The Guest of Sam the Blackmailer
AS A MAN, Sam the Blackmailer would never be cast for a screen lover, but as a cook he was superlative… when he liked to exert himself. He was known from one end of the Darling River to the other, and no squatter alive was game enough to offend him, for at the least offence, real or imaginary, a superlative cook would demand his cheque and make post-haste for the nearest pub.
Be it known that cooks are not as plentiful as peas in a pod; they aremore rare than rich squatters who breed Melbourne Cup winners. Sam’s bread and yeast buns were a delight to eat, whilst his pastry simply floated down the throats of men long used tosoddy damper and mutton stews thickened with pure sand.
Sam was tall and thin. His face was as white as his bread, and his unruly, straggly moustache was the colour of beer. When he sat down it seemed that he coiled himself, and when he got up he took an appreciable time to uncoil himself. He had never been known to wear other than white flannel trousers and cotton singlet, and when his great flat feet were thrust into cloth slippers he was the monarch of all he surveyed.
The men’s eating-room at Wattle Creek Station was akin to that on the majority of stations. It was a dining-room cum kitchen combined, and at half past three o’clock it was Sam’s duty to have tea and brownie ready for the hands working about the homestead.
This afternoon he heard a car arrive and stop outside the station office three minutes before the time to call the men. He was about to coil himself upon a petrol case preparatory to peeling the dinner potatoes when he changed his mind and sauntered to the door, there to lean against the frame to observe the well-known figure of Sergeant Marshall being welcomed by Massey Leylan. Bony he did not recognize, but he did see that Bony was not dressed as a policeman, and when his employer and the sergeant went into the office he whistled with his fingers and then beckoned the stranger to him.
His next act was to lurch from the doorpost and amble to the short length of railway iron suspended from a tree branch. This he struck with an iron bar, giving it one terrific clout as though it were his greatest enemy, who needed only the one blow. He was seated at the end of one of the long forms flanking the dining table when Bony entered, followed by several hands.
“Gooddayee, mate. Come and have a drinker tea,” he said to Bony.“Pannikins on the wall there. Tea here in the ruddy pot.”
Bony nodded his thanks, took down a shining tin pannikin, and poured himself tea.
“Sit down, mate,” invited Sam the Blackmailer. “Ain’tneverseen you before. Bushman?”
“Yes. Looking for a job… or was,” replied Bony, helping himself to brownie.
“Cripes!” exclaimed one of the hands. “Ain’tyou the bloke what was run in and made to paint the police station fence?”
“My fame as a painter of police station fences has, apparently, gone out far and wide,” modestly admitted Bony, beaming upon them all.
“Ruddy shame,” snarled Sam the Blackmailer.
“Oh, the work is easy enough, the hours not long,” Bony said lightly. “And I get my meals at the sergeant’s table, and his wife’s a good cook. Plus two bob a day to spend over at the hotel half an hour before closing time. I needed a spell. I’m getting it.”
“I still say it’s a ruddy shame,” persisted the cook. “The ruddygov’ment ought to be made to pay union wages, that’s what Isays. What did they shoot you in for?”
“For several things all at the same time,” Bony replied laughing, and recounted how he had been awakened by the sergeant, and the answers he had given to his questions.
“That’s what old Marshall would do,” asserted a thick-set man, and the cook demanded to know what Marshall was doing here at Wattle Creek.
“To ring up old Jason and ask him to take a truck out to that hut at Sandy Flat for a body that was found hanging from a beam,” Bony answered carelessly. He was lounging over the table and methodically stirring the tea in his pannikin, but he registered the effect of the announcement on each of his hearers. “A swagman hanged himself in that hut last night.”
“So!” Sam the Blackmailer said softly, and his brown eyes seemed unnaturally large. There was complete silence following Sam’s exclamation, broken only by the cawing of crows and the methodical action of an engine pumping water. “Now whatd’youknow about that? Is he a medium-sized bloke, grey hair, getting along for half a century, and dying of consumption?”
Bony nodded.
“How did he do it?” demanded a youth who wore spurs that tinkled like cracked bells every time he moved his kangaroo-hide riding boots.
“Buckled his swag straps together… after making a noose through the buckle of one. Got up on the table, put the noose round his neck, tied the other end to the beam, and stepped off the table. You fellers know him?”
