No footprints in the bush b-8

by Arthur W. Upfield

  Dr Whyte stopped and turned and glared back at the aborigines still watching the metal twisting in the flames.

  “Itcheroo is not there,” Bony said. “Later I may introduce him to you.” Following this half-promise they walked in silence, arrived at the road to Shaw’s Lagoon and followed it up the steep slope to the office which they entered.

  “What are we going to do about this business?” asked Whyte his voice still unruffled, his face almost without expression. Crises appeared to freeze him. Bony completed the making of a cigarette before he answered.

  “It does seem that I continually make plans only to have them frustrated before they can be put into action,” Bony said, slowly. “Were I not a patient man I would become angry. It seems, too, that I have been lethargic, and yet for this I have an excellent excuse. I hate to hurry or to be hurried. I decided that having accomplished what I came to do I would return to Brisbane and my wife and family. My wife will now be writing telling me how much I am missed and urging me to return as quickly aspossible, and my Chief Commissioner will again be thinking of sacking me. But to revert. Having established the person who was causing a great deal of trouble in the Land of Burning Water, my mission was accomplished. Then I stood by the tomb of Tarlalin, and my plan to retire to Brisbane was discarded.

  “I then decided to start out after Rex McPherson when Miss McPherson’s uncle returned home. I could not do so because Mr McPherson did not return. I waited for the arrival of Dr Whyte-no slog, please, for I am speaking impersonally-and Dr Whyte’s aeroplane is destroyed. These constant frustrations will have to cease.”

  Whyte stared at Bony fascinated and a little awed at a man whose ego was smarting under this challenge.

  “As Miss McPherson will not run away, Harry, will you remain here for a week, two if necessary, and see to it that Rex McPherson doesn’t steal her?”

  The doctor considered and then assented.

  “You see, Miss McPherson, what a problem you are,” Bony continued. “However, I like problems, especially feminine ones, if genders can be applied to problems-which I doubt. Now I will plan again, and this time there must be no frustration. Pardon me.

  Bonaparte rose and crossed to the telephone.

  “Ah! This is Detective-Inspector Bonaparte speaking from McPherson’s Station,” they heard him say. “I want an urgent telegram dispatched. Will you see to it that it is sent off at once Thankyou. Ready? Address: Captain Loveacre, Pacific Air Company, Brisbane. Message begins: You are urgently wanted McPherson’s Station, via St Albans and Shaw’s Lagoon. Remember my promise. Bring fast machine. Fuel supplies on hand. Excellentobserver waiting join you. Bring tat-tat. Inform me when leaving Brisbane and probable arrival St Albans where flying instructions will await you. Message ends. Yes, from Inspector Bonaparte. What’s that? Oh-tat-tat? T-a-t hyphen t-a-t. Good! May I expect a reply within two hours? Yes, I will be here.”

  Bony hung up and resumed his chair.

  “Captain Loveacre!” exclaimed Whyte. “Not the ex-flying ace?”

  “The same,” replied Bony. “Captain Loveacre has on several occasions assistedme, or rather he has been associated with the background of several of my investigations. I like him. I once promised to call to him for assistance should an adventure offer. I am confident he will oblige me.”

  He blew a smoke ring towards the doctor and expertly sent an arrow through the ring.

  “What is a tat-tat?” demanded Flora.

  “Oh!” he said casually, “A tat-tat is a machine gun. It is Captain Loveacre’s word for it. When he knows my requirements he will beg, borrow or steal a suitable machine if he hasn’t one of his own.”

  Dr Whyte relaxed and whistled. His mouth became expanded in a grin, so that the chin scar became more pronounced, but in his small grey eyes was the gleam of anticipation.

  “When I was in Brisbane ten days ago-it seems ten weeks-Captain Loveacre took lunch with me,” Bony said, reflectively. “After the war, when his services were no longer required by a grateful country Loveacre formed a flying circus with which to make a living. Subsequently he obtained financial backing to form an air transport company.

