by Judy Nunn
It was Kate who came to her senses first and pushed herself away from him. It took her a moment to regain her breath. Her eyes were fixed upon the ground, unable to meet his.
‘I am sorry,’ she murmured finally.
Giovanni could see that she was deeply shocked. He was shocked himself, he certainly hadn’t intended such a thing to happen. He tried to ease her discomfort as best he could.
‘Why are you sorry? There is no need for you to be sorry,’ he insisted. ‘It is I who must apologise. Please forgive me. I had no right.’ She said nothing but continued to stare at the ground.
‘I came to see Evan,’ Giovanni explained, trying to sound as though nothing had happened. ‘But if he is not at home I can come back later.’ He turned to go.
‘No.’ She put out her hand, but stopped short of touching him. ‘No, there is no need.’ Then she looked up at him and smiled, and it was a smile that made his heart ache. A smile so warm, so honest, that he had to fight the impulse to touch her again, simply to brush his fingers against her cheek, to stroke her hair. ‘Please,’ she insisted, ‘please, come inside and wait. He will be home soon.’
Giovanni could do nothing but obey. He followed her into the front room, sat on the chair she indicated and listened to her voice as she called from the kitchen.
‘Fresh lemons,’ she was saying as she prepared them a cooling drink. ‘Mary Kinane, the accountant’s wife, grows a beautiful lemon tree and she keeps me supplied.’
Giovanni looked around the little front room. There was love and attention in every detail, from the handmade curtains and cushion covers to the hardy homegrown flowers carefully arranged in the small glass bowl on the sideboard table.
‘Evan planted a lemon tree for me at the Clover,’ she said, entering and handing him a large glass, ‘but it died. I hope you have a sweet tooth—I put in a lot of sugar.’
He sipped the drink and nodded. ‘It is very good.’
‘I’ll get a damp cloth for your cheek.’ And before he could protest she had disappeared again.
She returned several minutes later and handed him a small face towel. ‘I have soaked it in salt,’ she warned, ‘it will sting.’
‘Thank you.’ He held the warm cloth to his face and was grateful for the momentary distraction as the salt stung into his wound.
She sat in a hardback chair on the opposite side of the room and sipped at her drink as she talked. ‘How did you hurt yourself?’ she asked.
‘I fell.’
‘Oh? From a horse?’
‘Just a foolish accident.’ When she nodded, realising he didn’t want to go into detail, he said jokingly to lighten the moment, ‘At least one side will match the other now, eh?’ And he gestured at the scar which dominated the left side of his face.
‘Oh no,’ she replied seriously, studying the scar from the knife wound, ‘it will not leave a mark like that.’ The splendid blue eyes suddenly met his. ‘You were lucky that night. He was a coward that man, the sort who could kill.’
Giovanni was taken aback. Why was she speaking of the past as if it was an intimacy they shared? They could not afford to have a past.
He drained his drink. ‘Will Evan be much longer? Perhaps I should—’
‘No. He will be home any minute. He and Paul have gone to fetch Briony from the Lavertons’.’
‘Ah.’
‘Little Lucy Laverton is four years old today, and they had a party for her. It started at ten.’ She looked at the clock on the sideboard table, it was nearly midday. ‘He shouldn’t be long.’
She seemed so relaxed. As if nothing had happened. And yet all Giovanni could think of was the texture of her skin and the moistness of her parted lips.
‘I am here to ask him about work,’ he said, ‘at the Midas.’ He must keep talking, he told himself. There must be no silence between them.
‘Work?’ She looked surprised. ‘But why would you need work at the Midas? You and Rico have the Clover.’
‘Not any longer. Harry sold it.’
‘Harry sold the Clover?’ Now she looked confused. ‘But I thought you were partners.’
‘That is what we thought also. There was a misunderstanding.’ Her expression was one of such concern that he was distracted. He stared down at his glass as he hurried on. ‘So I need a job. As soon as possible. Rico has had an accident and cannot work so I must look after Teresa and the children.’
