by Margaret Way
“Morning, Miss Chrissy!”
The children shifted in their seats, heads swivelled. Not one, but two teachers. Miss Victoria had the most amazing long curling dark red hair, pulled back in a ponytail, and eyes as green as a deep lagoon with the sun on it. Miss Chrissy had short corkscrew dark curls that went everywhere, and big brown eyes. Miss Victoria was dressed the part in a blouse and skirt. Miss Chrissy was in jeans with a blue T-shirt. The children were fascinated.
“I’m off,” Haddo told Tori crisply. “You can tell me all about it at dinner. Kerri and Marcy will be arriving early afternoon, don’t forget.”
“No way to put a stop to it?” she asked sweetly.
For a minute it looked as if he was about to drop a careless kiss on her cheek, but instead he laughed, waved a hand and strode off down the aisle, calling, “Goodbye, kids! I’ll be hearing about how you behave. That goes for you too, Charlie!” He directed a finger in Charlie’s direction.
Eleven-year-old Charlie, whose greatest ambition was to become a stockman on the station, gave a whoop of laughter. Why anyone would want to go to school was a mystery to Charlie, but to run off or go walkabout would be to jeopardise his chances with the big boss—Mister Haddo. Charlie stopped lolling and sat forward, looking as if he was going to make an effort to pay attention. Of course it wouldn’t help him one bit to become a good stockman, much less a tracker, but the teachers were so pretty—especially Miss Victoria—so he guessed it was cool.
By the time Tori rang the bell for “little” lunch, sent down for the children from the homestead—no junk food, just sandwiches, fruit, muffins—she had formed a few ideas of her own. First of all she had made each child come up to the blackboard to write their name, age and class. Next she had decided she wanted one brightly painted feature wall, where the children could display their artwork. She wondered what talent she might discover. She had also decided the schoolroom needed a small upright piano, so there could be singing. She rather fancied forming a junior choir. She wasn’t a highly accomplished pianist, like Pip, but she had some talent, and had managed to gain an Associate Diploma by the time she left school.
By three o’clock, the end of the day—though it was two o’clock for the two little four-year-olds, who took a nap anyway—she was bursting with ideas. The children had not only to be taught, they had to be entertained. Music, the universal language, would be a good start. She didn’t need Haddo to supply the piano—though she had better talk to him about it first—she could buy it herself and have it trucked out.
“I didn’t know I was such an idiot!” Chrissy said, folding her skinny arms over her head. “Even Charlie knows some of his tables. And that little kid, Leila, writes better than I do. Just look at her name and mine.” Chrissy, a virtual orphan, who had regularly been beaten up at her various homes, pointed to the board.
“Some of the best-educated people in the country have terrible writing,” Tori laughingly pointed out. “There’s no such thing as a copybook, like in the olden days. You should see Pip’s writing. It’s beautiful. Haddo has a good hand. And mine’s not too bad.”
“It’s beautiful!” Chrissy said strongly. “And you’re so smart! The kids really enjoyed their lessons. The way you put things and explain. I did too.”
Tori’s tender heart broke a little. “Don’t worry, you’ll catch up to where you want to be in no time, Chrissy,” she promised. “All you have to do is want to.”
In the time she had been on Mallarinka Chrissy had been protected and cushioned by the kindness of the household—Tori, Philippa, Haddo, motherly Kate in the kitchen, with whom she got on extremely well—and had an uncomplicated friendship with the house girls Kate had trained so well. But now, within days of the arrival of Haddo’s sister Kerri—tall, bone-thin, very glamorous, unhappy and because of it on the caustic side—and her friend Marcy—by way of contrast, a short, very pretty brunette, carrying a few extra pounds, but shapely with it—the atmosphere took on an abrupt sea change. Marcy, who was remarkably skittish around Haddo, was given to passing snappy, loud comments when he wasn’t around, and Chrissy was the butt of many of Marcy’s wisecracks. Sometimes they were funny, but they had a core of ridicule that came perilously close to insult.
