JM01 - River of Darkness

by Rennie Airth

  “This is Mr. Tozer,” Madden said. “Mr. Tozer—Chief Inspector Sinclair.”

  The man rose and offered his hand to Sinclair who shook it. A white ridge of scar tissue showed on his face, running from the corner of one eye to below his cheekbone.

  “I’m delighted to meet you, Mr. Tozer. I take it our message reached you?”

  “Yes, sir. Last night when I got home.” He spoke with a marked Cockney accent.

  “Your sister wasn’t expecting you till the weekend.”

  “I came back early, sir. It’s been raining for three days in North Wales. When Milly gave me your message I thought I’d come down here in person. I always wanted to see the inside of Scotland Yard. Fact is, I was hoping to work here one day.” He displayed a crooked grin.

  “Were you, now?”

  The chief inspector shifted Tozer’s chair so that it was facing his own desk. Hollingsworth had risen, but Sinclair waved him down.

  “Stay there, Sergeant. We’ll need a note of this.” To Styles, he said, “Bring in a chair for Mr. Madden, Constable. And then you might fetch Mr. Tozer a cup of tea.”

  He waited until Madden was seated in a chair alongside his desk.

  “You were saying you’d hoped to be a policeman?”

  “That’s right, sir. I reckoned I was cut out for police work, especially after the time I spent with Captain Miller. But when I came to after our car was hit by that shell I found I had a flipper missing.” He grinned and held up his left arm, displaying the shirt pinned back under his jacket sleeve, covering the stump of his wrist. “Well, bang went my hopes of joining the Met!”

  The chief inspector inclined his head. “I’m sorry to hear that. Now, about this name you’ve given us. Pike. You’re sure that’s right?”

  “I am,” Tozer replied, without hesitation. “Like I was saying to the Inspector, I remember the whole business clearly. It’s not something you’d be likely to forget.” His eyes narrowed. “Do you mind my asking, sir—but why do you want to know about it now?”

  “I don’t mind your asking, Mr. Tozer.” A smile touched the chief inspector’s lips. “But I’d be obliged for the moment if you’d answer our questions. We’re somewhat pressed for time.”

  Madden interrupted, “I came for you as soon as I got Pike’s name, sir, and after I’d rung Colonel Jenkins at the War Office. But I dare say you’d like to hear it from the beginning . . .”

  “Would you do that, Mr. Tozer?” Sinclair turned to him. “Start with the crime scene, please. Captain Miller was assigned to the case, I assume. Did you work with him regularly?”

  “Yes, I did, sir. The captain always used me as his clerk. We seemed to hit it off.”

  “And how long had you worked together?”

  “Going on six months. From the beginning of 1917. That’s when I got posted to the investigation branch. Happiest day of my life, you might say.” Tozer looked up and saw Styles with a cup of tea standing beside him. “Just put it down, would you, son?”

  He displayed his stump with a grin and the constable reddened. He placed the cup and saucer on the chief inspector’s desk.

  “Your happiest day, Mr. Tozer?”

  “Yes, sir. I was sent to France in early 1916, so I was there for the Somme, and afterwards.”

  “You took part in the battles?”

  “Oh, no, sir.” Tozer dropped his blue eyes. “No, we were posted down the line. The men would go up to the forward trenches, but we had to wait in case any of them turned back. Sometimes they’d lose their nerve, and it was our job to pick them up. No more than boys many of them were . . . but they called them deserters just the same.” He lifted his gaze. “They used to look at us, the Tommies, as they went by, up to the front. I’d never seen hate like that in anyone’s eyes before . . .”

  He fell silent. No one spoke. He shifted his gaze from the chief inspector to Madden. “I reckon you know what I’m talking about, sir.”

  Madden moved his head a fraction. “It’s in the past now, Mr. Tozer,” he said gently. “Best to put it from your mind.”

  “Thank you, sir. I try to.”

  Sinclair let a few moments pass. Then he spoke again: “So you joined the Special Investigation Branch?”

