Arthur Upfield - Winds of Evil

They left the office arm in arm.

Trap Setting

INSPECTOR NAPOLEON BONAPARTE certainly agreed with Martin Borradale’s verdict that the evidence he found concerning the broken branch and the devilish laughter, which had so frightened the tennis players, proved the causes to be perfectly natural. Now, while the squatter and Donald Dreytonwere talking in the office, he sought for and found Stella Borradale reclining under an orange-tree in the garden. The quick smile with which she greeted him but proved the strain still controlling her.

“Hullo, Bony! Have you come to talk to me?”

“Yes. May I sit here on the ground at your feet?”

“Why not bring a chair from the veranda? It would be much more comfortable.”

“I like comfort, Miss Borradale, but it is good for a man not to indulge in it too much. I wanted to assure you again that your uneasiness the other evening really had no foundation.”

“Oh!” she breathed, the corners of her expressive eyes become tight.

“I climbed the tree this morning and thoroughly examined the branch again, as well as making a careful examination of the ground. What I saw confirms my opinion of yesterday, and that was based on a superficial knowledge of the action of tree sap at certain seasons and in certain temperatures. Excessive heat drives the sap out of the branches, down the trunk and into the roots. Permit me to give an illustration. You know, of course, what is colloquially called a needlewood-tree. If a surface root is laid bare and broken off, and then fire is set to the foliage, the sap will be driven down the trunk to the roots, so that should a billy-can or other receptacle be placed under the broken root it will collect quite drinkable water. Over about three parts of Australia there is no need for anyone to perish if means are to hand to make fire.

“Well, then. What happened to the gum-tree branch was that the heat of the day had driven the sap down towards the roots, and when evening came the sap began its journey up into the branches. At the junction of the branch which snapped off from the parent trunk there was growing what I believe is called a tree cancer. The sap from the branch had taken a long time to pass round this cancer to the trunk, but it was not allowed to get back again quickly enough, and the first of the cool evening breeze was too much for the limb to resist. The laughter you assumed had human origin was, of course, made by a kookaburra. As you know, Miss Borradale, at times even the crows make a noise not unlike a man being choked.”

Stella sighed with relief. Bony smiled up at her.

“I am surprised by you,” he said in his disarming manner. “Imagination is our greatest gift and blessing, but when it is uncontrolled it can be a curse. And for an experiencedbushwoman to be bushed by a new-chum book-keeper-”

“Please, Bony!”

“Oh, I know,” he said swiftly. “The longer we live in the bush the easier can we become frightened by it. I become horribly frightened by it sometimes.”

“Well, I am glad to hear what you have said about the branch and the laughter,” she told him half-laughingly. “Probably I would not have been so foolish if that stupid man had behaved normally. Why, he was a perfect coward. But, oh, I wish you would catch this beastwho is so frightening every one. Do you know why I am sitting here?”

“Because it is cool and quiet and wonderfully pleasant.”

“No. It is because I am becoming so fearful that I despise myself. I am forcing myself to sit here under this tree. I am defying fear and deliberately allowing my imagination to do its worst. Martin told me that he believes the beast dropped out of a tree to attack his victims, and when I discovered the other evening that I dreaded being under a tree for an instant I determined to sit under this one.”

Bony, seated on the ground and smoking one of his badly-made cigarettes, regarded the small and attractive face turned down to him.

“The procedure is excellent,” he said. “To control fear one must exercise the will-which is always good. Still, it is not always desirable to carry that too far. I can most earnestly assure you that there are no grounds for fear during the day-time, and there need be none during the night if you do as I suggested: keep your bedroom door and windows fastened. Even that is merely precautionary, as the wearing of a hat is a precautionary measure against sunstroke.”

She was now leaning forward, her lips parted, her gaze fixed on his eyes.

“Do you think you will ever clear up this terrible mystery?” she asked.

It was one of Bony’s grandiloquent moments.

“I should be utterly astonished if I did not,” he said gravely. “After all, Miss Borradale, it is what I have come from Brisbane to do. I have never yet failed to clear up a mystery, and it would be absurd even to contemplate failing to clear up this one. Within a week I shall vanquish the ugly cloud hanging over Carie and Wirragatta.”

“You will?”

“Yes. I will make it a promise. You see, Colonel Spendor is becoming annoyed by my absence. He is a very impatient man. My wife, too, becomes unduly impatient when I remain away from home for a little while.” Bony’s face lit up from the smile originating in his eyes. “Like myself, my wife is a half-caste, but, unlike me, she has not the gift of patience. So you see, Miss Borradale, I have two impatient people on my tracks who simply will not allow me to take the time I would like on an investigation. Marie, my wife, tells me that she finds life almost unbearable when I am away from her. That, of course, is very nice of her. May I express the wish that some day soon you will be as happy as my wife says she is when I am home?”

The girl’s eyes abruptly sparkled, and she cried softly, “I told you once before, Mr. Napoleon Bonaparte, that you are a dangerous man. I ought to be furiously angry with you, and I cannot understand why I am not.”

“It is a problem somewhat common among my-my friends. I may regard you as a friend?”

“Yes… my dangerous friend, Bony,” she answered and laughed at and with him. Try as she did, she could not control the trembling of her lips or cease to wonder at her complete acceptance of him. “You know, Marion Trench used to make me smile over her letters about you. I understand her now. I think you are the most dangerous, the most discerning, the most sympathetic man I’ve ever known. No one, not even a woman, could hide a secret from you. Tell me, why did you so laud Harry West to my brother when we stopped at the fencers’ camp the other day?”

“I am, Miss Borradale, not the only discerning person present,” he told her, utterly pleased with her and withhimself. “I will lay baremy secret. I think quite a lot of Harry West, and on two occasions I have met his sweetheart. Harry is young yet, but he is possessed of moral courage beside physical courage, and he is considerate to others as well as being terrifically keen on his work. Tilly, when she smiles, is lovely. Alas! romance is my one weakness. If we can assist a dream to come true, why not?”

He saw her eyes become quickly diffused, and he looked away.

“Yes, why not?” she echoed. “I will see to it that this onedoes come true, even if others do not.”

Bony rose to his feet to stand before her, hat in hand.

“I must be going-if you will permit it,” he said grandly. “I promised your brother I would pay a visit to the prospector and his wife now camped beside Catfish Hole.”

“It is extremely foolish for them to stay there.”

“Yes, it is. A miner’s right, however, is a powerful document. Now, please, do not allow fear to trouble you. I shall soon banish the cloud, and I hope most earnestly that the result of the long investigation will not spoil a most valued friendship. Aurevoir!”