Arthur Upfield - Sands of Windee

“What-it whitefellergotta do blackfeller?” the ancient asked, intelligently placing his finger on the crux of the affair.

“That’s what I can’t understand,” Bony admitted.“Me good friends with Moongalliti.” He whispered three words, and Illawalli’s eyes gleamed with aroused interest. “No good to me hetell me on sign of the moon. Then I can no tell no one. He not see sign on your back same as me. You read his spirit-mind, Illawalli, and what you read you tell-it me, eh?”

For a little while the old man made no reply. His seamed face was as that of some ugly heathen god, but, whereas the god expresses evil, there was in the face of Illawalli a look of placid benevolence. “Me grow old,” he said at last. “P’r’apsme can’t look into Moongalliti’s spirit. You one plurry fool, Bony. ’Member me wanted teach you how to look in men’sspirits? Mine father learned me, an’ my father’s father learned ’im, an’ ’is father learned my father’s father. From the land of Ind, before the waters rose an’ made this landroun ’ as is the sun, came the secrets my father learned me. Noson have I to pass on the power. You are my son and my father, Bony, and you will have none of it.”

The half-caste sighed. Illawalli’s hypnotic power was stupendous. Twice had Bony experienced it, and gladly would he have become possessed of the power had there been any other than the precise condition accompanying the offer. In his profession the secrets of the art, handed down through countless generations to Illawalli, would have been of inestimable value; but the condition on which the old man insisted in return for the knowledge was that Bony should forsake the white man’s civilization and become chief of Illawalli’s tribe when the latter died. And that was a condition Bony felt he could never accept. It would mean surrendering all the interests in life which the white man’s education had given.

“It cannot be, Illawalli,” he said a little sadly. “Yet do as I ask. for I have had you carried on the emu’s back that you might do it.”

“Have no fear, Bony. As the missionary at Burke turns the leaves of his book and reads the signs therein, so will I read the pictures in the mind ofMoongalliti. Say, now, am I getting old?”

Bony was idly watching the goanna waddling over the ground, its gait belying its tremendous speed when hard pressed by a dog. Idly, his mind occupied by the possibilities of Illawalli’s power, could he but possess it without the damning condition, he watched it make a small circle, then stand still for a second before raising itself on stiffened legs and swelling out its neck to an alarming thickness.

A rabbit drew near and crouched down facing the goanna. Another joined it, also crouching and looking into the bright eyes of the reptile. Then at short intervals other rabbits came and gazed at the goanna till presently there was a complete ring about it. Rabbits were scurrying towards the reptile, and after a little while a second ring was formed outside the first. When that was completed a third ring was formed, and yet a fourth, a fifth, sixth, and seventh. Seven rings of greyfur, and in the centre the motionless, evil-looking, gigantic lizard.

Seven perfect circles, one within the other! Bony watched, and saw possibly a thousand rabbits move as one, so that they sat up on their hind legs. As one, that host of rabbits bowed in deep obeisance to the monarch seven times. At this point remembrance came to Bony and he laughed. He realized that Illawalli was hypnotizing him. Yet knowing it, quite aware that what he saw did not really exist, nevertheless he continued to see it as plainly as though it did exist. In spite of what he knew, he plainly witnessed the rabbits disperse as they had formed the circles, and when the last had gone he watched the swelling of the reptile’s neck subside, saw the long grey-green body sink nearer to the ground, then proceed on its way.

“You are yet strong in spirit,” he said, chuckling.

“You say to yourself that ole Illawalli is a great man,” the ancient countered.

“I did,” Bony admitted. “There is nothing hidden from you, O reader of men’s minds! Come, let us go back, and you read me the mind of Moongalliti.”

They arose and walked to the camp in the quiet stillness of the new-born night. Arrived at the camp, they found that the hunters had all returned and were eating in the light of several large communal fires. When they joined Moongalliti, Illawalli handed to him a few berries from a box-tree, after he had made many mystic signs over them. And Moongalliti took them and chewed, and because he was given faith he was cured.

The three sat alone and maintained a long silence. About them the tribe ate or wrangled or conversed with much laughter. The wrangling was only sporadic, the laughter continuous. Children chattered and shrieked, dogs yelped and growled over titbits tossed to them, and the scene was lit by the glowing fires that tipped the tree-leaves with scarlet and put out the stars above.

Bony broke the silence that had settled about him and his two companions. He said to Illawalli:

“You ’member Arney? He killed a blackfeller near Camooweal little time ago. Black trackers caught him on the Diamantina, and when a white policeman was taking him back to Camooweal in a motor-car he escaped.”

“Ah!” Illawalli sighed non-committally, for he had never heard of Arney.

“Yes. On the way Arney attacked the policeman who was driving the car, nearly killed him, and escaped. They haven’t caught him yet.”

“Ah!” Illawalli said for the second time, but there was something very significant in the sound of this second “Ah”. Bony felt satisfied. He knew then that the fictitious story regarding Arney and the policeman fighting in the motor-car had brought to the surface of Moongalliti’s mind the story told by Ludbi. And, having set memory going as a wound-up clock, Bony fell into silence again. Moongalliti did not speak; he was making a cigarette, and whilst he made the cigarette Illawalli was reading his thoughts as one reads the printed page. A minute elapsed. Then Illawalli sighed as though he awoke from a long sleep. His forehead was damp with perspiration, and he rubbed his hands as though they were cold. When he looked at Bony, the half-caste saw in his parchment-like face the faint light of triumph.

The Strange Lady

THE FOLLOWING day Illawalli disappeared as mysteriously as he had arrived. His visit to Windee had been arranged with creditable expedition and privacy by Sergeant Morris, so that none ever knew that the old man had been police-conducted. Illawalli returned to his tribe by slower but none the less interesting methods of locomotion, and the excursion proved to be the crowning experience of his life.

The day after Illawalli departed. Bony learned that one of the station trucks was leaving for Mount Lion to bring back a load of rations. Instead, therefore, of walking in company with Jack Withers to the site of the new stockyards he and the cross-eyed man were building, he sought and found Jeff Stanton in the station office.

“Morning, Jeff!” he drawled pleasantly. “I hear Ron is going into Mount Lion this morning, and as I want some clothes, will you allow me to go with him?”

Stanton relit his half-consumed cigarette before replying: “I’ve got no objection, Bony. You’re on contract work, and time is your own. But I’m paying Jack Withers wages. Can he get along by himself?”

“Most easily. He knows exactly what to do.”

“All right. But don’t forget to come back.”

Bony smiled at the significance in the other’s voice.

“I will return in order,” he said. “But I had better take ten pounds. Father Ryan is sure to tax me. Besides, I run no account at the stores.”