Free Hardcastle's Traitors by Graham Ison Page B

He’s in his twenties, I’d think, and with the present drain on subalterns I don’t suppose he’ll last more than a few weeks, but that’s no excuse for his behaviour. Trouble is that new officers these days aren’t out of the top drawer, so to speak, and even worse, I’ll probably find that he went to a grammar school.’
    It was a remark that did little to endear Villiers to Hardcastle who had been the doubtful beneficiary of a London County Council elementary school education.
    â€˜Is this here Tindall still in France?’ asked Hardcastle.
    â€˜I imagine so, but there again he might be dead,’ commented Villiers, revealing the pessimistic fatalism of those soldiers who prosecuted the war from muddy rat-infested holes in France and Flanders.
    â€˜As a matter of interest, why
didn’t
you report any of this to Colonel Powell?’ asked Hardcastle.
    â€˜I thought I’d sort it out myself,’ said Villiers. ‘As I said just now, if I’d placed the matter before the colonel, he’d have had no alternative but to have a summary of evidence taken, with a view to court-martialling Tindall.’
    â€˜Thank you for calling in again, Captain Villiers. I doubt that I’ll need to speak to you again.’
    â€˜I hope not,’ said Villiers. He paused at the door. ‘You didn’t tell me how you found where Annabel lived, Inspector.’
    â€˜No, I didn’t,’ said Hardcastle.

FIVE
    L ater that afternoon, Hardcastle was seated in his office, contentedly smoking his pipe and thinking. Occasionally, he would stand up and pace the office, sometimes stopping to stare unseeing at the Underground station below his window. After fifteen minutes of this deliberation he sent for Marriott.
    â€˜I’ve been wondering about this here Second Lieutenant George Tindall of the Royal Field Artillery, Marriott.’
    â€˜What about him, sir?’
    â€˜It’s possible that he was being a bit clever in getting his own back on Villiers.’ Hardcastle had almost convinced himself that Tindall was Reuben Gosling’s murderer. Or one of them. ‘Supposing he stole Sinclair Villiers’s expensive motor car and carried out the murder to throw suspicion on Captain Villiers?’
    â€˜How would he know where Sinclair Villiers lived, sir?’
    â€˜I’d think he could’ve got that from the records at the unit where they were both serving?’ suggested Hardcastle. ‘But you seem to know more about the army than I do,’ he added archly. ‘Is it possible?’
    â€˜I suppose so, sir,’ said Marriott, surprised that for once the DDI was deferring to him. ‘But if Tindall had wanted to kill Villiers, it would’ve been easier for him to do it in Flanders, surely? According to Villiers, Tindall told him never to turn his back on him. My brother-in-law Frank reckons that quite a few sadistic NCOs have got a bullet in the back out there.’ Frank Dobson was a sergeant-major in the Middlesex Regiment, and had told Marriott the tale of one or two vindictive sergeants who had met their end at the hands of their own men. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, their deaths were put down as ‘killed in action’. ‘Mind you, sir,’ continued Marriott, ‘I don’t really see that Tindall would have such an opportunity; RFA officers don’t go over the top like the infantry.’
    â€˜Yes, but even so, that wouldn’t have paid off his debts, Marriott, would it?’ Hardcastle sat back, a satisfied smile on his face. ‘But a handful of tomfoolery might’ve done. And, like I said, using Sinclair Villiers’s car to do it would’ve thrown suspicion on Haydn Villiers.’
    â€˜But do we know if anyone else knew about the debts, sir? It might just be a tale that Haydn Villiers put about because he didn’t like the man.’
    â€˜One way of finding