“That’s them,” shouted Meena, and Bony turned to say:
“Could be. But how far away?”
The question baffled her. The shadows of the voyagers magically lengthened and were barely the width of a hair. The flame of the sky darkened to crimson, and the mirage turned to green and swiftly from green to steel. Overhead the crimson pall quivered, became ribs of blood veined by black valleys and moving ever to the east before the wind; the mirrored surface of real water to the north enflamed by the setting sun.
They could see the gradual darkening as the sun passed over the rim, and swiftly all the colours under the sky faded into drab brown oblivion. Quite suddenly they saw, barely two hundred yards distant, a low wall of reddish sand, topped with tussock grass. And a man and a child!
“Down,” shouted Bony, as he sprawled forward on his chest, wriggled slightly to pull the rifle off his back and bring it to the ready.
Facing the glare of the western sky, the man and child sighted the voyagers moments after they themselves were seen. Yorky, for it must be he, flung himself down behind the robust tussock grass, but the child continued to stand on a miniature hummock of sand.
The moments were those between the magic hours of day and the shrouding hours of night, when this country is revealed in true perspective, and this evening, stereoscopic clarity. Over the barrel of his rifle, Bony watched the movements behind the grass, and actually witnessed the muzzle of Yorky’s Winchester being pushed through the fringe.
A swift glance backward showed him Meena still standing, and he called to her to go down. She shook her head and shrilly shouted to Linda:
“It’s me! Meena! Tell Yorky, Linda. Tell Yorky!”
Meena provided a perfect target. Bony, who was better than average, could see the tip of Yorky’s rifle and knew precisely where the man’s head was in relation to it. The range was only about two hundred yards. The light held. Perspiration ran like rain down his face to wet the stock of his rifle against which his cheek was pressed. If Yorky fired first, Meena or himself would die. If he fired first, curtains for Yorky. Instinct drove him to pull the trigger; training commanded him to wait.
Chapter Twenty-three
A Mixed Reception
BONYWAITED.
A lesser man might not have hesitated before speeding a bullet into Yorky’s brain. He would act on the impulse of survival of the swiftest, and subsequently would be commended for preventing the possible murder of the woman so rashly exposing herself to danger.
Great men are natural gamblers. Bony gambled that Yorky wouldn’t shoot his own daughter; and that Yorky wouldn’t shoot him, not yet. He believed that Yorky thought himself behind full cover, and therefore safe from destruction and in command of the situation. And, like all great gamblers, Bony won. Linda shouted:
“Come on, Meena. Tell that man to stay there.”
Above his sigh of relief, he heard Meena sliding along the pad, and when the sound stopped and he heard her panting, he said:
“You will have to step over on me. Do it quickly.”
“That Yorky!” she exclaimed, almost crying. “That ole fool of a Yorky! I thought you’d shoot first. Why didn’t you? Why? He could have killed you easy. I’ll fix him.”
He felt the board press lightly on the small of his back, its toe-tip dig into his neck as she stepped over, regained her poise and stayed to look back at him.
“I’m all right, Meena,” he told her. “Go on and pacify Yorky. Get his rifle if you can, but don’t try fighting for it.”
Obediently, she went on along the pad, and Bony continued to hold his rifle sights at a point one inch above Yorky’s rifle muzzle. That muzzle wavered not at all, informing Bony that it was aimed at him, and not the girl.
Even though concentrating on Yorky, Bony could see Linda dancing in her excitement as Meena slowly neared the sandbank. He heard the child’s cries of joy, and the girl’s rapid questions and command to Yorky to point the rifle elsewhere. Then she was on the narrow hard crust dividing sandbank from mud, and the child was in her arms. After a few moments, the child was running to Yorky, and Meena was removing her mud shoes. Obviously, Yorky issued an order, for Linda screamed:
“You man over there! You come here. Yorky won’t shoot.”
Bony walked to the solid land with taut expectancy. On sliding to land he had an impression of fluffed water beyond the dune, and mud extending into blue-tinged darkness. Meena and the child came close to him, and nearby a man chuckled mirthlessly, and said:
“Linda! Take the rifle from that feller.”
