Dawn was breaking in the sky over her left shoulder and as she rode up to the main body she found she could make out familiar faces in the pale light. All looked weary and tense and the frequent glances up into the surrounding rocks did not go unremarked by Lily. They were not, apparently, riding into entirely friendly country. The horses steamed gently in the morning mist and made their way down to the stream to drink. She saw Rathmore being cut free and the cloth taken off his head. Was he aware of the danger he was in? Lily was consumed by a sudden rush of hot anger at the difficulties he had caused them by his arrogance and stupidity and now, she suspected, by his murderous guilt. And she would have to stand helplessly by and watch while these bandits tortured the truth out of him.

  He turned and recognized her and, face crimson with rage, shouted her name. ‘Traitor!’ he added. And, ‘Baggage!’ The idiot appeared to be blaming her for the trouble they were in. When Lily got angry she didn’t shout back. In any ruckus, she reckoned it was the one who kept his head that won. Sitting as tall as she could in the saddle she fixed him with a stare in which she hoped hauteur was blended with an equal amount of derision.

  ‘Sir. You are the author not only of your own misfortune but of mine also! Your abduction cannot be laid at my door. For the fact that your hide is still in one piece, however, you may thank me.’

  ‘In one piece? What the hell are you talking about, you Yankee bitch?’

  ‘They threatened to skin you alive if I didn’t come along quietly. They caught me as I was about to ring the alarm bell. Take your time to work it out and when you have I’ll listen to your apology.’

  She slithered from her horse and led it towards the stream.

  Chapter Eleven

  Threading his way neatly along the lines of communication linking the fort with Peshawar and Peshawar with the air base at Miram Shah, Fred, by being the only person in the fort who knew exactly what he wanted, had got his own way. Replacing the receiver he smiled with conspiratorial satisfaction at Joe and James and looked at his watch. ‘08.00 hours. There’ll be a plane up in half an hour – I’d be happier with half a dozen but one’ll have to do for now. It’ll be landing here in . . . oh . . . just over an hour and then we’ll tell the pilot what all this is about. I’ll go and get a bit of a map together showing the search area and get the football field marked out for landing. All right if I take a squad of your blokes with me, James?’ And he had bustled off, competent, purposeful, relishing the vindication of his views at last. But as he left the room some of his confidence left with him and James seemed sunk in gloom once again.

  ‘You’ve done everything you could as a matter of urgency and first response,’ said Joe, ‘but let us note that we have a very serious situation here, one far beyond your immediate responsibility, James. Obviously, we’ve got to report back to Peshawar and seek their instructions.’

  ‘How can I find the words to do that? said James despairingly. ‘Tell me – how do I explain all this in a few words?’

  ‘Here’s the phone, James!’ said Joe. ‘This should come from you, not from me. I’m nobody. My only job is or has been to keep an eye on blasted Lily and a right balls I’ve made of that! Now – make a few notes. Pick up the telephone. Ring up Sir John Deane in Peshawar and seek instructions. Tell him, in the first place, that Rathmore’s disappeared. We may look on him as a bumbling halfwit in whose ultimate fate we have no personal concern but he’s quite a prominent citizen. He has the ear of some brass hats in Delhi and Calcutta who will be interested to say the least in his fate. And the first thing you say to Peshawar is, “Your one-man trade delegation has been kidnapped. Sorry!” And the second thing you have to say is, “Zeman Khan, a prominent Afghani national, closely associated – indeed, closely related – to the Amir of Afghanistan, is dead in our care. The diagnosis from a reliable medical source speaks of food poisoning. Zeman’s associate, kinsman, second-in-command and close friend rejects this diagnosis and has snatched Rathmore as a hostage it seems, threatening this or that unless the matter is reinvestigated or indeed investigated.” And while the poor man is digesting this so welcome piece of information you should add that Lily Coblenz, American citizen, guest of the British Government, has also apparently been snatched. Unless, of course, she has run off to join the circus.

  ‘And if all this mixed information doesn’t stand his hair on end, I will be astonished. But what we need is instructions. You’re not th
e Viceroy, still less am I. Throw the whole dismal heap into his lap and stand back – that would be my advice. And why don’t you do it now, James? And while you’re about it – why not send a tough reply to Iskander? Threaten him with the full weight of the entire Indian Army. Call Lord Roberts back from the grave – he’d know what to do!’