  “Yes, sir . . .” Tozer gathered himself. “Well, not as such—the branch wasn’t formed until after the war—but the Military Police were already detailing squads to do investigative work and I got myself posted to one which was attached to a provost company stationed at Poperinge. That’s where I met Captain Miller. We were working on another case—a theft of goods in the railyards—when he got the order to drop everything and go directly to St. Martens.”

  “That was the village closest to the farm, was it not?” Sinclair shifted in his chair. “How far away was the military camp?”

  “Only a couple of miles. It was an area they used a lot for rest camps. Troops coming out of the line would spend about a week there before going back up. This particular battalion—it was from the South Notts Regiment—had been there four or five days.”

  “From the file it seems that the soldiers were regarded as the only suspects. Why was that?”

  Tozer tugged his earlobe. “Well, for one thing, there weren’t that many civilians around. The war had pretty well cleaned them out. A few of the farms were still being worked and there were people in the village. But the Belgian police and gendarmerie had been at work before we got there, checking on their own citizens. They reckoned they could account for all of them. And then there were the bodies, sir. Well, three of them. The husband and the two sons. They’d been bayoneted, no doubt about that. Expert job, too. One thrust each.”

  Sinclair glanced at Madden.

  “So Miller took over? It became a British investigation?”

  “Not entirely, sir. The victims were civilians. But the Belgians had asked for our assistance and it was understood Captain Miller would handle everything on the military side and keep the Belgian authorities informed.”

  “The woman who was killed, the farmer’s wife, where did you find her body? Describe the scene, if you will.”

  Tozer reached forward for his cup of tea. He took a sip and then replaced the cup on its saucer. He licked his lips. “She was in the bedroom upstairs, lying across the bed with her skirt and drawers ripped off. Her throat had been cut.”

  “The assumption, Captain Miller’s assumption, was that she had been raped?” The chief inspector put it in the form of a question.

  “Oh, yes, sir. In fact, when he read the Belgian pathologist’s report he asked him to go back and re-examine the body. He thought he must be wrong. But the pathologist confirmed there was no trace of seminal fluid and no sign of forcible entry.”

  “So the captain was surprised?”

  “He was. And not just by that. One of the things he noted, you may have seen it in the file, was the difference between the upstairs and the down. In the kitchen, where the men’s bodies were found, you might have wondered how it could have happened. There wasn’t a plate broken, just one chair overturned, as I recall. They must have been killed in a matter of seconds. Upstairs was a different story. She’d put up a fight. The mirror was smashed and the curtains torn off one of the windows.” He shook his head regretfully. “Strong, fine-looking woman she was. Lovely fair hair. Lollondays, they called her in the district.”

  “What was that?” Sinclair prompted him.

  Tozer blushed. “That’s as close as I can get to it, sir. It’s a French word, means the Dutchwoman. She came from Holland. Spoke a few words of English, we were told. She was a favourite with the lads when they came out of the line. I don’t mean she . . .” He flushed again. “More like a mother, if you take my meaning. She’d cook for them at the farm, lay on omelettes and fried potatoes and the like. Well, she charged, of course, but the men liked to go there from camp.

  “This lot from the battalion—fifteen men from B Company—they’d been there earlier, that same week, and they’d booked again to come
back that night. We had no trouble getting their names. They owned up straight away. Said they’d gone there and come back in a group.”

  “But Captain Miller didn’t believe them?”

  Tozer pursed his lips, frowning. “It wasn’t like that exactly. See, those lads were the obvious suspects. Or, anyway, the first ones that came to hand. And the captain knew, any time a Tommy found himself face to face with a redcap he’d play deaf and dumb. Like I said, they hated us. So he went at them hard. He reckoned if they’d done it together, one of them would crack. And if they hadn’t, if it was just a few of them who were involved, the others were likely to know about it and he’d get at the truth that way. But after he’d had the last one in I remember him saying he didn’t think it was them.”

  “He’d dismissed them as suspects?” Sinclair was surprised.

  “Oh, no, sir. He meant to question them again. But they were off that night, heading back to the front.”

