The Scarecrow

  The knock came again. Whoever it was had, by this time, rapped on the back door several times.

  When Alf Yerbey opened the door his heart sank. The height of the shadowy figure standing at the foot of the steps suggested officialdom.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked. ‘Whadda yuh want?’

  ‘Mer friend,’ said the tall stranger. ‘Please forgive me influctuating on yer at this hour uv night. I am a stranger in yer town, stranded here on account of a breakdown in mer limousine.’

  He laughed hoarsely and laid a hand on the publican’s elbow. The light from the passage now illuminated his gaunt countenance. Alf Yerbey’s fear of a raid was completely set at rest by the colour of the stranger’s nose. He had not been a hotel-keeper twenty years for nothing. He was puzzled and intrigued by the black bow tie.

  ‘If yer would be so kind,’ said Salter, ’as to provide me with some refreshment, preferably of an alcoholic and reviving natchuh. Quite candidly, sir, I feel that, unless I have a drink, there is some doubt of me surviving the night. I spent yesterday, sir, with a hectic school of froth-blowers and all day I have been travelling and suffering the agonies of hell. If the milk of human kindness flows in yer veins, yer will not turn me from yer hospitable door.’

  Salter also was no novice at appraising his man. In Alf Yerbey’s veined and blotched countenance and distended abdomen, he had recognised the gateway to sympathy.

  When the light clicked on in the bar the men who had been skulking in the storeroom emerged and inspected Salter slyly and curiously.

  ‘Yer will join me, sir?’ asked Salter when he had put the cardboard box he was carrying down at his feet and been given a double schnapps. The publican declined. Salter drank three doubles in as many minutes. He then purchased a packet of cigarettes. It was to be observed that his hands were shaking. Salter’s hands, after the first shock of his overall appearance had been digested, were always the next feature to attract attention. They were hands that would have been noticeably large on a bush-whacker and yet they were as sensitive-looking and as cared-for as those of a concert pianist. He offered a cigarette to Athol Cudby who was standing alongside him.

  ‘Thank yuh kindly,’ said Athol Cudby, taking the cigarette and holding up a crooked finger of his free hand in unctuous acknowledgment.

  ‘My name is Cudby,’ he said. ‘Athol Cudby.’

  ‘Salter, Hubert Salter.’

  ‘My friend Mr Charles Dabney—Mr Salter.’

  ‘Deelighted to make yer acquaintance.’

  ‘Deelighted also. Also delighted not policeman. Horror of policeman. Positively allergic policemen any shape or form. Only hanging on in business for pleasure of burying policeman some day. Bound to come one day. Ole Charlie’ll have the last laugh, never fear.’

  ‘Mr Dabney is our local mortician,’ explained Athol Cudby in his soft-voiced fashion.

  ‘Well now,’ said Salter. ‘That’s a very interesting profession, I’m sure, sir. And lucrative I imagine.’ He laughed hoarsely. ‘All flesh is as grass, sir.’

  ‘People just dying to meet ole Charlie,’ said the little undertaker, his unlit and well-chewed cigar waggling up and down all the time he spoke. ‘See ’em all go down the main street yet. But shed many a tear. But not when police kick the bucket. If a man was having a cup of coffee, who’d be the first bastard to come along and test it with a hydrometer? Smith! Great Scott, Mr Salter, you won’t credit the depth a man could stoop to till you’ve lived in this town under Smith.’

  ‘Smith is our sergeant,’ explained Athol Cudby. ‘A very bad man is Sergeant Smith. No love lost between him and Charlie.’

  ‘Pig of a man,’ said the undertaker. ‘Never understand gracious living. Not as long as his hole points at the ground. Watch a pub all night, leaning up against a bank doorway while burglars taking the safe out the back way. See a man lying in the gutter with a knife sticking out of his back and he’d arrest him for being inebriated.’

  The cigar waggled furiously and Charlie Dabney’s chest and shoulders heaved with mirth. Athol Cudby sniggered.

  The gullies of flesh in the tall stranger’s jowls deepened. He was smiling, but his thoughts were on the rapidly diminishing pile of change beside his glass on the counter. A financial crisis was one double schnapps distant. If he had managed to reach Oporenho that night he would have soon sniffed out a card game among the freezing-workers, but this town presented a very different picture. In Oporenho he would have kept the uncanny skill of his fingers a close secret but here, he reflected, it might be more profitable to openly startle the natives with some sleight of hand.

