Bony was like a plaster of pitch within the shallow crevice in the rock wall. The bulge seemed to grow upon the corner line, grow with the inevitability of a stalactite until at the end of a hundred thousand years the left side of a man was revealed.
With nerve-shattering swiftness the man came round the corner—to be frozen by the sight of two glittering eyes above the black shape of a pistol.
Not even in this situation was Bony’s diction unusual. He said:
“Glen Shannon, I presume. Place your weapon on the floor and then support the roof.”
The ex-hotel yardman sank down on bended knees, placed his pistol on the ground and stood up with his arms above his head.
“What’s cookin’?” he asked, and Bony returned the only accurate answer:
“Bread.”
Chapter Sixteen
Shannon’s Play
AS it would be infernally dark within a few minutes, the encounter was exceedingly inopportune. A man can easily be bailed up in daylight, or at night with the aid of a torch, but the limitation of eyesight is a fatal disadvantage in total darkness.
Ordering the American to step back, Bony in his turn sank on bended knees to retrieve Shannon’s weapon, his eyes never leaving the man nor his pistol wavering. Even then he had with great reluctance to accept the probability that Shannon had a second weapon hidden in his clothes and the certainty that Shannon had somewhere on his person more than one throwing knife.
“This country owes your country a great debt,” he said. “I should hate having to mark my personal recognition of it by shooting you. You must believe that, and also you must believe that, should you attempt a hostile act, I shall shoot to kill. Turn about and proceed to the outside entrance.”
The American turned round, keeping his arms high. He said as he moved along the passage:
“I don’t agree that you owe Uncle Sam much. It just happened that you Australians were somewhere in between Tojo’s stern and Uncle Sam’s boot. What do I do here—with my hands?”
“Lower them and go on. I’m right behind you—and I can still see.”
“Hope you’re not pointing the gun at my kidneys. I’d prefer it between the shoulder-blades.”
“You have no choice. It will probably be in the back of the head—if you risk anything whatsoever.”
One close behind the other, they emerged into the open and Shannon was ordered to sit with his back against a rock and his hands upon his knees. The evening still held light. He was without a hat and his fair hair was roughed and dry. His trousers from the knee down were badly slashed, denoting several days and nights in the bush. Recognition widened his mouth.
“I had an idea when I saw you at the shanty that you weren’t just touring,” he said. “Well, I guess it’s your play.”
“And I guess it’s your play, Shannon. What are you doing here and why were you after me?”
“I wasn’t after you—particularly. Didn’t know you was you until this minute. Just happened to see you go in, and as you didn’t come out, I decided I’d have to nail you for identification, sort of. Would have too, if I’d used my brain as Pa taught me to use it. I got myself up going round that corner of rock, making it so my gun hand came last. Say, what’s your part in this script?”
“You are not clear to me, Shannon, and I don’t want to have to take you for a long walk to Dunkeld,” Bony said sharply. “Your intervention the other night when that wrestling fellow attacked me, although most welcome, does not square with your constant observation of my movements. There is another matter which puzzles me, and that is your hasty departure from the hotel. It’s up to you to make yourself clear and to keep your hands firmly upon your knees.”
“Well, you aren’t at all clear to me, either. You might be a cop, but you don’t talk like one. There’d be plenty of chances on the walk to Dunkeld. Seems we’re both up a tree, don’t it?”
There was no heat in the drawling voice and neither anger nor fear in the frank blue eyes, but beneath the voice and deep behind the eyes dwelt resolution which nothing would break. And then came decision to dissolve the stalemate, for he was convinced it was stalemate and that he was not unequally placed by Bony’s wavering pistol.
“All right! I’ll tell you,” he said. “I’m looking for a pal of mine.”
“Indeed! What is his name?”
“Her name is Mavis Sanky.”
“Ah! Go on.”
