The Beach of Atonement Read online

  THE BEACH

  OF ATONEMENT

  ARTHUR W. UPFIELD

  ETT IMPRINT, SYDNEY

  Exile Bay

  This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission. Inquiries should be addressed to the publishers:

  ETT IMPRINT

  PO Box R1906

  Royal Exchange

  NSW 1225, Australia

  First published by Hutchinson, London 1930

  Copyright © William Upfield, 2016

  ISBN 978-1-925416-49-7

  ISBN 978-1-875892-50-3 ebook

  The publisher would like to thank Rosemary King for her effort in preparing this edition

  Design by Hanna Gotlieb

  TO

  the many courageous women dwelling in the depths of the Australian Bush, each helping to add to the British Empire a further meed of greatness, and each at the same time flinging back the lie that the youth of Great Britain are lacking in the spirit of adventure, I dedicate this book.

  A. W. U.

  150 miles from nearest town,

  Western Australia.

  CONTENTS

  I. Ellen and Tracy

  II. The Moving Finger Writes

  III. The Justice of Man

  IV. The Beach

  V. The Absent-minded Trapper

  VI. Hester Long

  VII. Hester Long’s Eagles

  VIII. The Dream

  IX. In Chains

  X. The Devil In The Bottle

  XI. Edith Mallory’s Confession

  XII. Dudley Goes Home

  XIII. A Lady With A Lamp

  XIV. Bravo Hester Long!

  XV. Beauty Surface Deep

  XVI. Dudley’s Step Forward

  XVII. Temptation

  XVIII. Battling With Satan

  XIX. At the Precipice Edge

  XX. Finlay comes To The Beach

  XXI. Hester’s Defeat

  XXII. Madness or Repentance

  XXIII. The Fall of St Anthony

  XXIV. The Fox-Hunter

  XXV. Storm

  XXVI. Hester Long’s Ordeal

  XXVII. Death – And Life

  XXVIII. A Woman of Empire

  CHAPTER I

  “ELLEN AND TRACY”

  ARNOLD DUDLEY mechanically lifted the telephone receiver from its hook in the early morning of the day that was to witness the beginning of his exile from the world of men. The voice at the other end of the wire was masculine, slow, and distinct. He did not recognize it. He never heard it again.

  “Is that Dudley—Arnold Dudley?” inquired the voice.

  “Yes.”

  “Are you alone?”

  “No. My stenographer is with me. Why?”

  Dudley heard a slight cough, the speaker evidently desiring to clear his throat. Then:

  “I am about to say something very unpleasant. It is entirely for your benefit that I suggest that you are better alone when you hear it.”

  Frowning, Dudley motioned to the stenographer to withdraw, and, when the office door had closed behind her, he said shortly :

  “Well ? I am alone. What is it?”

  “You are acquainted, I think, with Edmund Tracy, the stock and station agent, of Geraldton?”

  “Yes ; he is an acquaintance of mine. Who are you?”

  “In the circumstances I cannot divulge my name,” replied the unseen man with finality. “I am commissioned by a mutual friend to inform you that for the last five Saturday afternoons Mrs. Dudley has given your servants a holiday as from one to seven o’clock, and that shortly after they have left the house she is visited by Edmund Tracy, who remains with her until about six: Whilst our mutual friend trusts that nothing dishonourable is going on, he has decided that it is only right and proper you should know.”

  “I think you are a liar,” Dudley said distinctly.

  “I expected that you would think that,” came the clear voice. “Your cook, however, spends her pleasant Saturday afternoons with her mother at No. 7, Hyland Road, North Perth. No. 5 is occupied by a Mr. Smith, whose telephone number is A 2778. I suggest you ring him up at two o’clock and ask him to call Miss Merrill, your cook. She will undoubtedly substantiate my statement regarding her extra half-holidays. Good-bye!”

  “A-two-seven-seven-eight,” Dudley repeated. “Is that right?”

