Arthur Upfield - Winds of Evil

“Let us hope you will not contract eye-strain,” Bony murmured.

“What’s that? You talking to me?”

“I am under that impression, sergeant. You have been staring so hard that you fail to see certain facts. Miss Storrie was attacked by the man who murdered Alice Tindall and young Marsh. When Alice Tindall was murdered, Mr. Elson was on holiday down in Adelaide, and I was not within hundreds of miles when either of the two crimeswere committed.”

Simone for the first time took from his mouth the now almost completely eaten cigar. His lips creased to express heavy sarcasm.

“Quite the detective, eh? So you and Mister Elson can be acclaimed innocent little lambs? Now let me tell you that the feller who attacked Mabel Storrie wasn’t the bird who done in them other two. If he had been that bird, he would have done the job on the Storrie girl good and proper. As it was, she was attacked by an imitator of the murderer, and a darned poor imitator, too. I’ll tell you two some more. The real gent is strong. The feller who attacked Miss Storrie wasn’t so strong. That’s why he failed to kill her. So don’t you two think you’regonna get out of it as easily as all that.”

“There are, of course, other facts,” Bony said carelessly. He was enjoying himself thoroughly, and Lee, guessing it, was enjoying himself too.

“I don’t want to hear aboutyour facts andyour ideas,” shouted Simone, viciously flinging to the ground the remains of a once beautifully symmetrical cigar. He was now standing rule-straight, his head thrown back, the velour hat appearing to be much too small for his bullet head, three layers of fat welling over his linen collar. “I’m headserang* of this investigation, and you aregonna know it before I’m through.-Now then, you, Fisher! How did you know Mister Elson was down in Adelaide when Alice Tindall was done in?” *The boatswain of a Lascar or East Indian crew.

“I’ll tell you,” Elson began to say when he was cut off like water gushing from a tap.

“You’ll tell me nothing till I ask you to tell me things, and then you’ll be mighty quick off the mark,” Simone snapped. “Now-you-”

“I met Mr. Elson in Carie last night,” explained Bony with unruffled calm. “It appears that a good many people regard him with grave suspicion, and so I asked him if he remembered just where he was when both Frank Marsh and Alice Tindall were murdered. As their murderer undoubtedly tried to murder Miss Storrie, when it came out that Mr. Elson was not in the district when either of those other two were murdered, it seems very unlikely that he murdered the girl he is in love with. That’s obvious.”

“And it’s obvious that you and him have been in collusion,” sneered the sergeant.“Oh, no, my bucks! That won’t go down. The feller who attacked Miss Storrie wasn’t as strong as the birdwho did the murdering. And I can see two gents right now whoain’t so very strong. Now we’ll have a squint at the scene of the crime.”

Huge though he was, Sergeant Simone walked with strength and easy carriage. A bull-doggish appearance gave to him a personality not possessed by the easy-going Constable Lee, albeit a personality rudely overbearing and ruthless. He would not be lacking courage when dealing with armed desperadoes, but as a detective dealing with a bush case and with bush people he was a freak.

Lee managed to wink appreciatively at Bony before striding off at Simone’s side, and at half a dozen paces behind them walked Barry Elson and Bony.

“Thanks, Joe,” whispered the young man.

Bony smiled. His first impression of this overseer who was employed on a neighbouring station named Westall’s had been very favourable. It was continuing to be favourable, but a wide experience had taught him not to value a first, or even a second, impression. The reason why he had crossed the doctor’s name off his list was his conviction that the Strangler possessed agility above that of the average man. Mulray was long past physical agility up to the standard set by the average man. So was Mrs. Nelson and Grandfer Littlejohn and many others, and their names would be erased in due time.

What had impressed Barry Elson’s innocence on Bony had been the young man’s sincerity when, the previous evening, he had made open confession. Then, his handsome dark eyes and quivering lips bespoke sensitiveness and frankness. He explained how, for several years, he had been the Don Juan of the district, and how, when he finally and honestly fell in love with Mabel Storrie, his reputation rode him like an old man of the sea. Without foundation, Mabel had accused him of flirting, and she rashly presented him with his ring. To make matters worse, he had then got drunk on the day of the dance, but before the dance actually began he was sobered and had striven to “make it up” with her.

Then hadoccurred the walk following the non-appearance of Tom Storrie and the truck. At the Common Gate Elson had made another desperate attempt to obtain forgiveness, whereupon the still unappeased object of his adoration complained about his drinking. All the evening Mabel really had been as miserable as her lover, and even at this late hour the ghost of his reputation haunted her. It was that wretched ghost, and not the fact that he had been far from sober during the day, which had withheld her forgiveness. They argued for the next several hundred yards, and then, as Elson confessed, he blackmailed her for a kiss or two, with the threats of a dark night and a prowling strangler.

Mabel Storrie, however, was not the girl to be intimidated by threats of such a nature. She was no shrinking miss. She called Elson’s bluff and refused his escort farther; and he, as he said, like a fool, took her at her word and walked back to the township. No one had seen him arrive at the hotel, and no one had seen him enter and go to his room.

So now, as the policemen and the suspects walked back to the place where Mabel had been found by the coach people, Bony inquired of himself if Barry Elson could have been made strong enough by the emotion of anger to strangle into unconsciousness, at least, a healthy and robust young woman. “Angergiveth strength,” as someone might or might not have said.

“As far as I remember, Lee,” Simone was saying, “this Mabel Storrie is quite a hefty wench.”

“She’d weigh about a hundred and fifty pounds,” Lee estimated as the party arrived at the sand patch examined by Bony in company with Donald Dreyton.

“Humph!” grunted the sergeant, and then he glared at a kookaburra impertinently watching them from a nearby bough. “It was dark that night?”

“As dark as a rabbit’s hole.”

“That being so, I can’t understand why she walked off the road. You’d think she would have stuck to the centre of the track. Of course, she might have been dragged off the road by her attacker. That seems likely enough when we pass out the murderer of them other two and reckon she was attacked by an imitator. The murderer made no attempt to conceal the bodies of them he done in.” Baleful green eyes glared at Bony and Barry Elson alternately. “No, she didn’t walk off the road to this place. She was dragged off it by the imitator, who expected her brother to pass on the truck.”

The kookaburra at this moment chuckled throatily.

“But shewas attacked on the road and shedid walk off the road, to trip over that root and stun herself,” Bony said lightly.

“You’re mighty fly, ain’t you, Mister Fisher? How do you know that? Bit of a tracker, eh?”

“You really would like to have proof?”

“You spout your stuff and give less lip.”

“Very well.”Bony detailed the movements of the girl after the Strangler had let her slip from his hands, concluding with: “On that small claypan are the imprints of her shoes.”