The Widows of Broome

by Arthur W. Upfield

  “We may return to the study?” asked the Justice of the Peace.

  “Yes, of course.”

  Bony turned to the window. Before him was Broome. Aided by the binoculars found in the headmaster’s private safe, he could clearly see the empty clothes lines behind the houses of the Widows of Broome.

  ***

  Bony spent the entire afternoon compiling his report for the Criminal Investigation Branch, for Rose was to be taken to Perth by the two constables on the aircraft scheduled to leave at six that evening.

  On returning from the airport, Inspector Walters found Bony already at dinner with his wife and two children. The relief from the strain under which he had been suffering was marked by unwonted joviality.

  “It’s me for a good long sleep tonight,” he declared, and to Bony added: “And you’re due for a good sleep, too.”

  “We shall all sleep soundly tonight,” Bony agreed. “By the way, I have taken the liberty of asking Mrs. Sayers and Briggs, Mr. Dickenson and Sawtell to be here at seven-thirty. I feel I owe it to them to give a short summary of my investigation. I presume you wish to be present.”

  “Of course I do.”

  “And you, Mrs. Walters, will be most welcome to join us. As you have cooked the dinner, your husband and I will do the washing up. It will be quite a little party with us all in the office.”

  “Blow the washing up!” snorted Walters.

  “You will assist me in the washing up,” Bony said with mock severity.

  “Let the kids do it for once,” argued the inspector.

  Keith and Nanette looked uncomfortable and wordlessly appealed to Bony. Bony was firm.

  “I am sending Keith and Nanette to the pictures to commemorate.”

  Inspector Walters and Inspector Bonaparte did accomplish the washing up of the dishes, and the children did eventually go off happily to the cinema, and Mrs. Walters did change her frock and join the party which gathered in the station office.

  “I would like every one of you to accept my grateful thanks for your co-operation in the difficult investigation just concluded,” Bony began. “From each I was given much, and together we have done excellent team work with which the great police organisations of the world’s capitals would be well pleased.

  “On this occasion I’ve been confronted by an adversary who was exceptionally intelligent, and, moreover, one who committed his crimes under the most favourable circumstances to himself.... The murder of Mrs. Cotton provided no leads to her slayer and gave no indication of his motive. The murder of Mrs. Eltham was accompanied by similar negative results until I was informed that on the night after the homicide squad from Perth had left Broome a man was seen to leave her house in the early hours of the morning.

  “What I discovered in Mrs. Eltham’s wardrobe, and subsequently in Mrs. Cotton’s wardrobe, was actually the first lead to the mind of the man who had strangled these women. The second lead was the discovery that both the victims had previously lost a nightgown from their clothes line, and this second lead was closely allied with the first. Other than those two leads I had nothing. I was shown the mentality of the murderer but gained nothing to assist in identifying him, other than the fact that he suffered from a peculiar skin disease named psoriasis.

  “Most people, I think, are aware that police investigators very often know who has committed a crime and yet are unable to bring the criminal to trial through lack of sufficient evidence to place before a judge and jury. I had not sufficient evidence to suspect a particular person of these murders, and therefore, to my profound regret, was not in time to safeguard other possible victims.

  “The murder of Mrs. Overton revealed that the murderer had adopted a plan of action which was fairly rigid, and this very plan indicated his type of mind and hinted, for that is the word, hinted at his background. His background was made a little more clear through his acts, which revealed several of his habits in normal life, such as his passion for tidiness.

  “His knowledge of criminology was less than that of the average boy of sixteen. He wore rubber gloves to prevent leaving his finger-prints about the scene of his murders, and then illogically wiped clean the articles he did touch. It became obvious that the man who did that was, although intelligent, quite ignorant of crime detection with which the general public is superficially familiar. I began to think the murderer was a man who had never wasted his time at the cinema and never read fiction less than a century old.

  “That he stole women’s silk nightgowns and destroyed women’s silk underwear did not indicate the sex maniac but rather the introvert. His motive was certainly not material gain, and therein lay my greatest obstacle. I found clues which were extremely promising, but they turned out to be of value only as substantiating evidence. They did not lead to the murderer.

  “The most promising of these clues was the shoe-prints of the murderer in and about the house of Mrs. Overton. I have made a study of footprints, and am sure that the science of footprints could be far greater than the science of fingerprints. The shoe-prints of the murderer assisted me further to build a picture of him, the picture of a man without a face. My picture grew to be that of a man weighing at least twelve stone, having a size-eight foot, burdened with an inferiority complex, and enjoying good physical health.”

  Bony paused to light an alleged cigarette, and no one commented. Mrs. Sayers was looking at him as though he were a visitant from another world; Mr. Dickenson was steadily regarding his shabby shoes; Inspector Walters was fiddling with a ruler. Briggs, of course, continued his chewing, and Sawtell and Mrs. Walters were tensed.

