‘We’ll leave it there for the moment,’ he said.

‘Leave it there for ever, you bloody fool!’ and the Superintendent strode from the room.

Hardly had he left when Naurung entered.

‘Ah, good morning, Naurung,’ Joe said cheerfully. ‘You’ve just missed Bulstrode Sahib but you arrive in time to escort me to my next interview. Colonel Prentice’s bungalow? Can you take me there?’

On the way to the bungalow Joe briefed Naurung on his superior officer’s alibi and asked him to discreetly check on his movements on the day of the murder. Naurung listened with expressionless discretion but there was a gleam in his eye which said, ‘Give me a bit of routine policework and I’ll know just where I am.’ In front of Prentice’s bungalow Joe dismissed him and began to walk down the drive unaccompanied.

He was hailed by a voice behind him and turned to see Prentice handing his horse over to a syce.

‘Looking for me?’ Prentice asked.

‘Yes, I am. I was hoping I might be able to talk to you. Away from sharp ears and wagging tongues.’

‘When would you like to do that?’ said Prentice without much interest.

‘Well, I rather thought now… the sooner the better… no time like the present…’

Prentice laughed. ‘That alone would mark you out as a European,’ he said. ‘No Indian would say, “No time like the present.” For them any time would be better than the present. But there we are, you’ve said it. Come in and I’ll give you a cup of tea.’

‘An early ride?’ asked Joe as he walked down the gravelled drive alongside Prentice.

‘Regimental exercise. Try to get in one a month and this month’s was today. I like to start them early at this time of year – get them over before the heat.’

He led the way on to a verandah, called out ‘Koi hai!’ and sat down on a stool. A servant appeared and took his hat and whip, a second performed the same service for Joe. A third hurried forward to pull off Prentice’s boots. He stood up again and padded forward in his socks. ‘Shall we go through to the north verandah? It’s much cooler on that side at this time of day.’

They passed through the house and looked down at the garden, neat, tidy and totally unimaginative. The adjoining garden, however, was almost theatrically overgrown. Marechal Niel roses had run rampant and there were rose bushes as big as cottages. Seeing Joe’s attention taken by this wilderness, Prentice stopped, smiled and said, “That is the garden of what used to be my house. Destroyed in a fire, as you may have heard. Big garden. It goes all the way down to the river.’

‘And the pretty little building down there at the end?’ Joe asked.

‘Garden pavilion. Terribly overgrown now. It’s older than the British Raj – it’s older than John Company. It’s a Mogul building. I’ve often thought of selling the site but to do so would mean selling the pavilion and that I really can’t do. It’s been such a refuge to me. There are times when you want to get away from the demands of matrimony; there are times when you want to get away from the cares of parenthood, to say nothing of the demands of the regiment. When I go and work there it’s understood that I’m not to be disturbed. I don’t think I could run my life without it! But, come on now, let’s see if I can find you a drink or a cup of tea.’

To all outward appearance, Prentice’s bungalow was a fair example of the Raj public works department as they developed such things in Edwardian times. Four rooms of identical size surrounded an open sitting area and the whole within a wide verandah. There the resemblance to a typical Anglo-Indian house finished because Prentice had furnished exclusively with Indian furniture. No nostalgic glance towards the English home counties here. No framed hunting scenes by G.D. Armour or Lionel Edwards, not even a copy of the ubiquitous ‘Midnight Steeplechase’. In their place Indian illuminated paintings, many on silk, many on rollers, small jade, ivory and soapstone figures, Kashmir embroidered hangings on the walls, Bokhara and Afghani rugs on the floor.

Joe paused beside a large painting of an elephant bearing a small jewelled figure.

‘The Emperor Akhbar, riding an elephant,’ Prentice explained. ‘I oughtn’t to keep it hanging like this. It ought to be kept on a roll but I really enjoy it so much, this room would seem unfurnished without it. Now, come with me.’

They walked through the house together and Prentice opened a door leading off from the central hall, pointing as he did. ‘Getting this room ready for my daughter. She’ll be home soon. Haven’t seen her for four years.’

Joe was amused to see the array of spindly bamboo furniture, the paintings and the fabrics that the surprising Prentice had thought suitable for an eighteen-year-old fresh from the sophistications of Europe. The centrepiece of the room was a light wood-framed Indian charpoy bed whose simplicity had been relieved by silver decorations which twined their way up the legs. Above it, at the head, had been tacked a delicate embroidered hanging depicting the goddess of the night. Against a background of midnight blue, she threw a protective fold of her silver-starred sari around the dimly seen shape of a child, naked but for the two silver bangles around its ankles. Joe compared this with the iron bedstead, the neatly folded rug, striped in the school colours, the steel engraving of the ‘Light of the World’ that Midge would have grown accustomed to in Europe and thought that Prentice probably had it right.

Prentice led the way out on to a cool verandah and tea appeared.

‘One concession to the home counties,’ said Joe appreciatively, viewing an English teaset.

‘ Darjeeling,’ said Prentice. ‘I hope you can drink it. But now – what can I do? What can I tell you? I told you my theory at the dance but I don’t suppose you would accept that unscientific idea of a malign spirit?’

Joe smiled. ‘I’d love to,’ he said. ‘It would really appeal to me. But if I was caught dismissing the matter in that way it might be held that I was not really doing my job. But if you could clear up one or two small things for me… We’ll go back to the beginning.’

‘To Joan Carmichael.’

‘Well no,’ said Joe, surprised. ‘Back beyond that. Back – if you’ll forgive me – to the death of your wife.’

‘Of course,’ said Prentice hurriedly. ‘Of course. But I don’t think of them as being the same. After all, in that case the perpetrators were identified and executed.’

‘Perhaps we can start there? “Executed” you say. Can you tell me about that?’

‘Very little to tell. I knew who they were. I knew where they came from. I knew most of them by name. They were vengeful – they were courageous with hash. They were not men of much judgement. It took me a day or two to recover from the shock and then I collected a troop of Sowars from the regiment, boys I’d had my eye on for some time and who were delighted to be involved in this foray. Not short of volunteers, I might say. I went after them. Executed them. Of course I should have done nothing of the sort and they should have been brought to trial in the proper way. I even had to face a court of enquiry. But by then the deed was done and everybody, Indian and English, was on my side. All saw it as a very proper act of retribution and, if you’ll allow me to say, Sandilands – so it was!’

‘You have no doubt in your mind,’ said Joe carefully, ‘that they had come to kill you and only incidentally your wife?’

‘And Chedi Khan.’

‘Yes, Chedi Khan. Does he come into the equation?’

Prentice paused a long time before replying. ‘He was a very fine man,’ he said at last. ‘The finest the Pathan nation has to offer. Loyal, courageous, persevering and, like many Pathans, artistic, poetic and ingenious but the whole salted with a cynical and ribald sense of humour.’

‘How did he come to be in your service?’ Joe enquired.

Prentice poured them both out a cup of tea and lay back for a moment in his chair saying at last, ‘Long story. Know what I mean by proscription? No? It’s a system on the frontier. Tribes will raid their neighbours, they will pursue blood feuds, come raiding down into India and steal things. Anything they can lay their hands on, particularly rifles. Girls too. It’s their way of life. Of course we criticise but any nation that sells girls into prostitution is in no position to criticise those who merely steal girls for themselves. But a time comes when it has to be stopped and offending villages are proscribed. A punitive raid is mounted, fortifications are dismantled, watch towers demolished, crops burned, hostages taken. They’re called barramptas, these raids. It was – and still is – an accepted part of life. They know the rules. I conducted many such raids when I was serving with the Scouts on the frontier.