Arthur Upfield: Murder down under

With a stub of pencil Muir indicated the plan.

“When they left the hotel Loftus drove along the main road eastward. At the garage he should have turned south to the old York Road, a mile farther on, which would have brought him to the Number One Rabbit Fence in about another mile. This night, however, Loftus drove straight on east, following the railway, and Wallace expostulated, as this road was in bad condition. They had proceeded a quarter of a mile, still arguing, when Loftus stopped the car and ordered Wallace to get out. He then drove on alone, according to Wallace. He had about one mile to travel before reaching the rabbit fence, where he would turn south, traverse it for another mile, cross the old York Road, and after covering a third mile would arrive opposite his farm gate.

“But he never reached home. He crashed into the rabbit fence gate, and, when backing his car, backed the car into the State water-supply pipeline, which at that place runs along a deeply excavated trench. The car was smashed badly, of course. It was impossible for Loftus to get its back wheels up out of the trench. His hat was found beside the car, and Wallace’s hat was found on the back seat. Close by were two newly opened beer bottles.

“Of Loftus there had been no sign since Wallace, as he alleges, parted from him about one-twenty A.M. A search lasting twelve days has produced no result. If only it hadn’t rained thirty points the black tracker, brought from Merredin, would have picked out Loftus’s tracks, and have found him dead or alive.”

Muir ceased talking.

“Well?” urged Bony.

“The funny part about the affair is the time Wallace reached home. When he alighted from the car they were less than half a mile from the hotel. They left the hotel, remember, at one-ten. It would be one-twenty, no later, when they parted company, yet it was two-fifteen when he entered his bedroom, according to Mrs Wallace. He states that when Loftus drove away he walked back as far as the garage turning; there, feeling the effects of too much grog, he turned up along the south road for a walk.

“I think he did nothing of the sort: it doesn’t sound reasonable. Yet what did he do during those fifty-five minutes? He wouldn’t require fifty-five minutes to walk back to his home, a distance of less than half a mile. But if the two were together at the time of the smash, if they fought and Wallace killed Loftus, there was time to hide the body and get back home at the time Mrs Wallace said he did.”

“You have not found a body?” interposed Bony.

“No.”

“Then until a body is discovered we must assume that Loftus is still living. Has Wallace a record?”

“Nothing against him.”

“You are sure that Loftus did not reach his home?”

“Quite. Mrs Loftus is frantic about him.”

“Is the car still wedged above the pipeline?”

“Yes.”

“Why not arrest Wallace on suspicion?”

“Not on your life. Greggs was enough,” John Muir said fervently. “In future I’m creeping that slow and sure that a turtle will be a racehorse against me.”

“Overcautiousness is as big a fault as impetuosity,” Bony said with sudden twinkling eyes. “Your Burracoppin case captures my interest.”

“Will you lend a hand?”

Bony sighed.

“Alas, mydear John! You will have to go to Queensland.”

“To Queensland! Why?”

“If you go to Myall Station, out from Winton,” Bony said slowly, “if you proceed circumspectly, you will there find your lost friend, Andrew Andrews, whom you let slip away because you were so sure of Greggs. As the delightful Americans say, ‘Go get him, John!’ ”

“But why didn’t you have him arrested or arrest him yourself?” demanded Muir, so much astonished that he swayed back in his chair.

“Not being an ordinary policeman, but a crime investigator, I seldom make an arrest, as you well know. Arresting people is your particular job, John. We will tell a tale to your commissioner. We will persuade him that getting Andrews is of greater importance than finding Loftus, who, after all, may be playing a game of his own. I have still three weeks of my leave remaining, and, while you are away in Queensland, I will look after your interests in Burracoppin.”

“Bony, old man, how can I-”

“Don’t,” Bony urged with upraised hand. “I often enjoy a bus-man’s holiday. Between us we will make them promote you to aninspectorship. But curb your desire to question. It is your greatest fault. Curiosity has harmed other living things besides cats. Read Bunting’s ‘Letters to my Son’. He says-”

An Ordinary Wheat Town

IN THE investigation of crime Napoleon Bonaparte was as great a man as was Lord Northcliffe in the profession of journalism. Like the late Lord Northcliffe, Bony, as he insisted upon being called, interested himself in the careers of several young men of promise. John Muir was one of Bony’s young men, having learned the rudiments of crime detection by valuable association with the little-known but brilliant half-caste. Yet of his several young men the Western Australian detective-sergeant was the slowest to learn Bony’s philosophy of crime detection. Although he knew it by heart he often failed to act on it, and consequently Bony’s advice was often repeated: “Never race Time. Make Time an ally, for Time is the greatest detective that ever was or ever will be.”

Together they gained an interview with the Western Australian Commissioner of Police. By previous agreement Bony was permitted to do most of the talking. He melted Major Reeves’s reserve, which his duality of race had created, with his cultured voice, his winning smile, and his vast store of knowledge that now and then was revealed beyond opened doors. He charmed John Muir’s chief as he charmed everyone after five minutes of conversation.

The interview resulted in Major Reeves believing that John Muir had traced the murderer, Andrew Andrews, with the slight assistance rendered by the Queenslander. He consented to send his own man to Queensland and permit Bony to interest himself in the Burracoppin disappearance. It thus came about that Bony and Muir left Perth together by the Kalgoorlie express, the former alighting at the wheat town at five o’clock in the morning, and John Muir going on to the goldfields’ terminus where he would board the transcontinental train.

Day was breaking when the express pulled out of Burracoppin, leaving Bony on the small platform with a grip in one hand and a rolled swag of blankets and necessaries slung over a shoulder. No longerexisted the tastefully dressed man who had accosted Detective-Sergeant Muir in Hay Street. In appearance now Bony was a workman wearing his second-best suit.

At this hour of the morning Burracoppin slept. The roar of the eastward-rushing train came humming back from the yellowing dawn. A dozen roosters were greeting the new day. Two cows meandered along the main road, cunningly putting as great a distance as possible between themselves and their milking places when milking time came. A party of goats gazed after them with satanic good humour.

When Bony emerged from the small station he faced southward. Opposite was the Burracoppin Hotel, a structure of brick against the older building of weatherboard which now was given up to bedrooms. To the left was a line of shops divided by vacant allotments. To the right the three trim whitewashed cottages, with the men’s quarters and trade shops beyond, owned by the State Rabbit Department. Behind Bony, beyond the railway, were other houses, the hall, a motor garage, and the school, for the railway halved this town; and running parallel with the railway, but below the surface of the ground, was the three-hundred-miles-long Mundaring-Kalgoorlie pipeline conveying water to the goldfields, and, through subsidiary pipes, over great areas of the vast wheat belts. Thus is Burracoppin, a replica of five hundred Australian wheat towns, clean and neat, brilliant in its whitewash and paint and its green bordering gum-trees.