About the beautifully moulded brows a frown was strangled at birth. Nancy Chesterfield inserted a cigarette in a long jade holder, and instantly Bony was on his feet holding a match in service. Whilst she drew at the cigarette she regarded him with a whimsical smile, and he knew he had baffled her regarding the degree of his sophistication.
“Tell me what Australian authors you’ve read, and then we may discover a starting point,” she said, softly but distinctly.
Wisely he confined himself to the three novels he had read in Miss Pinkney’s garden, devoting a full minute to each. He rhapsodized over Wilcannia-Smythe’sThe Vine of Abundance. He praised Mervyn Blake’sD’Arcy Maddersleigh, and then went on, “One doesn’t come across their work in South Africa, nor in England, where I was two years ago. On the other hand, the books of I. R. Watts are widely read outside Australia. I like his novels. He holds his readers with fine suspense.”
Nancy Chesterfield listened attentively, sitting almost motionless and keeping her gaze on a pile of manuscripts on her desk. Bony liked her more and more. She was certainly very clever. She had watched his face and his eyes to get inside his mind, and now she listened to his voice in her search for the door. He was baffling her, and intuition, upon which he often relied with implicit faith, was informing him that the experience for Nancy Chesterfield was both rare and pleasing. When he had finished, she said, “When discussing Australian literature in your book-to-be, you should, I think, soft pedal on I. R. Watts. I agree that Watts writes excellent romances. When in need of light reading I go to him, but-er-he is not a creative artist like Mervyn Blake or Wilcannia-Smythe.”
For the moment Bony was baffled. But only for the moment. A woman in the position occupied by Nancy Chesterfield should most certainly have a higher appreciation of literature. Here once again was the invisible object he sought to uncover.
“Well, no, perhaps not,” he agreed reluctantly.“Still, I. R. Watts-well, well! By the way, I cannot find I. R. Watts in the localWho’s Who. I suppose heis an Australian writer?”
“Oh yes, he’s an Australian. He’s something of a mystery, I understand. He’s not a member of any literary society of national importance.” Nancy Chesterfield tapped the ash from her cigarette and Bony sensed that she was gathering her forces to attack. “You see, Mr Bonaparte, our national literature is fast growing up, and it is vitally important that the work of our authors should be judged with extreme care, that the grain should be winnowed from the chaff, so that the authors of the future will be influenced by the masters of the present. If you give your attention to the work of Mervyn Blake and Wilcannia-Smythe, and Ella Montrose and others of their standard, you cannot go wrong in an appraisement of Australian literature today. A critical survey you should also study is that made by Dr Dario Chaparral, of Colombia, South America. He visited Australia twelve months ago and has just published in English the result of his study of our literature. I haven’t a copy here, but you can obtain one at most booksellers, I think.”
“Dr Chaparral!” Bony echoed. Screwing his eyes into blue points, he went on, “No, I haven’t met him, but I’ve heard of him. Did you meet him?”
“Yes. When in Victoria he stayed with Mr and Mrs Blake. Do you know their house at Yarrabo?”
“Oh yes, it’s next door to the cottage where I am lodging. Blake died suddenly, did he not?”
“That is so,” Nancy Chesterfield replied. “If you stay long you will doubtless learn as much about that unfortunate event as anyone. Australian literature suffered severe loss in Blake’s demise. Still,” and she brightened with astonishing swiftness, “there are others to carry on the leadership and continue directing our young authors in the way they should go. I do hope your book is successful, Mr Bonaparte, and I’m really delighted that you came to see me. I like talking to importantoversea people, especially literary people, and I am going to give you an introduction to Mr Wilcannia-Smythe, who is staying at the Rialto. In fact, he is the man I was having afternoon tea with. You’ll like him, I’m sure. He’s a Sydney man, and is here gathering material for a new book.”
“You are most kind, Miss Chesterfield. I shall be delighted to meet Mr Wilcannia-Smythe. You place me in your debt.”