  “He didn’t try to hold them?”

  “Nothing to hold them on. But it didn’t matter. They weren’t going anywhere. Just back to the salient.”

  The chief inspector looked at Madden questioningly.

  “Passchendaele, sir. That’s where the battle was fought. Near Ypres.”

  “It was just a few square miles of mud and craters,” Tozer explained. “You crossed over the canal and you were there. Death’s Land, the Tommies called it. All there was was mud and corpses. They didn’t expect to come back.”

  Sinclair stared at his blotter. He was silent for several seconds. “In this case, seven did,” he said finally. “Of the fifteen. But Captain Miller didn’t interview them again, as far as I can gather.”

  Tozer’s eyes widened. “Only seven . . . I didn’t know . . . I’m sorry . . .” He glanced at Madden again and sighed. “No, sir, the captain never asked to see them again. By that time he was on a different track.”

  “That’s what we thought.” Sinclair sat forward. “That’s what I want to know about.”

  Tozer took another sip of tea. He had gone a little pale, Billy Styles thought, watching from his place beside Sergeant Hollingsworth. “The day after the battalion left, Captain Miller got a message from Poperinge. They were holding a deserter there. He was up for court-martial. He claimed he had information about the murders at the farmhouse.”

  “What was his name?”

  Tozer searched his memory. “Duckman . . . ? No, Duckham. William Duckham. He was from the same battalion as those fifteen lads, but a different company.”

  “Did Captain Miller interview him?”

  “Yes, he did. At the detention barracks at Poperinge.”

  “Were you present?”

  “I was.” Tozer touched the scar on his cheek. “The lad—Duckham—was in a bad way. He hadn’t been with the battalion long. Only gone into the line once, but that was enough and when they came out he’d made a run for it. Poor boy. He was shaking all over, couldn’t stop himself. Maybe he thought it would help his case if he told us what he knew . . .”

  “Which was?”

  “Duckham told the captain he’d got as far as the farm and then holed up in the barn, which was a little way from the main house. Found a spot in the loft behind some hay and lay there during the day. At night he’d come down and forage for food. He couldn’t get himself to move any further, he said. He just lay there—”

  Tozer broke off to reach for his tea cup. The chief inspector controlled his impatience.

  “The night it happened he heard the men from B Company arrive and leave, though he didn’t see them. He was lying low. But after they’d gone he crawled out from behind the hay and was about to climb down the ladder when the barn door opened and someone came in. Duckham heard him moving about down below, but it wasn’t till the man switched on a torch that he saw who it was.”

  “Pike?” Sinclair asked, in a low voice.

  Tozer nodded. “Duckham knew him by sight. He wasn’t in his company, but everyone in the battalion knew Pike. There was a joke that went round, or so he told us. No one in B Company gave a damn about Jerry. It was Pike they were scared of.”

  “He was sergeant major of B Company?”

  “That’s right. Quite a hero in his way. I’ll tell you about that in a moment.” Tozer emptied his tea cup. “Duckham had his head over the edge of the loft, and since he didn’t dare stir he saw everything. He said Pike had a rifle and knapsack with him and the first thing he did was fix a bayonet to the rifle. Then he opened the knapsack and took out—” He broke off, shaking his head. “You won’t credit this, sir, I know the captain had a hard time believing it, but according to Duckham what he did next was put on a gas mask.”

  Sinclair expelled his breath in a soundless sigh. His eyes met Madden’s. Tozer looked from one to the other. He seemed to be expecting more of a reaction from them.

  “Go on, Mr. Tozer.”

  “When he’d done that he stood still for a few moments. Sort of growling, Duckham said. Making these noises behind the mask. Next thing he was out of the barn door and Duckham heard a whistle. Just one long blast. He said before he’d even had time to crawl back behind the hay he heard the woman screaming. Then nothing more. He lay where he was and about ten minutes later Pike came back into the barn. Or he assumed it was him, because he didn’t budge. After a minute he heard the barn door being shut, but he stayed where he was for another half-hour until he was sure there was no one about. Then he climbed down and went over to the house. When he found the bodies downstairs he just grabbed whatever food he could and ran for it. He was picked up two days later outside Poperinge.”

