Convenient Brides

by Catherine Spencer

  After dinner they watched the in-flight movie, a comedy they both enjoyed, and they had a nightcap as the big jet flew on and on and the cabin grew quiet.

  But far from feeling sleepy, although they’d extended their chairs, Chantal had other things on her mind apparently. So, bathed in their tiny cocoon of light, they chatted on quietly.

  She told him that she had the offer of two jobs, both revues, one in Melbourne, one on the Gold Coast. Since Melbourne was her home town the sensible thing to do was to take that one, she felt, but she hadn’t decided yet. Then she grew thoughtful and placed her hand lightly on his arm. He glanced at her shiny red nails then into her eyes, and guessed what was coming.

  ‘Do you have a partner, Brett?’

  He said after the briefest hesitation, ‘At the moment, no.’

  ‘I don’t get the feeling you’re a loner, somehow.’ Her fingertips did a little tattoo on his arm.

  ‘Not always,’ he conceded. ‘The Congo has its limitations in that line,’ he added gravely.

  ‘Why don’t we get together? I do get the feeling you’re my kind of man.’

  ‘What kind is that?’ he asked, and assured himself the only reason he was pursuing this conversation was because he was over thirty thousand feet above the earth hurtling through the night, trapped, in other words, on a long and boring flight.

  ‘My kind of man?’ Chantal said dreamily. ‘There’s a song that says it all, I’ve danced to it often enough—a man with a slow hand. A man who knows how to make a girl feel a million dollars. Tell me you’re not that kind of man, Brett?’

  He didn’t agree or disagree. He said instead, ‘I don’t think you should go around making those judgements on face value, Chantal.’

  ‘Oh, a girl can tell,’ she assured him. ‘’Specially in my line of work. It isn’t only looks and physique.’ She raised herself on one elbow and her gorgeous eyes drifted over him. ‘Not that they skimped on those when they were handing them out to you, but it’s an aura, I guess. The way you talk, the way you smile, a sense of humour.’ She shook her head. ‘It’s just there.’

  For almost thirty seconds, as he stared into her eyes, Brett Spencer was tempted to prove her right—when they got to Sydney, naturally. One would have to be a block of wood, he reasoned, not to be tempted. But deep down he knew he couldn’t further complicate his already complicated life.

  ‘Chantal,’ he said quietly, and covered her hand with his free one, ‘thank you for the offer and don’t think this is easy to do, but—’

  ‘I’m not your kind of girl?’ she supplied a little bitterly.

  ‘On the contrary, you’re the kind of girl to dream about.’

  ‘The kind of girl you only think of in terms of sex?’

  He paused and wondered, with a tinge of black humour, whether the flight was equipped with parachutes. He also praised his instincts that had seen him not divulge his surname. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I guess because I’m a bit older—’

  ‘How much older?’

  He shrugged. ‘Thirty-five whereas you would be…twenty-one?’

  She looked momentarily gratified. ‘Twenty-four.’

  ‘Even so, I’ve had eleven more years’ experience of this business,’ he said wryly. ‘I think it’s a good idea for two people to get to know each other before they take—that—plunge.’

  ‘If this wasn’t a plane I could show you different, Brett,’ she said huskily. ‘You have to start somewhere.’

  How right you are, Kylie Jones—damn! Brett thought. I must be mad.

  ‘So,’ she continued, ‘let’s be honest. I’m not and never could be the right girl for you except as a one-night stand?’

  ‘Let’s put it another way—I’m not and never could be the right man for you.’

  ‘How do you like your women, then? All intellectual and upper crust? I can tell by the way you talk you’re both intellectual and upper crust yourself.’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with that. Chantal, if I’m not the right man for you, that doesn’t mean to say there isn’t a Mr Right out there—you’re lovely enough and nice enough. Just—’ he hesitated ‘—take it a bit slower. But for what it’s worth—’ he smiled down at her ‘—here’s looking at you, kid!’

