by Anne Hampson
She began to learn about her surroundings, gradually becoming used to the immensity of the bush, its deep silence and the wild tang of its herbs. The fantastically-shaped residual rock gleaming red in the distance no longer took the form of some grotesque monster when the sun, streaming through a high col, cast the foreground deeply into shadow. She became used to the stockriders, and the enormous quantities of meat they ate, cooked by Maisie who described herself as coloured twice removed and who was almost as broad as she was tall. Loren learned of the plutocracy and snobbery existing among the great cattle graziers of the Outback, and that their status was assessed by the square miles of land each happened to own. She soon learned too that the Outback was no place either for the lazy or the weak.
The pleasant dawn chorus of the magpies in the blue gum tree outside her window became so familiar that she heard it almost before she awoke. She had made friends with Prim and April, the lubras whose task it was to keep the homestead clean and do such chores as washing and ironing.
Gran Amelia was as formidable as Dena had described her and even after a fortnight Loren was still timid when in her company, and often she was faintly puzzled by the old woman’s attitude towards her. Gran Amelia seemed to regard her with marked distrust, almost as if she suspected her grandson of having some ulterior motive in bringing Loren to Moonrock.
‘If as you say you’d have preferred to remain in England then why didn’t he let you?’ she asked Loren, her manly voice harsh and unreasonably accusing. ‘Have you no idea at all why he insisted on your coming here?’
‘No. ’ Loren shook her head. ‘Perhaps he decided I wasn’t old enough to fend for myself.’
‘Rubbish! These days young women of your age are more than able to take care of themselves.’ The wrinkled sun-dried face carried a darkling look and the colourless lips were tight. Loren sat quietly, waiting for the old woman to continue, and wishing heartily that she would soon decide she was tired and go to her room for a rest. But Gran Amelia was determined to question Loren further. ‘Has he not given you the slightest inkling why he should have brought you out here?’
‘I don’t know what you mean, Gran Amelia. You sound as if there’s some mystery.’
‘Mystery?’ White eyebrows shot up. ‘There’s no mystery! On the contrary, it’s as clear as daylight. The trouble with that boy is that he has more of me in him than is good for my peace of mind. If only I were a bit younger I’d show him who was master here! Well, miss, just you be prepared and think well before you fall in with Thane’s plan. He’s tough and hard and he’s an Australian. Our men are notorious for their self-sufficiency; women are not considered vitally essential to their contentment and happiness.’ She paused a moment, half amused by Loren’s bewildered expression but contemptuous too. ‘What good a little hothouse plant like you will do in a place like this heaven knows. I never thought to see a namby-pamby like you—’ She broke off as Thane appeared. ‘Off you go, Loren. I know you want to because you’ve been fidgeting for the past ten minutes!’
‘What’s wrong?’ Thane, rather overpowering as he came close to Loren, looked down at her in some amusement. ‘Why have you been fidgeting?’
She coloured but flashed him a glance.
‘She’s bored with my company,’ Gran Amelia replied before Loren could speak.
‘But how bad-mannered, Loren,’ he chided in his slow and rather lazy drawl. ‘In what way did you illustrate your boredom?’
‘I didn’t,’ she protested. ‘Gran Amelia says I fidgeted, but I wouldn’t dream of doing so.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Gran Amelia pettishly. ‘Go, I said. I want to speak to Thane privately.’
Loren needed no further encouragement; she went out to Stew, who was cleaning the hen coop. Stew was very different from Gran Amelia, and during that first fortnight he and Loren became good friends. Having found himself a good home he always went out of his way to be helpful and cheerful to everyone in it. Usually he worked outside, but he could turn his hand to anything, and when the lighting plant failed it was Stew for whom Gran Amelia sent, confident of his having it working in no time at all, which he did. Stew always ate with the family, as did Prof, an Englishman of about sixty years of age who looked far too benign for a schoolmaster. He took school during the morning only and a siesta after lunch. He and Loren would often sit on the cool back verandah, under the shade of a passion-fruit vine, and invariably Prof would become nostalgic as he questioned her about Britain, and on one occasion she asked him why he didn’t go back.
