When a mile had passed under the wheels, Red said:
“If the Boss wants to shift flocks from the back end of the run where it’s pretty dry already this summer, I can’t see him agreeing to George taking on the rabbits. Cooks ain’t that easy to get. If the Boss says no, George might stand by it, but I don’t think so. For a long time now George has had his mind on trapping when the Lake dried out. Funny bloke.”
“How so?” pressed Bony, turning his sea-blue eyes to the driver.
“Well, he don’t spend and he don’t drink and he don’t go for skirts. They sez never to trust that kind of bloke, but George is all right even though he’s got a mania for saving money. Now me, I reckon money’s only good for booze. But what does George do? He saves his dough till he’s got enough to buy a good ute and a trapping outfit. When fur prices is good he slings in the cookin’ and goes trapping, and when the trappin’ is finished he goes back to cookin’. No between spell, no guzzle on the honk. Not even a trip down to the city. Why? Search me! Tain’t like he was savin’ to buy a pub, or a racehorse or something. He ain’t got no wife to drain him, neither. Leastways he never owned to one.”
The wind came after the truck and the cabin was hot and fouled with burned gas and oil. Only at Sandy Well had they seen animals on this trip, and the naive would have complained that the land was a desert. Invisible animals hugged the shadows of trees and bush, and deep underground the warrens were packed with rabbits.
They were travelling over a treeless plain extending for twelve miles when Draffin broke a long silence.
“Crook, the Lake dryin’ up like she is,” he said as though speaking of one close to him. “Lot of fish in her, too. Cod up to nine pound and brim up to seven.”
“The floods filled it, of course,” encouraged Bony.
“Yair. Record flood what began up your way. The River got miles wide, and the overflow brought water into the Lake. Nineteen feet of water she took, and with it she took enough fish spawn to feed Orstralia for a year.”
“And now the water has drained from the Lake?”
“No. Evaporation took six or seven feet a year. Then there’s the birds. Ruddy thousands of birds from pelicans down to moorhens. And this summer there’s been millions of rabbits drinking at her. Cripes! No lake could stand for that.”
“Do any fishing yourself?”
“Now and then.”
“Boat, of course.”
“There was a boat, but she broke up on the beach one windy day. You hear about the bloke what was drowned? In the Adelaide papers?”
“No, I didn’t read about it. Working for the Station?”
“Yair. Bloke by the name of Ray Gillen. Goes to bed a hot night and then says he’ll go for a swim. Good swimmer, too. Usta go a hell of a way out and muck about before he came in. Boasted he’d swim across the Lake and back. Could swim, all right, but he got himself drowned. About eleven at night, it was. Full moon. Left the quarters with only his ’jama trousers on. Never came back.”
Yet another gate stopped them, and after Bony had opened and closed it, and they were moving towards scrub-covered dunes which appeared an impassable barrier, he said:
“The body was recovered?”
“No, it wasn’t,” replied Draffin. “There was no body come ashore, no ’jamas, no nothink. Ray Gillen just went for a swim and the next morning they wondered wot in hell had happened to him. Got blacks out from the River. Scouted around for a week. They tracked him down to the water but couldn’t track him out again. They nutted out the wind and drift of the tide and such like, and argued Gillen had to come ashore along the west end of the Lake. But he didn’t. He stopped right down on the bottom somewheres. Funny about that. I always thought there was...”
“What?” Bony softly urged, and it seemed that the noise of the engine prevented the question from reaching the driver. Louder, he added: “What did you think?”
“Well, just between us. Tain’t no good stirring up muddy water, but I’ve always thought there was something funny about that drowning. You see, Ray Gillen wasn’t the sort of bloke to get himself drowned. He was the sort of bloke wot did everything goodo. Fine horseman. Make you giddy lookin’ at him ride his motor-bike. Swim like a champion. Goes through Korea without battin’ an eyelid.”
“And nothing has been heard or found since?”
