“It’s all very horrible,” Frances said softly. “But although all those things happened near Breakaway House, there’s nothing to connect my uncle with them.”
“No…” he said doubtfully. He watched her eyes widen, uncertainty and fear entering them.
“Is there? Is there?” she demanded, sharply.
In reply, he held out his hand towards her, palm upward. On the palm rested a gold-plated matchbox. She recognised it before she took it to gaze at the carved letters on its face – two letters joined, an “A” and an “M” representing Amy and Morris.
“I found that about four feet from where the car was stopped that night. The owner evidently put it down on the offside rear mudguard, for it fell into the wheel track on that side almost immediately after the car was started,” she heard him say.
From the box she raised her gaze to meet his, her eyes round and filled with horror, her face pale and her lips parted. “You think he was there?” she whispered.
“How can I think otherwise? For your sake, I wish I could. Listen! After I saw you I resigned from the police force. My father won’t accept the resignation, but no matter. I resigned because if your uncle was proved to be mixed up with a gang of criminals and had nothing directly to do with the murder of Hamilton or the possible killing of John, I decided I wasn’t going to be the man to bring him to justice. My mission is to find out what has become of my brother. Peace of mind for my father and mother is of greater importance to me than people’s criminal activities. The question which I want answered, because it will answer others, is why your uncle has planned twice to kill me. Believe me, I am less concerned by those attempts than with the answer to that question.”
“Why don’t you ask him? Why don’t you have him arrested?” she said sharply.
“Because arresting him on suspicion of having attempted to kill me would be unlikely to reveal John’s fate.”
“Do you think – do you suspect that he killed John?” she asked, as though stifled.
“I believe that he’s mixed up with that gang of criminals. I’ve an open mind as to whether he himself actually killed John, or even that John is dead. You’ll remember that when John reached Breakaway House you were away at the Gatley-Tomkins’s. It’s quite likely that John stayed at Breakaway House that night. It’s probable that he discovered something, and was in turn discovered with knowledge dangerous to your uncle.”
When she offered no comment to this, he went on: “A further fact which may, however, have no significance is that the day you were at the Gatley-Tomkins’s, the day that John reached Breakaway House, saw the arrival of Colonel Lawton in his aeroplane. Have you ever met him?”
“Twice. I don’t like him.”
Tremayne’s brows rose a fraction of an inch. “I met him once. To me he seemed all right,” he said. “What is there about him you don’t like?”
“I don’t know exactly,” Frances replied, flushing. “But he’s not nice.”
Tremayne noticed the quick drumming of her fingers on her knee, saw the troubled expression in her eyes, and got to his feet.
“What am I to do?” she asked helplessly. “It’s all so terrible. What am I to do?”
Bending forward to bring his face on a level with hers, he said: “Do nothing, Miss Frances. I would not ask, I would not want you to do anything for me which might be against your uncle. As you have just said, you owe him loyalty, and until he proves to be unworthy of your loyalty, you must stand squarely by him – not me.” Tremayne’s voice quickened as he proceeded. “I’ve told you what I have because I feel that between you and me there can be no deceit; that you had to know just why I’m here. Actually you should regard me as an enemy of the Tongers. But I must find out what’s happened to John; find out if he is alive, and, if he’s dead, to bring to justice his killer. That’s all. Do you think you could get across to Bowgada next Sunday afternoon?”
“Why?”
“I persuaded Mr Filson to invite my lovely Violet and Miss Sayers to spend the afternoon and evening. I want to have a semi-official talk with Miss Winters, and,” he added slowly, “I want to give Miss Sayers a chance to impress on Mr Filson what an ass he is to think that a few war disabilities make any difference to a woman’s love.”
“I’d like to go,” she said wistfully. Then she added with a dawning smile: “I thought they were in love.”
“Of course they are. Very much so. But Brett Filson thinks Miss Sayers would be making a sacrifice by marrying him. Will you come over on Sunday?”
