Outback Doctors/Outback Engagement/Outback Marriage/Outback Encounter

by Meredith Webber

  ‘Thanks!’

  His voice was gruff with gratitude, but Anna shrugged it off.

  ‘Anyone would have done it—and as far as Penny’s concerned, I think anyone would have done. She needed someone to listen to her, nothing more. Now, we really should get her to bed.’

  ‘I suppose we should,’ Tom agreed, but he didn’t move, though the hand that had touched her hair earlier had found its way back there, and was now stroking her, as gently as he’d stroked Cass that first night at her house.

  ‘I’ve got to go,’ she whispered, forgetting she’d intended staying—forgetting everything except the effect that tender touch was having on her body.

  ‘Are you sure of that?’ Tom asked, as if he could read exactly how she felt in the texture of her hair.

  ‘Yes, I’m sure,’ she said, and turned to disentangle herself from Penny. But the movement brought her closer to Tom, and he had only to turn his head for their lips to meet.

  This is wrong, wrong, wrong, her conscience shouted, but unless a lightning bolt came down from the sky and stopped them, she was going to let him kiss her—and probably kiss him back, though, given the way Penny was slumped against her, nothing else could possibly happen.

  Then lights illuminated the steps again—not a lightning bolt but another car, presumably Carrie’s, sweeping up the drive.

  ‘Saved by the return of the sisterhood,’ Tom said lightly, then he bent, and with only a slight grunt of effort lifted his sister into his arms.

  That incident meant nothing to him, Anna thought as she walked out to her car. Or at least nothing more than a mild flirtation.

  And as it couldn’t mean anything more for her either, she couldn’t understand why she was upset.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ANNA returned home, tired and dispirited, to find Cassie, perhaps able to smell smoke, prowling around the kitchen and twitching nervously. Picking up the cat, she walked through to her bedroom. Maybe they both needed company tonight.

  Waking after a restless sleep, she found Cassie had deserted her, and though nothing more than the faintest smell of smoke lingered in the air, the cat still prowled and twitched, yowling now as she did her round of the kitchen.

  ‘I guess it’s better than having you sitting in your travelling cage, looking sulky,’ Anna told the cat, although she did wonder if perhaps this behaviour was because she’d moved the cage from the kitchen, shutting it away in a storeroom at the back of the house.

  Cassie didn’t enlighten her, and though sorely tempted to call Tom and ask about this latest erratic cat behaviour, Anna knew it was the last thing she should do.

  She had to see less of him, not more. And with the entire town in cahoots to see that didn’t happen, she’d have to be extra vigilant about keeping her distance.

  She had a quick breakfast, then, with no morning surgery, set off for town, grateful, given her working hours, that the supermarket opened on Sunday mornings. She’d do her shopping early, then spend the day at home, doing domesticated things like laundry and tidying the house. After which she’d write a long letter to her parents, telling them all about life in the outback and the new things she was learning. She’d write to Gay, her best friend from for ever as well, and maybe even Philip, though he never wrote back, preferring to phone.

  With this satisfactory plan in mind, she smiled as she shopped, greeting people she passed in the aisles, stopping to listen to tales of the fire or how little Adam was getting over his chickenpox. The open, easy friendliness of the locals gave her a sense of belonging but she guessed they still held something back—that becoming one of them would take longer than the six months she had.

  ‘Takes fifty years,’ Barb at the checkout told her when Anna mentioned this, asking how long it took to be counted as a local. ‘I’ve been here twenty-two years and they still think of me as a newcomer.’

  Anna smiled, but deep inside she felt again that unexpected twinge of loneliness—the longing for a friend.

  ‘At least I’ve got Cassie, even if she does prefer Tom to me,’ she comforted herself as she drove home and unloaded plastic bags full of groceries from her car.

  Struggling with the bags, she had to lean over and turn the back doorknob with her chin, then she kicked open the kitchen door and walked in, stumbling on something she must have dropped on the floor before she left.

  Something soft?

  She looked down, dropped the groceries and let out a desperate cry. The beautiful animal was dead. She knew it but couldn’t help herself, scooping up the limp body and racing back out to the car.

