Bony - 29 - The Lake Frome Monster

by Arthur W. Upfield

  Bony couldn’t help but feel sorry for these nomads in a changing world, when the way of life of the white man had meant that the lands over which once they hunted and roamed at will had been fenced and reduced to private ownership. From hunting their own food the aborigines had been brought down to relying on white men who largely despised them. The rapidly changing world had made their young men restless with the old customs with­out being able to follow those of the new civilization. Quite apart from his feeling of kinship with them, Bony realized just how little chance most of them had of ever receiving the education which could bring them out of their pre­carious no-man’s-land into the white man’s world.

  Newton ordered two glasses of beer and led Bony over to a table in a secluded corner of the hotel lounge where the two men had met up for a chat. “Now,” he said, “quite apart from my natural curiosity, you sure owe me some­thing for letting an inexperienced labourer look after one of the most important sections of my Fence. Whether I’ll ever get ’er back in proper shape or not I just wouldn’t know. I want the whole story.”

  “Well,” said Bony, “I shouldn’t talk to you until after the trial, but I really do owe you something. However, you must forget what I tell you, as all this still has to be proved.

  “The whole story started when Levvey, whose real name by the way, is Graham, and who had been suspected of stealing stock in the Riverina in New South Wales, just disappeared from the records of the New South Wales police and from that State. He had, in fact, decided to hole up in Central Australia. He had also worked out that the best way of losing himself was to live with a tribe of blacks. Finally, he chose those who later became known as the Quinambie tribe. He took a lubra from among the native women and had actually lived with the tribe for some time before they moved to Quinambie. It was while he was living with the tribe that he first met Nugget.

  “Nugget knew all about Lake Frome Station, for he had been an itinerant worker on stations round about most of his life. He also knew about Joyce’s reputation for inex­perience with his cattle. Nugget told Levvey of the isolation of Lake Frome and he made inquiries and found that the manager there was largely left to his own devices. It was not long before he began to see the makings of a racket on a very large scale.”

  Newton broke in: “Levvey—sorry—Graham must have been a beaut organizer,” he said. “He certainly prepared the way very carefully.”

  “Yes,” said Bony. “Let’s call him Levvey. It’s simpler. One of the ways was to take advantage of the presence of the Lake Frome Monster to make the area sound extremely unhealthy for any nomads other than the blacks whom he wanted about him and whom he could trust. The fewer people who came near Lake Frome the better. So the legend of the Monster was magnified to the point where natives from any other tribe would not dare visit the area and even the few white travellers proceeded with caution.”

  “It was surely a pretty long shot,” Newton objected. “How on earth would he think he could get away with holdin’ himself out as a manager?”

  “You must realize,” said Bony, “that nobody knew the new manager; and Levvey knew enough about stock and station life to pull it off. Unfortunately, there was no way of getting the new manager out of the way except by killing him and Nugget had no compunction about doing this. Levvey simply arranged to appear at the same time and introduced himself as the new manager. Before this happened, the Quinambie blacks had already moved into Joyce’s property and gradually became accepted. Nugget had managed to get a job on the Fence and after Levvey arrived, apparently not having known any of them before, the game was on. It obviously couldn’t last, for soon some­one would have made inquiries about the absence of word from the real Levvey, but as luck would have it he was not married, and had no close relatives. As far as the station was concerned, Levvey typed short reports well enough following on the pattern of the ones he found in the office to allay the suspicions of his employers for the time being.

  “It was unfortunate for Eric Maidstone that he had to visit the part of the world where the real Levvey had told him he was going. The wireless message which Levvey received must have been a bombshell to him. Maidstone had not only met the real Levvey, but he was actually on his way to Lake Frome homestead. Levvey and Nugget decided that the best thing was to be absent from the home­stead and arranged to round up some more of Joyce’s cattle at a time when they thought that Maidstone would already have passed Bore Ten. However, not only did they coincide in their appearance at the Bore, but Maidstone managed to take two very good flashlight photographs of Levvey and Nugget at the Bore with Joyce’s cattle!

  “After driving the cattle farther on, it was apparently decided that Nugget should return and dispose of Maid­stone, and this he did.”

  “I still don’t see how it could last,” objected Newton. “They must have been crazy.”

  “Well,” Bony said, “with the money involved, had it gone on a little longer, Levvey could have got out of the country. And don’t forget that there wasn’t much to implicate Nugget. He could have stayed on the Fence long enough to allay suspicion and then quietly drifted on as so many of his type of worker do. In fact, as we’ve seen for ourselves, the thing about it was that the scheme jolly nearly worked.”

  “Yes, I can follow all that,” said Newton. “But how on earth did you get on to what was going on?”

  “Well,” said Bony, “it became obvious that Maidstone must have been at Bore Ten at the same time as the duffers and although he had used two flash bulbs, the film that he took was missing. It was really Joyce, however, who put me on the track when he recalled that Maidstone said he had known Levvey. Then there was the obvious friendship of Nugget and Levvey. Nugget was the only one who could have alerted the Quinambie blacks to attack me. The infor­mation about my movements could only have been passed on to the blacks by Nugget. Also it was very obvious that he had discussed me at length with Levvey. Levvey’s story of having a job for me was much too pat. I was getting too close to the truth and this was one of these games in which, when once embarked upon, the odd extra murder didn’t make any difference.”

  “When you were talkin’ to Wells along the Fence that day, I suppose you were arranging a rendezvous at Lake Frome Station?”

  “That’s right,” said Bony. “But Wells got bogged on the way in, and but for the diversion created by the Monster, bless him, I might not have been sitting drinking with you now.”

  “Why on earth should the Monster behave like an ordinary animal for long periods and then suddenly go berserk?” asked Newton. “He seemed all right whenever I saw him.”

  “I’ve got a theory about that,” said Bony. “It would not have been beyond Levvey and Nugget to catch and deliber­ately ill-treat him to make him sufficiently vicious to bolster up the legend. Don’t forget it was always a native or half-caste he went for, first Luke, then Nugget. He was always nervous when Nugget was about, and if I had to pick the tormentor it would be Nugget. My Superintendent was a bit sore about him still roaming that country. I suppose you heard he got away?” Bony looked innocently at Newton.

  Newton choked on his beer and started to speak, thought better of it, and drained his glass.

  Bony refilled the glasses. “And now,” he said, as he sat down again, “there’s one thing you’ll be glad to hear. I never thought that I would get rid of the taste of the sand from that confounded Fence of yours and get the dryness, caused by that howling westerly wind, out of my throat. I now must admit that my throat is neither as dry, nor is the taste quite as bad, as when I first met you here today.”

  Newton grinned, and raised his glass. “A toast,” he said. “To the finest Fence in the outback, coupled with the name of the Lake Frome Monster!”

 

 

 
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