Bony - 09 - Death of a Swagman Read online

  “As I have pointed out, we policemen are bound hand and foot. We cannot enter houses and shops and search without a warrant. But you can, Padre. You can gather a band of men and women and go from house to house to make search for Rose Marie. No householder will object to such action by you. It is useless to search for tracks outside or on the street. Turn every house and shop inside out. Game?”

  “Of course,” replied Lawton-Stanley.

  “Good! And include the church and the parsonage.”

  The evangelist nodded, turned, and went out with Mrs Marshall. They could hear him talking softly to her in the passage. Then Dr Scott came in … like a little dust storm.

  “Morning!” he snapped, his white hair all ruffled. “Bit early. I haven’t had breakfast yet.”

  “I want you to go along to Rose Marie’s bedroom, Doctor, and there take a sniff at the child’s pillow. When I did so I fancied I could smell chloroform. Then, under the bed, you will find a strip of carpet, rolled up. Take that back to your laboratory and, with your microscope, establish the foreign matter adhering to it. I think it is jute fibres. Anyway, I must know just what that foreign matter is. Will you do that for me?”

  “Of course I will. Damn the breakfast! I’ll do that immedi­ately and come back with my report.”

  “Good! You may be disturbed by the evangelist and his search party, but you won’t mind that, will you?”

  “Mind it!” echoed the doctor. “What the heck does Lawton-Stanley want to search my house for?”

  “To find Rose Marie. They are going to search every house in the town.”

  “Oh, all right! I won’t bellow.”

  As he had entered, so Dr Scott left, followed by Marshall. In less than two minutes the doctor returned to the office to tell Bony that he was sure the smell of chloroform still clung to the child’s pillow. Marshall let him out and then rejoined Bony.

  “Sorry I spoke like I did,” he said gruffly.

  Across Bony’s face flashed a smile. It vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

  “That’s nothing to worry about, Marshall,” he said softly. “I felt no better about it than you did, and do. When it is all cleared up you will acquit me. I am now expecting the postmaster. After he arrives I want you to go along to the garage and ask young Jason to come in for a moment or two. As you well know, young Jason was very friendly with Rose Marie. He may be able to give us a lead. Treat him very gently.”

  “Yes, he might give us a lead,” Marshall agreed. “He’s a queer fellow, but all the kids like him. He might give us a lead as you suggest. Ah … there’s Lovell coming in now.”

  The postmaster’s pale face was adorned with a thin mous­tache. His shoulders were slightly stooped. The sergeant placed a chair for him at the table opposite Bony and withdrew.

  “So you are a police inspector,” Lovell said, brows raised. “What can I do for you?”

  “A lot for me and more for Rose Marie.” Bony told him. “The child was kidnapped sometime during last night, and I am going to confide in you this much—I believe that she was taken by the man who killed Kendall and that swagman.” Bony leaned well back in his chair and stared hard at Mr Lovell. “I am professionally interested in certain parties here in Merino, and some time ago I wrote to Sydney asking for in­quiries to be made concerning their origins and histories. Being a civil servant, as I am, you will appreciate that no sense of urgency will be experienced by the officers in Sydney. You will appreciate the urgency animating us here in Merino, and you will appreciate the urgency with which I want to contact Sydney.”

  “That’s so, Inspector. Rule of thumb, you know, and all that. Still, as a general rule, it’s better to be slow and sure.”

  “I agree there with you. Now … will you take over that telephone exchange yourself and do all possible to clear the lines to police headquarters, Sydney, as quickly as possible?”

  “Yes.”

  “I am going to ask headquarters to speak on matters which normally would be concealed in a sealed envelope, and, there­fore, would you remain in that exchange until I am done?”

  “Of course.”

  “Fine. Thank you, Mr Lovell. Will you get going?”

  The postmaster stood up.

  “Anything else I can do?” he asked. “I’ve got a kid of Rose Marie’s age.”