Tori came in for her share too. The only difference being that Tori had no difficulty firing off a quick retort, while Chrissy couldn’t handle repartee, and she had no confidence whatever around “posh” women like Kerri and Marcy—the social elite. As far as Chrissy was concerned they came under the label of “rich bitches”. Women who had never had to fend for themselves and were way out of touch with what Tori sardonically called “the lower orders”. And the first and last time Marcy had smilingly interrogated Chrissy about what had happened to her front tooth—feigning fascination—Tori had told her if she didn’t ease off Chrissy she might be missing a front tooth herself.
“Oh, sorry—sorry, Victoria!” Marcy, dressed in a white linen shirt and matching trousers, performed an exaggerated salaam. “You’re such a firecracker, aren’t you? You’ve done so many wild things since you were a kid—and your friend, Chrissy!” She rolled her eyes. “You found her in a shelter? What next? Is that a wig she’s wearing, or her own hair? And what’s she doing down at the school? Not helping you teach, I bet! She’s got no verbal skills. I try to engage her in conversation but she can’t even string two words together. Even when I say hello she’s pushed for an answer.”
“Whereas you more or less don’t let up,” Tori retorted bluntly, stung on Chrissy’s behalf. “Chrissy is having difficulty responding because you go out of your way to make her nervous. To my mind, that’s cruel.”
Marcy’s bosom heaved with the level of affront. “I can’t begin to imagine why Haddo is so fond of you,” she muttered grimly.
“That’s something even I’m not capable of answering,” Tori quipped. “But then, you’re no closer to Haddo than you were six or seven years ago. That’s sad, Marcy. Maybe it’s time you asked yourself the Big Question: could I be wasting my time?”
Marcy threw back her shiny head, cut in the latest style, “Terribly amusing, my dear.” She glared. “But then you always were obnoxious.”
“Charming!” Tori murmured. For some reason Marcy, several years older, had always been afraid of her. Why, exactly?
“And you’re heading for a cropper.” Marcy’s crystal tones sharpened. “Don’t think I don’t know why you’ve been sent out here. The family are worried about the sort of people you hang out with.”
“Your sort, Marcy,” Tori reminded her dryly. “You know—the so called shakers and movers. The in crowd.”
Marcy all but choked. “The only difference being I know how to behave. You simply don’t.”
“So why is it you always look envious?” Tori smiled. “What you don’t take into account is that I’m smart, and I recognise it in you. Anyway, I’m doing great! Not that it’s any of your business. And, yes—I do believe I’m family, while you’re just a visitor here. So don’t try telling me off. Or Chrissy.”
“Oh, my goodness!” Marcy made a face, as if she had never encountered such rudeness. “A visitor? Everyone knows I’m much more than that. Kerri and I forged our friendship in school, and Haddo and I have always been close, as it so happens. Why else would he have me here?” She gave a thin, knowing, smile. “We all have our little secrets, dear. What would you know about what’s gone on in the past few years? And what about what you have to deal with? You don’t fool me one little bit with that smart aleck manner you’ve adopted with Haddo. It’s just an act. Haddo is far more to you than you’re letting on.”
“Of course he is!” Tori flashed a breezy smile. “I won’t lie. He’s Cousin Haddo, and I just adore him. But to get back to Chrissy. She was really enjoying being here until you arrived. It’s important to me we keep it that way.”
“Right you are!” Marcy gave an unkind laugh. “But how could a little street person like Chrissy be at home here? As the old saying goes,
you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. If she feels bad it’s because she recognises that fact. She’s totally out of place when you consider what her natural habitat has to be. She could have been doing drugs, for all you know. Or prostitution. Lovely! Her feeling bad has nothing to do with me, Victoria. Actually, I’ve made attempts to be kind to her.”
The redhead in Tori got the upper hand. “I don’t regard barely disguised ridicule as kindness,” she said, very sharply indeed. “And, for the record, Chrissy is totally drug-free and she was never into prostitution. You think you’re so superior to the Chrissys of this world, don’t you, Marcy?”
Marcy gave a throaty laugh, placing a hand on her curvy hip. “Don’t think so, I know so, dear.”
