The Coral Tree

by Joyce Dingwell

  Yet something in the brief touch lifted Cary’s spirits so completely that the long trip back in the train passed by almost unnoticed.

  When she got off at Sunset in the small hours of the morning her relief of spirit was still there.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  THE DOORS of O’Flynn’s always remained wide open. If there was an arrival by the train from which Cary had just alighted, it was cordially expected he would come in and find the comfortable room down the passage that was kept made up and ready for such occasions. Even inexperienced voyagers, not aware of the existence of the room, could creep thankfully into the lounge and stay there until the house stirred and a sympathetic maid plied them with welcoming cups of tea.

  This morning, however, Cary did neither of these things. She was not tired and she was anxious to get back to Clairhill.

  In the train she had written a note to Mr. O’Flynn apologizing for not stopping for breakfast. She put it now on the desk, then tiptoed out to the garage and backed the car as quietly as she could so as not to disturb the house. It was very early, even early for country folk. The moon was still high in the sky.

  Once away from Sunset she accelerated more freely, chuckling to herself at the anticipation of Sorrel’s surprised face when Cary Porter, not Mrs. Heard, walked in with the early tray. Sorrel liked company. If she had been the traveller she certainly would be resting now in the spare hotel room prior to a chatty breakfast shared with the genial O’Flynns, any hotel guests, and, of course, the “girls”.

  A rabbit ran across the road. Cary missed a wallaby by only a few inches. The moon got lower and the sky lightened to a charcoal grey. She consulted her watch. She should be home in another quarter hour.

  More rabbits ... a shade lighter charcoal in the east ...

  What was that?

  She bent forward, straining her eyes. The headlights of the car had picked up what seemed to be a trudging figure. She slackened speed to peer closer. Yes, it was certainly someone walking along the deserted road. He—or she—was travelling in the same direction as Cary was. At the sound of the car the figure turned and put up a beckoning hand. Cary hesitated cautiously, but only for a moment. Her foot went down on the brake, stopping the car by the side of the dark blur. It was a girl, she saw. It—why, it was—

  “Maysie!” she said. Maysie was seated beside her in a fraction of a moment.

  “Me feet,” she said bitterly, and took off her shoes.

  Cary did not start the engine.

  “Maysie, how on earth—”

  The girl was stretching her toes ruefully. In her relief to be borne instead of walking she had not thought of anything but the delicious prospect of sitting back. Now she looked up, realized her position, and shot out a stubborn bottom lip.

  “Of all people to give me a lift,” she said ungraciously. “Now I suppose you’ll throw in a lecture as well.”

  “I might do,” admitted Cary, “but first I’ll have an explanation.”

  “Of what?”

  “Of the reason for your being here on this road at this time of morning.”

  “It’s a free country, isn’t it?”

  “It is, Maysie, but you are not free. You have to answer to your parents.”

  “That’s none of your business, then; you’re not one of them.”

  “No, I’m not one, but I employ your parents, and as mistress of the house—”

  “Oh, that’s it, is it? You’re going to sneak.”

  “Whether I’m going to report you or not is not under consideration, Maysie. It’s your explanation I want.”

  “There’s nothing to tell. I just went to a dance at the Ten Mile woodshed, and now I’m walking home. Or”—with an unpleasant grin—“I was.”

  Cary ignored the smile. “At this hour!”

  “Dance didn’t stop till after two. I wasn’t leaving before it would up, no fear.”

  “And since then you’ve been travelling back to Clairhill?”

  “That’s so.” Maysie’s lip still protruded. She looked truculent and her eyes challenged Cary’s.

  “Maysie, are you telling me the truth? Have you been only to the dance?”

  “How did you get there?”

  “Went down to the road and hitched a lift to. Crossroads. Hitched another one then to Ten Mile. That’s where the hop was—Ten Mile.”

  “With no arrangement made in advance for your transit home.” The girl must be mad, thought Cary irritated, young as she is; only a stupid child would be as unthinking as that.