“Can’t say as we know him,” replied Sam the Blackmailer. “He was here last night having his dinner.”
“He was over at the hut afterwards,” supplemented the youth.
“That’s right,” agreed the thickset man. “Meand Johnny was pitching to him for a coupler hours.”
“Where did he come from, did he say?” Bony asked.
“Said something about having come out of the ’ospitalat the Hill,” answered the youth. “Come to think of it, he didn’t give much away about himself, did he, Harry?”
The thickset man agreed. Bony spoke, softly, indifferently. “He must have left this homestead pretty late last night. What time did you see him last?”
“He left our hut about ten. He was camped up at the wool-shed,” volunteered Johnny.“Never saidanythink about going on that night. Come to think of it, he passed through here some time back. Don’t you remember, Sam?”
“Can’t say as I do,” replied the cook.
“Anyway, he’s dead now,” Bony put in. “He made a very good job of himself.”
“Ruddy shame-bloke likethat being on the tramp,” snarled the cook.
“Might sooner be on tramp in freedom than penned up in a hospital,” remarked an elderly man. “Hospitals are good places to be out of.”
“I remember-” began Johnny, and then cut off.
Sam the Blackmailer glared at him.
“Well, whatd’you ruddy well remember?”
“About that swagman. He nevercome through here like I thought. I seen ’imover at Ned’s Swamp that time me and Jack Lock went over there to fetch them horses. Yes, that’s where I seen ’imbefore.”
“Ned’s Swamp is a run on the other side of the Walls, isn’t it?” inquired Bony, who knew it quite well.
“Yes. Me and Lock went over to the homestead-sixteen miles across. That’s where I seen that swagman. I remember, too, when that was. It was three days before George Kendall was murdered. Funny!”
“What’s ruddy funny?” growled the cook.
“George Kendall was murdered six or seven weeks ago and thatswaggy told us he’d been in hospital for the last three months. Didn’t he, Harry?”
“He did so.”
“Must have beenwanderin ’ in his ruddy mind,” asserted Sam. “Must ’ave’ad a lot on ’is mind last night when he was here, to go and ’ang’imselflike that.”
“He didn’t seem to haveanythink on his mind when he was talking to us, did he, Harry?”
“No,” replied the thickset man. “He did not. He was cheerful enough. Talked about going down toMelbun for Christmas. Got a sister down there. Didn’t-”
“Cripes, now!” almost shouted the youthful Johnny.
“Don’t let it ruddy well ’urtcher,” urged the unsmiling cook. “And look at the time. The ruddy boss will be sacking the lot of you if you don’t do a get back to work.”
Johnny’s eyes were big, expanded by the idea in his brain, and he had either to get it out or explode. He said, when on his way to the door and back to his work:
“I wonder if that swagman killed old Kendall, and then had to go back to the scene of ’is crime? Then he got overcome by remorse and did ’imselfin.”
The thickset man chuckled.
“You might be right, Johnny me lad, but don’t go gabbing about it to the police,” he advised, winking at Sam. “Besides, blokes these days don’t hang themselves through remorse. You been reading too many of them murder mysteries. You stick to the sporting news in future.”
“Kendall!” exclaimed Bony with raised brows. “Was Kendall killed in that hut?”
“Too ruddy right he was,” asserted the cook. “He was bashed about, somethink awful. His blood was all over the place, wasn’t it, George?”
The elderly man nodded and stroked his grey moustache with the stem of his pipe.
“All over the floor, anyway,” he corrected. “It was the boss and me who found him. Wewas going farther out, away across the Walls that day, and we called in at Sandy Flat with rations for Kendall.”
“The police never got anyone for the crime, did they?” asked Bony.
“No, they didn’t, and theyain’t likely to now. A d. came out from Sydney, but he didn’t dono good-leastways it never came out,” cut in Sam the Blackmailer. “There was a bit of a blue at the social and dance the night before, and Kendall was mixed up in it. It seems that Kendall pushed Rose Marie, the sergeant’s daughter, and young Jason took aholt of ’imand marched him outside. They had a fight afterwards. You seen ’im?”
“Young Jason? Yes. He doesn’t say much.” The remaining men left for their work, and Bony asked: “What kind of a man was Kendall to work with?”