  ‘Yuh right enough,’ said Alf Yerbey as he refilled the glasses. He addressed the stranger. ‘Our sergeant here gives the pubs hell. Examines our registers every damn’ night that passes without fail. Offends bono feedo guests drinking in the lounge. Positively sits on a man’s friggin’ doorstep. Do you know what the bastard did once?’

  Salter shook his head.

  ‘Swang on a man’s legs to break his neck,’ said Alf Yerbey.

  ‘’S’fact,’ said Athol Cudby. ‘True as a man stands here tonight.’

  ‘When this Smith was pounding a beat,’ explained Yerbey, ‘he was at a hanging at Mount Davidson. They dropped a guy through the hatch and they made a balls of it. Smith was the guy who grabbed hold of his ankles and swung his sixteen stone on him to snap his neck like a rotten parsnip.’

  Alf Yerbey found the reaction to this macabre tit-bit extremely gratifying. He had related it times without number and was always sure of seeing horror register on the faces of his audience, but the tall man seemed positively overwhelmed. His face went chalk-white and he grabbed at the edge of the bar.

  ‘Gives yuh some idea, eh?’ Alf Yerbey chuckled, taking the man’s glass away to replenish it.

  ‘’S’fact,’ said Athol Cudby. ‘’S’solid fact. True as a man stands here tonight in this very room.’

  ‘Drink’s on me,’ said Charlie Dabney. He fumbled with his wallet, watched anxiously by three eyes and one cunningly constructed of glass. Athol Cudby retrieved the wallet when it fell to the floor.

  ‘Drinks on me. Inshish, inshish,’ proclaimed the little old mortician. He momentarily stayed the waggling of his cigar when Salter leaned across and held a match to its end.

  ‘Allow me,’ said Salter. The hand holding the match was shaking badly.

  Several more rounds of drinks were served and consumed and still the small heap of silver in front of the stranger remained intact. Athol Cudby, quick to recognise opportunism in a rival, studied the newcomer covertly with a beady and suspicious eye. His fingers, when they were not occupied with either a glass or a cigarette, fidgeted in the lining of his trouser pockets. In his sulky preoccupation he failed to hear the blandishments which prevailed on Charlie Dabney to suddenly hand over his big gold watch to the stranger. Athol Cudby started violently.

  Salter took up a position half-way around the oval bar, from whence he was clearly visible to all present.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ he said. His tone of voice, his great height, the bow tie, contributed to a presence which commanded and was granted a sudden silence. The murmur of several voices tailed off resentfully.

  ‘I have ‘ere in mer hand,’ said Salter, holding up by its chain the outsize gold watch, ’the timepiece of our good friend and well-known citizen, Mister Charles Dabney. None of us have the slightest doubt but that it is a very valuable gen-u-ine gold watch of great antiquity and reliability. In addition to its value as a gen-u-ine gold timepiece, I am also informed by its owner that its sentimental value is incalculating.’

  Salter laid the watch on the bar in full view of everybody and stepped back. He pushed back his sleeves and tucked them under to keep them there. He held his hands aloft, fixing the watch with a glittering gaze. His wrists, bared and curving, were like necks of geese.

  ‘Great Scott,’ said Charlie Dabney, enjoying himself immensely.

  Salter now produced a large handkerchief a
nd, holding it by the top corner, displayed to all that it was innocently empty back and front. He gave the handkerchief to a man standing nearby. The man examined it gingerly at first but, reassured by its cleanliness, thoroughly enough. Salter emitted a throaty chuckle. He dropped the handkerchief over the gold watch on the bar.

  ‘Yer will observe,’ he said, spreading the handkerchief out with one or two gossamer flicks of his long fingers, ‘that this most valuable timepiece is still visible through the thin material. If anyone present entertains the slightest doubt they are at liberty to investigate.’

  No one moved. Everyone was watching intently. Salter stooped down and removed one of his shoes. ‘This little illusion, which I bring you tonight,’ he announced, ‘is known as “The passing of time”, or, in certain circles in the mistykeist, “The crack of dawn”.’

  Salter brought the heel of his shoe down with a splintering crack on top of the handkerchief. He raised his hand again, but Athol Cudby leaped forward and caught his upraised arm. Salter fixed him with his weirdly compelling gaze. Athol Cudby fell back.

  ‘Great Scott,’ mumbled Charlie Dabney.

