Reaching for the Stars

by Lucy Walker

  ‘For goodness’ sake,’ she said. ‘What is that?’

  Ann had to look again.

  Claire was poised on a rock. In a minute she would dive, and beautifully too, because she had been well taught at school, as Ann knew. Lang, standing there by the rocks at the side of the creek, would see her. He was meant to see her ‒ all of her that was so little covered by that scrap of a swim-suit.

  ‘It’s my cousin Claire being beautiful all over again in a different set of clothes,’ Ann said. ‘Do you suppose Lang will fall in love with her now? This minute?’

  ‘It would be a godsend if he did,’ Heather said with a yawn. ‘It would take an awful lot of trouble off all our hands. You’ve no idea what it is to have an eligible bachelor around … one who happens also to be rather a pet. There are so many other young men to look at, and take one out; yet somehow Lang in the background is a menace to peace of mind.’

  ‘You too, Heather? I know all the girls in the office are dotty about him.’

  ‘Everyone is. Me neither more nor less than anyone else. I don’t attach any importance to it. I just wish he’d get married and out of the way, then I could marry any one of three men down at the studios ‒ with peace of mind.’

  Ann could not help but laugh at Heather. She was so frank, and she obviously spoke the truth about herself.

  But about Luie? Ah, that was another matter and Ann did not care to trespass further and ask.

  There was a faint splash as Claire dived.

  ‘Come on, let’s go!’ Heather said impatiently. ‘I might feel inclined to hope she strikes a snag and stays there on the bottom.’

  Ann too was on her feet now. ‘Except that Lang would rescue her.’

  ‘Of course. Except that Lang would rescue her. I’m sure Claire is quite capable of arranging things that way, too.’

  ‘Dear Heather ‒ excuse me pointing it out, but you’re talking about my cousin. Don’t be surprised, but I’m actually fond of her.’

  ‘Good for you. Now that you’ve pointed out the fact of your devotion I’ll look only for the good points.’

  Suddenly she laughed. ‘Well, her figure is her number one good point. Wouldn’t it be nice if we were all the same?’

  Lang on the other side of the creek had not dived in. As Heather and Ann swam across he leaned down and gave them a hand, one after the other, to scramble up on the shore.

  After that one sustained glance on the veranda Ann had not looked at Lang again … except in the distance and from where he could not see her lying on the rock. As he took her hand and hauled her up on the bank where she stood dripping wet beside him, a little self-conscious of the fact her swim-suit clung to her own slim straight figure, she gave him only a fleeting glance. She was surprised to see that he was looking at her in a friendly way.

  ‘You swim well, Ann,’ he said.

  ‘Claire and I were both taught at school. She’s there in the pool now. Will you keep her company while Heather and I go up to help with the lunch?’

  Why on earth did I say that? I’ve thrown him at her … and he’s Luie’s. It was for Luie I was afraid …

  Yet somehow she was sorry for Claire too. Claire wanted him. She had wanted to make an impression on him. Ann had to give her something of her own way. All her life she had had to do that ‒ give Claire the bauble of pleasure she was for ever seeking.

  Lang nodded. ‘I’ll take her for a long swim and build up a good appetite for lunch.’

  With that he too dived in and with a few powerful strokes overtook Claire.

  Ann turned away. ‘Come on,’ she said to Heather. ‘Let’s get changed and go up.’

  Half an hour later Claire, dressed and dried, came up to join the others round the cloth they had set for the picnic lunch.

  ‘Where’s Lang?’ Mrs. Franklin asked quickly. ‘I thought he was looking after you, Claire.’

  ‘He was,’ Claire said coldly. ‘Till he discovered Luie was swimming somewhere half a mile away with Ross. Then he went off in a tearing wrath to rescue her. Does he suppose Ross would drown her or something? Of course she is an irresponsible child …’

  Mr. Condon and Heather exchanged glances, then both stole a look at Mrs. Condon, who was at that moment rattling spoons and forks and had not heard Claire.

  ‘Lang went after them?’ Mr. Condon asked, a trifle too anxiously for the fact to be hidden.