  “If I coulda got a lift I woulda taken it,” said Maysie sulkily, “but mid-week dances are always the same; the boys don’t want to be out late because they’ve got to be up with the birds.”

  Cary decided not to comment on this.

  “Maysie,” she chided instead, “do you realize what a risk you might have run just now? I could have been anybody stopping—anybody at all.”

  “Wish you had been, if you’re going to tell,” returned Maysie flatly.

  “Your parents don’t know?” That was foolish, Cary knew. Mrs. Heard would have been beside herself if she had guessed what was going on.

  Maysie’s lip curled. “Would I be anxious now about your telling if they did?” she returned.

  Cary started the car and resumed slowly.

  “Can’t you go quicker?” complained Maysie. “At this rate I’ll be lucky if I can duck under the blankets before Mum brings in the tea.”

  They were descending Pudding Basin Hill now. There was a streak of pale grey in the sky. By the time Maysie would have reached home if she had kept walking it would have been morning, Cary said to the girl.

  “I suppose so. I would’ve told Mum I couldn’t sleep so got up early and she would have swallowed it,” she replied.

  Cary remembered the calm way she had jumped into the car beside her. It could have been any car, any driver, she thought again. This foolish girl had not given it a second thought. She said so a second time to Maysie. She spoke gravely.

  “So what?” came back her passenger impertinently.

  “It’s a risk. Some men, even without encouragement—”

  “I thought that was coming,” said Maysie triumphantly, “and I advise you to keep any chat about encouragement to yourself. After all, you did a bit of it, too, didn’t you?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “It’s not just me talking,” savoured Maysie. “There was a lot at the dance saying it as well.”

  “ What are you talking about?”

  “About that Jan something-or-other from Switzerland-or-somewhere. Right round the world, anyway, he came, Miss Porter. That’s encouragement for you. Switzerland’s further than Ten Mile from Clairhill.”

  Cary’s hands on the steering-wheel tightened angrily. How did things like this start? she thought—and then, being no fool, she knew.

  She had no doubt that Maysie had begun the chatter herself at the dance; she had no doubt as to how Maysie’s information had been obtained. She was a shrewd little fox. She had seen her often lingering outside the Clairhill rooms, no eye or ear actually to a keyhole, perhaps, but on the alert for anything she might see or hear. Anything that might avail her later on. She was a prying child. Cary knew she would have no qualms in probing into anything in which she had no concern.

  “We are not discussing Mr. Luknit,” she said coldly. “We are discussing you.”

  “Same thing,” said Maysie laconically.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, if you discuss me, Miss Porter, I’ll do the same back to you. What’s good for the goose and all that. You’re no better than me.”

  “You’re a silly, impertinent child.”

  “And you’re sillier still if you think I’m a child. I’ve got my ears open—my eyes as well. I could tell a thing or two. What’s more, I’d know where to go if you started anything first.”

  Cary felt like stopping the car and having the whole business out with the wr
etched girl. But time was passing. It was incredible, she thought, how soon after the first streak of grey in the east morning arrived. If she did not hurry, Mrs. Heard would be up before they got into the house, and then there would be interrogations, awkward explanations, and though Cary had no intention of letting the matter slide—indeed it could prove dangerous to Maysie if she did so—she had not yet decided what step to take. A report on Mrs. Heard’s daughter to Mrs. Heard was the last thing she intended doing. She liked the housekeeper too much for that. No, there must be another way out.

  Maysie construed her silence as capitulation on Cary’s part, and grinned slyly. When the car stopped she jumped out and was in through a side door of the house before Cary had time even to alight.

  Cary kindled the sleeping fire in the big oven and moved the black kettle over the flame. The water, already warm, took little time to boil. She brewed the tea and cut bread and butter, smiling to herself at the thought of Sorrel’s sleepy, amazed face when she took in the tray.

  Mrs. Heard came into the kitchen as she was arranging the cups. “You back, Miss Cary?” she said, surprised.

