Читать книгу Cake in the Hat Box - Arthur W. Upfield - Страница 10

Tracking Constable Stenhouse

Two o’clock in the afternoon of this late winter’s day, and the sun powerful enough to blister skin not customarily exposed, and the exhilarating air so clear as to give the illusion that the ranges were painted on canvas.

Six miles westward of Agar’s Lagoon, the utility emerged through the Kimberley Gates to a large expanse of comparatively level country where the aerodrome had been established. Past the aerodrome Irwin had to reduce speed and be wary of sharp if shallow water gutters. Now the ranges crept forward on both sides like the two paws of a bored cat playing with a blouse.

Twenty miles from Agar’s Lagoon, Irwin turned off to a track running southward across flats covered with spinifex grass ... light-green cushions crowded with tall straw-coloured pins.

“It’s better going than the track to Wyndham,” remarked Bony. “You haven’t had to change down for half a mile.”

“Won’t last long,” predicted Irwin. “We’ve to cross several mountain spurs, but beyond that the country is almost flat and continues so down to the desert.”

“Nowhere else have I seen the sky so filled with shooting stars, if I may use the phrase,” Bony remarked.

“Big one fell not far off the track we’ll be taking.”

“I wonder if the meteors are attracted by these Kimberley Ranges. There might be something in the idea that somewhere in them lie huge deposits of radio-active ore.” Bony laughed. “Look at that mountain slope. Red rock and soil covered with pale-green spinifex. Reminds me ... now what does it look like?”

“A woman’s over-rouged face partially toned down by a green-spotted veil?”

“Good!” exclaimed Bony. “That’s just what it does resemble. And this dry creek we have to cross looks like the Grand Canyon.”

Having with exceeding caution manoeuvred the utility down and across the creek bed, and given the engine every ounce of power to climb its far side, Irwin broached a subject which had been in his mind for some time.

“You mentioned this morning that you had felt undercurrents at Agar’s. I thought that peculiar because I’ve felt those submerged influences, too.”

Bony was mildly astonished that this large, raw-boned man, who laughed when there was no reason to do so and yet was intelligent, could be sensitive to subversive influences.

“Were you stationed at Agar’s at one time?” he asked.

“Yes. Five years ago I worked down here with Stenhouse. Was with him a couple of months, or rather I was stationed at Agar’s while he was down in the desert rounding up a gang of sheep killers. I can get along with people as a rule, but I could never get anywhere with the people at Agar’s. They seem to be entirely different, cliquish and reserved.”

“They’re not entirely cut off from civilization, either,” observed Bony.

“Oh, no. Since the war there’s been quite an increase of road traffic through Agar’s from Derby and Broome to Darwin and the Alice.”

“More than along the track from Agar’s to Wyndham?”

“Much. That track’s too tough at the best of times.”

They passed out from the claws of a senna-coloured range to enter comparatively flat country supporting robust gums, wattles and edible shrub and grass.

“It would appear that Stenhouse either unearthed unlawful activities, or that he was murdered as the result of a personal feud. Which of these theories do you support?”

“Neither, particularly.”

“Well, what unlawful activities could be operating? Is there much cattle thieving?”

“No, very little.”

“Mining, then, gold? If gold was being transported over the ranges to a coast inlet and from there to an Asian port, the price would be very much higher. Remember the soil adhering to Stenhouse’s boots. I think that soil is from a mine dump. Hallo! A homestead!”

“Red Creek, the first of the homesteads mentioned in the diary.”

Dogs raced forward to meet them. Goats grazing along the bank of a wide creek containing a chain of water-holes paused to look at the approaching vehicle. And then the truck was being braked to a halt at a wicket-gate in a brushwood fence surrounding a small and well-conditioned weather-board house. From a near-by outhouse emerged a twin to Irwin.

“Good day-ee. Why, Constable Irwin! Haven’t seen you in years.”

Inspector Bonaparte was presented to Mr Cummins, the manager of Red Creek Cattle Station, and Mr Cummins, successfully concealing his curiosity, ‘ordered’ the travellers to:

“Come along in for a cup of tea. Missus will be glad to see you.”

Irwin produced a bundle of mail, and Cummins led the way through the gate and along the path composed of the rubble of termite hills, and stalked into the house calling for his wife. After a little delay, Mrs Cummins appeared, tidy and excited.