  ‘He did,’ said Claire airily. ‘I’ve no doubt he’ll bring them back in time for lunch. It was too far for me to swim. Besides, two is company but three or four is not. I wanted to dry my hair. It looks better brushed into place.’

  It was another half-hour before Lang came back with Luie and Ross. They were all dressed now, having put on their clothes again down by the willows. Lang was smiling and talking to Luie but clearly Luie was in one of her less happy moods. Lang was perhaps trying to talk her out of it ‒ win her back to smiles and jokes and laughter. He seemed to ignore Ross altogether. Ross came up through the bush with them, walking on the far side of Lang, not next to Luie.

  Ann felt her old burgeoning anger against Lang. Why had he gone after them? Why hadn’t he let Luie have her little bit of fun with Ross? It was harmless enough. She could even be falling in love with him. Ann and Heather had heard them laughing and talking and splashing farther up the stream. Why did Lang do this to Ross? Worse, and stranger, why did Heather and her father want Lang to do this to Luie?

  Possibly it was because they wanted Lang to marry Luie and they had no real way of making him propose to her. The days when Victorian fathers demanded a man’s intentions were well and truly over.

  Lang, by his strange guardianship of Luie, neither allowed her happiness with another, nor gave her happiness himself.

  Ann felt she wouldn’t have any more day, or evening, dreams about saying ‘yes’ instead of ‘no’ to that memorable question in the office at Franklin’s. She was back to feeling that Lang’s way of life was a cruel one, when it impinged on the life of others.

  He had even been cruel to Ann herself.

  The picnic part of the day was lovely. Everyone enjoyed themselves. The food ‒ sandwiches, cold meats, salads, fruit and cream ‒ were served lavishly on large red plastic picnic plates set about on a colourful cloth. Mr. Condon boiled the billy and made true bush tea while Lang and Ross poured cool drinks for those who wanted them.

  Aunt Cassie said she adored the picnic, adored the food, but mostly she adored blue smoke from the camp fire twirling up and spreading through the gum trees around; and the smell of burning gumleaves under the billy.

  ‘Tell that to an old bushman, Mrs. Boyd,’ Mr. Condon said warmly. ‘You will have a friend for life.’

  When the plates and cutlery were washed in the creek then packed away in boxes, the girls settled down on the rugs, using bushes or rock outcrops as back rests, to have their late-afternoon rest. Mrs. Franklin and Aunt Cassie used the folding canvas chairs from the boot of Lang’s car.

  The air was warm and drowsy-making with the hum of insects in the bushes and amongst the wildflowers. The bush itself was very still.

  Claire shared a rug with Ann. It was used as a ground-sheet, for the afternoon was too warm for cover, but sticks and small prickly plants beneath them made rest far from comfortable unless they had something to protect them.

  Tree-shade was sparse now that the sun was beyond its zenith and was moving gradually to the west, exposing the picnic ground to its hot rays.

  Claire lay on her back and stared up at the pale blue sky.

  ‘So what goes on between Lang and Luie?’ she asked. ‘Lang and I were coming across with a fine friendship down there in the creek when all of a sudden he heard that girl squeal. You could call it laughter if you were charitable. He hardly said “Excuse me, I must find Luie” before he was out of the creek and fighting his way through the creepers and undergrowth to find that wretched girl.’

  ‘I wouldn’t know what is between them, except that they’re neighbours and ver
y old friends,’ Ann said. Since the swim and the good lunch her own troubles had seemed to be lulled into the gentle quiet of a soporific afternoon. It was so much easier to drowse, even sleep, in the sun than worry. When one was really asleep one did not live again and again a scene in which the word ‘no’ was becoming so sadly repetitive that she felt she would never use it again.

  ‘Friends!’ Claire said coldly. ‘How naïve do you want to be, dear Ann? Either or both of those Condon girls are trying to get him in ‒ each in her own way. If you ask me Luie is playing a ducks and drakes game with that Ross Dawson to keep Lang running after her ‒ to make sure she is not being kidnapped, or something.’

  ‘In which case Lang would be foolish to fall for such a ruse. Knowing him the little I do, I would say he is too clever to be taken in by anyone. I also think he is very fond of Luie, but I haven’t the faintest idea how fond. If he thought she was in difficulties he certainly would go to her help. Ross Dawson doesn’t know the creek as he’s a stranger. Perhaps there are dangerous places …’

  ‘I would say the only dangerous place would be where Luie Condon was standing.’

