Winds of Evil b-5

by Arthur W. Upfield

  Winds of Evil

  ( Bony - 5 )

  Arthur W. Upfield

  Arthur W. Upfield

  Winds of Evil

  On The RoadTo Carie

  IT WAS A wind-created hell in which the man who called himself Joe Fisher walked northward towards the small township of Carie, in the far west of New South Wales.

  Somewhere west of Central Australia was born the gale of wind this day lifting high the sand from Sturt’s country-that desert of sand ranges lying along the north-eastern frontier of South Australia-to carry it eastward into New South Wales, across the Gutter of Australia, even to the Blue Mountains, and then into the distant Pacific.

  Now and then the dark red-brown fog thinned sufficiently to reveal the sun as a huge orb of blood. That was when a trough passed between the waves of sand particles for ever rushing eastward. The wind was steady in its velocity. It was hot, too, but its heat constantly alternated, so that it was like standing before a continuously opened and closed oven door.

  It was not always possible for Fisher to keep his eyes open. Although he could not see it, he knew he was crossing a wide, treeless plain supporting only low annual salt-bush. The track he was following could be seen, on the average, for about six yards. On his left ran a boundary-fence, wire-netted and barbed-topped-a fence which had caught a rampart of wind-quickened deadbuckbush, up and over which came charging like hunters the filigree balls of dead and brittle straw.

  Quite abruptly, and without warning, a large touring car appeared in the red murk. It stopped at the precise moment that Fisher saw it, and from it the driver clambered, bringing with him a four-gallon petrol-tin.

  “Good day-ee!” he shouted to the swagman.

  “Let us hope we will have a good day tomorrow,” Fisher shouted back when he joined the driver. “How far are we from Carie?”

  “ ’Bouteight miles. What a day to be on the tramp! I’d sooner be me than you. You aim to get to Carie today?”

  “No. I intend going only as far as a place called Catfish Hole, on Nogga Creek.”

  The driver’s sand-charged browsrose a fraction. He was hefty and tough.

  He exclaimed with singular inflection of voice, “Well, I wouldn’t camp there if I were you-not for all the tea in China. Blast!”

  “What is the matter?”

  They were standing before the radiator, the tin of water at the driver’s feet.

  “Take off the cap, will you?” requested the driver.

  Suspecting that the radiator was very hot, Fisher gingerly extended a hand, and when his fingers were about an inch from the bright metal mascot, from it to each finger leapt a long blue spark. Beneath the force of the electric shock, Fisher gave a sharp cry.

  “There’s enough static electricity in thatflamin ’ bus to run a dozen house lights for a week,” shouted the grinning driver. “Strike a light! I’ve only had that happen to me twice before.”

  “But what is the cause?” inquired the astonished swagman. “I have felt the effect, and seen it, too, so now tell me the cause.”

  “I dunno exactly. Some say it’s the bombardment of the sand against the car’s metal-work what creates the electricity that can’t get away ’costhe rubber tyres are non-conductors. These wind-storms are fuller of electricity than a thunder-storm.”

  Not too happy about it, he again attempted to unscrew the cap, and to his fingers leapt the blue sparks.

  “What’s up out there?” shouted one of the three passengers.

  “Come out and try your strength on this radiator cap,” he was invited.

  The near-side rear door was opened, and a fat man came stiffly out, helping himself to the ground by holding to the metal hood support. Immediately his feet touched earth he uttered a yell of anguish and almost sat down on the track.

  “What did you want to let go for?” asked the amused driver. “Why didn’t you stay making contactso’s the electricity could run out of her?”

  “It’s a remarkable phenomenon,” observed Fisher.

  “Phenomenon! Two to one on that word. Reckon you’re right, dig. Phew! What a corker of a day. You’ll bemeetin ’ another swagman presently. We offered him a lift, but he was too independent to get up. He’s about a mile back.”

  “Well, do we stay here all day?” demanded the fat man. To which the driver replied with a show of impatience:

  “I’m notlookin ’ for a seized engine, Jack. We’ll drain off the juice this way.”

