Bony - 07 - The Mystery of Swordfish Reef

by Arthur W. Upfield

  “On one point I owe the Sydney men something: by their questioning of you they must have fixed in your minds a mental picture of everything you did that day the Do-me failed to reach port. You have had much time to think of that day, to discuss its generalities among yourselves.

  “Now, here on these sheets of paper I have drawn a rough sketch map of the coast for twenty miles north and south of Bermagui. By the way, why is the town spelled Bermagui and the river Bermaguee?”

  “The Postal Department named the town BERMAGUI,” replied Remmings. “It was a long time ago. Why, no one can tell.”

  “And what does the word ‘Bermaguee’ mean? Do you know?” pressed Bony.

  “Yes. It means, in abo language, a meeting place.”

  “Ah! I like to know these small details. Now for my maps. I want you, Flandin and Remmings and Burns, each to take a map and a pencil, and to plot on your map, as accurately as possible, the course your launch followed throughout the whole of that vital day. Take your time. There are several bottles still to be emptied. I want you, Jack, to sketch on this map the position of Swordfish Reef, the edge of the Continental Shelf, and any other reefs of which you are familiar. And you, Joe, you are a man after my own heart, for you can track at sea as well as I can track on land. Do you think you could plot on this sketch map the drift a piece of flotsam would take assum­ing it came from the Do-me which sank above Swordfish Reef?”

  Joe grinned with pleasure at the implied compliment.

  “I’ll give ’er a go,” he said, and accepted paper and pencil, to examine the paper with his eyes screwed to pin-points whilst he sucked the point of the pencil.

  “Were you able to borrow the weather records from the postmaster, Telfer?” asked Bony.

  Telfer nodded, placed a wad of official forms before the detective—and then filled all glasses. The others worked industriously at their maps, and Bony fell to studying the weather records. One by one the maps were passed to him. He gave Flandin another sketch map of the coast, saying:

  “I want you to plot the course of the Do-me till the moment you last sighted her, marking her position then, and your own position, with a cross and noting the approximate time.”

  Flandin having done this the same map was passed to Burns, the Edith having been the next launch to have lost sight of the Do-me, and after he had continued the Do-me’s course and marked his own and her position when he had last sighted her, Remmings was asked to continue the tale, as he on the Gladious was the last of all to see the Do-me.

  “When I am in my native bush, gentlemen,” Bony began in explanation, “everything I observe, except the clouds, is static. On the sea nothing is static. A ship does not leave tracks on the sea, but when I have transferred the courses of your launches and the ships you saw that vital day to one key plan we will see how the sea was tracked by their wakes for a few seconds.

  “You have been patient with me, and I am going to present each of you with yet another blank sketch map and ask you to plot the course of any ship or other craft you saw during that day the Do-me disappeared.”

  Whilst the men were working he thoughtfully watched them, noting how each bore the same stamp of the sea upon his face and neck and hands whilst retaining marked individuality. The colour of their eyes was different, but the manner in which all eyes were employed was exactly the same. Here in the lamp­light all eyes were wide open, and all were as clear as the sea which was their background. When their maps had been re­turned to Bony, he gave several minutes to studying them. Then:

  “So the mail steamer, Orcades, passed northward that day. How far out from shore was she?”

  “About fourteen miles,” replied Burns, and Remmings agreed.

  “You, Remmings, saw a trawler working south of the Gladious. I assume that that was the same trawler which was spoken of the following night by you?”

  “That’s so.”

  “There was only the one trawler working off the coast here­abouts that day?”

  “Only that one.”

  “She was the A.S.1, not the A.S.3, which recovered the angler’s head?”

  “Yes, she was the A.S.1,” confirmed Remmings.

  Bony produced a telegram from his suit-case, and, glancing at it, said to Remmings:

  “You did not that day see a launch about fifty feet in length, without a mast, and painted a silver-grey?”

  “No.”

  “That day, Mr Remmings, you worked southward of Berma­gui, and the Edith and Snowy worked about Montague Island which is north of Bermagui. I want you to be quite sure that you did not see that launch painted silver-grey. Think.”

