We were certainly a queer lot there, and most of us were known by names never given to us by our parents in baptism.
I was Rob Turner, and I was supposed to have hailed from Brisbane. We were all very reticent7 about our affairs. Folks without a shilling upon them, I have found, are always quite as distrustful of one another as rich men with big balances at their banks.
But we were not a glum8 lot all the same, and joked and laughed together sometimes as if we hadn’t a care in the world. One man in particular was always merry — old Nat Saunders, who made a scanty9 living by selling papers or carrying bags for folks arriving at the railway station.
He was a rare old gossip, and somehow always seemed to gather all the news of the under-world of the city. It was quite uncanny sometimes how he would regale10 us overnight with bits of news that would next morning appear in the newspapers.
That evening he was very excited.
Something was doing in Adelaide, he said; something was going on. He had recognised Arnold Kitson, the famous Melbourne detective, that morning coming out of the station carrying a bag and a rug, and he followed him up to the police headquarters, and from the way the man on duty at the door received him, he was quite sure the visit was not unexpected; and so on, and so on.
He wondered if it had anything to do with the Mount Gambier murders, and of course that set them all talking. The Mount Gambier mystery was then about a fortnight old. A man and his wife, on a small outlying farm, had been brutally11 murdered and the two assassins, after ransacking13 the house, had got clear away. It had been at first thought there was no chance at all of tracking them down, but a week after the murder a little girl had come forward with important information. She had been going to the house the day the poor victims were killed, but hearing dreadful shrieks14 as she got near the door, she had hidden in the woodstack, and subsequently had seen the two murderers ride away. She had given the best description of the men she could, and all Australia was now on their track.
But Australia is a wide place, and the track was no longer fresh; so very little hope was entertained now of catching15 the men. Everyone was, of course, blaming the police.
I slipped out quietly when I had finished my tea. I wanted to get away somewhere by myself and think. The money I had so fortunately acquired would give me another chance in life, and I wanted to map out my plans.
I took the train to Glenelg, meaning to walk from there along the sands the five miles to Henley. It was still pretty warm when I arrived on the sands about half-past six, and there were lots of people about. But a couple of miles away I was, as I expected, quite by myself.
It is always a lonely walk from Glenelg to Henley along the foot of the sandhills, and one generally has only the seagulls for company the middle part of the way.
I lay down between two sandhills and gave myself up to my thoughts.
Here was I, quite a failure in life at twenty-six, and I wanted to understand to myself why.
I was an only son. My mother had died many years before; indeed, I hardly remembered her. My father had been one of the leading doctors in Melbourne, and two years before the war, he had sent me to England to walk the London hospitals and in due time take my degree. When the war had broken out, I had joined up at once, but I had been badly wounded on the Somme with a fractured thigh16, and had been many months in hospital. When I rejoined my regiment17 I had come in for some hot times, but in less than a year I had risen to the rank of captain, and, indeed, when the Armistice18 was signed, was on the point of going up a step higher. So I hadn’t done badly there. Just after the war had ended my poor old dad died suddenly, and I had returned to Melbourne to settle up his affairs.
Unhappily for me there had not been much to settle up, and a bare two hundred pounds was all that came to me when the estate was closed. I didn’t know what to do with myself. It was, of course, quite impossible for me to continue my medical studies, and for a time I couldn’t settle down to anything.
I messed about Melbourne for a while, stopping at good hotels and going about, and my money soon began to dwindle19 down and get beautifully less and less.
Then one day I suddenly woke to the fact that I had less than a ten-pound note between myself and actual want. I pulled myself together at once, and, like every true Australian, turned to the land for succour.
I got work on a sheep station out Broken Hill way, and for about eighteen months stuck like a limpet to my job. It was lonely, hard, and monotonous20, but it suited my despondent21 state of mind for a time.
When I finally decided22 that I had had enough of it, the old man was very angry at my going, and did his best to persuade me to remain, but I had persisted in my resolve, and through my stupidity had ultimately arrived at Adelaide almost penniless, as I have explained.
My meditations23 were interrupted by the appearance of a man coming along the sands from the direction of Glenelg. I expected he would pass by without noticing me, as he was walking about a hundred yards away close to the sea. But getting level, he noticed me at once and, to my annoyance25, turned in towards me. He walked very slowly, with his right hand tucked away in the breast of his coat.
As he got near me he called out and asked me the time. Without getting up, I told him abruptly26 I hadn’t got a watch and didn’t know, but he still came on towards me very deliberately27. I thought he must be deaf, and so I raised my voice loudly this time and told him again I had no watch.
I didn’t want his company, and was in no mood to talk to anyone.
