Boomerang

by Sydney J. Bounds

  They were fascinated by Jim Fletcher’s reminiscences—all except George Bullard.

  He sneered. “It must be the black blood in you. I expect your grandfather slept with an aborigine.”

  “I expect he did,” Fletcher said. “But these days, the abos have another problem. Their kids sniff petrol, and that can be deadly.”

  He drained his glass and began to sing in an exaggerated accent:

  “We three Kings of Bankstown Square

  We sell ladies underwear

  So fantastic

  No elastic

  Only a dollar a pair....”

  Bullard picked up his easel and paint-box. “I’m not stopping here to listen to a drunken slob.”

  “It’s time you were all back at work,” Keith Parry said.

  Margo Nicholas toiled slowly up the hill on the way to the studio with Sammy. Her sketching bag felt heavier than it had on the way down that morning.

  “Let’s stop at the tea-rooms for a cuppa,” Sammy suggested.

  “I think we’d better,” she said. “I hadn’t realized Cornwall was like this. It’s going to kill me if we have to walk up this hill every day.”

  “There is a bus,” Sammy said. “I’ll find out what time it runs.”

  “Sounds like a good idea.” Margo wondered if he was getting interested in her. She quite liked the little man, and her stars indicated a new romance.

  They reached the cottage in the bend of the road and took an outside table, dropping their gear beside their chairs.

  “Nice view of the harbour from here,” Sammy said.

  Margo kicked off her sandals and wiggled her toes. “Am I glad to rest my feet?” She lit a cigarette, inhaled, and sighed. “My clothes are sticking to me. The first thing I do when we get back is to take a bath.”

  The waitress arrived and Sammy said, “Two strawberry teas, with extra cream.”

  “I shouldn’t really.” Margo protested.

  “Nonsense. All this walking will keep you in trim. Anyway, I prefer a woman with something to get hold of.”

  Sammy propped his small canvas against a spare chair and looked glumly at it. “Not exactly an old master.”

  Margo said loyally, “It’s not that bad. After all, this is our first day, and you’ll improve with practice. I must say, Keith is very helpful.”

  “He’s all right. How did you get on?”

  Margo flipped open her sketchbook as their tea arrived.

  “That’s great,” Sammy enthused. “Wish I had your talent.”

  “We each do what we can.” Margo helped herself liberally to cream and popped a strawberry into her mouth.

  “I like boats,” Sammy said. “Only I can’t draw very well. And this is a good place for boats...there’s only one fly in the ointment.”

  “I know what you mean. George.”

  A fire blazed up in Sammy’s eyes. “A ruddy Jew-baiter! And an artist—I’d never have believed it.”

  Margo helped herself to more cream. “Forget him. These strawberries are lovely, Sammy—eat up. I’m psychic, and I’ve a feeling about George. No good will come to him, I’m sure.”

  George Bullard stood outside the front porch at Porthcove Studios just before dinner and watched young Linda walk across the lawn towards him. He had been studying a flowering shrub and deciding in his mind how he would paint it.

  Linda Snow wore tight-fitting jeans and a teeshirt and her walk had a sensuous hip-swinging style. Duke didn’t know what he had there, Bullard thought; it took a mature man to appreciate this girl.

  “Hi, beautiful,” he said as she approached. “How about posing in the nude? You’d make a great model and this outdoor sketching isn’t really me.”

  She stared blankly at him. “Pardon?”

  “We’ll make up a kitty to pay you something. I’m sure all the men would chip in.”

  Linda tossed her blonde hair. “Get lost!”

  A hand gripped him from behind and swung him around. Bullard saw Duke Dickson, his face contorted in fury.

  “Keep your hands off my girl-friend, or I’ll kill you!”

  “You, and whose army?”

  Duke balled his hand into a fist and slammed it into Bullard’s stomach. As he doubled over in pain, Duke’s arm lifted to strike again. But before the blow could land, someone gripped his arm.

  “Cool it,” Keith Parry said.

  “Yeah, cool it,” Linda echoed. “I can look after myself.”

  “You know I don’t like you playing around with other blokes, Linda.” Duke allowed himself to relax, then shrugged. “Okay, but if George takes one more step out of line, I’ll flatten him.”