‘So many accidents,’ she murmured. And when he looked up to meet her eyes he could stand it no more. If he did not leave he would have to touch her. He rose under the pretext of putting the face cloth and his empty glass on the table.
‘Would you like another drink?’ she asked, also rising.
‘No. No. I think I should leave,’ he replied. ‘I will see Evan another time. I will call at the Midas tomorrow.’
‘Stay, Giovanni. Please.’ She indicated his chair. ‘Sit and wait.’ And, when he hesitated, there was a definite plea in her voice. ‘Sit and wait for Evan. Please.’
He did as she asked, knowing that there was something she wanted to say to him, but they sat in silence for several moments before she spoke.
‘It would be wise if, from now on, we avoided each other whenever possible, particularly if you are to work with my husband.’
Giovanni stared at the floor, miserably nodding his agreement, and Kate studied him as he examined the floorboards beneath his feet. He looked like a boy, she thought. A beautiful, sad boy. She so wanted to go to him and cradle his head against her breast.
Kate had known from the moment she had responded to Giovanni’s kiss that she loved him as completely as he loved her. She could no longer dismiss his love and she could no longer ignore her response to his love. Kate’s guilt had disappeared when she returned his kiss. Their love was irrevocable and, although it could never be fulfilled, she felt a great elation in acknowledging its existence.
‘But Giovanni … caro mio …’ He raised his head, bewildered by the endearment, and she continued to speak in Italian. ‘It would be foolish to torment ourselves by ignoring what is between us. It is better that we declare our love.’
He stared at her, dumbfounded. She smiled that glorious smile again and he could not believe the words he was hearing. ‘I love you, Giovanni. It’s as if I have always loved you. And I know I always shall.’
‘Caterina …’ He didn’t dare move and he scarcely dared breathe her name for fear he would break the spell. ‘You love me?’ he whispered.
‘Yes.’ Her smile faded. ‘I shall never speak of it again, but I believe it is more honest to admit it. If only to guard against it,’ she added with a touch of regret. ‘Perhaps I am wrong but—’
‘No.’ Giovanni felt such joy. She loved him. His girl from the mountain. His dream. His Caterina. ‘No. I love you. There is no shame in that.’ He wanted to hold her, but she was not his to hold, and he could accept that fact now. Willingly he could accept it. She loved him!
From the opposite sides of the room they gazed at each other. Seated in hardbacked chairs against the walls, neither moving, they drank their fill of each other.
She looked at the man-boy with the gentle hazel eyes and the kind face. The beautiful face. She studied the scar which marred the symmetry of his beauty. She liked the scar—it was something they shared. She had been there that night. If she’d known then that the man was Giovanni … If their lives had once again become entwined that night…
Kate smiled. No, she told herself. No ‘ifs’.
Giovanni watched the smile twitch at the corners of her mouth. He watched the fine feathers of laughter form at the outer corners of her eyes, and he recalled that frosty morning on the mountain how the girl’s blue eyes danced, how laughter bubbled beneath the surface of her beauty.
Her face had changed since then. It was no longer that of a girl, with the milky-white skin and the clear, wide eyes of a child. This was a woman. A woman of the goldfields. The skin was tanned and, although she was not yet thirty
, life’s experience was already etching itself upon her face.
She is more beautiful than ever, Giovanni thought. The blue eyes still danced and there was still laughter beneath her beauty, but there was a strength in her now. The strength of a woman with a will of her own. She was magnificent.
‘Caterina. My Caterina,’ he breathed.
‘Yes, caro mio.’ She gave herself to him through her eyes. ‘I will always be your Caterina.’
They continued to sit in silence. Neither moved, but each was lost in the other’s caress. As Giovanni’s eyes slowly travelled down her throat, Kate could feel the insistence of his lips upon her neck, then her shoulder, then her breast. Across the distance of the room, she could feel their naked skin pressed together, the weight of his body and the strength of his hands as he pulled her to him. And, when he finally lifted his eyes to meet hers once more, Kate allowed her own gaze to travel down his body.