‘No one to go to,’ he answered. ‘Not a relative in the world. Besides, I like it here and I daresay that even if I went to the old country for a holiday I’d soon be wanting to return. I’m one of the family here; came thirty years ago to teach the stockmen’s kids. Had great faith in me, did the old-timer — but, lord, was she a hard taskmaster! The Boss is a piece of cake in comparison.’
‘He is?’ This surprised Loren. During these past two weeks she had seen him twice in a rage, the first time with Cooper, although Loren never learned the reason for it. The second time was with Dena, who had accidentally left the handbrake off the Land-Rover and it had rolled down the slope and crashed into Thane’s overlanding car.
‘He’ll do his block!’ exclaimed Dena, going rather pale.
‘ Just look at that dent. How the dickens did I forget that wretched handbrake!’ She shrugged philosophically as she saw Thane approaching, his attention having been attracted by the crash. ‘Oh, well, I’ll just have to grin and bear it.’
‘I’ll go,’ said Loren hastily, but Dena urged her to stay. ‘He’ll not say quite as much if you’re here.’
But he said quite enough, and for the next half hour or so even Dena’s innate high spirits were in her feet.
‘He was awful!’ declared Loren indignantly when at last he strode off after examining the damage to both vehicles. ‘It could happen to anyone!’
‘Oh, no, it couldn’t - not to the infallible Boss!’ Dena was flushed, smarting under the cutting sarcasm of Thane’s tongue. ‘In fact, no man could ever have left the brake off -only a stupid woman could possibly have managed such a thing. And to think I once wanted to marry the fiend! ’ ‘You’re a long way off.’ Prof’s mild and pleasant voice brought Loren back to her surroundings; she smiled a little ruefully.
‘I was thinking of the times I’d seen Thane in a temper. I can’t imagine Gran Amelia being any worse than he was.’
‘You haven’t seen her roused, though. Wait until you have -and she’s nothing now to what she was in her earlier days.’ He spoke reflectively and in the small silence Loren looked at him with interest. He would take all and never retaliate, she decided, noting the mild expression on his long lean face and the full mouth that was strangely soft for a man. His hair was grey and thick, his eyes widely-spaced and
kindly. They were blue, she sometimes thought; at other times she decided they were slate-grey.
‘You always seem to be sad when we talk about Britain,’ she said, changing the subject. ‘That’s why I asked you if you’d like to go back.’
‘I’m not sad,’ he denied, ‘but I do think of the old country sometimes, and like to hear about it from anyone who’s recently lived there. I was born in Shropshire.’
‘I know it; it’s a beautiful county.’
‘Have good weather there - sort of micro-climate, being in the rain-shadow of the Welsh mountains.’
‘Yes, I’ve heard of it. You can have rain all around, but in parts of Shropshire it’s fine and sunny.’
‘Hmm ... very nice up there. The lush green and the streams,’ he murmured nostalgically, then fell to musing about it. ‘You miss the water over here,’ he went on presently. ‘Rivers and lakes and waterfalls make the greatest contribution to the beauty of the landscape.’ He swept a hand, indicating the dry creek bed winding about until it became lost in the grey-brown vista of mesas and residuals and spinifex plains. ‘We see water in the creek only dur
ing the Wet - and often it’s gone again within a few weeks; evaporated in a very short space of time. All the stream channels are dry for the greater part of the year. Running water, Loren, that’s what one misses here.’
She thought of the stream running through the small town in which she had lived; it tumbled over hard rocks, forming sparkling rapids before it swirled under the town bridge and proceeded merrily on to reach the confluence where it joined the main river.
‘ The scenery here is different. I know well-watered land has enormous charm, but so does this land have charm. ’
‘I suppose I must agree. It’s a primeval landscape, savage and sort of - timeless.’
‘I never wanted to come here, but I know I shall miss it when the time comes for me to leave.’
Prof turned his head to look at her.
“You’re not finding it too quiet, then? The Outback’s a man’s world, so it’s often said.’
