The Lucky Man
THEsun rose with a bound and looked at them suspiciously. From somewhere centre of the Nullarbor to its western edgelay six narrow shadows, and a seventh which petered out at about a mile. The seventh shadow was cast by Lucy.
There was no wind. No clouds. The air was cool, and there were no flies. It was one of those days when you wonder what the heck you are doing just where day found you. You wake, you stand up, and there you are. You wonder where you came from and where you are going. But the point is that if you are going anywhere at all, it will be by way of your sore feet which are somewhere at the end of your aching legs.
Bony inspected not detectives, but a bedraggled and dejected squad. He had to refasten Maddoch’s blanket roll, and retie Myra’s blanket shoe, and sling the half-empty water drum to sit comfortably into the small of his back. The squad wanted to remain there for several hours. Maddoch urged the return to the caverns.
“We are heading for a large depression named Bumblefoot Hole,” was Bony’s bait, “where there is water, plenty of it, and stores I left on my way north. We can camp there for a week if necessary. Now we have to keep moving because our only water supply is diminishing. So, come on!”
The girl followed after him, and Brennan again was the rear link. Presently, Brennan began: “Left, right, left, right, left… left… left.” That helped quite a lot, and when Myra broke into ‘Tipperary’ and all joined in, it was better still. At the end of the first hour, their spirits had risen, to sink again when they realised that the rest-halt was exactly the same as the breakfast camp, only there were no empty tins or fire ash. And at the next halt they merely halted. Company awaited them at the third hour’s halt-a colony of jerboa rats.
Here they made a fire and brewed a half-billy of tea, and Bony did his best to interest them in the habits of this rodent bearing the scientific name ofLeporillus. Their houses were different in size and shape, but all were expertly constructed of woven bush, and all but two had roofs weighted with stones to defy the wind.
Jenks banged the side of his foot against a house, and Brennan removed the stones from the roof of another, when out sped a rodent of the size of a common rat, leaping in hops, its long hind legs and short fore-legs giving it the appearance of the genuine marsupial.
Bony allowed two hours’ rest. Maddoch and Myra lay face down, pressing their eyes into their arms to defeat the flies, which were not really vicious. Only Lucy was happy. She snuffled at the rats’ houses, and Brennan laughed uproariously when a rat bolted from the back door of one and a rabbit fled through the front door, and Lucy couldn’t make up her mind which to chase.
Jenks was the most restless. He stood often to gaze at thePlain, eyes small, lips betraying nervous reaction to something his mind could not accept.
“How far we come today?” asked Riddell. “Only seven blasted miles! And half the day gone! We onlydoin ’ fourteen miles a day?”
“We should cover more when we become hardened, Joe.” Bony said.
“Howjaknow we done seven miles?” pressed the big man.
“By the sun we have walked for three separate hours. Walking speed of the normal man unencumbered is two and a half miles to the hour. As we are all encumbered and weary, I am being generous in estimating our speed at only a fraction under the two and a half.”
“Then how far are we from them caverns?”
“About forty miles.”
“And how far to this Bumblefoot Holeyou beentellin ’ us about?”
“I cannot say with any degree of accuracy, Joe. I am hoping it will be a little less than fifty miles.”
“So!” Riddell pondered.“Oughtado it on our heads.”
“Of course we’ll do it. And another hundred miles beyond Bumblefoot Hole. Were you doubtful?”
“Well…”
“We’ll get there,” he was assured, and noting the glint in the blue eyes, he turned to gaze with Jenks at the absence of scenery.
“Think we bluffed theabos?” asked Brennan, sitting with Bony.
“I’ll be more confident of that, say, tomorrow night. It’s quite possible, youknow, that they may never discover our departure. Having visited us the other day, they could think we were safe enough, and go off on their own affairs for several weeks. Think you could also carry Myra’s swag this afternoon?”
“Sure!” drawled Brennan.“Anything to help a lady. Let’s get going.”
Left… right… left. Nothing to look at. The endless shuffle of left foot… right foot… left foot. Eyes front and directed to the heels of the man ahead. Sing! To hell with singing. Talk! What’s the use? Daydream of city lights, of wallowing in beer, of a feast of women! Lights and beer and women! What in hell are they? Saltbush and jerboa rats! Crawling like lice on a two-bob bit! Better to have stayed with old doc in those caverns where there’s water and no flies, no need to think, only listen to old doc’s stories. Ruddy fool to take on this.
It was after four o’clock when Bony saw a shadow where none should be, a black line some five hundred yards to the right. He veered towards it, and hope was born, grew to maturity when the shadow thickened, and he saw whatwas a miniature Bumblefoot Hole.