  “Had I come across the man wearing the shoes in which he murdered Mrs. Overton,” Bony proceeded, “I should have seen the face of the man of my picture. But before I could do that, poor misguided Abie must needs attempt to blackmail him. What I am going to say regarding Abie is off the record.

  “Abie did not die of petrol poisoning but of another poison given him by the murderer he tried to blackmail. The fact that Abie was poisoned and not strangled took me another step toward the murderer. He poisoned Abie because he was a man, and an aborigine at that. He did not strangle Abie because it would have dulled the memory of the ecstasy he experienced when strangling young and attractive women.

  “Who of the men in Broome could this be? He was one having the attributes I have itemised and he suffered from psoriasis. I was left with three probables, and one of them I discarded when Bill Lung, the shell-packer, quoted his father as saying: ‘The wise man feasts in the morning before the night brings gall to his palate.’ The discarded probable had certainly feasted in the morning, whilst the murderer had gall on his palate.

  “When for the fourth time he stole a woman’s nightgown, thus beginning for the fourth time a cycle of acts which with one exception had not varied, for me the two remaining probables were reduced to one certainty.

  “He killed those three women and attempted to kill Mrs. Sayers because he hated them, and he destroyed the silk underwear because he hated something in himself. Psychologically it is too involved to present to a jury, which is why I took a picture of him attempting to strangle Mrs. Sayers, so that material proof against him would be strengthened.

  “Hatred is often inspired by fear. This murderer was governed by fear ... fear that what he had built would be destroyed. He had raised himself to a position of power, power over other minds, power to be increased by and through affection in those minds. He wanted to maintain that affection, because he had left it too late to gain the affection of even one woman. He wanted the affection of the boys whom he controlled, and these four women of Broome, with perhaps others, threatened his power to dominate affection.

  “He murdered the attractive Mrs. Cotton because to him she was not fitted to be the mother of one of his boys. She sold liquor over the bar to leering, roystering men. She encouraged men and thus she was a menace to her son, and through him, to other of his boys.

  “He murdered the attractive Mrs. Eltham becau
se of the easy bestowal of her favours. Her reputation was well known in the town and, he was sure, would be known to his older boys. What he had denied in himself was monstrous when he imagined it stirring in those boys.

  “Now why should he have murdered the attractive Mrs. Overton? I’ll return to Mrs. Overton after I’ve told you why he attempted to murder Mrs. Sayers. He tried to murder the attractive Mrs. Sayers because she was a dominant influence in the school. She was the most influential member of the Board of Control, and on occasions he had felt himself humiliated by her, and he the headmaster. She was held in great esteem by the boys, for on many occasions she had provided real schoolboy feasts.

  “And so when he stole the nightgown belonging to Mrs. Sayers and thus gave warning that she was to be his next victim, I knew who of the two probables was the murderer, and I knew why Mrs. Overton was murdered. The attractive Mrs. Overton was a great favourite with the college boys, and on the day she was buried at least one of the older boys openly wept. The murderer was he who was frantic for the affection of the boys. My discarded probable, whom we will call Happy, never cared a hoot for their affection. Ah, the car is coming.”

  Smiling, Bony rose to his feet. Mrs. Sayers crossed to him and took his hands. She wanted to speak, but could only look at him. Mr. Dickenson regarded Sawtell and smiled, and the sergeant nodded agreement with what he saw in the old man’s expression.

  From without came the noise of skidding tyres and then a sudden stoppage of a roaring car engine.

  “Mr. Dickenson and I promised ourselves an evening at Dampier’s Hotel when the investigation was finished,” Bony said. “Therefore, please excuse our hurried departure. Thank you for listening to me, and again for your unswerving cooperation.”

  “So you’re going out to Dampier’s Hotel, eh!” Walters said. “Well, I’m going out with you.”

  “Me, too,” added Sawtell.

  “Hold everything!” cried Mrs. Sayers. “What a nice little party ... to be left out of. Briggs, we shall also try the gin at Dampier’s Hotel. Come on, Esther! Don’t you be left out.”

  “I’m not going to be left out, Mavis,” determinedly announced Mrs. Walters.

  Johnno came bounding into the office.

  “I arrive!” he said gravely, impressed by the gathering.

  “Come along!” gurgled Mrs. Sayers. “We’ll all pile into Johnno’s car.”

  They trooped outside. The resplendent new edition of an automobile was ignored. Johnno held doors open and bowed them into his taxi. Mrs. Walters was obliged to sit on Sawtell’s knees and Mrs. Sayers giggled as she settled herself on the knees of Inspector Walters. Johnno forced his way in behind the steering-wheel, and Mr. Dickenson said:

  “Johnno, drive like hell.”

  The loaded car shot forward, and proceeded to gather speed.

  “I drive ... like hell,” shouted Johnno. “We arrive. We always arrive.”