Sand on the Gumshoe: a century of Australian crime writing

‘Archie, indeed, was quite correct in saying I had better wait to see the people before I recommended him to fall in with his aunt’s views,’ I thought to myself, ‘for if his cousin is not the most ill-tempered and worst-bred girl I ever met, I’m no judge. What a jolly row there will be when she finds out about Archie being over head and ears in love with Bessie Elliot! By-the-bye, I must get him to introduce me before I go. I should like to become acquainted with Archie’s idea of the beautiful.’ But little, indeed, I thought in what an awful way I should become acquainted with Bessie Elliot.

I had got to the end of my cigar and stood up to fling the butt out of the window. As I did so, I heard a rush of feminine garments and the sound of a hurried, but light, foot on the grass outside. It was, as I have before stated, nearly full moon, but a number of white, fleecy clouds were sailing in the lovely, pale sky, which at that moment had met and partially hid the lady moon so that the light under the trees at the side of the house was but indistinct. The idea that the movement I had heard was caused by some fresh freak of Hester Thorne struck me, and deeply curious, I stepped out and moved more into the shadow of the trees.

Standing there a moment I heard voices at some distance down toward the Loddon, and allowing my curiosity to overcome what small sense of decency I may have possessed, I ran down behind the fringe of shrubs that separated the gravel from the large centre grass plot. As I approached the speakers, I at once recognised the voices of mother and daughter. In a few seconds more there was between them and me only a thinly-leaved bush, and I could distinctly see the two forms – one a picture of almost demoniac anger, the other of an humble and pleading yet most terrified petitioner.

‘Do you hear? I will not be followed and haunted day and night. You are driving me mad! Don’t I tell you that it is only by the side of that water that I feel at rest, and yet you will try to keep me away from it! Go home, woman! If you are one of those who can sleep in bed when those they love are dead, go and sleep in yours. And yet you say you loved my father!’

The scorn of the latter words was unendurable, and the poor mother seemed barely able to gasp -

‘Oh, Hester!’

‘Oh, Hester!’ the angry girl mimicked. ‘Oh! Hester, why aren’t you a stone? Oh! Hester, what makes you feel? When you see the man you love, and who has loved you, drifting away from you for ever, why don’t you go to bed and sleep? Don’t deny it! He did love me! He has been mine only from boyhood. Hasn’t he lived with me under one roof, and sat with me in one school and one church, and prayed to God with me from one book, until the pretty face of a girl baby bewitched him?’ And with a dark face, eyes full of fire, and a gesture full of fury, she hurried riverward once more.

‘Oh! what am I to do?’ Mrs Thorne gasped, as she clasped her hands and wrung them despairingly; and then, as the form of her daughter was rapidly disappearing, she turned and went quickly back to the house.

On witnessing this bewildering scene I was puzzled. This was love with a vengeance. What a fortunate chap my friend, Archie, was to inspire the girls with so desperate a passion! But then, you know, we don’t respect girls that throw their hearts at fellows’ heads that way, and I am afraid that the sneer on my lips would not have gratified Miss Thorne if she could have seen me listening to her confession of love for a young man who cared less for her than he did for his cricket bat.

But when she turned to face her terrified mother with eyes that gleamed like a cat’s in the moonlight, and raised her right hand and her voice in furious exclamation, a memory of one other face shot into my mind and almost suspended my breath.

‘Good heavens!’ I thought to myself. ‘Can it be possible that that is the likeness I fancied I recognised? If it is I can quite understand that unfortunate woman’s terror, and her as unfortunate daughter’s violent temper. I must question Archie tomorrow.

In the meantime, however, it should not do to let that girl go away down to that river all alone. In her violent mood it would not be safe, and her mother was afraid to follow her – I could see that, so I hurried down by the side of the grounds, avoiding the moonlight as much as I could and seeking the shelter of the trees and shrubs.

It was by this time almost as bright as day, and when I reached the bank of the Loddon, lower down than the spot at which I had seen her in the afternoon, I paused and looked toward it. She was not seated by the tree, but she was standing by the river, her face gleaming white in the moonlight, and her gaze fixed apparently on some object up the stream.

All at once I remembered her words to her mother – words to which I had, at the time they were spoken, paid little heed. She had alluded to Archie being bewitched by a baby girl’s face. Was it possible that she had, in some cunning way, discovered the secret he had been so anxious to preserve and knew of his affection for Bessie Elliot? If that was the case, truly was ‘all the fat in the fire.’

And it seemed probable, as I watched her, dreading to tell you the truth, that she contemplated suicide. I noticed that Bessie’s home was visible from where she stood, its white wooden roof gleaming brightly just above the foliage at the bend of the stream higher up.

She stood there so immovably for some time that I got tired of watching her, and just as I was thinking of boldly walking down to her and pretending I had been tempted to a stroll by the beauty of the night, she lifted the hand that had been drooping by her side and took her watch from her side.

I saw it gleam in the brilliant beams of the moon and knew that she was consulting it to see the time, for she lifted her eyes from its face to look up at the moon, as if to see how high it was. Then she turned one more steady look up the river before she moved away and went quickly, as one with a purpose, up the gravel walk toward her home.

I felt relieved, and was about following her when I heard a rustle behind me, and looking in the direction of the noise, I saw Archie hurriedly coming toward the river. He was greatly surprised on meeting me and hastily asked what had brought me there.

‘I thought you in bed an hour ago,’ he said. ‘Have you seen anything of Hester? There’s the deuce to pay with the old lady and her it seems, and I’m in for it nicely.’

‘Make your mind easy about your cousin; she’s at home by this time,’ I returned. ‘But what is the what-do- you-call-’em to pay about?’

‘Aunt came to my room a few minutes ago like a woman half cranky with terror. She told me that Hester had gone down to the river in spite of her, and that Hester was in such a state of mind that she was afraid she’d make away with herself. Then she begged and prayed of me to get up and go after her, declaring that the girl’s very existence was in my hands.’

‘Hum!’ grunted I.

‘I tell you what it is, Mark. It is the deuce of a bore -’

‘Will you say what-do-you-call-it of a bore?’ I interrupted coolly.

‘Bosh! It is the deuce of a bore to have a girl threatening to drown herself or kill somebody if a fellow doesn’t make love to her.’

‘Oh! that’s it, is it?’

‘About it, I believe. Aunt almost told me plainly that Hester was breaking her heart at what she was pleased to call my desertion. Sinclair, you know more about women then I do. Is it customary for mothers to stand in bodily fear of their daughters and to be afraid to cross them in any way?’

‘Rather a difficult question, my boy, and one I should prefer not answering, but I may observe that, as a general thing, we could do in the world with a few more obedient and respectful daughters. But I want to ask you a question. Are you quite sure that your Uncle Thorne is dead?’

‘Am I sure? What a strange question! Of course I’m sure. What should aunt pretend he was dead for if he was not?’

‘Another puzzling question, but do you know anyone who saw him dead? Or who saw him even ill?’

‘No! Bah! Sinclair, what a fellow you are! You can’t help fancying a secret in the most natural event. What makes you suppose the possibility of Uncle Thorne’s being alive?’

‘Because I believe I saw him in Melbourne not a month ago!’

‘Gracious! But how could you know him?’

‘You have told me a dozen times of your cousin’s extraordinary likeness to her father, and when I saw her tonight under a strong excitement, her face brought before me another face – a man’s face – with the same terrible expression on the same mould of feature.’

The young chap saw, or imagined he saw in my face, or heard in the tones of my voice, a hint that there was