“Right, Bony. Not a trace. Trick of a bloke, too. Always laughin’ and teasin’. Good-lookin’ and a proper skirt chaser. The young bitch out there was eyeing him off and puttin’ the hooks into him, but I reckon he was too fly for her. Anyhow, bad feelin’ worked up with the other blokes, and one evening there was fireworks, Ray and MacLennon getting into holts. I wasn’t there, but Bob Lester told me they hoed into it for half an hour before Mac called it a day.”
“But Gillen must have been drowned,” Bony argued. “Wearing only his pyjama trousers, he couldn’t have cleared away to another part of the State.”
That’s so,” Draffin agreed.
“Well, then, he must have been drowned,” persisted Bony, prodding the simple driver to defend himself.
“Could of been, and then he could of not. George Barby told me he reckons Gillen went after a woman that night.”
“Wearing only pyjama trousers?”
“It was a hot night, and it ain’t necessary to be all dressed up.”
“Well, he went visiting, then disappeared. That it?”
“Yair.”
Red Draffin braked the truck on a hard claypan and silently cut chips from a black plug. Without speaking he rubbed the chips to shreds and loaded his odorous pipe and, still without speaking, lit the pipe and again settled to his driving. When they had covered a further three miles he voiced his thoughts.
“Don’t know what you think about things, Bony, but I reckon booze is a safer bet than women. You can trust booze. You know just what it can do to you. But women! All they think about is what they can get out of a bloke. Look! Only the blacks get their women in a corner and keeps ’em there. Do they let women play around with ’em? No fear. They gives their women a beltin’ every Sunday morning regular, and there’s never no arguing or any funny business during the ruddy week.”
“There’s an old English custom. Are you sure the blacks choose Sunday mornings for the belting?” Bony asked, and Red Draffin, noting the smile and the twinkling blue eyes, roared with laughter.
“Could be they makes it Sat’day night sometimes so’s not to miss out,” he conceded, a broad grin widening the spaced flame of hair on his face.
“What makes you think Gillen mightn’t have been drowned?”
“Well, you being a stranger, sort of, I can talk to you, and you can keep it under your bib. As I said, it’s no use stirring up mud. When you get a bird’s eye view of Ma Fowler and the daughter you might feel like me about Ray Gillen. Y’see, it was like this. Ray had a good suitcase, and one day I’m having a pitch with him in his room when he was changing his unders. He pulls the case from below his bed, and he unlocks it with a key what he kept on a cord with a locket, what he always had slung round his neck. The case was full of clothes. He took a clean vest and pair of pants off the top of the stuff in the case, and he had to kneel on the lid to get it locked again.
“That was a week before he went missing. I wasn’t at the Lake when he drowned, if he did, but George Barby was, and the next day, or the day after, the overseer got Bob Lester and George to be with him when he opened the case and made a list of what was inside. And accordin’ to George Barby, the case was only three parts full of clothes and things. I never said nothink to no one except George about that, but I’ve thought a lot of what happened to make the tide go down like it did.”
“And did the overseer discover anything in the case, or find anything about Gillen’s parents or relatives?” Bony asked, to keep the subject before Red Draffin.
“Not a thing. Ray’s motor-bike’s still in the machinery shed ’cos nobuddy’s claimed it, and the police took the suitcase and
things. I’ll tell you what I think. I think Ray got wise to them women, or someone got wise to him, and that sort of started someone off. I tell you straight, I don’t believe he got himself drowned, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they come across his skeleton when the Lake dries up and find there’s bones broken what the water couldn’t of broke. So don’t go muckin’ about these women. Keep to the booze and you’ll be all right, like me.”
“I will,” Bony promised, and there was no further opportunity to discuss the disappearance of Ray Gillen.
So swiftly as to provide a shock, the ground fell away before the truck, to reveal the track winding down a long red slope, the buildings clustered at the bottom, and the great expanse of sun-drenched water beyond, shaped like a kidney and promising all things delightful after the long and arid journey.
“Beaut, ain’t she!” remarked the ungainly, uncouth driver, and added with genuine regret: “Just too crook her going to die.”
