Wings Above the Diamantina

by Arthur W. Upfield

  “We have had one hundred and thirty-five points of rain here,” Bony opened. “How much has fallen at Coolibah?”

  “One hundred and forty. I was on the point of ringing you up when your call came through. For some unknown reason I have got through to Tintanoo on the river line when all previous efforts to do so failed. Kane informs me that Loveacre’s machine passed overhead at the same time as the storm arrived. It looked to him as though the captain intended to effect a landing on the strip of clear ground between the river and the homestead. It was just as well that he didn’t, because it is a steep incline. Loveacre then flew west. Kane got through to Gurner’s and told him to keep a look-out and be ready with his car to go after the machine while it was in sight in case it landed, but Gurner had left on a trip to St Albans. Later Gurner rang up from St Albans, reporting that the machine passed over him soon after he left the hotel and landed off the road ahead of him. It was smashed badly in the landing. He rescued Loveacre, who is badly injured, and took him to the doctor at St Albans, but he did not mention anything about Illawalli. When I asked Kane about the passenger he said that Gurner said nothing to him about there being a passenger at all.”

  “Ah! That’s strange,” said Bony, his calm voice concealing his nervous tension. “Will you again ring Kane and get him to make contact with Gurner for information about Illawalli? Good! I’ll be here. Then would you get through to Ned Hamlin and ask him to be sure that both Shuteye and Bill Sikes are at the hotel by seven in the morning? I’ll be there then to meet and pick them up. Illawalli was with the captain. Of that there is no doubt.”

  When Bony had repeated the information to Cox he looked at the time. “Loveacre’s down,” he said harshly, “but no Illawalli! Between Gurner’s and St Albans. I leave at daybreak for Gurner’s.”

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Bony Is Again Submerged

  TWO DAYS AND NIGHTS had passed, and Bony was exceedingly weary. A dozen times during this period of incessant labour, with the assistance of Bill Sikes and Shuteye, he had had to dig the runabout from rain-soaked road bogs.

  Captain Loveacre had elected to put his plane down on flat claypan country not far from the western end of Tintanoo and on a small selection owned by people named Martell. What had from the air appeared to be a good landing place was made traitorous by low banks of sand enclosing the claypans, and the machine had turned right over on its back, smashing the propeller, its broken body forming an arch that had prevented a fatality.

  Loveacre had received a severe blow to his head and another to his face. He came round to reality to find himself lying on wet ground with heavy rain beating down on his upturned face. In his throat was the fire of raw whisky. Quite oblivious to the elements was a little, round-faced man standing beside him.

  “Do you think you could walk across to the road where I was obliged to leave my car?” this man had asked. “You’re too heavy for me to carry, but you certainly require surgical attention.”

  “I’ll try,” Loveacre assented. “How’s my passenger?”

  “Passenger? I’ve seen no passenger!”

  With the assistance of Mr Gurner, Captain Loveacre had looked for but had failed to find Illawalli. The storm was intense. Gurner was anxious to reach St Albans before the heavy rain sank far into the ground and produced bogs on the road, and the captain was really too ill to be much concerned about the disappearance of the old chief. He fainted once before the car was reached, thereafter suffering periods of unconsciousness while being taken to the bush nurse stationed at St Albans. Not only was St Albans Gurner’s destination: it was nearer to the scene of the crash than Coolibah and Dr Knowles.

  Gurner stated that he had left his hotel two miles behind when the biplane flew over him. He did not actually see it land, but, having passed through the Tintanoo boundary, he saw the tail showing above a line of tobacco bush right off the road. Gurner had crossed to the disabled machine to find Captain Loveacre hanging head downward from his seat. He had not seen a second man. The storm broke while he was getting the unconscious airman clear of the machine, and only after a considerable time had he been successful in bringing Loveacre to his senses.

  Gurner and the St Albans constable had been met by Bony the next morning at the scene of the unfortunate landing. The detective had with him both Shuteye and Bill Sikes. The storm had obliterated all possibility of tracking Illawalli, and no signs of him had been found then or subsequently. Having learned who the passenger was, the constable offered what Bony had to accept as a sound theory. The flight and the crash had so frightened Illawalli that he had run away, and, doubtless, even now was making his way back to his own country.