She looked at his mouth and Giovanni felt their lips meet. He felt the moistness of her tongue. Then the touch of her fingers caressing his shoulders and his chest. Her arms encircling him. The fullness of her breasts, her hands clinging to his back, pulling herself closer and closer to him.
For how long did they give themselves to each other? From their hard chairs on the opposite sides of the little room, how long? A lifetime? A moment? Impossible to tell. Then, outside, the sound of horses. Two horses. One at a canter, one at a trot.
They both heard the horses but still they did not move. ‘My name is Kate,’ she reminded him gently. ‘Always Kate.’ He nodded.
The cantering horse was pulled to an abrupt halt outside the front of the house. ‘I won!’ It was Paul’s voice.
‘Wait a few years, she’ll beat you yet, won’t you, Briony girl?’ It was Evan’s voice as the horse at a trot was reined in alongside.
‘We will never speak of this again,’ she said.
‘I know. And we must never see each other alone,’ he added. ‘Never.’
‘Is it possible to be so sad and so happy at the same time?’ she asked.
‘Yes.’
They smiled and their eyes drank in the final moment. Then they rose and turned to the front door as the footsteps sounded on the verandah.
The door opened. ‘She’s the best horsewoman, Kate. She took the reins as though she was born to them.’ Evan stood there with Briony, barely three, on his shoulders squealing with delight and nine-year-old Paul, flushed and excited, beside him, and Giovanni felt no pang of jealousy as he watched Kate kiss her husband lightly on the lips.
‘How was the party, my darling?’ She held her arms up to the little girl who slid from Evan’s shoulders into her mother’s embrace.
‘Giovanni!’
Before Briony could answer her mother’s query, Paul had run to Giovanni and hugged him and it was Evan who felt the pang of jealousy.
‘Giovanni is here on business, Paul, leave the poor man alone.’ Kate slung Briony onto one hip and held out her hand to her son. ‘Come along and help me in the kitchen. I’ll bring some tea in shortly,’ she called over her shoulder.
‘Sit down, Giovanni, please.’ Evan pulled a chair up to the table by the front window and sat. Giovanni did the same. ‘Business, is it? What business could you be wanting to do with me? I hear the Clover’s been doing very well.’
Fifteen minutes later, when Kate returned with a pot of tea and freshly baked scones, Evan had heard the full story. Giovanni had told it with as little emotion as he could but his bitterness and hostility were evident.
‘I don’t suppose I need to enquire where that came from then?’ Evan pointed to the cut on the Italian’s cheek and, when Giovanni shrugged a reply, he asked, ‘How’s Harry?’
‘Worse.’
‘Good. He deserves it. Thank you, my dear.’
Giovanni avoided looking at Kate as she poured the tea, concentrating on the teapot instead.
‘I can’t say I’m surprised,’ the Welshman continued when Kate had returned to the kitchen. ‘Harry’s always been a slippery one.’ Giovanni declined the plate of scones which Evan held out to him. ‘Never an out-and-out scoundrel, mind. Never openly robs a man, but as good as, in my book. I’ll wager he’s convinced himself he’s done nothing wrong too.’ Noticing the growing anger in Giovanni’s eyes, Evan took a bite of his scone and changed the subject. ‘Still, no amount of talking is going to get the Clover back for you. I take it you’re here to ask for work, is that it?’
Giovanni nodded, appreciating the Welshman’s bluntness. ‘I am a good worker, you know that I am. And so is my brother. Between us we can do the work of four men. When Rico is recovered you will see—’
‘I cannot employ your brother, Giovanni.’
‘He has a temper, I know, but I can—’
‘Yes, there is his temper to take into consideration,’ Evan admitted, ‘but that is not why.’
‘I can control him, I swear to you I can.’
‘I believe you, my friend. In fact, I believe you are the only man who can control your brother. But as far as the Midas is concerned, he is unemployable.’ Giovanni waited for an explanation, although he knew the answer. Evan shrugged. ‘He cannot speak English.’
