Murder Must Wait b-17

by Arthur W. Upfield

  “What do you know?”

  “That Bulford committed suicide with the bank’s revolver.”

  “You saw him this morning, they tell me.”

  “Yes, I did call on him.”

  “Oh!” Yoti glared. “You won’t talk, eh?”

  “No. I want to listen.”

  “Well, he shot himself through the mouth.” Sergeant Yoti sighed. “A bloody policeman isn’t supposed to have any feelings, but when I looked at him sprawled over his desk I thought what a terrible waste of life. I’ve played bowls with him, and I’ve met him at Lodge, and I won’t believe he did himself in over pinching the bank’s money. There can’t be anything like that.”

  “Has it been suggested?”

  “No. The teller took charge, and the bank inspector’s due to arrive from Albury. Do you know why he committed suicide?”

  “I’ve a half-cocked land of idea,” countered Bony, and the phrasing did not escape the Sergeant, who said:

  “Funny how life treats some people. You know, me and the wife never had any trouble, always got along well. Looking back, we sort of changed for the best as the years went by, butthere’s a lot of people who begin to change for the worse immediately they’re tied. You met Mrs Bulford, of course?”

  “Yes. Alice McGorr says she is the type of woman whoget themselves ‘Crippenised’.”

  Yotigrinned, the grin became a genuine chuckle of laughter.

  “Good one, that,” he said. “Thatlass is about right regarding the wife. Bulford was meek and milk, but liable to blow up. Poor old Bulford! If only he’d had guts enough to knock her down once a week.”

  “You appear to dislike Mrs Bulford.”

  “Nothing new about that. Now she’s blaming you for hounding her husband over the disappearance of their baby, for getting him alone and defenceless in his office. The long worry over the baby, plus you, drove him to suicide. What about giving a little? It’s my turn to listen.”

  “Very well, I’ll give you what I know,”assented Bony. “In his first statement to me, which was identical with that given to the previous investigator, Bulford said he remained working in his office after his wife left until half past five. Subsequently he stated he had not remained at work after his wife left, but had gone to the Library to talk to Mrs Rockcliff. This morning, I informed him that on the day his baby was abducted the Library was closed to the public while renovations were being carried out. I asked him for the truth, and he declined to give it. When I left him, he knew I would discover the truth; in fact, it could be that he was convinced I knew all the truth concerning the abduction of his child.”

  “So that’s it,” Yoti slowly exclaimed. “And do you know the truth?”

  “I may be right in my guess. Now, how did the trouble with the doctors turn out?”

  “It seems that the teller of the bank rang for Dr Delph after he rang me and, being understandably upset, he merely asked for Delph to be sent to the bank at once. When Delph didn’t turn up, I rang Dr Nott, and the house said he was at the hospital. I told Mrs Nott why we wanted her husband in a hurry, and she said she’d get him. Then Nott rang the man on duty, saying he was on a serious case which he couldn’t leave, and the duty man rang Delph and was told Delph was out. Meanwhile, Nott finished up at the hospital but did not want to leave his patient if he could help it, and he rang Delph. The cook at Delph’s house told him the doctor couldn’t answer the call because Mrs Delph had been taken ill.

  “Mrs Delph suddenly ill! H’m! She seemed to be well enough at Alice’s plonkparty.”

  “Drinks like a fish,” growled Yoti. “Haw! Ought tobe ‘Crippenised’ . Good one, that. How did you know about the doctors?”

  “Your telephone record. I’d make it a must at every Police Station. Think you could enlist your Postmaster friend to aid us again?”

  “Why not? What’s the use of friends if you can’t use ’em?”

  “I’d like a list of all the calls made by Mrs Bulford after four this afternoon, all the calls made by theDelphs after four this afternoon, and all the calls made by and to the Aboriginal Settlement. Up to, say, midnight tonight. Think he would do that?”

  “Do it for me, anyway. Now, why the interest in young Martin?”