“She got herself lost in this country some time back. Queer country, too. I don’t much like it. Been lost in it myself more’n once. There’s no beginning or end to it. However, there is plenty of water running through it, and a fella has only to climb a mountain to find out where he happens to be. Funny thing about it is that my girl was used to the bush, her people being sheep owners.”
Shannon’s voice dwindled into the silent evening, and Bony’s voice entered into it.
“What you say is all public property.”
“Yes, I ’spect it is. But what isn’t public property—yet—is that Mavis was my girl. We met in New Guinea. She was then in your Army. We planned to be married, but the war sort of took us apart. I wrote a couple or three times after I was sent on to the Marshalls. There I met a Jap and was a bit careless with him. He blew up and I was back in the States when I realised how silly it is to be careless with a Jap. I wrote a coupla times more to Mavis, and because she didn’t write to me I got sore, not having sense enough to realise that wartime letters can take a year to go anywhere.
“The Army shipped me back home. Ma was sick. My kid brother was away with the Navy. The war stopped and Ma died. Pa took it badly, so did the sisters. Then one day nine letters came from Mavis, some of ’em written more’n a year before. I wanted to set about getting her over to the States so we could be married, and Pa had a spare ranch up his sleeve for me. However, Pa said to go and get her, as he reckoned it wasn’t right to expect a girl to cross the world to reach me, what with floating mines and gov’ment restrictions and the rest, and because all the Shannons went after their women with their heads down and their boots on and didn’t wait to be chased by ’em. Then Pa fell ill and sort of delayed things. Time I was ready to start, a letter came from Mavis’s pa telling how she had been lost. Pa said to get going fast. So I came over by air.”
“Another girl was with her, I understand,” Bony said.
“Yes, that’s so. Her name was Beryl Carson.”
“After you arrived in Australia, did you contact the police?”
“No. After I had a talk with Mavis’s pa I had the idea that if Mavis and her friend hadn’t really been lost in the bush I wouldn’t want the cops butting in. Are you a cop?”
“Assuming that your girl friend and her friend were not actually lost in the bush, that something quite different happened to them, what then?”
The American’s face was a pale oval against the rock. It was so dark that his eyes looked black. When he spoke the attractive drawl was absent.
“Pa always said never to spoil a private war by yelling for the cops.”
Bony relaxed a trifle.
“Where have you left your swag?” he asked.
“Down the creek a bit. Say, are you a cop?”
Bony stood up, and without command Shannon rose with him.
“Not cop enough to spoil a private war.”
He pocketed his pistol and proffered the other to its owner, saying:
“We will climb down out of that tree you spoke of. Get your swag and come to my camp. That bread will be baked too hard if it’s not taken from the ashes.”
He watched the tall, almost shambling figure merge into the black and featureless background of the scrub, confident that the American would return. He felt that Shannon knew much more about the Simpsons than he himself had learned, for Shannon had been employed at the hotel for several months and his tracks told of much activity. Then the figure appeared and advanced, carrying a hiker’s pack from which dangled a quart-pot and a rabbit.
Without speaking Bony turned and entered the rough passage, groping forward in the darkness, the sound of boots on rock chips informing him of Shannon’s presence behind him. At the short turn-off passage Shannon was told to wait. He saw a match being struck and flame mount from dry bark to feed on sticks that the Australian was placing one by one. When by invitation he entered the chamber, Bony was raking from the ashes his damper loaf.
“Where did you obtain that pistol—and the silencer fitted to it?” Bony asked, and Shannon set down his pack and sat on it.
“Fella in Melbourne sold me the gun for a hundred bucks. The silencer I bought from another fella who charged three hundred bucks. If I could bring a thousand pistols into this country I’d make a lot of money. The silencer isn’t very efficient. Some day somebody’s goin’ to invent a real silencer, and then it’s goin’ to be bad for a lot of other guys and the cops. Can I cook a feed on your fire?”
“Of course. Get busy. Let me have your quart-pot and I’ll take it with my billy to the creek. The firelight is safe enough. I’ve made sure of that. But we must talk softly because sound carries a long way and I don’t wish to be located.”