  He received no answer and, realizing that the man at the other end of the wire had broken the connection, replaced his own receiver on its hook and gazed vacantly at the figures he had noted on his paper block.

  Arnold Dudley was not yet thirty-five. Clear hazel eyes regarded the world with penetrating keenness; straight dark eyebrows almost met above the well-defined, slightly Roman nose; whilst above the broad low forehead wavy dark brown hair with a tinge of copper in it was brushed back in a manner that denoted pride. Altogether Dudley’s face was a strong one, but withal a likeable one. It was his mouth that attracted. Kindliness and tolerance were it on the lines about it.

  On this day he was a wholly successful business-man. From a rabbit-trapper he had become a skin-buyer, and his early struggles as a buyer of rabbit-skins, kangaroo-skins, sheep-skins and hides had been shared by Ellen, his wife. They had met and loved and married when he was touring the pastoral districts of Western Australia, driving his own truck and buying in person the furred skins from the trappers, and the sheep-skins and hides from the squatters.

  Now he occupied a suite of offices on St. George’s Terrace, and owned a warehouse in Fremantle, and his name was a household one all over the back country. He was famed as an honest dealer, and no longer did he have to “scout” for sellers. They sent him their combined produce in tons, and after it was graded and weighed, and promptly paid for, his bales of rabbit-skins, kangaroo fur, and hides, were shipped to America. And his wife, who had heartened and helped him in his struggles and disappointments, and now shared his success, occupied one of the most magnificent homes in Perth.

  To listen to that slanderous swine on the telephone was to insult his wife. The mere thought of her being unfaithful to him was criminal. Ellen, the girl he had married, was a vision of winsome loveliness. Ellen, still in her twenties, the wife of a successful business-man, was just a wonderful, brave, sweet woman. Unfaithful! It was impossible.

  No—improbable, not impossible.

  There was the affair between a friend of his and a woman in Smith Street some nine years before—an affair that had stamped itself on his mind. It had been arranged that he should call for his friend in a car at nine o’clock one evening. Slightly disgusted with his friend’s intrigue, he had stopped his car a little further along the street. At the appointed time the friend had joined him, and not twenty seconds after he had left the house the woman’s husband walked up to the door. And the woman, fresh from the embraces of her lover, had said loud enough for them to hear:

  “Why, Harold ! you are home early. Ted has only just gone.”

  In the light shining out through the open door they had seen the woman draw her husband to her and kiss him before leading the way indoors. Dudley’s friend had said, with a sigh of relief:

  “That was a narrow shave. Can you beat a woman for slyness? The Ted she spoke of is her brother.”

  It was the Judas kiss which had shocked Arnold Dudley far more than the woman’s betrayal of her husband’s honour. And even worse was the cynical laugh of his then companion at the expense of the poor blind trusting fool of a husband.

  But Ellen—no! a thousand times no ! She and he had become so bound together by their intimate life, their reliance each on the other, that
the mere thought of unfaithfulness in her was an outrage. Yet—! That other man—the man betrayed—would then have thought of his wife precisely as he was thinking—or trying to think.

  Then there was Tracy. He and Edmund Tracy had risen to success at about the same time. Their acquaintanceship had dated back to those far-off years when he had been a skin scout. There were many traits in Tracy’s character which were to be admired, but his attitude towards women was not one of them. Tracy would be about thirty years old. He was good-looking in his dark, pale way, unmarried, and judging by reports of his feminine conquests, alive with what has been termed “sex appeal”.

  But Ellen! Ellen, the fresh and the beautiful, who had waved him good-bye that very morning when he drove off in his car to business! Ellen and Tracy! And Tracy three hundred miles north in Geraldton! Ridiculous!

  A girl came in with a sheaf of letters for his signature, and Dudley forced his mind to concentrate on them. Yet at the back of his mind, as though an imp dwelt there constantly shrieking, came the reiterated phrase:

  “Ellen and Tracy—Ellen and Tracy—Ellen and Tracy!”