  “I’m keeping that angle to myself.” Yoti watched the eyes harden, and the chin firm. “You must travel with me, Yoti, and I have to tread with the spring, and silence of a stalking cat. As I have already said, the babies must take priority over the murder of Mrs Rockcliff. I’ve put Essen on to the Martin angle, and Martin mustn’t know our thoughts. The same attitude applies to the stolen drawing, itself of much less importance. I know why it was stolen, and until the investigation into the abductions is concluded I am not interested in who stole it or where it is. When did the Premier come toMiford?”

  “Eh? Oh, the Premier…”

  “January 3rd, Inspector,” interjected Mrs Yoti. “And if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to remove the tablecloth.”

  “Mind? Of course not. As your husband is so argumentative, make him do the washing-up.” Bony smiled, and withdrew before the glare in the Sergeant’s eyes.

  He found Alice and Essen in his room, the former wearing a dark-brown dress and a small black beret with a large red bobble perched to one side. The ensemble disagreed somewhere or other. Was it the brown and red or the bobble on the black?… Bony gave up.

  “All ready for the job of earning our wages,” he remarked cheerfully. “You haven’t got a line on young Martin already, Essen?”

  “Only that he came in his own car, which is garaged at a Service Station. A pal of mine is manager of the garage, and he’s going to nose around this evening without mentioning me.”

  “Good! Now for another job. I want a boat, light and shallow draught. I want it at eleven tonight. Can do?”

  “Yes. Know just the thing.”

  “There’s an old jetty a hundred yards up-river from the bridge. Have the boat there at eleven,”

  “On the dot,” agreed Essen.

  “How far up the Settlement Creek does the river back water?”

  “Don’t know that one. Could find out from the town butcher who runs stock on the far side of it.”

  “Obtain the information… with your usual caution.”

  Essen left, and Bony regarded Alice, and Alice knew she had not previously met this particular Bony.

  “Mr Bulford committed suicide, Alice. And Mrs Delph becomes suddenly ill. As soon as it’s dark, pay the cook a visit and find out just what the illness is, and if possible the cause. Let me know by phone. Then skip along to the Olympic Bank and keep an eye on Mrs Bulford. Clear?”

  “Quite. You stirred up the ants’ nest, didn’t you?”

  “You’re guessing, Alice.”

  “P’haps.”

  “Well, stop it. See you tomorrow. I must talk to Yoti.”

  He left her mutinous but high on the peak of action. He passed Essen at the telephone and sank into the chair beside Yoti. Yoti put down the pen with which he was writing a report on the Bulford suicide, and Essen came to state that the water in Settlement Creek lay as far back as the lantana swamp. Bony asked him to draw a rough map, and the sketch showed the lantana swamp due north of Mr Beamer’s house at the entrance to the Settlement.

  “I was hoping that was so,” Bony said, distinctly gratified. “In the morning, Essen, I want you, accompanied by two constables, to proceed to the Aboriginal Settlement, leaving here exactly at nine o’clock. On reaching the Settlement, I want you to tell Beamer that you have information concerning Marcus Clark’s trespass in Mitford which necessitates interrogating every aborigine remaining at the Settlement. I want every aborigine called to the hospital ward where Clark is a patient and there kept for at least an hour. Cross-question them on the imaginary information, and permit not one to leave Clark’s ward during that hour. There will be, so Beamer told me, not more than a dozen to be rounded up, and I want them out of the way for an hour only. Clear?”

&
nbsp; “Yep. That’ll be done,” answered Essen. “With two men, I’ll leave town at exactly nine. Meanwhile…”

  “Your patrols on duty?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good! Now I have to make my own preparations. I’ll see you again, Sergeant, before I leave.”

  Bony vanished beyond the doorway, and Essen looked at his superior with the ghost of a smile widening still further his wide mouth.

  “Busy little man… sometimes, isn’t he?” he remarked to the wogs flying about the light.

  “Reminds me of a Chinese I knew and sometimes played draughts with,” Yoti said seriously. “Ah Chung let me win a man off him, then perhaps two more, and then another, and I’d think I had him well sewn up. And he would sort of hesitate and say: ‘Igibbit chance’. He’d move a man to make me move, and then he’d clean the board. And do it every time.”

