by Amanda Doyle
Grey eyes were bent upon Aunt Allie, and the man’s head was inclined her way. He seemed, then, to hesitate, but only for a second. Perhaps Mattie had imagined that tiny pause.
“How do you do,” he said to Aunt Allie. “Just call me Gib.”
“Gib?” Mattie repeated it. “Mr. Gib?”
White teeth really flashed in the dark beard at that.
“Just Gib,” he drawled. “Swaggies don’t expect a Mister with their name, Miss Bennett.”
There was a teasing light in the eyes now, and the crinkles at the corners had deepened. They disappeared just as suddenly as they had come when he tasted his soup, however.
Aunt Allie, forewarned, was making steady progress with hers, but it was obviously something of an effort.
Mattie’s heart sank. She lifted her spoon and tasted.
Yes, it was even worse than she had feared. The soup had more a sort of scorched taste than a burnt one, more unpalatable, and there were little blackened lumps in it which the ladle had scraped from the bottom of the pan as she dealt it out into the plates.
Mattie’s colour ran high. It was all she could do to drink it, but no comment was passed.
The next course was no better. Why, oh, why hadn’t Aunt Allie left the places set at the pastry table in the kitchen? Couldn’t she guess what a miserable ordeal this was for Mattie, who had already had more than enough of ordeals today? The carrots had the same singed taste as the soup, and the chops were so dry and black that they chased about the plates, refusing to be cut.
“Never let your embarrassment show and affect someone else.” Miss Mottram’s words rang in Mattie’s ears. “Your own discomfiture may easily be passed to another and that is a form of inconsiderateness. The phrase “good manners” simply implies consideration of others’ feelings, so remember this at all times girls.”
Mattie remembered, and managed to grit her teeth on the charred tail of her chop as though it were a delicious and tender morsel.
When the pudding was served, though, her humiliation was complete.
She had placed it to the coolest part of the range, knowing that the temperature was impossibly high, with the result that one side was completely uncooked. In fact, Aunt Allie had taken the only presentable portion for Lex.
Somehow Mattie made herself carry through the three plates. Her head was held proudly, her shoulders straight. She moved with dignity and grace, as she always did. Then she sat and looked dumbly at the revolting uncooked pudding in front of her.
She raised her eyes and met those of the man, Gib, intent, interested, and—amused?
Suddenly it was all too much for Mattie. Something seemed to snap inside her.
“Go on, laugh!” she challenged him, her peaty eyes blazing defiantly. “Laugh if you like—I know you’re dying to, and what do I c-care! T-tramps aren’t supposed to be fussy, and you n-needn’t eat it for my s-sake. You either, Aunt Allie. I know I can’t cook, however hard I try, and that s-stove knows it, too. It h-hates me, and I hate it. D’you hear? I hate it!”
Mattie was aware that she was gabbling. Worse than that, she was allowing others to be embarrassed as well as herself. Hot, defiant tears were trickling down her cheeks, and she somehow couldn’t stop them.
Aunt Allie was staring at her with her mouth open.
Blindly Mattie scraped back her chair. Blindly she must flee to some place of solitude, and weep out her misery and frustration, and this queer feeling of fright and aloneness which had been with her ever since she gave Bryn his notice.
She’d have done it, too, if that voice had not arrested her.
It wasn’t that it shouted at her. It simply said, “Sit down, Miss Bennett,” quite quietly, softly almost, but in such a stern, clear, penetrating way that you simply had to obey.
So that’s what she did. Obeyed.
CHAPTER THREE
MATTIE slumped reluctantly back into her chair, searching stupidly for her handkerchief. She had had to sit down. The voice said she did, and you didn’t argue with a voice—even if it belonged to a man who came to the table in rolled shirt-sleeves and no jacket—when that tone was employed.
Somehow she managed to check the soundless tears. They were replaced by an air of silent defeat, as she mopped at her wet cheeks, thoroughly ashamed of herself.
Gib’s deep voice came to her now, impersonal, steadying.
“There’s nothing wrong with your cooking, Miss Bennett. It’s your stove that’s at fault. I’ll help you with it.”