“Such is arrogance.” Tori sighed. “Shouldn’t you remember it was just an accident of birth? Chrissy, through no fault of her own, was dealt a really bad hand. Don’t we, with so much more, have a responsibility to help out? If you spent some time checking out how the less fortunate live, it might make you a better person.”
“Please don’t lecture me, dear,” Marcy said, with a curl of her lip.
“And you can quit calling me dear in return,” Tori replied sharply. “You consider yourself pretty classy, but a real lady would never torment anyone less fortunate than herself. Would you try to remember that for the duration of your stay?”
“Can’t promise anything.” Marcy glanced pointedly at her designer watch. “Better get cracking, then. Haddo wants me to join him for the day.”
Tori, who’d been about to turn away, stopped short. “Now, there’s a howler if ever I’ve heard one. Pip is taking morning classes for me while Haddo flies Chrissy and me into Koomera Crossing. We’ll be taking the chopper. Chrissy has a dentist appointment. We want to get things started on fixing that tooth. She’ll need a porcelain crown.”
“Ugh!” Marcy shuddered, as though Chrissy was in desperate need of a full set of false teeth. “Makes you happy, does it, dear? This dispensing largesse to the poor and the needy?”
“Yes, it does, actually,” Tori answered quietly. “I’ve come to realise that’s what makes being an heiress worthwhile.” She turned on her heel before her disgust grew too much for her. “See you this evening, Marcy,” she called over her shoulder. “Kerri is a wonderful horsewoman. Why don’t you get her to help you brush up on your many lessons?”
Marcy started with indignation. “Why the hell would I want to ride a horse?” she asked haughtily, and strode away in the opposite direction.
While Chrissy was bravely coping with her dental appointment—the second of her life, the first having been bad enough to make her think of it ever after as torture—Haddo and Tori took a walk around the prosperous Outback town, which had its own bush hospital, with visiting medical and dental specialists. At the well-stocked pharmacy Tori bought a few toiletries Pip wanted, then they headed towards a good coffee shop.
Once inside, they were shown to a quiet banquette that looked out on the broad sunlit main street. Four-wheel drives and utilities were parked practically bumper to bumper to either side. “How are you going to go about convincing Marcy she’s not the love of your life?” Tori asked by way of conversation, after their order for coffee and sandwiches had been taken.
“Why are you so desperate to get me to?” Haddo asked, equally casual. “Are you jealous?”
“Hell! I hate you,” she said flippantly. “Haven’t you found that out yet?”
“I’m okay with your hating me.” He shrugged. “It makes you heaven to kiss.”
She flushed. “The kissing has to go! It’s not in my best interests. I can’t worry about you.”
He gave a half-laugh. “You should. I’m getting on. Damn nearly thirty, and I have a compelling need to marry and have kids.”
“Marcy can’t help?”
“Ah, don’t be ridiculous,’ he said, shaking his crow-black head. “There have been women in my life other than Marcy.”
Her mind immediately darted back to a few. “Yes, that’s right. There was Georgina Thomas—and whatever happened to Rosie Armitage? I always liked Rosie. She was very sweet to me when people like Marcy were never nice. Marcy’s not good around Chrissy either.”
He nodded, looking directly at her. “It hasn’t escaped me. I’ll have a word with her.”
“That might be helpful. Is Kerri’s marriage falling apart? She won’t speak to me.”
“She’s jealous of you, Elf. Don’t you realise that?”
“Oh, come on, Haddo,” she said quietly. “Why would Kerri be jealous of me?”
“You actually know the answer to that question,” he said bluntly.
Colour flooded into her flawless skin. “So Kerri’s resented me right from the beginning? Is that what you’re saying? She was your sister—your only sibling. She wanted all your love and attention. Instead you made a little pet out of me.”
His smile was crooked. “I promise you, you were the most enchanting little girl that ever drew breath. You had so much life in you, even after you lost your father and were in so much pain. I couldn’t not love you, Tori.”
She drew a tortured breath. “So why did you treat me the way you did?”
He groaned and put a tanned, elegantly shaped hand to his temple. “Not again! Because you were a child, my little Elf, with your cute little pointy ears. I absolutely adored them.”