  “Yair! This half-caste seems something like your Chow,” Essen drawled. “Plays his leads, then stirs up a mob ofabos, and we get what? Nearly all theabos clear out, and a bank manager shoots himself. And now he’s going off on a boat trip, and tomorrow I’m to bale up the remainingabos on fake information. I’d better go after that boat.”

  Yoti nodded, and returned to his endless writing.

  At eight o’clock the duty constable reported, was told to lock up and go home. At eight-twenty Alice McGorr rang up and spoke to Sergeant Yoti. At nine-fifteen the Postmaster came in with two bottles of beer and to talk for fifteen minutes. At nine-forty Bony reappeared.

  He was dressed in black. There wasn’t a speck of white about him. He wore a pair of old black canvas shoes, and about his neck were slung a roughly made pair of sheepskin overshoes with the wool on the outside.

  “Fancy dress ball this time?” mocked Yoti.

  “Something of the kind. Anything further?”

  “Yes. Your Alice McGorr rang to say that Mrs Delph has had a nervous breakdown.”

  “Indeed!” purred Bony. “She gave me the impression she was heading for it.”

  “From information received,” continued Yoti grimly, “it is alleged that Dr Delph communicated with a Dr Nonning in Melbourne, saying his wife was seriously ill, and asking him to come to Mitford at once, to assist him with his practice.”

  “Promising, Sergeant,” Bony almost lisped. “Nonning is Mrs Delph’s brother, the well-known psychiatrist.”

  “Any good to you?”

  “It gives. Dr Nonning is also a collector of aboriginal relics. I wonder if he would be interested in that missingdrawing? ”

  Chapter Twenty-two

  The Secret Camp

  SAVEFORthe talking ripple at the bow, the boat and its crew made no sound. The ‘maiden moon’ had vanished and her starry lovers were lustreless.

  The flow of the stream was negligible, and the only discomfort was created by mosquitoes. Facing to the bow, Bony pushed at the oars for three hours before he saw on the skyline of the north bank the tree marking the turn-off to the Settlement. Ten minutes later he was resting under the bridge carrying the main track over Settlement Creek.

  By the stars it was then two o’clock… when all good aborigines should be fast asleep, sheltered and safe from the dreaded Kurdaitcha.

  Under the bridge it was completely dark and, in this creek, no currents. The boat rested motionless, and Bony made a cigarette, lit it when hands and head were enfolded by a bag, and thereafter kept it cupped by his hands. Here the surfacing fish were almost lethargic, when those in the river had exhibited elan in their chase after smaller fry. The bullfrogs ‘clonk-clonked’ like bells minus tonal strength, and the invisible night birds committed their murders with unemotional efficiency.

  There was no need for haste, and Bony, having finished his cigarette, greased the hole in the square stern of the craft to take a rowlock, and greased the rowlock before laying an oar in it. From now on he would propel the boat by the oar astern, and steer without error.

  The bridge passed, and the trees almost met over the narrow waterway. The sculling oar and its rowlock made no sound, and it seemed to be the trees passing the boat, not the boat in motion. The lovesick stars were no lamps upon the dark waterway, and the trees slept unattended by wind. There was plenty of time to reach the far end of the waterway and hide the boat before dawn, when Bony hoped to be high in an ancient gum within fifty yards of the blacksmith’s shop and about that distance from Mr Beamer’s house.

  Presently the trees halted in their procession to make way for clumps of lantana growing along the edge of the now shallow water. A few minutes after having entered this lantana section, Bony smelled smoke. Camp-fire smoke at three in the morning! Smoke when all camp fires would be out or damped down for the night! The air movement was from the Settlement to Bony, but such was the strength of the aroma its origin could not be a fire banked with ash ready to be broken open for breakfast cooking in the Settlement.

  Bony ceased sculling, and the boat continued to ‘drift’ through the still water, and then abruptly the aroma was cut off and the rancid smell of mud returned. Gently the stern oar brought the boat round, and slowly it was propelled back over its course until again it was centred in the ribbon of invisible smoke, so sweetly aromatic.