  Parry released Duke and helped Bullard upright. “You really should think before you open your mouth. George.”

  Duke stared thoughtfully at Parry as the tutor helped Bullard into the house.

  “That Mr. Keith now, he looks a bit of a poof, but he’s got a grip all right. Of course, he took me by surprise.”

  “Of course,” Linda said sarcastically. “Now can we drop this macho stuff?”

  Sammy Jacobi and Fletcher were watching, with quiet amusement, as Margo read the tarot cards on the writing table in the common room. She was telling Linda’s fortune.

  “I see trouble in your life. It will come quite soon—but it will pass, and I see unity with your beloved.”

  After dinner, Parry had suggested they relax for an evening. This, after all, was a holiday and not intended to be all work.

  The armchairs were deep and comfortable, there was a selection of light reading in the bookcase and a film showing on the television.

  George Bullard strolled in.

  “The gypsy’s warning,” he said contemptuously. “That old con game—I didn’t think anyone fell for that line any more. Crystal balls, seances and table-turning. Nothing but a bag of tricks—talk about getting money under false pretences.”

  “No money is involved,” Sammy said. “Linda asked Margo to read the cards for her.”

  “That’s right,” Linda said. “It’s only a game really. Everyone reads what the stars foretell in the newspapers, don’t they?”

  “I don’t,” Bullard sneered.

  “Perhaps you should,” Margo said quietly. “Perhaps it might change your attitude if you knew what was in store for you.”

  “Rubbish!” Bullard sniffed the air. “My God, woman, do you bathe in that cheap scent? Try soap and water.”

  “Excuse me, Linda.”

  Margo Nicholas leaned forward, brass bangles jangling, and seized Bullard’s wrist. She stared intently into his palm and spoke in a mystic tone.

  “I see...I see a deal of unpleasantness. First it moves out from you...a dark cloud obscuring your lifeline. Then it returns, like a boomerang.”

  Bullard jerked his hand away from her as if scalded. He scowled, and blustered, “A lot of rubbish.”

  He opened the hall door and paused in the doorway. “Jim, I’m going down to the inn for a drink. Care to join me?”

  Fletcher said solemnly, “Sorry mate, but you know I don’t drink.”

  Bullard went out, slamming the door, and Linda giggled.

  “Damn,” Fletcher said. “I intended to go out for a drink later. I don’t suppose there’s another pub within miles.”

  Margo looked at Linda, her expression grave. “It’s nothing to laugh at child. I truly am psychic.”

  Sammy said, “If I made a habit of murdering people, George would be my favourite corpse.”

  * * * *

  The Harbour Inn was not busy when George Bullard pushed open the door and walked in. The landlord, plump and bespectacled, polished glasses behind a bar lit by ships’ lanterns. A few locals played dominoes under hanging fishnets decorated with blue-green glass floats.

  In a corner seat, Wilfred Keller and his wife sat having a quiet drink.

  “That dreadful man is here,” Hilda said in a carrying voice.

  Bullard smiled as he headed straight for them.

/>   “Saw your sketch today, Wilf, old boy.” There was condescension in his voice. “Not bad, not bad at all. If you want my advice—” Hilda Keller rose to her feet and said loudly, “My husband does not require instruction from you. He is a great artist.”

  “Not that great,” Bullard said. “Not as good as me, in fact.”

  “Come. Wilfred.”

  Hilda swept majestically past Bullard, hand on her husband’s arm, steering him towards the staircase leading up to their private room.

  Bullard watched them go, laughing, then called out, “Goodnight, horse-face—goodnight, lap-dog!”

  He strolled to the bar.

  “Whisky, landlord, a double. No watering it now, and no short-changing me.”

  “I shouldn’t keep my customers if I did that, sir.”

  Bullard stood at the bar counter, sipping his drink. A few feet away, a man wearing a blue jersey that smelled of fish watched him steadily.

  The man moved closer and asked in accented English; “You are, perhaps, a painter, m’sieur?”

  “I am a painter,” Bullard agreed. “And you’re a damned Frog!”

  He swallowed his whisky and walked towards the door.

