A more sinister thought occurred to him. Zeman was of the royal blood and, all would agree, a charismatic figure.
There might well be a faction at court who preferred Zeman’s style to that of the Amir Amanullah. If Amanullah had found out it would have made good sense for him to engage a trusted lieutenant and someone close to Zeman to dispose of him discreetly, well away from the Amir’s sphere of influence. If his rival were to die of natural causes under the unbiased eye of the Raj that would be nothing but good news for Amanullah. And doubtless Iskander would have his reward when he returned home. Joe knew he ought to be sharing these thoughts and theories, collecting information from James. But there was something in James’s behaviour since the discovery of the body that Joe was not entirely comfortable with. His friend to whom he would entrust – and indeed in the past had entrusted – his life seemed, in some unseizable way, to have taken a step back from him. Joe decided to leave James out of his calculations and, meantime, Lily was filling the gap remarkably well. And pacing along with his unspoken thoughts apparently.
‘And why wait do it here in the fort? Is that significant, Joe?’ she asked him.
‘I think so. Yes. There are nine impeccable Western witnesses, some of them decidedly important and well-regarded people falling over themselves to prove he had nothing to do with it, that the death was entirely natural and unavoidable. Because the suspicion that Zeman had been killed by anyone while under the protection of James and through him the British Army could well lead to conflagration. We couldn’t even accuse Iskander if we were certain he’d done it – it would be a frightful insult to the Amir.’
‘What would he do about it?’
‘At the worst, he would do what Amirs have done before. Declare a jehad – a holy war – against the British. They’ve done it on much slighter provocation. He would rouse the tribes on this side of the frontier to join his Afghani forces, he might even call on a little Russian support. They’re already supplying him with bomber planes. The Scouts you see manning this fort are all related to the tribesmen in the hills; they are Afridi, Khyberee, Mahsud, Wazir, Khattack, and though they are very loyal and very brave – best fighters in the world perhaps – they are also Muslim and the strength of their faith might well override any army loyalty. Every village has a Mullah holding the Koran in one hand and a drawn sword in the other! Every fort along the frontier could fall to a concerted attack from without and betrayal from within.’
‘The frontier in flames?’ said Lily, remembering a phrase she had heard on so many lips in Simla.
‘The frontier?’ Joe frowned. ‘No, worse than that – the frontier today, the Punjab tomorrow and the rest of India would soon follow, Lily.’
‘There’s only one thing to do, Joe. Pull ’em in and give ’em all the treatment! Sweat ’em until someone coughs!’
‘Lily, what have you been reading? Dime novels? No, I can’t do that. So long as we can keep up the pretence of “natural causes” and all are content with that, the fuse remains unlit. If I start stirring about, expressing or implying doubts, then we’re lost. You too, Miss Coblenz! You must behave entirely naturally. Don’t go around searching rooms and looking sideways at people.’
‘Not even Iskander?’ she asked innocently. ‘Here, take a look! He’s coming back in.’
‘Right, let’s go and meet him, shall we? Ask politely if there’s anything we can do… see if we can establish what his plans are for the rest of the day.’
An extraordinary change had come over Iskander, Joe decided. He appeared to have taken over not only Zeman’s commanding role but elements of his personality too. Grave, as befitted one who had just lost his friend and countryman, he was no longer a silent and menacing presence but easy, responsive and prepared to answer questions. Yes, there was something they could do, he said. He needed to write up a report on last night’s unfortunate occurrence, perhaps Joe could point him towards a supply of writing paper? They walked with him to the library where Joe found and laid out sheets of the fort’s headed writing paper, pens, blotters and all he could possibly need.
‘The report will take some time,’ said Iskander, ‘probably the whole of the rest of the morning as I shall write it out in two languages. This afternoon I have arranged for my men to bury Zeman. There is, Commander Lindsay tells me, a small Muslim burial ground between here and the river, the remains, I understand, of the village which was razed to the ground to make way for the building of this fort. It will be entirely suitable to lay him to rest there. I think we must put off until tomorrow our return with Dr Holbrook to Kabul. Perhaps you would be so good, Sandilands, as to inform her of our change in plan and ask her to be ready to move off immediately after breakfast?’
Joe murmured his readiness to do this. Lily, obviously hunting for some way of establishing contact with him and finding nothing better said, ‘Tea? I’ll have some tea sent to you, Iskander.’
To Joe’s surprise he turned to her and gave her a smile full of grace and humour. ‘You are kindness itself, Miss Coblenz. I should be very grateful for tea.’
Iskander was grateful for tea three times in as many hours and all delivered personally to the library by Lily.
‘What are you up to, Lily?’ Joe asked impatiently, finding her coming for the third time from the library.
‘Just keeping an eye on suspect number one,’ she said. ‘It’s all right, Joe. He’s just doing what he said he would do. It’s taking a long time and there’s a lot of pen chewing going on. But I think I was pretty helpful. You do spell “autopsy” with an “s”, don’t you?’
She continued to keep him under her eye during the afternoon but from the distance of the wall of the fort. Joe joined her to watch the funeral unobtrusively. With distaste his eye took in the bleak Islamic cemetery, rocky and forbidding on a flat plain between two folds of unrelenting hillside, perpetually shaped and honed by the endless, searing wind. An empty plain covered with forgotten memorial stones on end. Memorial stones of all ages, some new, some hundreds of years old, some straight and true, others undermined by the wind and leaning drunkenly.
‘What a place to await eternity!’ thought Joe and his mind fled to England, to peaceful and ordered headstones, soft, dark earth, here and there a self-sown blossom tree, healing rain and caressive wind. To a Surrey churchyard: ‘The Rev. Simon Graham, who departed this life… ’ ‘Dora, beloved wife of the above, who fell asleep… ’ ‘Benjamin Elliott, aged six months, asleep in the arms of Jesus… ’ According to legend they waited in joyful hope for their resurrection but who, in this horrible place, would wait in joyful hope – or hope of any sort? He looked at the shallow grave prepared for Zeman and remembered the style of that subtle and perhaps even romantic figure and, for a moment, Joe grieved for him. ‘I’d sooner be working with him than consigning him to this bleak and unforgiving stone yard!’
He cheered himself with the thought that warriors of Zeman’s religion were guaranteed eternal felicity in the arms of timeless houris and hoped it might be true. He said a silent prayer to any god who was listening and noticed that Lily also, head bent, was lost in thought or prayer.
Following the funeral, a very brief affair, the Afghanis returned and to Joe’s surprise Iskander approached James with the suggestion that some of his off-duty Scouts might be persuaded to teach the game of cricket to his men.
‘Of course,’ James replied. ‘There is in fact a game scheduled for this afternoon for your entertainment but I had wondered whether to cancel it in view of the sad event of last night. Your men are very welcome to watch and get the hang of the game and afterwards I’m sure the Scouts would be delighted to coach your chaps. That is if they are not too downcast by the death of their commander. I would quite understand if you thought they might prefer to spend the afternoon in quiet thought and contemplation.’