  Doubtless it was the weight of a cold twig which broke through the white ash covering the burning heart of the fire, because in the wall of black velvet suddenly appeared a flaming ruby to become an angry eye staring at the man in the boat. And for five long minutes Bony stared back at the angry red eye. It was then that the embers beneath the eye subsided when for a brief three seconds there lived a tiny flickering blue flame.

  It wasn’t an old tree stump smouldering away for days. It was a camp fire, and just beyond it was a rough humpy constructed with tree branches. Thatmuch the tiny flames revealed before retiring to permit the red eye to continue its angry watch.

  Bony sculled silently down the creek till coming opposite a large lantana clump partly growing in the water. Here he went ashore, pulling the boat into the cane-mass, and then as silently boring through the mass to dry land. On stepping forth from the lantana he was wearing the sheep-skin overshoes which would leave no imprints on these hard river flats.

  He stalked that camp fire without making sound enough to disturb a finch, seeing its red eye where he expected to see it, and finally squatted behind a clump of low cane-grass situated within a few yards of it.

  Save less than a dozen, all the aborigines had gone on walkabout. Those who had remained would be sleeping in huts, not here beside this stagnant backwater. There was no normal reason for this lonely humpy, indicated by the fire as being inhabited, excepting perhaps that an aborigine had brought here his newly-wedded bride. In view of the prowling Kurdaitcha not even the most obedient bride could be expected to honeymoon in such solitude.

  The false dawn came, followed by darkness more intense, and a little cold wind to make Bony shiver. A fox barked as though at the squatting man, and seconds later barked again from far away. It was when that second bark had been blanketed by night, and Bony saw the first shaft of soft light high in the sky, that the baby cried.

  There reached him the low murmur of gentle soothing; the baby quietened. The dawn shafts were spearing the night when the child cried again, this time demandingly. A woman said sleepily:

  “Was’matter, little feller?”

  The voice was the voice of an aborigine. The baby yelled, old enough to know how to claim attention, and, a moment after, the red eye vanished. The baby continued to cry, and soon there appeared a faint glow which grew swiftly bright to reveal the aboriginal woman tending her fire.

  The blazing fire proved the humpy to be a tent almost made invisible by green tree branches. Bony could not see the mouth of the tent. The woman stood and the firelight showed her to be tall and graceful. She was wearing male attire, a suit of flannelette pyjamas, and her black hair was banded with a blue ribbon. Bony remembered her. She had been with old Wilmot when he visited the Settlement with Alice. She left the fi
re for the humpy, soothed the infant who wouldn’t be soothed, and came out carrying a feeding-bottle, a tin of powdered milk, and an old billycan. The billy she filled at the creek and placed over the fire.

  The infant, understanding that screaming failed to bring instant doting attention, stopped as abruptly as it had begun. Like all the mothers of her race, this woman loved babies and was versed in the exquisite art of being cruel to be, kind. The baby was hungry and so food must be prepared for it, but to worry about the screaming would be the height of folly because the cry lacked that poignant note of pain. Calmly this woman watched the water heating, and only when it was boiling did she go to the tent and bring out a jug in which to mix the milk.

  She brought cold water from the creek to cool the milk before pouring from the jug to the bottle, her movements unhurried, her face expressive of abiding content. Taking the bottle to the tent, she spoke to the baby and the baby started a yell which was stopped by the bottle teat. Thereafter the soft voicelullabyed.

  Bony could remain no longer, for now the water of the creek was visible and the kookaburras were greeting the New Day with their ironical laughter. The boat was safe enough from chance discovery, and silently he walked up the creek and so to the red gum near the blacksmith’s shop.

  The tree was bent by the years and scarred by innumerable climbing boys. They had made a path upward by the only way, and Bony climbed this path to reach a rough platform at the junction of two branches with the trunk, the work also of the Settlement children.

  Like the woman at the fire, his movements were deliberate as he made himself comfortable on the roughly-woven sticks. He smoked two cigarettes, and now and then he smiled at little mental images and refused to permit ugly thoughts to disturb his mind.

  Having pocketed the two cigarette-ends, he told his mind to sleep till nine o’clock. His mind slept. His mind awoke at nine o’clock when the sun was high and the ants already were up the tree gathering its sweet exudations.