TWENTY-TWO
His return to consciousness was slow, erratic and uncertain — like a fire which is catching hold, but may still yet die back.
At first, all he could focus on was the angry buzz which was coming from somewhere in the back of his brain.
Next, he became aware of himself as a physical presence — a presence which, moreover, was sitting down, and did not seem to be able to move either its arms or its legs.
A minute passed, and the angry buzz transformed itself into what he recognized was a stream of words, though each word followed on so rapidly from the one which preceded it that they still meant nothing to him.
Another minute ticked by, and the words — spoken from the bottom of a deep metal jug — began to make sense.
‘What are we going to do with him?’
‘What we have to do!’
And what they have to do is kill me, he thought. Now they’ve gone this far, they have no choice.
He kept his eyes closed, knowing that the moment they realized he was back with them, they would rob him of what little freedom he still had.
‘We can’t kill him. Not like this — not in cold blood!’
Hatfield!
‘Of course we can. He’s nothing — a piece of working-class scum, who thinks that just because he’s employed by Scotland Yard, he has the right to ride roughshod over his betters — and if it comes to it, I’ll crush him in much the same way I might crush a cockroach.’
Soames!
‘When you talk about the honour of the regiment, Benjamin, it’s just words, isn’t it? I suppose we shouldn’t expect any more of you. I, on the other hand, am prepared to do whatever it takes to avoid tarnishing its proud reputation.’
Maude!
They were all there — the three musketeers.
But exactly where was there?
Even though his head had cleared, the three men’s words still had a slightly hollow sound, which would suggest that they were in a small, enclosed space.
A dugout — probably in a trench which had long since been abandoned, and thus was the perfect place to commit a murder!
His hopes of survival were slim, Blackstone told himself, but if he could find a way to turn the musketeers against each other, there was still a small chance that he might come out of all this alive.
He opened his eyes. Just as he had suspected, he was in a dugout, and was tied to a chair.
And there they all were, revealed in the flickering light of an oil lamp — Maude sitting across the table from him; Soames standing behind Maude; and Hatfield uncertainly hovering near the entrance to the dugout, as if he would rather not be there at all.
‘Welcome back, Inspector Blackstone,’ Maude said sardonically. ‘It was rather inconsiderate of you to keep us waiting for quite so long.’
‘If you didn’t want me to keep you waiting, then you shouldn’t have hit me quite so bloody hard, should you?’ Blackstone replied.
Maude laughed. ‘That was Lieutenant Soames’ doing, I’m afraid. He’s a fine chap, our Roger — but he can be a little heavy-handed sometimes.’ He paused. ‘Would you like a drink of water?’
‘If it’s no trouble,’ Blackstone said.
‘It’s absolutely no trouble at all,’ Maude said graciously. ‘Give him a drink, Hatfield.’
Hatfield crossed the dugout, picked up the jug which was easily within Maude’s reach, poured some water into a tin cup, and held the cup up to Blackstone’s lips.
‘Is that better?’ Maude asked.
‘Yes.’
Maude nodded. ‘Good — because, before we’ve finished, you have a lot of talking to do.’
‘Is that right?’
‘Indeed it is. Before we’ve finished, you’re going to tell us exactly what it is that you know.’
‘I know a great deal,’ Blackstone told Maude.
‘A great deal, you say. Would you care to give me an example of that knowledge?’
‘I know, for one thing, that I’ve been on the wrong track for most of this investigation, and that the three of you didn’t kill Lieutenant Fortesque.’
‘Are you. . are you prepared to swear to that?’ Hatfield gasped.
‘Yes,’ Blackstone said.
‘Oh, for God’s sake, does it matter whether he’s willing to swear to it or not?’ Soames asked exasperatedly. ‘He’s not a gentleman — his word is not worth the breath it takes to give it.’
‘He doesn’t have to be a gentleman if he’s willing to swear to it with his hand on the Bible,’ Hatfield said desperately. ‘And if he really doesn’t believe we killed Charlie, we can let him go.’