  The girl having gone, he rose and paced the room, a tall, lithe figure in a grey suit, yet supple and athletic. The poison of doubt had been inserted in his brain, and only proof, certainty, of his wife’s fidelity, would remove it. The voice over the telephone line, clear and incisive, had sounded top grade incoming fur, without blemish. There was no doubt, no hesitancy, no blundering, in that now hateful voice.

  “I can’t believe it—I simply can’t believe it,” Dudley moaned, sinking into his chair and burying his face in his arms over the littered desk. “But proof! I must have proof!”

  When he looked up, his face was drawn, his eyes wide, and in them a strange glitter. He pressed the buzzer on his desk, and when his stenographer entered he was writing a message on an Urgent Telegram Form, to be dispatched to Tracy’s chief clerk. The message asked for Tracy’s whereabouts.

  The telegram was sent at ten-fifteen, and precisely one hour later ‘the reply was handed to him. Quite calmly he tore open the buff envelope and read:

  “Mr. Tracy left for Perth last night’s express.—

  “MILLER”

  The stenographer, who had waited whilst he read the telegram, was amazed to see blood on his nether lip, and alarmed by his colour-drained face and staring eyes. She was about to leave hurriedly; when he reassured her by saying quietly:

  “Put me through to the warehouse, please. Then draw a cheque to self on my No. 2 account for a thousand pounds. Ask Mr. Thomas to come here.”

  There was no hint of emotion, no hint of panic, when he directed the manager of his warehouse to dispatch in a car an employee named George Finlay to the office. Then entered Mr. Thomas, Dudley’s chief clerk, who was requested to be seated on the further side of the table.

  For Arnold Dudley had decided to kill Tracy if he were. engaged in an intrigue with his wife. Since the law is incapable of protecting a man from dishonour, since the law will not punish a seducer of married women, he must then be a law unto himself. But on no account must he suffer the law’s punishment for punishing the wrecker of a man’s life, “happiness, and home”; for such retribution would defeat the injured and not the injuring party. He was his own man when he spoke.

  “It is quite possible, Thomas, that I shall be absent from business for some time,” he said. “I intend making you the manager of it, and giving you a power of attorney to act for me. I can trust you, Thomas, to give me a fair deal in my absence. You know my principles and my methods. Adopt them as your own, and you’ll keep the old ship sailing. Go at once and get the necessary papers drawn up. I want the matter fixed before we close at twelve. When Finlay arrives, show him in.”

  “It may be needless to say it, Mr. Dudley, but I am surprised,” Thomas answered, rising. “You may be sure, though, that I shall do my best.”

  “I know you will,” Dudley returned rapidly. “Remember that we have a hundred and thirty people on our pay sheets, and if you let the business down they go down with it. Now, hurry off for those documents.”

  The chief clerk’s place was taken by the stenographer, who laid the cheque before him for signature. After signing it, he told her to get it cashed in one pound notes, and added:

  “I may have to take a long journey, Miss Sawyers. During my absence Mr. Thomas will manage the business. I trust that you, as well as the staff, will serve him as loyally as you have served me. Always remember that personal honour is your greatest possession.”

  “I will always do my best, sir,” was her reply, before hastening to the bank.

  Ten minutes later she returned with twenty wads of one pound Treasury notes in a black bag, and found him counting the money that had been in the safe. When she had again withdrawn he replaced the amount taken from the safe with the new notes obtained from the bank, an operation assuring him several hundreds in untraceable currency. The black bag containing this money he set down beside his chair, and from a drawer in his desk he took a small-calibre automatic pistol, which he dropped also in the bag before finally closing it.

  Then it was he sat slumped in his chair, his body hot with fever, his brain as though encased in ice, and deep within his mind the voice of the imp:

  “Ellen and Tracy—Ellen and Tracy—Ellen and Tracy!”

  He heard sounds beyond his door denoting the departure of his staff, and then Thomas entered, followed by the stenographer dressed for out-of-doors.

  “Here are the documents you asked for, Mr. Dudley,” Thomas said, laying before Dudley several papers. “I have asked Miss Sawyers to please witness your signature.”

