Fatal Error
THESUNLEAPTto the summit of Black Range, opened wide his golden cloak and danced a jig. None took notice of him, for Irwin and his trackers were oiling and greasing the truck, and Bony was sauntering about the homestead as though nothing disturbed his meditations. The women were busy at the kitchen preparing breakfast, and Kimberley herself had ridden out for the working hacks and had seen no sign of the Musgrave blacks.
Irwin had contacted his superior officer at Wyndham onAlverston’s transceiver, and before leaving next morning his sergeant had reported that theBreens had handed over their cattle to three town men, who were to deliver them to the Meat Works. They should now be well along the track to their homestead.
Irwin had gained a fairly clear picture from Larry of all that had happened throughout the journey with Bony over Black Range, and although impatient to know more about the shaft and the ambushing of Patrick O’Grady, he had refrained from asking questions when firmly told to give the remaining hours to sleep. And he had not met Jack Wallace.
The dogs were still free. Several were interested in the cooking smells from the kitchen. Three accompanied Bony to a near pile of Devil’s Marbles, climbing with him to the summit of the topmost and evincing no trace of uneasiness of hidden enemies.
Standing upon the low eminence, Bony could see beyond the ridge at the back of the homestead, and the succession of ridges over which he had walked the previous evening. He could see Black Range sweeping on to the north, its bars and patches of red and of smoky purple subduing the mottled green and brown valley. And to the west, white-painted posts and a white gate enclosing what was evidently the Breen cemetery.
It was a full half-mile from the house, and Bony reached it by a circuitous route as though arriving there by chance. The enclosure within the netting and barbed wire strung to the white-painted posts was about an acre. In marked contrast with the outside land, which had been eaten bare by goats and horses, the enclosed area was almost massed with native shrubs and grasses, giving the place an appearance of neglect despite the air of an oasis.
On reaching the white picket gate, he noted that recently several men had passed in and out, and he lifted the latch, feeling confident that yet another facet of his theoretical background of crime was to be proved correct.
He was surprised by the number of graves. There were seventeen ranged along one side, and without doubt they contained the bodies of aborigines, for at the head of each stood a bar of ordinary shoeing-iron bearing a number. In the centre of the cemetery stood two massive wooden crosses set in blocks of cement to defeat the termites: and each cross had been hewn from a single tree, smoothed and polished, and stood seven feet from the ground with arms at least three feet wide. Carved into the circular centre of the crosseswas the name of the sleeper, and the date of death.
They were true men and women who came out of Ireland and Scotland and England to conquer a new world with little except tireless energy and unfaltering courage. They were generous to their own and rebels against Caesar. What they won, they held, or, losing, won again. They gave to their children their all: their possessions and their spiritual attributes; and left an example of independence today either ignored or scorned by those desiring to lean on the State from the cradle to the grave.
There was a third grave, on the far side of that of Nora Breen. This was a new grave, and no cross was erected at its head, and no data of the person buried. Unlike the older graves marked with pavements of white quartz, this third grave was bereft of even the raised mound of displaced earth. In fact, it appeared that evidence of the grave had been carefully removed, and only a stranger like Bony, who sought for such a grave, would have noticed it by the absence of native shrubs and grasses.
Who had recently been buried there? Silas, according to Kimberley, was now away shooting crocodiles at the Swamp. Ezra and Jasper were now, according to several persons, returning with the droving plant and their aboriginal riders from Wyndham.
In thoughtful mood, Bony returned to the homestead, where he found Irwin breakfasting with Kimberley. He made his apologies to his hostess, saying he had walked farther than intended, and he was informed by Irwin that everything was ready for departure immediately after breakfast. Kimberley agreed with him that the Musgrave men were not in the vicinity of the homestead, and that the nearest they had been to it was at least one mile. Her anxiety had been further allayed by Bony, who had pointed out that the desert blacks would not travel after dark the previous evening, or set out on the next stage of their journey of vengeance till they had been thawed by the sun this same morning.
“I think their interest has shifted from here,” he said. “Otherwise they would have revealed their presence, and their intentions, before now. Perhaps you would like to accompany us?”
“D’youthink the wild men might try to stop the boys after they leave Wyndham?” asked Kimberley.
“I understand that they handed the cattle over to drovers from Wyndham, and are already well on the way home,” Bony said, reassuringly.
Kimberley revealed her astonishment.
“But that couldn’t be. They would have let me know from a homestead yesterday at four or this morning when I was on the air at six. How did you know… they didn’t take the cattle to the Meat Works?”
“Constable Irwin was talking to his sergeant yesterday morning… on MrAlverston’s transceiver.”
