Escape to Koolonga

by Amanda Doyle

  why she’d want to do it, unless ----- ’ She clasped her hands

  together, twisted them. Turned to face the granite profile. Ridd was staring ahead in concentration as the wipers cleared the windscreen and the rain obscured his vision again almost immediately. The car was going fast, slithering in the sea of mud that had once been the road.

  ‘I—I had to rebuke her this morning,’ she confessed with anguish. ‘Oh, it was just a trifle, nothing serious. She took it all right, or at least I thought she did, only now I keep asking myself if—if----’

  ‘All kids need a firm hand now and again. It won’t be that. Have you asked the boys?’

  ‘I didn’t want to go into it too deeply. It seemed they didn’t know anything, although they were very sleepy when I questioned them. I knew I’d have to go out, so I didn’t dare wake them up too much. There was no one to leave them

  with.’

  ‘I told Susan to stay where she was, just in case Daisy might have been on her way there. It’s not likely, though. My guess is that there’s a simple explanation, and that she’s quite near at hand. It’s a hell of a night for anyone to go out into.’

  Emmie winced, thinking of Daisy. She was frozen herself by now. Chilled to the marrow, in fact. Numb, weary.

  ‘That’s what I keep thinking, too. She’ll be s-soaked, and maybe frightened. She’s only little.’

  He didn’t answer that. She saw his mouth compress itself in the dim light, and he drove in silence, without slackening speed, until he swung the car off the main road and pulled up outside the store.

  ‘I’ll see those boys first of all.’ He followed her inside, went straight to the sleep-out and flung back the mosquito nets. ‘Wake up, mates! It’s Ridd!’ He pulled and pummelled them awake with none of Emmie’s gentleness. ‘Now then. A dollar to the one who hits it first. Where’s Daisy, and why has she run away?’

  Emmie waited nearby, listening rather hopelessly to the patient catechism that was going on, and this time it was on to her own veranda floorboards that the rainwater was drip ping from her clothes.

  Ridd’s voice went on and on, sifting information, getting his answers systematically. No quarrels today? Sure about that? What did you all do, then? Where did you go when you came back from school? No, tell me exactly. Everything you can think of. Each little thing.

  It had turned into a game, for the boys at least. They vied for his attention, prompting each other in the cause of accuracy.

  ‘No, you didn’t. That was before.’

  ‘No, after.’

  ‘No, before, Morrie. It was after that that Bingo chased Quinty up the tree. Daisy was pretty angry about that.’

  ‘Angry?’ Ridd was all attention.

  ‘Quinty s going to have kittens,’ Jim explained. ‘At least, we think she is. We think she was looking for a place to have them, see, and Bingo kept following her around and chasing her out of the sheds. They don’t like each other much.’

  ‘He’s only a pup, that’s what I told Daisy. He doesn’t really mean it. He’s got to learn. I told her that, but she belted him because he wouldn’t let Quinty find a place in peace. In the end I tied him up.’

  ‘And what did Quinty do then, Morrie?’

  ‘Oh, she was still up the tree. We waited around for ages, but she wouldn’t come down. She was still there even after tea. And then, later, she came down and ran away. She went away up the railway line, and over near the signal-box.’

  Ridd’s eyes sought Emmie’s. ‘Did you look at the station, Emmie?’

  ‘No, I didn’t. I—I hunted everywhere here, through the house itself, and then through all the sheds and outbuildings. And then I w-went to ring Susan. It was the only thing I could think of to do. I never thought of the railway station.’

  She was shivering by now, uncontrollably.

  ‘I’ll look,’ he said evenly, and turned to the boys. ‘Simmer down, you chaps. If this hunch pays off, it’s a dollar for each of you, if you go to sleep and don’t bother Emily.’ He took her arm. ‘Go and have a hot bath and give yourself a good rub down with the towel. Dry your hair afterwards, will you?’

  ‘I’m coming.’

  ‘No, leave it with me, and do as I say. The boys are awake now, in any case.’

  ‘Please, Ridd. I’ll wait till you come back—for the bath, I mean.’ Her eyes were tortured. ‘Do you really think you’ll find her?’

  ‘Yes, I’ll find her.’ He made it sound such a certainty that Emmie almost felt able to believe him.