When Giovanni shook his head and gave a sigh of exasperation Evan continued, a trifle impatiently. ‘Now you listen to me, Giovanni. I know you and all of your friends think that the language regulation is there merely as an excuse not to employ Italians. Or Europeans in general for that matter. But there is a reason, believe me. Sure, maybe there are some who exercise the rules for the wrong reasons, but I’m not one of them. If a miner can work well then it’s immaterial to me what part of the world he comes from.’
Kate returned with a jug of hot water to top up the teapot and Giovanni forced himself to concentrate on Evan, even though he didn’t really believe what the Welshman was saying.
Evan sensed his scepticism. ‘You’ve never worked the big mines, Giovanni. In the big mines a man’s ability to communicate is as important as his ability to wield a pick. I tell you, man,’ he said, ‘down there is a world bigger than you could possibly imagine.’
Kate watched as her husband leaned across the table, intent upon making contact with the Italian. There was an uncharacteristic edge of excitement to his voice and an enthusiasm in his eyes she had never seen before. ‘I know that you love working under the ground. Just as I do. And you’ll love this world, Giovanni. But it is a far more dangerous world than the Clover. I never truly knew it myself until I started at the Midas. I thought mining was mining. But this is different. You’re so far down you could be in the centre of the earth, I tell you. One moment you’re working a stope that will barely contain a man, and the next you’re in a cavern that could hold the Town Hall itself. Men work in teams. Not just for reasons of efficiency, but for their own safety. And it’s for reasons of safety that they must be able to communicate, don’t you see? In the big mines, more than ever, a man needs to rely upon his brothers.’
Kate continued to watch her husband, fascinated. She had never heard him speak with such passion. She was touched and at the same time disappointed that he had never discussed these feelings in such a way with her.
Giovanni could sense Kate’s response to Evan’s rare show of animation and for the first time he felt a surge of jealousy. If the mere mention of a man’s passion for the world below the earth’s surface could stir her, what could he, Giovanni, do to her? He could lie with her in the red desert dirt in the dead of the night and share with her the diamond-studded sky. Nowhere in the world did the stars shine with such brilliance as in the velvet-black roof of the desert—had the Welshman shared that with her? Had he shared with her a love of the great brown land itself? The soft, powdery texture of the dust when you held it in the palm of your hand, the smell of the saltbush when you crushed it between your fingers, the constant trickle of sweat on the body that tasted like salt if you licked it.
A brief image. Caterina’s naked body. The trickle of sw
eat between her breasts. His tongue licking it away. Giovanni rose and his chair scraped angrily on the bare floor. He knew he was being unfair. Evan was a good man, a man of honour and, no doubt, a good husband. But he was not a passionate man. Caterina was a passionate woman, and she needed a passionate man.
‘I understand, and I agree. Rico is not the right man for the Midas.’ Giovanni could have argued Rico’s case further; he could have told the Welshman that his brother could understand the basics of English, but what was the point? Evan was right, Rico did not belong as part of a team. He could not be trusted.
‘I must go,’ he said. ‘I have taken up enough of your time.’ He needed to get out, to get away from the two of them. It was his own passion that was devouring him, he knew that. Surely he should be grateful that Evan was not a passionate man, surely it would be unbearable to contemplate Caterina in the throes of ecstasy …
He must leave. He must. ‘Thank you for the tea, Kate,’ he said.
‘It was a pleasure.’ Kate was busying herself stacking the cups and saucers. Something was wrong. She could sense it.
Suddenly she was overwhelmed with remorse. What had she done? She had told herself there was no shame in declaring her love. She had told herself she was not being unfaithful, merely honest, when she admitted to Giovanni that she would always love him. But there was shame and she had been unfaithful. She could still feel their eyes devouring each other. She might just as well have given him her body; perhaps it would have been more honest if she had.
‘I’ll see you at the mine tomorrow then, Giovanni,’ Evan was saying. ‘At half past seven—the morning shift starts at eight.’
‘I shall be there.’ The men shook hands. ‘Thank you, Evan.’
Giovanni nodded to Kate and left.
She had done a shocking thing, she told herself as she brushed up the scone crumbs from the table. She had shamed herself, she had brought torment to Giovanni and, above all, she had wronged her husband.
