But no, she shrugged to the darkness, Scott is doctoring anywhere but a remote Riverina village. Probably he’s now taking out expensive appendixes, treating expensive nerves. And he’s married to Pamela.
The car called for her promptly at nine-thirty. Frances was glad the others had left for work, for they would have embarrassed her with their gasps at the very affluent looks of the large lavish estate wagon. She was a little embarrassed herself.
The man driving it, young, from the country, too, judging by the width of the brim of his hat, diminished her embarrassment, however, by flinging open the door to the seat beside him and waving her in.
‘Don’t want to be the lady bountiful?’ he grinned at her. ‘I don’t blame you, it is rather an eyeful, isn’t it, but it runs like a song.’
‘At its price it should run like grand opera.’ Frances had seated herself. ‘Why is it quite this grand?’
‘Why not when you have the money? I’m Bill Furness, overseer.’
‘I’m Frances Peters, nurse and teacher. Well, for one reason: showiness.’
‘Wouldn’t occur to him, he would buy this for the space alone. Must have space for the kid.’
‘Jason?’
‘Yes, the sonno. We need more room than the usual car affords for that leg of his.’
‘Yes,’ Frances agreed.
Bill Furness was negotiating the city traffic with caution. ‘Thank heaven in another two days I’ll be able to drive without having eyes as well at the back of my head. And yet’... a little laugh ... ‘after I get back to Mirramunna I always yearn for the bright lights. Still, it should be different this time with you there.’ He gave her an appreciative look.
‘I’m signed up to nurse, teach and guard the child,’ she stated. She hoped he would pick up the ‘guard’ and comment on it. Perhaps enlighten her.
He didn’t. He grinned, ‘There’s always time off.’
‘Does a busy overseer have that?’
‘You’re making West out as a slavedriver.’ He stopped at traffic lights. ‘He isn’t.’
‘Perhaps that’s the opinion of an old employee. Probably you’ve known Mr. West so long that it wins you liberties that newcomers don’t get.’
‘I’m a newcomer,’ he informed her, ‘like yourself. I’ve only been with West since I left agricultural college some six months ago. No, Frances’... Frances had to smile a little at that young, assured Frances ... ‘he’s all right, is West.’
She said thoughtfully, ‘So you’re a newcomer, too.’ She was thinking it would be of little use to ‘probe’ here.
‘Freshers both,’ he smiled, and took his eyes off the traffic a moment to say it. They were clear blue eyes. They pulled up at the expensive city office-apartment block. ‘I’ll put you out here, Frances, I have to bed this expensive baby. But I’ll see you.’ His eyes smiled again.
Frances got out, entered the building and took the lift to the seventh floor where Mirramunna Estates had its office and B. West his city suite. She pressed the bell, and a plump, pleasant-faced woman opened the door.
‘You would be Miss Peters,’ she said. ‘Come in.’
Frances followed Mrs. Campbell, as she learned, into a small but sufficient bedroom. A small but still sufficient child’s sleeping quarters had been made out of an adjoining box-room. Jason was not in the room, but that was only to be expected at ten in the morning.
‘You might care to put your things out,’ Mrs. Campbell suggested. ‘Mr. West intends remaining a few more days in Sydney before we go back.’
‘And Jason?’
‘He’s watching the traffic. That’... a sigh ... ‘at least diverts him.’
‘I’ll come at once,’ said Frances.
‘No need. I’m watching him.’
Watching him. Watching a little semi-disabled boy of seven. What was this? Frances looked covertly at Mrs. Campbell, but knew immediately she could never hope for enlightenment here, even if she asked (as he had hinted she would) and she didn’t intend to ask.
No, there was the unmistakable hallmark of the old and trusted retainer on Mrs. Campbell’s pleasant face. There was also, for all the pleasantry, a Scots canniness and a nurtured reticence.
‘I travel light,’ Frances said, turning ready to begin her duties.