  She was unsurprised when he came up the path not long afterwards with Daisy in his arms, a small oilskin bundle enclosed in his big black waterproof riding-cape. As he shouldered his way through the door and walked towards Daisy’s bedroom, Emmie could see that his own hair was thoroughly wet now, too, but he still wore the military-looking raincoat he had had on from the start. The oilskin was obviously a spare.

  Beneath it, Daisy was quite dry. There wasn’t a drop of rain on her bright candy-striped pyjamas as he slipped her into bed,

  and said softly to Emmie,

  ‘She’s fine. She was underneath the platform itself, with her coat and gumboots beside her. It’s quite weatherproof under there. Quinty picked a good spot to have her kittens. She’s got five.’

  ‘Two blacks, a grey, and—two—that are sort of—brindle,’ murmured Daisy through shut eyes. ‘We mustn’t let Bingo get them.’

  ‘We won’t,’ Emmie whispered. ‘Go to sleep again, Daisy.’ ‘I’ll just tell the boys to keep him tied up in the morning, and then I’ll get home. I’ll see about getting a phone connected, too, Emily, after this. It only means taking on the poles, an extension of the existing line.’

  Ridd walked out on to the veranda. Afterwards Emmie followed him to the door.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said. There wasn’t anything much else she could say, was there? She felt incredibly foolish not to have thought of looking up at the station before bothering Susan.

  ‘Get into that bath now,’ he instructed abruptly.

  ‘Yes, I will.’ She watched him lift his collar against the pelting rain as he prepared to leave. ‘R-Ridd?’

  ‘Yes?’

  It was difficult to speak, because her teeth were chattering so violently. She really did need that hot bath badly! ‘R-Ridd, you’ll be g-g-glad of the r-rain, w-won’t you? It will be g-good for your sh-sh-sheep, won’t it? You won’t h-have to c-cut s-s-s-scrub for a w-while.’

  He turned, hunched into his upturned collar, his face unreadable. He took so long to reply that she almost wondered if, in the end, he hadn’t been going to say something altogether different to what he did say.

  “That’s right. Emily.’ he said to her, in a surprised sort of way, almost as if she had told him something he didn’t already know himself.

  And then he disappeared into the darkness of the storm, and Emmie went to light the chip heater and wait for the water to get hot.

  Perhaps it was that final interval of sitting about in her dressing-gown, still cold and clammy from her wetting, while the geyser got slowly to work eating up the kindlers she had fed it, that was responsible for the chill she seemed to have caught.

  It wasn’t much, she told herself.

  In fact, it had only come on two days later. The following morning she had felt quite normal, and thank goodness the children appeared to have taken the episode in their stride. They were delighted with the kittens, and Emmie, kneeling on the gravel with them and peering under the sloping railway platform, marvelled at the soft sweetness of the small furry things that kneaded at Quinty’s soft fur blindly, mewing piercingly.

  The cat had retreated to the farthermost point of the cavity, where the gap between ceiling and ground was at its narrowest. The children, even crawling on their tummies, could not get within touching distance, and certainly Bingo’s fat, roly-poly body might have got wedged, too, but Emmie had decided not to risk any further disasters. Bingo would be tied up when he wasn’t actually in the house wit
h her there to keep an eye on him, or when the children had arrived home from school and could give him their proper attention.

  He sat on his haunches in a smart new collar and chain which the store stock had obligingly provided, looking guilty and smug at the same time. Emmie took pity on him, went back into the kitchen and produced a beef-bone for him to chew and worry over to relieve his boredom until the children reappeared, ignored the soreness in her throat and the tension behind her eyes.

  A cold. And who’d be surprised, after such a drenching?

  Well, maybe not exactly a cold, she corrected herself a couple of days later still. More like a sort of ’flu. Her head was aching, and there was a leaden weight attached to each of her limbs. She dragged around in the morning for a bit, and in the afternoon lay down on her bed, dozing fitfully until nearer the time of the children’s return, when she heaved herself up reluctantly to get the tea.

  ‘Don’t say anything to Susan, will you?’ she bade them croakily. ‘It’s just a touch of ’flu. This is its worst day. I’ll be better tomorrow.’