The little girl’s brown eyes stared up at Bony as she held out her hands, and Bony smiled.
“Thank you, Linda. I want to take off these silly boards. My word, I shall be glad to be rid of them.”
“Bring the rifle to me, Linda,” commanded the hidden Yorky, and Meena said sharply:
“Cut it out, Yorky. You’re not on the films.”
“I’m a desperate man,” snarled Yorky, and Meena retorted:
“You will be if I get at you. Point that gun some other place. We haven’t come to shoot you. You are all right, Linda darling? That Yorky! Wait till Sarah gets at him.”
Yorky stood at the edge of the sandbank, a small, wizened, sun-blackened man in working trousers and shirt so repeatedly washed as to be negative. His greying hair was over-long, and the grey moustache suspended long tails to the tip of his pointed chin. His eyes were light blue, small, and red-rimmed. The Winchester still pointed at Bony.
The culminating surprise of this day was the contrast between the hunted and the hunters. Both Yorky and the little girl were clean and tidy. Yorky had certainly shaved that morning. Bony could not forbear gazing from them to Meena and himself, then back to Linda, and laughing.
“Linda, who looks the dirtiest? Meena or me?”
“You do, lying out there in the mud like that,” replied Linda severely. “But we have a private lake, you know. We can have a bath whenever we like, can’t we, Yorky?”
“Yes, I suppose so,” agreed Yorky, and a further surprise was the faint whine in his voice. “Comin’ barging in like this. How’m I to know you didn’t come to get me? Anyhow, who are you? Ruddy stranger to me.”
“I am a person of little importance,” countered Bony. “Linda mentioned a lake, and that indicates water. We have been severely rationed. Where is this lake?”
“Over there,” shrilled Linda. “I’ll show you. Come on.”
Following her pointing finger, they saw the steely sheen of water seemingly close enough to step into, and Bony, with Meena, who was being dragged along by the eager Linda, heard Yorky say:
“Now look-see, Linda. You’ve been in there all of two hours already. Don’t you be going in again, or you’ll be getting a cold or something.”
There was the water, inviting, alluring, limitless now in the deep dusk. Linda shouted. Meena shouted. Bony shouted. Meena stepped down from the sandbank to the bordering hard ground, stepped into the water and, finding the bottom hard, went farther in, splashing as the water rose to her waist. Bony followed her. Behind them the little girl and the man were silhouetted against the pink sunset sky.
Water in the middle of Lake Eyre! Water in the centre of a near desert at the end of a rainless summer. Clear water, and fresh, and seemingly miles of it lying cool and sweet under the serene stars and the flaming meteors.
When emerging to be met by the impatient Linda, Meena was even more beautiful, but Bony, still wearing shirt and trousers, looked like a near-drowned cat. Pulling off the shirt he wrung it out, thankful that it was cleaned of mud, and after all the surprises of this day came another when Yorky said:
“Better come on up and have a drink ’ertea.”
The invitation belied Yorky’s hostile attitude. Stepping back, he motioned them up on to the sandbar, Linda leading the way to a shallow dell where a small fire burned before the dark opening of a grass humpy. Beside the glowing embers stood a billycan, and close by were fruit ti
ns for cups and one filled with sugar.
Linda ran into the grass shelter and came forth with a towel, which she presented to Meena, who quickly dried herself and passed the towel to Bony. Shorts and trousers began to steam in the fire heat, and Linda expertly poured tea into two tins, and went again to the humpy, this time returning with a dainty cup and saucer.
Juggling the hot tin in his hands, Bony turned his back to the fire to face Yorky, who was sitting on the ground several yards away, and stubborn yet with the Winchester ready for action.
“You answer questions?” demanded Yorky, the whine still in his voice. “You march into my camp without any by-your-leave. You don’t say who you are. Why?”