  “Now, Harry, you know more about the kind of machine Loveacre will bring to meet with my requirements, and you will know what supplies of petrol and oil Loveacre will need. After refuelling your machine there is now only some hundred and fifty gallons left in the store. How is petrol and oil usually brought, Miss McPherson?”

  “When the truck is sent to Shaw’s Lagoon for rations or supplies it always completes its capacity loading with petrol.”

  “And who drives the truck?”

  “The men’s cook.”

  “Where is the petrol obtained at Shaw’s Lagoon?”

  “From the store. There is only the one general store. The petrol depot is run in conjunction with an oil company.”

  “Then we must arrange with the store people to let us have as much petrol as possible, and further to have their stocks replenished as quickly as possible. Excuse me.”

  Bony was busy at the telephone for ten minutes, when he announced that the depot could supply up to a thousand gallons of first grade petrol. He was expressing his satisfaction when the telephone bell shrilly rang.

  “That was Nevin,” he said. “They are leaving the outstation now, and will be bringing all the blacks there with them. Now let me think. Yes, the two trucks can go to Shaw’s Lagoon tonight. They cannot leave until after dark, and they must be back before daylight. We must think of a place to store the petrol and to camouflage the store to prevent Rex blowing it up. And tomorrow Harry, if Loveacre comes, which I am confident he will do, we must plan to construct a well camouflaged place to conceal his machine from the same destructive young man. Now we can but wait to hear from Loveacre.”

  The doctor rose saying:

  “I feel younger, and I’m going over to the house to change into flannels.”

  “And I’m going over to see about a cup of tea. Will you come over to the veranda, Bony?”

  On his feet, Bony was smiling at her.

  “If you will excuse me,” He said, “I would prefer to sit here and wait for Loveacre’s telegram. But a cup of tea-here-”

  “I’ll have it sent over.”

  When, twenty minutes later, a lubra maid took to him a tray of tea she discovered him slumped into the swivel chair, a row of cigarettes on the table before him, the place filled with blue smoke, and a large sketch map drawn on sheets of writing paper pasted together. When she had set down the tray at his side he said to her:

  “You are Ella, eh?”

  “Too right, Mister Bony.”

  “Your totem is witchetty grub, I see. You know about Tarlalin who lived long ago?”

  The black eyes widened and a smile flashed into the round and pleasant face.

  “Tarlalin she live in that one sugar-gum tree beside cemetery feller. Shewait there one time lubra go and sit beside it. Then she drop spirit baby beside lubra, andbime -by lubra she have little baby and little baby grow like Tarlalin. I bin sit there but ole Itcheroo he bad feller and little spirit baby he get frightened and run back into tree to Tarlalin.”

  “Itcheroo he bad blackfeller, eh?”

  The girl “made a face” for answer.

  “What totem Tarlalin? You know?” asked Bony.

  “Too right. She witchetty grub like me.”

  “And Chief Burning Water-what totem feller him?”

  “Burning Water he emu totem feller.”

  So the line of descent in this Wantella Tribe lay in the female side, and because Tarlalin’s child father was a white man her male child would be given her brother’s totem. Rex McPherson would be of the emu totem, and any emu man ought not to be led in battle against him. Bony wondered if McPherson remembered this when he took all the blacks with him from Watson’s Bore.

  Captain Loveacre’s reply telegram arrived at ten minutes to twelve, and Bony was dictating a further message to be telegraphed to him when Dr
Whyte entered the office, sat quietly down and studied the sketch map. Presently Bony joined him, saying:

  “Loveacre will be leaving Brisbane first thing tomorrow morning. He will fly via Quilpie and St Albans where he will land for flying instructions. Those instructions I am going to leave to you.”

  “And the tat-tat?”

  Bony smiled grimly.

  “The captain says that his tat-tat is only too willing to accompany him.”

  “Good news! Let me see! Loveacre ought to get to St Albans with plenty of daylight to spare. What’s this sketch?”

