The Warning
THE NEW BOOK-KEEPER for Wirragatta arrived on the morning of 1st December. The next day he took over the office from Donald Dreyton, and the day following Dreyton departed, with his camels, on another inspection of his one hundred and eighty-three mile section of boundary-fence.
As usual, this morning of 3rd December, Bony, as Joe Fisher, accompanied the men to the office at half-past seven, where they received orders for the day. As usual, promptly on time, Martin Borradale emerged through the wicket gate in the homestead garden fence and walked briskly towards the knot of waiting men.
He had a nice way with his employees, which went far in retaining their loyalty. He would always halt several yards from the gathered men and, after giving a general good morning, would call each to him in turn and give his orders in quiet, confidential tones.
This morning he called first Harry West, and what he had to say occupied a full five minutes. Having received his orders, Harry came away with a stony face and paused beside Bony to whisper that he was to take the ton-truck with wire and fencing-tools out to a place called Westall Corner and there assist Dogger Smith, who had accepted a fewweek’s work fence repairing.
If there was a man Bony was anxious to meet it was this Dogger Smith, and when, on having called him, Martin Borradale asked with a smile what work he would like to be given this day, Bony requested to be sent with Harry West.
“All right, Bony. Are you looking for a spell of real work?”
“Physical work always bores me, Mr. Borradale, but it invariably improves my digestive organs.”
“How is your investigation going?”
“Slowly but surely.”
“I am glad to hear that,” Borradale said warmly. “My sister, having guessed who you are, has been talking to me quite a lot about you. You know old Stanton and the Trenches at Windee! Jolly fine people, aren’t they?”
“They are among the finest I have met,” Bony agreed with equal warmth. “I hope you do not take it amiss that I have not confided in you about my investigation, but I always work along certain lines. However, it is due to you to know that I wish to examine this man called Dogger Smith. Can I have your permission to use the truck should I desire to return here before the fence repairing is completed?”
“Certainly-but I would like you to leave the camp with sufficient water to last for three or four days. Would you inform me on one point which has bothered me for some time? I cannot think what motive the Strangler has in killing people. Do you think he is a lunatic?”
Bony looked deep into the candid grey eyes and then examined in a split second the boyish, kindly face. Slowly he shook his head.
“I don’t really know what to think, Mr. Borradale. Were he a lunatic he would not select the time and the place when opportunity presented him with a victim. Were he a lunatic he could not hide his lunacy from his associates for long. I may be wrong, of course, but that is what I think. The Strangler is a man who is controlled in exaggerated form by the lust to kill. This same lust, in much lesser degree, finds expression in the normal man who shoots pigeons released from traps, and who kills animals and birds when not bound to do so for food. I should say that the Strangler is a man who has never mentally matured.”
“You think, then, that Simone arrested the wrong man?”
“Yes, I am sure he has.”
“How will Elson get on?”
“He will be charged and probably remanded. I feel confident, however, that the Crown Prosecutor will not be satisfied with the evidence set before him by Simone, and that Elson will be released.”
“I hope so, Bony. The lad was all right, you know. He was a bit wild with the girls and all that, but he’s not vicious.”
“I think with you. I would not be surprised if the Strangler turns out to be a stranger to everyone here. It is quite an interesting case.”
“I wish you luck with it. I may take a run out to the camp in a day or so. Dogger Smith will take a peg or two out of young Harry’s ladder. The young blighter is afraid of nothing. I expressly told him not to ride Black Diamond, and, as you are aware, he rode the brute to Carie to see his girl. He has let me see he would like to be promoted to the boss stockman’s place and live in the married people’s cottage, with Tilly for his wife. Because I would like to promote him and see him married to Tilly, I have decided to teach him a lesson. The young rip is a born horseman and a good sheep-man, and he looks on manual work as terribly degrading.”
They laughed together.
“It will probably do him a great deal of good,” said the delighted Bony.
“I think it will. He has many excellent qualities. Please do not mention to him what I hope to do for him. Ah, here is my sister on the veranda. She wishes to speak to you, I think. I’ll go back and finish the orders.”
Martin nodded, leaving Bony at the wicket gate to pass through to the garden and so to the veranda, where Stella waited, cool and charming.
“How are you getting on with the investigation?” she asked.
“Slowly but surely, Miss Borradale,” Bony replied. “There are many little matters I have to straighten out.”
Her warm hazel eyes became swiftly serious.
“I am not going to be dangerous this morning,” Bony gravely told her, whereupon she laughed deliciously and her eyes told him he should dare to try. “I am going with Harry West to work at repairing a fence, and I shall be away for several days. Would you grant me a favour?”
“If it is not impossible, certainly.”
“It is this. While having no intention to alarm you, or to be melodramatic, I would urge you not to leave the house at night without escort, not even to step into the garden. And in future, after a day of wind and dust, keep your bedroom window and door locked, no matter how uncomfortable that may be. And, too, instruct the cook and the maids to do likewise.”
“Surely there is no danger to us in the house, is there?” she asked, her face now drawn and revealing the horror which had been in her heart for many a long month.
“The reason why my namesake, the Great Napoleon, won so many battles, Miss Borradale, was because he took every possible precaution against defeat. It is during the night following a day of high wind and dense dust that every man, woman and child in and south of Carie is in grave danger. All that I ask is that all sensible precautions be takenspecially throughout such a night.”
