River of Darkness

The chief inspector inclined his head. 'I'm sorry to hear that. Now, about this name you've given us.

Pike. You're sure that's right?'

'I am,' Tozer replied, without hesitation. 'Like I was saying to the Inspector, I remember the whole business clearly. It's not something you'd be likely to forget.'

His eyes narrowed. 'Do you mind my asking, sir — but why do you want to know about it now?'

'I don't mind your asking, Mr Tozer.' A smile touched the chief inspector's lips. 'But I'd be obliged for the moment if you'd answer our questions. We're somewhat pressed for time.'

Madden interrupted, 'I came for you as soon as I got Pike's name, sir, and after I'd rung Colonel Jenkins at the War Office. But I dare say you'd like to hear it from the beginning 'Would you do that, Mr Tozer?' Sinclair turned to him. 'Start with the crime scene, please. Captain Miller was assigned to the case, I assume. Did you work with him regularly?'

'Yes, I did, sir. The captain always used me as his clerk. We seemed to hit it off.'

'And how long had you worked together?'

'Going on six months. From the beginning of 1917.

That's when I got posted to the investigation branch.

Happiest day of my life, you might say.' Tozer looked up and saw Styles with a cup of tea standing beside him. 'Just put it down, would you, son?'

He displayed his stump with a grin and the constable reddened. He placed the cup and saucer on the chief inspector's desk.

'Your happiest day, Mr Tozer?'

'Yes, sir. I was sent to France in early 1916, so I was there for the Somme, and afterwards.'

'You took part in the battles?'

'Oh, no, sir.' Tozer dropped his blue eyes. 'No, we were posted down the line. The men would go up to the forward trenches, but we had to wait in case any of them turned back. Sometimes they'd lose their nerve, and it was our job to pick them up. No more than boys many of them were… but they called them deserters just the same.' He lifted his gaze. 'They used to look at us, the Tommies, as they went by, up to the front. I'd never seen hate like that in anyone's eyes before…"

He fell silent. No one spoke. He shifted his gaze from the chief inspector to Madden. "I reckon you know what I'm talking about, sir.'

Madden moved his head a fraction. 'It's in the past now, Mr Tozer,' he said gently. 'Best to put it from your mind.'

'Thank you, sir. I try to.'

Sinclair let a few moments pass. Then he spoke again: 'So you joined the Special Investigation Branch?'

'Yes, sir…' Tozer gathered himself. 'Well, not as such — the branch wasn't formed until after the war — but the Military Police were already detailing squads to do investigative work and I got myself posted to one which was attached to a provost company stationed at Poperinge. That's where I met Captain Miller. We were working on another case — a theft of goods in the railyards — when he got the order to drop everything and go directly to St Martens.'

'That was the village closest to the farm, was it not?' Sinclair shifted in his chair. 'How far away was the military camp?'

'Only a couple of miles. It was an area they used a lot for rest camps. Troops coming out of the line would spend about a week there before going back up.

This particular battalion — it was from the South Notts Regiment — had been there four or five days.'

'From the file it seems that the soldiers were regarded as the only suspects. Why was that?'

Tozer tugged his earlobe. 'Well, for one thing, there weren't that many civilians around. The war had pretty well cleaned them out. A few of the farms were still being worked and there were people in the village.

But the Belgian police and gendarmerie had been at work before we got there, checking on their own citizens. They reckoned they could account for all of them. And then there were the bodies, sir. Well, three of them. The husband and the two sons. They'd been bayoneted, no doubt about that. Expert job, too. One thrust each.'

Sinclair glanced at Madden.

'So Miller took over? It became a British investigation?'

'Not entirely, sir. The victims were civilians. But the Belgians had asked for our assistance and it was understood Captain Miller would handle everything on the military side and keep the Belgian authorities informed.'

'The woman who was killed, the farmer's wife, where did you find her body? Describe the scene, if you will.'

Tozer reached forward for his cup of tea. He took a sip and then replaced the cup on its saucer. He licked his lips. 'She was in the bedroom upstairs, lying across the bed with her skirt and drawers ripped off. Her throat had been cut.'

'The assumption, Captain Miller's assumption, was that she had been raped?' The chief inspector put it in the form of a question.

'Oh, yes, sir. In fact, when he read the Belgian pathologist's report he asked him to go back and reexamine the body. He thought he must be wrong. But the pathologist confirmed there was no trace of seminal fluid and no sign of forcible entry.'

'So the captain was surprised?'

'He was. And not just by that. One of the things he noted, you may have seen it in the file, was the difference between the upstairs and the down. In the kitchen, where the men's bodies were found, you might have wondered how it could have happened.

There wasn't a plate broken, just one chair overturned, as I recall. They must have been killed in a matter of seconds. Upstairs was a different story. She'd put up a fight. The mirror was smashed and the curtains torn off one of the windows.' He shook his head regretfully.

'Strong, fine-looking woman she was. Lovely fair hair.

Lollondays, they called her in the district.'

'What was that?' Sinclair prompted him.

Tozer blushed. 'That's as close as I can get to it, sir.

It's a French word, means the Dutchwoman. She came from Holland. Spoke a few words of English, we were told. She was a favourite with the lads when they came out of the line. I don't mean she…' He flushed again.

'More like a mother, if you take my meaning. She'd cook for them at the farm, lay on omelettes and fried potatoes and the like. Well, she charged, of course, but the men liked to go there from camp.

'This lot from the battalion — fifteen men from B Company — they'd been there earlier, that same week, and they'd booked again to come back that night. We had no trouble getting their names. They owned up straight away. Said they'd gone there and come back in a group.'

'But Captain Miller didn't believe them?'

Tozer pursed his lips, frowning, 'it wasn't like that exactly. See, those lads were the obvious suspects. Or, anyway, the first ones that came to hand. And the captain knew, any time a Tommy found himself face to face with a redcap he'd play deaf and dumb. Like I said, they hated us. So he went at them hard. He reckoned if they'd done it together, one of them would crack. And if they hadn't, if it was just a few of them who were involved, the others were likely to know about it and he'd get at the truth that way. But after he'd had the last one in I remember him saying he didn't think it was them.'

'He'd dismissed them as suspects?' Sinclair was surprised.

'Oh, no, sir. He meant to question them again. But they were off that night, heading back to the front.'

'He didn't try to hold them?'

'Nothing to hold them on. But it didn't matter.

They weren't going anywhere. Just back to the salient.'

The chief inspector looked at Madden questioningly.

'Passchendaele, sir. That's where the battle was fought. Near Ypres.'

'It was just a few square miles of mud and craters,'