Heart of the Outback

by Lynne Wilding

  “That’s a waste of good champagne,” Darren joked. “I’ll get you another.”

  “No, I’ve had enough,” CJ replied and forced a grin to hide the fact that suddenly he didn’t feel great. “Obviously.”

  “I’d like to have a word with you about that art museum, CJ. The Chamber of Commerce wants to put on an arts and cultural festival next year, between May and July. If the museum was finished … it’d be a great drawcard.”

  CJ stared at the mayor. “I’ll say this for you, Turk, when you get onto a pet project you’re like a dog with a bone.” He thought for a moment. “I believe Francey has some more work to do on the plans but I can’t see any reason why it shouldn’t be up and running by the time of your festival.”

  Darren Turk beamed. “That is good news.”

  CJ barely heard the man’s reply, he was trying desperately to get some feeling back into the useless hand resting inside his pocket. He wanted to flex the fingers but the message wasn’t getting from his brain to the extremities. Hell, what was the matter with him? He had to get away from Turk, away from everyone who might cotton onto this new weakness. “Yes, well. Excuse me, I’d better do some mingling.”

  Mike Hunter finished giving his instructions to the five station hands who were going to take part in the muster starting at first light tomorrow. He then went up to CJ and Les, who’d been sitting in on the meeting, to make sure everything was satisfactory.

  “You’d better keep an eye on that new man, Finch,” Les said to Mike, “I reckon he hasn’t got as much experience as he says he has.”

  “I’m aware of it,” Mike agreed, twirling his Swiss army knife between his fingers as he spoke. “The muster and the boys will soon sort him out.”

  “Wish I was going myself.” There was a note of wistfulness in CJ’s voice. “Been years since I’ve done a bit of hard riding.”

  Les chuckled as he glanced at CJ. Wearing grey moleskins and a green and yellow striped shirt, at fifty-nine he looked fit enough to go mustering, that was for sure. “You’ve done your share over the years. Why don’t you come in the ‘copter? Francey’s away but Lisa can take care of the business for a couple of days.”

  CJ didn’t need to take long to think about that suggestion. “No thanks, helicopters and me don’t mix. Can’t stand all that swaying and dipping about. Enough to make a man chunder all over the place.”

  The two men grinned at each other, neither believing the enigmatic CJ capable of such ordinary, lowly things such as being physically ill. CJ had the reputation of being as strong as a mallee bull.

  “We’re planning on bringing four hundred head in,” Mike said, “then we’ll drive them to the abattoir at Cloncurry. Should be away a week, maybe ten days, if everything goes to plan.”

  CJ studied the foreman. “Make sure that it does. Timing’s important. North West Abattoirs are waiting on those animals, they’ve orders to fill.”

  They talked for a few more minutes about the details then Les and CJ left the bunkhouse to return to the homestead. Outside, dusk was falling and a burnt sienna haziness lay over the stockyards and the outer buildings.

  “Did Francey get a chance to tell you before she left?” Les said. “The Cooktown project’s been approved by the EIS.”

  The pain hit him without warning. It started at the back of his head and was breathtakingly sharp. Cruel. CJ gasped from the force of it and came to a dead stop, his hands scrabbling to his head as if touching it would somehow contain the pain. Then in the next instant his left leg gave way under him. He crumpled forward onto the red earth and rolled onto his side.

  “Gron … web’ll…” CJ tried to speak but what came out was garbled and unintelligible.

  “Jesus, CJ, what’s the matter?” Les dropped to his knees beside him, trying to turn him onto his back. He saw the fingers of CJ’s hand gripping his head, as if trying to protect something. He saw too that he’d turned very pale and was trying to talk but couldn’t. Beads of sweat glistened on his forehead. “I’ll get help.”

  Les rushed back to the bunkhouse and yelled at the top of his lungs. “Something’s happened to CJ. Mike, come with me. Lucky, ring the house, tell Shellie to get onto the doctor. You two,” he pointed to two men playing cards, “grab a couple of blankets for a stretcher. Come on, hurry it up. Now!”

