Benson had spoken of a trust, even as the remains of an old yardman were being cremated. A trust! How much did those two press-ganged girls know of it? If they knew nothing of it, they were still press-ganged, still the turnkeys to open the door of a gaol to receive Carl and Cora Benson. How would they fare at the hands of these people when Mulligan and his men arrived?
The thrill of achievement coursed hotly through the veins of the watching Bonaparte. When a police organisation had turned its attention to other matters for want of clues, he had undertaken the assignment to bring to light the fate of two young women who had disappeared in the bush five months previously. He could reveal their fate, but he yet had to prove it, to do which he must produce the bodies before persons able to identify them.
At the first sign of an invasion by Mulligan, these women might be whisked away beyond reach. They might be taken in the aeroplane, flown over the not-distant sea, and jettisoned with weights attached to them. At all costs he would have to get them out of the house and into a place of safety before Mulligan’s police cars skidded to a stop at the front door.
Instinctively he glanced round to observe the time-telling stars, found he could see none beyond the arc of diffused light, swiftly essayed the guess that it must be eleven-thirty. A peculiar hour for people to be seated before a meal comprising several courses. The food and drink being served recalled to him the hunger he was experiencing, the hunger created by a sharply unbalanced diet. Yet there was no envy in him, none of the despair of one on the outside looking in, for within the fine apartment the atmosphere was so foreign to ordinary human conviviality that he was chilled by it.
Not once had anyone smiled. Carl Benson did most of the talking. Once Simpson spoke to his left-hand neighbour, asking in English what the passenger load of the aeroplane was, and was told “eight”, in so brusque a manner that his face became faintly flushed. Everyone was on edge, as though facing a momentous decision or a tremendous event.
Then happened that which made Bony fighting mad and yet glad that Shannon was not with him.
Red Head was pouring wine into the glass before the woman facing the windows, who was clearly the sister of Carl Benson, when the woman’s arm inadvertently came into contact with the napkined bottle. The result—a little wine upon the polished table. Red Head straightened up, and the woman, with no expression upon her large face and no detectable alteration of expression in her eyes, raised her hand and slapped the girl’s face.
Before the sound of the blow ceased its echo down the corridors of Bony’s mind, the butler was behind Red Head, one great hand fastened about her hand clasping the bottle. She was snatched away from the table as though she were a feather duster and whisked to the serving bench, where her other arm was swept up her back in a half nelson and the bottle removed from her right hand.
No one at the table turned his head or removed his gaze from Carl Benson, and Benson did not pause for a fraction in what he was saying. The butler, six feet two and weighing in the vicinity of fifteen stone of everything bar fat, placed the bottle on the serving bench, released his hold of the arm behind the girl’s back, and violently pushed her against the wall. Then he marched to the table, swabbed up the spilled wine, and proceeded to fill the woman’s glass.
Red Head didn’t cry. She stood beside the serving bench, hands clenched, green eyes blazing, chest heaving. Her fellow-servant left the board with used plates, and as she crossed to the bench she shook her head, imploring Red Head to do nothing. Then, astoundingly, the butler marched to the serving bench, took a bottle from an ice-pail, withdrew the cork, wrapped the bottle, and presented it to Red Head. Red Head returned to the table to continue serving.
The meal came to an end. The remnants of the meal were transferred to the serving bench by the two girls, the butler assisting. At an order from him, Red Head passed out of the room, to reappear beyond the shutter which opened behind the bench. She drew out the loaded trays passed to her by the butler, and the brunette left the room. The shutter was closed and the butler fastened it. Then he locked the door and proceeded to serve wine in fresh glasses, the diners remaining seated and silent.
Every glass charged, the butler took up the glass he had filled for himself and stood beside Benson. Benson looked up at him standing as stiffly as the best of sergeant-majors, and then he, too, rose to his feet, followed by the company.
A guest began to speak. He was tall, lean, grey, and soldierly in bearing. He spoke in the same language, keeping his light blue eyes directed at a point just above the opposite man’s head. The others became statues, each of them holding the wineglass poised at a level with his or her face. The toast, for it was certainly that, was a long one. The voice was low but loaded with emotion, so much so that Bony, who could not understand a word, felt it powerfully.
Abruptly the voice ceased its outpouring. The ensuing silence could be measured. Benson spoke the same word twice, and in time with the third utterance of the word the company gave a single great shout. Glasses were drained and then cascaded into the great Benares bowl upon the table.
The melodrama thrilled Bony down to the soles of his naked feet.
The butler stalked to the door and, unlocking it, threw it open. The company almost stalked, too, as they drifted out of the room. And then Bony was off the veranda, crouching down beyond its edge as he watched the butler close and fasten the windows and finally switch off the lights.
Continuing to feel the peculiar emotional reaction to the voice of the toast giver and the final smashing of the glasses, Bony debated his next step. He toyed with the idea of testing the french windows to gain entry to the house, gave that away and decided to reconnoitre outside the building and familiarise himself with the set-up of the homestead.