  “I’m quite sure about it,” Remmings said, positively. “If I had seen her I would have remembered because she must be the Dolfin, Mr Rockaway’s launch.”

  “Oh! I have not seen her.”

  “No. She hasn’t been in with a fish since you’ve been here.”

  “Where, then, is her headquarters?”

  Telfer answered this question.

  “Mr Rockaway has a house near the mouth of Wapengo Inlet, a mile or two south of Bunga Head. He’s been living there for a few years now. Built his own private jetty.”

  “Great angler,” supplemented Burns. “Mr Rockaway’s a mem­ber of the Bermagui Anglers’ Club, and when he catches a fish he brings it here to be weighed and recorded.”

  “Hum!” Again Bony studied the sketch maps last filled with detail. “I see here that you, Burns and Flandin, have noted the presence of several launches in the vicinity of Montague Island, but have not named them. Where did they come from?”

  “They came from Narooma, a bit north of Montague,” replied Flandin. “None of ’em were this side or east’ard of the Island.”

  “So I see. And you, Burns, who that day was well east of Montague Island, would have seen any Narooma launch that was east of Montague Island, would you not?”

  “Yes. I was trolling out there east of the Island most of the day.”

  “Hum! Can you tell me why Spinks named his launch the Do-me?”

  The question produced smiles and chuckles, and Remmings answered the question.

  “When Bill Spinks and Joe, here, were building her we’d go and have a look at their work and chiack ’em about the ideas Spinks was putting into her, and he used to say: ‘Well, she’ll do me, anyway.’ ”

  “And I suggested to Bill when naming came up that he call her the Do-me,” added Wilton.

  “Well, I am most grateful to you men for your interest and assistance,” Bony said, smiling at them in turn. “We have cer­tainly laid foundations more solid than those put down by the Sydney detectives. What I would like agreed upon is the limit of visibility that day the Do-me vanished. I mean the limit of visibility beyond, say, five miles off the coast.”

  “There was more haze that day than there was today,” Flandin said, with slow deliberation.

  “Yes, there was,” confirmed Burns. Then he asked: “Visibility of what, Mr Bonaparte? We’d see a liner farther away that day than a launch, you understand. We seen the Orcades quite plain at about six miles, but we’d have found it hard to see a launch at four miles.”

  “Quite so, Burns. I am thinking of small craft sighted from small craft.”

  “It wouldn’t be much more’n four miles,” Remmings contri­buted, and Flandin agreed with him.

  Bony proceeded to question them about the Do-me. All stoutly resisted the suggestion that the Do-me was unseaworthy, or that her engine and petrol feed system was faulty and likely to cause fire.”

  “She was only three years old,” Wilton said. “I helped to install her engine which was a new one, and her petrol-tank was away up in the bows. Spinks always stowed his supply of extra petrol up for’ard, because he and young Garroway were great cigarette smokers and he was naturally cautious. Anyway, if she’d caught fire someone would have seen the smoke.”

  “And I’d have found drift wood or something when me and Jack follered the currents to Swordfish Reef t
he next day,” added Joe.

  “Nothing happened to her like that,” Burns said, with solemn conviction. “Even if that head hadn’t been found I’d never believe that the Do-me disappeared through natural causes.”

  “What were the odds against the trawler bringing up the head?” asked Bony. His confreres regarded the ponderous Joe who had once served aboard a trawler.

  “Smaller than you’d think,” answered Joe. “The sea bottom is as plain to a trawler skipper as a paddock is to a farmer. The trawler man knows all the reefs, and all the bottoms that are clear of reefs and rocks. The only thing about that head being found in the trawl is that it was found in the trawl when the bottom bar of the net is higher than the ground on which it is dragged.”

  “Then, how do you account for it?”

  “Well, it’s like this here. It seems to me that after Mr Ericson was shot he was tossed overboard, or his body fell overboard after he was shot. There was a shark or two about and they fought over the body, tearing it to pieces, you understand. They missed the head what sinks while they’re fighting over other bits, and the head comes to rest on thick seaweed a few feet above bottom.”