  The heel of the shoe fell savagely several times. No one had any doubt by now that the stranger in their midst was as mad as an elephant with earache. But nobody moved. The tall lunatic gathered up the debris of the watch in the handkerchief and held it aloft like a miniature plum pudding in its cloth.

  ‘I see by all yer faces,’ he said, ’that the ruthless destruction of this valuable timepiece of incalculating value has not left a single one of yer unmoved. By the powers of magic vested in me, I will now endeavour to undo the damage I have done. Only endeavour, mark my words. I can make no promises. Only if the gods of darkness and magic are favourable, can I restore Mr Dabney his precious gen-u-ine gold timepiece.’

  A low moan escaped the owner of the watch. Salter began a mumbled incantation and then shook out the handkerchief. A gasp greeted the fact that it was empty. Salter dropped the handkerchief and flashed his weird eyes around the bar. He approached Athol Cudby and lifted, from that horrified gentleman’s head, his battered slouch hat. He groped in the hat and withdrew from it, held delicately by the chain, the late-lamented gold watch.

  ‘Great Scott,’ exclaimed Charlie Dabney in vast relief. ‘A magician. A jolly ole wizard. The lights won’t go out all night.’

  Salter, having modestly consumed the double schnapps with which his skill was rewarded, now proceeded to hoax and amuse the patrons of the Federal Hotel back bar for some time. At last he declined to perform further on the ground of excessive weariness. He became involved in a deep conversation with Charlie Dabney.

  ‘Great Scott,’ the undertaker exclaimed from time to time. ‘Sensational, magnificent. We’ll amalgamate, sir. With your skill and my coffins we’ll rock this town to its foundations. We go together like Gilbert and Sullivan. We gravitate to each other like a boiled carrot to a hunk of corn brisket. Nicely put?’

  ‘Very nicely—’ began Athol Cudby.

  The undertaker struck the bar in great excitement. ‘This is what I’ve been waiting for. Athol here knows I’m investing in one of those neon signs. Off and on all night. Too many of the old families in these parts going past ole Charlie lately. Have a wagon sent up from one of those upstart undertakers to take ole Dad’s body all the way to the crematorium at Highriver would they? It’s degrading. Fellows are a disgrace to the profession. Not even got a decent hearse with flowers painted on it. It’s high time people around here were made to realise it’s just as important to die in a dignified way as it is to live graciously. You’re the answer to my prayer, Mr Salter.’

  The tall man rubbed his hands together gleefully.

  ‘Yer may count on me, sir,’ he chuckled.

  ‘Neon sign going off and on all night. The dignity of death. The dignity of death. How does that sound, eh, eh—’

  ‘Cremations arranged,’ put in Athol Cudby. ‘I thought that was what it was gunna be. I like that better.’

  The cigar ceased to waggle as the undertaker digested Athol Cudby’s interjections.

  ‘Cremations—’ began Athol Cudby, but Charlie Dabney held up a stern hand to silence him. He spent a few moments in rapt cogitation and then slapped the bar triumphantly.

  ‘Great Scott! A revelation! I’ve got it! See it clear as the tadpoles in that water carafe. Heh, heh. Episode closed. Can’t you see their faces! Can’t you see their mouths hanging open like the addled-brained nincompoops they are, when they see that sign flicking on and off all night! And dear ole frien’ here, Mr Salter, in the window sawing through a coffin with some young popsie in a nightdress inside it. It’ll create a furore. Dabney and Son, the ole firm. Great Scott, we’ll put these upstarts over at Highriver clean outa business.’

  Chapter Five

  Monday, tongue in cheek, dawned bright and clear. Les Wilson walked half-way home with me in the dinner hour and we were the happiest. Victor Lynch had not even looked in our direction at school and his lieutenant, Skin Hughson, had actually nodded at Les, so Les informed me.

  I ran along our dirt path, saw a tall man standing on the verandah, without taking much notice. Then I saw his helmet, missed the top step and hit the deck flat on my face. The cop gave me a hand up. Ma was in the kitchen wringing her hands. Out came Uncle Athol, shaky and bloodshot-eyed, with a pink singlet done up around his neck and showing above his grey shirt. He was as unshaven as an albino hedgehog, but he had his teeth in.

  ‘C’mon, Cudby,’ said the cop. ‘Oi know, Oi know. It’s all a terrible mistake, but we’ll straighten everything out down at the sta-hayshun.’

  I went into my bedroom. I could not tell if I was shaking with fear or relief.