  Ann was silent. She lay with closed eyes, tired, wanting to be happy, suddenly impatient of Claire. She didn’t want to quarrel with her, or start giving advice about leaving Lang Franklin to the girl, or girls, of his own choice. Claire could and would turn that one so neatly against herself.

  ‘It will all come out in the rain,’ she said at last. ‘I mean the business of who likes who and why. You’ve only been here such a short while, Claire ‒’

  ‘Long enough to know Mrs. Franklin likes me as a person. She’s rather pointed about it, specially when Lang is around. I have a pretty good idea she wants someone to take Lang’s mind off those Condon girls. Just now the someone is me …’

  ‘It’s because they’re neighbours, that’s all. Mrs. Franklin is kind enough to them but probably has become too used to them to see how really nice they are.’

  Claire turned on her side, resting on her elbow. She stared at Ann’s closed eyes.

  ‘Darling,’ she said, ‘it didn’t take me twenty-four hours to find out what goes on there. I mean as far as Mrs. Franklin’s opinion of Luie is concerned. And why. Are you dumb, dear Ann? Or just not inquisitive?’

  ‘Just not inquisitive.’

  ‘Then you deserve your fate, pounding a typewriter in an office for ever. I’ll tell you what, sweetie-pie, I’m never willingly going to work in an office again, ever. Unless, of course, I have good cause. You watch my style in the next few weeks and you’ll see why. Meantime, do you suppose if I went for a walk out of sight in places that might be dangerous Lang would come looking for me?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. But I expect he would. He’s chivalrous enough sometimes.’

  ‘What do you mean by that cryptic sometimes?’

  ‘Depends who is lost in dangerous places, I should say.’

  ‘Thanks for the tip,’ Claire said. ‘I might put it to the test.’

  Ann couldn’t be bothered with this conversation any more. The warm scent of bush and flowers, the insects in the trees humming their lullaby … whatever it was that Claire went on saying Ann no longer heard. Sleep was nearer, kinder, and such a release!

  Ann was sure it was only minutes later that she woke with a start.

  Where was Claire?

  Somewhere, in the middle of that sweet sleep, a warning bell had rung.

  She sat up.

  Ross, Lang and Mr. Condon were not about. They had taken rifles on the chance of finding a kangaroo, while the ladies slept. Aunt Cassie and Mrs. Franklin were both sound asleep in their canvas chairs. Heather and Luie, lying on rugs, their heads buried in their arms, appeared to be asleep too.

  Ann sat quite still and listened. Claire couldn’t have been so silly as to carry out her threat. Had it been a threat, or had it been a joke? What was it she had said? I might put it to the test. Claire too, like Luie, could wander off just to draw Lang away from a considered rival.

  Ann thought this was all right by Claire’s standards ‒ except for one thing. Lang had gone kangaroo-hunting. He was not to know just where Claire had gone and Claire might not know that it was too, too easy to be lost in the bush.

  Surely the Franklins would have warned her as firmly as they had warned Ann, about the bush?

  ‘It all looks the same, once you’re into it,’ they had said. ‘Nothing is ever different from one mile to another. It’s too easy to be lost. There’s thousands of square miles of timeless gum tree, wattle, banksia and scrub. Each square mile is the same as each other square mile. Each mound of granite outcrop is the same as another. The bush is for ever the same bush from one horizon to another …’

  They had all said it ‒ the Franklins, the Condons, Ted, even the girls in the office.

  Would Claire realise this? Would she keep near enough to the creek and the picnic party?

  Ann sat quite still and listened. She could hear no sound of footsteps returning through the dried leaves and crackling undergrowth.

  She rose quietly to her feet. She didn’t want to wake the others and rouse an alarm that was probably without foundation. Claire was probably down by the creek.

  Ann tip-toed away from the picnic spot down to the creek. There was no sign of Claire.

  A little lower down where the creek narrowed was a series of fallen logs and jumbled granite boulder. Perhaps Claire had crossed the creek there!