  “Well, now,” said Bony slowly, placing the tips of his fingers together beneath the point of his chin. “You could take a faint interest in the conversations of other telephone users this morning, and make a mental note of anything which might have a bearing on the disappearance of Rose Marie. But haste in contacting Sydney is of first importance.”

  “I’ll bet I’ll get Sydney within an hour. So long. And when I do, I’ll lock the exchange door and shut fast the window.”

  It was a quarter to nine o’clock. Left alone, Bony sat still and stared at the police notices on the back of the door which Lovell had closed behind him. From outside came the voice of the wind which since sunup had risen to become half a gale. Bony’s mind became less taut, more fluid. He thought of young Jason and of Mr James. Then again of the postmaster. What had Lovell said just before he went? Something about shutting a door. Yes, that was it. Shutting a door. Who else said some­thing about shutting a door?

  Into Bony’s mind appeared, as on a screen, the hut at Sandy Flat, the hut as he had last seen it in the moonlight. The door of the hut was shut, and he remembered that he had debated then whether he had closed it. Closed it! No, he hadn’t closed that door when he left the place for the cane-grass meat house, because his arms were loaded with his swag and things. And that door would not have been closed by the wind. It would not just catch shut because there were no door lock or handles. There was merely a bent piece of wire to keep that door shut. Bony leapt from his chair. Within three seconds he was out in the street.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Mrs Sutherland Is Thrilled

  IT WAS NOT by chance that Mrs Sutherland arrived in town so early that morning. She was to meet a sister who was coming from Mildura by the mail which reached Merino at eleven o’clock, and she found that she had certain shopping to do, so decided to do the shopping before rather than after the ar­rival of the visitor.

  The track from her homestead joined the main road just below the church and, on arriving at the lower end of the macadamized street, she was astonished to see the activity of the inhabitants. Her destination was the hotel yard, where she always parked her car, and halfway up the street she saw the Rev. Lawton-Stanley emerge from a shop followed by more than a dozen men and boys. They all trooped into a house next door to the shop. She saw another party of men swarm­ing about a house which stood back from the street beyond an empty allotment, whilst others stood in groups here and there, engaged in excited conversation.

  Mr Watson, who was accompanied by two strangers, waved to her. The Rev. Llewellyn James, who was talking to Mr Fanning, the butcher, raised his felt hat to her, but on neither his face nor on Mr Watson’s face was there a welcoming smile. And then, as though he materialized out of space, the man she knew as Robert Burns was standing on the running board of her moving car.

  “I want you to take me at once out to Sandy Flat,” he told her.

  Instinctively she accelerated, then put the brake on, hard. The car stopped midway between the hotel and Mr Jason’s garage. Bony dashed round to the front of the car and climbed into the seat beside her. Mrs Sutherland giggled.

  “What is this, a getaway from the police or attempted elopement?” she demanded. “Get out of my car. I don’t budge till you do.”

  “Neither, Mrs Sutherland. Your car is the only one on the street at this moment, and I’ve got to get to Sandy Flat without loss of time. Come on now. Be a sport and take me there. I can tell you all about it on the way.”

  Mrs Sutherland was first and foremost a romantic. To back up her romanticism there was a strong vein of humour. And, in addition, there was a fine confidence that she could take care of hers
elf. Besides, this Burns man was a good-looking fellow, and he had nice eyes even though they were somewhat small and fierce this bright morning.

  She pressed the self-starter, geared in, and drove the car in a small circle to begin the journey to Sandy Flat just as Ser­geant Marshall and young Jason emerged from the garage.

  “Thanks, Mrs Sutherland. Drive like … hell,” Bony said.

  “You are not escaping from jail, are you? I thought you were out,” she remarked without visible concern. “What’s it all about?”

  People stared at the old car as it sped down the street, the hardest woman in all the district holding with sun-blackened hands to the driving wheel.

  Bony told her who and what he was, and gave in very broad outline the purpose of his visit to Merino. He spoke with un­masked truth in his voice. And then he told her how Rose Marie had been taken from her bed, and what he suspected was the reason, and whom he suspected of kidnapping her.

