Breakaway House

by Arthur W. Upfield

  “A crack on the head with a bullet!” Tonger echoed.

  Tremayne bared his head and bent it forward for the squatter to inspect the wound.

  “See any fly maggots in it?” he asked.

  “No, but it’s full of grit and dust.” Tonger regarded the overseer intently. “I don’t quite get you,” he said. “Did you see anyone shoot at you?”

  “No. I was facing that balancing rock when I got it,” replied Tremayne, lifting the water-bag to his parched lips. “There were some fellows with service rifles hunting away back from the breakaway. That was just before three o’clock. I came to about ten minutes ago.”

  “Deuced strange, Tremayne! What the devil would anyone deliberately shoot at you for? Tell you what! It might have been, in fact it must have been, a ricochet bullet. I never did like those three-o-threes. They shoot too damn far. That’ll be the Kenny brothers using them. They got permission to shoot on my place several days ago. You’d better come along to the house and get your wound fixed up.”

  “Thanks! I really have no business here, but I wanted to get those Bowgada cattle before they boxed and save trouble. Instead of which I got more trouble than I bargained for.”

  When Tremayne was mounted, Tonger asked: “Hurt much?”

  “Like hell. A hammer keeps hitting the top of my head.”

  “I’ll stop those fellows using service rifles. They’ll be killing my cattle and horses next,” Tonger remarked decisively. “You’ve had a very lucky escape. A fraction of an inch closer and we’d have found you dead.”

  “Service rifles are too expensive shooting anyway.”

  “Much. A man wants only to miss once in four and the profit on his skins is next to nothing.”

  Not a word from Tonger’s hand. He rode a little ahead of them, a man whose daylight hours were clearly all in the saddle.

  They presently rounded the northern point, on the other side of which was a half-mile range of cliffs ending in another point off which a low, scrub-capped island stood, its barren grey slopes in shade and its dark green cap of vegetation coloured by the westering sun.

  Having passed between the island and the point, they now rode in sight of the homestead which was built in the centre of an estuary mouth rising in a long gradient to the higher level. It was the first time Tremayne had seen Breakaway House at close range in daylight.

  The buildings were grouped in a line. To the left, the homestead proper; to the far right, the great shearing shed. Between these two buildings were the men’s quarters, the combined office and store buildings, while to the front of the shed were cane-grass cart and motor sheds and the poison house. Beyond the men’s quarters, on higher ground, were stockyards.

  “Alec, take Mr Tremayne’s horse and water and feed it. You’ll stay the evening, Tremayne.”

  Although badly tempted, Tremayne decided to decline. “Sorry, but I must get back to Bowgada,” he said regretfully. “I would be glad of a cup of tea and a wash though.”

  “You’re welcome,” Tonger told him pleasantly. “Come on in. I’ll show you the bathroom. Then I’ll get some stuff for the wound.”

  Tremayne followed the squatter into the house, through the hall, along the main passage, and then into a luxurious bathroom.

  “Hold your head under the tap,” Tonger advised. “I won’t be long.”

  “Thanks. I will.”

  Having removed his coat and shirt, Tremayne permitted the cold rain water to gush into the open scalp wound. It “bit” at first, but when the adjacent hair had become saturated, he washed away the dust and caked blood.

  Must have bled some, he thought grimly. Could have bled more. No sign of Frances. Where is she?

  “Feel any easier?” Tonger inquired, returning. “Here, have a drink. Beer or whisky?”

  “That’s kind of you. Beer, please. Cold?”

  “As cold as it can be got without ice. Yes, a near shave that. You’d better let me stitch it.”

  “Thanks. You a doctor?”

  “Well, I’ve had practice with the blacks,” Tonger replied chuckling, a very different man from the one who had raged at Frances.

  Like old friends they drank each other’s health, after which the squatter efficiently cleansed the wound with a strong carbolic solution and expertly stitched the lips together.

  “Get Filson to have a look at it now and then,” he advised. “At the slightest sign of trouble, see the Mount Magnet doctor. There’s one at Myme but it’s not often he can see straight. Besides, he’d want to cut off your head to prevent gangrene.”