“Not at all, Mr Bonaparte. You must also meet Mrs Blake and Mrs Montrose before you leave us. It’s a pity we didn’t know you were coming to Australia. We like to entertain men like you and Dr Chaparral and Marshall Ellis of London.”
Bony bowed from his chair.
“It’s most charming of you,” he said. “I feel sure I shall like them.”
“Well, I do want you to return to South Africa with a balanced opinion of us,” she went on. “So many visitors to Australia leave with a distorted view of us simply because they haven’t been able to meet the right people.” She smiled at him and added, “My job here is to publicize anyone with news value, as of course you know. After you’ve gone I shall write a happy little paragraph about you. You’ll find it in tomorrow morning’s paper. I hope you will come and see me again.”
“I am daring to hope that you would lunch with me,” Bony said, having risen.
“I’d love to-but remember what Clarence B. said about me.
“I shall never forget it, Miss Chesterfield. Could we arrange a day?”
A well-manicured hand was put forward to turn the leaves of an engagement book.
“Would Friday suit you?”
“Of course.”
“Then you may call for me here at one. Don’t bother with a taxi. I have my own car. I’ll post the letter of introduction for friend Wilcannia-Smythe to the Yarrabo Post Office. You’ll get it tomorrow.”
He thanked her, and she shook hands in a manner he liked. She was entirely outside all his previous experience, but he felt he was parting from her on equal grounds. Impressionable as when an undergraduate, he walked out of the building feeling pleasurably excited, believing that he had detected a facade behind which dwelt the real Nancy Chesterfield.
Chapter Fourteen
Wilcannia-Smythe’s Adventure
BONY arrived back at Yarrabo shortly after half past three, and near Miss Pinkney’s gate a little girl stopped him, saying nervously, “Please, sir, my father wants to see you at the police station.”
Having given the message, the child instantly left him to cross the road and enter the store. Hot, thirsty, and fatigued by the journey from the city, Bony hesitated whether to obey the summons or first find out if Miss Pinkney’s kettle was boiling. He decided to go to the police station.
There was no one in the office with Constable Simes, who at once crossed to the door and closed and locked it.
“So’swe won’t be interrupted,” he said. “I’m glad you returned by that train or I’d have had to play off my own bat and that mightn’t have suited you.”
“I hope it’s important,” Bony said, seatinghimself. “I was looking forward to Miss Pinkney’s afternoon tea.”
“My sister’s taking care of that,” Simes hastened to say. “I saw you turn into the main road from the station, and I sent my girl after you in preference to bailing you up. Something has happened that may bear importantly on the Blake case.”
“So! Go on.”
“At eight five this morning an old car stopped here and two men came in. I had just begun my office work. One of these men was Wilcannia-Smythe and the other was a forestry man named Jenks. At this time Jenks is camped about three miles from the junction of the Old Warburton Road with the main highway. At half past seven this morning he left his camp in his old car and came this way down the Old Warburton Road to his work. He was about half a mile from his camp when he saw a man tied to a tree. This man, Wilcannia-Smythe, was in full view, although the tree to which he was tied is about eighty yards up the side of a foothill. Jenks left his car and walked up to the tree, released Wilcannia-Smythe, and brought him here.
“Smythe-blast his silly hyphen-looked all right, though his hair was dishevelled and his clothes were creased and
slightly stained. He said he felt all right, except for a stiff jaw, wanted his breakfast, and wished to return to his hotel. He said he had been grossly assaulted, but for what reason he didn’t know because he hadn’t been robbed. And he didn’t want to lay a complaint, let alone make a statement.”
“Did he say why?” asked Bony.
“Yes. He said that as he hadn’t been robbed he didn’t want the matter to go further and get into the newspapers. He liked publicity, being an author, but not publicity of that kind. I told him I could not have that sort of thing going on in my district, and that he must give me all the details.
“He said he was out last evening walking along the highway towards Yarrabo when a car overtook him, stopped, and two men jumped out. He was able to see that both had handkerchiefs draped under their eyes. One was a largeman, the other was tall and lean. The large man pointed a pistol at him and ordered him to get into the car. Smythe said he couldn’t do anything else but obey, and he got into the back seat where he was followed by the big man. The other got into the driving seat.