Lucy ran on and disappeared, and presently they stood at the lip of a shelving bank, ending in a rocky floor sloping to the foot of a cliff at the far side. There were the shadows-of small eaves. There werea dozen old-man saltbush offering real wood instead of light brush, a fire to bake bread. If only water!
“Looks good to me,” cried Mark Brennan. “A hole’s better than all of this Plain.”
Bony agreed, and turned to share their relief. His brows straightened in a swift frown. His eyes narrowed as their glance swept over the Plain. Sharply he asked:
“Where’s Maddoch?”
They looked at each other, then down at the saltbush into the small depression less than half an acre in extent.
“When I looked back about half an hour ago, Maddoch was walking ahead of you, Jenks. What happened to Maddoch?”
The sailor’s eyes opened wide, despite the flies. He regarded Bony as though being asked the most ridiculous question. He glanced at Myra Thomas: he gazed all about him, his jaw slack.
“Cliff!” he exclaimed. “He was in front of me at that. Where’s he got to? I don’t know. Must be down there. Must have got ahead of us without seeing him.”
“You hit him with a rock or something?” mildly enquiredBrennan, and the subtlety of the suggestion didn’t even register.
Bony focused the picture he had seen when last he had looked back. They had not been strictly in line of file, but Maddoch was certainly of the number of those who followed his lead. Everyone was walking with face down and shoulders humped under the load carried. It was probable, almost certain, that Jenks and Brennan who came after him had at the same time been mentally occupied elsewhere than on the Nullarbor Plain, and could, therefore, easily have failed to notice Maddoch drop out.
“He’s gone back to the caverns,” guessed the girl.“Said he wanted to. The idiot.”
“Ought to see him,” shouted Jenks, staring to the east, and Brennan agreed, although he gazed to the west, and Riddell, catching the idea, looked to the north.
Bony was sure he could see any object within three miles, as high as Maddoch stood. Half an hour back, when he had seen Maddoch with the party, they were about a mile, or a little more, from this place where he was missed.
Assuming that Maddoch had dropped out without being seen, and having the intention of returning to the caverns, he would start walking to the north, simply because it was opposite to the line ofmarch. But not for long would he continue northwards. Within minutes he would veer to the left or the right, according to which leg was longer than the other.
There being no natural objects to guide him, to lure him, he would inevitably walk in a circle, the problem being how far would Maddoch walk before making a halt, after which he would set off on another circle.
That he, Bony, could see a walking man clearly for three miles meant little on this tricky Plain, where distance is distorted, and sound judgment not possible.
“You must camp and I’ll go back to look for him.” Bony led the way down to the floor of the hole. They helped to make a fire, and then Bony, noticing that Lucy’s muzzle was wet, found a rock-hole half-filled with water, and covered with green slime.
“You may use this water sparingly to wash with,” he said, “but not to drink unless first boiled. Brennan, I am placing the drum of clean water in your charge. You see that bush?”
“Yes.”
“If I am not back by sun-rise tomorrow, make a fire under it. Make a smoke. Understand?”
“Yes, but… you can’t leave us like this. What’ll we do if you can’t find your way back?”
“Yes, what’ll we do, Inspector?” echoed Jenks.“If Maddoch chooses to clear out, let him go. He’saskin ’ for what he gets.”
“Too right! Too ruddy right!” snarled Riddell. “Let him rot.”
Bony stared at each man, stared them down.
“Leave Maddoch. I can’t leave Maddoch. I don’t yet know who murdered Mitski, and I’m taking Mitski’s murderer all the way.”
It is said that a man spends his life struggling to return to the protection of the womb, and it was this impulse which drove the little man who loved peace and security to seek the mother he had lost when as a small child he was left, sensitive and alone. He married, not the comforter, the protective mother, but a shrew, and the climax of the tragedy was inevitable.
For Maddoch first the legal jail and then detention in the caverns had provided protection from the raw world he had feared. Although he would never admit it, even to himself, the period spent in jail had been the happiest of his life, and that spent in the Nullarbor caverns had given much in compensation for the unnecessary crudities. The craving for protection afforded by the known caverns had reached its peak when gazing upon the tiny houses of the jerboa rats.
Inspector Bonaparte wouldn’t turn back, so he decided he must slip away and seek the warm comfort and safety of those caverns where there were no flies, no glaring sun, no torturing left, right, left, right.
Gradually he edged himself out of the line; slowly he fell back, the last two men passing without lifting their heads. For a moment he stood watching them. Then he realised that at any moment the leader might see him standing there like a fool. Down he went to sprawl amid the saltbush, to lie still.