Loren’s glance wandered over the garden with its pleasant lawns and shady trees, to where the cattle grazed, away on the rolling plains. Three stockriders - tough sun-browned men of the open spaces - were by one of the bore-water troughs, letting their horses drink.
‘I’ve heard that said before, and I suppose it’s true, in a way, it is a man’s world. But I like it; I like the peace and the feeling of being isolated from the rest of mankind.’
He smiled faintly, following the direction of her gaze.
‘You’ll get tired when the novelty wears off; they all do.’
‘They?’
‘We’ve had many English girls here during my time - come as companions and home helps. Think it’s an adventure, and in the background of all their minds is the thought of finding a husband. But the heat gets them, and the loneliness and monotony. Wait, Loren, until you’ve been here another few months. You’ll be hankering after returning to civilization.’
‘It’ll be no use; I’m here for two and a half years whether I like it or not. ’
‘Strange business, your coming here as the Boss’s ward. Everyone was amazed because he’s hardly the fatherly type. And he’s young, too, to be the guardian of a girl of your age. We all wondered why he didn’t make some arrangement for you, so that you could have remained in England, I mean. ’ He shook his grey head and for a moment fell silent, wrapped in thought. ‘Yes, funny business. Must be some reason which the Boss himself knows of and I expect we shall all learn of it eventually. ’
Prof’s words struck home, merely because Gran Amelia had also seemed to find Thane’s behaviour rather odd. Gran Amelia had spoken so strangely, advising Loren to think well before she fell in with Thane’s plan, but Gran Amelia had not said what that plan was. She might have done, later, had
Loren given her the opportunity, but she evaded the old woman and cautiously made sure she was never alone with her. She also went out of her way to avoid being alone with Thane, but one afternoon, on seeing her on the verandah waiting for Prof to come and join her, Thane told her to come to his study, and reluctantly she followed him to the quiet, oak-panelled room at one end of the hall.
‘Sit down, Loren.’ He was dressed in slacks and a dark green check shirt; his slouch hat was on a chair in the corner, where he had just flung it. ‘There’s the matter of your allowance. I gave you some money, but you’d better have a cheque paid into the bank regularly.’ He mentioned a sum and went on to ask if that suited her. She smiled wryly and said,
‘Half as much would do. I haven’t anything to spend it on.’
‘You’ll make up when you go to Kouri End. Dena always comes back broke, so doubtless you’ll be the same.’
She looked across at him, noting the grey tinge at his temples and the tiny lines at the corners of his eyes. They made him appear tougher, somehow, as if they illustrated his outdoor life, which was lived among his own sex. Would he ever marry? she wondered, her mind switching to the girl — Felicity - whom Dena had mentioned. Next Saturday Loren would be meeting her, as her father was giving a film show, with films he had hired from Brisbane, and before that there would be a barbecue. Loren recalled how her cousin Janet had flirted with Thane and felt she would be diverted by watching Felicity with Thane and comparing her behaviour with that of the lovelorn Janet who, however, had been even more enamoured with Robert, whom she had married after knowing him only three months.
‘When will we be going to Kouri End?’
‘Dena usually goes when she’s getting short of the sort of supplies she needs — clothes and stuff for her face and the rest.’ He spoke disinterestedly, as though such things were so frivolous as to be quite boring. ‘She should be going soon; I believe it’s about a month or six weeks since she went.’ He paused, but Loren had nothing to say and he continued, ‘I’ll arrange for your monthly cheques, then. There’s a bank at Kouri End, so you can draw your money each time you go there.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Don’t thank me,’ he returned expressionlessly. ‘It’s your money.’
She lifted her face; he stared at her, noting the soft colour fusing her cheeks, the big brown eyes, tender and pensive and lifting slightly at the corners. His glance moved to her hair, shining with life but loosely falling on to her shoulders in the most informal style possible. A faint twitch of his lips portrayed his reflections and Loren’s colour deepened.
‘You have complete control over my money, though,’ she reminded him, intent on diverting his thoughts. ‘I suppose I must be grateful for what you give me.’
‘Is that meant to be sarcasm?’ he inquired softly, a sudden glint in his eyes.