  “What do you reckon it is?” Mike asked as they rolled CJ onto the blanket.

  “God, I don’t know. Could be a fit. No, maybe a stroke.” He gestured to the men to grab an end of the blanket. “Come on now, lift.”

  The pain edged out all awareness of his surroundings and of what Les and the men were doing for him. He didn’t react when they placed him on his bed, didn’t even notice they’d done so. His eyes were shut tight, trying to screw out such agony as he’d never before experienced. Tears formed at the corners of his eyelids and squeezed out and down his cheeks. He prayed for oblivion to release him from his suffering. His prayers went unanswered. He became aware of a woman’s voice. Brenda? No. Stupid. A guttural moan escaped from his throat. The pain was stopping him from thinking straight. Brenda was dead. Shellie.

  “He’s had bad headaches before, but never like this,” Shellie told the two men.

  “How long before Barry gets here?”

  Shellie glanced at her watch. “Ten minutes. He dropped everything as soon as I called.” She looked down at CJ. His face had turned whitish-grey, his clothes were soaked with sweat but his hands had stopped clutching his head. They now lay limply at his sides, as if holding them up took too much effort. He moaned again, like a wounded animal and then his body went limp.

  “Jesus,” Mike whispered, “he’s unconsious.”

  “Yes, but his breathing’s okay. Let’s try to make him more comfortable,” Les suggested.

  The two men stripped CJ down to his underwear and gently rolled him under the bed covers. They had just finished their task when Doctor Ryan arrived.

  Shellie shooed the other men out and watched from her position at the foot of the bed while Barry gave CJ a thorough examination. It was like old times, almost, watching the man she loved work on a patient but this time the meaning was especially important for her because the patient was her brother, her only close living relative.

  As Barry removed his stethoscope and put it into his black bag, she tried to keep her voice calm. “Is he going to be all right? What’s the matter with him?”

  Barry looked at her, his eyes locking with hers. “I wish I could give you a clear-cut answer, Shellie. I need to ask CJ certain questions regarding the symptoms and until he regains consciousness I can’t do that.”

  “He could be unconscious for hours.”

  “I know, but I don’t think he will be.”

  “All right. I’ll make some coffee and we’ll wait together.”

  His smile was tinged with gratitude and compassion. “That’s a grand idea. I’ll ring my surgery,” he took out his mobile phone, “and ask them to get Doctor Wilson to fill in for me.”

  Pasty-faced, CJ sat up in bed with three pillows under and around him to keep him upright. The nauseous feeling was abating and at least he hadn’t been sick like before. Some of the feeling had come back into his hand though it still felt incredibly weak. It was time for serious questions and he’d never shirked a tough one in his life.

  “You’re the doctor, what’s the problem?”

  “Well,” Barry spoke slowly, consideringly, “I think you realise it’s more serious than just bad headaches. You need to have some tests done to pinpoint the medical problem. A CAT scan to identify where and what the difficulty is and an MRI, a slightly different scan which we use to define whether the problem’s benign or malignant.”

  CJ’s gaze narrowed. “You know what it is, don’t you?”

  “I’ve my suspicions, but it wouldn’t be professional of me to offer a diagnosis without the results of those tests.”

  CJ snorted and thumped the bed cover with his fist, “Jesus, Barry, you sound like a
politician. Can’t you give me a straight answer, mate?”

  Barry shook his head. “What I can do, and what I’ve already organised while you were unconscious, is to have those tests done at the earliest possible time. Tomorrow, in Brisbane, if you’re up to it.”

  CJ blinked then looked at him hard and long. “That serious, hey?”

  The doctor’s expression was sober. “I think so.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  In the specialist rooms of neurosurgeon Doctor Jack English, Doctor Barry Ryan and English studied the test results on the X-ray illuminator.

