The Bachelors of Broken Hill by Arthur W. Upfield

Author:Arthur W. Upfield [Upfield, Arthur W.]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Fiction - Classic Crime
ISBN: 9781875892556
Publisher: ETT Imprint
Published: 2008-12-31T11:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fourteen

Honours to Nimmo and Abbot

JIMMY NIMMO sat in a saloon bar and was unhappy. Superficially there was nothing to cause him unhappiness, for he had plenty of money, clothes which satisfied him, and proximity to a plentiful supply of cooling beer. It was the threat of hidden forces and not material things which fretted him.

He ought to be in this pleasant saloon bar reading a paper and enjoying the best cigarettes with long ‘butchers’ of beer. Outside was Argent Street, and if not now, then very soon there would be gimlet-eyed men walking up and down Argent Street who would recognise him, and one of them might be his arch-enemy, Inspector Stillman.

And this at the time when he was becoming increasingly interested in the stone-built two-storeyed house offering so much promise. The third poisoning would be bound to stir up the entire police force and interfere with the routine of the night patrols with which he had made himself familiar.

Jimmy hadn’t to be told the police set-up. He knew that Bonaparte was a Queenslander—seconded to New South Wales to investigate a series of poisoning cases—and he knew also that the Queenslander would not be permitted to undertake in addition the case of Policewoman Lodding. She had been a member of the Police Department, and nothing stirs up a police department more than the killing of one of its own. Therefore, if Crome and his boys failed to ring the bell, the Sydney mob would barge in, pronto.

Following four murders, Broken Hill was no place for a respectable burglar.

Jimmy wanted to leave ‘toot sweet’, and this he dared not do without Bonaparte’s permission. It was just too bad, for there were two strong attractions for him in Broken Hill: one, that two-storeyed house, and the other for whose sake he might even retire from his profession. The major problem was that the lady for whom he yearned expected him to take her to cinemas and other places of amusement and would wonder why he kept to his room by day as well as by night.

It was Tuesday, too, and the policewoman was found late on the Sunday night. The bar clock said fourteen minutes past eleven, and any action was better than being a sitting shot.

Jimmy went out and found a telephone.

“Mornin’, Inspector! How’s things?” he asked Bony.

“Tip-top, Jimmy. And how are you?”

“Pining to associate with the ruddy police. What about a chin-wag?”

“Certainly. Have lunch with me. See you at the Western Mail at one.”

Jimmy returned to the saloon bar and ordered more beer. For the tenth time he read the latest on the Lodding murder. There was something he might use to wangle permission to leave Broken Hill by the Adelaide Express that evening. At five past one he was seated at a table with Inspector Bonaparte.

“Been getting around?” inquired Bony.

“Yes and no. You been busy?”

“Very. Not able to relax like you, you know.”

Jimmy tried to see behind the bland blue eyes, failed, and set to work on the fish.

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