It was important to locate where the hands were quartered and their approximate number. It was vitally important to have the entire plan of the place in his mind that he might move quickly if speed of action was essential. That done, he could proceed to contact the girls and get them out of the house and into a place of safety. They had to come first, and of that there could be no argument.
The languorous wind whispered to the orange trees and the smaller shrubs. The stars gleamed like sequins on a woman’s velvet dress. A black and shapeless shape moved swiftly along the darkened side of the house, passed round it, flitted on to pause before a lighted window, broke into rapid movement, and slipped up into a flowering gum tree. From the gum tree Bony could gaze into a large kitchen.
Both girls had changed into blue linen house-frocks. One was polishing glasses, the other washing dishes. They were talking and they were alone. They talked without smiling and yet without sulkiness. Red Head was still indignant, Brunette still pleading.
Bony had yet to master the plan of the homestead, but he was tempted to knock upon the window and urge the girls to escape with him. The opportunity, however, although appearing favourable, was not felt to be so in view of all the other aspects of this new development.
Having finished the chores, the girls came to stand near the window, where they linked arms as though gaining comfort by the affectionate contact, talking earnestly, the one soothing the outraged nerves of the other. They stood thus for several moments, when the butler appeared, armed with an oversize flashlight.
Beckoning with his head, he marched out, followed by the girls.
Bony dropped lightly from the tree, hope given him by the flashlight carried by the butler. The shapeless shape danced away from the kitchen window, withdrew a little farther from the house, stopped beyond the next corner that two sides of the house could be watched.
A door was opened on that side opposite to the lawn, and a man issued from it, closing the door behind him. Bony went to ground, searched for, found a sky-line. Along the sky-line he observed the head and shoulders of James Simpson, and Simpson crossed a wide, gravelled space and entered the dark observatory. The next moment a light appeared in a small window high from the ground.
Immediately the light had been switched on inside the observatory, another house door was opened and three figures issued from it. This time, across Bony’s sky-line slid the heads and shoulders of the two girls, followed by that of the butler. His flashlight came on, the beam aimed steadily at the ground about the girls’ feet as they walked over open gravelled space, skirted the observatory, and halted before the door of a small building. After them, like a long-legged tiger cat, skipped Inspector Bonaparte.
Chapter Twenty-five
The Opening Score
TWICE the butler raised the angle of his flashlight, revealing to Bony that they were crossing a wide gravelled area hemmed by the house, the observatory, the outbuildings, and the stacks of fodder. It was obvious that the two girls had taken this little journey before, because, without direction from their escort, they walked straight to one of the outbuildings.
Before the door of this building they stopped and the man passed them, to throw his light upon the lock, which he proceeded to free. The door was pushed inward. The girls entered, an interior light was switched on, and the butler then relocked the door. When he stalked back to the house, Bony was lying full length at the base of the observatory.
The man having entered the house, Bony crossed to the outbuildings. It was constructed of stone blocks, and it needed no light to inform him that the door was heavy and solid and that it was secured by a bolt kept in place by a padlock of the Yale type.
He could hear the murmuring voices of the inmates, and without making his presence known to them, he circled the building, and so arrived below a small window set high in the wall. The window was open, and the light within revealed thick iron bars bisecting it. Here the voices were louder but the words indistinguishable.
Bony waited until the light went out, and then, reaching up, he began to tap a tattoo upon the window-sill. When nothing happened he so employed his wire sword as the drumstick, and then above the soft tapping came a voice asking who it was.
“A friend,” he called softly. “Don’t put on the light.”
He jumped and caught hold of the lowest bar, pulling himself upward so that his face was above the sill. He could feel the warmth of the room. A vague shape moved just beyond the bars and the sound of quick breathing played upon his ears.
“Are you Mavis Sanky and Beryl Carson?” he whispered.
An exclamation, and then steadily:
“Yes. Who are you? What do you want?”
“Well, for one thing, I want to get you out. I presume you would like to be free. As I told you, I’m a friend—and a policeman. I want you to answer my questions as shortly as possible because time is vital.”
“All right.”
“Tell me how many hands are employed here?”
“Seven.”
“Whereabouts are they quartered, do you know?”
“Two, no, three buildings from here. On my right. But they’ll be over at the house with the Bensons and their visitors.”
“The hands were not at table with the company this evening?” Bony queried.
“Oh yes, they were. All of them excepting the two who are away. They’re not real stockmen.”
“I didn’t think so. When are the absent two expected back, d’you know?”
“Tonight,” replied a different voice. “I heard Heinrich ask Mr. Benson, and he said they should have been back from Dunkeld before it was dark. They’re not stockmen, as Mavis said. They’re all foreigners, excepting the Bensons and that man from the hotel.”
“And you were abducted, were you not?”
“Yes,” indignantly. “They were waiting for us on the road—after we left the hotel. They forced us into a car and we fought them, so they chloroformed us or something. The last thing I remember was seeing that old yardman at the hotel looking out from behind some bushes. We were brought here and compelled to work for Miss Benson.”