  “It’s of the Illprinka country. I have filled in the details as much as possible from information obtained from Burning Water. We’ll get him to check it over later. Loveacre, or you as his observer, will want it. See, here’s Duck Lake, and down here is the area of cane-grass. I’ve been thinking, too. Remember, Rex bailed up his father approximately nine miles from here about four o’clock yesterday afternoon. Here’s the place on the sketch. This morning he destroys your machine here at nine o’clock. During the night where was he? Not such a great distance from the station boundary, and with his aeroplane I’m willing to wager. He’s been close to us, Harry, and I think that the reason of that is to carry out a plan he conceived before he bailed up The McPherson, a plan he hasn’t yet carried out. We will have to be extra careful tonight with Miss McPherson.”

  The instructions were dispatched to Captain Loveacre at the St Albans Post Office, and then Bony suggested that Whyte return to the house alone for lunch and ask Flora to have his lunch sent to the office. He did it in such a manner that the doctor did not suspect Bony’s sentimental reason.

  About three o’clock Burning Water came in and was asked to con the sketch map. He offered suggestions for several additions and one major alteration. Bony completed the work, and then he said, slowly, pointing to the area of cane-grass:

  “That is where I think Rex McPherson has his headquarters. Those smoke signals were sent up for two reasons. First to allay suspicion of an immediate blow to be given by Rex McPherson, and, second, to create the belief that his headquarters, as well as the blacks’ main camp, are at Duck Lake.

  “See here. The difference in distance from here to Duck Lake and from here to the cane-grass at the western end of the plain is only forty miles, a bagatelle to the aeroplane. The cane-grass offers significant advantages over Duck Lake. Duck Lake is surrounded with sand-dunes and lines of box-trees bordering the several creeks emptying water into the lake. It’s all bad landing country. The cane-grass, on the other hand, is bordered with wide claypan country, and also it would provide an excellently camouflaged hiding-place for the aeroplane and for all the Illprinka blacks. We must not omit from our plans the likely fact of Rex knowing the possibility of an attempt being made to arrest him.”

  “The cane-grass is where he would hide,” agreed Burning Water. “It’s a great place, the grass covering land half as big as McPherson’s Station. I looked down on it once from the top of a high sand-dune. It stretches across the horizon. But the Illprinka people don’t like it. They say that the Great Snake of the Alchuringa went into it one day and went to sleep and has never come out again. They believe that the Great Snake will be very hungry when it wakes and will run after any blackfeller it finds in the cane-grass and eat him up.”

  Bony pondered on this slight objection to his theory. Then:

  “Still, Rex McPherson must be strong-minded, and I think he would be able to impose his will on the Illprinka people to the extent of persuading the bolder of them to stay with him at the cane-grass waterhole. By the way, Nevin is coming in today with every one at the out-station, and tonight I am getting him to drive his truck, together with the station truck driven by the men’s cook, to Shaw’s Lagoon for petrol. I want several of your best bucks to go with each truck in case of any hitch on the road.”

  “All right! I’ll see to that.”

  “And there’s another matter, too. Now that Dr Whyte and Nevin will be here my mind is relieved concerning the safety of Miss McPherson, and we can proceed to that dangerous fire and stamp it out. Well leave immediately after Captain Loveacre has arrived. He is a friend of mine and is flying here. Meanwhile I think you ought to make us Kurdaitcha shoes. They will last longer than blood and feathers. What do you think of emu feathers?”

  “They are good if the bird is young when killed.”

  “Good! Will you see to it now?”

  “And Itcheroo?”

  “What of him?”

  “He went bush very early this morning and has not yet come back to camp.”

  “Oh! Well, I shall want him presently. Meanwhile let him alone.”

  When Ella brought the afternoon tea to him Bony was writing a full history of the case against Rex McPherson, and he had not finished it when Burning Water returned.

  “I have sent two bucks out to hunt a young emu, and when they come back an old man of my totem will make the Kurdaitcha shoes. I think I heard the out-station truck coming.”

  Shrieks and shouts drifted to Bony and the chief from the black’s camp, and when the truck first appeared in the far scrub the homestead aborigines were running into sight to welcome the travellers: men, women carrying babies, and children of all ages.

