Barbara Cleverly by Ragtime in Simla Page B

look like a better target for an assassin’s bullet than Korsovsky. Someone may have got wind of the fact that Sir George was planning to put his tame ferret down a particularly nasty rat hole in Simla.’
    At that moment Carter’s sharp ears warned him of Meg’s return and he added hurriedly, ‘And listen, Joe, don’t even think of going off to inspect that flower shop by yourself! I couldn’t guarantee your safety. If we have to, we’ll go together – with plenty of back-up!’
    Meg bustled in, happy to resume her revelations about Sharpe, and Joe was very willing to draw her out. ‘Tell me, Meg,’ he said, ‘does Reggie Sharpe work for his living?’
    ‘Not really. But don’t forget he’s on the board of ICTC and a substantial shareholder. It’s common knowledge that Alice takes all the decisions. He does a bit in the ADS, I think. He used to help Alice with some of her charitable things but he doesn’t even do that now. I started to work in the hospital a bit – Lady Reading’s hospital – that’s how I met Alice. She’s an assiduous fund-raiser and works there full time one day a week when she’s in Simla. I like her.’
    Joe smiled. ‘Yes, I gathered that much.’
    ‘Well,’ said Meg Carter defensively, ‘she’s easy. You can get on with her. We’ve worked well together. And the more she does, the more useless does Reggie Sharpe seem.’
    ‘Perhaps,’ said Joe, ‘he resents her? It does happen sometimes. Bright active girl, husband trailing along behind
    Not a recipe for happiness.’
    ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Carter. ‘It seems to work all right for us.’
    Joe emerged from the Carter bungalow prepared to walk the short distance back down the lanes to the town centre but, to his surprise, the four rickshaw men who’d brought him there now reappeared, hastily putting away the dice they’d been playing with and presenting themselves again, smiling and keen to be off. Telling himself to remember rickshaws did not operate by the same rules as London taxis, Joe climbed aboard and said, ‘To Mrs Sharpe’s office. ICTC. It’s just off the Mall,’ he added helpfully but the men were away at the mention of her name.
    After ten minutes scraping around corners they were back in the town’s main concourse and weaving their way through the press of foot traffic. Smartly dressed ladies strolled in chattering groups pointing and exclaiming at the displays in shop windows which would not have looked out of place in Paris. Men in army uniforms marched purposefully about at a smart pace, disappearing into the town hall or the telegraph office or making their way along to the army HQ next to St Michael’s Church. Indian ayahs trailed past leading files of small children, mushroom-headed in their oversized solar topees. Joe noticed with amusement that this season the fashion in topees for little girls seemed to be a white covering of broderie anglaise.
    Amongst the soberly dressed English, the showy figures of chaprassis stood out, turbaned, scarlet-coated, each with his important-looking message box in his right hand, sometimes with a file of papers tucked under his arm. They walked swiftly on pointed sandalled feet from public building to public building and Joe realized that what he was looking at was the Empire at work. This dusty, narrow little street so inaccurately called the Mall was the nerve centre of British India, the scarlet messengers the electrical impulses which kept the information flowing.
    Catching a glimpse of a sign advertising ‘Stephanatos Cigarettes. The best in Simla’, Joe, on an impulse, called out to the men to stop, indicating that he wanted to buy some cigarettes. They stopped and waited for him to do his shopping. Joe looked appreciatively at the smart façade with its array of pipes, mounds of exotic tobaccos, cigars of all sizes and brands of cigarettes he had never heard of. He entered the cool, dark and intensely fragrant interior with the anticipation of a child entering a sweetshop. The Indian assistant was