“I don’t n-need help, thank you,” mumbled Mattie ungraciously. She was resenting that dominant, masculine voice that had made her stay when she wanted to run away somewhere where she could be alone.
“Yes, you do.” Gib was amused. “The damper isn’t working properly. Didn’t you know? I spotted that telltale roar whenever I ever set foot in the kitchen—far too much draught. There’s probably a bit missing, but I’ll investigate later. Swagmen like to do some small service in return for their handout, so don’t refuse, or my pride will be hurt.”
Mattie glanced at him suspiciously through her damp lashes. He gave her a reassuring smile, and turned to Aunt Allie.
“Miss Bennett had a—slight upset, an hour or so ago, Sister Marchant. I think she hasn’t quite recovered. Perhaps a cup of good strong tea or coffee might be welcome?”
Mattie looked anxiously at the nursing sister. The nerve of the man! The words were hardly less than an order, though they were couched in the nicest and most tentative terms.
To her surprise, Aunt Allie beamed affably at the strange man, although she was obviously curious about his reference to Mattie’s “upset”. She seemed to have accepted Gib almost as one of themselves. It wasn’t like Aunt Allie to be so rash, especially with a complete stranger. One should be careful.
“Of course, Gib. I’ll make a cup for all of us. It will buck you up, Mattie dear, and if Gib can fix that range, so much the better. I’ve known it wasn’t really right ever since I came.”
She bustled off, and very soon returned with the teapot and some cups.
Mattie swallowed the hot tea gratefully. She felt washed out and witless, but in a strange way comforted at the thought that her lack of culinary skill was not entirely to blame for the dreadful dinner. A bad workman blames his tools, but she had truly come to feel that the old-fashioned cooker had an active spite against her. It had become an enemy, no less. Well, she’d let this man conquer its whims and fancies afterwards, if he could. It would be heaven to have some measure of control over it, after all, and as he said, swagmen in the Australian bush often chopped wood or did a spot of weeding or digging at the places where they received hospitality. Fixing broken parts on cooking ranges was a fairly unusual line, but this one seemed to think he was capable of doing it.
While she and Aunt Allie rinsed and stacked the dishes for Lucy and Nellie in the morning, the man squatted down to inspect the damper on the cooker. Mattie saw him take his handkerchief to jiggle some of the hotter pieces about. Presently he lay down full length and squinted up into the firebox from underneath, swearing softly as his fingers sought and found something that was obviously hotter than he had expected.
“Ah-h!” It was a satisfied sound. “There’s your trouble.”
Gib stood once more, and brushed himself down. There were now some sooty marks on his white shirt, but he didn’t seem to care. He turned triumphantly to Mattie.
“The connection’s gone at the control base. I’ll come up in the morning and fix it while the range is cold, before you light it, but at best that will be a temporary measure. To give permanent satisfaction it will have to be welded.”
Aunt Allie beamed at him again, and he smiled back. “What a good thing you happened to come along,” she said warmly—much too warmly and familiarly to please Mattie. “If you can show us the exact place in the morning, we can get Bryn to weld it over at the machinery shop. He’s very handy about anything mechanical, isn’t he, Mattie? Your dad has said as much
to me several times lately. He doesn’t worry the same, knowing he has a man like Bryn about the place.”
Mattie turned and put her back to the taps, trying to appear calm, although she was actually feeling desperately apprehensive about what she had done.
“Bryn won’t be here in the morning, Aunt Allie. I meant to tell you. He’s—leaving.”
“Leaving?” Aunt Allie was flabbergasted. “Dear to goodness! He can’t be! He can’t leave now, at a time like this, with your poor father so ill, and all the crops to be got in, and everything. Why, the mere thought could give Lex a relapse.”
Mattie’s eyes widened. She looked—and felt—positively haunted.
The man Gib remained standing beside them, not moving. Neither of them even remembered he was there.
“He—he has to go, Aunt Allie.” Mattie tried to sound firm. “We’ll keep it from Father. We’ll manage somehow.”
Aunt Allie’s experienced eyes were shrewd.
“So that’s the upset you’ve had, Mattie. No wonder you’re as white as a sheet, with Bryn handing in his notice so suddenly.”