  Herbert was still in bed, which was not actually a new development. We watched the cop and Uncle Athol get into a big sedan car (in which, I little dreamed, I was to have one of the most hair-raising rides of my life) and drive off. Herbert lit a cigarette with a shaking hand.

  ‘What a start for the day,’ he said. ‘Cripes, that give me a turn. That’s undone all the good of a night’s rest, that has. What’s the old tit done?’

  ‘Dunno.’ I went to take one of Herbert’s cigarettes, but he grabbed the packet.

  ‘Thought yuh wanted to be a six-footer.’

  ‘I’ve changed muh mind, I’m gunna be a jockey.’ I made a grab for the smokes, but just then Ma came in carrying on something awful.

  ‘What a disgrace!’ she cried. ‘There’s Athol dragged off in handcuffs to the cop-shop and yuh father as drunk as a coot on a Monday. This is the end of us around this burg. I might as well give up the ghost right now. Many’s the time I’ve said there’s trouble just around the corner and now it’s all coming true on a bloody Monday. Yuh father’ll be picked up for being drunk-in-charge as sure as eggs’re eggs and that’ll be the stone end of the whole caboosh. If Grandma uz here, she’d drop down stone dead from shame, and so would I. What a beginning for the week with a tub full of washing. Poor little Eddy, get yourself some bread and jam, yuh poor little boy. Yuh mother’s nearly all in and can’t bring her mind around to thinking of food. I’ve had a terrible shock seeing that cop standing there on the doorstep, and yuh father as drunk as a coot.’

  Pop was standing with his back to the stove, the nape of his neck against the mantelpiece and his hands behind his back. I had noticed the Dennis in the yard so there had obviously been a rescue expedition to Te Rotiha. By Pop’s appearance, the operation had not been all work and no play. I could tell by the way his head was wagging from side to side, he was a real job all right. I had to work in behind him to see if there was any stew in the pot. There was a spoonful of stew with a carrot in it.

  ‘Ducashun,’ said Pop. ‘Sathing. Ducashun. Be lawyuh, doctuh. Go school, get ducashun. Breeding gets yuh nowhere. Gotta have lottsa dough and ducashun. Police got no breeding. Got no friggin’ ducashun either. Poor ole Athol. Whitesh man Chris’ ever put breath into. Gunna miss ole Athol. Get legal coun
sel. Bes’ money can buy. Kayshee if neshry. Money no object. Disgrace firm Daitch Poindexter. Gross miscarriage jusch.’

  I got some bread and butter and sat up at the end of the table with my spoonful of stew.

  ‘Fowls,’ said Pop. ‘Hic.’

  That was one spoonful of stew that bore a charmed life. I put it back on the plate.

  ‘Fowls,’ Pop went on. ‘Ole Athol wouldn’t stoop to stealing fowls. Can’t stoop anyway. Got a rupchuh.’

  He started chortling idiotically.

  ‘Couldn’t pull a friggin’ fowl off the nest,’ he gurgled.

  I heard Prudence coming in and pounded out to head her off. Dolly and Monica were right on her heels, so I beckoned her into the washhouse.

  ‘Crummy,’ she said, when I told her the goings on. I paced up and down the washhouse like a nut. Prudence came back.

  ‘It’s fowls, awright,’ she said. ‘That’s what the police have got him over. He’s been raffling fowls all over town every Saturday and they reckon he’s been stealing ‘em. Ma said it was Lynch’s fowls that got pinched. Whatcha gunna do, Ned?’

  I sat down on the W.C. seat. As far as I was concerned this was the end of the trail.

  ‘Whatcha gunna do?’ Prudence worried. ‘He never took any fowls. You did. Maybe he’s got an alleyway.’

  I said nothing. What could I say? Prudence said, ‘Well I gotta have something to eat. I didn’t have any brekker this morning.’

  I high-tailed it down to Wilson’s and now it was my turn to spoil someone’s dinner. I will grant Les this, he made the only sensible suggestion to date.

  ‘Well, one thing’s fuh sure,’ he said. ‘We can’t go to school. We gotta go somewhere quiet where we can use our brains.’

  The thought of locking ourselves in Fitzherbert’s shed with all that gang of poultry was too much, so we headed for the dam. We stretched out under a pine tree, which grew out over the water. The pine sadly contemplated its image, impaled on the reeds, while we tried to marshal our wits.

  ‘The trouble is,’ Les kept pointing out, ‘we haven’t got enough grata. We don’t know what to do because we don’t know what’s going on. The old boy might have wriggled out of it. We’ll just have to have more grata.’