  “Thank you very much. It feels good now. And the headache is going.”

  “Better be sure about the headache and finish the bottle. Then we’ll go along to dinner.”

  Ever the courteous host, Tonger chatted while Tremayne completed a hasty toilet and then conducted him to a large plainly furnished room in which the table was set for two diners. Did that indicate that Frances would not be there? Through the open French windows drifted regular reports from the exhaust of the petrol engine running the electric light dynamo, and faint perfume from the standard rose trees in the narrow strip of garden fenced with white painted pickets.

  “I understand that you had a slight argument with Mr Ross at the ball, some time after he tried to trip you on the dance floor,” Tonger said coolly while they waited for dinner.

  “Ah, yes! I was obliged to knock him out when he attempted to hit me with a bar of iron he’d used on a Bowgada black named Ned,” Tremayne said, just as coolly. “Ned followed his woman over here. Objected to her staying. As it seemed likely that he would create a disturbance, and as the woman refused to leave with him, I picked her up and drove them both back to Acacia Well. Ross followed with two of his accomplices, intending to tar me for abducting the girl. One of the swine heaved a rock which floored poor Filson. I had the pleasure of knocking Ross out for the second time. The pleasure of knocking out the man who hit Filson is yet to he enjoyed.”

  “Go easy,” Tonger advised smilingly. “Ross and his associates are a tough crowd.”

  “I like tough crowds.”

  “I suppose you meet hard cases up in the Kimberleys?”

  “There may be an odd one or two, but they don’t heave rocks or use their boots. In this case, it appears that Ross objected to me paying attention to Miss Winters. It seems that Ross and Miss Winters’ brother were great pals. I wonder if he was mixed up in the business in which Miss Winters’ brother was shot.”

  Tremayne turned and casually looked into his host’s eyes. A trim maid entered with a loaded tray.

  “It’s quite likely. Ross is blackguard enough for anything,” averred the squatter, motioning his guest to the table. “Yet I think the shooting of Winters ended what really was a criminal practice. After that there was no further trouble with gold-stealers. You know, I really believe that more gold has been stolen from our West Australian mines than has gone to pay shareholders’ dividends.”

  “Quite likely.”

  “There was Tinker’s Find – do you like your meat well or underdone? – away north of Myme. They knew gold was being stolen, so the directors sacked all the executive officers and employed an ex-policeman to search the miners when they left after each shift. The mine closed down in 1911. The manager retired to Perth. The policeman bought a nine-thousand-pound farm near Pinjarra.”

  The conversation was kept to the subject of gold-stealing, Tonger revealing an unexpected dry fund of humour. The meal proceeded pleasantly, but he made no reference to his niece, nor did Tremayne permit himself to inquire. This big, powerful man was a paradox, at times coarse and brutish, at others suave and cultured.

  Tremayne could not fathom him, although he did reveal flashes of an iron will and a ruthless disposition. Did Tonger know of the tryst at the balancing rock? Did he know of the deliberate attempt on his life? Had he engineered it?

  A telephone bell rang, and shortly after the maid entered to say that Brett Filson wanted to speak to To
nger.

  Tonger nodded to her and pushed back his chair. “Excuse me, please,” he requested rising. “I shall have to go over to the office. The instrument is over there, but an extension of the call alarm is in the hall.”

  “I’ll be all right. I’ll help myself to more meat in your absence.”

  “Yes, do.”

  He had been gone but a few seconds when the maid came in again and said softly: “Miss Frances asked me to get Hool-’em-up Dick to take this letter over to Bowgada, secret like.”

  Accepting the dainty pink envelope, Tremayne looked up into her face and encountered dark eyes which plainly forbade questioning.

  Yet she answered the question hovering on his tongue. “She had to go to Perth,” the girl whispered, and swiftly went out.

  Badly though he wanted to open the envelope and read the letter, Tremayne dared not be found by his host with it in his hands. A feeling of elation fired him. Frances was not at the balancing rock that afternoon!

