‘No,’ said Joe. ‘Just as well perhaps, because I don’t think I’d be a very good clam.’

‘Good,’ said Meg Carter, ‘that suits me but come in here.’

She showed him into a small office of a type with which Joe was becoming familiar. Ragged files on shelves, noisy overhead electric fan, water in a water cooler, Benares brass ashtray, group photographs on the wall – it was standard Indian equipment.

‘Come in! Come in!’ said Charlie Carter. ‘Sorry not to have been there to greet you. Didn’t hear you arrive. Come and sit down and tell me where you’ve got to.’ He pushed a cigarette box towards Joe. ‘I’ve cabled his agent and prepared a press release. I’ll have an autopsy report this afternoon confirming the cause of death and the Coroner has it in hand too. We have a problem though… who to identify the body? Who knew him? I’ve arranged for him to be photographed and I’ve examined the body for distinguishing features. (None incidentally.) There must be a next of kin somewhere…’ He paused and ran a worried hand across his face.

‘I’ve had a preliminary search through his luggage,’ said Joe. ‘Found this hidden in a compartment in the lining.’ He produced the leather case. ‘Here, we have photographic evidence of possible next of kin – a brother and younger sibling. Presumably his agent will know where they are.’

‘Well, that’s a start. And there’s the question of a funeral. He can’t just lie in the morgue for ever and we can’t just shovel him underground – he was, after all, an international figure.’

‘See your problem… should be massed choirs, banks of flowers…’ Joe’s voice trailed away.

‘We don’t have much in the way of refrigeration here. We must talk to Sir George. These are deep waters for a country bobby like me!’

‘And me! I have no real authority in the case at all. And I have to confess to you that I undertook to interview Sharpe this morning. Hope I haven’t muddied the waters.’ He set out his suspicions and talked his way through his recent interview with Sharpe, collecting his random thoughts as he did so. When his account reached its conclusion Carter rose and took a pace or two about the room.

‘That was well done. I don’t know if you agree with me but surely the most significant thing you’ve turned up is this change in the confirmation letter directing the poor sod to come by tonga. Find the man who did that and we’ve found out something which could hang a man.’

‘I’m seeing Alice Sharpe again this afternoon,’ said Joe. ‘I may be able to glean a bit more. I gather from her husband that she’s the real driving force in the theatre. She may have her own suspicions.’

They talked on until the khitmutgar summoned them to the table.

‘We eat on the terrace. I hope you don’t mind?’ said Meg Carter. ‘I never tire of looking at the view and it’s nice to sit in the breeze. And anyway, our dining room is dark and our dining-room furniture repulsive.’

‘Not repulsive,’ said Carter defensively.

‘Oh, Charlie, it is! It was old and repulsive before when we bought it off Brigadier Robinson, since when it’s had six years of attention from these two.’ She waved a hand at her two daughters who were sitting politely side by side with their napkins round their necks. It was an English scene and, if Mrs Carter was English, so was the lunch. Shepherd’s pie and an apple tart and custard.

‘Charlie tells me you’ve fallen for Alice Conyers? If so, I’m not surprised. Everybody does. Including Charlie. Including these two,’ she added, indicating her children.

‘I admit it,’ said Joe. ’I thought she was delightful! And rather more than that – practical, sensible, energetic. Oh, no – I thought she was a lass unparalleled.’

‘I think she is. And lucky to be alive!’

‘Lucky to be alive?’

‘Lucky to have survived the smash. The Beaune railway disaster! You’re going to tell me you haven’t heard? It’s usually the first thing anybody says about Alice.’

Carter joined in. ‘Yes, when she first came out three years ago she was coming down by train from Paris to Marseilles and planning to spend a couple of weeks in the south of France seeing the sights before taking the P&O to Bombay. The train went off the rails crossing a viaduct near Beaune. Terrible accident, perhaps the worst France has ever had.’

‘Oh, of course,’ said Joe, ‘I remember it. I remember hearing about it. Just after the war. I never connected it.’

‘No reason why you should but Alice was the only survivor – at least I think she was the only survivor. There were over two hundred fatalities. The companion she was travelling with was killed and she woke up and found herself in a French hospital, alone and miles from home.’

‘What an extraordinary story,’ said Joe. ‘What happened then?’

‘Well, under the terms of her grandfather’s will she was the majority shareholder in ICTC and they were expecting her on the next boat. Nothing loath – and you’ll find this is Alice all over – she wired her trustees in London to say she was quite all right and intended to continue the journey as scheduled. She spent the spare two weeks recuperating in hospital – she wasn’t completely unscathed.’

‘The scar on her cheek?’

‘Yes, that. Plus a couple of cracked ribs, sprained this and that. Anyway, half dead though she was, she showed the enterprise we all associate her with – she made friends with a woman who was nursing her in the hospital and Alice took her on as her private nurse, lady’s maid, companion – call it what you will. They managed to locate her luggage and they came out to India on the boat as planned. She’s still here, the companion. In Simla as a matter of fact. Name’s Marie-Jeanne Pitiot. Alice started her up in a little shop in the Mall. What’s it called, Meg?’

‘La Belle Epoque,’ said Meg. ‘Very exclusive, by which I mean very expensive. I look in the windows and hurry away before anyone charges me for the privilege – you know, that sort of establishment! All the best people shop there – it’s rumoured that even H.E. has been seen shopping there.’

‘H.E.?’

‘Her Excellency. The Vicereine, Lady Reading. She too is a friend of Alice’s.’

‘And who owns the shop?’ Joe wanted to know.

The Carters looked at each other. ‘It’s in Marie-Jeanne’s name, I believe,’ said Carter.

‘But Alice, of course, supplies her with stock,’ added Meg. ‘It’s just another of her outlets. And it has gone from strength to strength. Marie-Jeanne’s opened another branch in Bombay and they say she has one planned for Delhi next year.’

‘So the accident didn’t bring bad luck to everyone,’ said Joe thoughtfully. ’I’d like to have a word with Mademoiselle Pitiot.’

‘Well, Alice must have been very grateful to Marie-Jeanne and they have remained good friends. Alice is very generous, you know.’

‘And richer than she was when she came out here,’ said Carter. ’Everybody admires her business flair. ICTC was a good old-fashioned outfit when she arrived, ticking over solidly, highly respected and sound, making money. People were a bit nervous when a little twenty-one-year-old came out holding fifty-one per cent of the shares in her hand.’

‘They were even more nervous at the idea of Reggie Sharpe holding forty-nine,’ sniffed Meg.

‘But, as it turned out, she never put a foot wrong. The first thing she did was to marry Reggie, her second cousin, and change her name to Conyers-Sharpe. The second thing was to offer retirement to the pack of distant family members who had been overseeing the company in Bombay and replace them with two Eurasians and one Indian. You may imagine how unpopular that was! But she and Reggie set to work to run the company together. Good career move. It was obviously to their mutual advantage to keep their money bags in one hand.’

‘I met Reggie Sharpe this morning,’ said Joe. ‘Didn’t like him much.’

‘Not surprised!’ said Meg Carter explosively. ‘I can’t stand him! Charlie always makes allowances but then he makes allowances for everybody. If he told the truth he’d say he can’t stand him either. He’s not a bit like Alice. Where Alice was and is a really good businessman, Reggie is just a pretentious ass, idle, drinks like a fish — ’