“Sorry,” Bony said. “I’ve become so accustomed to asking questions that I find it tedious to answer them. Now listen to me.” Authority had crept into the coldaccentless voice. “I am Detective Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte, of Queensland, assigned to locate the whereabouts of Linda Bell, and apprehend a man concerned with a crime of violence. Having found Linda Bell, I have yet to apprehend the slayer of you know who. Now, suppose you answer a question? You tell me why you cleared out from Mount Eden and brought Linda with you.”
Yorky advanced until he was within a yard of Bony, the rifle aimed at Bony’s chest. The firelight gleamed in his eyes made small by suspicion.
“Suppose you tell me what you’re driving at?”
“I’ll answer that one, Yorky, by suggesting that talking of serious things be deferred until Sleepy Head has retired for the night.”
“That don’t satisfy me,” snarled Yorky, and Meena cut in shrilly:
“No, it wouldn’t, Yorky. You told Linda all that happened?”
“No, I haven’t yet.”
“Then shut up and put the rifle down. We’re famished. Where’s our packs, Linda? There’s tinned stuff in one of them for sure.”
They disappeared in the direction of the ‘beach’, and Bony said, proceeding to push fire sticks together:
“I don’t believe that you shot Mrs Bell.”
“But everyone else must,” replied Yorky.
“I don’t.”
“You don’t! D’you know who did?”
“My guess is good. Had you shot her I’d have had the cuffs on you before now. Easy man easy! They are coming back. We’ll talk of other matters. Do you know that the floods are pouring into Lake Eyre?”
“They are? Bad?”
Yorky sat in the circle of firelight, placing the rifle at his side. He was still suspicious, and almost furtively began to chip flakes from a plug of tobacco.
“Down the Coopers and the northern rivers.”
“You see water on your way?”
“No. But there was the mirage of water in the sky. You must have seen that.”
“Didn’t think.” Yorky fell to watching Meena opening tins. Linda appeared, this time carrying two large dolls, one the image of Ole Fren Yorky, the other that of Meena. She began to croon to them.
“We saw strange things,” Bony went on. “That great slough of soft mud is being agitated. Could be caused by water pressure building up underneath it. Did you see it?”
“Didn’t travel that way since we come out here first. The mud was quiet enough then. Must be the flood,” agreed Yorky. “Have to shift camp first thing after daybreak.”
“Where to, Yorky?”
“Where to! Don’t know, exceptin ’ back to the shore.” In the ensuing silence the only background sound was Linda’s crooning voice.
“There is another way to the shore?” asked Bony.
“Yes, the pad I take to the old hut at the south end of Mount Eden boundary fence. Much shorter. I’ve been back there twice for tucker.”
“You must have been to the homestead at least once, for the dolls?” pressed Bony.
“No. Friend of mine brought ’emfrom the homestead.”
“Friend of yours!” echoed Meena. “What friend?”
“You stopaskin ’ questions,” whined Yorky. “Just a friend, that’s all.”
“Did you meet this friend, or did he leave the dolls in the hut?” pressed Bony.
“Left ’emin the hut.”
“And this friend didn’t leave word that the water was pouring into Lake Eyre?”
“No. Musta forgot.”
“Must have forgotten! He would know that the water would cut you off, that you’d starve to death, or drown trying to reach shore, wouldn’t he?”
“Yair, I suppose he would,” admitted Yorky. “But…”
“And he forgot to leave word. Nice friend, Yorky.”
“Damn nice friend,” jibed Meena, and Linda said sharply:
“It’s rude to swear, Meena.”
“Must of forgot,” obstinately averred Yorky. “Anyhow, we’ll have to move in the morning. Linda, you be off to bed. We got a long way to gotomorrer.”
“But you haven’t told mynightie story yet,” protested Linda. “You always do, Yorky.”
“I know, but not tonight. I’m too sleepy tired.”
“I’ll tell the story,” volunteered Meena. “Now you show me the inside of your little house. Come on!”
Linda gathered her dolls under one arm, and picked up the cup and saucer. Politely, she wished goodnight to Bony, threw her arms round Yorky, and said he must go to bed, too. With additional interest Bony studied the nondescript little man who had abducted a child and cared for her exceedingly well under hazardous conditions. The humpy constructed with tussock grass thatched to a frame of driftwood accepted the little girl and Meena, and after a short silence Yorky said:
“That right you reckon I didn’t shoot Mrs Bell?”