  Bony and the chief could presently see the fringe of black heads bordering the truck’s cabin roof. The driving seat was exceptionally wide, and from both sides protruded gun barrels. The uproar increased: the homestead blacks dancing and shouting, those on the truck being as vociferous. Dust rose thickly from the stockyards as the truck ran past them, dust from the excited horses yarded that morning and not freed because The McPherson had not been there to issue his orders.

  When the truck turned to draw in towards the side door of the house, the mass of black humanity it carried was such that one would have been pardoned for wondering how they all managed to retain their places. The vehicle stopped opposite the house door and the mass became black water falling to the ground like a waterfall.

  Bony saw a white woman and two little children leave the truck and enter the house. Aborigines followed them with bags and cases. From the crush about the truck emerged a short man with flaming red hair, dressed in blue dungaree trousers and a black shirt. He was escorted by an aborigine extraordinarily dressed in a bright blue shirt only, and carrying half a dozen rifles. The blue shirt and the red hair formed a striking contrast.

  A hand grasped Bony’s right arm, and he turned to look into Dr Whyte’s anguished face.

  “Flora-I can’t find her!” gasped Dr Whyte. “She’s gone!”

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Blow Falls

  BONY cursed himself for a dolt in not having set a rigid guard over the house night and day. He found no excuse for himself in the confidence he had had of Flora’s safety whilst Dr Whyte was with her. Tight-lipped, he hurried to Nevin.

  “Nevin-not a word, not a question,” Bony cried. “Miss McPherson is missing from the house, and Dr Whyte fears the worst. Time and speed are vital. Get those horses saddled and bridled, and muster the best riders. Imagine the house to be on fire and you organizing the men to fight it. Spring to it, man.”

  Bony spoke with terrific intensity, and Nevin without hesitation did spring to it. He turned and raced to the stockyards, shouting to the blacks to follow him. For a moment they ceased their uproar, and then excitement regained ascendance and they ranpellmell after him.

  Burning Water and the doctor followed Bony, who ran to the house, entering it by the front door. In the corridor beyond the hall he met one of the lubra maids, and at sight of him her smiling excitement changed to fear. He gripped her by the arm and she winced.

  “Where’s Miss McPherson?” he shouted at her, and dumbly she stared at him and over his shoulder at the two standing behind him. “Where is she?” persisted Bony.

  “Missus she gone,” wailed the lubra.

  Bony turned to the doctor:

  “When did you last see her?”
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br />   “We had afternoon tea together on the veranda,” replied Whyte, his mouth grim. “She said she’d go to her room and change for dinner. Said she’d be only an hour at most. I stayed and read a book, and then, when she hadn’t come out again ten minutes ago, I went to see where she was. I’ve searched the house. Ella went into her bedroom. She wasn’t there either.”

  “You show me Miss McPherson’s bedroom, quick,” urged Bony. He was more controlled now. His voice was imperative.

  She ran like a doe kangaroo along the passage and stopped outside a door. Without knocking, Bony went in. He stared about the pleasant room and swiftly appraised its contents and condition. Clothes lay on the bed, the kind of clothes suitable for evening wear. A kimono lay over a chair. The girl had gone to dress two hours before, and she had not even begun to dress when she had left her room. Bony bounded to the open French windows. Standing in the frame, he called:

  “Burning Water, go and fetch the men’s cook and Old Jack. Harry, get away across to the yards and hurry Nevin with the men and horses. See that horses are prepared for us three. Wait there with them.”

  His mind registered replies indicating obedience to his orders. There was no questioning Bony’s authority in such an emergency. The first phase of mental excitement produced by the calamitous news had subsided, and now Bonaparte was calm and mentally taut.

  Stepping beyond the windows, he found himself on the same west veranda upon which opened the windows of his own room. Recently this veranda had been treated with used oil from motor crankcases, and the wood was almost black. Now the wind of the day had deposited a thin layer of fine sand over the boards, and a lesser man than Bony would easily have seen the imprints of Flora’s shoes on it. But a lesser man than Bony would not so quickly have read her recent actions in the footprints.