  The door behind Tozer opened suddenly and Bennett put his head inside. His quick glance took in the scene.

  “I won’t bother you now, Chief Inspector. Fill me in as soon as you can, please.”

  He shut the door.

  “Well!” Sinclair sat back. “So Miller knew it was Pike he was after. What did he do next?”

  Tozer’s eyes crinkled. “He didn’t exactly know, sir. All this had come from a man who was up for a court-martial. He might have had something against the sergeant major. He might have been spinning a yarn, hoping to save his own skin. Word had got around about the killings.”

  “Miller said that?”

  “Yes, sir, he talked to me about it. He liked to do that. Think aloud. He wanted to question Pike first. So he made inquiries and he found out the battalion had crossed the canal the night before. That meant they’d be in the line for anything up to a week. If it had been a matter of a day or two he might have waited until they came out. But he felt it was too long, the case was too serious. So we went after them.”

  “You crossed into the salient?” The chief inspector showed surprise.

  “Oh, no, sir! Thank God!” Tozer shut his eyes as if in prayer. “The battalion command post was this side of the canal, but that was bad enough. No end of shells falling all around. I thought we were going to cop it for sure. But the captain was a real terrier. Once he’d got his teeth into something he wouldn’t let go. There was an officer called Crane in command there, a major.” Tozer nodded, as though in recollection. “Copped it himself a week later, we heard. Anyway, when Captain Miller said he wanted Pike sent back, Crane flat refused. Said the battalion was heavily engaged and the sergeant major was one of his best men. Now he couldn’t do that, you know, refuse. Not in that situation. Not if he was a general. Captain Miller had the authority. But he took the major aside and explained how things stood. He said he didn’t want Pike’s name associated with the crime if the charge wasn’t true. Which it would be if he had to issue an arrest order. He wanted Pike to have a chance to clear himself. Well, after he’d put it like that, Crane had to agree and he sent a runner up the line straight away with orders for Pike to be sent back.”

  “I take it he never appeared.” The chief inspector eased some stiffness from his shoulder. His gaze remained fixed on Tozer’s face.

  “No, he didn’t, sir. We waited there i
n the command post all night. The runner came back next morning. He’d reached B Company and found that all the officers were dead or wounded. Pike was alive, so he passed on the major’s order directly to him.”

  “Do you know how that was phrased?” Madden broke his long silence. “Was there any mention of the Military Police wanting to talk to him?”

  “No, there wasn’t. I know that for a fact. Captain Miller was with the major when he spoke to the runner.”

  “But he’d seen you, hadn’t he? The runner, I mean. A pair of redcaps.”

  “I reckon so. Mr. Miller thought the same thing. He said he must have told Pike. It was the only explanation.”

  “For what?” This time it was Sinclair who spoke.

  “After the runner had delivered his message he left to return. There wasn’t any trench line as such. The troops were dug in in craters. Pike was sharing one with two other men—neither was from the lot we’d questioned, by the way. They both said the same thing later. Right after the runner left, Pike vanished.”

  “Vanished?”

  “He crawled out of the crater and they never saw him again.”

  “You mean he headed back to his own lines?” Madden asked.

  “No, that was it.” Tozer shook his head hard. “He went forward, in the direction of the enemy. They both said the same thing. It was the last anyone ever saw of him. Till they found his body.”

  His body?” The chief inspector sat bolt upright. Madden was frowning.

  Tozer looked from one to the other.

  “Didn’t you know he was dead? I thought . . .” He broke off and stared at them. “Cor! You didn’t think he was still alive, did you?” And then, as the truth suddenly dawned on him, “Christ! It’s Melling Lodge!”

  In the hush that followed his exclamation the squeak of Sergeant Hollingsworth’s pen was clearly audible. The two detectives looked at each other. It was Sinclair who spoke: “What makes you say that, Mr. Tozer?”