“The car was driven through Yarrabo and then turned off the highway on to what we know as the Old Warburton Road. This road is now in disuse after the first half-mile, where there is a house. The car passed the house, and then began to climb the track, which passes a stone-crusher and then winds up and round, past the quarry and on for some distance.
“Then the car was stopped and Smythe was forced out and made to walk up off the road to the tree. He was lashed to the tree and gagged with his own handkerchief. That was about nine last night and he was there until found by Jenks shortly after half past seven this morning. Luckily for him, it was a warm night.”
“What was he tied to the tree with?”
“Old, but still good, half-inch rope,” replied Simes. “The gag was kept in position with ordinary parcel string.”
“Wilcannia-Smythe did not even suggest a motive for the assault?”
“No. He was angry all right, but not angry enough, in my opinion. If anyone had tied me to a tree and left me there all night, I’d be fighting mad. The explanation he thought might hold water was that he had been mistaken for someone else.”
“H’m! Interesting. Did you visit the scene?”
“Yes. I went out there with Jenks. It just happens that everything I know about the bush old Jenks taught me. It happened, too, that Jenks stopped his car yards away from the place where the kidnappers stopped their car, and he was careful not to overrun that car’s tracks. When I went back with him, both of us avoided spoiling the tracks from the kidnappers’ car to the trees and down again, for I knew you’d want to look at them, too.”
“Good man!” murmured Bony.
“Jenks and I agreed that one man was wearing a size sevenboot or shoe, and that the other man was wearing the same size in shoe-leather.”
“But you said-”
“I know. Wilcannia-Smythe said that one man was big and the other tall and lean. He gave me the impression that the big man would wear a bigger size in boots than a seven.”
“Even a big man may have comparatively small feet, and wear a seven boot,” Bony pointed out
“Those tracks still prove that Smythe is a liar.”
“Indeed. How so?”
“Smythe said that one man was large and the other man was tall,” Simes said with slow deliberation. “Jenks and I first saw the tracks of the three men where the car stopped. Then we followed the three sets of tracks up to the tree, being careful not to overstep ’em. We agreed that one man was lean, but not taller than five feet ten, and that the other man was about as tall and slightly heavier. Our agreement was based on the length of stride taken by both men.”
“Ah!” murmured Bony. “Good work, Simes, good work. Mr Wilcannia-Smythe’s inaccuracies do not confirm the theory that he was mistakenly kidnapped for someone else. Whatd’youthink?”
“The tracks don’t fit into his statement, and his demeanour doesn’t fit in, either,” Simes said with conviction. “It’s likely that he knew who kidnapped him, and why. I think that the reason was not revenge so much as to get him away from his hotel or some place for the night.”
“It’s feasible, Simes. Do you think that the kidnappers intended to return to release Wilcannia-Smythe, or let him stay there to rot? What’s the position of the tree in relation to the road?”
“I’m inclined to think that the tree was very well chosen, because no one coming down the road or going up the road could fail to see Smythe lashed to it.”
“Would there be many people likely to use the road at that place?”
“Yes. Beyond the camp occupied by Jenks there is another occupied by a dozen men who are at work cutting afirebreak. They have a truck there, and that truck is driven to Yarrabo every day. Why?”
“It would seem that the kidnappers knew that road intimately, and were aware of the use made of it by forestry workers. Unless, of course, they intended to return there tonight to make sure that Wilcannia-Smythe had been released. It would hardly be their intention to leave him there to die. I’d like you to take me out there.”
“All right! I’ll see how that tea’s coming along. Like to read my report?”
Simes was back again within the minute, carrying the tea-tray with the skill of a club steward.
“I forgot to tell you,” he said. “Dr Fleetwood wants to see you.”
“Please ring him and ascertain if six o’clock this evening will suit him.”