  “It wouldn’t be feasible to send a diver down in the locality where the head was found—to search for, let us say, the Do-me?”

  “No. Because they don’t know where the head entered the trawl. They only know where the trawl was brought up. That trawl was down one hour and thirty minutes, and it had travelled over the sea bottom four or five miles along a zigzag course.”

  Bony rose to his feet.

  “Well, gentlemen, the night is ageing and we all have to go to sea early in the morning. Permit me again to thank you, and to make a final request. That is, that you will continue to think of me as a cattleman from the Northern Territory, and not to disclose my profession. Good night!”

  Left alone with Constable Telfer, Bony wrote on a sheet of blank paper. Then, regarding the constable intently, said:

  “Get this message off to Headquarters first thing tomorrow. We must know if the officers of the Orcades saw any small craft far off land that day the liner passed up this coast. One of them may have remembered seeing such a craft. No note of it will be in the log, but yet one may remember.”

  “That’ll be done, sir. Why did you ask about Rockaway’s Dolfin?”

  “Because the captain of the trawler A.S.1 has reported seeing her early that morning, and I think it important to have noted, on the key plan I will be preparing, every craft at sea that day.”

  Chapter Nine

  The Key Plan

  THE FOLLOWING morning, instead of joining Emery at the break­fast-table at seven o’clock. Bony sent a message to Wilton say­ing that he would not be going out that day, and asking him to call on him at eleven.

  From the hotel balcony he watched the majority of the Ber­magui launches appear from beyond the promontory hiding the bar and the mouth of the river, pass across the inner bay, skirt the headland for bait-fish, and so set out to sea. He now knew them all by name, and he instantly noticed among them a strange craft. It was a sleek cruiser-type launch, some fifty feet in length and painted silver-grey.

  “Do you know the name of that launch?” he called down to the yard-man who was sweeping in front of the building.

  “That’s the Dolfin,” came the reply. “She belongs to Mr Rock­away who lives down at Wapengo Inlet. She brought a swordie in this morning to be weighed.”

  “Indeed!”

  “Yes. A black marlin. Weighed two hundred and ninety-one pounds. Miss Rockaway caught him south of Tathra.”

  Watching the tail end of the procession of launches, Bony felt keen-edged regret that the Marlin was not among them and he in its cockpit, for that drug which Emery had said was worse than alcohol was already his master.

  He was in the lounge studying his sketch maps when Wilton arrived.

  “They tell me that that smart launch which went out this morning was the Dolfin?” he said, query in his soft voice.

  “That’s so, Mr Bonaparte. Miss Rockaway landed a nice two-ninety-one-pounder. Black marlin. That’s her third fish this season. She’s pretty good at game fishing.”

  Bony led the way outside to the sidewalk where he faced his launchman, and said smilingly:

  “I thought we’d give Joe a spell today. There are a few matters I have to attend to, and I thought you might like to assist me.”

  “Only too glad to.”

  “Well then, I would like to meet Miss Spinks to whom you could give me an introduction. While I am talking to her you could engage the mother with small talk. Confide in her my profession.”

  “All right.”

  An expression of doubt touched the keen brown eyes regard­ing Bony, and Bony’s blue eyes became abruptly hard. Wilton recognized in them that indefinable something stamping all men who have made their mark on the world, several of whom had been “his” anglers.

  “I shall not upset Miss Spinks by severe questioning and a too vulgar probing into her family relationships,” Bony said, slowly moving off along the street in the direction of Nott’s Tea Rooms. “I am not going to hold out any hope that Spinks is alive, although we have no proof that he is dead. If, however, he is alive and should one day return home, Miss Spinks might consider herself in a more favourable position to accept the suggestion of marriage, don’t you think?”

  Glancing sideways at Wilton, Bony noted the expression of strain.

  “I know, Jack, how matters are with you. In fact, I know about you more than you may think. My first impression of you is wearing very well, and had I not been born a detective-inspector I would have been a great match-maker.”