‘And give him the opportunity to file charges against us for assault?’ Soames asked. ‘Have a worthless creature like him appearing as a witness against us at our court martial? I’d rather die.’
‘But if he was also willing to promise that he’ll say nothing about what happened here today. .’
‘He’ll promise anything that you want him to promise,’ Soames said, with obvious disgust. ‘Don’t you see that? He’ll tell any amount of lies in order to save his own miserable life.’
‘They’re fools, aren’t they, Blackstone?’ Maude asked mildly. ‘Complete bloody idiots.’ He turned to his two friends — if they were his friends, if his huge ego had ever been capable of encompassing friendship — and continued, ‘The reason that Blackstone has reached the conclusion that we didn’t kill Charlie is because he knows what we really did.’
‘Do you, Blackstone!’ Hatfield screamed. ‘Do you?’
‘As I told you earlier, I know a great deal,’ Blackstone replied. ‘I know why you put those two privates — Clay and Jones — on a charge, Lieutenant Hatfield, even though you knew that by doing so you were making yourself look weak and incompetent.’ He grinned. ‘It was always going to be you who was going to put them on the charge, wasn’t it? There was never really any question of it being Soames or Maude?’
‘There. . there were good reasons why I was the one chosen to do it,’ Hatfield said.
‘I’m sure they sounded good, when Maude explained them to you,’ Blackstone replied. ‘We both know how persuasive he can be. But whatever he said to you, it simply wasn’t true. The real reason you were chosen was that you were the one with the least amount of honour to lose — and deep down inside yourself, you know that.’
‘You’re wrong,’ Hatfield protested. ‘We discussed it, and we decided that I should. .’
‘All right, all right, have it your own way,’ Blackstone said dismissively. ‘What else do I know? I know why Maude went to see Fortesque shortly before he died. I know why Soames smashed in Fortesque’s skull half an hour before stand-to, and I know why you felt it was vital to steal the coffin from the warehouse in Calais.’ He paused for a second. ‘I also know, Lieutenant Hatfield, why Maude ordered you to attack me with the tent peg mallet.’
‘He didn’t order me to attack you,’ Hatfield said angrily. ‘It was something we all decided on.’
‘Of course it was,’ Blackstone agreed. ‘And what exactly were your instructions?’
‘Shut up, you bastard!’ Hatfield said. He turned to Maude. ‘Make him shut up, William.’
‘Since the whole purpose of this interrogation is to find out what he knows, making him shut up would be rather pointless, don’t you think?’ Maude asked coldly. ‘Besides, I find the whole way he’s chosen to handle this situation absolutely fascinating.’
‘Fascinating!’ Hatfield repeated. ‘For the love of God, what’s fascinating about it?’
‘Most men in Blackstone’s position would either be begging for mercy by now, or doing all they could to ingratiate themselves with us. He’s chosen quite a different approach, and I’d be most interested to see where that leads.’ Maude turned his attention back to Blackstone. ‘You may continue, Inspector.’
‘At the time, I thought you’d been sent to kill me, Lieutenant Hatfield, and had simply made a mess of it,’ Blackstone said. ‘I se
e now that that wasn’t the case at all. If you’d wanted me dead, you’d have been going for my skull, and you wouldn’t have switched your flashlight on until you’d reached the head of the bed — but since you’d only been told to hurt me, you switched the light on when you were no more than halfway there, level with my trunk. And what I’m wondering at this moment, Lieutenant Hatfield, is if you even know why you were told to attack me.’
‘Of course I know why I attacked you!’ Hatfield said angrily. ‘Maude thought — I mean, we all thought — that you were getting too close to the truth. We knew we couldn’t kill you, because though you’re only a lowly policeman, you are still a policeman, and Scotland Yard would feel duty-bound to send more officers over to investigate your death.’
‘So the plan — as you saw it — was to take me out of action for at least a week or so?’
‘Exactly.’
Blackstone laughed. ‘You’re not even close to the truth,’ he said. ‘Maude didn’t particularly want me out of action, because he was rather enjoying playing games with me.’