‘Wise,’ approved Mrs. Campbell. ‘Well, if you’re really that anxious, come and meet the boy.’
‘I did that yesterday.’
‘Each new day is a fresh meeting, I’m afraid, he’s a handful, that one. Still’ ... a sigh ... ‘I suppose one must expect—’
What she supposed and expected was not finished. She simply led Frances to the room to which Mr. West had led her yesterday, and there at the window once more sat the child, his leg held out stiffly, one elbow on the leg and supporting the young round chin. He did not turn as Frances joined him and he did not respond when Frances said brightly, ‘Hullo, Jason.’ With another sigh Mrs. Campbell went out.
Frances got a chair and sat at the window, too. ‘Can you tell the different cars?’ she asked.
No answer.
‘That one’s a Holden.’
No answer.
‘So is that red one.’
‘They’re both Fords.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Of course.’
Well, at least she had broken the ice!
‘First one to count ten Mini Minors gets a sweet.’ To show him she meant business she held up a barley sugar.
He pretended not to see it, but she could see by his little moving mouth that he was counting. What a very lovely, if pale, little boy he was! He had, even this young, a distinct profile, and his hair was thick and fair. So far she could see no resemblance to his father—West senior was very dark-haired—but when he turned a moment later to call triumphantly, ‘Ten Minis!’ she saw he, too, had dark green eyes.
‘You win,’ she smiled, and handed him the sweet.
He accepted it, then actually looked at her. More ice broken.
‘France is a silly name for a girl,’ he said.
‘It’s Frances really. Remember? But how do you know about France?’ She recalled Mr. West saying that the child had not been to school.
‘I lived there,’ he said.
She concealed a delighted smile; she loved an extravagant imagination, never did she consider it or call it a fabrication. She did not mind, she thought, if the going was hard, and it looked like being hard, if the reward was to be a child with dreams in him before fact.
‘Good for you!’ she praised. ‘I’ve never been anywhere, even Mirramunna.’
‘Oh, I don’t know there.’
‘Then it will be new for both of us.’
She must have overdone her enthusiasm. He dampened her with, ‘I don’t care.’ This, she thought warily, was going to take quite a long time. Wisely, she made haste slowly. They counted more cars, colours this time. Then her glance fell on his propped-up leg.
‘I was a nurse in a children’s ward once,’ she proffered, ‘but I never ever saw plaster that didn’t have something on it. Faces ... or writing ... sometimes noughts and crosses.’
‘On their legs?’
‘Or arms or shoulders or wherever they were being mended.’
‘Didn’t the doctor mind?’
‘No. He knew the plaster had to come off and then be thrown away.’
‘He’d mind, I think.’
‘Your father?’
‘I don’t call him that.’
‘What do you call him, then?’
‘Nothing.’
Quickly, as she certainly didn’t want to start ‘nothing’ again, she said, ‘But when you do call him, Jason?’
‘I only saw him a little time ago. I was away.’ He said that a little uncertainly as though he could not remember very clearly.
‘I see. And you’re to call him—?’
‘Bern,’ he said. ‘That’s silly, too, because it’s a country as well.’
‘Yes,’ said Fran
ces rather curiously, ‘a very lovely city, though, Jason, not a country.’ This child might not have been to school, but he certainly was not uneducated, geographically, anyway, she thought. ‘It has wonderful cathedrals.’
‘I know. I lived there.’
She smiled at his imagination again.
‘Look,’ she proposed, ‘I don’t think he’ll mind about the plaster, but just in case we’ll do it in pencil that we can rub out ... that is, if you want to write on your leg.’
‘Oh yes.’ His little face actually quirked into a smile.
They played all morning on Jason’s stiff leg. When it came to rubbing out he laughed so much that Mrs. Campbell came to the door to watch the fun.
‘First time I’ve heard that sound from him,’ she said to Frances as the little boy dragged himself laboriously to the bathroom to wash his hands before lunch.