  “A classic textbook case,” Jack English said as he studied the foreign mass, a mass that shouldn’t rightly be there, but was and showed a light-grey on the scan. The earlier EEG had also confirmed its presence. “Glioblastoma, one of the most aggressive types of brain tumours.”

  Barry took off his glasses to pinch the bridge of his nose before he spoke and when he did his tone was thick with emotion. “Yes, I’m afraid so.” Kept to himself though was his compassion for the patient and an even deeper feeling for the woman he loved. She would be devastated by this news.

  “Look how it’s growing. Could operate to slow its growth but it wouldn’t reduce it for long, and it’s in a delicate position. The operation might kill the patient rather than the growth.”

  “What about radiotherapy?”

  “Purely palliative. Might give the patient more time, if he wants it.”

  Jack English looked at his colleague, they’d been friends since medical school. “Hmmm. What are you going to tell him?”

  Barry shook his head, the expression in his eyes sad. “CJ isn’t the kind of man you fob off with half-truths. He deserves to know, no doubt he’ll need time to make,” he paused, thinking for a moment of the times Shellie had tried to explain her brother’s vast financial empire, “arrangements.”

  Jack nodded. “Poor bastard.”

  CJ’s legs were rubbery, his stomach was churning and he noticed that his fingers shook as he used the security card to let himself into the luxurious suite of the Hilton Hotel.

  He had insisted on going to the specialist by himself, gruffly telling Les he didn’t need to be mollycoddled. In hindsight that hadn’t been smart. Shock was beginning to set in … He moved to the hospitality bar and poured a whisky, a generous one. He downed it in two gulps. Without waiting for the alcohol to take effect, he poured another and took it with him and literally fell into a chair. As he settled he gulped down half the glass’ contents and only then did he begin to relax as the smooth Johnny Walker began to warm his insides.

  Suddenly memories of past close encounters with near death situations overwhelmed him. He’d looked death once or twice in the face before and survived against the odds, but this! His hand rubbed his skull where Barry had said the tumour was growing, putting pressure on areas that affected his eyesight and his motor skills. Eventually it would stop him from functioning all together.

  Just what had Barry said to him? He was more than a little confused. The two doctors had talked a lot, given him details, options. What he could expect by way of symptoms, about radiotherapy, about how much time he probably had left. Christ. He began to sweat. He touched his arm, the skin was cold and clammy. Months, not years!

  Anger welled inside him and he gripped the glass so hard he cracked it. He let it fall to the floor, uncaring of the mess. Months. Maybe a year if he was lucky. Shit. Lucky! Doctors sure had a funny way of phrasing things. He thought of Francey, seeing in his mind’s eye her slender figure and her lovely features. A wave of intense pain gripped his heart. Why now? And then a gurgling kind of a chuckle rumbled through his chest. A stillness came over him as, with a sense of fatalism he didn’t know he was capable of, he mentally and emotionally accepted the doctors’ diagnosis. After all, he’d always been a realist. But God, what bloody rotten timing.

  He rested his head back on the chair and closed his eyes. Tiredness sapped the energy from every muscle and he sagged into the thickly padded chair, not resisting the weakness. The news sapped the strength from him but even as he sat in repose he knew that he couldn’t give in to the feeling. There was too much to do in too short a time. Things to organise. What to tell people? A frown creased his forehead. The truth. Yes. Les would have to be told, he’d need him to take care of the many things which had to be set in order. The others, of course they had to know too, but at a time of his choosing. No point in worrying those close to him unduly.

  And he had to decide whether he agreed to an operation and radiotherapy. English had said a clinic in Switzerland was the best and the operation would give him some extra time, but at what cost? Both men said the treatment would make him ill and listless. They’d been honest, telling him that there was no cure and at best it might extend his life by a few months, if he was lucky. That word again. He grimaced. Lucky!

  His uneasy gaze scanned the suite. He scarcely registered the French provincial reproduction furniture or the view from the top floor of the city and the Brisbane River.