“Yes.”
“Good! I’ll fix it.” He was smiling at her now, and she was bravely smiling back. There was a hint of wistfulness in his voice too when he said: “I’m afraid you’ll have to go now. It’s quite unnecessary to ask you not to mention to anyone our little tête-à-tête. Tell me – had you not gone to Mount Magnet, would you have met me at the balancing rock?”
Her eyes fell, but her head faintly indicated an affirmative answer.
Tremayne’s spirits soared.
CHAPTER XXII
MORRIS TONGER AT HOMEUS
FRANCES did not return directly to Breakaway House. There was too much in her mind to be sorted and classified and studied, too many problems demanding instant solution. On reaching the plain she set her horse at a hand gallop out to “sea”, grateful for the cooling air pressing against her face and seeming to pour into her brain, clearing it as Epsom salts clear muddy water.
What was she to do? What could she do? Nothing – as Harry Tremayne had said. And yet she must do something; there must be some action she could take. Supposing that Harry Tremayne and Ned were killed through the instigation of this violent, sensuous uncle of hers? Gold-stealers, thieves and worse were the men who came sometimes to eat with her uncle and herself, and then retire to the office to drink and plan fresh villainy.
Of its own volition her horse eased to a canter, and presently relaxed to a walk. There was no doubt that Uncle Morris was with that party of men who had blasted out rock in an attempt to kill Harry Tremayne. There was now also no doubt that it was her uncle who had planned that shooting, and had sent her to Mount Magnet to be out of the way while it was being done.
When she was finally shaken out of her uneasy reverie by the yells of two riders mustering a small mob of cattle, she realised she was some two miles at “sea” and due east of the balancing rock.
At any other time she would have delighted in joining those riders, but this afternoon she found no joy in living, no room for anything in her world which now seemed governed by vice and wickedness and horror.
What had they done with John Tremayne? Never would she forget his face, his burning hazel eyes, his strong white teeth and clean-cut features when he had told her he loved her as they sat in a single-seater car on a lonely hilly road in the Darling Range. He was as good-looking as his older brother, just as attractive, and yet she could not love John Tremayne. He had bravely accepted his defeat.
And how terrible for poor Mrs Tremayne away down in Perth, waiting, waiting every day and every hour for news of her boy; hoping, always hoping that he lived, continually fighting down the dread that she would never see him again.
Do, what could she do? One thing she would have to do was keep calm. Whatever else, she must not give her uncle reason to suspect where she had been that afternoon and with whom. He must not find out what she knew and suspected.
For a minute or so she contemplated running away to the Gatley-Tomkins’s who would welcome her, or to Perth where she could be hidden. And then the mental picture of Harry Tremayne and Ned keeping watch on the island produced a resolve to remain and see it out to the bitter end. For that there would be an end, she felt sure.
No – she could not now leave Breakaway House. It would be too much like cowardice, or desertion. Harry had said: “Do nothing.” And for the moment she wouldn’t. She would go on as she had been, and wait and watch. She owed it to her uncle to remain loyal if he was innocent of any crime, but di
d she owe him loyalty if he was responsible for those crimes enumerated by Harry Tremayne? Surely not…surely not!
Before she realised it she found herself approaching the balancing rock, and, with a shudder, looked up at it perched like an egg on the very end of the promontory. Here and now she could so easily visualise Harry Tremayne, hope and joy in his heart at the prospect of seeing her, pulling back his horse to wave his hat in greeting, and then seeing the rifle flash which preceded the sudden darkness of oblivion.
Her heart was behaving strangely, and new and wonderful thoughts were flooding her brain. He loved her! Of course he loved her! Did not his every gesture, his every look proclaim it? It was as though he were with her then, telling her about it, his strong hands gripping hers. She felt the blood surging up her neck into her face. Her face grew hot, and she set boot heels to her horse and galloped him to the breakaway cliff south of the jetty. Only at the foot of a steeply rising cattle pad did she pull him up to make him carry her upwards between walls of granite forming a wide cleft in the lip of the breakaway.