Mattie gulped.
“He didn’t hand it in, Aunt Allie,” she confessed shakily. “I gave it to him. I told him to go.”
“Told him to go? Mattie, have you gone mad? Do you want to kill your father? Whatever’s got into you?”
Mattie stared at her, her throat working. She couldn’t trust herself to speak. She felt defenceless.
The tall form near the stove stirred itself at last.
“Miss Bennett was quite right, Sister, in doing what she did. You can take my work for it, she hadn’t a very—er—desirable alternative. I happened to witness some very plain speaking on her part, and she did the only possible thing in the circumstances.”
His word? Mattie, illogically, was resentful that he had intervened on her behalf. Why should Aunt Allie take his word, that of a rootless swagman with no greater purpose in life than “waltzing Matilda” over the outback tracks?
But Aunt Allie did take it. He was that sort of man. She accepted his judgement without question. The shock of it made her sit down in the nearest chair, for all that.
“You mean he—?”
“I mean he made an undesirable proposition to Miss Bennett, and used his position here as a threat,” Gib informed her evenly.
“Yes—well—yes, of course,” murmured Aunt Allie, looking from him to Mattie’s set face in perplexity. “But it does put us in a spot, doesn’t it, Mattie? You’ll never manage, will you, with only Dan Pirrett as a stand-in? He doesn’t know a nut from a bolt, although he’s quite good with stock. That’s what Lex always says.”
That was what Bryn had said. Now Aunt Allie was saying the same thing. They were both right, of course. Mattie acknowledged as much by her miserable silence.
“How long before Lex Bennett can handle the thing himself?” Gib was asking Aunt Allie now, in a crisp, businesslike way.
“It’s hard to say,” the older woman demurred. “Six weeks—eight weeks. Just now it could set him back very seriously, medically speaking.”
The man nodded. He accepted her judgement, just as she had accepted his.
“I can give him eight weeks at the most,” he stated, almost irritably. “Would that tide him over, d’you reckon, Sister?”
Mattie’s eyes flew wide open with surprise.
Aunt Allie was nodding, holding the man’s eyes with her own blue, wise ones. Neither of them looked at Mattie at all. Not at all, even though it was her father about whom they spoke—her father, her station, her problem!
Mattie laughed. It sounded harsh and angry and unfamiliar.
“Are you out of your mind?” she said. “You must be, to even suggest such a thing. You, a man from nowhere, going nowhere, someone of whom we know absolutely nothing. A-a-a—”
“Swagman,” Gib supplied, his narrowed eyes glinting dangerously. “Say it, Miss Bennett. The word is perfectly apt.” He laughed, too, every bit as harshly and angrily. “And if it makes you feel better able to accept the offer of my services, it’s not because I have the slightest urge to help you. It’s Lex Bennett I’m thinking about, and that’s who you must think about, too. After all, one can’t pass by and leave a fellow-pastoralist in a fix. Remember the ear of wheat and the cream cake? The tie is there, however slight.” There was a soft, sarcastic slur to that, and Mattie blushed uncomfortably.
“Furthermore,” he added more gently, “there’s very little about machinery that I can’t handle myself, given a forge, and some spares and oxy-acetylene and so on. Presumably you have the usual facilities on a remote place like this?”
“Yes, Gib, we have,” Aunt Allie assured him eagerly. Mattie felt as if the whole world had suddenly gone off its axis.
“Very well, then. I’ll take it on, Sister Marchant, on one condition. I’d like to see Lex Bennett first.” There was silence then. The man’s eyes were demanding, unwavering, inexorable in their request. Aunt Allie looked into them for quite a time, before some quality there appeared to satisfy her.
“How long must you spend with him?” she asked quietly.
“Ten minutes at the outside.”
“You won’t upset him?” Aunt Allie’s own eyes were strangely pleading.
“I won’t upset him—on the contrary,” Gib promised gently.
“Very well.” Aunt Allie stood up. “I’ll go and see him first, so that he’ll expect you.”
Gib was watching Mattie, standing so still and pale and alone, but he looked back at the nurse as he replied.