  He tilted the tin of water against the bumper-bar, being careful to release it the moment before it touched the metal. At contact there was a brilliant blue flash. Nothing further happened, and when the driver extended his hand to remove the radiator cap he received no shock.

  “Mighty strange to me,” grumbled the fat man. “Wonder the car didn’t blow up or something. It’s good for the rheumatics, anyway. My right leg was aching like hell before I got that shock, and now she’s all right.”

  “The petrol-tank might have exploded,” calmly stated the driver, who was now filling the radiator from the tin. “I’m dragging a wheel-chain from now on, like the petrol-wagons drag a chain down in the cities.”

  “Might be as well,” agreed the fat man. “I’d sooner have the screws than be blown up. Cripes! No wonder me wife’s mother has to lie down when the wind blows like this. She says the electricity in these storms takes all the strength out of her.”

  The grin on the driver’s face became a wide smile.

  “Better get her to wear thick rubbed-soled shoes. Then the next sand-storm will charge her with static till she blows to pieces,” he suggested,

  “Not a bad idea,” conceded the fat man without smiling, but his dust-rimmed eyes were twinkling when he turned back to enter the car. Fisher was chuckling delightedly as he called “Good day” and left the driver fixing one of his wheel-chains to the rear bumper-bar.

  The wind sang its menacing song as he plodded northward, a small swarm of flies hovering in the back draught produced by his body and the swag on his back, the left side of his face and his left hand continuously stung by the sand particles. Before and behind him thebuckbush charged the fence rampart, sometimes singly and at times like a squadron of horses, many to leap right across the track. Now and then a filigree ball would strike the swagman’s head, either to bounce from it or to collapse against it and wrap straw about his face and neck.

  The horrible discomforts of this evil day were for a while lessened by thinking of the phenomenon of the electrically charged body of the car. Fisher was not sure that the driver’s explanation of the cause was correct, although it was certainly feasible. Petrol-wagons had been known to explode, or ignite, by the static charge generated, so some said, by the constant movement of petrol within the tank. It was certainly interesting. This may be the real cause of aeroplanes exploding in mid-air during great storms. It was, indeed, a problem of interest to a thinking man.

  Fisher came upon the swagman mentioned by the car driver. He was trying to boil water in a small billy at a fire partially sheltered by a track-side bluebush. That he was an old man of fixed ideas was already proved by his refusal of a lift this terrible day. At Fisher’s sudden appearance he leapt to his feet, with surprising agility, obviously much frightened.

  “Good day!” shouted Fisher. “D’youmindme boiling my billy at your fire?”

  The old man stretched his bent body, venting a sigh of relief.

  “I suppose you can,” he consented grudgingly. “You pass a car?”

  “Yes. The driver had stopped to fill his radiator, and the machine was so charged with static electricity that he couldn’t remove the cap. He said there is more electricity in these wind-storms than there is in a thunder-storm.”

  “ ’Course
there is,” agreed the old man readily. “You don’t ’ear no thunder, but the electricity’s in the air all right. You get a cat a day like this and rub ’erfur and see the sparks fly! I know a bloke wot gets a terrible ’eadachewhen she blows, so’s he’s got to lie down. Where you headed for today?”

  “This side of Carie, I think,” Fisher replied.“On Nogga Creek. There is water in Catfish Hole, isn’t there?”

  They were by this time seated on their swags in what shelter the bluebush provided. At the mention of Nogga Creek and Catfish Hole the old man froze, and he leant nearer his chance companion to stare with a fixity which defied the dust.

  “Ya-as, there’s water in Catfish Hole, I’m told,” he said, much more slowly.“You a stranger in these ’ere parts?”

  “I have not been this way before,” Fisher admitted.

  “Ho! But you’ve heard what’s been going on around Carie?”

  The old man’s billy coming to the boil, he flung into the water half a handful of tea, removed the utensil and waited for Fisher’s answer.

  “Er-no.”

  “You haven’t, eh? Well, I’ll tell you. What’s been going on around Carie is what wouldn’t let me camp at Catfish Hole for all the tea in China.”