Sam gazed straight into Bony’s blue eyes, paused before saying:
“There are some blokes whatwasborned to be husband of a nagging wife. Thereis other blokes what wasborned to have sixteen kids. And there are some blokes which areborned to be murdered. Kendall wasborned to be murdered. The surprising thing is that he was murdered so late in life.”
“You don’t say,” Bony observed.
“I do say. By rights Kendall ought to have been murdered when ’e was much younger… say about two days old,” proclaimed the cook. “Kendall was justnatcherly a nasty bit of work. He never could say a good word for anyone. Australia ’as the best Labourgov’ment what ever lived, and Kendall didn’t even have a good word for it, let alone local man, woman or child. We ’ere was all very glad when the boss sent ’imout to Sandy Flat.”
“How often did they take Kendall out his rations?” Bony asked without apparent interest.
“Every month. Why?”
“Just thinking I might ask the boss here for a job. A man out at Sandy Flat would kill his own meat?”
“Of course. There was ration sheep in the yards when Kendall was murdered. Everyone was so excited at Kendall being flattened that them sheep was forgotten for nigh a week. Three of them there was. They reckoned that Kendallmusta got ’emyarded just before he went to town that evening, ’costhere was a full carcass in the safe. Having killed one, he ought to have let the others go. Mustaforgot.”
“Well… well… and now he’s dead. And now that swagman is dead in the same hut. Don’t you think it funny that swagman left here in the middle of the night to tramp to Sandy Flat?”
“Come to think of it, I do,” agreed Sam the Blackmailer.
“How long was he here? Any idea?” persisted Bony.
“Yes, I know that one. He arrived the afternoon before and camped in the woolshed. He called in here when wewas having dinner. I give ’ima handout.”
“If it was roaring hot weather, he could be expected to travel at night. But why go to Sandy Flat? There’s no public road past that well and hut, is there?”
“There’s no public road, but there is a track what begins againt’other side of the Walls, a track that goes on over to Ned’s Swamp homestead.”
“So actually that swagman spent a full day here?”
“Yes. That’s so, mate.”
“What road’s this place on?”
“On the road toPooncaira. Dry track, too. There’s another road what branches off just north of the woolshed what goes to Ivanhoe. You worrying about getting a job?”
“Not exactly,” Bony said carelessly. “Went down to Melbourne and went broke. You know, pawned a watch for me fare up to Mildura, and I’d like a couple of months’ work somewhere.”
“Ask the boss. He’ll put you on.”
“I will. Want to write a letter, too, when I get back. When does the mail go out?”
“Went through here yesterday. Left Merino yesterday. Won’t be another tillSat’day.” Sam uncoiled himself and clawed at the table to get himself to his feet. He stood then, looking down at Bony, and he said paternally:
“Don’t you go taking a job out at SandyFlat. That’s no ruddy place for no ’umanbeing, what with a murder and a suicide being done there.”
“I wouldn’t loseno sleep over it if I did go there,” Bony stated, getting to his feet. “Suppose I’d better get back to the car. Thanks for the lunch. See you sometime.”
“Yep. In the ruddy pub, prob’ly. Hoo-roo!”
On leaving Sam the Blackmailer, Bony walked back to the car, and then strolled along the creek bank to the woolshed and shearing shed, a quarter of a mile distant. He came first to thewoolshed, now empty of wool, its great doors wide open, and before them a makeshift fireplace.
There was no one within. He stood for a moment in the doorway, surveying the dim interior. It was cool within and smelled of wool in the raw. On one side were two hydraulic presses; along the other was a stack of wool tables.
Before going in he walked over to the fireplace, knelt, and felt the white wood ashes with the back of his hand and found them cold. He saw Sergeant Marshall and the squatter crossing from the house gate to the men’s quarters, and he guessed the sergeant would be making his inquiries concerning the dead swagman. Sam the Blackmailer was a certainty for the inquest the next day.
Knowing that he still had time at his disposal, Bony entered the woolshed, glanced at the inside of the heavy door posts, and eventually reached a far corner where three sheepskins lay side by side, obviously placed there to form a mattress. He lifted up each one. Nothing lay beneath them. Nothing had been left by the dead man… if there was to be excluded a half-completed game of noughts and crosses drawn in chalk on the nearer of the twowoolpresses.