  Driving the way Tom had driven her to Dani’s place, she screeched to a halt outside Tom’s house only minutes later. Thank heavens his car was there—he was home.

  He came hurrying out from behind the surgery, no doubt alerted to her arrival by the screech of brakes and splatter of gravel as she’d pulled up. Not in blue today, but in khaki overalls, unbuttoned from the waist up, long sleeves rolled to the elbow as his shirts always were, the long legs of the garment tucked into boots that finished just below his knees.

  All this Anna took in as she lifted the cat out and raced towards him.

  ‘It’s Cassie,’ she cried. ‘I found her on the floor like this. Tell me she’s not dead, Tom. Tell me she’s not dead.’

  Tom caught her in his arms and held her steady for a moment, then carefully eased away and lifted the cat from her trembling hands.

  ‘You know she’s dead, Anna,’ he said quietly, ‘but it was right to bring her here. We have to find out how she died.’

  He walked towards the surgery, carrying the cat as gently as if she were still alive.

  ‘But she was my friend,’ Anna sobbed, aware she was losing it but unable to cope with all that was happening a minute longer.

  Tom opened the door and led the way inside, through a tiled reception area, into what was clearly an operating theatre. Which, from the water splashed everywhere, he’d been hosing down when she’d arrived.

  He put Cassie down on the table in the middle and turned on a bright operating light. Then he reached out and once again drew Anna close, tucking her up against his body so her tears splashed against his chest.

  ‘I know,’ he said gently, smoothing his hand down her hair. He let her cry for a few minutes but, comforting though it was to be held against him and interesting though the texture of his chest and swirl of chest hair was beneath her cheek, she knew this wasn’t exactly avoidance. She straightened, muttering apologies for behaving so pathetically, then turned her attention to the cat.

  ‘Could someone have poisoned her?’ she asked. ‘Could I have given her something inadvertently?’

  Tom’s eyes narrowed when she asked these questions and he nodded, as if acknowledging that she’d shifted emotionally as well as physically away from him.

  ‘It’s more likely snakebite. With the drought and the dams drying up, snakes are coming closer to the houses in town in search of food—frogs.’

  ‘But Cassie never goes outside,’ Anna protested. ‘She might have accepted the move to Merriwee to the extent she gave up the travelling cage, but nothing would tempt her out into what she must have considered wilderness.’

  Tom said nothing. He was examining the cat, running his hands carefully over it, smoothing the hair backwards as if seeking something.

  ‘There,’ he said at last, pointing to the skin on her left cheek. ‘See the puncture marks. Snake.’

  ‘But she hasn’t been outside,’ Anna repeated. ‘In fact, last night she was prowling around the kitchen and making such a fuss I thought she might want to go out. I opened the door and left it open but she wouldn’t deign to look in that direction.’

  ‘She was prowling and making a fuss?’

  Anna nodded in answer to the repeated question. ‘And yowling,’ she added. ‘Making a terrible noise.’

  ‘Come on,’ he said, turning to take her hand and lead her out of the theatre.

  ‘Where are we going?�
� Anna demanded.

  ‘Where am I going,’ he said. ‘You’re staying right here. You can talk to Penny, you’re good at that. You can even talk to Grace and Carrie if you like, but stay here until I get back.’

  ‘Why? Where are you going?’ Anna demanded, tugging her hand out of his and refusing to move another inch until she knew what was happening.

  ‘To your place. That cat died of snakebite and if she hasn’t been outside, it means the snake is inside. That’s why she was upset.’

  Anna felt as if all her blood was draining away and must have swayed, for Tom reached out and caught her.

  ‘Don’t you dare faint,’ he said sternly. ‘You’re far too big to carry any distance. I might do it over a threshold one day, but any further than that would be asking too much of a man.’

  She knew he was joking—about the threshold—to make her feel better, but, coming on top of the death of Cassie, it was too much. Stupid tears—for someone who never cried—slid down her cheeks so Tom had to hold her close again, and smooth her hair, and pat her back, murmuring, ‘There, there,’ in such a husky voice it didn’t sound at all like him.