Stella expelled her breath in a slow sigh.
“Very well,” she assented.
“Thank you. Within a week or two I shall have removed the danger for all time.”
“Then you suspect someone?”
“Alas! I suspect ten people,” he replied. “One of the ten is my man. Have no uneasiness. I shall get him in the end. I have never yet failed to finalize a case.”
“Never failed?”
“No, never. As Colonel Spendor says, and says truly: I am a damned poor policeman but a damned good detective. Permit me to leave you. I must roll my swag and assist Harry West to load the truck.”
When she bowed her head slightly in assent, he bowed to her and wished heraurevoir. Watching him walk to the gate, she felt like crying after him mockingly. Then she remembered the expression in his blue eyes and turned to enter the house for breakfast. Had he been dressed in evening clothes and with a jewelled turban on his head he would have been the living likeness of her idea of an Indian prince-polite, assured, dignified.
By the time the truck was loaded with rolls of wire, shovels and crowbars, rations and a tent and swags and a round iron tank, it was nearing noonday. Hence it was after one o’clock when Bony and Harry West and Harry’s five sheepdogs left Wirragatta for the scene of their coming labours.
Two miles below the homestead the outback track crossed the now empty river over a roughly built but stout bridge, and thereafter the road ran southward for several miles before bearing again to the west. During the first half-hour Harry maintained a grim silence. There was no cabin to the truck and one of the dogs stood with its jaws resting on Harry’s shoulder, another crouched against Bony, while the remaining three rode the load. All enjoyed the speed.
“Make us a smoke,” requested Harry dismally. He handled the truck as though it were his greatest enemy.
“Certainly, my dear Harry,” consented Bony, rolling him a cigarette.“Why are you so depressed this calm and warm afternoon?”
“Depressed!” snorted the youthful outlaw-rider. “Stiffen the crows! What bloke wouldn’t be depressed at coming down to a fence lizard? Which ends of them shovels do you use to dig with, any’ow? Fencin ’! Come down tofencin ’ and you want to know why a bloke’s depressed.”
With one hand working the steering-wheel, Harry struck a match and lit the rolled cigarette. The track wound sharply across a wild range of sand-drifts, and the detective regarded the slim, brown hand clutching the wheel with some misgiving as the speedometer was registering forty miles an hour. The cigarette alight, Harry reinforced his right hand with his left and savagely pressed down on the accelerator.
“I reckon I done me dash for that married cottage,” he moaned. “Last year a bloke done some crook work, and the boss set him scrubbing the house verandas. You see, the boss don’t ever sack a man. If he wants to get rid of him, he sets him to work such as scrubbing floors, knowing that no bloke will stand that for long before he asks for his cheque. I got a good reason to ask for mine, too, ’costhis fencing to a horseman is just as crook as scrubbing floors is to a fencer.”
“You must swallow your pride, Harry,” Bony said softly. “You listen to one who is possessed of much worldly wisdom. We should always mould our conduct on the examples set by the great men in history. Er -Nelson, Napoleon, Marlborough and others learnt in their youth how to obey. Having learnt how to obey, they were fitted to demand obedience. There arrived a point in the lives of all great men when they could and did put telescopes to their blind eyes and otherwise intimate to their superiors that they could-er-retire to the equator. The secret of success, Harry, is to know just when you can tell a superior to retire to the equator without resultant disadvantage to oneself.”
“I didn’t exactly tell the boss to go to hell, Joe. Some fool went and let theridin ’ hacks outer the yard when I wanted one to ride to Carie. Black Diamond was in a yard by himself and they hadn’t the guts to let him out. Any’ow, I can ride that cow on me nose.”
“I don’t doubt that, Harry. The circumstances, I admit, were annoying, and the business urgent. The boss said not to ride Black Diamond. You said ‘Iwill ride Black Diamond.’ Inexperience permitted you to disobey the boss when you expect advancement. Impulse blinded you to the obvious way of disobeying without subsequent unpleasant result. Now, Black Diamond is black all over. If you had thought at all, you would have stolen some white paint and given him a forehead blaze and white hocks. Then no one in Carie would have recognized him.”
“Gosh, Joe! You’re a corker,” Harry said with great earnestness.
Bony laughed.
“I have the idea that the boss is merely testing you by putting you to real work, Harry. You see, if he thought of making you boss stockman, he would want to be sure of your character, that you would have strength of character to lead the men under you. In any case, why worry; why be depressed? As I pointed out, it is a beautiful day and you find yourself in good company.”
The young man’s expression of gloom persisted for another half-minute, when it swiftly changed to normal cheerfulness. He slapped Bony on the shoulder with his left hand and put on additional speed.
“You know, Harry, I think you are eager to get going on the business end of a crowbar and a shovel,” Bony murmured, or rather his voice sounded but a murmur above the roar of the engine. Harry turned to face his companion, and the truck shied violently.
“Me eager-! Cripes! What you mean?”
“To me it appears obvious. You seem to be so eager that you are endangering both our necks in order to reach the work as quickly as you can.”
The engine ceased its roar and the speed dropped to five miles an hour.
The grinning youth said, “I never thought of that.”