  ‘Send a gunboat?’ said James.

  ‘Something of that sort. And when it comes to a gunboat, you’ve got some very good people here. It’s not up to you to declare war on Afghanistan of course but get permission to rattle a sabre!’

  ‘Hell, Joe!’ said James desperately. ‘I’m not often at a loss but . . . I think this’ll cost me my career,’ he added miserably.

  ‘Cost you your career? Nonsense! No such thing! Where, I’d like to know, is the old free-booting spirit of Clan Lindsay? Let’s hear the skirl of the pipes . . . “Lochaber no more” and all that!’

  Joe picked up the telephone and put it in James’s hand. ‘I’ll leave you to it,’ he said, patting him on the shoulder and pointing out of the window. ‘I shall be there. Smoking a cigarette. The first of many, I dare say, before we’ve sorted this out. But just get on with it! I’ll be composing a letter to Iskander if you don’t mind.’

  ‘Mind! I’d be very relieved!’

  Joe had hardly lit the promised cigarette before James emerged, half amused, half exasperated. ‘I don’t believe this! The bastard! He’s on the bloody golf course! On the golf course! The fate of nations hangs in the balance and the Commissioner is on the golf course! That’s what’s wrong with the Indian Empire! You’ve no idea how often this happens.’

  ‘So how did you leave it?’ said Joe.

  ‘Well, just for once I took a strong line. I said, “This is a grade one emergency. I don’t want to talk to anyone else about it. Get him back at the double.” Was I right?’

  ‘Right? Of course you were right!’

  Joe took a sheet of foolscap paper and began to write.

  To Muhammed Iskander Khan, Captain in the service of HM the Amir of Afghanistan.

  Sir,

  I have received and read with interest your communication of the 20th April 1922 and in respect of this seek confirmatory instructions from my superiors. In the meantime:–

  1. I see no reason to reject the findings of the preliminary autopsy performed on the body of Major Zeman Khan here at the fort.

  2. We are discussing an event which took place on British territory and as such the matter will be judged under the provisions of British law which must be upheld.

  3. Obviously, I will be prepared to initiate a full investigation of the circumstances surrounding the death of Zeman Khan but would not be prepared to embark on this while the issue is clouded by the illegal apprehension and sequestration of Lord Rathmore.

  4. No further steps will be taken in the matter until His Lordship has been returned to our care in good health. As a necessary preliminary to any investigation I must insist that you make arrangements accordingly forthwith.

  5. The reaction of HMG to any failure on your part to meet this condition will be prompt, resolute and effective.

  ‘“Prompt, resolute and effective”, indeed!’ said James. ‘Sounds good . . .’

  ‘It’s not very good,’ said Joe, ‘but if you’re talking to the Commissioner it might be sensible to read it to him. I think you shouldn’t utter a threat of tough stuff to come without his approval.’

  ‘I very much agree,’ said James. ‘What do we do in the meantime?’

  ‘Do what I’m about to do,’ said Joe, ‘have a whisky and soda. Steady the quaking nerves.’

  At this moment the telephone rang. ‘It’s Peshawar,’ said James, his hand over the receiver.

  ‘I’ll leave you to it,’ said Joe. ‘But be bloody, bold and resolute! Nothing to hide, after all.’

  ‘You never know how he’s going to take things,’ said James nervously. ‘Sometimes he can be all sweetness and reason and sometimes he can be an absolute sod!’

  ‘Only one way to find out,’ said Joe and, patting him on the shoulder, he stepped out into the sunshine and looked out on to the fort, puzzled to find his friend, usually so decisive, now apparently in retreat.

  Faintly he could hear James speaking. Faintly he measured the intervals for reply. This went on for a long time. For a very long time in Joe’s estimation. He fought off the temptation to stand at James’s elbow and listen. He waited and waited until at last James appeared, flushed but, Joe was glad to notice, seemingly relieved and seemingly more cheerful.

  ‘Well?’ said Joe.

  ‘Well!’ said James. ‘I think – well! The first thing I told him was that this was getting a bit beyond me . . .’

  ‘Can’t think why you said that,’ said Joe, ‘you’re doing very well.’