  Ann never knew how she too became lost.

  She had crossed the creek, gone down into a shallow trough of land, then climbed a stony knoll beyond it. She thought that from there she would either see Claire on the one hand, or the picnic place on the other.

  Way down a sort of natural grass track she had seen the light-coloured patch of a girl’s dress. So that was the way Claire had gone. It wasn’t far. She would go after her and make her see sense.

  It was within sighting distance of the creek. Well, not the creek but the granite knoll above it.

  It took longer to catch up with Claire than she had anticipated. To begin with, the natural path ceased after a hundred yards or so, and hereabouts the prickly wattles grew higher. It was quite a business getting through them. Fortunately, in the distance, she was able to see Claire disappear over another rise.

  I’ll make for that spotted tree, Ann told herself. She went right past it. Then I’ll call to her. I’ll be far enough from the picnic place for them not to know what a stupid game Claire is up to.

  Once through the prickly wattle, up the rise, Ann could again see Claire ‒ a very diminutive figure in amongst some rolling granite slabbing on the hillside. It was a mass of monoliths and no bush at all. Only mighty grey outcrops of stone and low round tufts of green undergrowth.

  Ann called again and again, but Claire either could not or would not hear. After all, it was Lang she had wanted to follow and rescue her. Not Ann.

  It was a full half-hour before Ann caught up with Claire. The latter was not pleased.

  ‘What are you doing, following me?’

  ‘You can get lost in the bush, Claire. It’s dangerous.’

  ‘So what? There’s plenty of manpower around to do a little rescuing. I’m sure I’m a lot more interesting than a kangaroo.’

  ‘For goodness’ sake, come back now before the woman-power gets annoyed. Claire, they’ll be furious with you. Me too, I expect …’

  ‘I’m not a bit interested in how they feel about me. All I want is a drink of water.’

  Claire’s face went white. Suddenly the meaning of being lost in the bush was borne in upon her. The atmosphere was dry ‒ drier than anything Claire or Ann had ever known in England. Within half an hour one was thirsty, and so, within that same half-hour, one wanted water.

  ‘Ah well, I suppose we’d better go back.’ Claire tried to say this carelessly. ‘After all, I only went for a walk.’

  While the girls had been talking they had turned a little. They were not facing the same
way they had been facing a minute ago ‒ yet they did not know it.

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Ann. ‘I might want a drink of water myself any minute now.’

  She made a little joke of it so as not to have another ‘cousinly quarrel’ with Claire. After all, Claire had had quite a fright when she realised she might be very, very thirsty long before Lang came looking for her.

  They started down the granite heap, heading through the low shadeless scrub bush in the direction from which Ann thought she had come. Presently they pushed their way through taller bush and sapling trees.

  It was when they were amongst the trees that Ann feared they had lost their way. These trees looked different, when one was amongst them. They were gum trees, like all others in the bush, but they were slimmer, taller, and the undergrowth was damp.

  For quite ten minutes Ann worried as to whether she would tell Claire she thought they had lost their way back to the creek.

  Ann knew that, though Claire always took the limelight she had to have somebody’s shoulder under her when she was in difficulties. Ann felt it was her own fault they were now probably lost. It was she who had led Claire this way.

  ‘If I find water, and she isn’t so frightened of the thirst, it will be all right,’ Ann told herself.

  Find water?

  The undergrowth was damp. There must be water somewhere, even if it was still pool-water cupped on fallen leaf-mats.

  ‘Let’s stand still and listen a minute, Claire,’ she said. ‘I want to hear if we’re near the creek.’

  ‘For heaven’s sake hurry up and find it, Ann. I’ll die of thirst in a minute …’ Claire’s voice was half a crack, half a whimper, on the last note. Fear made her thirst greater. ‘I’ll never get back to the creek without being carried. I’m sure you’ve brought me the long way round on purpose,’ she added angrily.

  The long way round? Yes, but not on purpose.

  Ann said nothing, but, holding her hand to motion Claire to keep still, she stood, head on one side, and listened.

  There was a faint sweet rustle of music only a few yards away from them.

  ‘There!’ Ann said joyously after they had taken a few more steps. ‘There’s a creek, anyway …’