“By who?” Shannon asked, looking up from delving into his pack.
“The other side, of course. I find myself annoyed that you saw me this evening. I don’t want to be further annoyed by gross carelessness.”
“Pa used to say that carelessness made dead men. He was never careless, and he’s still going strong.”
Evidently Shannon’s Pa had been tough, and Bony wondered about him and this son of his as he made his way to the creek where he washed before returning with the filled receptacles. The American spoke like an unsophisticated country boy, but there was plenty of sophistication about that silencer and those throwing knives.
Shannon had the pistol apart and was cleaning it with a rag.
“I got coffee,” he said. “And a piece or two of grilled chicken. No bread, though. Can’t get the knack of bakin’ flapjacks on the coals. You show me some day?”
Bony promised that he would, noting the warmth in the pleasant voice and doubting no longer that the American’s actions were truly motivated by his self-imposed mission. Shannon withdrew from the pack a paper parcel, opened it beside the fire to reveal what would be a chef’s nightmare and which was described as grilled chicken. Observing Bony’s frozen eyes, he grinned sheepishly, saying:
“Guess I’m no cook. Never had much of a chance to learn, what with Ma and the sisters to look after Pa and us kids. I can fry things in a pan and boil things in a can, but plain fire sort of frustrates me.”
“I regret I cannot offer you a dinner,” Bony said politely. “Had I known that you were calling, I would have saved a portion of my grilled rabbit. I can offer you, however, the remainder of yesterday’s bread to assist you to eat that—er—”
“Fowl. One of Simpson’s. Thanks for the bread. Pa used to say that a real man’s grub should always be plain steak just singed and washed down with likker. The likker sort of loosens up the steak fibres in the stomach, and that’s very good for the eyesight.”
Bony brewed tea for them both and pensively smoked whilst the American ate ravenously. Now and then he caught Shannon looking at him with steady calculation. The tension was still in the boy; suspicion was still alive despite the acts of obvious friendship. The return of his pistol placed him at a disadvantage in this little game of wits, and he was feeling it.
“Scoop a hole in the sand and bury the bones,” Bony said. They were squatted before the fire in the space between wall boulders, and Shannon cast a swift glance over his shoulder, then grinned and nodded, and with a hand made a hole and covered over the cleaned chicken bones. A little later Bony brought his swag and set it on the ground farther back from the fire and himself sat with the swag as a back-rest.
Shannon lit a cigarette with a fire stick and turned his body slightly so that he could face the detective-inspector.
“Well, do we begin?” he asked.
“Yes, if you’re ready,” Bony agreed. “I think our best course is to join forces. If we can agree to do that, then the next good thing to do would be for both to lay all his cards face up.”
“Depends on how much of a cop you are. Suppose you tell me about that.”
“Being a cop, suppose you tell me more of yourself. I am an officer of the law in this country. You are an alien and, moreover, in possession of a concealable weapon which is unregistered and for which you have not a licence. And in addition, your remarks about conducting a private war indicate your intention, in the near future, of committing a breach of the peace. How was it that you obtained employment at the hotel?”
“That’s easy. I was stayin’ over at Dunkeld and was havin’ a few drinks with a couple of fellas when in came James Simpson. One of the others said I was wantin’ work, and Simpson looked me over, asked a few questions, and then offered me the job of yardman and general man. Suited me.”
“And how did you come to leave the hotel—in such a hurry?”
Shannon grinned and dropped another stick on to the fire.
“Perhaps for the same reason that you did,” he replied. “Simpson said he didn’t want me any more as there weren’t any guests coming till Easter. I reckon he wasn’t too pleased about me stopping that guy from twisting you inside out. Said he didn’t approve of knife-throwing in his saloon. Told you to go too, didn’t he?”
“How do you know that?”
