CHAPTER 9
On their way to see Ravgani, the Police Commissioner the pair had their normal banter about the man; Roy said that the man was indolent Edrich felt the man to be merely incompetent. Indolence, Edrich claimed was always accompanied by fatness in the individual concerned and Ravgani was as thin as a rake so he could not be indolent. Roy argued that indolence and fatness did not go hand in glove and that the only reason that Ravgani was not fat was that he must have a tapeworm. Edrich countered that tapeworms were invariably, in his experience, caused by eating pork and as a Muslim Ravgani did not eat pork hence he couldn’t have a tapeworm. Roy was caught out by this and had not thought of an answer before they were ushered into the Police Commissioner’s presence.
Edrich opened the conversation once he felt the ritual pleasantries were concluded. ‘I have discussed with the governor matters that could concern your police.’
Ravgani looked vague and shifted his sitting position as though this gave him time to think – not a common occurrence. ‘What police matters were discussed?’
‘Well it seems that there are three Lur tribesmen whose task is to kill me.’
Ravgani nodded his head. ‘I met with the governor recently and he mentioned you.’ Ravgani looked off into space as he concentrated on what he was going to say, ‘and that you were involved in a feud.’
‘Yes something I have inherited from my predecessor.’
Ravgani starred off into the distance, ‘Major Titmus. I remember him.’
He only left a couple of months ago hardly surprising you remember him, thought Edrich as he said, ‘I have the names of the Lurs who are suspected of planning to kill me. Possibly, they match the names you have?’
The Persian again did not answer immediately and appeared to be thinking. The droning of a fly was distinctly audible in the silence of the room. Ravgani looked warily at Edrich when he spoke, ‘no, I do not know who they are. If I did would you want me to arrest these men before they kill you?’
‘That would be most helpful,’ said Edrich mystified by the other’s response but trying not to show emotion.
‘I think it will be difficult for me to arrest them unless they have done something.’
‘Well, Commissioner, naturally I would want to see them perhaps frightened off before they committed my murder.’
‘Yes,’ Ravgani looked serious, ‘I do not wish to see my good friend, Major Edrich, killed but if I do not know the names of these men. I?’ Ravgani shrugged his shoulders helplessly.
‘May I make a suggestion?’
‘Yes,’ said Ravgani very slowly. This sounded like work.
‘I have these names of Lurs who are known, in the past, to have been involved in banditry, attacks on caravans, shooting at patrols, all that sort of thing. Now I do not say that the names I have are the ones involved in my threatened murder. But we have to start somewhere do we not?’ Edrich went on after hesitating to see if Ravgani wanted to reply; he didn’t. ’Of course we do. So if I give you these men’s names perhaps you could get your men to visit all the inns in the city to see whether they have already arrived in Shushtar and are staying here. If any of them are here in the town then we can ask them why they are here and that we will, sorry you will, be keeping an eye on them.’
Ravgani felt depressed at the thought of work. ‘If these Lurs are dangerous then it will hard for me to send my men out for such work when the government has not paid them for months. My men may feel that this is between the British and the Lurs and that it is none of our police business, it is political.’
‘Murder whether political or not surely is police business?’
‘Yes, well, it is,’ Ravgani’s voice trailed off whilst his eyes avoided Roy and Edrich.
Roy looked at Edrich who held his finger to his lips; the silence filled the room. When Ravgani’s eyes focussed back on Edrich, the latter spoke, ‘when I came to visit you today I was accompanied by some of my soldiers. Now I was thinking that on our way back to the Residency there are two inns that we could investigate for you. We could just chat to each innkeeper to find out if he has seen these Lurs, whether they are staying with him or whether he knows if they are in town. I was thinking if I did that, it would allow your men to get on with their other work.’ Edrich sneaked a look at Roy whose eyes were boggling at him.
Ravgani looked of unhappy at that suggestion. ‘It may cause me trouble if we have Indian soldiers searching our Inns.’
‘No, no, no, Commissioner we would not search the inn, or create a commotion merely I’d ask if these men were staying there. If these Lurs are there I’ll invite them to have a chat to me about their reason for being in town. They are unlikely to cause trouble if I catch them unawares and my escort will be outside the inn waiting for me.’
‘If they are there and do not wish to speak to you?’
‘All I will do is, send you a message stating that fact. If you wish you can get your men to go and talk to them and see what, if anything, they are up to.’
Ravgani looked visibly relieved. ‘The Indian soldiers won’t go into the inn?’