Loren shook her head. She would have liked to return him a crushing reply of some kind, but nothing suitable occurred to her. Besides, she had witnessed his anger, on two occasions, directed against others. She had no wish to provoke him into anger against herself.
‘No, of course not. I merely stated a fact.’
Thane made no comment on this and Loren realized the interview was over, as he was rising from his chair, the sort of lazy grace with which he did so seeming to add to his formidable aspect. She stood up and for a brief space they looked at one another, Thane’s expression of uncompromising severity reminding Loren of what Dena had said about his not being the same man he was five years ago. Most certainly he was not; he had matured enormously and not by any stretch of imagination could she see him acting in the way he had on the occasion of his entering her bedroom and offering her a handkerchief to dry the tears for which he himself had been responsible. He had even turned back to renew his persuasions that she should return to the party, had said they would both go downstairs together. No, he would never do that now; he was hard and tough, as Dena had asserted; he would undoubtedly consider such softness towards a female as a manifestation of weakness on his part.
‘How is the pony?’ he asked unexpectedly as they reached the door together. ‘Are you satisfied with her?’ ‘She’s lovely, and so quiet. I ride her every day.’
‘I must find time to ride with you some time,’ he said, and left her staring after his tall figure as he strode through the hall, her eyes widening in astonishment and disbelief.
CHAPTER FOUR
Among the letters and parcels brought in by the mail plane was a letter from Janet. Loren opened it eagerly, but soon her spirits were deflated as she read through it. Janet seemed disproportionately out of patience with her for allowing her own desires to be submerged by those of Thane. Loren put the letter away, but somehow she kept on reading it and she was doing so on the evening of the film show, after she had bathed and slipped on a housecoat over her clean underwear. She had always wanted to be close to Janet, to have her as a sister rather than a cousin, but Janet had never been responsive and now she appeared to be openly hostile.
‘Loren, are you ready?’ Dena’s voice outside the door brought Loren’s thoughts from her cousin, though only momentarily.
‘Come in, Dena.’
The door swung inwards and Dena stood on the threshold looking
extremely attractive in a heather-green shirt and white slacks.
‘What’s up?’ Her eyes strayed to the letter in Loren’s hand, then back to her face. ‘You look as if you’ve had bad news?’
‘Not really.’ Loren managed a smile, looking her friend over. ‘I thought we’d have to wear dresses.’
‘Can if you want. I never feel comfortable in one. Been too long in pants, that’s the trouble.’ She glanced again at the letter and asked if it was from England.
‘It’s from Janet; she isn’t at all pleased that I came here.’
A frown of perplexity appeared on Dena’s wide brow. ‘Why not?’
A little spread of Loren’s hands and then,
‘I don’t know. She said I should have refused Thane’s offer.’ It was in effect an order, thought Loren, an order which she could not possibly disobey, but Janet seemed to think she could have done so.
‘That’s odd. Did she expect you to live all alone in England?’
‘She used to like Thane,’ murmured Loren thoughtfully, although she did not see what that had to do with it. Janet was happily married ... or was she? A swing of thought brought back the conversation which she and Janet had had on the day Janet was leaving for her return to Canada. Loren had told her to remember her to Robert and a sudden frown had touched Janet’s brow; at the time Loren was too grief-stricken to do more than notice it, but now she recalled that a discontented droop of Janet’s mouth had accompanied that frown. Yet hadn’t Janet refused to have Loren only because she and Robert desired to be alone? Shrugging, Loren put down the letter and, taking off her housecoat, she slipped a dress over her head.
‘Will I be all right in a dress?’ she asked in some doubt. ‘I’d hate everyone else to be in slacks.’
‘They won’t be; you’ll see them all arrayed in their finery
- especially the fair Felicity. She’ll be all dressed up -- for the benefit of the Boss. She’s a trier, I’ll give her that. I’ve always got my fingers crossed when we go to these events because I’m so afraid she might get him.’ Noticing that Loren was struggling with her zip fastener, Dena moved over and fixed it for her. ‘Wonder what she’ll think of Thane’s ward? Watch out for her; she has claws!’