  How often had he said the words during his life? He’d been a lucky bastard. He had won that mine and found opals in Coober, and he’d been lucky to have had Brenda for a wife, she’d been good for him. Lucky too to have made the right decisions business-wise and amassed a fortune. Then Francey had come along, and he’d been lucky there too … But now his luck was running out and his millions weren’t one bit of help. How ironic, the thought came out of nowhere, he had all the money in the world to get the best doctors and medical treatment but it was too late to do any good.

  On reflection he had a few regrets about his life but then who didn’t. Mary. Yes, he’d been very wrong to let the affair with Mary end as it had. Selfish bastard. Yes, he admitted it. He’d only cared about himself and how he could set himself up on the road to success. He should never have let her get into a difficult situation — pregnant and without support. Especially since Richard’s death he’d thought of her a good deal, and had suffered many sleepless guilt-ridden nights wishing that he’d handled things differently.

  He also regretted some of his business deals. How often had he been too determined to get his own way no matter who got hurt? Francey, with her principles and high morals had shown him an alternative way to do business in the short time she’d been at Murrundi. What was it he’d thought about her when they’d first met? That she had too many scruples to be a successful businesswoman. He’d been wrong. Week after week she was proving that she could be successful without resorting to underhanded methods. He admired that in her.

  Uninvited a blurriness formed in his eyes and tears began to run down his cheeks. Tears of regret, frustration and the luxury of something he had never allowed himself before, a characteristic he derided in others — self-pity.

  The door clicked as the knob turned and he straightened up in the chair and rubbed the wetness off his cheeks. He recognised the rustle of parcels being laid on the buffet and Les’ lithe stride as he approached.

  “You’re back,” Les said superfluously. “How did it go?”

  As he came face to face with the man who’d been his boss for almost twenty years, one look gave him the answer. CJ’s pasty face and the slight tremor of his hand as he brushed his forehead telegraphed the fact that the situation wasn’t good.

  “You’d better pour yourself a stiff one,” CJ said, “and get me another.”

  Les poured the required drinks, handed CJ his and sat opposite him. In a tentative tone he asked, “So?”

  Ten minutes later Les’ lean features had taken on the same ashen hue as CJ’s. It couldn’t be true. Not “the man with the golden touch”. CJ Ambrose was, had always been indestructible. A tumour. Terminal. His brain couldn’t, it refused to accept the truth. He had fashioned his ideas, his business skills, his attitude to life on that of the man he respected above all others. He’d never thought about it much but he did now. He loved him like the father he’d never really known. Loved his gruffness, his tough attitu
de to business and his sense of fair play, unless he was closing a business deal, when all that mattered was to win. He tried to imagine a world without CJ. He couldn’t.

  “You’ll get a second opinion?”

  CJ nodded. “Of course. Barry told me to and I’ve more appointments tomorrow but, really, they showed me the scan’s results. There’s this mass in my brain and it’s almost the size of a small egg. It’s been suggested that they take out what they can then hit me with a course of radiotherapy. Barry says it’s not a cure, that the damned thing will grow again but it should at least buy me some time. They reckon up to thirty-seven months if I’m lucky.” He looked at Les. “I don’t expect another specialist to tell me any different to what I’ve learned today, however I’ll go through the motions.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “No, there are things I want you to do.”

  “But CJ, I want to …”

  CJ smiled at the younger man, instinctively knowing that he was churned up about the development in his health. “I know, and I appreciate the thought but, lots of things have to be done, Les, before …” he paused. “I need you to help me do them.”

  “What sort of things?”

  “I’ve got to get down to Sydney, see how everything is progressing on the house that O’Connor fella’s building for me. And I have to meet a couple of people. I want you to set up the meeting for me. It’s a delicate one and will need your diplomatic skills. Then, when we come back, I’ve got to put all the businesses in order. That’s going to take a while.”

  Les’s frown was one of curiosity. “Who do you need to meet in Sydney?”

  CJ smiled and held his glass out to him. “Here, get me another drink and I’ll tell you a story, a true story. You’re going to be amazed at its conclusion.”