  ‘Not as well as all that. I explained to him that this had become a complicated police enquiry and that I’d got quite enough to do commanding the fort without going round on hands and knees with a magnifying glass. While I was there he put a call through to Simla. I don’t know what’s happened to the Posts and Telegraph Department of the Indian Empire but the speed with which these things are handled still surprises me – and the long and short of it is that I spoke to Sir George Jardine himself and – old boy – I hope you won’t be too horrified – but you’re still on attachment to the Bengal Police and, like it or lump it, you’ve been appointed to initiate, conduct and complete the enquiry! The return of Sherlock Sandilands in fact and – honestly – I simply can’t tell you how relieved I am. Sorry, Joe! Didn’t mean to drop you in the shit. But at least you’ve now got some official status. And, having cleared that out of the way – and I explained the whole plot to him – he said, “This is too important to be dealt with locally. It has to go up to the Council. And we need some political involvement.”’

  ‘Now what the hell does that mean?’ said Joe.

  ‘I think it means that the grand strategy should be put in the hands of one of the Heaven Born, not left in the hands of a humble cavalry major on attachment to the Scouts.’

  ‘An Indian Civil Servant, you mean?’

  James’s face had cleared as he spoke and he almost laughed as he replied. ‘He said, “Now who can I think of? Who’s available?” Oh, Joe! You’re going to like this! An official with adequate powers is not only available but in situ! Know who he meant? None other than the Warren Hastings of the twentieth century – Edwin Burroughs!’

  Joe was aghast. ‘Good God! Didn’t you explain to him that this is the same Edwin Burroughs whose name has risen several places to top the list of suspects? How can he possibly lead the mopping-up operation if he’s under suspicion?’

  James fixed Joe with a bleak but resolute stare. ‘Look, Joe. None of us murdered Zeman if that’s what you’re implying. And I wish you’d stop harping on that. We have the opinion of Grace Holbrook on this – death by natural causes or misadventure at the worst if the theory about the arsenic is correct – and I’d be obliged if you’d leave it there. As you said yourself, we oughtn’t to be stampeded into a barmy bit of theorizing just because Iskander wasn’t happy with the official decision. And with this in mind, I think you should now go to Burroughs and explain what’s happened.’

  ‘Correction,’ said Joe. ‘You can go and explain.’

  ‘Further correction,’ said James. ‘We’ll go together.’

  They set off to bang on Burroughs’ door.

  ‘Come!’ an irascible voice called.

  They stepped inside to find Burroughs sitting up in bed, bottle of bismuth tablets in one hand and a glass of water in the other, gold-rimmed glasses on the end of his nose, pink with indigestion, girt in a pair of broad-striped pyjamas.

  ‘I’ve been sitting here,’ he said without preamble, ‘like a damn fool, hoping that somebody would come and tell me what the hell’s going on. So I could say in a manner of speaking I’m glad to see you. What have you to tell me?’

  ‘Morning, Sir Edwin,’ said Joe
. ‘Quite a lot to tell you one way and another.’

  ‘Well, keep it short. There’s only one thing in which I’m seriously interested,’ Sir Edwin interrupted, ‘and that is – just how soon can it be arranged for me to leave? I have work to do in Delhi which really cannot be put on one side. I hadn’t reckoned to be away from my desk for more than a day or two but I’ve now been away – thanks to the delay in Peshawar – for a week. I really need to get back. Now, you were saying?’

  ‘There’s been a bit of a change,’ James Lindsay began tentatively.

  ‘A change affecting your status in the affair,’ Joe supplied. ‘A change affecting my status too, for that matter.’

  ‘What the devil’s that supposed to mean?’ said Burroughs. ‘I’ve done what I came here to do which is to assess the present position in this part of the NWFP and all I have seen so far persuades me that the so-called Forward Policy has been a mistake and I shall continue to say so as soon as I can get back to Delhi.’

  ‘It’s not quite as simple as that,’ said Joe and they explained.

  Burroughs’ face changed from pink to white and back again. He sat up in bed and gobbled. Disjointed words and phrases came across.

  ‘Disgraceful . . . ridiculous . . . incompetent . . . no concern of mine . . . purely local difficulty . . . I’ve got better things to do . . .’