She swallowed down a rush of emotion at the use of his old nickname for her. It was part of him—and her. The halcyon days. “Let me remind you I’ve grown into my ears,” she said sharply. She hadn’t really.
He appraised her with indulgent eyes. “Your ears are fit for a faerie princess, Tori,” he consoled her. “As for the myth of my cruel treatment of you. I would have thought I’d made the reason for that abundantly clear. Surely in retrospect you can understand?”
Maybe some part of her did. Only her emotions weren’t keeping pace with her head. “I wasn’t there for an orgy,” she told him heatedly.
“You never thought you might have got one?” He pinned her emerald-green gaze.
She blinked at the bluntness of his tone, then drew back. “You would never hurt me, Haddo. Anyway, I wasn’t wrong about the way you looked at me. You looked at me in a way no one else ever has, and I’ve had more than my share of attention. Don’t deny it. That look led me astray.”
“So I made a mistake.” He sighed very deeply. “You were just so beautiful. Everything about you cried out, Haddo, look at me!”
“So it’s still my fault, is it?” she flared.
“It’s always the woman’s fault.” He smiled, his blue eyes so intense they made her feel disorientated. “You don’t know your own power.”
“Nor you yours,” she said sharply. “If I had to lose my virginity—”
“Have you?” He caught the tips of her fingers, holding them in a tight grip.
“That’s none of your business!” She attempted to wrench her fingers away.
He allowed her to, lounging back, intense one moment, nonchalant the next. “Well, we’ve been friends for so long I thought you might want to tell me. I’ve already heard about the hundreds and hundreds of kisses.”
She gave a little involuntary shudder. “I couldn’t wait to lose it after you.” She gave in to the deeply entrenched desire to hurt him as he had once had hurt her.
“So what held you back?”
She fixed him with spirited eyes. “Who said anything did?”
His expression gentled, and that tender smile played about his lips. “You’re sort of my girl—aren’t you, Tori?”
All the fight went out of her. Just like that. Emotions waxing and waning. “Yes,” she said. “Isn’t that too damned odd? Especially since you turned me into a juvenile delinquent. All I wanted was for you to love me. Instead you made me so unhappy.”
“I’m sorry.” His brilliant eyes reflected all the sincerity in the world.
It shook her, yet perversely pricked her into giving a who-
would-care flick of her hand. “Anyway, I—” She stopped short as she saw the young waitress fast approaching. “Here comes the coffee.”
“Forget that for a moment,” Haddo said in a deep, quiet voice. “I promise I’ll do everything in my power never to hurt you again as long as I live.”
She was touched that he should say such a thing. How could she ever distance herself from this man? “So help me God. You must say it.”
“So help me God,” he solemnly intoned.
It was such a strangely moving moment her eyes filled with brilliant, unshed tears.
The smiling waitress arrived at their table, then set down their order. Black coffee for Haddo, cappuccino for her, and a plate of delicious-looking club sandwiches, artfully decorated with a few little salad items to the side, for them to share.
It was Haddo who restored the mood to something like normality. “To answer your question about Kerri—she’s having trouble conceiving. It’s making her very edgy, and I have to say bitterly sarcastic.”
“I bet her husband’s copping it,” Tori remarked ruefully. “I wouldn’t wish Kerri being bitterly sarcastic on my worst enemy. Why doesn’t she get off that strict diet she’s on? She’s so thin, and you must have noticed she doesn’t eat! Perhaps if she were eating properly, and took a course in meditation or something, they might have more luck?”
“I sort of suggested that.” Haddo’s expression was wry. “And maybe a long, relaxing trip together. She needs to unwind.”
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned about Kerri, it’s that she finds it very difficult to relax.” Tori shrugged. “I truly hope she follows your advice. Heck, she could make you an uncle. That’s fabulous!” Her face lit up.
“Here’s hoping!” He took a test mouthful of the coffee and found it very good. “I wonder how Chrissy is going on? No gain without pain, I guess.” He pushed the plate of sandwiches nearer her. “Who’s paying? You or me?”
“I’m paying for the porcelain crown. You’re paying for this. Another thing. I have an idea Chrissy is falling for your jackeroo, Shane.”