He got into his shell quickly again, though, and as after lunch he went to his bed for his afternoon nap, starting again at four o’clock comprised as much ice-breaking as before.
The leg did it once more, though. By now Frances had taught him noughts and crosses, and by the time Mr. West came into the room that evening there was very little space left for another bout. The child looked quickly up at the man, measuring his reaction to a previously white surface now liberally peppered with small figures.
But—‘How do you read them?’ said his father. ‘You ought to use chalk and write bigger.’
‘Can I?’
‘Black chalk. It’ll show up much better.’
‘But it won’t rub out. It kind of tickles when she rubs.’
‘She?’
‘France.’
‘That’s a country, old sonno. Remember?’
‘I think I’ll call her France, though.’
‘Yes, Jason, do,’ Frances said.
They all dined together, Jason in a chair with an attached tray so he could still hold out his leg. Bill Furness came up, and Mrs. Campbell joined them. The talk was general. After the meal Frances asked Jason would he like to go to bed, feeling a little apprehensive as she did so in case he protested, as children often do, and she did not know enough yet to judge how to handle him, and with eyes on her ... deep green eyes ... she would feel inadequate.
But—‘Yes,’ said Jason.
He was tired, she saw that as she pressed him in. He allowed the pressing but withdrew from a tentative cuddling. Still, she decided, dimming the light, it could have been worse.
When she returned to the dining-room the men had gone. ‘Books,’ said Mrs. Campbell. ‘I often think the books are the worst things to property.’
She sat with the housekeeper and they talked pleasantly but not, for Frances, informatively. At last Frances, too, went to bed.
The next day was a repeat of her first day, only a little more ice broken, more loosening up. The three, Mrs. Campbell, Jason and Frances, had lunch together, then once again the child took a nap.
Mrs. Campbell went out to the kitchen. Sitting by the window Frances listened to her moving around until she, too, dozed.
She woke, yawned and went in to see if Jason still slept. He did, like a little possum. She smiled and came out again. She stood at the window a while looking down on the ants of people and beetles of buses. It was a fine way to see the city, and she wondered how it would look from the top floor, some fifteen more storeys up. She decided to find out.
It proved superb up there. She could trace out to the coast. She could look up to the Blue Mountains. She went round and round the roof top in delight. But her delight faded away as she returned to the apartment. Mr. West was standing waiting for her and his face was dark with anger.
‘Where in tarnation have you been, Miss Peters?’
‘To see the view.’
‘While you left the boy alone?’
‘Mrs. Campbell was in the kitchen.’
‘Mrs. Campbell, knowing the responsibility is now yours, is gone out.’
‘But—but I heard her. At least …’ She had heard her, but it had been over an hour before. ‘What harm could come?’ Frances asked in self-defence.
‘Harm? A child on his own in the city?’
‘He’s a sensible little boy. He likes looking out of the window, but I doubt if he would like to climb through it, even if he could.’
The man took a step forward in his anger, she saw the anger clearly, then he checked himself.
‘At this early stage, Miss Peters,’ he said icily, ‘let’s get things right. You are not paid to think what is safe, or not, you are paid to—’
‘Comply,’ she put in.
‘Comply,’ he sealed. ‘The boy must not be left. Oh, you’ll have your leisure, have no fears about that, but at any other time unless you are absolutely sure there’s someone else in attendance you’re not to leave Jason alone.’
‘I’m sorry. But’ ... in a second wretched attempt at self-defence ... ‘I did shut the door behind me.’
‘There’s a tradesman’s entrance,’ he said.
There was silence in the room. Frances found herself hoping desperately that Jason would break it by waking up and calling for her attendance. But the child slept on.
Eventually Mr. West broke the uncomfortable lull himself. He said coolly, ‘Well, no harm done, so we’ll close the subject for today. Tomorrow it will be different, we’ll be back at Mirramunna. You may care to get your things ready tonight, Miss Peters, Jason’s ready. It’s not a long run to the Riverina, only some three hundred miles, but for the boy’s sake we’ll take it in easy stages.’