  Dudley signed without speaking, and passed the documents across to the manager, who pointed out the places for the witness’s signature. The girl, glancing at her employer before turning to the door, wondered at Dudley’s strained expression. Thomas said:

  “Is that all, sir? I trust your journey will be a pleasant one. Finlay is waiting outside. Shall I tell him to come in?”

  “Yes, do. I am not absolutely certain that I shall have to go away, Thomas. You will know either way on Monday morning.”

  “Very well, Mr. Dudley” And when Thomas left he did not wonder so much at his employer’s haggard appearance. He had heard an ugly rumour about Mrs. Dudley.

  Finlay came in. He was a stocky, powerful man of fifty or thereabouts. Dressed in a rough suit of tweed, his many years of outdoor life evidenced by his reddish complexion, Finlay looked what he was, or what for years he had been before he entered Dudley’s warehouse as a skin-classer.

  “Sit down, George,” he was told. “Till and light your pipe. I want no one to hear what I am going to talk about.”

  Dudley lit a cigarette, and for several minutes the two smoked in silence. Each understood the other; for many a year they had been partners in rabbit-trapping and kangaroo-shooting. At last Dudley rose and passed into the outer office. It was clear of workers, and he locked the main door before returning to his own office and reseating himself.

  “Have you still got your old ton truck, George?” he asked.

  “Yes, Arnold. Why?” Finlay replied with old-time familiarity.

  “Is it in going order?”

  “Yes. Me and the missus went up Moora way last week-end, and we got a couple of foxes.”

  A further silence fell between them. Then:

  “I am facing a lot of trouble, George,” Dudley said. “I am told that Ellen is carrying on with Tracy. You remember Tracy?”

  “Tracy! Ellen carrying on with Tracy!” gasped Finlay, the pipe sagging from his mouth, his body suddenly bent forward. “Like hell, she is!”

  “Precisely. It may be like hell she is,” Dudley said with sudden, surging anger. “I am going to make sure this afternoon. It has been my custom to spend Saturday afternoons on the golf links. We play till it is too dark to play, and it is generally eight o’clock when I reach home. I have been informed that the servants have been sent out on S
aturday afternoons, and that Tracy goes to my house and remains there several hours. If he is there this afternoon I am going to shoot him.”

  “And get yourself hanged,” stated the now calm George, adding: “I don’t believe Ellen is carrying on with Tracy. I’ve known her ever since was she a little dot. As for Tracy—well, I never liked him. He’s too flash. Anyway, he ain’t worth getting hanged for.”

  “I am not going to get hanged for him, Dudley said quietly. “That is why I want to buy your truck. What’s it worth?”

  “About eighty quid. But look here, it is—.”

  “Have you still got your trapping-gear?” Dudley cut in. “Yes. Six dozen rabbit-traps, rifles, and loading outfit, a tent, and tucker utensils. But why—?”

  “How much do you want for the gear?”

  “Twenty quid would cover all that, Arnold. But what is the idea?”

  From the black bag now on his knees Dudley took out notes to the value of a hundred and fifty pounds, which he slid along the desk towards his old partner. Then he said:

  “I do not believe that Ellen is dishonouring me, but from what I have been told this morning the maggot of doubt has been created in my brain. I have simply got to kill that maggot. If I find Tracy with my wife I am going to shoot him, and you are not going to prevent me.

  “I am not going to get hanged either, if I can help it. There are a hundred and fifty pounds for your truck and all the gear. Go home and tell your wife you are going out with a friend for the day. Get her to fill the tucker-box to last a couple of days. Then about three o’clock leave with the truck and drive to Midland Junction, where take the north road to Geraldton, and stop about two miles beyond the Junction. Wait there for me. Is that plain?”

  “Yes, it is. But don’t be a fool, Arnold,” Finlay said earnestly. “They ain’t worth it. Even Ellen ain’t worth it. No bloomin’ woman is worth hell and damnation.”