‘But who the hell…?’

‘Dacoits… we think it was dacoits. Doped up, no doubt – drugged-up courage. In a mood to stop at nothing. It happens. Prentice had been routing them out of village after village and they came for him. Didn’t know he was away, I suppose… Or perhaps they knew only too well! They’ve chased all the servants off or they’ve fled. No sign of them anyway. Come crawling back in the morning I dare say and then we’ll find out more.’

Dickie Templar had heard enough. He turned aside and blundered into the darkness to hide his distress. He stopped dead. He had heard a faint cry.

From a stack of tall flowerpots there emerged a ghostlike figure: Midge Prentice, white face a mask of terror, her bunched nightie gripped convulsively in a small hot hand. Dickie fell on his knees and gathered her in his arms, sobbing, kissing her face and holding her to him, murmuring childish endearments. ‘You got out!’ he said at last. ‘You got out!’ And then, ‘Where’s Mummy?’

For reply, the child pointed dumbly to the smouldering ruin of the house.

Chapter Two

CALCUTTA 1922

Commander Joseph Sandilands of the Metropolitan Police was delighted to be going home. Delighted that his six months’ secondment from the Met to the Bengal Police should, at last, be at an end.

He’d had enough India. He’d had enough heat. He’d had enough smells.

Though no stranger to the midden that was the East End of London he’d not, by a long way, been able to accept the poverty that surrounded him. And he still resented the social formalities of Calcutta. As a London policeman, his social status had been, at the least, equivocal in the precedent-conscious atmosphere of the capital of Bengal. He had counted the days until he could pack, say his farewells and go, but even that pleasure was denied him; inevitably, the bearer who had been assigned to him had done his packing for him. But, by whatever means, it was at last done and tomorrow he’d be gone.