He shot a questioning look sideways at Carter. The policeman was struggling to suppress a smile. He had realized that the raised left eyebrow which had been fixing him with a chilling expression of query and disdain was, in fact, permanently fixed at this disconcertingly quizzical angle by clumsy surgery.

‘I’ve heard – and tell me if any of this is wrong – a lowly police superintendent is often at the end of the gossip chain, you know – that you are a highly decorated soldier – Scots Fusiliers, was it? – latterly of the Intelligence Corps and now recruited into the CID. An injection of brains and breeding to shake up the postwar force is what they say.’

Sandilands gave him the benefit of his left profile again but Carter pressed on, matter-of-fact and friendly, ‘And that you’ve had a success in Bengal bringing the force there up to scratch on intelligence-gathering, interrogation techniques – that sort of thing.’

‘True,’ said Joe. ‘But, look here, Carter, I’ll say again – I’ve finished my tour and I’m on leave. I’ve not come here to lecture you or get in your way. The last thing in the world I want is to get drawn into this.’ But even as he spoke, instinctive reluctance gave way to a rush of anger. Anger for Feodor Korsovsky, so genial, so excited and friendly and so alive. And Joe had heard the last note of that wonderful voice turn to an obscene scream of pain. Yes, it was his business.

Perhaps reading his thoughts, Carter eyed him with friendship. ‘I’ll tell you something, Sandilands. You are drawn into it so you might as well settle down and enjoy yourself. I expect baritones get shot two or three times a week in London but – I’ll tell you — it’s something of a novelty in Simla. Makes a nice change from rounding up blasted monkeys which it seems is how I spend my time nowadays.’

With the posse closed up behind them they threaded their way through the lower town and out on to the open road, breaking first into a trot and then into a canter. Carter ranged up beside Joe as they rode. ‘Tell me something about this Russian,’ he said. ‘You had plenty of time to get acquainted travelling up from Kalka. Apart from this appearance at the Gaiety, had he any business in Simla? Any friends? Any contacts? Was anyone meeting him? I’m trying to understand why anybody would want to shoot the poor chap.’

‘He didn’t say anything useful,’ said Joe. ‘He mentioned that he was in contact with the Simla Amateur Dramatic Society who’d booked his appearance. They’d made all his arrangements, hotel and so on. But I got the impression that it was all purely professional. He didn’t even mention a name. He’d taken the engagement entirely, I think, because he’d always wanted to see Simla. He’d turned down a good offer in New York to do it.’

Carter cast a sharp glance at Joe. ‘Feller was a tourist, are you saying?’ He barked out an order and four of the following sowars came forward and stationed themselves in front and on either side of Joe, all scanning the slopes ahead and on each side with increased alertness.

‘Ah! You think I was the target? And the marksman hit the wrong man?’ said Joe.

‘Yes, I do,’ said Carter. ‘Well, it’s certainly a possibility. What about you, Sandilands? Any contacts in Simla? Embarrassing connection with a disreputable past? Senior policemen pick up quite a few enemies on their way up. Especially those whose rise has been… would the word be – meteoric? So what about that? Something of that sort would be a great help to me, you know.’

‘Sorry,’ said Joe, noting the man’s shrewdness with approval, ‘can’t supply. The only contact I have is the Lieutenant-Governor and contacts don’t come much more respectable than that! No, I know nobody in Simla. And the only man who might take the trouble to line me up on a lonely mountain pass is – I’m glad to say – serving twenty years in the Scrubs.’

‘But someone was lying in wait for the Governor’s car. You were the expected passenger, weren’t you? Was it by chance that you offered Korsovsky a lift?’

Joe nodded.

‘Then, don’t you agree that it’s far more likely that the sniper was lying in wait for you?’ Carter persisted. ‘You were the man he was expecting to find in the back of the Governor’s car.’

Something – a remark made by the Russian – was nagging at Joe’s mind. He thought for a moment and then said, ‘When we met and we were discussing ways of getting up to Simla he said to me… something like – “I’ve been instructed to take a tonga.” Yes – instructed. I thought at the time it was an odd word to use. Listen, Carter, someone had told him, and firmly we must assume, to come up by tonga. So your sniper is lying in wait – quite possibly for hours – looking out for a tonga bearing a large Russian singer. He picked a good place. Plenty of cover and a direct shot at the very spot where I expect everyone stops on their first visit to Simla. Tara Devi. You round the corner and there it is, your first sight. And there’s even a place where you can pull over and stop to get a better view.’

Carter was listening earnestly and nodding his agreement.

‘So, you may be watching out for a tonga but if a car pulls over and a large man rises to his feet and serenades the hills with what is probably the most magnificent operatic baritone in the world, and that man is wearing a white suit and is outlined against a black rock, you’ve got your man.’

‘Sounds reasonable to me,’ said Carter but Joe noticed he kept his protective escort in place.

The posse swept on, attracting much attention from the few people now on the road, and rounded the bend before the ill-fated Devil’s Elbow.

‘We’ll stop here and dismount,’ said Carter. ‘I’ll tell off horse-holders – two should be enough – and the rest of us will do a short sweep through the rocks.’ He looked up at the sky, judging the amount of light left to them. ‘Better get a move on. Where did you reckon the shot came from?’

Joe pointed.

‘Right then,’ said Carter. ’Off we go! This is what’s called a gasht. Pushtu word. Suppose if this were the British Army it would be called “an armed reconnaissance”, perhaps even “a fighting patrol”. Call it what you will. Equally it could be called “sticking your neck out”.’

The policemen formed a line and with rifles at the port set off to sweep into the hills, Carter in the centre, a police jemadar marking the right flank and Joe reluctantly marking the left.

‘I don’t know what on earth I think I’m doing,’ he thought. ‘I’m supposed to be on leave, for God’s sake! And has it occurred to Carter that of all this mob, I’m completely unarmed? Perhaps I should have said something? Ah, well, too late now.’ But a further thought came to him: Feodor had been a nice man – interesting, interested, talented, looking forward to the coming weeks, harmless – yes, surely harmless, and yet someone had shot him. And, so far as he was anything to Joe, he could say that he was his friend for however brief a time. Joe could turn his back on it but – he realized – he had no intention of doing so.

The gasht moved up the hill at surprising speed and it wasn’t more than a hundred yards before Joe began to blow. Tirelessly, Carter led them forward. Resentfully, Joe floundered in his wake, glad to be out on a wing, deeming this to be, if there was such a thing, the position of minimum danger. And perhaps that was why Carter had put him there.

After a sweating quarter of an hour, Carter held up a hand to call a halt and redress ranks and at once there was a call from the man to Joe’s right. He shouted something Joe did not understand and Carter replied. They closed in together to meet beside the discovery of whatever it might be.

‘Perhaps we have a clue,’ said Carter. ‘Hardly dared to hope for such a thing. Let’s see what we’ve got!’

What they had got was the brass cases of two spent rounds. The man who’d found them was standing still and pointing at them, not, Joe was relieved to see, dashing in to scoop them up in his hand.