  She wasn’t, though. In fact she wondered quite how she got through the next day, and the next. There was a rasping pain inside her ribs that just wouldn’t go away, and every breath was becoming an agony. She waved the children off in her dressing-gown and crept back to bed, taking some more aspirin with her as she went, so that she would not have to get up again.

  She huddled under the bedclothes, shivering violently, praying that nothing would disturb her ever again, and that she wouldn’t find it necessary to cough. She asked herself if there was anything further she could do, in the name of common sense, to get herself better, but she couldn’t concentrate on the problem for long. Her head was pounding too desperately, and she found she had enough to think about, merely in getting her breath.

  The walls closed in as she lay there, and the ceiling hovered just above her. It was claustrophobic. Lonely. She longed unreasonably for the reassuring sound of the children’s voices, bringing cheer to the stillness, even if it did mean somehow getting up again.

  Would they be home soon? She didn’t know. She couldn’t even seem to summon the necessary energy to lean over to the bedside table to turn the clock face nearer so that she could see what the hands were saying. She couldn’t even be bothered to take any more of that aspirin, either, that was there, somewhere there, beside the clock.

  There were footsteps now. They scrunched up the gravel pathway and into Emmie’s consciousness.

  The children. Lots of steps. Big, heavy, elephantine steps. Those clowning children! Some sort of game. Elephants today. One of those childish flights of fancy to which they sometimes devoted themselves.

  Even the scrunch of the elephant-steps reverberated. It irritated, annoyed. She must get up when the steps came right inside. Get up and get the tea. She’d wait till they came right in, though. She’d wait till the last possible minute, because she wasn’t too sure that she could bring herself to get up at all!

  The steps had congregated somewhere near the back of the lean-to. Now they stopped altogether.

  ‘Emily?’

  Oh lord! It was Ridd Fenton’s voice, not the children at all! The shock of it brought her right back to her senses.

  ‘Yes?’ She meant to sound brisk and businesslike, but her voice was disappointing.

  ‘I’ve got the men here, to install the telephone. Do you want it in the hall, or the main store? Which?’

  The telephone! She thought fast.

  ‘The store,’ she shouted, only it wasn’t much of a shout.

  ‘The what?’

  ‘The—store.’

  She couldn’t say it again, not even once more. It had taken too much energy to speak already. There was that knife in her ribs again, and she felt a band of sweat breaking on her forehead with the effort of it all.

  She lay back, sighing.

  ‘Emily, where are you?’

  Emmie lay back and closed her eyes. It seemed the simplest way out of things. Just close your eyes and pretend you weren’t there. Pretend that Ridd wasn’t there either.

  ‘Emily?’ Steps again. The bedroom door. ‘Emily?’

  Ridd was there, beside her now. She hadn’t actually opened her eyes, but she knew it all the same. She opened them now, to confirm the situation. Yes, there he was, standing there with his hat in one hand, bending over her. ‘Emily?’ Ridd’s voice was slow and careful. He was a careful sort of man, Ridd Fenton. Deliberate. Controlled. Always master of the situation. No, not always, not quite always, not when he got suddenly, blazingly angry and kissed so ruthlessly, so cruelly, so terribly. She preferred him this way, really. Careful, controlled, slow and unalarming.

  His hand was already searching for her pulse, but even that was a slow, precise, careful gesture. ‘How long have you been like this?’

  He made it sound important, as if he expected an answer. Emmie thought a moment.

  ‘A few days. I’m better.’

  It was a wearying business, this talking. A fresh dew broke out on her forehead.

  ‘Why are you propped up like that, Emily?’

  ‘More—comfortable,’ she gasped, and closed her eyes again in disgust. What a stupid question! Not up to the usual Riddley Fenton standard at all! ‘What are you doing?’ she managed to ask hoarsely, her eyes flying open again as she felt the blankets being pulled from the corners of the bed and a hand sliding purposefully behind her shoulders.

  ‘I’m taking you home.’ Ridd’s tone was curt.

  ‘Home?’

  ‘Koolonga. Lie still, Emily.’

  ‘The—telephone?’

  ‘They’ll carry on.’

  ‘In—the store?’

  ‘In the hall. More central.’