  On his return Morris Tonger told him the reason for Filson’s call. “Apparently N’gobi, Nora’s husband, has escaped from the Kalgoorlie gaol.”

  CHAPTER XVIII

  A NIGHT RIDE

  BY the aid of matches and the pale light of the young moon, Tremayne read Frances’s letter in the bed of a creek about a mile from Breakaway House. She wrote:

  Dear Mr Tremayne,

  Despite what the parson said, I did not go to the balancing rock. Did you? If you did, I hope you had an enjoyable time admiring the wonderful scenery.

  I am going to Perth to transact some business for Uncle and will be away for several days. Remember me to Miss Winters when next you see her. To Miss Sayers and to Mr Filson, too. Just between ourselves, do you think they are in love?

  Yours truly,

  Frances Tonger

  There! No regret at being unable to meet him. Just a cool statement of fact to which was added a spice of impish sarcasm. She seemed to like the prospect of rushing off to Perth and leaving him to wait, possibly for hours, beneath a rotten balancing rock. And yet – she had written; had remembered him. And she had not written to say that she did not wish to see him ever again. She had stated that she would be away only a few days, and reading between the lines, that must mean she would not find boredom in a future meeting.

  Well, it was a relief to know that she had not fired that shot; had not been anywhere near the devil who had fired it. But had she told Tonger about the tryst? Did she know of or suspect the attempt to be made on his life, and write the letter to cover her tracks?

  Tremayne cursed himself for his horrible suspicions, and yet could not entirely rid himself of them. There are moments when a lover is not a reasoning man, when his mind is over-clouded by the passion of his heart, and then a wrong construction is placed upon every sentence, every act of the loved one.

  Yet how did the determined killer know that he was to be at the balancing rock at three o’clock that afternoon?

  There was no mistaking or forgetting the vision of the rifle flash, followed instantly by the stunning blow, before his fall into the gulf of unconsciousness. There was no mistaking the coloured handkerchief waved to him for the purpose it achieved, making him stop to become a motionless target. In the entire act, only the undue confidence of the marksman was at fault. Yes, he must have been very sure of success when he fired from the distance he did.

  Tremayne mulled it over as he rode, and then, just as he was drawing near to Acacia Well, he hit upon a very likely hypothesis. Those kangaroo shooters operating back from the breakaway! That was it! His murder was to have been staged as an accident. That was why the killer had not been able to wait until he, Tremayne, was within a few yards of him. He was to be killed on the slope, several hundred yards from the face of the promontory. He was to be left just where he fell. In the course of time his body would be discovered by Ellis or Ned tracking his horse from Acacia Well, or by one of Tonger’s riders attracted to it by the eagles. The police would be brought from Mount Magnet. Trackers would thoroughly examine the ground. That was why the killer had not come down from his perch to make sure he was dead. He could not leave tracks for the police party to read as easily as a summons.

  It would have been remembered that the Kenny brothers were that day shooting above the breakaway. Tonger would mention it. They were using service rifles, and one of the ricochet bullets had unfortunately killed Tremayne. Was it not obvious? Naturally the killer’s rifle would be in possession of one of the kangaroo hunters. A bullet fired from it would be microscopically compared with that found in Tremayne’s body. Accident! A most unfortunate accident.

  If this hypothesis were correct, then the Kenny brothers were members of the gold-stealing gang. That being so, the planned accident would have been the result of an arrangement evolved by some one man. Who was he? If not Tonger, who? How had he found out that his victim was to be in that place at that time? Perhaps Frances would remember confiding in someone; her uncle, one of the maids who betrayed her confidence.

  They certainly had caught him napping, but they had erred through over-confidence, and had shown their ruthless blood-stained hands. To reason further – why did they want to kill him? Surely not for besting Buck Ross! Nor for taking Nora away from Breakaway House. They had found out through Frances – he felt sure it had been through her – that he was to visit the balancing rock, and through that same source they had learned that he was a policeman here on the Murchison to look into the matter of thefts of gold and the disappearance of one John Tremayne.