Chapter Four
“I am what I am”
THE TRUCK STOPPED outside the store and Bony’s world was filled with sounds common to every outback homestead. Chained dogs barked and whined. The power engine chugged in rivalry with the clanging of the lazy windmill. Cockatoos shrieked and magpies chortled. People appeared and gathered about the truck.
Bony opened his door and stepped out. To him no one spoke. He saw Red Draffin pass the mailbag to a dapper man and knew instantly he was the Boss of the out-station. The other men were types to be seen anywhere beyond the railways. He was conscious first of a big-boned woman with flashing dark eyes and raven hair, and a moment later was gazing into eyes as blue as his own. In them was reserved approval. His eyes registered points ... deep gold hair, oval face, wide full-lipped mouth ... and again his eyes met the eyes of the girl, and they were green and smiling and approving.
“Now you two wash and come in for your dinner,” the elder woman told Red Draffin. “I’ve kept it hot for you, so don’t delay by gossiping.”
Draffin grinned at her, and took Bony to the men’s quarters where they shared a room. In the shower house at the rear of the building they washed and then Bony needs must return to the bedroom to comb and brush his hair.
“Never mind making yourself look like a fillum star,” Red said.
Bony was sure that neither comb nor brush had been applied to the red hair for many years, but his own lifelong habits could not be interrupted by Red’s impatience. He was conducted across the open space and into the men’s dining annexe off the kitchen. Mrs Fowler appeared carrying loaded plates.
“Well, how’s things, Ma?” Draffin cheerfully asked as he slid his enormous buttocks along the table-flanking form.
The woman’s dark eyes flashed and her mouth became grim.
“You should have been smothered at birth.”
“Now, now, no offence meant,” placated the driver. “All widders are natural mothers to me. You’re a widder, aren’t you? Hope so, anyhow.”
“Eat your dinner. And don’t waste your time. I told you last time you were out that you haven’t a chance.”
“So you did. Never mind. Next time I’m out here you won’t. Or it might be the time after.”
Mrs Fowler sat on the end of the form nearest the door to the kitchen and regarded Bony with slow appraisement. He was supposed to be a horse-breaker and to be casual in manner and careless in speech, but he was too wise to adopt in the beginning idiosyncrasies which with the passage of time would be difficult to maintain. As, ultimately, he would be judged by his acts, he decided to be himself.
From glancing at the man of cubic proportions and slovenly habits he studied the woman. That she was the mother of Green Eyes was very hard to credit, for there was no hint of the matron about her figure. She smiled at Bony with her lips and not her eyes.
“D’you think Red would have a chance, Mr ... er...?”
“Call me Bony,” he replied, beaming upon her, and noted the fleeting shock he gave. “I cannot believe that Mr Draffin has the merest ghost of a chance.”
“Chance of what?” asked Joan Fowler, who appeared at the kitchen door and came to sit opposite her mother. She sat slightly sideways, that she could the better see Bony who was sitting on the same form.
Bony hesitated to explain, and was glad when Red took the lead.
“The chance of marrying your mother, Joan. What do you reckon?”
The smoky blue-green eyes were insolent and the girl smiled. “Not a hope, you would never be able to fix her.”
The mother rose hastily, saying:
That’s enough of that.” Then she looked at Bony, her dark eyes casual, but incapable of masking her mind. “You’ll like being here, Bony,” she said. “How long are you staying?”
Although returning her gaze, he was conscious of the girl’s eyes.
“It depends,” he replied. “A month perhaps.”
“Where have you come from?” asked the girl.
“Down from Uradangie,” Red gave the answer. “Up at Uradangie women never arst questions.”
“You hurry with your dinner, Red, and get out,” Joan told him.
“I’m not leaving without Bony,” Red stated. “I like him too much to leave him alone with you two.”
“Bony can look after himself,” snapped Mrs Fowler.
“Not with you, he can’t. He ain’t old enough yet to hold his own with either of you.”
