The major saluted Tom’s uniform, not knowing that Morris was senior in rank, but the pathologist rapidly made the introductions and stepped back smartly to let Alf carry on. As Morris explained the situation and took the infantry field officer for a quick look at the deceased, Tom saw that the MPs were looking curiously at the armoured Buick and pointing at the prominent blood staining visible inside by the light of their large torch. The four soldiers were stood at ease in front of their truck, wondering what the hell was going on.
At that moment, the developing jamboree was further enlarged by the arrival of another Land Rover, this time a blue one. It raced up to the now open gate and swerved across the car park, its daredevil Malay driver squealing to a halt alongside the three-tonner. Steven Blackwell emerged, dressed in mufti, as he had been at The Dog that evening and unlike Alf Morris, had not yet gone to bed.
Once again, the RAMC major recounted the little that was known. As soon as he had finished, his counterpart from the garrison decided that ‘something must be done’.
‘Like the last attack on Jimmy Robertson, this sounds bloody unlikely for a terrorist attack,’ growled the officer from the West Berkshires. ‘But we can’t ignore the possibility.’
What he really meant was that he had no intention of carrying the can if the affair went pear-shaped and they missed the opportunity to nail a few CTs.
‘The deceased is a civilian, so investigating it is down to me,’ added the police superintendent. ‘But chasing bandits is both our jobs, so I’d be grateful if you’d kick-start that. We need to know where this happened and whether Gunong Besar has been attacked or is under threat.’ A new thought dawned on him.
‘And where the hell is Diane Robertson?’
SIX
As the police superintendent was asking the question, Diane was driving fast up the lonely road towards her bungalow. The Austin was going well in the cooler night air and she had her shapely foot flat on the floor, urging every extra bit of speed from the little car. Her face was grim as she peered down the bright cone of her headlights that cut a tunnel through the darkness of the endless trees.
She had drunk quite a lot, but no more than usual on a Friday night and had the usual delusion of drinking drivers that their performance was that much better with a few gins inside them. She threw the small saloon around the bends, veering a little from edge to edge of the rutted red road and within minutes had covered the few miles to Gunong Besar without seeing a single vehicle. At that time of night, it would have been extraordinary if anything else was on that road, apart from the occasional police or military patrol, which as had been promised, were now more frequent.
At the estate, Diane swung up on to the slope of the knoll and drove straight under the house, stopping in an abrupt scuffing of gravel. She slammed the door and ran up the front steps to the verandah. With servants on the premises, the doors to the lounge were never locked and she hurried inside, stepping out of her heels and throwing her evening bag on to the settee as she went straight to the side table to pour herself a large gin and tonic. Her hands were shaking with a variety of emotions and the ice she had spooned out of a vacuum jug rattled against the side of the glass as she raised it to her lips.
After a couple of gulps, she calmed down and walked back out to the verandah, to lean on the rail with her glass cupped in her hands. Ironically, she wondered how many boring hours she had spent in exactly this posture since she came to Malaya. Taking another mouthful, she looked out into the velvety night, seeing only a few distant points of light far away in the valley. Somehow, she thought, it’s going to be Norfolk I’ll be looking at before very long. Now down to the bare ice in her glass, she was debating whether to get another, when a sound caught her attention that penetrated the turmoil in her mind. The sound of engines came rapidly closer and even her slightly fuddled senses recognized that more than one vehicle was approaching. Almost at once, headlights flickered through the trees and moments later, a Land Rover tore up the drive, followed by an armoured car and a three-ton truck. The last two were in army drab, but the first was a blue police vehicle. A dozen soldiers in jungle green scrambled from the truck and dispersed themselves and their weapons into the trees on either side of the drive.
Two men cautiously emerged from the Land Rover, one in officer’s uniform, the other in civvies. Both held revolvers as they stared up warily at the bungalow. In the light escaping from the lounge, they saw a figure leaning over the verandah — a figure with blonde hair.
‘Diane? Are you alright?’
The woman recognized his voice, even though the starlight was too dim to see his face. ‘Steven? What the devil are you doing up here at this time of night?’
There was some murmuring down below and the officer peeled off and went back to his men, as the policeman began climbing the steps. As he reached the top, the armoured car revved away and vanished up the road towards Kampong Kerbau. Holstering his pistol, Steven Blackwell walked across towards Diane Robertson, anxious to carry out this unwelcome task as best as he could manage.
‘What’s going on, for God’s sake? Anyway, come in and have a drink!’
Her bright, brittle voice rang out as she went into the big room and he followed her with a heavy heart.
‘Diane, forget the drink for a moment. Come and sit down, I have to tell you something.’
Hardened policeman that he was, he had been dreading this moment on the drive up from Tanah Timah, but in the event it was almost an anticlimax.
The new widow heard the news of her husband’s death with what at first seemed incredulity, then amazement tinged with curiosity. Diane neither fainted, nor screamed, nor sobbed. What she did do was go across the room and refill her glass, insisting against Steven’s protests that he have a drink as well. She came back to the settee and sat down, looking up at the superintendent. Her face was pale, but otherwise she seemed unmoved.
‘I don’t understand this, Steve. I have to believe it, if you say so! But I can’t understand it.’
He found that he needed the whisky after all and sat down rather heavily opposite the blonde, bemused by her reaction — or the lack of it.
‘We don’t even know where it happened yet, Diane. He just drove up to The Dog — God knows from where!’
She sipped her own drink, staring at him over the rim.
‘So I’m a widow now. I don’t even have a suitable black dress.’ She looked down at the slinky blue model that she was wearing. It must be shock, he thought. Soon, the facts will sink in and she’ll break down.
‘You can’t stay up here on your own. Is there someone who can stay with you? What about Rosa next door?’
Her eyebrows went up about an inch. ‘Rosa! Like hell she will! That bastard was screwing her, didn’t you know? Sorry, I suppose I mustn’t speak ill of the dead.’
Slightly tipsy now, she jumped up and staggered slightly, then went across to get more gin. She held the bottle up and waggled it at Blackwell, but he shook his head uneasily. He didn’t want a drunken witness on his hands, bereaved or not. He stood up and beckoned to her.
‘Diane, come back and sit down, please! You do realize what’s happened, don’t you? James has been killed and we have to find out how and where, urgently.’
She padded over in her bare feet and dropped heavily on to the settee.
‘I hear you, Steve, I’m not numbed with shock. You may as well know, I’d decided to leave him anyway. I was planning to go home to England, I’d had enough of his bloody nonsense.’
She took a deep drink, downing almost half the glass. ‘So if I’m shocked, it’s because of the surprise, not grief. I’m sorry, you’re thinking I’m a hard bitch, but that’s the way it is. But what the hell am I going to do now, with the bloody estate and all that?’