  Only Brett Filson and Frances Tonger knew both his status and his mission. But only Frances knew he would be visiting the balancing rock. There he was again – back to Frances Tonger.

  The hum of a car engine made him glance back to observe the lights of a machine a mile or so behind him. It was coming on fast, and when he and the horse were bathed in radiance, he urged Major off the track. Without lessening speed the big hooded machine roared by on its way to Acacia Well.

  After a while he saw its headlight beams turn upwards as it mounted the steep rise beyond the water-gutter, his side of the boundary gate, but when he arrived at the gate twenty minutes later the car was but half a mile beyond the hut.

  Reaching that, he discovered Fred Ellis entertaining company, for on dismounting he heard interspersed between Ellis’s ramble another man’s voice. Quite distinctly the voices issued through wall cracks and the open door.

  “Too right, Alec. It’s yours; only don’t forget to bring it back.”

  “I’ll send it over by Hool-’em-up Dick on Sat’day. That do?”

  “Yairs, that’ll do. Boil, blast you, boil!”

  Within, Tremayne found the stockman trying to force a billy to come to the boil, and, seated on a case, the hand who had accompanied Morris Tonger that afternoon.

  “Good night, Mr Tremayne – gonna camp?”

  “No, Fred. On my way to the homestead.”

  “Goodo! Wait a tick, have a drink of tea. This is Alec, come across from Breakaway House with them travellers to borrer me accordion.”

  Nodding to Alec, Tremayne found a seat on Fred’s bunk. “Going to stay the night or walk back?” he inquired, busy with his cigarette making and wondering why no mention was made of the accident.

  “Reckon I’ll walk back,” replied Alec, expressionless. “Only four mile. Took a ride here when those travellers come through.”

  “Who were they?”

  “Don’t know.”

  “An’ I never went to the car to look in. They’ll be strangers to me if Alec don’t know ’em,” supplemented Fred.

  Lifting the billy from chimney hoop to table with his felt hut, Ellis proceeded to stir the contents with a stained spoon before filling three tin pint pannikins, continuously gabbling away about nothing of importance, until he referred to the Aborigines’ smoke signals.

  “They bin at it orl day. There’s bin hell let loose somewheres, they ain’t corroboree fires, that I know. Ned and No
ra bit at them, too. They won’t ’ave done no work. They ’ad to ride the south paddock and overlook them weaners. They’re that unreliable, sooner jabber over a two-stick fire than work, any day.”

  “Do you know what those signals were for?” Tremayne asked Alec.

  The fellow was fingering Fred’s accordion, and without looking up shook his head. Still no mention of an affair which surely should have been of the first conversational magnitude.

  Liar, thought Tremayne. Here, evidently, was a very sly bird. Tremayne drank his tea, which he did not really want, and at the end of half an hour rose to leave.

  “How’s your stores, Fred?” he asked.

  “Bit low on flour and sugar, anyone coming out send me a cuppler pounds of tobacco and a tin of mill oil.”

  “All right. Pity the boss doesn’t have this place connected by telephone.”

  “Said he would long time ago. Means only a few posts and two ’undred yards of wire to connect with the main telephone line.”

  “I’ll remind him about it. Well, so long!”

  “Hooroo, Mr Tremayne. See you some time. Come and camp a night, want a pitch.”

  The lean scraggy figure arrayed in soiled clothes waved a hand and grinned a cheerful goodbye, watery eyes sparkling in the light of the suspended hurricane lamp. Fred Ellis was at home, content with his hut, and emphatically unwilling to exchange it for anything in the city.

  Into the quiet world of low saltbush and treeless flats, illuminated by the ghostly light of the young moon drooping to the horizon, rode Tremayne, leaving Major to follow the track, his mind now occupied with this Alec. There was nothing significant in his ignorance, or pretended ignorance, concerning those smoke signals. That was natural to the race with which he was closest allied, but he might have asked how his wound was, or made some mention of the “accident”, even though he was a taciturn fellow.