  He held her for long enough for her to recover her composure—and perhaps a little longer—then ordered her up to the house.

  ‘Pen’s around somewhere, she’ll make you a cup of tea.’

  He touched her lightly on the cheek, then added, ‘On second thoughts, you might be better making your own cup of tea. She’s far too impatient to wait for the water to boil, and tea made with warm water just doesn’t work.’

  He was trying so hard to make her feel better that Anna forced her lips to smile. She knew it wasn’t much of an effort but, as it turned out, she doubted Tom had noticed. He’d walked away, returning with a strange, long-handled object and a hessian bag.

  ‘Snake-catcher,’ he explained, fiddling a string to show how jaws at the end of the pole opened and closed.

  ‘You don’t need to catch the snake!’ Anna was so appalled the words came out in a panic-induced screech. ‘Just kill the bloody thing!’

  ‘‘‘Just kill the bloody thing’’!’ Tom mimicked her accent, then grinned. ‘Tut-tut! What would your patients think to hear you swearing that way? You’ve been in the bush too long, Dr Talbot.’

  But his smile and teasing only accelerated her panic.

  ‘I’m serious, Tom. I don’t know much about poisonous snakes but I know that trying to catch them is a great way to get bitten.’

  ‘So is trying to kill them,’ he said, more sober now. ‘Interfering with them in any way is likely to frighten them into attacking, but it can’t stay in your house for ever.’

  ‘I don’t mind. I could shift in here. You said yourself you’ve tons of room. And it’s not far from the hospital.’

  She knew she was being unreasonable, but fear for Tom had thrust common sense down to some subterranean level of her mind.

  ‘Or I could get a flat in town.’

  She was babbling now, and the suggestion was totally irrational, but every protective instinct in her body was protesting against his plan.

  ‘Calm down!’ He squeezed her shoulder. ‘I’ve done this heaps of times before. I’ll capture the snake, take it out into the bush and release it back where it belongs.’

  The enormity of this new suggestion—which entailed driving some kilometres with a poisonous snake in the car—was so great, Anna couldn’t speak at all. Well, not until she’d walked across to her car and opened the door.

  ‘No you won’t,’ she said, sliding in behind the wheel. ‘Because it’s my house and I won’t let you in. I’m going back to lock it up and I’ll leave it locked up for ever.’

  Tom’s burst of laughter told her just how stupid that idea was, but it wasn’t until he came over, leant in and twitched the car keys from her fingers that she became really annoyed.

  ‘Give them back,’ she ordered, but he ignored her, merely touching her cheek once again, this time with a gentle forefinger.

  ‘All in good time,’ he promised softly. ‘But in the meantime, you stay here.’

  He walked away, then turned back. ‘I won’t do anything foolish,’ he promised. ‘I’ve far too much to live for to put my life at even the slightest risk.’

  The words seemed heavy with multi-layered meanings but, far from reassuring Anna, they only deepened her apprehension. Her fear for him might have lessened—slightly—but her reaction to his words—a bizarre kind of excitement—was frightening in a different way. Jolted and confused, she remained sitting where she was until long after he’d driven away.

  ‘I saw you out there. Come in. I’ll make you a cup of tea.’

  Penny appeared at the window of Anna’s car.

  ‘Come on! I’m still a bit spotty but you already told me I’m not contagious,’ she reminded Anna, opening the door and waiting impatiently for her to get out. ‘I want to thank you for being kind to me last night. Fancy me losing it like that. And, actually, I’ve a lot of other things to tell you. While I was in bed with the spots, I read through the letters. You know, the ones Mum sent on to Tom. And I think I’ve found a woman who sounds just right. I want you to read it to see what you think.’

  Bizarre didn’t begin to cover Anna’s reactions this time.

  ‘You shouldn’t read other people’s mail,’ she reminded Penny, speaking sharply enough for the young girl, who’d headed back towards the house, to pause and turn towards her.

  ‘But Tom said I could.’

  ‘Oh!’