  She fell asleep eventually but he didn’t. Perhaps because his life was about to change drastically, he mused. He was going home for the first time in five years. Back to civilization to ride a desk, and he wasn’t at all sure about it. Yes, he knew he needed a break. Not only that but he had papers to write and a new disease to move on to. And it wasn’t that he didn’t enjoy civilization but for how long he’d be able to resist the call of the wild—the call to work amongst people who desperately needed help—was another matter.

  Then there was Elvira Madigan. His best friend’s girl-friend whom he’d rescued and set up in his own home, a girl it had several times occurred to him to marry but for all the wrong reasons—well, almost all…

  Chapter Two

  THE first note on the fridge door said:

  Dear Mum

  Just want 2 let u know I’m not blind. I can tell there’s a new man in your life by the amount of time u spend fiddling with your hair—I hope he’s a better choice than the last one. But worse than that, I can c there’s not a bloody (note I do not use the F word) thing to eat in this fridge!!! Your loving son, Simon.

  The second note in a more mature hand read:

  Simon, on the contrary, this fridge is full of things to eat. True, there are no frozen, instant, microwavable meals, if that’s what you’re on about, but that’s because they’re not good for you on account of their high fat, sodium etc., etc., content. By the way, the B word is no more acceptable than the F word, so please discontinue its use.

  Love, Mum.

  A pencil drawing of a freckle-faced boy crying crocodile tears adorned the third note:

  Mum, I’m only 10! I haven’t had the time 2 learn 2 cook yet! So what’s wrong with a frozen pizza now and then? Just 4 when I get desperate? Other kids eat them all the time and they don’t seem 2 be dying off because of them. Also, don’t forget u r a working mum and I’m your only son. Simon—growing boys of the world unite against hunger!

  The last note was the longest:

  Son, blackmail will get you nowhere. And what you’re implying is not true. I cook you two nutritious meals a day and I exhaust myself creating imaginative, filling and delicious lunches for you to take to school. So there is no need for you to add cooking to your array of skills at present. But if between meals is the problem, I’m quite sure you’re old enough to make a sandwich (or 6!) out of the cold meat, salad items, cheese and the like that this fridge holds in abundance. And if you’re really dying to drive the microwave, at this point in time for example, there’s some chicken casserole left over from last night that only needs reheating. Mum—overworked, undervalued mothers of the world unite!

  There was a pencil sketch at the bottom of the note of a woman with six hands filled with pots and pans, a broom, an iron and with her hair pinned up with clothes pegs.

  It was a pleasant kitchen that the fridge-cum-message board stood in. It had always been a pleasant room with terracotta tiles on the floor and a view of the garden, but there were added touches Brett Spencer did not remember as he turned away from the fridge with a lingering smile.

  New yellow curtains with white daisies, pots of basil, thyme and parsley on the window sill, colourful jars of preserved chillies and other evidence of a cook who took her cooking seriously; a set of black-handled knives from carving through to chopping and paring in wooden block holder, a food processor, a garlic press, a bowl of lemons and a full spice rack.

  At one end of the room was a round table with four ladder-back chairs. The surface of the table was cluttered with books, magazines, a fruit basket, a cricket ball and two baseball caps.

  Then the back door opened precipitously and a boy pelted into the kitchen. He pulled up abruptly as he saw Brett.

  ‘Who
are you?’

  A little jolt of recognition ran through Brett. There was no doubting whose son the child was…

  ‘You must be Simon,’ he said lightly as the fair, freckled boy slung his school bag onto the table causing the cricket ball to roll off. ‘I’m Brett. I’ve come to see your mum.’

  ‘Gosh!’ Simon eyed him alertly, then picked up the ball and rolled the seam between his fingers. ‘Don’t tell me she’s got it right at last.’

  ‘Got it right?’

  ‘She has awful taste in men,’ Simon confided. ‘But you look pretty normal and if that’s your car in the drive, it’s real cool!’

  ‘Uh—it is—but what makes you say she has awful taste in men?’

  ‘Well, the last one had this thing about getting back to nature. He was forever taking us on hikes and orienteering expeditions and he was into birds and bush tucker and he didn’t believe in television and he never stopped trying to teach me knots and survival skills—I tell you, I was absolutely worn out when she finally saw the light! You’re not a back-to-nature-freak, are you?’ he asked warily. ‘I mean, you look OK, but I guess you can’t tell until you know a person.’