“We refused, of course,” said the other girl, and when Bony asked what then happened, her voice was vibrant with anger. “They whipped us. They tied our hands together round a post. She was there and counted the strokes. Heinrich did it with a whip with lots of thongs on it. Ten strokes that woman counted for each of us. We went on strike again a few weeks after that and got fifteen strokes that time. We daren’t refuse to work after that, scrubbing and washing and waiting at table for the beasts.”
“Oh, please get us out of here. Smash the door down or something.”
“No, Beryl, not that. They would hear. Mister—out there—you might get the key of the door bolt. It’s hanging on a nail just inside the side door.”
“The door by which you left the house?” Bony asked.
“Yes, that’s the door. Will you try to get it?”
“I won’t try to get it,” Bony said. “I’ll just get it. Now you dress and wait for me. I may not return for an hour, but be patient. Now tell me. What’s going on here?”
“We don’t know. It’s something inside the observatory. They hold a kind of service over there, generally at night. They’re going to have a service tonight. Yes, there’s the organ.”
“Who attends the service?”
“Everyone who’s here.”
“What about this Heinrich man?”
“Oh, he goes too. Serves them with drinks and refreshments.”
“How long does the service continue?” Bony pressed.
“Two hours at least. Sometimes much longer.”
“You don’t know what kind of service?”
“Can’t even guess. That hotel man plays the organ, and sometimes someone or other sings. It’s all foreign to us.”
“All right,” Bony whispered. “Now I’ll be going. Dress in the dark and be ready. Have you your walking-shoes?”
“No. They took our shoes from us the day after they brought us here. Shoes! It’ll be weeks before we can wear shoes again after having had to wear slippers for months.”
Hands reached forward and became clasped over Bony’s hands gripping the bars.
“You’ll take care, won’t you?”
Bony chuckled encouragingly, and he said with a confidence he dared not mistrust:
“Don’t you worry. I’ll be all right. Anyway, there’s a friend of mine not very far away. I wonder if you know him. Which of you is Mavis Sanky?”
The hands upon his own pressed hard, and their owner gave the affirmative reply.
“His name is Glen Shannon.”
“Glen!” almost shouted the girl, and her friend hushed her and cried: “You always said your American would come looking for you, didn’t you?”
“Well, he has been looking for you, and you will see him soon. So both be good girls and obey orders, and don’t switch on your light or make any noise. I’ll get that key, but it may take time. Au revoir!”
Relaxing his grip, he dropped to the ground, picked up the wire, and passed round to the front of the building.
Opposite was the observatory, two wide windows set very wide apart appearing as the eyes of a pagan idol emitting music instead of fire. To the left, the house, with its main entrance illumined by a porch light. The side door was open and he could see a small hall beyond.
Once again the shapeless shape danced through the corridors of the night. Bony located the hands’ quarters, a spacious building and empty of light. His nose located the paint and oil stores, and fire was the natural idea-association with oil. The door being unlocked, he entered, and with his fingers found a tapped drum of kerosene and an empty bucket which he filled from the drum. Diversionary tactics are easily executed, and with greater celerity, by the application of kerosene and a lighted match to a fodder stack.
One of the stacks was of oats, and it had been broken open. Loose straw was there, which he piled against the open cut and saturated with the kerosene. The ignited match could be applied if and when events decided the moment.
Everything he saw, even in the darkness, bespoke the wealth and the prosperity of the owner of Baden Park. There was
no litter. Somewhere in the distance, removed that its noise would not disturb, hummed a powerful generating plant. The garage building contained seven stalls, each having an automatic door, whilst under one great iron roof was enough machinery to work a dozen ordinary farms.
Satisfied that he was now familiar with the scene of the probable battle to come, Bony drifted back to the observatory and discovered several points of interest. The building was square in shape, its thirty-feet high walls of granite blocks supporting the cupola, and its only doorway facing towards the house. The door was ajar. It was almost four inches thick and was fitted with heavy iron hinges reaching almost across its width, like the door of an old church. There was no keyhole and no fastening bolt. Near the left-hand corner a series of iron rungs gave access to the cupola, Bony assuming that when the telescope was installed certain mechanism required periodic attention.
As though to a time-table, people appeared in the main doorway of the house, and Bony skipped to the far side of the observatory and peered round the wall angle to watch the house party arrive. They walked slowly and solemnly, as people walk to church. The butler pushed open the door, stood aside, then went in last. The door was partly closed, leaving a five-inch ribbon of light to fall upon the ground.
The music faded into silence, and the enthralled Bony could hear the subdued voices within. They went on for perhaps a minute, when the organist began again to play and Heinrich emerged and went back to the house, where he switched off the exterior light over the main door, closed that door, and passed to the secondary or side door. Bony could see him cross what appeared to be a small hall and disappear beyond.
The organ produced sound like the wind in faraway trees, rising and falling, and gradually gaining in strength until it became the rolling drums of a funeral march.
Bony - 12 - The Mountains have a Secret Page 18