‘No, they will be under strict orders not to enter the inn, unless someone takes a shot at me,’ Edrich added casually. ‘Then my men will have to go in and arrest them for you, Commissioner. I am sure you would be happy for them to do that.’
‘Yes, Major Edrich, I think I would welcome your help on this matter, but only the two inns. Now you have some names?’
Edrich passed the list of Lur names to Ravgani who scanned them briefly then looked up, ‘these might be the same three names his Excellency gave me the other day.’
Edrich pondered the governor’s last statement. Three names surely he would have remembered that few but there was no point in getting angry at the man opposite. ‘Ah, I thought his Excellency might have done that. With the amount of work you must do it must be difficult to keep on top of things. I am sure his Excellency the Governor would be pleased to reward you and your men if somehow the three were to be detained before my death. I don’t know but I think my government would hold the governor responsible if I was to be killed. Who knows what the governor would do then,’ Edrich’s voice trailed off.
It was impossible to know by looking at him whether it was the sound of possible gain or blame that galvanised Ravgani into staring at the Lur names on the list as if he was trying to memorize them. Ravgani then tried to return the list to Edrich but when he was told he could keep the list he reluctantly placed it in front of him. Edrich visibly relaxed and the next half an hour passed slowly by as he reiterated once again for the benefit of the commissioner how well the allies were doing in France, Palestine and Mesopotamia.
Roy was bursting to ask Edrich a question and as soon as the pair had left Ravgani he said, ‘Major, do you really think that the men who are trying to kill you would stay in one of the inns we are going to? Surely, they would stay with one of their many tribesmen who now live in the city, or at least an inn run by Lurs. The two we are going to are both run by Bakhtiaris?’
‘I think you are undoubtedly right, Roy. But we have to start somewhere, don’t we? Yes, it is extremely unlikely that Lurs would stay at an inn run by Bakhtiaris but by going somewhere where they are unlikely to be means I will not be shot at – something dear to my heart. Also let me ask you this, what do you know about inns?’
Roy furrowed his brow, ‘They are places one stays in, where one meets and chats to lots of people from different places. They are usually filthy places fit only for tribesmen. Won’t it frighten the Lurs off before we can catch them if we start looking for them in the city’s inns?’
‘I will not lose any sleep if that happens, Roy.’
‘Ah, I see. It lets the Lurs know that we are onto them, major, doesn’t it? Provided that the men named by the governor are the actual ones after you.’ He paused and looked at Edrich knowingly, ‘the hunter now becomes the hunted.’
‘There you have it. Another expression we use in English would also fit
the situation, “the biter bit”.’
‘I wouldn’t want to bite a Lur, major, I don’t eat meat.’
Edrich stopped and looked at Roy, ‘I’m hungry so let’s go find a Lur and who knows how he might be in a curry sauce.’ Roy made a face of mock disgust and they both laughed.
Most Shushtar houses had cellars that were used for relaxation or entertainment in the hot weather. Edrich and Roy had agreed a plan of campaign that the former would enter an inn on his own but that he would not go down to the cellar where as an honoured guest he was bound to be invited. Cellars, whilst cool, were too good a place for an ambush. Edrich anyway was wary of Persian inns, as he had been told provided that they harboured the typhus bug; though whether the bug was happier above or below ground he wasn’t sure. He decided based on no scientific evidence whatsoever that the disease would exist better in the less aerated cellar.
Yusaf Bahadur was the innkeeper of the first inn they visited and true to form he invited Edrich to sit in the cellar. Edrich declined the invitation telling Yusaf that a horse had trod on his leg so climbing stairs was difficult for the moment. As Edrich stood in a room leading off the courtyard talking to Yusaf he kept his back firmly against the wall. Edrich made a great play of keeping his eyes roving round the room. Eventually when he felt he had discussed the weather, trade, and caravans Edrich asked him whether any Lurs were staying with him. As expected Yusaf replied in the negative but Yusaf promised that if any did come to stay, particularly the three whose names Edrich mentioned, he would personally tell the consul. Edrich smiled when he heard Yusaf promise that and wondered - was the man telling him what he wanted to hear or would he actually do as he said?
Three days after his meeting with Clarke and the General, Routledge received a telegram from Peshawar. The telegram stated that Sennett had been recently thrown from his horse and had suffered a badly broken leg. Sennett’s injury was so bad that it was expected that he would be incapacitated for three months at least. Routledge went back to his list of candidates and arranged another meeting with Clarke to discuss Sennett’s replacement. Topping the list of candidates was Edrich.
The Cotton Spies Page 10