  Penny had moved on again, so Anna had to get out of the car and follow if she wanted to continue the conversation.

  Which she did!

  ‘But he didn’t say I could,’ she reminded Penny. ‘Besides, do you really think you’re qualified to choose a wife for your brother? And do you really think he wants one?’

  ‘Of course he wants one.’ Penny had swung around, and the determined look in her blue eyes, so like Tom’s, confirmed her certainty. ‘Milk in your tea?’ she asked, as if tea had been the sole topic of conversation.

  Anna nodded, remembering Tom’s warning as she watched Penny pour the watery brew.

  ‘You see, once he’s got a wife, then we—my sister and I—won’t have to worry about him ever again. We won’t have to worry about him bringing someone who’s likely to be a pain into the family, or about some woman taking him for a ride, or hurting him the way Grace did, though, actually, I don’t think he was ever that much in love with her. It was just he thought she suited him and it was time he settled down.’

  She’d skipped over her suitability—or not—as a matchmaker, and Anna decided not to go there again. She didn’t know how long Tom would be and, though reading other people’s mail was about as wrong as you could get, she couldn’t help wanting to know more about this paragon Penny had chosen for her brother.

  So she, Anna, could send poison-pen letters to her?

  Or make a voodoo doll and stick pins in it?

  Don’t be ridiculous.

  It’s none of your business.

  But the longer the silent argument went on, the weaker it became, so when Penny returned from a foray out of the kitchen, brandishing a letter in her left hand, Anna knew she’d lost.

  ‘If you feel bad about reading it, I can read it out loud,’ Penny offered, but, generous though the offer was, Anna didn’t accept. She felt enough empathy with the unknown writer to not want Penny making mockery of the words.

  ‘I’ll read it myself, though I still think you should leave your brother to choose his own wife.’

  ‘He goes on looks mostly, and convenience—someone who’s around. I suppose, left to him, he’d choose you,’ Penny said.

  ‘I’m not available,’ Anna snapped, and all but snatched the letter from Penny’s fingers.

  But far from being aggravated by her guest’s behaviour, Penny actually smiled—a smile that left Anna feeling even more apprehensive than she had earlier.

  Had Penny indeed found a paragon w
ho would make Tom the perfect wife? Was that why she was smiling?

  Anna opened the letter, though her fingers sensed her reluctance and fumbled with the sheets of paper.

  The woman was indeed a paragon and beautiful as well, if the enclosed photograph was actually of her and not some movie star.

  ‘See, she loves the country, grew up on a property, can fence and brand and muster and she’s even won the sponge-cake competition at local shows. My mum says a sponge cake is the hardest thing to cook. She says they’re not worth the bother, because they hardly ever turn out right.’

  Anna frowned at her youthful informant.

  ‘Why’s it important Tom’s wife can make a sponge cake?’

  ‘Bake a sponge cake,’ Penny corrected, then she added triumphantly, ‘Because it’s what country women do!’

  ‘But they do more than that,’ Anna protested. ‘I’ve met many of them, talked with them. They teach their children, and they help their husbands on the farms, and they are on committees and do meals-on-wheels and run swimming clubs for the kids. They do more, probably, than city women, as they don’t want their children missing out on opportunities they might have had in larger towns. I don’t see where sponge cakes come into it.’

  ‘It’s a country thing,’ Penny said, as if that was enough for her to win the argument.

  Anna let it drop, though Penny’s conversation had left her with a strange feeling of inadequacy.

  As if you’d ever need to bake a sponge cake, her mental self chided, especially once you’re married to Philip, who has chefs in every house and apartment he owns. But there was no escaping it—this woman, who, even discounting the sponge cake, could do so many things Anna couldn’t do, would be perfect for Tom.

  ‘Well, what do you think?’ Penny demanded, but Anna couldn’t force her lips to put her thoughts into words.

  She merely nodded, and passed the letter back to Penny, then sipped at the now cold as well as tasteless tea. But the thought of Tom being matched up with the wonder-woman made it curdle in her stomach and, knowing she had to escape before she revealed her turmoil, she rinsed her cup and announced she should be off.