Mrs Fowler gathered the plates on a tray and departed to bring in the sweet course. Red winked at Bony, and tore a crust of bread with teeth able to smash walnuts. The girl watched him, a sneer on her face, and determined to “sit” him out. Her mother reappeared to ask:
“Do they bake better bread up at Uradangie, Bony?”
“Madam,” Bony gravely began, “neither at Uradangie nor elsewhere in Australia do they bake better bread than yours. And, please, permit me to compliment you on your cooking.”
The woman’s smile of appreciation was almost tender, and then Draffin intruded.
“Talks like Ray Gillen, don’t he?”
The smile was wiped from the woman’s face.
“He does not, Red Draffin,” she said, venomously.
“Something like,” purred the daughter. “We are going to like him, too.”
Bony almost bowed sitting down, and Draffin had to toss in the final spanner.
“Well, well, it won’t be long now ’fore the Lake dries out and we can collect poor old Ray and find out if he did die from no air. Wouldn’t be surprised if...”
“Stop that kind of talk. Red,” commanded the elder woman.
“All right! All right! Don’t go crook at everything I say,” complained Red and lurched to his feet. “Come on, Bony. Let’s go ’fore there’s blood spattered all over the walls.”
“Do you play cards, Bony?” asked the girl. “Come over one evening. You’ll be welcome.”
“Thank you. Yes, I like a game of poker now and then.”
“I like poker, too,” the girl said, sleepy green eyes challenging alert blue eyes. But Bony smiled at both women and followed Red Draffin out into the sunset.
Red introduced him to the other men, and they were not greatly interested, superficially, in the stranger. The two blacks had withdrawn to their own camp, an old hut farther along the lake shore, and the whites were excusably engrossed in their mail and papers, which were irregularly delivered. He felt their reserve and decided it was too soon to worry about the precise classification of their attitude. The only man with whom he had conversation was called Earle Witlow, middleaged, rotund, grey and cheerful, and the subject of mutual interest was horses. Another, elderly but alert and addressed as Swede, invited all and sundry to play cards and received no co-operation. He didn’t meet Martyr until the following morning when orders were issued for the day, and by then he had summed up this small community.
The two aborigines, of course, were a section to themselves. Earle Witlow and the Swede appeared to be joined in some kind of alliance, and the re
mainder were peculiarly individualistic. These individualists were Lester, MacLennon and Carney. They were the “old hands”, who, with George Barby, had been working here when Ray Gillen was drowned.
MacLennon and Carney were sent out for the youngsters and half an hour later their whips could be heard like exploding rifles, and soon a spear of dust speeding down the slope to the homestead became a river of horses, and ultimately the head of the spear was rammed into the open gateway of a yard. They emitted a cloud of red dust for a minute or two before the restless animals quietened.
Men sat on the top rail of the yard and watched the horses—the overseer and Bony, Lester and MacLennon and Carney. No one commented, and Bony quickly felt he was being appraised rather than the youngsters.
Fifteen taut-eyed young horses who had never known bridle and saddle, or the caress of a rope, stared at the men on the rail, and the men rolled cigarettes or filled a pipe and waited. They would have to be satisfied that he, Bony, could break in horses, for they must be made to accept him as such, and so enable him to fit into their own background.
Without being a horseman one could watch the change from the exhilaration of the open gallop, to the uneasy fear of the trap which held them, to the acceptance of the trap and men immobile on the top rail. And then when Bony slid to the ground within the yard, fifteen pairs of eyes pricked and fifteen pairs of nostrils whistled wind.
Martyr and his three stockmen moved not a fraction. Their faces were blank, but their eyes were quick and hooded, as though eager to detect errors. And although he hadn’t handled horses for years, Inspector Bonaparte fancied he could disappoint them.
Standing in the centre of the yard, he clicked his tongue, and the horses could not choose a corner where they might be safe. He sauntered after them as they rushed from corner to corner, deliberately taking time to judge their points and sum up their characters. For a little while he leaned against the yard rails and slowly rolled a cigarette, like a man unable to make up his mind which horse to back for a race. He put on a good act, but at the same time shrewdly chose the animals most amenable to begin with.
Death of a Lake Page 3