  “Yes, and if you hadn’t been so prompt I would have taken you in a cup of tea. It’s time you had that service, Mrs. Heard; you’ve always given it to others.”

  “Doubt if I’d enjoy it,” admitted Mrs. Heard, “Joe, either. We both like our feet under the table. Now, my lazy girl, she’s different—”

  Cary said quickly: “I took Maysie’s in.” She did not want Maysie’s mother going to her daughter’s room—not yet. No doubt the girl was in bed, probably even asleep already, but Cary had no trust in Maysie, not even in her powers of deception. She was too slipshod not to leave clues behind. She took up Sorrel’s tray and started upstairs.

  “What about the gentleman?” called Mrs. Heard. “Mr. Luknit. He’s back again, you know.”

  Jan ... Cary paused, quiet amusement quirking the corners of her mouth. Jan ... Why, she had completely forgotten all about Jan, and yet it was because of him that she had rushed away so urgently to Sydney. How foolish and childish and unnecessary that action seemed now—now that she had warmly behind her the certain knowledge, if as yet unacknowledged, of Richards’s feelings for her.

  She still paused, the tray aloft.

  When would Richard acknowledge that feeling, she wondered a little tremulously? And her mind went dreaming back to Pan’s Meadow, then to a sweeter moment still beside the plane. Love is a warmth, she thought, a reaching out between people. Richard must reach out very soon.

  “Mr. Luknit, Miss Cary,” prompted Mrs. Heard. “He’s in the guest room.”

  “Of course. Will you take his tea, Mrs. Heard?”

  Cary went on up the stairs.

  It was fun to knock on the door, then enter so quickly that Sorrel had no time to feign alertness.

  “Come on, sleepy head; I’ve been up for hours.”

  Sorrel yawned, stretched and gaped.

  “Cary, I didn’t expect you for a few days. Even if I had expected you to stay only one day, I certainly wouldn’t have looked for you on the early train.”

  Cary sat on the bed and indicated the tea.

  “This is my penance for running away,” she said contritely.

  “You didn’t even wait for breakfast at the O’Flynns’,” marvelled Sorrel.

  “Not even that. Sit up, Solly, your tea’s getting cold.”

  Sorrel sat up and began munching bread and butter. “You put more butter on than Mrs. Heard,” she grinned. “I don’t care how often you do penance.” She looked at Cary seriously. “Feeling better?”

  “I feel grand. And, Sorrel, I feel ready for—things—now. I’m not going to run away any more.”

  “Good girl! Here’s something as a reward. I don’t believe you’ll have need to run away, Cary.”

  Cary glanced quickly at her, and Sorrel nodded back soberly. “I’ve been talking with Mr. Luknit. I think you’ll find he will talk back with you.”

  “Sorrel, you mean you—”

  “I mean I said to him a lot of the things you said to me. Did I do wrong, Cary? You looked such a miserable, bewildered child—”

  “No, Sorrel, you did right, and I thank you for it. Was—was it difficult to broach?”

  “It was not difficult,” said Sorrel promptly. “He’s an easy person to talk to.” For a moment she seemed absent—but happily so.

  “All the same, Cary,” she warned, coming back to earth, “you’re not out of the wood yet. You have a lot of explaining to do. And this time it will be your burden, not mine.”

  Cary nodded humbly. “I’m not out of the wood, but I’m not so deep in them. Thank you, Solly.” She got up from the bed and kissed her.

  “If you’ve finished, I’ll take your cup, and then I’ll start rousing the babes.”

  But she didn’t rouse the babes—not for a while.

  As she went down the stairs she heard a noise issuing from Maysie’s room, which was a small alcove on the left of the landing. She paused involuntarily, then recognized two voices: Mrs. Heard’s, her daughter’s. Mrs. Heard must have come up to Maysie’s bedroom, after all.

  “Where were you last night, miss? Now, come on, no more of your deceit.”