  All night through Bony had crouched over a little camp fire, now and then pushing together the ends of four or five sticks in order to maintain a low flame. Near by stood the utility, and beside it slept the two blacks. He had spared neither them nor himself. Tintanoo, the Martells and Coolibah had contributed horsemen to muster miles of surrounding country for Illawalli. All effort had been without result.

  It was supremely urgent to finalize this case, to secure one, if not more, vital links of the chain he was forging. The evening before he had learned from Dr Knowles that Muriel Markham now was rapidly sinking. Dr Stanisforth had arrived to join forces in the fight to prolong her life. It was the physical condition of Muriel Markham that placed the detective in a dreadful quandary. Should he order the arrest of John Kane without having the proof that Kane was at the head of the conspiracy?

  If he ordered the arrest of John Kane, and despite luck and bluff failed to obtain a confession of complicity, his fine reputation would be blasted. People like John Kane cannot be arrested on flimsy evidence. Morally certain that Kane had been behind the whole matter of the stolen aeroplane, Bony toyed with an idea this early morning—an idea that was nothing less than conscripting his two aboriginal companions, kidnapping the squatter and taking him deep into the bush where means might be found to force a confession from him.

  It was, however, only an idea—an idea he knew to be beyond possibility of being put into practice. It was not that the execution of such an idea would ruin him, but rather that it might prove to be fruitless. Without proof he could not move against the squatter.

  The sun slipped above the horizon, and still Bony crouched and pondered what his next move was to be. Shuteye awoke and called Bill Sikes, and presently they crossed to the fire, their coming arousing Bony to the reality of the new day and the desire for food.

  “You bin sit here orl night, eh?” Shuteye exclaimed with wide eyes. “Now, you buck up, Bony. All thing goodo bimeby.”

  His brain aching, Bony looked up into the big, round, jovial, black face, and then at the other, ugly and scarred, that came into his vision beside the fat one. When he did not speak, Shuteye did.

  “Me, I don’t reckon ole Illawalli run off back home at all. Suppose he was frightened blackfeller when aeroplane came down smasho! At first he run and run, and then bimeby he remember good feller Bony and he stop runnin’. He say: ‘Bony, he fix me up goodo. He gimme plenty tucker and tobaccer.’ Then ole Illawalli, him come look-see ole Bony. P’haps he see homestead, and he tell people he look-see Bony and they telephone.”

  “Well, he has not returned, nor has he got any station people to communicate with us,” Bony pointed out, adding: “And this is the beginning of the third day since he vanished.”

  “P’haps he not run away any time,” Bill Sikes put in. “P’haps he’s hid up somewhere. That Jack Johnson look like he know something. When we were there I talked to him about Illawalli and he keep lookin’ on the ground. Jack Johnson no good feller. He’s crook.”

  “You mean the yardman at Gurner’s Hotel?”

  “Too right! I bet that that Jack Johnson know where ole Illawalli is.”

  “We go find out, eh?” suggested Shuteye. “P’haps Jack Johnson he pretty fine feller and know nothing, but we grab ’im and take ’im away into bush and make him talk, eh?”r />
  Black eyes no longer reflected a humorous soul.

  “Hum! There lies a possibility I have not considered. You should have spoken like this the day before yesterday,” Bony said slowly. Gradually his lack-lustre eyes regained their old keen brightness. He expelled his breath, breathed deeply. He felt as though he was emerging from a dark cavern into brilliant sunlight.

  Self! He had thought only of himself, of his career, of his unblemished reputation. What was all that weighed in the balance against that young woman’s life? It was as air. The fact was that he was becoming old, too cautious, too prone to follow the civil service gutter marked out by red tape. Red tape had never been any assistance to him. Daring and the contempt of established authority, on the other hand, had more than once enabled him to bring to a brilliant close a difficult investigation.

  Still crouched over the fire, he offered no assistance to his companions, who now were preparing the breakfast of johnny-cakes and grilled kangaroo steak. The depression that had enchained his mind was giving way to the growing strength of a clear resolution.

  Bluff! That was it, bluff! He had to bluff! Bluff offered a chance to dig from the ground of obscurity a nugget of fact. Time was on the side of the opposing force, and this was the first of his cases in which it had been. Formerly time had been on his side. Patience had been the chief factor of his success. Patience! He had been too patient!