  “You don’t know who has done these murders?” she asked, the veneer of frivolousness stripped from her.

  “No … not yet … but I’m getting warm. Can’t you drive faster?”

  “Perhaps I could,” she agreed, and pressed the accelerator down to the floorboard. “You know, I always felt you were not an ordinary stockman. I was only saying so to Mr Jason the other evening. He comes out some evenings to listen to my playing.”

  “Strange man,” remarked Bony. “I understand that he’s been an actor. He can certainly quote Shakespeare. When was he out at your home last?”

  “Ah, that’s telling.” She cut off the giggle before it got fully under way. “Let me think. Oh yes. It was last Saturday week. You needn’t be jealous, Inspector. You will be welcome any evening. My sister is due today from Melbourne. She plays the violin rather well.”

  “I may accept your invitation. Thank you. Better stop before the gate. There is a lot of barbed wire about it.”

  When he did not trouble to shut the gate after the car had been driven beyond it, and had regained his seat beside her, she said:

  “What about shutting the gate?”

  “Drive on, Mrs Sutherland. Minutes may count vitally. The gate can wait.”

  “Oh, all right! What do you expect to find down here at Sandy Flat? The murderer?”

  “No, Rose Marie.”

  The wind was racing the car. The dust was being swept along with it. The woman’s hands were glued to the steering wheel and she risked sand-skidding. Ahead, the Walls of China were light brown and indistinct. She said:

  “D’you think he will have killed her?”

  “I am hoping not. It’s why I asked you to bring me, and did not wait to suggest to Sergeant Marshall that he bring me. Better drive slower when we reach the white ground. A few seconds will make no difference.”

  They passed out from the tree line to the white sandy waste footing the Walls. Ahead, the dark blurs of the hut and the reservoir tank appeared very small. Mrs Sutherland was driving well over thirty miles an hour when twenty was the safety limit. The engine was labouring when she drove the car in a circling movement to stop outside the hut and facing the road back.

  “Stay here, please,” Bony commanded.

  The doorstep was covered with sand, like fine drift snow. The temporary wire catch was dropped down over the nail. He released it and pushed inward the door. Then he turned and beckoned to Mrs Sutherland.

  When she entered the hut he was raising the drop window in the far wall. He from the window and she from the door stood without movement regarding the little body on the bunk. Simultaneously they advanced to the bunkside. Then Bony was on his knees. And then she heard him cry, loudly, so loudly that the moaning hiss of the wind was subdued:

  “She’s alive!”

  Clad only in her pyjamas, Rose Marie was lying on her back. On her face the sand dust lay thickly, and Bony gently blew it off her brow and her closed eyelids.

  “Is she asleep?” asked Mrs Sutherland. “Move away so that I can take her up.”

  “Wait! I don’t think she’s asleep.” Bony softly patted the limp hand. “Rose Marie! Wake up! Mrs Sutherland and your friend Bony are here to take you home.” Gently he raised her head. Mrs Sutherland uttered a cry. There was blood on the back of the child’s head. It had dripped through the wire netting of the bare bunk to the floor beneath.

  “Bashed on the head with a blunt instrument, eh!” Bony said, his voice a snarl. He moved each of her legs, and then each of her arms. “Doesn’t seem to be any other injury. I’ll carry her to the car and take her back to town. Never mind the door. You get into the car first and take her from me. I’ll drive.”

  Mrs Sutherland climbed into the seat Bony had occupied, and he passed the limp little figure into her waiting arms. The wind tormented the canvas hood and carried the hissing sand past and under the machine. Presently they reached the gate, and without stopping to close it Bony drove on to the main road and up the long incline. They were well past the cemetery when the child said loudly:

  “Annabella! Annabella!”

  “Who is Annabella?” Bony asked of Mrs Sutherland.

  “I don’t know—unless it’s Annabella Watson, Mr Watson’s mother.”

  Bony made no further comment, and a moment later Rose Marie said in a singsong tone of voice:

  “Annabella Miller, what are you doing with that caterpillar?”

