The Barrakee Mystery. Arthur W. Upfield

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      Bony Novels by Arthur W. Upfield

      1 The Barrakee Mystery / The Lure of the Bush

      2 The Sands of Windee

      3 Wings Above the Diamantina

      4 Mr Jelly’s Business/ Murder Down Under

      5 Winds of Evil

      6 The Bone is Pointed

      7 The Mystery of Swordfish Reef

      8 Bushranger of the Skies / No Footprints in the Bush

      9 Death of a Swagman

      10 The Devil’s Steps

      11 An Author Bites the Dust

      12 The Mountains Have a Secret

      13 The Widows of Broome

      14 The Bachelors of Broken Hill

      15 The New Shoe

      16 Venom House

      17 Murder Must Wait

      18 Death of a Lake

      19 Cake in the Hat Box / Sinister Stones

      20 The Battling Prophet

      21 Man of Two Tribes

      22 Bony Buys a Woman / The Bushman Who Came Back

      23 Bony and the Mouse / Journey to the Hangman

      24 Bony and the Black Virgin / The Torn Branch

      25 Bony and the Kelly Gang / Valley of Smugglers

      26 Bony and the White Savage

      27 The Will of the Tribe

      28 Madman’s Bend /The Body at Madman's Bend

      29 The Lake Frome Monster

      This corrected edition published by ETT IMPRINT in 2020

      This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission.

      Inquiries should be addressed to the publishers.

      ETT IMPRINT & www.arthurupfield.com

      PO Box R1906

      Royal Exchange NSW 1225 Australia

      First published in the UK in 1929 as The Barrakee Mystery

      First published in the USA in 1965 as The Lure of the Bush

      This edition first published by ETT Imprint in 2016

      Reprinted in 2018

      First electronic edition published by ETT Imprint in 2013

      Copyright William Upfield 2013, 2016

      ISBN 978-1-922384-70-6 (pbk)

      ISBN 978-1-922384-46-1 (ebk)

      Digital distribution by Ebook Alchemy

      Chapter One

      The Sundowner

      With eyes fixed thoughtfully on the slow-moving muddy stream of the River Darling, William Clair lounged in the golden light of the setting sun. His frame was gaunt, his complexion burnt-umber, his eyes were blue and unflickering, his moustache drooping like that of a Chinese mandarin was jet-black, despite his fifty-eight years.

      It was the beginning of March, and the river was low. The birds, perched on the up-thrusting snags, were taking their evening drink; the galah, the cockatoo, and the kookaburra mingling their screeches, chatterings, and maniacal laughter with the funeral caw-cawing of the sinister crows. Not a breath of wind stirred the light-reflecting leaves of the giant gums bordering the river. From gold the sunlight turned to crimson.

      Just below Clair were moored three small boats. Behind him was the homestead of Barrakee Station, set amid the paradisiac oasis of cool green lawns edged by orange trees. A little down the river, above a deep hole at a bend, were the men’s quarters, the kitchen garden, the engine that raised necessary water into the two great receiving tanks set upon thirty-foot staging. Further down was the huge corrugated-iron shearing-shed, adjoined by the shearers’ quarters—all now empty. In the shearing-shed were Clair’s swag and ration-bags.

      Half a mile upstream the river took a sharp turn to Clair’s left, and above the angle of the opposite bank a pillar of blue-gum smoke marked a camp-site. It was a camp of blacks, and interested the gaunt man mightily. Beneath the gums the shadows darkened. The glory of the dying day laid over the surface of the river a cloth of crimson patterned with shimmering silver rings where the small perch leapt for flies. The colour of the cloth dimmed magically to that of glinting steel. A kookaburra broke off his laughter and slept.

      Clair waited, motionless, until the last glimmer of day had faded from the sky. Then, without noise, without haste, he slithered down the steep bank to where the boats were moored, pulled out the iron spike at the end of one of the mooring chains, softly coiled the chain in the bow, got in, and silently swung out the oars. The operation was so noiseless that a fox, drinking on the opposite side, never raised its head. The “sundowner”, for Clair at that time was carrying his swag with no intention of accepting work, sat facing the bow and propelled the boat forward by pushing at the oars. There was no suspicion of the sound of water being dug into by oars, nor was there any noise of moving oars in the row-locks. Boat and man slid upstream but a darker shadow in the gloom beneath the overhanging gums.

      At the bend, half a mile above, a dozen ill-clad figures lounged about a small fire, not for warmth, but for the sake of spirit-defying light. Clair pushed on silently for a further two hundred yards, when he slanted across the stream and landed. It is the law of New South Wales that no white man shall enter a camp of blacks. Of this Clair was not ignorant. Nor was he ignorant, being well read, that laws are made for men, and not men for laws.

      Avoiding fallen branches and water gutters with the ease of a born bushman, he passed through the darkness to the camp, where he halted some twenty feet from the fire.

      “Ahoy! Pontius Pilate!” he called.

      Lolling figures about the fire sprang up, tense, frightened at the suddenness of the voice in the night.

      “I want to speak to you, Pontius Pilate,” called Clair.

      A grizzled, thick-set aboriginal stared suspiciously in Clair’s direction. He gave a low-spoken order, and three gins hastened to the seclusion of a bough-constructed humpy. Then, striking an attitude of indifference, Pontius Pilate said:

      “You want-it talk me; come to fire.”

      When Clair entered the firelight the grizzled one and a youth of nineteen or twenty regarded him with unfriendly eyes. After a swift appraising glance, Clair sat on his heels before the fire and casually cut chips off a tobacco-plug for a smoke. The two aborigines watched him, and when he did not speak they edged close and squatted opposite the law-defying guest.

      “Have a smoke?” said Clair, in a tone that held command. The elderly black caught the tossed plug, bit a piece out of it and handed it to his companion. The young man wore nothing but a pair of moleskin trousers; the elder nothing but a blue shirt.

      “Only got one suit between you,” observed Clair unsmilingly. “Well, I reckon you can’t get sunburnt, so what’s the odds? You fellers belong to this part?”

      “We come up from Wilcannia las’ week,” came the literally chewed response. “Where you camped, boss?”

      “Up river a bit. Is old Mokie down river, anyway?”

      “Yaas—old Mokie, he married Sarah Wanting. You bin know Sarah?”

      “I