The girl’s grey eyes were suddenly small. Her voice was angry.
“Yes, I’ll go with you. You’re keeping something back. So’sSilas and Ezra and Jasper. You all know things I don’t know, and I’ll go with you and find out for myself. I… I’ve known something was wrong. I’ve remembered that Ezra wouldn’t look at me when he told me I was to come home with Blinker and the others. He looked… Why the hell don’t you tell me now? Why don’t you say what you think, what you’re going to do?”
The grey eyes were flashing. Bony went on eating, and she transferred her furious gaze to Irwin, who became uncomfortable and helplessly regarded Bony. Bony put down his knife and fork and, leaning back in his chair, found and held Kimberley’s gaze.
“What I think, MissKimberley, must remain my business,” he said, firmly. “What I know is little in addition to your own knowledge, and it would be unwise of me to express what I fear when there is no concrete foundation for it. I suggest that you accompany us to meet your brothers, who could greatly assist us in the investigation into the death of ConstableStenhouse. When we all meet, we can discuss many points, and you can tell me of matters concerning which you have been a trifle reticent.”
The anger subsided as rapidly as it had risen. Kimberley sat down. She was now coldly on the defensive. For the first time, she was afraid of this slim dark man with the penetrating blue eyes.
“TheBreens ’ business is their own,” she said. “You’ve no right to go prying into it.”
“I certainly haven’t the right… excepting where it might touch on the murder of ConstableStenhouse,” Bony returned. “I have no intention of browbeating you, or of demanding information which you don’t wish to impart. You have been most kind to Constable Irwin and me, and we do not forget that you are our hostess. When we meet your brothers under the open sky, we’ll be able to talk without restraint. Everything will be made plain and we shall, I sincerely hope, remain good friends. Now I think we should go.”
With an impatient sideways toss of her head to clear stray hair from her eyes, Kimberley turned and walked with clinking spurs to an old sea-chest looking as though it required two men to lift it. Producing a bunch of keys she unlocked the chest and then crossed to the sofa, taking from under it the two hat boxes and locking them in the chest. Neither man spoke. Bony fancied he witnessed a tiny gleam of triumph in the grey eyes.
Irwin’s trackers were waiting by the truck, and the party was delayed five minutes while Kimberley gave orders to her domestic staff and the native stockmen. Irwin explained to Larry and Charlie that the Musgrave blacks might be on the road ahead, and instead of sitting on the loading they rearranged it to permit the blacks to stand and watch above the cabin roof.
The dogs followed for half a mile, and after they dropped back there was silence save for the whine of the engine and the constant changing of gears. Kimberley sat between the two policemen.
They came to the tall-flat of sugar grass, and the eagles and the crows showed where lay the speared horse. The grass could have hidden a battalion, but was empty. The body of the horse, and the grass either side, gave evidence that other than birds had feasted on the carcass.
“Over the next ridge, you reckon?” Irwin said, and Bony agreed that the next ridge was where the hunted boss stockman and hunting wild men had vanished. And on immediately topping the ridge, other birds revealed the body of Patrick O’Grady.
The back of the blue shirt was blood-stained. The head was smashed. He lay face down in grass several yards off the track.
Bony and Irwin left the truck, the former shouting to his trackers to maintain a sharp look-out, and they covered the body with a tarpaulin and weighted the corners with heavy stones.
After passing the Nine Mile Yards ample proof was given of Constable Irwin’s bushmanship, for the track was entirely wiped out by the hooves of cattle. The previous night he must have driven by the stars and instinct. They passed eventually the terminal bluff of Black Range, named McDonald’s Stand, and there saw the tracks of Wallace’s utility heading for the road to Agar’s Lagoon.
“Ezra always said Jack had no guts,” Kimberley averred. “Until you came yesterday afternoon, Inspector Bonaparte, he didn’t believe the place was in danger. Then when you told us about the desert blacks and Pat O’Grady, he got the wind up and cleared for home and his mother.”
“There could have been two spurs jabbing him, Miss Breen. Fear and a guilty conscience.”
“We’ll soon know. I’ll find out.”
“Is there the possibility that we may pass your brothers without seeing them?”
“No. They’ll keep close to the Wyndham road.”
About two o’clock, they came to a creek marked with white gums, and Kimberley said that was Camp Four. Here they stopped to eat the lunch provided by the homestead cook. Following lunch, and two hours’ driving, they sighted the string of horses, black on the green-grey summit of a ‘bump’, and thereafter lost them, saw them, lost them again, till finally Irwin stopped the truck where the animals, loose and pack-horses, were travelling wide of the track. At their rear were six mounted men. One rode to meet them, and one having a black beard stayed on the far wing.