  “Why are you asking me when you know already? she told you, didn’t she? All right, two can play at that game.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I do know you’ve got mud on your shoes and your father polished them last night; he always does—”

  ... Stupid Maysie, thought Cary; probably she left the shoes at the foot of the stairs.

  “I sleep-walked,” said Maysie sarcastically. “Does that suit you better?”

  “The truth would be better still.”

  “Then ask Miss Porter to finish the tale.”

  “Maysie, leave Miss Cary out of this.”

  “Why should I? She didn’t leave me out.”

  “I won’t have you talking about her like that. Not to me nor anyone else.”

  “I won’t talk to you, then—but I will to someone else.”

  “Maysie!”

  Cary went on, her lips tight with distaste. Unfortunately for her own peace of mind, she could see Maysie’s angle as well as Maysie’s mother’s. Clairhill, for all its large household, was a lonely place for a young girl. To the teenager, she thought, recalling her own youth, a different age group, be it young or old, is a world away. A child will fraternize with either maturity or immaturity, but an adolescent is different stuff.

  Then, again, Maysie’s parents were already mid-elderly. How could they expect to reach a girl of fifteen?

  Cary’s brows met. How was she to solve this problem that was Maysie? Perhaps she could inveigle some of the village girls to come and work at Clairhill, but if she did would they stay, and where, for that matter, could she place them? Perhaps Matt could be persuaded to sign on a few young stable-hands.

  In her absorption as to the future of Maysie, Cary gave no heed at all as to her own future—in Maysie’s hands. The girl was only a child, sly, impertinent, even underhand, perhaps, but a child for all that.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  SEVERAL DAYS passed before Jan and Cary had their long-due talk.

  The delay was not due to reticence or evasion on either side; it was simply lack of opportunity. In a place like Clairhill, with its quota of children and attendant adults, it was not easy to pick a right moment or choose a right spot in which to speak freely and without fear of interruption.

  Sorrel did her best to afford them moments alone, but was unsuccessful. As is often the way with such charitable foundations, everything suddenly happened at once—a Sydney journalist arrived to write a feature article, an honorary dentist spent several afternoons advising on young teeth, a local member brought a party of V.I.P.’s to watch the functioning of the new home in his constituency.

  It all meant extra work, not only to Mrs. Heard, on whose shoulders fell the burden of double catering, but
to Sorrel, who had to demonstrate what was being done remedially, and to Cary, who was the home’s instigator, and therefore considered the pivot of Clairhill.

  Jan helped tremendously. When the journalist and the dentist and the V.I.P.’s all descended together, it was the blond guide who discreetly sorted them out, tactfully farmed them to the girls, then took the largest party himself on a tour of inspection—including among other points of interest Pudding Basin Hill.

  There was something about Pudding Basin, reminded Cary to herself as she raced here and there ministering to her guests.

  She found time to ask Jan, and he nodded gravely. “A gentle hill, a grass landing area—I spoke of that the night of my arrival. I told you I had worked on such a project with our mutual friend Jan Bokker; but you, Cary, did not heed.”

  There was no reproach in his voice, but Cary felt reproached. “I’m sorry, Jan; I wasn’t attending. I was worried.”

  “I know that—now.”

  “Will you tell me what this plan of yours is?”

  “After we speak of other things. We have tried, I believe, to speak of other things.” His blue eyes searched hers.

  “Yes.”

  “Then when your guests depart I shall take you to the hill and demonstrate.” He paused. “And talk,” he added.

  Cary said humbly again: “Yes.”

  At last the journalist had all the material he needed, the dentist was finished, the member in possession of any facts for future speeches that might be required and the V.I.P.’s anxious to look into something else.

  They watched them go, Maysie, who had gone out of her way since her late night at the dance to be unco-operative, remarking sulkily: “Good riddance, I’m sure. Just a lot of old fogies causing a lot of extra work.”

  That afternoon Sorrel came to her and suggested that she go with Jan up to Pudding Basin. “He wants to tell you what he has in mind, Cary. He demonstrated it to the journalist and the V.I.P.’s, and they all thought it was a very good idea.”