On the open space between the breakaway lip and the line of mulga scrub, she turned her mount round to gaze over the sunlit plain of saltbush towards the Bowgada breakaway.
Well, what was the use of trying to hide it from herself? What use further to deny it? She loved that tall, lithe man who teasingly had asked her how was Perth, who had so coolly intervened when her uncle raged at her. Of course she loved him. Little fool! Else why had she kept that last dance open for him? Why did she thrill and thrill when near him? Why was she thrilling now – if she did not love Harry Tremayne?
Loyalty? Ah! Now she knew where loyalty was due. He loved her and she loved him. She would work for him and against the man who had planned his death, and who would again plan his death immediately he knew that his last attempt had failed.
Death! The thought of Harry Tremayne dead made her gasp. It fashioned her mouth into grimness and forced her rounded chin outward into an expression of the famous Tonger stubbornness. Patting her horse’s neck, she whispered into his receptive ears: “Why, I don’t feel afraid of Uncle any more.”
With a glad cry, she swung him round, made him canter to the bordering scrub and hurried him through the thick grey broad-leafed mulga for several hundred yards before coming out on to an area of surface rock similar to that over which Mug Williams drove duffed cattle from Breakaway House into Bowgada country.
Across this area of granite passed the Breakaway House-Mount Magnet track, and, following the track homeward, Frances presently came to the turn where, at the bottom of a long straight grade, rested the group of buildings she had come to look upon as home.
Later she met Morris Tonger waiting dinner in the dining room. He was standing at the sideboard, whisky glass in hand. Dressed in well-fitting gabardine slacks and tweed coat, the whiteness of his soft linen collar providing startling relief against the dark-red tint of his skin, he appeared at ease in that plainly furnished room. Nodding to her, he refilled his glass from bottle and syphon, drank slowly, and then came to his place at the head of the table.
“Been out for a ride?” he said, in tones which made the question a statement of fact. “Which way did you go?” He spoke with such casual interest that for a moment she forgot the gold matchbox exhibited to her on the browned palm.
“I went down the valley,” she replied. “Came home via the balancing rock and the Magnet track.”
“See any sheep?”
“No, but I saw two of the men bringing in the killing beasts. Are they killing one tonight?”
“Yes. I’m expecting an important visitor tomorrow or the day after.”
She felt rather than saw his gaze fixed upon her and refrained from looking up from her task of serving the vegetables.
For almost a minute they ate in silence, then: “You don’t want to know who the visitor will be?” he inquired.
“Frankly, I’m not greatly interested,” she replied coolly. “The only visitor I like to welcome is old Mr Wonkford. At least he can talk on subjects other than money, mining, sheep, cattle and the weather.”
“Strange old bird,” Tonger said, chuckling. “But he’s got tons of money, and you could do worse than marry him. What do you think of Colonel Lawton?”
“To be frank again, I don’t like him.”
“No! Well, he’s even richer than old Wonkford. And younger.”
“Were I eighty years of age he would be too old for me,” Frances said a little hotly. “I…I feel soiled when in his presence.”
For a second or two her uncle regarded her with a queer expression on his face, a mixture of pride and determination. “He’s the important visitor,” he said slowly. “The last time he was here, when you were away, he asked if I would accept him as a nephew-in-law. I told him that I would; I’m telling you that I hope he never will be. If you like, I’ll ring up Mrs Gatley-Tomkins and ask if she’ll have you over to her place. You could go tomorrow.”
“I’m not afraid of Colonel Lawton. If he proposes to me I shall refuse him.”
Pride and determination became more pronounced in Morris Tonger’s face. “When you get married, Frances, I want to see you married to a good man,” he said with strange earnestness. “We Tonger men have been nothing to shout about, but the Tonger women were all good and pure. Even your aunt. She ran away with a shearer, but I drove her away. I don’t blame her. I’m a pretty evil sort of beast now, but I’m not that bad that I would like to see you married to Colonel Lawton, or any man like him.”
