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 in 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?'
'Because… because that's what I thought when I read about it first. I mean it reminded me of St Martens. A lot of people murdered in a house. I saw somewhere the lady had her throat cut. But I didn't think… I never thought it was PikeY The chief inspector made a small adjustment in his position. He rested his forearms on the desk.
'You say his body was found. What do you mean, exactly? Did you see it yourself?'
'Oh, no, sir. It didn't happen like that. Did it, sir?'
He appealed to Madden.
'Sometimes there was a lull in the fighting,' Madden explained. 'Both sides would hold off firing and allow the wounded to be collected. Bodies would be picked up at the same time. Otherwise they would lie there.'
'Take Passchendaele now,' Tozer amplified. 'More than forty thousand bodies were never found. I read it in a newspaper. Forty thousand! That was the mud, you see.'
'But Pike's was, you say,' the chief inspector reminded him. 'Why? What makes you so sure?'
'It was reported found. About a week later, when Captain Miller was writing up the case. It was listed among the bodies brought back.'
Madden spoke again: 'If we're right about this, sir, what it means is they found a body with Pike's identity disc tucked into the puttees or fixed to the braces. Also his pay book, I imagine. And, if he wanted to be thorough, his tunic with his rank and his regimental badges on it. That would certainly have been enough to establish his identity. Do you agree, Mr Tozer?'
The other man nodded.
'There's no reason why anyone from his own battalion should have seen it. In any case, they would have been out of the line by the time it was brought back.'
Sinclair chewed his lip. 'Let's be clear in our minds about this. Granted, he could have switched identities with some body he found on the battlefield. But how could he have got back himself?'
'He might have faked a wound,' Madden suggested.
'Not the easiest thing, I imagine.'
Tozer put up his hand. 'I've just remembered, sir. I saw Pike's service record — the captain had it. Just before all this happened he'd been in hospital at Boulogne. Concussion, it was. Now that could have been useful.'
'Useful?'
'It's not an easy thing for the doctors to be sure about. There were those that tried to fake it. Men who had it were sent back for observation. Pike would have known that.'
'Sent back to Boulogne?'
'Or Eetaps. Once he was there he could have slipped out of the hospital. It was a dodge deserters tried.'
Sinclair directed a questioning glance at Madden.
The inspector shrugged.
'It's quite possible, sir. Of course, he would still have had the problem of getting back to England. But it could be done, provided he had the nerve.'
'Oh, he had nerve all right!' Tozer interjected.
'Yes, I want to hear about that.' Sinclair turned back to him. 'Go on with your story.'
Tozer was silent, collecting his thoughts. Then he resumed: 'We waited there at the command post all day and in the evening a report came back that Pike was missing. One of the officers from another company was among the walking wounded and he told the major what the two men had said, that Pike had left the crater without a word