  The investigation was like a machine he was laboriously building—a machine that would never work until he possessed all the component parts. Well, he would heave a crowbar into the machine, smash it, and then see what parts he had with which to begin again. He would order the arrest of Owen Oliver on suspicion of having destroyed Captain Loveacre’s aeroplane. Oliver might talk, and, if he did not, then he would have to be made to talk. In addition to this move he would search Gurner’s Hotel for Illawalli without the formality of a search warrant. Bluff! It would be a gigantic bluff. He would either smash his career or discover the person who drugged Miss Double M. Into his world of thought entered the pleasing voice of Shuteye.

  “What you do now, Bony?” he asked softly.

  “Throw a seven if you don’t eat your breakfast, Bony, that’s what you’ll be doing,” warned Bill Sikes. “You smoke and smoke and not eat. That no good.”

  Bony looked at them. They were squatting over the small fire eating a johnny-cake held in one hand and a wedge of grilled steak held in the other. His meat and johnnycake they had placed on a plate together with a knife and fork, and into a tin pannikin had been poured strong tea.

  “You are a pair of good lads,” he told them smilingly, and at once their faces brightened. “This day will determine whether I go back to Brisbane as a senior police officer, or I wire to Marie, my wife, to join me and go bush for ever. First we will go to Gurner’s Hotel. Then we will call in at Tintanoo.”

  It was a few minutes after six when they set off for the main road and Gurner’s Hotel. They were bogged four times before getting off the little-used track beside which they had made camp, and it was, therefore, nearly eleven when Bony pulled up outside the wayside hostelry.

  “You two come with me,” directed Bony. “I want you to do just what I tell you, and do it without asking questions.”

  Within the bar they found Gurner alone. He was seated behind the counter, engaged by a newspaper.

  “Hullo, Inspector! Found that nig yet?” Gurner demanded with sarcasm in his throaty voice.

  “Not yet, Mr Gurner. I wish to use your telephone. May I?”

  Mr Gurner slipped off his high-legged chair to raise a counter flap, permitting Bony to reach the wall telephone at that end of the bar.

  “Serve each of my friends with a bottle of lemonade, and draw me a glass of beer,” Bony ordered.

  “It’s against the law to serve aborigines here. Still—lemonade’s all right, I suppose.”

  “I am not respecting the law to-day,” said Bony. “It may be that after to-day you may not be troubled to serve aborigines with anything, Mr Gurner.”

  “What’s that?”

  “One moment, please.” Bony rang, and Miss Saunders’s cool voice replied.

  “Kindly put me through to the police-station,” requested the detective, watching Gurner attending to the drinks. Then, with a palm pressed against the mouthpiece, he said to Bill Sikes: “Go out and bring Jack Johnson here.”

  Wordlessly the aboriginal obeyed. Mr Gurner stared at Bony. Miss Saunders said: “Here you are,” and then Mrs Cox spoke.

  “He is up the street somewhere,” she said in reply to Bony’s inquiry after her husband. “Is it important? Who is speaking?”

  Bony informed her and stressed his wish to speak with the sergeant, whereupon Mrs Cox volunteered to go after him.

  Replacing the telephone receiver, the detective passed to the front of the counter and picked up the glass of beer after pushing lemonade towards Shuteye. Mr Gurner pretended to be interested in his paper—until Bill Sikes returned pushing a reluctant blackfellow before him.

  “You Jack Johnson?” sharply demanded Bony.

  “Too ri’!” assented the yardman. Bony went on:

  “I wanted to tell you a little story, Jack Johnson. There was, not far way, a station homestead where the cat always was having a rough time. It appeared that when the missus nagged the boss he roared at the boss stockman, and the boss stockman snarled at the stockmen, and the stockmen kicked their dogs, and the dogs chased the unfortunate cat. As there was a drought, the cat could not stalk the birds; and take it out of them. Now, Jack Johnson, you are the cat. You are going to get all the kicks and no ha’-pence. I am going to arrest you and take you off to jail.”

  “Whaffor! Whaffor, Bony, boss, Mister Bonaparte? Me done nuthin’. Whaffor me go jail?”