There were occasions when Morris Tonger was much less coarse than usual, and if ever there was an occasion when Frances could have given him affection, this was it. He was a paradox. A stranger paradox of a man she had never met. Violent in temper, yet courteous when not governed by temper. She had seen him embracing one of the maids. She had witnessed him knock a stockman flat to the ground. Outside with the men he swore vilely, but in her presence seldom spoke an ill word. He always drank too much, even for a man of his wonderful physique and outdoor life. He was an animal mastered only by her purity and his family pride was strangely at variance with his own acts.
“Well, you must excuse me,” he said at the close of the meal. “I’ve some work to do in the shearing shed and then I have business letters to write.”
Her uncle having gone, she passed into the drawing room and spent an hour softly playing the piano in the half-light afforded by the lamp in the hall. The evening was very quiet. She wished it would blow and rain more often, for these long periods of calm weather became monotonous. A further hour she devoted to her diary, seated at her own escritoire, pouring out in ink the meeting with Tremayne and their conversation almost in its exact words. This heavy, brass-locked book was and had been her only friend since coming to Breakaway House. At about ten o’clock she carefully relocked it, and locked it within the escritoire and then retired for the night.
She was wearied by her evening of solitude, and her nerves felt tortured by the eternal silence. She suspected that her uncle was drinking himself into a stupor in his office.
When in bed, even before switching off the light, she knew she would not sleep. With the light out, she again clearly saw the gold matchbox held out for her inspection on a brown palm. Vague imaginings consolidated into acute fears for the immediate future of the blue-eyed man who had laughed at her and then come to laugh with her.
Again switching on the light, she saw the time to be a quarter to twelve, and spent five minutes searching for an aspirin bottle before remembering that it was in a vase on the mantelpiece in the drawing room. And so it was that, after slipping into a dressing-gown, she walked along the thick-carpeted corridor to find the drawing-room door ajar and a light on within.
Without a sound she pushed the door open wide. Her uncle was seated at her escritoire, the desk-flap was down, and on it lay her diary wide open, the diary she was always so careful to leave locked within the locked escritoire. With his back not quite directly pr
esented to her, she was able to observe him intently reading her most secret thoughts.
Of how long she stood there she retained no memory. At first, indignation controlled her, then dismay, then terror. Watching his face in profile, she clearly saw the upward turn of the mouth, the expression of cynical amusement alternating with one of calculating cruelty. And then within her surged a sudden fierce desire to run away and hide, to get away safely from this man who had suddenly become a monster.
Frances closed the door softly. It made no sound. But when she released the handle the lock clicked sharply, and that sound caused her to fly along the corridor to her room, shutting and locking the door behind her. Then her light was out and she was in bed, the clothes pulled up around her face.
So that was how they knew! She buried her face in the pillow. That was how they knew Harry Tremayne was to visit the balancing rock! Into that book she had entered all the little personal items of the dance, even Harry Tremayne’s insistence that he would be at the balancing rock at three o’clock the following Wednesday afternoon. That was how they knew he would be there!
Her uncle had been regularly reading her diary. He possessed duplicate keys to her escritoire and her diary. So they lay in wait to shoot him like a kangaroo!
And instead of leaving the door open as she had found it, she had stupidly closed it and thereby informed her uncle that he had been observed.
CHAPTER XXIII
THE BUNYIP
THEY knew – they knew about Harry Tremayne! The diary had told them everything about Harry Tremayne!
These sentences ran through Frances Tonger’s mind, over and over, again and again. Lying there on her bed in the dark, frozen into immobility by the knowledge that she had, albeit unwittingly, given over to her uncle and his associates Harry Tremayne and the innocent Ned, she lashed herself with the knout of self-condemnation.
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