“Mr Irwin! Whatever are you doing down this way? Sit down, do, and I’ll make a pot of tea. Glad to meet you, Inspector Bonaparte. Heard your name on the wireless the other day.”

Questions and answers criss-crossed like the nightly display of shooting stars. The welcome was warm and, to Bony, Irwin’s standing with these people amply assured. By magic the living-room table was ‘set’ for afternoon tea of buttered scones and cake, and it did seem incongruous to interrupt the gaiety with the announcement that Constable Stenhouse had been found shot to death.

Mrs Cummins was obviously shocked. Cummins accepted the news with an abrupt withdrawal. It was as though an opaque curtain fell before his keen grey eyes.

“Well, that’s just too dreadful,” said Mrs Cummins. “He was here only the other day. Stayed the night.”

The cattleman’s brows drew close in a frown, and Bony could ‘see’ his mind at work. He was mentally adding miles, and placing them against the total of days since Stenhouse had left his house for Leroy Station up to the afternoon when his body was found ninety miles north of Agar’s Lagoon.

“Did he say where he intended going on leaving here?” Bony asked.

“Yes. Said he thought of running across to Leroy Downs,” replied Cummins.

“I see you have a transceiver. Did you mention over the air to Leroy Downs the probability of Stenhouse arriving there?”

Cummins shook his head. His wife said:

“No. Unless you policemen ask us to we never say anything of your movements. That’s the rule up here.”

“Thank you. Did Stenhouse have his tracker with him?”

“Oh, yes. Jacky Musgrave was with him.”

“And Jacky’s missing?” Cummins interpolated.

“That’s so,” replied Irwin. “Any of Jacky’s mob working for you?”

“Yes. One. He’s away on walkabout.”

“I didn’t see any aborigines when we arrived,” Bony remarked. “None here?”

Cummins nodded and laughed. “Plenty,” he replied. “But they all went down the creek aways day before yesterday.” What he fancied was in Bony’s mind made him ask: “Think that’s anything to do with Jacky Musgrave?”

“Possibly. Have you noticed an unusual number of smokes recently?”

“No, haven’t seen any.”

“There was something that stirred up the blacks, though,” said Mrs Cummins.

Irwin glanced at the old pendulum clock on the mantel, and Bony rose to thank their host and hostess and express the hope that he would meet them again. Both escorted them to the utility, and they departed to the accompaniment of hearty farewells, the barking of dogs and the excited crowing of roosters.

“Most of these stations have a transceiver, I suppose?” Bony asked when his fingers were engaged making a cigarette.

“All of ’em,” Irwin answered. “The wireless and the aeroplane and the refrigerator have changed life considerably. People can now gossip to their heart’s content to their neighbours over forty, sixty, a hundred miles of space.”

“They have to keep off the air at certain periods, I understand.”

“Yes, for periods which are kept clear for telegrams and the Flying Doctor Service.”

“And do you find that the station people do refrain from talking of police movements?”

“Oh yes. They’re strongly cooperative there. Same with everything else. Notice Cummins’s reaction to the news about Stenhouse?”

“Yes. He was wondering how Stenhouse came to be north of Agar’s Lagoon. I received the impression that he didn’t like Stenhouse.”

“Me, too.”

The track ran southward, following an ever-widening valley prodded by the long red fingers of the ranges pointing towards Jacky Musgrave’s country. They passed a well from which radiated lines of troughing. Red cattle were drinking, and other cattle were standing in the spinifex and looking exactly like the termite hills. Far to the south-west a low, flat-topped range, isolated and singular on that quarter of flat country, gleamed opalescent gold under the opalescent blue sky.

“Looks like a range, doesn’t it?” remarked Irwin. “That’s the wall of the meteor crater. Full mile round, as I said. Steeper than a house roof, and the interior at least three hundred feet below the top of the wall.”

“What’s down inside, d’you know?”

“Nothing much. Floor’s flat, or almost so. Small desert trees growing down there. In the dead centre, a lake forms after a good rain.”

“Any official name given to it?” pursued the interested Bony.

“No. People hereabout call it ‘The Racecourse’.”

“And what’s beyond it?”