  The French fisherman stared after him.

  CHAPTER THREE

  MISS EATON AGREES

  Wilfred and Hilda Keller were taking lunch in the dining room of the Harbour Inn. The tablecloth was white and starched, the glasses sparkled in a beam of sunlight, and the cutlery gleamed.

  When the door opened. Hilda said, “Oh, dear—one of your party has just come in.”

  Wilfred glanced around. “It’s not George. Jim’s all right.”

  Fletcher crossed to them, smiling easily. “G’day, mate. Nice to meet you, Mrs. Keller. Thought I’d have a change from sandwiches today—d’you mind if I join you?”

  “Take a seat,” Wilfred invited.

  “What’s on the menu?”

  “We’re having the fish,” Mrs. Keller said. “It’s caught locally, and I always think it makes such a difference to the flavour when it’s fresh.”

  As the waitress appeared, Fletcher ordered. “I’ll take fish—and a pint of lager to go with it.” He turned to Wilfred and made a face. “I got stuck with George—that bloke gives me the needle.”

  “An oaf,” Hilda remarked.

  “Not a pleasant type,” Wilfred said absently, glancing through his sketchbook.

  “D’you mind if I take a look?”

  “Of course not, Jim.”

  Fletcher turned the pages slowly, studying each charcoal sketch in turn.

  “Yeah, you’ve got something all right. I was admiring your pastel of a rock formation yesterday, and I said to myself, that bloke’s got it.”

  “He’s very good,” Hilda purred, while Fletcher paused at a black-and-lndigo study of some fishermen’s cottages. “Nice, very nice. “D’you sell much of your work. Wilfred? Ever had a West End showing?”

  “Only when my wife’s paid for it.”

  “I was happy to do that,” she said quickly.

  Fletcher drank his lager as the fish arrived. “What you need is an agent. Someone to push your work—make a name. After that, it’s easy.”

  Hilda Keller paused over her food. “You seem to know something about it, Mr.—?”

  “Fletcher’s the name. Yeah, I suppose I do—there’s no point in false modesty. I’ve been at it a few years, talking on radio, demonstrating on telly, all around the world. Say, I might be able to fix something for Wilfred. Give him a hand, like....”

  * * * *

  In the kitchen at Porthcove Studios, Joyce Willis, the cook, flushed with anger as she prepared dinner with Val’s assistance.

  “That Bullard person’s never satisfied, is he? No matter what the menu says, he wants steak when we serve fish, and curry when lamb’s on. I don’t know why you let him get away with it, Mrs. Courtney, I really don’t. He’s a pain in the neck.”

  Joyce slammed down a saucepan on the stainless steel table.

  “Yes, well,” Val said mildly. “I might agree with you—in private—but he is paying, you know. And we do try to give satisfaction.”

  Joyce sniffed expressively.

  “Satisfaction, is it? That one? Never! No matter what you put in front of him, he’ll want something different. No matter what I cook special for him, he’ll complain. You ought to send him packing, that’s what. I hear things, you know—he’s upsetting everybody.”

  She chopped onions rapidly with a sharp knife.

  “Mind your fingers,” Val said. “Just try to stay calm.” She sighed, and wished she could send George Bullard packing.

  George Bullard moved quietly along the passage in the annexe towards the room that Linda shared with Duke Dickson. Lucky man, he thought enviously; too young to know what he’d got there, too young to appreciate her.

  He’d seen her arrive back from the harbour and heard her splashing about in the bathroom, but he wasn’t sure if Duke was in their room or not. Nothing ventured, nothing seen, he told himself.

  He paused with his ear against the door. He heard small movements but no voices. He turned the handle and opened the door without knocking.

  Linda lay on the bed wearing a pair of bikini pants and smoking a cigarette. When she saw him, she put out her tongue.

  “That’s rude,” he said.

  A voice came from behind the door. “Seen all you want, you dirty old man?”

  Bullard flushed. “I just came to see—”

  “I know what you came to see,” Duke said contemptuously. “You can look, and that’s all you can do. Now beat it.”

  He gave Bullard the finger.

  As Bullard closed the door and went back to his own room, he heard Linda laughing.