Then he was running. The run became a trot, the trot a hurried walk. He glanced backward. The party had vanished. He was free to walk on and on to where Dr. Havant waited. Dr. Havant would be so pleased to see him, so happy to hear that Clifford Maddoch couldn’t bear to think of the doctor being so alone, and had come back to keep him company.
Presently he was conscious that the sun had disappeared. H’m! Must have come a long way. Can’t be much farther to go. He tripped and fell hard on his chest, scrambled up and gazed about with bovine curiosity for what had snared his foot.
However, it wasn’t so important, and he had yet to find Dr. Havant. The evening brought the horizon closer, and it was so quiet that he could hear the soft swish when a foot brushed a bush. Then it was suddenly moonlight, and he knew he must be close to the caverns for he had crawled from the caverns into the moonlight.
Following this thought a sound far away came rushing upon him, engulfing him within a voice that screamed. He didn’t recognise the cry of the brolga.
He was lying on the ground. He could feel the cool touch of saltbush under his face. He was running; he knew he was running; knew he was crawling on hands and knees, was certain he was drawing nearer and nearer to the little hole down which he would crawl to Dr. Havant. That little hole! Maddoch shrieked with mirth. His wife would never be able to crawl into that little hole. She was too big, too damn big, the screamingbitch.
The moon was up there, too. For a long time he gazed at her, but the moon persisted in moving so that he had to turn his head when it was painful to do so. Blast the moon! He closed his eyes and the moon was gone, and it was daylight. He was looking along his arm. He could see his hand resting on the ground, palm upward. And beyond his hand stood a kangaroo, cleaning its face with a paw, like a cat.
A kangaroo! Perhaps Dr. Havant would know how to kill it and they could eat its tail. Kangaroo soup was a luxury for sure. Once he had tasted some at a dinner somewhere. The kangaroo took no notice of him, didn’t see him. That’s funny! The kangaroo came and sniffed at his finger-tips. Well, now! How extraordinary! The kangaroo actually jumped up and now sat right on his hand.
It was perfect from nose to tail. The colour of its coat was fawn and there was a tiny streak of white down its soft warm belly. Maddoch, with strange violence, closed his hand and imprisoned the kangaroo.
Sitting up without opening hishand, and this was done with spasmodic effort, Maddoch gazed at the tail of the prisoner and chuckled gleefully at the prize he would present to the lonely Havant. He tried to stand, failed, and tried again, continuing to hold the kangaroo in his closed hand. A foot appeared in front of him, and he looked up to see his wife. He opened his mouth to scream, and the woman became Inspector Bonaparte, who said:
“A pair of giant compasses would not have drawn a better circle for me to follow than you did with your feet, Clifford. Come along, now. Get up, and we’ll find the camp where there’ll be coffee waiting, and something to eat.”
An arm lifted him. He knew his burning feet were dragging.
“Where were you when Mitski was killed, Clifford?” the persuasive voice asked, and only after many attempts to speak did he say:
“Coming from the Jeweller’s Shop, Inspector. I saw him near the boulder.”
“You didn’t kill him, did you?”
“No. How could I? I wasn’t…”
“Of course not, Clifford. Now lift your feet and help a little. We haven’t far to go. Out on the Nullarbor Plain so bright, we’re so happy we could be tight. I’ll help you and you’ll help me, and we’ll go forward with hearts of glee. Didn’t know I am a poet, did you?”
“I… I want to find the caverns and the doctor, Inspector.”
“Not now, Clifford. We’re on the Nullarbor. Not in, but on Australia, the real Australia known by the aborigines, the old time sundowners, the stockmen and waifs like us. For people in cars who follow the roads, for politicians who come inland only when winter coolness is here, Australia puts on a disguise. You and I see Australia without anydisguise, see Australia as it really is. You have a great deal to be joyful about.
“Come on, lift your feet. That’s better. You will come to love Australia, as I do. You have to get down on your stomach, press your face into the sand and against the hot gibbers, smell the land and feel through your empty belly its closeness toyou, woo it with a voice clogged by the lack of saliva. And then, Clifford, as with many men, this naked fair Australia will become the great love of your life.”
How far! What was that the Inspectorsaid. What?
“What have you in your hand, Clifford? Show me.”
A blessedhalt, and Maddoch opened his hand.
“See, you have already captured the veritable Australia. Don’t you know that scientists, writers and photographers travel around Australia in trucks and caravans, and never ever see, let alone hold in their hands, a kangaroomouse. You lucky, lucky man.”