Irwin slid from his seat. Bony alighted and was followed by Kimberley Breen. The man cantering towards them was a part of the animal he rode. His face and forearms were the colour of the range at noontide, and when he pulled his horse to astand, his eyes were the colour of Scotch granite and as hard. He swung to the ground.
“Good day-ee! ’Day, Kim! Anything wrong?” asked Ezra.
“Plenty. This is Inspector Bonaparte. The wild blacks have speared Pat.”
Kimberley stood with her hands pressed to her hips. Her eyes were as hard and her mouth as grim as the mouth and eyes of the young man facing them. Irwin vented his peculiar chuckle, and it passed unnoticed. No one saw the broad grin slowly spread over his face, or how his legs were slightly bent and all of him poised on his toes. The riders and horses were passing by, parallel with the track and a quarter-mile from it. Bony said deliberately:
“We came to warn you that the wild blacks are probably lying in wait to spear your brother Jasper. They are obsessed by the idea that he and your boss stockman were responsible for the death of Jacky Musgrave.”
Ezra Breen slowly transferred his scowling gaze from his sister.
“UsBreens can look after ourselves,” he said, without heat. “If the wild blacks speared Pat O’Grady, it’s up to you policemen to go after them. That’s what you’re paid for.”
The grey eyes and the blue held their gaze without a waverThe soiled red kerchief about Ezra’s neck enhanced the mahogany-tinted, handsome face, and the short leather gaiters seemed to make his legs much longer than they were. The mild tone of Bony’s voice caused Kimberley to flash a glance at him, but Irwin’s gaze did not move from Ezra Breen’s right hand.
“First things first, Mr Breen. Because the murder of ConstableStenhouse and his tracker come before the killing of your boss stockman, we have first to clear up those murders. I am confident you could assist us, you and Mr Silas Breen.”
“All right, if I can I will. Silas isn’t here. He’s out at the Swamp, s’far as I know.”
“Isn’t that Mr Silas Breen with the horses?”
“No. Jasper.”
“I couldn’t possibly be mistaken.”
Ezra stepped nearer. Irwin again chuckled. Kimberley stared across the intervening horses at the white man riding on the far side.
“You’re not saying I’m a liar, are you?” drawled Ezra, and his hand moved downward to the butt of the holstered revolver. Spurs clinked, and abruptly Ezra’s face was hidden by Kimberley’s gold hair. Her voice was shrill with fury.
“Ezra Breen, don’t you dare touch that gun. Inspector Bonaparte spoke true. You’re a liar, Ezra. That’s Silas over there. Up to tricks, both of you. Smarties, that’s what you are, you and Silas.”
Ezra swept her aside as though she were a straw. He took a step forward, and she struck him with her open hand. The blow might have been a fly alighting on his face for all the effect it produced. He had no need to advance further, for he was confronted by Irwin, whose face was expanded by a smile.
“Pipe down, Ezra,” Irwin said softly, standing on the balls of his feet and his hands flaccid against his thighs. They were a good match: the one gingery and the other blond.
“I said it was Jasper,” Ezra rasped, his lips barely moving.
Irwin chuckled, and his mouth was the only part of him that moved.
“I’ll get him,” cried Kimberley, and it seemed that she was catapulted to the back of Ezra’s horse. Ezra shouted, jumped, was too late to stop her.
Argument was interrupted. The three white men and the two blacks still standing at the back of the utility watched Kimberley Breen racing the horse across the stony country to the widely extended horses and attendant riders. They saw the man on the far side check his mount and sit more uprightly in his saddle, saw his indecision. The girl swept round to the rear of the aborigine stockmen, rode straight to the white rider, and he raised both hands to the back of his head.
Neither Irwin nor Bony looked at Ezra when he said:
“That’s blasted it.”
They watched the girl haul back her horse before the white rider. She pointed accusingly at him, kneed her mount to his side, stretched out her hand, received something. For a minute they talked, then came towards the waiting group at a jog-trot as though the man were the prisoner of the woman.
The blackness of the lower extremity of the man’s face was gone. He was talking to the girl, and she was riding with her eyes to front. Distance dwindled, and Bony recognized the huge Silas Breen who had carried his brother from the crowded bar in Agar’s Lagoon. Distance dwindled still, and he could see the strip of goat’s hide Kimberley was carrying. Then he was looking into the menacing blue eyes, and hearing Silas Breenshout that which he least expected:
“Good day-ee!”