40 Days 40 Nights: A Sgt Major Crane Novel by Cartmell Wendy

Author:Cartmell, Wendy [Cartmell, Wendy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Endeavour Press
Published: 2014-02-11T06:00:00+00:00

Day 22

The Chinese take away from last night was giving Crane indigestion. He’d been in the barracks for hours, interviewing Padam with an interpreter. At the moment Padam was with an artist trying to come up with a composite picture of the soldier seen leaving the cemetery. Crane took a copy of his signed statement off the desk in front of him and decided to have a walk around the car park.

The movement seemed to ease his stomach problems and the fresh air cleared his head, as he studied the statement again. McInnes must have heard something, a disturbance in the cemetery perhaps and went to investigate. Once inside McInnes must have encountered the murderer, who broke his neck and pulled him behind the pillbox. The pillbox was in a remote part of the cemetery, so maybe McInnes tracked the suspect for some distance. Or had he been lured there? That was more likely, but if so it indicated that the perpetrator had some training, military or otherwise and a degree of cunning.

What was the reason for the death? The act of killing itself, he wondered? Counting Lance Corporal Simms, there were two murders. Perilously close to becoming a series of killings. Which meant there could be more to come. But what motive would someone have for picking off soldiers and with such precision?

As Crane walked he tried to look at the puzzle from another angle, lighting a cigarette to aid his thinking. The missing weapon could be the key. Perhaps that’s what the suspect was after. But if that’s the case, what was he after the first time? Nothing was taken from the first soldier. So if nothing was taken, maybe it was to stop him either seeing something or reporting something. But Crane had no bloody idea what could be under the swimming pool that they shouldn’t see. They had searched it again since the death of Corporal Simms. But they’d better search it one more time. Exhaling the smoke from the last drag of his cigarette, he marched back into the barracks.

Crane managed to catch his Officer Commanding in his office, but unfortunately Captain Edwards didn’t share his views. As usual.

“How can you be sure this old Gurkha is telling the truth?” he demanded.

“I beg your pardon, sir?” Crane couldn’t keep the incredulity out of his voice.

“This old man had been lurking around on the garrison in the middle of the night,” Edwards warmed to his theme. “What was he doing?”

“Well, just keeping an eye out I guess.” As he spoke Crane realised how lame that sounded.

“Keeping an eye out! For God’s sake, Crane. You should be treating him as a suspect, not a witness. He could be making the whole thing up. A cover story for killing a soldier who found him trying to break in somewhere or steal something.”

“Break in? Steal something? In a cemetery?”

“I understand these Gurkhas are very poor. Living on the breadline.”

“Yes sir, it’s an appalling state of affairs,” Crane agreed.

“That’s as may be, but that sort of vagrant tends to turn to stealing to survive.

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