“Ferris told me. I got along all right with Ferris. She knew something was doing that night, and she slipped out of the cupboard to have me at hand. She reckons that not everything in the garden is lovely, the ugliest thing being her brother.”
“So she knew those men, eh?”
“Yes, she knew ’em, or rather two of ’em. I knew ’em, too, when I saw them, and that was when I was in the cupboard, Ferris having called me in. Those two guys, not the wrestler, came to the saloon six or seven weeks back. They insulted a woman who was staying, an artist woman. Used to get around a lot. Too much for Simpson, looks like. That night, as well, Simpson was out of the way, and the next morning when the woman complained to him he told her to go, saying he’d heard a different story. Seems like those guys are Simpson’s plug-uglies. Question I ask myself is what Simpson has to hide that he don’t like women artists and sheepmen on holiday poking around. Answer is, my girl and her pal. What you think?”
“I am not yet thinking that far,” Bony answered. “Why were you so interested in my movements that you kept me under observation?”
“That’s easy too. I wasn’t keeping you under observation so much as I was keeping Simpson under observation because he was keeping you under observation. By then I had been getting around some myself. I’d gathered lots of impressions, if you know what I mean. Pa used to tell me before you start in on a guy it’s best to have the feel of his background, and when you came to the saloon I’d got Simpson’s background pretty well lined up.”
“And you think that Simpson has something to hide?”
“He’s got something so rotten to keep hidden that one day he came very near to attempting to shoot you. It was the day you found that bit of quartz with the gold in it. He was watching you for some time before he spoke. Once he half aimed the shot-gun at you and almost made me wing him with a knife.”
Bony sighed. “It seems that you have had to keep me safe from several evils,” he said. “Thank you, Shannon.”
“That’s all right, Mr.—say—Parkes—which will do until you tell me your right name. You see, keeping an eye on characters comes sorta easy to me, what with Pa’s training and all.”
“What do you think Simpson is concealing with such earnestness?”
“The murder of my girl and her girl friend.”
“Perhaps that. But what could be his motive for killing them?”
“Having got Simpson’s background, I reckon that what’s behind them girls getting lost is pretty big. Simpson’s a natural killer. He’
s got the eyes of a killer and the hands of one too. Pa showed me how to pick ’em, men who are just naturally dangerous.”
“He can play the organ,” Bony said.
“He sure can play the organ.”
“How do you react to the idea of counterfeiting?”
“Not big enough. I’m not much interested in the cause of my girl and her friend being done away with. I’m interested mostly in who killed them. That’s why I’ve concentrated on Simpson and around his saloon. The cause, in my opinion, requires a mighty good barbed-wire fence to keep it in and keep them out who might be wanting to uncover it.”
“Oh!”
“As I said, I’m not concerned with causes, but only with effects. What I aim to do is to locate the effects. I’ve located one, but it don’t rile me as much as I’m gonna be when I find what’s happened to my girl. When she and her pal were first missed, Simpson headed the search for them. I guess the fella that was yardman at the time saw something or added something to something else. His name was O’Brien. He was a little old man with white hair, and he never wore socks. Never wore boots, either, ’cause of his bunions. Ferris told me all about him. A fortnight after the girls disappeared, and when Ferris and her mother were away, O’Brien left. He’s an effect. He’s buried right under where you’re sitting.”
Chapter Seventeen
“You Ever Been in Love?”
BONY stared at the lounging American for three seconds before his gaze fell and his right hand conveyed the cigarette to his lips. For ten seconds Shannon noted that the hand trembled.
One of Bony’s burdens, and not the least, was fear of the dead, fear which, during his career of crime investigation, had often leaped from the subconscious to gibber at him, reminding him of the ancient race from which he would never wholly escape.
The American was unaware that it was grossly unfair to spring the information on Bony at this particular time and place, but the whites of the eyes and the trembling hand gave him an inkling of the devil he had loosed. Regret was tinged a little by contempt, and then because there was no tremor in Bony’s voice the contempt was banished by admiration.
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