  ‘No, I’m not, but—’

  ‘Then there was the artist,’ Simon went on blithely, but screwed up his face. ‘He didn’t know one end of a cricket bat from the other and he was always putting her down.’

  ‘Putting her down?’

  ‘Mum likes her art conventional. He used to say she had the artistic appreciation of a hen. I used to tell her that a hen with a paintbrush could probably come up with better art than he could.’

  ‘Well done, but—’

  ‘You sure you’re not an artist in disguise?’ Simon eyed his khaki trousers and blue shirt.

  ‘Quite sure,’ Brett said wryly. ‘And I happen to like my art conventional.’

  ‘Then—’ Simon rolled his blue eyes ‘—there was the father-figure. Had to be the worst of all!’

  ‘Why was that?’

  ‘He was always trying to help me with my homework; he was mad about playing Scrabble and chess; he used to make up these general knowledge quizzes.’ Simon shook his head wearily.

  ‘Worse than the back-to-nature freak?’ Brett enquired gravely.

  ‘Yes. He had no sense of humour!’

  ‘That is tough to live with,’ Brett agreed.

  ‘More so if you have a mum who can be a little wacky at times. But he just didn’t get it so she used to try and be all serious. I love my mum the wacky way she is.’

  ‘Were there any that you liked at all?’

  Simon chewed his lip, then looked as mischievous as only a freckled, ten-year-old boy could. ‘There was one I didn’t mind. Not that I liked him ’xactly, but he used to slip me five bucks and tell me to get lost for a while.’

  ‘I see. Incidentally you haven’t got that flipper quite right—can I show you?’

  Simon handed over the cricket ball and Brett positioned it in his hand with his fingers on the seam and went through the bowling action in slow motion. ‘See? You need to flip your wrist over like this so it comes out of the back of your hand.’

  ‘You…like cricket?’ Simon asked with an awestruck look in his eyes. ‘More than Scrabble and chess?’

  ‘More than most things. So. You assumed I was the new man in your mum’s life?’

  Simon shrugged. ‘Who else would you be? She’s got a new hairstyle and she painted her nails the other day. Isn’t that what girls do?’

  ‘They…yes, probably,’ Brett Spencer murmured.

  ‘And you’re here in the kitchen so I guess she told you to let yourself in—hey! You’re not a teacher, are you?’

  ‘No. And I am in the kitchen.’ Brett put the ball back on the table and they both turned as a woman came in through the back door.

  ‘Simon, sorry I’m late,’ she said breathlessly. ‘Did you get a lift home? I guess that’s got to account for the strange car. Who—?’ She stopped dead as her gaze fell on Brett Spencer, and dropped her purse.

  It was five years since he’d last seen Ellie Madigan, Brett Spencer mused. Five years that had treated her kindly—either that or reaching thirty had brought together all her potential. Gone was the naive, unsure-of-herself girl his friend Tom King had introduced him to eleven years ago. Gone was the sick, desperate girl of not much later. Gone was the rather limp, colourless mother of a particularly energetic five-year-old she’d been on that last occasion.

  In fact, until she’d frozen to the spot, she’d radiated energy. There’d been a spring in her step and a wry little smile on her lips. And she certainly wasn’t colourless. Her brown curly hair shone and was cut in an attractive short bob, her skin was smooth and fresh, her hazel eyes with their little flecks of gold were clear and expressive, and her slender figure beneath a short yellow skirt and a white stretch T-shirt made you doubt she could be the mother of a ten-year-old.

  ‘You!’ she said at last. ‘I didn’t know…I didn’t expect…’ She stopped and bent to pick up her purse.

  ‘My fault, I should have let you know, Ellie,’ Brett said. ‘I hope you don’t mind me letting myself in?’

  ‘Uh—well, it is your house.’ She swallowed visibly. ‘So you and Simon have got to know each other?’

  ‘I sussed out that he was the new man in your life—what do you mean it’s his house?’ Simon asked, turning to stare at Brett suspiciously.

  ‘We hadn’t got around to that yet,’ Brett murmured. ‘Simon, I’m Brett Spencer. We have met before but you were only five.’