  “The child’s delirious,” Mrs Sutherland said. “Poor little mite. She’s repeating a rhyme learned at school.”

  “Annabella Miller,” now whispered Rose Marie, “what are you doing with that caterpillar?”

  Presently they reached the street, passed the church, and were between the skirting pepper-trees.

  “I am going to drive into Dr Scott’s yard,” Bony announced. “His drive gate is always open.”

  “Very well. If the doctor will care for her, I’ll stay and do the nursing. I was a nurse once.”

  They arrived at the doctor’s residence and Bony drove into the driveway and stopped the car outside the veranda steps leading to the front door. He got to the ground and took the child from Mrs Sutherland and carried her into the house through a side door which happened to be open. An elderly woman met them, and Bony called for the doctor.

  Bony followed her into a large room, a combination of surgery, library, and laboratory. She smoothed a mattress on a trestle bed and shook the pillow, and Bony laid the child down. The doctor came in, exclaimed sharply, bent over the still form. Bony sat down in a great easy chair. Quite sud­denly he felt very tired.

  He heard the doctor call for hot water and the elderly woman hurried from the room. He saw Mrs Sutherland draw near to the trestle bed a trolley loaded with instruments. She selected a pair of scissors and placed them in the doctor’s outstretched hand. The elderly woman came back, carrying a can from which issued steam. The two women stood by the little doctor, who was bending over the child.

  Bony knew that should Rose Marie die the edifice of the philosophy responsible for his success in crime detection would fall, possibly without replacement by any other. The mood of self-condemnation was heavy upon him.

  Lawton-Stanley came in. He glanced at the three about the bed. On seeing Bony, he crossed to him and sat on the arm of the chair.

  “Someone saw you carry the child in,” he said. “Thank God she’s alive. Hurt much?”

  Bony nodded.

  “We found her at Sandy Flat,” he explained. “Will you go and tell the Marshalls? Tell everyone to keep out. If you see Gleeson, ask him to come here and keep everyone out.”

  Lawton-Stanley rose to his feet. “Can I give the Marshalls any hope, d’you think?”

  “I don’t know.”

  The evangelist departed. Bony continued to sit in the great chair, the thought in his brain that the death of the child would affect him as much and as vitally as it would the ser­geant and his wife.

  Presently the doctor came to him and sat on the chair arm as the minister had done.


  “Bad,” he said. “Fracture at the base of the skull. May pull through. Be a long time, and she will require very close attention. I am going to keep her here. Mrs Sutherland will do the nursing. Where was she?”

  “In the hut at Sandy Flat.”

  “Ah! Any connexion with those other murders?”

  “Yes. The murderer may very well make another attempt to kill her. The house will be guarded day and night, never fear, until I get him. That won’t be long now. Lawton-Stanley was here. I asked him to fetch the parents.”

  The doctor pursed his lips. His grey eyes were hard and small.

  “There were jute fibres on that piece of carpet,” he said slowly. “They came from a sack of some kind. I put a quantity of them into this envelope.”

  Bony indicated thanks with a movement of his head. Mrs Marshall appeared in the doorway, her husband behind her. The doctor went to them, spoke rapidly and firmly, and con­ducted them to the trestle bed. After a little while the ser­geant came over to Bony.

  “Not as bad as I thought, although bad enough,” he said.

  “Nothing is ever as bad as imagination can paint it,” Bony told him, rising. “Ready for duty?”

  “More than ready.”

  “Come on, then.”

  Gleeson was standing at the end of the front veranda, in which place he could stop people from reaching either the front or the side doors. To him Bony rapidly outlined the circumstances, and warned him that the person who had abducted the child and had attempted to kill her might very well try again. He was to remain there until relieved.

  Together Marshall and he strode up the street to the police station.

  “No talking just now, Marshall,” he said firmly. “You go and get your car out. We must get back to Sandy Flat. While you’re getting the car I’ll ring your headquarters and ask for assistance.”

  On reaching the station office, Bony rang the telephone ex­change.