The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [223]
The site chosen that day had been near a shallow expanse of weed-choked water that had evidently once been a man-made tank, dug many centuries ago to supply some long-forgotten city, the traces of which still surrounded it in the form of low mounds, crumbling sandstone blocks and the remains of ruined walls that were barely higher than the rustling, lion-coloured grass, and split by the roots of neem and kikar and sal trees.
As usual, Ash's tent had been pitched under a tree on the outskirts of the camp, with his servants' tents arranged in a half circle some way behind it. The waist-high grass had been cut or trampled down for twenty yards around to ensure that no one could approach unseen, yet some time during the hottest part of the day someone had done so.
No less than two of Ash's men had been on guard at the time, squatting in the shade of a neem tree at the edge of the clearing from where they could keep the tent under observation. But the fact that neither had seen anything suspicious was not altogether surprising – they had been up since four o'clock that morning, and having eaten their mid-day meal were replete and lulled into drowsiness by heat and the hot wind. Both had dozed off at intervals – secure in the conviction that their mere presence would be enough to deter any wrong-doer from approaching – and they had heard nothing to rouse them, for their ears had been filled with the dry rustle of leaves and grass in the wind.
Ash had been busy elsewhere, and he had returned to find his belongings in considerable disorder: the locks of his boxes forced and their contents strewn about the floor. Even his bed had been stripped, and the entire tent showed signs of being searched in great haste, yet with a thoroughness that he found oddly disquieting. Every piece of furniture had been moved and the matting rolled back to see if anything had been buried in the earth underneath it. His mattress had been slit open with a knife and both pillow-slips had been removed. But the search had proved unrewarding, as apart from a handful of small change – most of it copper – there had been neither money nor firearms in the tent, for Ash had taken to carrying his revolver, and had given the two cash boxes, the rifle and shot-gun and his spare ammunition to Mahdoo, who had hidden them in a shabby canvas bedding-roll which he added to his own luggage.
The only other mitigating circumstance – if it could be called that – was the fact that the thoroughness of the search seemed an indication that the thief had been looking for money, and was therefore not the man who had previously stolen the rifle. Ash drew what comfort he could from that, because although it was unpleasant enough to find that someone had managed to enter his tent without being seen, ransack it and leave again, all in broad daylight and with two of his servants in plain sight, it was better than wondering if once again one of his own weapons had been needed to use against him, and if so, why. To make a murder look like suicide? – or because suspicion would naturally fall on his servants if he were found shot with his own gun?
That last seemed the most likely explanation, as all the camp knew that the Sahib's tent stood apart and was not easy to approach unseen, so who but one of his own people would have been able to enter it and take the rifle? The reasoning would have appeared sound enough, and the majority would have accepted it because the alternative (that in a camp where there were literally thousands of firearms – muskets,