  Simon stared, then his mouth fell open as dawning comprehension came to him. ‘You mean you were my dad’s best friend? Jeez—’

  ‘Simon!’ Ellie murmured warningly.

  ‘But this is great, mon!’ Simon turned to his mother enthusiastically. ‘Not only that but this guy likes his art conventional, he’s not into the birds and the bees, he doesn’t mind a bit of wackiness—what more could you want?’

  Ellie had to smile although weakly. ‘Simon—’

  ‘And he can bowl flippers! It just gets better! Though why you couldn’t tell me who he was I’ll never know. Um…guess what? I’ll leave you two alone for a while.’ Simon grinned wickedly. ‘And it won’t even cost you a cent,’ he added to Brett.

  He took an apple from the fruit bowl, put one of the baseball caps on backwards, picked up his cricket ball and sauntered out.

  ‘Won’t cost you a cent?’ Ellie said dazedly as she sank down into a ladder-back chair. ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘One of your ex…one of the men in your life used to tip him five dollars to make himself scarce.’

  The colour rose from the base of her throat, he noted, and spread to the clear fresh skin of her cheeks as she said, ‘You’re joking.’

  ‘Not unless Simon is given to making things up.’

  ‘Simon,’ she said bitterly, ‘is the most devastatingly honest person I know. Oh, no!’ She got even hotter. ‘Conventional art, the birds and the bees, wacky—he told you about them all?’

  ‘He ran through four of them.’

  ‘But why? How come you were discussing me like that?’

  Brett grimaced. ‘He assumed because you had a new hairstyle there was a new man in your life, and because he found me in the kitchen and because I said I’d come to see you—that I was it.’

  ‘That still doesn’t explain…’ Her eyes were wide and incredulous.

  ‘It would appear—’ Brett chose his words with care ‘—that he hasn’t entirely approved of your choice of men.’

  ‘Do you think I don’t know that?’ Ellie’s voice rose. ‘I chose them all because I thought they could enhance a facet of his life I was unable to but he…’ She broke off and breathed heavily. ‘He was so sickeningly polite and determinedly unimpressed it was just awful.’

  ‘Perhaps you should have chosen them for yourself?’ Brett suggested.

  ‘Well, obviously I liked them, or I thought I did, until Simon got to work on t
hem.’

  ‘Someone with a good working knowledge of cricket might have been a better bet.’

  Ellie propped her chin in her hands. ‘What are you here for, Brett?’

  He pulled out a chair and sat down opposite her. ‘The time has come to talk of many things—wouldn’t you say, Ellie?’

  ‘“Shoes and ships and sealing wax”…do you want your house back?’

  Brett Spencer was thirty-five and six feet two. He had grey eyes, dark hair, a rather hard mouth when he wasn’t smiling and the aura of a man who knew what he wanted—and got it. The one thing he had never wanted was his best friend’s girlfriend, Ellie Madigan…

  ‘No.’ He fingered the blue shadows on his jaw. ‘Unless you have plans to marry someone and move out?’

  Ellie smiled bleakly. ‘No. I would have thought that was obvious.’

  ‘What about the new man?’

  ‘Who said there was a new—?’ She paused and her gaze refocused on the other end of the kitchen. ‘You’ve been reading the notes on the fridge!’

  He nodded wryly and looked at her neatly painted nails, a soft pretty pink. ‘Simon was certain of it.’

  Ellie muttered something beneath her breath. ‘I have no plans to marry him.’

  ‘But you’re stepping out with him?’

  ‘I…’ She reddened again, then tossed her head. ‘If you call going to lunch and…oh, damn! I nearly forgot, I’ve asked him to dinner.’

  ‘Brave of you,’ he commented, and started to laugh.

  ‘It’s not funny!’ But despite her indignation a hidden tremor ran through Ellie—Brett Spencer was devastatingly attractive when he was genuinely amused.

  ‘Storming the Bastille might be child’s play compared to running the gauntlet of Simon for any of your suitors, Ellie. But I’ll be here to lend a hand.’

  ‘You?’ Her eyes widened. ‘You intend to stay here?’