  “The car driver said the same thing. What is the matter with the place?”

  “Murders-two of ’emto date, that what’s the matter. Me, I’m George Smith, and I wouldn’t camp there for ten million quid. You take my advice and don’tyou camp there tonight-or ever until the Strangler is caught.”

  “The Strangler?”

  “That’s what theycalls ’im. The year afore last, at this time, he done in a half-caste girl where Thunder and Nogga cricks become Wirragatta River. And then last March he strangled a young feller named Marsh just this side of the township. He’s due now to strangle someone else, and itain’tgonna be me. Don’t you let it beyou. ”

  “What does he do it for?”

  “Hedon’t do it fornothink bar the pleasure he gets outer corpsing people. That’s thewust of it. Thereain’tno proper reason. ’Course the police can’t donothink. They can ’oundus about, mate, but theyain’t no good atcatchin ’ murderers. Then this strangler, he does his killing at the end of a day like this and when it’s certain sure it’ll blow like hell again the next dayso’s his tracks will be wiped out.”

  “Where, then, did you camp last night?” Fisher asked.

  “Me! I camped in the Carie lock-up. They wouldn’t let me camp in the stables behind the pub, so Iarst the constable to let me camp in the jail. That’s about the safest place I know.”

  Fisher added tea to the water boiling in his billy. To the old man he appeared to be unreasonably calm.

  “I’m telling you not to camp at Catfish Hole, oranywheres outside Carie.”

  “Ah, yes! Thank you for the warning. I will certainly remember it. It all sounds a little unhealthy.”

  “Unhealthy! Too right it’s unhealthy. Itain’t healthy to be strangled, is it?”

  Although the subject was of absorbing interest to the old man, it was not unduly protracted. It was difficult, for one thing, to talk when sand-laden air and flies competed in entry to one’s mouth. The two men parted after the most casual of nods and immediately each was swallowed by the sweeping sand waves.

  Joe Fisher was of medium height, slight of frame and yet strong, steady on his feet despite the buffeting of the wind. Like a man long used to the track he carried his swag of blankets and spare clothing within a sheet of stout unbleached calico. The small canvas water-bag gripped by his right hand was stained red by the oozing moisture, and, as the billy was strapped to the swag, his left hand was free to battle constantly with the flies. His face and bare arms were caked by the sand grains. His face and hair below the rim of the old felt hat were dyed a light red. Only the blue of his eyes defied the red fog.

  There was a hint of grim tenacity in the dim picture of the shadowy man’s determined tramp northward in such bad weather. He could have found shelter, but no comfort, in the lee of the fence, but methodically and at even pace he passed along the track which now did not reveal wheel-tracks; not even those of the car he had recently met.

  At last the sun was no longer to be seen in the troughs of the sand waves, for it was too westerly. The wind was losing its strength a fraction, but the sand dust remained as dense. Knowledge of his own part of the country suggested that at sundown the wind wouldeither veer to the south and blow cool and cleanly on the morrow, or lull during the night and at sunrise begin again to blow stronger yet.

  Time passed and still he continued the steady tramping to the north, above him the lowering red blanket of sand particles, about him the red-brown fog which now and then was tenuous, and sometimes seemingly solid. Then presently the box-trees bordering Thunder Creek came marching to meet him from out the murk, holding invitation to the traveller with their gnarled and twisted branches.

  On gaining their comparative shelter, Fisher found the wind to be much less forceful, butmore angry in its song of power. Over the plain it had softly whined; here it bellowed and roared. With quickened pace he crossed the flat, shallow and dry bed of the creek to gain its far bank, when he saw the pine-walled, iron-roofed house standing some two hundred yards back and east of the track. Here the air was clearer, the wind almost conquered by the trees. They circled beyond the house as though purposely planted to keep at bay the vast stretch of open country across which Fisher had been tramping all day.