‘That’s not true,’ Hatfield protested. ‘We all agreed. .’
‘Ask yourself one question,’ Blackstone suggested. ‘If Maude had really wanted me thoroughly worked over, why didn’t he send Soames instead? Soames wouldn’t have run like a scared rabbit the moment something went wrong. He would have stayed and finished the job. But the whole point of the exercise was never to hurt me — it was to muddy the waters a little.’
‘I don’t understand,’ Hatfield said.
‘Of course you don’t,’ Blackstone agreed. ‘What Maude wanted was to link the two crimes firmly together in my mind. I’d been attacked with a mallet, so I’d naturally think it was the same mallet which had been used to kill Fortesque. And the reason that would have muddied the waters is because Fortesque wasn’t killed with a mallet at all — he wasn’t even killed by a blow to the head!’ He paused for a moment. ‘Maude didn’t explain that particular line of thought to you, did he? But then why should he have done? You weren’t his co-conspirator — you were nothing more than an instrument.’
‘I. . we. .’ Hatfield stuttered.
‘Don’t you see, you’ve always been Maude’s dupe?’ Blackstone asked. ‘Why, even back in your schooldays, in good old Eton College-’
‘That’s enough!’ Maude said, suddenly.
Blackstone laughed again, ‘Well, well, well, whoever would have thought it?’ he asked. ‘I’ve frightened you, haven’t I, William? Here I am, tied up in a chair, and completely helpless, and I’ve still succeeded in frightening you.’
A look of black anger crossed Maude’s face, and then was quickly replaced by his customary sardonic smile.
‘You don’t frighten me, Blackstone,’ he said. ‘A man like you could never frighten me.’
‘Prove it,’ Blackstone challenged.
For an instant, caution fought out a battle with arrogance on Maude’s face, but then — as Blackstone had known it would — arrogance won a decisive and overwhelming victory.
‘All right,’ the young lieutenant agreed. ‘You carry on with your clever little speech, Blackstone — and then you’ll see for yourself just how little good it does you in the end.’
‘You must have felt unworthy from the first day you set foot in the hallowed grounds of Eton College,’ Blackstone told Hatfield. ‘What right had you to be there, you asked yourself — a tradesman’s grandson, rubbing shoulders with the descendants of men who fought with William the Conqueror? But despite feeling unworthy, you still desperately wanted to fit in, didn’t you? You would have done anything to turn these wonderful people into your friends. You weren’t to know — how could you? — that all your attempts were doomed to failure, right from the start.’
‘That shows just how little you know,’ Hatfield said, in a voice which probably even he didn’t find convincing. ‘I. . I made some very good friends at Eton. And you’re in this dugout with two of them now.’
‘You didn’t have friends then, and you don’t have friends now,’ Blackstone countered. ‘All you’ve ever had is people who were prepared to use you for their own convenience, in much the same way as they might have used a groom — or a whore.’
‘You’re wrong. I-’
‘When you were at Eton, did you take the blame for things you hadn’t done?’ Blackstone ploughed on, remorselessly. ‘Were you ever given beatings that should rightfully have been administered to your “friend” Maude?’
‘I don’t remember.’
‘Of course you do!’
‘It’s the kind of thing that friends do for one another,’ Hatfield said. ‘If you can spare a friend by taking the punishment on yourself, you do it without a second’s thought.’
‘And did Maude take any beatings for you, in return?’
‘I. . he may have done.’
‘He didn’t! My sergeant talked to your old housemaster — Edward Harrington Cardew — and Cardew told him that Maude was never beaten the whole time he was at Eton.’
‘He. . he was lucky.’
‘No, he wasn’t. He avoided punishment by using you as his whipping boy,’ Blackstone said. ‘And it didn’t stop once you’d left your schooldays behind you, did it? Here in France, you did something for him that was far worse than anything you’d ever done for him before — you shot down a man in cold blood.’
‘I did it for the honour of the regiment.’
‘You might tell yourself that now, but the real reason you did it was simply because Maude asked you to,’ Blackstone said harshly. ‘You did it because you thought it might make him like you a little more. But it hasn’t. If anything, it’s only increased the depth of his contempt for you.’
