Folly Du Jour - Barbara Cleverly [71]
‘The girl had been the victim of multiple assaults. Of a sexual nature. She’d been raped. Many times. Also beaten and cut with a dagger and, finally, strangled. She was twelve years old.’ George’s head drooped and he seemed unable to carry on.
Joe and Bonnefoye could find no words to encourage him.
‘Somerton tried to cover it all up. No need of a report for such a matter. Who was lodging a complaint? The father? Pay him off! A few rupees would close his mouth. But the medical officer was made of stern enough stuff to stand up to him. He sent in a full report to Somerton’s superior officer and he sent a copy to me.’
‘Was a proper investigation conducted?’ asked Joe.
‘I insisted on it. I put my best men in to get to the bottom of it and when I heard what they’d discovered I took steps. They found that the girl had been sent – against her will and against custom – into the camp to deliver items of laundry urgently needed by the CO. Women never ventured near the place as a rule – the men had a reputation for savagery of one sort or another. The poor child must have been terrified to be given the errand but girls in that country obey their fathers. She’d delivered it to Somerton’s quarters. She’d been seen going inside and coming out again. This was the story my men picked up from every witness. A word-perfect performance, they judged. Too perfect. Rehearsed. They went to work and after some days finally found sitting before them at interview a young chap fresh out from England and as yet untrained in the ways of that regiment. He spilled the beans.
‘Put his own life in danger, of course, by his assertions and we had to take him away directly to a place of safety and hold him in reserve for the trial. He stated that the girl had indeed come out of the CO’s quarters but thrown out screaming and bleeding and in great distress – by Somerton himself. Some of his men had gathered round on hearing the din and our recruit had been horrified to hear his instructions: “She’s all yours, lads, if you can be bothered!”
‘Our chap ran away and hid and no one was aware that he’d seen anything, but he was able to give a full list of those involved. We had the names and rolled it up from there. The men had bragged about it to each other openly afterwards. They never knew exactly who had shopped them. It wasn’t difficult to get a confession from most of them.’
‘And you left him alive, George?’ said Joe quietly.
‘A court martial was held and he was found guilty. Kicked out of the army with every ounce of parade and scorn they could muster. A pariah for the rest of his days. I thought that was punishment enough. At the time. I wish now I’d had the bugger shot. I could have arranged it.’
‘Why did you hold off?’ Bonnefoye wanted to know.
‘The fellow had a wife and young son back home. And, on the whole, a cashiering makes less of a splash than an execution.’ He sighed. ‘Discretion, always discretion.’
Suddenly angry, he burst out: ‘And now see where discretion and pity have landed me! In danger of losing my head because the silly bugger’s got his comeuppance! And I didn’t even have the satisfaction of plunging a dagger into his snake’s heart! It’s a thankless task you two fellows have got on your hands. If you find out who ordered up this assassination I shall have to ask you to congratulate him before you slip the cuffs on.’
‘He didn’t kill Somerton, did he?’ Bonnefoye commented when Sir George, finally exhausted, had excused himself and gone off to his room.
‘What makes you change your mind?’
‘At the end, when he lost his temper and spoke without restraint . . . I believed him when he said he would have plunged the dagger into the man’s heart. He would have done just that. Quick and soldierly. He’d quite forgotten for the