  Marion Spinks turned from dusting the shelves and glass con­tainers beyond the counter to welcome her prospective custo­mers, and instantly the susceptible detective was charmed by her freshness and gipsy beauty. There was no guile, only a pleasing frankness in her dark eyes.

  During the introduction, Bony noticed the flash of hostility in those expressive eyes, replaced almost instantly by friendli­ness. He bowed in his own inimitable way, and said:

  “I thought, perhaps, that Jack could interview your mother, and himself bring me a pot of morning tea, while you and I enjoyed a little chat. I would like to prove to you that chatting with a detective can be enjoyable,” Bony spoke in his grand manner which, although probably overdone, never failed to charm. “There appear to be no customers requiring your atten­tion just now. Shall we sit at one of these little tables?”

  She nodded and, passing round the end of the counter, sat down opposite him. Wilton departed.

  “I want you to understand, Miss Spinks,” Bony began, “that I do not believe your brother had anything to do with the killing of unfortunate Mr Ericson. Further, as the Do-me evidently was not a victim of the sea, I am inclined to the opinion that your brother was killed with Mr Ericson.”

  “He’s still alive, Mr Bonaparte,” she said quietly, confidently.

  “Do you know that for a fact or do you just feel it so?”

  “I don’t know it and I don’t feel it.”

  “Then—”

  “I would have felt it had he died,” she proceeded earnestly. “Bill and I are twins. When he was caned at school I used to feel on my hand the cuts he got on his. If he got them on his right hand, then my right hand would sting and on it would appear a dull red mark. Father used to drink a lot, and one day he hit Bill with a billet of wood and knocked him unconscious. I was away picking blackberries when it happened, but I knew the instant Bill was hit. I could tell you about other things show­ing how close Bill and I are together. If Bill had been killed I’d have felt it. As it was, that afternoon the Do-me vanished I felt unsettled, and then, when mother and I were waiting at home before we went down to the jetty, I felt that Bill was wanting me badly.”

  “Have you felt like that since?”

  “Often,” she replied, nodding her black-crowned head. Then she clasped her hands tightly together on the
table and she cried out as though made desperate by all the people who had refused to accept her belief. “Bill’s not dead, Mr Bonaparte. I know he’s not. I’d have known it if he was. And I know he had nothing to do with the shooting of Mr Ericson. He’s too fine to do anything like that.”

  “And you are twins, I think you said?”

  “Yes.”

  Bony stared at her and she wondered why.

  “Tell me, Miss Spinks, did you know beforehand that your brother and Mr Ericson intended to fish along Swordfish Reef?”

  “Oh, yes. Bill told mother and me at supper the night before. It wasn’t finally decided then, but when mother took Bill’s and Robert Garroway’s lunch down to the jetty the next morning Bill and Mr Ericson had decided on Swordfish Reef.”

  At this moment Wilton came with Bony’s morning tea which the girl set out on the table. To Wilton, Bony said:

  “When did you know definitely that Bill Spinks and Mr Eric­son were going out to Swordfish Reef?”

  Wilton hesitated to reply.

  “I don’t remember,” he admitted. “I’ll have to think back. Ah—yes, I know. It was when Joe and me rowed to the jetty from the Marlin at lunch-time. We stopped for a chin-wag to Martin Hooper and Fred Penny. Fred Penny was saying that Swordfish Reef was as good as anywhere off Montague Island for sharks, the argument coming about because the Do-me had gone out to Swordfish Reef that day.”

  “Oh!” Bony sipped his tea. “It was then fairly general know­ledge?”

  “Yes. There was no secret about it, anyway.”

  “Hum! Now you go back and talk to Mrs Spinks. Tell her that the tea is just how I like it.” To Marion, Bony said after Wilton had left them: “Your brother did not have any ene­mies?”

  “No. Everyone liked Bill.”

  “And you all three liked Mr Ericson?”

  “Oh yes. He was a wonderful man. Bill said he was so kind and considerate. He even let Robert Garroway have his rod for half an hour catching tunny.”