‘That’s not true!’ Hatfield protested.
‘Not true! Look at his face, and tell me it’s not true!’
Hatfield was so desperate for reassurance that it would have taken only the slightest effort on Maude’s part — the smallest expression of insincere approval — to convince the tradesman’s grandson that the man who he admired so much admired him in return.
But it was never going to happen. Maude’s pride would not let it happen — especially with Blackstone looking on — and the expression that both the policeman and the young lieutenant saw on his face was one of open contempt.
Hatfield turned as pale as death. ‘I. . I have to go outside,’ he gasped. ‘I need some air.’
He rushed to the doorway, and stepped out into the trench. Once he was there, they could hear him retching.
‘I was wrong in what I said earlier,’ Maude told Blackstone. ‘Your clever little speech has had some effect, after all. But, if I were you, I would draw no comfort from that.’
‘Wouldn’t you?’
‘Most certainly not. By holding up a mirror to Hatfield — and letting him see himself as I have always seen him — you have caused me some little inconvenience. And I will not easily forgive you for that.’
‘So what are you going to do about it?’ Blackstone asked. ‘Kill me? That was always your intention anyway.’
‘Yes, it was,’ Maude agreed. ‘But perhaps now I might not make your death as merciful as it could otherwise have been.’
Blackstone fought off the urge to look at the door.
Hatfield had finished being sick. He was now completely silent, and was probably trying to work out, in his turmoil of a mind, what he should do next.
If he decided to come back into the dugout, the inspector told himself, then the game was as good as over.
But if Hatfield didn’t come back, then he himself still had a small chance of emerging from this dugout alive.
TWENTY-THREE
A minute passed — a long, drawn-out minute, in which each second felt as momentous and heavy as a tent peg mallet being smashed down on an unsuspecting skull. And when that minute did finally end, another followed on, beginning the same slow journey into a future of its own making.
Tick-tock. . tick-tock. .
/> Blackstone was still resisting the urge to look towards the door, though Soames had glanced in that direction several times.
Maude, for his part, was looking vaguely into the middle distance, with the sort of expression on his face that he might have worn if he’d been umpiring a rather boring cricket match.
It was Maude who finally broke the silence, as they’d all expected that it would be.
‘Well,’ he said, ‘since Hatfield has obviously gone off to find a hole to crawl into, I suppose we’d better continue the interrogation without him.’
‘What did you do with Charlie Fortesque’s coffin once you’d stolen it from the warehouse?’ Blackstone asked. ‘Did you throw it into the sea? Or did you make a nice big bonfire out of it?’
‘Those are monstrous suggestions!’ Soames said angrily. ‘Of course we didn’t do anything like that. We buried it.’
A tear — so small that Blackstone might not even have noticed if he hadn’t been looking for it — ran slowly down Soames’ right cheek.
‘We dug a grave — or, at least, Hatfield did — in some rather thick woods near Calais,’ Maude said. ‘I can tell you that, because even if you had the chance to search for it — which you won’t — you’d never find it.’
‘We couldn’t give him a headstone,’ Soames said. ‘We didn’t dare take the risk. But I said a few words over the grave and — ’ he sniffed — ‘and it was as close to a Christian burial as we could manage.’
‘That was such a touching little speech, Roger,’ Maude said. ‘Maybe later, you could write it down, and when we get back home, I’ll have it set to music for you. But in the meantime,’ he continued harshly, ‘we still have the problem of this troublesome policeman to deal with.’
‘Charlie Fortesque was a very bad President of Pop, wasn’t he, Lieutenant Maude?’ Blackstone said. ‘He didn’t hold a single Pop-Tanning all the time he was in charge.’
‘How do you know all this?’ Soames asked.
Because I got a very long telegraph from Sergeant Patterson, expertly decoded by Wally, the black sheep of the Winfield family, Blackstone thought.
‘I’m ordering you to tell me how you know all these personal details of our private lives,’ Soames raged.
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