  She gave up after that. Ridd would always have the last word, anyway, and she couldn’t be bothered to argue, not even about an important and permanent item such as a telephone. Emmie wasn’t too sure of anything very definitely after that. She remembered Ridd wrapping the blankets around her and taking her out, past the telephone men who stared curiously as he carried her past them through the hall. Then she was in bed again, and Ridd and Kevin were there. They hovered about on the other side of the room, speaking in low tones, and every now and then one of them would step out on to the veranda and look through the gauze.

  ‘No sign?’

  ‘Not yet. He shouldn’t be long now.’

  They were waiting for someone. The doctor, of course. Ridd would always do the sensible thing. She closed her eyes against the sensible, controlled Riddley Fenton. The Master of the Situation.

  ‘I’ve given her a fairly massive dose. I don’t want to move her in her present distressed condition.’

  ‘How long before it will work?’

  ‘It’ll start to take effect straight away, or should do. You needn’t expect to see much of a change before twenty-four hours, though. She’ll get some rest in the meantime. Can you handle one of these things?’

  ‘When I have to.’

  ‘Give her another jab in twelve hours, then. I’ll leave it with you.’

  They were talking above her, just as if she wasn’t there at all. ‘And then ----?’

  ‘Then carry on with the tablets. If there’s not a marked improvement by then, let me know, Ridd, and we’ll admit her, but she’s a bit low for the journey just now.’ A pause. ‘It’d be a guide if I knew any past medical history. You don’t

  --------- ?’

  ‘Strong as a horse,’ whispered Emmie, but nobody even caught the thin thread of sound.

  ‘I know nothing,’ said Ridd Fenton abruptly.

  ‘Hmm. Pity. Never mind, we’ll have to play it by ear. Mrs. Bexley has nursing experience?’

  ‘She’s capable. If you say not to move her --- ’

  ‘I’d prefer not, for various reasons.’

  ‘We’ll do it this way, then.’

  The voices died away.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Mrs. Bexley was sitting in
a cane chair by the bed. She had on a white apron and she was working busily at a piece of knitting. A strong face, Mrs. Bexley’s. A good woman. Capable, like Ridd had said. A good strong honest face. Emmie felt a twinge of shame for having deceived her.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mrs. Bexley.’

  ‘What’s that, dear?’ The housekeeper put down the piece of knitting, and leaned forward.

  ‘I’ve always—meant—to say it. About—the tomatoes --- ’ ‘Don’t talk, Emmie. Save your breath for breathing with,’ said Mrs. Bexley practically, in her eminently sensible way. Emmie turned her head on the pillow irritably.

  ‘You haven’t followed. I—want—to apologise, Mrs. Bexley.’ ‘What was that, Emmie?’ Mrs. Bexley had to lean forward all over again.

  ‘I never returned the bacon—I meant to - ’

  ‘Ssh.’

  ‘And a whole—basket—of tomatoes. You—didn’t know, did you? Did you, Mrs. Bexley?’

  ‘Know what, Emmie?’ Mrs. Bexley got up. Her face hovered. ‘Kevin offered me—some—cheeses, too. But they were— Ridd’s—so I couldn’t. I wouldn’t have—taken—anything— from Ridd. You do see, Mrs. Bexley?’

  But Mrs. Bexley couldn’t answer, because she wasn’t there anymore. It was Ridd’s face that hovered now. Very near where Mrs. Bexley’s had been. Emmie felt his fingers smoothing her damp hair back from her forehead.

  ‘What makes you think I’d have minded, Emily?’ he was asking gently. ‘What cheeses?’

  ‘I minded.’

  ‘Don’t talk any more, Emily. Go to sleep.’ ‘The—Master—of—the—Situation.’

  ‘What’s-that?’ Ridd bent over her.

  ‘The Master—of—the—Situation.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Kevin cheerfully, from the chair where Ridd had been sitting. ‘Everything’s hunky-dory now, thanks to you, Emm. Get some shut-eye, will you, old girl? I’m sleepy.’

  ‘I’ve been thinking, Kev -’

  ‘Mm?’

  ‘Thinking—things—over --- ’

  ‘What’s that, Emily?’

  ‘I’ve been—thinking. It might all—have been—quite

  different—thinking back!, you know—different if--------’