He had almost reached me, and indeed could not have been more than a couple of yards away, when a great shouting came up almost alongside of us, and three young fellows in bathing dresses dashed down from behind one of the adjoining sandhills and raced each other laughing to the sea.
The man just in front of me evidently was not deaf, for he stopped instantly and took his hand out of his coat with a frightened startled gesture, as if he was expecting someone to strike him from behind.
He seemed dazed for a moment, and stood hesitating, staring back at the three boys running down the sands. Then he muttered huskily something about his watch having stopped, and moved off as abruptly as he came.
But he left me thinking hard. As he had turned away I had noticed a watch on his right wrist and just above a patch on the coat sleeve.
It was the same man who had stood near me in Victoria Park when I had drawn28 the money over Rose of Dawn. The sinister29 significance of it came home to me at once. He had undoubtedly30 been following me all the way from the races, and but for the unexpected appearance of these three lads, had meant to do me mischief31.
Now I came to think of it, the peculiar32 deliberate way in which he had approached me with one hand hidden in the breast of his coat, could only have meant that he was holding some kind of weapon there, and for my benefit evidently.
I wasn’t a bit frightened and indeed once the flash of my recognition was over, felt rather amused.
I had been in too much hand-to-hand fighting in France to be afraid of any one man, and a rough-and-tumble scrap33 would have been just to my liking34, provided, of course, that the affair had started on equal terms.
All this flashed through my mind before the fellow had got twenty yards away, and I jumped up to go after him. Then I thought I was a fool. It might have been only a coincidence after all, and what an ass12 I should look if he were only a harmless individual like myself, just after fresh air from the heat and rush of the city.
I dropped down again on the sands, meaning to forget the interruption and go on with my meditation24. But somehow I couldn’t shake off the idea that the fellow had meant mischief. At any rate, I wouldn’t take any more risks, I thought.
I had a little revolver in my hip35 pocket, and I took it out. It was quite a toy affair — a little .22 Yankee one. It was no good for any accurate firing, except at point blank range, and then it was as deadly as any revolver of much larger calibre, as I had fortunately found once when dealing36 with a savage37 dog up country.
It had no value, or I should have sold it long ago. I carried it, always wrapped up in a little bit of linen38, along with about a dozen of its little cartridges39 in a scrap of oiled paper. I loaded it in its seven chambers40, and slipped it loosely into my jacket pocket.
I lay watching the boys enjoying themselves in the water for about a quarter of an hour, and then moved off again on my way towards Henley.
There was no sign anywhere of the man who had disturbed me, unless it was a little figure now hardly discernible in the distance.
It was a lovely evening, and when I was less than a couple of miles off Henley, I thought I would have another rest and watch the sunset over the sea.
I lay at the foot of the sandhills and idly drew in the peaceful beauty of the scene. It was warm and still under the dying sun, and my thoughts went irresistibly41 to the girl in the car. I wondered if I should ever see her again. My whole life seemed to have altered since the morning. I had found the motive42 of my life at last. For her sake I would work, I would strive, and I would endure.
About a dozen seagulls suddenly made their appearance upon the sands in front of me, just down by the margin43 of the waves. They were interested in a small object lying there, and started squabbling and fluttering about.
Although quite close, they didn’t notice me, and I lay back with half shut eyes dreamily watching the quarrel. They seemed so much like human beings, fighting among themselves.
All at once they all rose up together and started flying out to sea. I wondered lazily what had disturbed them, and then suddenly I thought of my racecourse friend.
I jumped up in a flash and turned round. Only just in time. There was my gentleman not five yards from me, creeping shoeless down the sandhill with a great ragged44 paling in his hand.
His footfalls had made no sound on the sand, but his mouth was wide open and I could hear him panting with his exertions45. I saw that his white evil face had murder on it, but I smiled grimly to myself to think what he had taken on.
Stick or no stick, I felt I was more than a match for him, and could have knocked him out easily in a hand-to-hand struggle, but I didn’t know whether he was carrying an automatic, and my decision was made instantly.
I whipped out my little revolver and gave him three bullets, one after another, as quick as I could, right bang in the middle of his face. One at any rate hit him, for he lurched forward in the sand, and falling on his side, lay moaning at my feet.
I had my hand on his neck in a trice, ready to squeeze the breath out of him, if necessary. But there was no need. I had killed men in France before in many a midnight trench46 raid, and I knew the feeling about a man’s neck when he’s finished with.
I stood up and turned the body over with my foot. It was still quivering convulsively, and I saw I had made a ghastly mess of his face. Two bullets had entered his forehead almost in the same hole, and the third had ploughed a deep furrow47 along his cheek. The blood and sand together quite obliterated48 his features and made him unrecognisable.