  Despite his statement that never before had he been this way, the man who called himself Joe Fisher knew that when he crossed Thunder Creek he would see the homestead of Fred Storrie’s Selection. Dimly in the distance he saw the box-trees bordering Nogga Creek. These two creeks came from the east to join in Wirragatta River less than a mile westward of the fence. And half a mile down the river below the junction of the creeks stood the homestead of the great Wirragatta Station.

  In the swagman’s tortured blue eyes leapt strange exultation as he strode along the branch track to the selector’s house flanked by windmill and reservoir tanks on one side and bysheepyards on the other.

  There was that about the front of the house plainly indicating that the door on this side was never used, and, as any swagman would, Fisher passed round the side of the house to its back door. Just beyond this door was a round iron water-tank before which stood a girl gazing vacantly at the terrible sky while water from the tap filled a bucket.

  “Good afternoon!” the swagman said, pitching his voice to master the howl of the wind about the roof.

  The meeting produced a remarkable result. The girl cried out, sprang about, and then pressing back against the tank stared with undoubted fear shining from her dark-brown eyes. The water continued to gush into the bucket and began to overflow and run to waste along the short brick drain.

  “The tap,” said the swagman, regarding the running water with a slight frown of disapproval.

  Without removing her gaze from his face, the girl permitted herself to sink on bending knees until her groping hand found the tap and so shut off the water.

  “You seem to be fearful of something,” Fisher said. “I hope you are not afraid of me.”

  The friendliness in his eyes and the flash of his well-kept teeth had its effect. The ice of her fear began quickly to melt, and it was with evident relief that she asked him what he wanted.

  “If you could spare me a little meat,” he replied. “I am on my way north and I intend to camp beside the waterhole on Nogga Creek. Catfish Hole, isn’t it?”

  The girl nodded, normal composure not yet regained. Fisher gave her time, and presently she said:

  “Yes, I can give you a little meat. But… but… Nogga Creek… in this weather!” Again her eyes grew big. “You wouldn’t camp there, would you? Not on a night that this is going to be?”

  “The wind will not bring rain,” he pointed out.

  “I know. But… but are you a stranger in these parts?”

  “Yes.�
��

  “Then you don’t know about the Strangler?”

  “Well, I have heard of him.”

  It was, perhaps, his easy smile that brought her from the tank to stand closer to him. Fear still lurked deep in her eyes. Despite the day, she appeared fresh andcool in a house-frock of brown linen. There was character in the moulding of her mouth and chin and grace in the outlines of her body.

  “Wait here and I will fetch you some meat,” she requested abruptly.

  From inside the house a woman called:

  “Mabel, who’s that?”

  “Only a swagman, mother. He wants meat,” replied the girl, and now more composed she flashed Joe Fisher a half-smile and then hurried across to thecanegrass meat-house.

  The man’s critical eyes took inthe out-houses, noting their condition and neat preservation. It was obvious that Storrie’s Selection prospered. The girl returned carrying meat wrapped in newspaper, and when she gave it him she again attempted to advise him not to camp beside Catfish Hole.

  “Oh, I’ll be all right,” she was assured. “I’ve camped often enough in wild country, and to be forewarned is to be forearmed. Besides, the last attack made by this mysterious strangler was last March, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes. And this time last year, too. You want to be very careful. No one walks about, or camps in the open anywhere along these creeks. I’m going to the dance at Carie tonight, but my brother is taking me on the truck.”

  “Late in the year for a dance, isn’t it?” he questioned.

  “Yes, it is so, but then, you see, we haven’t any other amusement in Carie.”

  Again Joe Fisher smiled.

  “Well, thank you for the meat. I hope you will enjoy the dance. Do you think I would have a chance of work on Wirragatta Station?”

  “It might be worth trying. TheBorradales are good people to work for.”

  “Then I’ll try them tomorrow. Good-bye and thank you.”

  Having raised his hat, Fisher adjusted his swag, picked up the water-bag and continued his tramp to Nogga Creek, now to be seen dusty-green below the red canopy of whirling sand. All the way across the half-mile flat between the two creeks the wind roaring through the trees provided the overture for the coming night of dark terror.