He turned and went to the door, but paused there.
‘We’ll leave early—eight o’clock. By the way, I’ll be home tonight, so you can go roof-viewing or whatever appeals.’
‘Thank you,’ said Frances, wondering what she could add.
But nothing else was forthcoming, for Jason ... and thanks be! ... woke up.
His was the most welcome complaint from the fretful young, she thought, hurrying to his little bed-corner, that she had ever heard in all her nursing days.
CHAPTER TWO
THEY left promptly at eight the next morning, which did not surprise Frances; anything Mr. Burn West decreed would be carried out, she thought.
She had packed Jason’s little things the night before, put her own in her single case. Burn West’s thick brows lifted at the economy of baggage, but he said nothing. He passed Bill Furness both ports and took Jason up in his arms.
The boy was withdrawn again ... a morning ritual, Frances decided. She look forward to the day when she broke down his resistance sufficiently to receive his answering (however faint) a.m. smile.
The great car was drawn up at the kerb and Frances and Jason were placed in the back seat. However, as four, even five, could have fitted in the front with comfort, Frances did not feel she was depriving anyone. Rather to her surprise Burn West took the wheel. He drove accurately, if, to Frances’ way of thinking, a little contemptuously, apparently contemptuous of the hazards anyone else found in city traffic. She noted that he took the coast road.
He had chosen this route, she appreciated, to divert Jason, and once the big estate wagon swung down the mountain-sea curves of Thirroul and Bulli the little boy thawed and began to count the ships and point out cliffs and rocks.
They stopped at an idyllic beach for flask tea ... milk for Jason ... and sandwiches. Before they started off again Frances took Jason to the creaming water’s edge to pick up shells. He found the sand hard going for his clumsy leg, so on the return journey Frances picked him up in her arms. At once Burn West was by her side and taking Jason from her. ‘Don’t ever do that again,’ he frowned. At her look of surprise he said, ‘He’s heavy, far too heavy for a lightweight. I don’t fancy paying out a compensation.’ She did not comment on that. After a few steps he added ... almost humanly ... ‘Also, I don’t want you to be hurt.’
The humanness spurred her to suggest something that had occurred to her as they had rounded
beach after beach. This was a long journey for a little disabled boy and the novelty of the sea eventually would wear off. How interesting if they could turn west, join the Federal Highway to Canberra, from there detour to the Hume Highway ... Gundagai and the Dog sitting on the Tuckerbox ... then on to Wagga Wagga, which would be on the route ... then past Wagga through to Mirramunna.
He listened to her suggestion and actually approved it. ‘Though I don’t know if he’ll be interested in politics,’ Burn West said of the capital.
‘Lake George, then? Imagine this, Jason’ ... she turned to the little boy ... ‘there’s a lake outside the first city of Australia that sometimes disappears and instead of water with boats on it, sheep and cattle graze.’
‘I want to see that,’ said Jason.
They climbed up through the rain forests of a shining valley, waterfalls springing but from mountain ramparts, lush green growth on either side.
As Burn West had shrugged, political history at Canberra at Jason’s age proved not very appealing. The child yawned at the memorials, brightened slightly at the new man-made lake but was pleased when they set off again. He dozed to the fabled Nine Miles from Gundagai, where Frances gently wakened him to show him the Tuckerbox Dog. She sang softly:
‘My Mabel waits for me underneath the bright blue sky,
Where the dog sits on the tuckerbox nine miles from Gundagai.’
She felt a fool, she had a small, inadequate, rather childish voice, but to her delight Jason asked her to sing it again, even tried a quavery note or two of his own. Mrs. Campbell joined in, Bill Furness. Burn West’s expression she could not see, but she could imagine the thinned, unamused lips. She felt sure her imagination was fact when he drew up rather abruptly at a shop near the Dog and without a word got out of the car. He was gone for some minutes. Ear-plugs? she wondered.
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