Bony poured tea into two cups, and sipped from his own with genuine relish. Simes replaced the telephone saying that the doctor would be at home that evening at six, and he drank his tea without apparent consciousness of its temperature, regarding Bony like a man who has many questions to ask.
Bony said, almost languidly, “Life is like a moving picture that can’t be stopped. There would be few successful investigations into homicide if murders would, or could, suspend their own animation for a few months. In very many cases it is what they do after the crime that brings them to face the judge, not what they did before it. I am going to accept the responsibility of asking you to retain your report on this Wilcannia-Smythe incident. I agree with you that this Wilcannia-Smythe affair may have an important bearing on the Blake case, and the Blake case, my dear Simes, belongs to you and me. Have you ever been inside Mrs Blake’s garage?”
“Yes, I was in there the day after the discovery of Blake’s body,” Simes answered. “I helped Sub-Inspector Martin to examine the place for-anything unusual. Nothing unusual was found.”
“Did you come across any spirits-whisky or brandy?”
“No.”
“There is a cupboard in the garage. What did that contain, d’youremember?”
“Yes. Battery acid and distilled water. Cleaning rags and tins of polish.”
“No spirits?”
Simes shook his head.
“Any drinking glasses?”
“No.”
“How long have you known Sid Walsh?”
“Why, ever since I took up duty here.”
“H’m! Let us go along to examine those tracks. Thanks for not asking pertinent questions. When I establish anything of value, I’ll let you have it.”
The policeman’s car was standing at the rear of the station, and at the end of ten minutes they had passed the stone-crusher on the Old Warburton Road. Swinging round a bend, they saw the road running almost straight for two hundred yards when it was thrust to the right by the hill-slope. At that right turn the slope above the road was denuded of trees save one growing eighty or ninety yards up the slope, and on reaching the turn it could be seen that the road ran again straight for almost a hundred yards. Thus anyone approaching that bend from either direction would be bound to note the tree growing in solitary state.
Simes pointed it out as the tree used to secure Wilcannia-Smythe, and then braked his car to a halt.
“The car that brought him here stopped half a dozen yards farther on,” the constable said.
“It was turned round half-way along that stretch of road where gravel was once dug out of the hill-side for the track. Jenks had to turn there, too. As I told you, his camp is half a mile up along the road.”
“Let us relax,” Bony said, and it was a command.
This was a page of the Book of the Bush with which he was unfamiliar, and it occurred to him that Constable Simes and Jenks might prove to be better trackers thanhimself in this class of country. Accustomed to the interior and its limitless plains and mulga belts, its gibber deserts and sandy wastes, here Bony was in an entirely different country and might have been on a different planet.
Requesting Simes to remain in the car, he alighted and went forward to examine the place where the abductors’ car had stopped and they with their victim had alighted. From this point to the tree high on the slope, human feet had laid ribbons of darker green on the floor of closely-growing bracken, and presently Simes watched Bonyzig-zagging to and fro across these ribbons as he mounted the slope. Then, having arrived at the solitary tree, Bony circled it several times, finally leaning with his back against the great trunk.
So clear was the air, Simes could observe Bony roll a cigarette and then, having lit the weed and pocketed the spent match, move out of sight behind the tree, remaining hidden for almost a minute. On reappearing, he came striding down the slope, the bracken to his waist so that he might have been wading in green dye. On reaching the car, he got in and slammed the door.
“You were right,” he said. “Both men wore size seven boots or shoes. Neither was a big man and neither was a tall man. The left leg of one man is slightly shorter than his right, and he is not a bushman because he places both heels as one used to walking on hard pavements. The other man is stouter, for his stride is a fraction shorter. He is slightly pigeon-toed and he has a corn on the fore-part of his right foot. Also, the lace of the right shoe or boot was undone.”
“Gosh!” Simes exclaimed. “Dinkum?”
“I might have read more clearly had it not been for the bracken,” Bony said. “Your friend Jenks is at least six feet tall, weighs something like sixteen stone, chews tobacco, has grey hair and has done a great deal of riding.”
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