The blade of a large bowie knife was protruding49 from the opening of his jacket. It looked sharp as a razor, and I thought unpleasantly of what he had intended for me.
I was not at all excited and felt no compunctions at having killed him. He had richly earned his bloody50 end. But I was sorry and anxious for myself.
Here was I, just on the start of a new life, just when I wanted to break away from all the old unhappy surroundings, involved in the killing51 of this man, and when it became known, in the horrible publicity52 of police court proceedings53 and the whole Commonwealth54 Press.
Besides, was it certain they would believe my version of the affair? The dead man was well dressed and I was shabby and poor-looking, but in the possession of a large sum of money, the source of which it would be difficult to explain.
Again I made up my mind quickly.
I walked casually55 down upon the sands. No one was in sight in either direction. The sun was down below the sea. It was rapidly getting dusk. I climbed a tall sandhill and cautiously looked round. There was no one to be seen anywhere.
I went quickly back to the body, and dragging it along by the heels made my way deep among the sandhills behind where I had been lying down. In one of the small sandy gullies there I scooped56 a long depression with my arms.
The light was failing rapidly, and I dared not stop to make the hole as deep as I would have wished.
Before dumping the body in, it struck me I had better search it.
Notwithstanding the possible danger attending any delay, I was intensely curious to find out something about my would-be murderer.
What manner of man he was, who went about in good clothes, wearing an expensive gold wrist watch, and yet who had all the cunning and methods of the habitual57 assassin.
My experiences in France had taken away all repugnance58 in handling the dead, and in a few seconds I had methodically gone through all his belongings59.
There was a thickish wallet in the vest pocket under his waistcoat, and I promptly60 appropriated it for later investigation61. His money and a silver cigarette case I left with him; also a hefty looking automatic that he had in his hip pocket. It would have been too dangerous, I thought, to have it about me. Fortunately for me, it was unloaded, and there were no cartridges in his pockets. I ran back and picked up his hat, which had fallen off when I shot him. Then with his own knife, which I buried with him, I made it possible for the gases to escape from his body when decomposition62 set in. The dry sand over his remains63 was so loose that it would be only too easily disturbed by putrefaction64.
I looked around hurriedly for his shoes but could not find them. He had taken them off somewhere to make his approach upon me quite noiseless.
I covered the place well over with a large quantity of sand by rolling it down off the adjoining sandhill.
I obliterated as best I could the track I had made in dragging up the body, and then, assuring myself that there were no late roamers on the sands, made off confidently in the direction of Henley.
As I walked along in the darkness I went over everything carefully, to be sure I had left no clues behind me.
By hiding the body as I had I knew that if anything were discovered I had laid myself open to a charge of murder. But there was only the pocket-book, I argued, to connect me in any way with the dead man, and that I would soon get rid of when I had examined the contents.
Then, suddenly, it came upon me with a sort of shock that I had still my revolver upon me, with its three spent chambers.
I was just passing the first of the numerous wooden bathing huts that stretch in line upon the sands for nearly a mile from the Henley jetty when the fact occurred to me; but I thought at once of a safe place to hide it.
I groped my way in the darkness to behind one of the huts, and, thrusting my arm deep down in the sand alongside one of the big square supports, consigned65 the revolver and remaining cartridges to what, I hoped, was an eternal oblivion.
The band was in full swing when I finally reached Henley, and I sat down for awhile to rest and listen. They were playing a selection from ‘Il Trovatore.’ I had seen the opera when on leave in London, and when they came to that part where the monks66 accompany the coffin67 to the vault68, the haunting melody of their dirge69 quite got on my nerves.
I thought of that wretched man out there under the sandhills, with his white, bloody face, with the holes in his forehead, and with the gashes70 I had made in his body, so that he might rot quiet and still.
The excitement of the day was beginning to tell on me, and so, leaving the crowds on the beach, I took the tram to return to the city.
When we reached the turn of the road at South Henley there was quite a long delay. The trolley71 arm must have slipped off the overhead wire I thought. At any rate, we were held up for quite three minutes, and it afforded an opportunity for a little, inquisitive72, parchment-faced looking man to poke73 his face in every department of the car and have a good stare at all of us.
Sitting in a corner, I deliberately turned my head the other way; but he wasn’t to be baulked, and came right round to the other side of the car to stare me straight in the face.
The incident rather annoyed me at the time. It could be only idle curiosity I knew, but still, when one has just killed and buried a man, it is not pleasant to be the object of anyone’s attention at all.