“That’s fine,” he said calmly. “I’ll give you a few minutes to prepare him for a visitor.”
In a couple of characteristically decisive strides, he left the room, and the swing-door swung back into place as the outer gloom engulfed his departing figure.
Mattie waited only long enough for the sound of his footsteps to fade before she turned on Aunt Allie.
“Aunt Allie, you can’t be serious!” she hissed at her older companion, in an urgent whisper, almost as if she suspected the man of lurking somewhere outside the door. “Why, we don’t know a thing about him. He could be anyone, anything—a thief, a murderer.”
The nurse shook her head. She was calm, and quite adamant.
“Don’t be silly, Mattie,” she replied. “One has only to look at him to see that he couldn’t be. My dear, I’ve had too many human beings through my hands not to know the wheat from the chaff by this time.”
Mattie had to hold in her temper with a conscious effort. She had expected more reason and common sense from Aunt Allie—not this blind intuition as an excuse.
“He’s—he’s a disreputable type,” she averred. “Foot-loose, obviously a no-gooder. Why, look at his clothes, and that terrible beard.”
“I’ve nursed men with beards, and men without, Mattie, in my time, so that argument doesn’t carry any weight with me, my girl. When patients are very ill, they sometimes have to grow beards—even shaving I disturbs them. And as for clothes—my dear, as one grows older, clothes become of increasingly less significance, although that may be difficult for a lovely , young model girl to accept. It’s true, nevertheless.”
Aunt Allie’s tone had hardened.
“All right. I accept that, if you insist. That means you’re taken in by that educated manner and air of authority.” Mattie suddenly felt as if everything and everyone were conspiring against her. “Aunt Allie, it isn’t safe. I—I don’t trust him. We could be out of the frying-pan into the fire. Oh, I know there are all sorts humping their blueys on the overland routes, but mostly they’re escaping from something—if not from some actual crime, then from some weakness in their own character. Can’t you see?”
“I can see there’s no weakness in that one’s character,” was the firm reply. Aunt Allie put a kind arm about Mattie’s shoulder, to reassure her, but Mattie shrugged her off.
“Exactly,” she said. “He’s bossy and unbearable, and looks as if he’s used to giving o
rders, and he’s obviously after something. I tell you I know it. Why else has he offered to stay?”
The nurse shrugged her blue-clad shoulders.
“If he has a motive, does it have to be a bad one?” she countered mildly. “You heard what he said. He’s doing it to help Lex. He said so, and why disbelieve him? Goodness knows, we need someone, what with you sending Bryn off at such short notice, and at such a crucial period in Lex’s recovery.”
Hot, guilty colour flooded Mattie’s pale cheeks. Seeing it, Aunt Allie continued more kindly.
“Mattie, hasn’t it occurred to you that I, too, have my reasons? I love Lex. I love your father, Mattie. I want him to get better without any more worries. He’s suffered enough as it is.”
“You love him?” Mattie was more than startled. There was this strange parental tie between herself and the unapproachable Lex, but that was because he was, after all, her father. The thought that any other woman could love him for himself, in the way that women do love men, was very difficult for her to understand, although she supposed that her own mother must have done, in his young days, before he got so hard and bitter and independent and remote. Because he seemed to resent her own femininity so greatly, Mattie had taken it for granted that he felt the same about all women.
The discovery that perhaps he didn’t had a strange power to hurt her. It meant that his feeling of aloofness was directed towards her, personally, as a daughter, rather than collectively at the whole womanly sex, as she had thought.
“Does he know—my father—how you feel?” she heard her voice asking, wooden and unfamiliar.
“Yes, my dear, he knows, and the wonderful thing is that he feels the same about me. It’s more miraculous than I’ve dared hope, that Lex could feel the same way. I’ve loved him for years, Mattie, but I couldn’t ever speak of it until he spoke first. I thought he must be delirious or something, but now I know it’s really true, and the thought of our future is helping him to recover. That’s why I’m prepared to gamble on a man like Gib. I’ve too much to lose, Mattie. I’d rather Bryn had stayed on, at whatever cost to you, if you want the plain, unvarnished truth, because Lex means everything to me. Love has made me selfish in that way—for him.”
