‘You want us to take the prisoner straight back to the lock-up?’ Johnson asked, confused. ‘But we’ve only just. .’
‘You can go — Blenkinsop stays,’ Blackstone told him.
‘I can’t have that,’ Johnson protested.
‘The war might last another two or three years,’ Blackstone pointed out. ‘You could end up having to clean out an awful lot of shit out of an awful lot of cesspits in that time.’
Johnson sniffed — as if the smell of the excreta were already beginning to seep into his nostrils.
‘I. . I. .’ he said weakly.
‘Go now — and come back in half an hour,’ Blackstone said.
Johnson still stood there, weighing his fear of Captain Huxton’s displeasure against the future that Blackstone was threatening him with.
‘Have you got a gun, Inspector?’ he asked, to buy himself time.
‘Now why would I need a gun?’ Blackstone wondered. ‘You won’t cause me any trouble, will you, Blenkinsop?’
‘I didn’t do it,’ the private moaned, hardly aware he was being spoken to. ‘I swear I didn’t do it.’
Johnson was still wavering.
‘Cesspits, Corporal Johnson,’ Blackstone said.
‘Half an hour?’ Johnson asked, defeatedly.
‘Half an hour,’ Blackstone agreed.
Johnson nodded to the other two corporals and they released their grip on their prisoner, turned smartly, and walked to the door. Denied their support, Blenkinsop seemed on the point of crumpling into a heap on the floor.
‘I didn’t do it,’ he said. ‘I didn’t. Honest, I didn’t!’
‘Why don’t you sit down?’ Blackstone suggested softly.
Blenkinsop tottered uncertainly over to the second chair, which was facing Blackstone’s own, and collapsed into it.
A good soldier-servant, Blackstone knew from his own observations, had to be perceptive and sensitive, industrious, efficient and sanguine. If his officer’s appearance fell below the accepted standard, then both the servant and the officer were deemed to have failed — the former for turning out his master in an improper manner, and the latter for displaying a lack of judgement by selecting a servant who was clearly not up to the job. Thus, when ex-soldier-servants chose to go into service in some of the grander civilian households — and many of them did — it was no surprise that they rose rapidly up the hierarchy of domestic service, and often even attained the exalted position of butler.
Blenkinsop, in complete contrast to the usual type, was clearly not a good soldier-servant and none of the great houses would have considered him for a moment — even as the assistant bootboy.
‘How long have you been Lieutenant Fortesque’s servant?’ Blackstone asked the quivering wreck.
‘Three. . three months,’ Blenkinsop told him.
‘What happened to his previous servant?’
‘He was hit by a bit of shrapnel in the trench, and given his papers back to Blighty.’
‘I see,’ Blackstone said. ‘And why do you think that Lieutenant Fortesque chose you to replace him?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You have no idea at all?’
‘None.’
‘And you didn’t ask him why he’d chosen you?’
‘No. I. . I didn’t think to.’
Of course he hadn’t thought to. Men like Blenkinsop didn’t wonder why things happened — they just reacted to them.
‘Do you remember the day he selected you?’ Blackstone asked.
‘Yes.’
‘How did he do it? Did your sergeant tell you to report to the lieutenant’s dugout?’
‘No.’
Blackstone sighed. Blenkinsop was hard work — but at least he seemed willing to give honest answers, as long as he was led to them.
‘So where were you when he told you that you’d been selected?’
‘I was by the cesspit.’
‘By the cesspit!’
‘Yes, you see, I. . I’d got into a fight with some of the other lads in the trench.’
‘You got into a fight?’ Blackstone asked, disbelievingly.
Blenkinsop shrugged. ‘Well, it wasn’t so much a fight as that some of the other lads was ragging me.’
Of course they were, Blackstone thought.
Blenkinsop was a natural victim — the sort of man that other men will automatically take their own frustrations out on.
‘Go on,’ Blackstone said.
‘Lieutenant Fortesque caught them at it. He got very angry, and said they shouldn’t be forcing any of their comrades’ heads into the cesspit, but if they had to do it to somebody, they shouldn’t choose his servant. And, like I said, I didn’t even know he’d chosen me as his servant at the time.’
Of course you didn’t, Blackstone thought. And if it hadn’t been for the bullying, he probably never would have chosen you.
‘What was the lieutenant like to work for?’ he asked aloud.
Blenkinsop shrugged again. ‘He got cross with me, sometimes. I don’t blame him — I tried as hard as I could, but I wasn’t very good.’
‘Did he even threaten to replace you?’
Blenkinsop shook his head. ‘He used to say, “You’re bloody useless, Blenkinsop. I’d be better off with employing a baboon to do your job — but if I threw you out now, you wouldn’t last a day.” Then he’d pick up his boots and start cleaning them himself.’
‘Tell me about the days leading up to his murder,’ Blackstone said.
‘We were in the trench,’ Blenkinsop replied, as if he couldn’t understand why the question was even being asked.
Blackstone sighed again. ‘Did anything unusual happen?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Did something happen that stuck in your mind?’ Blackstone asked — with more hope than expectation. ‘Something that wasn’t quite normal?’
Blenkinsop thought about it hard and long.
‘Well, there was that argument he had with the other officers in his dugout, if that’s what you mean,’ he said, finally.
‘What argument?’
There are two reasons why an unexpected visit of the three lieutenants to the dugout makes Blenkinsop nervous. The first reason is that officers always make him nervous — even the ones he only knows by sight, and who have never got their sergeants to shout at him. The second reason is the hard and unyielding expression on the faces of the three young men as they look at Lieutenant Fortesque.
One of the officers glares at Blenkinsop’s clumsy attempt to salute, then says, ‘Get out, you snivelling little bastard!’
Blenkinsop knows this is not protocol — that the only person who is supposed to order him about is Lieutenant Fortesque himself — but he still finds himself scurrying for the door like a frightened rabbit.
Once out in the trench, he doesn’t know what to do. He suspects the officer intended him to get well away from the doorway, but he is reluctant to go too far from the dugout in case one of his tormentors spots him and something unpleasant happens. So he stays where he is, trembling at the thought of the officer’s wrath, but comforting himself with the knowledge that if it gets too bad, Lieutenant Fortesque will step in and rescue him.
At first, all he can hear from inside the dugout is a low murmuring, but then one of the voices is raised — and that voice belongs to Lieutenant Fortesque.
‘It was wrong — I can see now that it was wrong — and I’m going to come clean about it,’ he says.
‘Now you really don’t want to act too hastily, do you, Charles?’ says a second voice, and Blenkinsop thinks that while the speaker is undoubtedly angry — and perhaps even threatening — he also sounds rather worried.
‘You can’t talk me out of it,’ Fortesque tells him. ‘The chances are, I’ll be killed in the offensive tomorrow — but if I’m not, I’ll take that as a sign that I should stand up like a man and confess.’
‘Have you thought about the consequences?’ asks the second voice.