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1
lodging
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| n.寄宿，住所；(大学生的)校外宿舍 | |
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chuckled
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| 轻声地笑( chuckle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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3
amazement
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| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
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jack
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| n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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surmised
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| v.臆测，推断( surmise的过去式和过去分词 )；揣测；猜想 | |
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reticent
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| adj.沉默寡言的；言不如意的 | |
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8
glum
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| adj.闷闷不乐的，阴郁的 | |
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scanty
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| adj.缺乏的，仅有的，节省的，狭小的，不够的 | |
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10
regale
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| v.取悦，款待 | |
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brutally
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| adv.残忍地，野蛮地，冷酷无情地 | |
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ass
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| n.驴；傻瓜，蠢笨的人 | |
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ransacking
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| v.彻底搜查( ransack的现在分词 )；抢劫，掠夺 | |
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shrieks
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| n.尖叫声( shriek的名词复数 )v.尖叫( shriek的第三人称单数 ) | |
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15
catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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thigh
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| n.大腿；股骨 | |
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regiment
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| n.团，多数，管理；v.组织，编成团，统制 | |
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armistice
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| n.休战，停战协定 | |
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dwindle
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| v.逐渐变小（或减少） | |
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monotonous
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| adj.单调的，一成不变的，使人厌倦的 | |
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despondent
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| adj.失望的，沮丧的，泄气的 | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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meditations
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| 默想( meditation的名词复数 )； 默念； 沉思； 冥想 | |
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meditation
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| n.熟虑，（尤指宗教的）默想，沉思，（pl.）冥想录 | |
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annoyance
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| n.恼怒，生气，烦恼 | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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sinister
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| adj.不吉利的，凶恶的，左边的 | |
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undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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mischief
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| n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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scrap
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| n.碎片；废料；v.废弃，报废 | |
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liking
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| n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢 | |
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hip
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| n.臀部，髋；屋脊 | |
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dealing
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| n.经商方法，待人态度 | |
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savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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linen
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| n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的 | |
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cartridges
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| 子弹( cartridge的名词复数 )； （打印机的）墨盒； 录音带盒； （唱机的）唱头 | |
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chambers
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| n.房间( chamber的名词复数 )；（议会的）议院；卧室；会议厅 | |
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irresistibly
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| adv.无法抵抗地，不能自持地；极为诱惑人地 | |
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motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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margin
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| n.页边空白；差额；余地，余裕；边，边缘 | |
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ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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exertions
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| n.努力( exertion的名词复数 )；费力；（能力、权力等的）运用；行使 | |
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46
trench
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| n./v.(挖)沟，(挖)战壕 | |
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furrow
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| n.沟；垄沟；轨迹；车辙；皱纹 | |
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48
obliterated
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| v.除去( obliterate的过去式和过去分词 )；涂去；擦掉；彻底破坏或毁灭 | |
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protruding
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| v.（使某物）伸出，（使某物）突出( protrude的现在分词 )；凸 | |
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50
bloody
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| adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染 | |
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51
killing
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| n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财 | |
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52
publicity
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| n.众所周知，闻名；宣传，广告 | |
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53
proceedings
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| n.进程，过程，议程；诉讼(程序)；公报 | |
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commonwealth
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| n.共和国，联邦，共同体 | |
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55
casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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56
scooped
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| v.抢先报道( scoop的过去式和过去分词 )；（敏捷地）抱起；抢先获得；用铲[勺]等挖（洞等） | |
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57
habitual
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| adj.习惯性的；通常的，惯常的 | |
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58
repugnance
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| n.嫌恶 | |
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59
belongings
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| n.私人物品，私人财物 | |
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promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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investigation
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| n.调查，调查研究 | |
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62
decomposition
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| n. 分解, 腐烂, 崩溃 | |
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63
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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64
putrefaction
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| n.腐坏，腐败 | |
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65
consigned
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| v.把…置于（令人不快的境地）( consign的过去式和过去分词 )；把…托付给；把…托人代售；丟弃 | |
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66
monks
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| n.修道士，僧侣( monk的名词复数 ) | |
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67
coffin
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| n.棺材，灵柩 | |
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68
vault
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| n.拱形圆顶，地窖，地下室 | |
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69
dirge
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| n.哀乐，挽歌，庄重悲哀的乐曲 | |
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70
gashes
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| n.深长的切口（或伤口）( gash的名词复数 )v.划伤，割破( gash的第三人称单数 ) | |
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71
trolley
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| n.手推车，台车；无轨电车；有轨电车 | |
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72
inquisitive
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| adj.求知欲强的，好奇的，好寻根究底的 | |
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73
poke
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| n.刺，戳，袋；vt.拨开，刺，戳；vi.戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢 | |
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