  “Because you are a bad-feller blackfeller,” Bony said mercilessly. “You are the cat, remember. In jail all blackfeller get one big walloping. Do you want me to arrest you and take you to jail?”

  “No, no! Me no wantum!” cried poor Jack Johnson.

  “All right, then. Now you tell me where that blackfeller chief, Illawalli, is.”

  “How in hell does he know that?” interposed Mr Gurner.

  “You are one of the dogs that chased the cat,” Bony told him. “Kindly be silent. Now, Jack Johnson!”

  “He doesn’t know where—”

  “Yes, I do Mister Bony Bonaparte,” yelled Jack Johnson. “I no go jail. I tell you. Ole Illawalli, him down in store cellar.”

  The telephone bell rang sharply.

  “He—he’s lying,” shouted Gurner, pointing at the quaking yardman. “The missing nigger isn’t on my premises, I tell you. If he is, then that black devil sneaked him into my cellar.”

  “Quiet, Mr Gurner. One moment, please,” entreated the detective. “Ah! That you, Sergeant? You know who is speaking? Right! The time has come to act. I want you to go along to the post office and request Mr Watts immediately to relieve Miss Saunders from duty. I understand that Mrs Watts was at one time a telephone operator, so she may be prevailed to take over from Miss Saunders. Please do that. I want Miss Saunders out of that post office in ten minutes. Ring me when she has been relieved.”

  Turning away from the instrument, Bony regarded Gurner with gleaming eyes peering beneath knit brows. Gurner looked most uncomfortable. It was evident that he had no idea why Bony was demanding the removal of the telephone operator at Golden Dawn. Then Bony said softly:

  “You, Bill Sikes, take Shuteye and make Jack Johnson show you where Illawalli is. Bring him here.”

  “I won’t have it,” shouted Mr Gurner violently. “Where’s your warrant?”

  “Permit me to remind you, Mr Gurner, that your premises are open to the police at any time. Permit me also to remind you that your best future policy is to confess all you know about the kidnapping of Illawalli, and of several other matters about which I intend to ask you.”

  The discovery of Illawalli now spurred Bony to the edge of recklessn
ess. In the bar Gurner’s breathing was the only sound. The publican was watching Bony with his little eyes. The detective could see the man’s brain working at high pressure. To them presently came the sound of shuffling feet approaching the bar along the house passage, and then into the bar came Shuteye and Bill Sikes carrying by feet and shoulders the inert figure of an ancient, white-haired aboriginal, who still wore on his head an airman’s flying helmet.

  It was Illawalli.

  “Is he dead?” inquired Bony with icy calm.

  Shuteye laughed. “Ole Illawalli, him drunk.”

  “He was down there in the booze cellar all free to drink what he liked,” supplemented Bill Sikes. “And he liked, too right!”

  “I know nothing about him!” shouted Gurner, springing off his chair to peer over the counter at the figure now lying on the bar-room floor.

  “Jack Johnson, he says Gurner and Mr Kane took old Illawalli down into the cellar,” Sikes explained. “Jack Johnson say Mr Kane brought Illawalli in his car. They took Illawalli down the cellar, and Mr Kane himself say to drink up and stay there before Bony come for him.”

  “Lies! All lies!” cried Gurner violently. “If it ain’t lies—if Mr Kane did put him down my cellar—then he’ll pay for all the grog that nig has swamped! I didn’t know he was down there. I ain’t been there for a week.”

  “Jack Johnson says you and Mr Kane took tucker down to ole Illawalli, and las’ night when ole Illawalli wanted to come up you took him a few Pink-eye gins to keep him drunk,” Bill Sikes continued. “Ain’t that all correct, Jack Johnson?”

  The yardman admitted it with surprising cheerfulness.

  Again the telephone bell rang shrilly.

  “Cox here, Bony. Mr Watts wants to speak.”

  “Very well.”

  “Ah, Mr Bonaparte! W-what’s all this regarding Miss Saunders?” stuttered the postmaster. “Sergeant Cox asks me to suspend from duty the telephone exchange operator, Miss Saunders, but he gives me no grounds for such action. I don’t understand it. Without grounds for action I could not do that. Miss Saunders has always given me satisfaction.”