  The air was still warm and scented with blossom. The sky was cloudless. Margo and Sammy strolled side by side in the grounds of the studio after dinner.

  “I’m beginning to wish I’d never come,” Sammy said gloomily. “George never lets up, does he?”

  Margo made a rude noise.

  “Ignore him, Sammy. If you let him see he’s getting you down, he won’t stop. Ignore him and he’ll get tired of baiting you and go away.”

  “I wish he would. Permanently.”

  They walked slowly in a companionable silence, then Margo said. “It’s not only George. It’s this heat wave—we’re just not used to this kind of weather. Everyone’s on edge.”

  They circled the goldfish pond set in the lawn and admired the roses. Margo was looking thoughtful.

  “Penny for them,” Sammy said.

  “Do you sometimes wonder about Jim?”

  “The Aussie? He seems all right.”

  “I wonder about him. He tells a good story, but doesn’t he lay it on a bit too thick? I wonder if he’s really been outback.”

  “It’s a thought,” Sammy agreed. “But does it matter? Where’s the harm?”

  Val Courtney relaxed in a comfortable chair in the private sitting room upstairs. She sipped at a glass of white wine and Mozart played softly in the background. Her husband, Reggie, sat opposite, cupping a tumbler of whisky.

  It was what they called the quiet hour, before going to bed, when they could forget the day’s cares and unwind. But not tonight.

  Keith Parry paced restlessly up and down the carpet between them, waving his arms dramatically.

  “I’m fed up with Bullard, I tell you. He’s upsetting the students and ruining my course.” His voice rose shrilly. “The only time I can get any teaching done is when he’s not around. When he’s there, he destroys the friendly feeling I try to build up with the party.”

  Reggie sipped his whisky. “A nasty piece of work, all right. Luckily I don’t have much to do with him, but I’ve heard him a couple of times.”

  Parry shuddered.

  “I get him all the time. He’s a menace, and I’m not sure I can take much more. He poisons the atmosphere.”

  “Oh, I expect you’ll manage, Keith
. You usually do.” Val forced a smile. “You’ve had difficult students before.”

  “Difficult, yes. But no one like Bullard—he’s impossible. I swear he enjoys making trouble. I’m convinced he came here only to cause trouble.”

  “That’s going a bit far, isn’t it?” Reggie protested. “I mean, he wouldn’t know anyone before he arrived, would he?”

  Parry stopped pacing to brood. “He might. I don’t know. I thank my lucky stars I’ve never encountered him before. He’s a sadist—I’ve never had such an unhappy week.”

  Val said, “He’s managed to upset Joyce as well. If she leaves, we’re really in trouble.”

  Parry began to pace up and down again, then turned to face her. The Mozart recording came to an end and his high-pitched voice sounded twice as loud in the silence.

  “You’re the brains of this outfit, Val. It’s up to you. You’ve got to do something to stop him, or this studio is finished!”

  * * * *

  Miss Isabel Eaton sat in a swivel chair with her feet on the desk and contemplated her legs below the hem of a brightly coloured dirndl skirt. They reminded her of a pair of hockey sticks.

  She poured liquid from a square bottle labelled Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey into a tumbler and sipped. The label was genuine.

  At her back, the window was wide open and the dust and heated air and traffic noises of Grays Inn Road came in. Her small office on the third floor smelt of stale cigarette smoke, and the building cleaners had firm instructions not to disturb the layer of dust on a rusting green filing cabinet.

  A cigarette burnt itself out in a metal ashtray. Miss Eaton didn’t much care for smoking but it helped the image she was trying to build up. There was a cigarette burn on the desk and the metal waste bin, ex-army supplies like the filing cabinet, overflowed with junk mail. Everything about the shabby office was a pose.

  She picked up a much-thumbed copy of Death Wears Red Garters, a favourite Sam Pike novel, and read:

  A man came through the door with a gun in his hand. It was a big .45 automatic. There was a streak of red flame and a slug blasted over my head.

  Suddenly there was the smell of fear in the room, like sludge from a sewer.

  I dived across the blonde on the bed—she was a genuine blonde, I noticed in passing—and slammed into the mobster. He bounced off the wall and slumped to the floor....