“Did you?” countered Bony, and Yorky sighed like a man long and sorely perplexed.
“I was sozzled and all on the boss’s whisky. I don’t rightly remember, but I must have. Things happened sort of out of order. You said you got a different idea. What do you think?”
“While not quite certain,” Bony tersely replied, “I think your friend did.”
Chapter Twenty-four
The Quail Shooters
WITHDWELLERSin the Outback, it is often the rule to wake by habit when the first sign of coming day appears in the sky. Such a bushman was Yorky, who stirred from his bed of sand and added wood to the still red embers of the camp fire. The resultant flame enabled him to see the empty billycan, and he departed for water. On his return he found Bony cleaning the Savage rifle, and while waiting for the water to boil he watched Bony at work on the high-velocity weapon; and neither spoke nor made a move to halt the progress.
Having tossed a handful of tea into the boiling water, Yorky lifted the billycan with a stick, and cut chips from his plug while waiting for the leaves to settle. Thus the day began completely normal.
Having cleaned his rifle, Bony set it carefully against his pack, and nonchalantly strolled away to wash at Linda’s own lake. Meena and the child joined him there, and all returned together. The Savage still reclined against the pack. Yorky hadn’t touched it. Smoking his first pipe of the day, Yorky ambled over to the water, and Bony finished dressing, simply by donning an old coat over the now dry shirt.
They were ready to move before sun-up, by which time Bony had surveyed their immediate surroundings and learned that the tussock-covered sand was barely a hundred yards wide, and in varying width extending as far as he could see to the north and south. The ‘private lake’, enclosed by sand, was about an acre in area, and must be maintained by springs.
They left the soft sand for the narrow beach, where Yorky led the party to the south. An hour later, when he halted for a rest, they were still walking the beach, and still the sandbar was on their one side and the mud on the other. Now well beyond the place of recent occupation the rabbits were fairly numerous, and already two dingoes had been seen.
“How much farther have we of this easy going?” Bony asked.
“About another seven miles,” replied Yorky. “Nearly all them seven miles towards the shore,
for this sand takes a turn like the elbow of a boomerang. That leaves only about eleven miles of mud. There’s water at the end of the sand, but not like Linda’s lake. After that no water till we get to the hut. How you going, Linda?”
“All right, Yorky,” replied the child, a trifle doubtfully.
“Expect I’ll have to carry you a ways. Easier on this hard beach than later on over the mud. Mind you, Linda, sweetheart, you’re doing good, but them legs of yours are too short and them Kurdaitcha shoes aren’t much good for the job.”
The shoes Charlie had made were slung about the child’s neck by the leather thongs. They had been fashioned with the bark of a tree to the shape of a boat, or like an Eastern slipper, having a curved toe-cap. They were too long for Linda unless she was also wearing her normal shoes, and, in fact, were not meant to be worn save in play. The yellow comb of a white cockatoo adorned each shoe immediately behind the raised prow. Along the sides of each shoe Charlie had scored aboriginal pictures, and glued to the raised edges were the herring-bone feathers of emus. Toy shoes made for a little girl.
“I shall be glad to be on the mud,” observed Bony. “That friend of yours could have decided to meet us, and could be waiting comfortably behind a clump of tussock grass.”
“Who’s your friend, Yorky?” demanded Meena. “I’m tired of you nottellin ’.” Looking back at Bony, and noting the slight frown of anxiety, she went on: “You wait. Sarah’ll get it out of you. You say you didn’t do it. Bony says you didn’t do it. Bony says your friend did it. Wait till we get back to Sarah, Yorky. She’ll make you talk fast enough.”
“That feller didn’t do it, I keeptellin ’ you,” exploded Yorky. “He’s been pretty decent all through. Only one I could trust, anyhow. And I’m not talking until we’re all facing him. Then we’ll see. I’m not a one to talk behind a friend’s back.”
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