Guardian Nurse (11 page)

CHAPTER SEVEN

Though
it proved just as hard the next day to prise Jason from lessons as on the first occasion,
C
andy helped considerably. When the little boy’s face clouded as Frances firmly and finally closed the books at noon to decree, ‘That’s all till tomorrow’ she found that an added, ‘Or the horses will get tired of waiting for us’ swept much of the cloud away.

‘Do you think Candy will like me?’ Jason asked anxiously over lunch by the window.

‘No one could help liking you, darling,’ Frances assured him, her heart going out to his little worry-creased face. What a serious little boy he was.

‘I don’t think she liked me sometimes,’ Jason said thoughtfully.

‘A lady you knew?’ asked Frances carefully.

But Jason either lost interest or could not remember.

‘He mightn’t like my leg.’ He was back on Candy again.

‘We’ll explain to him that it won’t be like that for long, only until the plaster comes off.’

‘It came off before and it had to go on again. Do you think it will this time?’

‘If it does you’ll have a lovely new scribbling leg, won’t you?’

‘Only I won’t scribble on it. I’ll do lessons. Will Candy know when you tell him about my leg?’

‘Not if we keep hi
m waiting, for then he won’t be t
here. Finish up your plate, honey. I think Burn is ready for us.’

When they came out on the verandah,
Burn
was. He let Jason struggle laboriously ahead of them to the stables. ‘It will loosen him up; I’ll carry him back.’

‘You do think he will be all right, Burn?’

‘Only his disinclination could discourage me, but I believe the boy is keen.’

‘He can’t wait.’ Frances smiled. ‘He was a little dubious whether Candy would like him, but I assured him that everybody and everything would.’ She frowned slightly.

‘Feeling you overdid your assurance?’
Burn
grinned at her. Evidently he had noted the frown.

‘No, I was just wondering at that “I don’t think she liked me” of Jason’s.’

‘Jason said that?’ His voice was sharp.

‘Yes.’

‘Did he say
—
’

‘No, he didn’t say a name,’ Frances forestalled, ‘he just went on to something else.’

They walked in silence for a few moments and Frances darted Burn a quick glance. His eyes were narrowed and he wore a tight look. She said rather hastily so as to change the atmosphere more to the occasion it should be; ‘I believe I read once how pony riding has been used as therapy for handicapped children.’

‘There was an instance in Copenhagen where a young woman who had been struck down in infancy recovered through equestrian exercise and eventually succeeded in the Olympic Games,’ he answered. ‘I have no Olympic ambition for Jason, but I feel he’ll take readily to riding, for after all he is a West.’

Which answers everything, Frances felt like inserting tartly. But when she saw Jason’s ecstatic little face as he fondled Candy’s chestnut head, she felt ... if reluctantly ... obliged to the name of West for passing on to the little boy such love and confidence
as
shone in his eyes. He was, as
Burn
West had said, born to this. As Burn had said on yet another occasion: His father’s son.

But where was Jason’s mother? And
Burn
West’s
wife?

Burn
lifted Jason up on Candy’s accommodating back and began walking him. As with his lessons, Jason progressed almost too fast. He would have cantered alone, and probably have made a success of it, too, but Burn ruled otherwise.

‘
Not until you have two knees to hug on with, sonno. Knees are very important with horses. Anyway, it’s France’s turn to be taught.’

Jason laughed merrily as
Burn
made Frances mount and dismount. ‘You wait till it’s your go,’ she grimaced at him, getting up and down for the tenth time. But, passed as satisfactory by Burn, she found the cantering completely enjoyable, especially when Burn mounted his own bay horse Major and accompanied her on white Miss Cloud.

She watched him enviously as he tried out a second and large circuit for the pair of them, galloping round in twice the speed and half the time it would take her. If only, she wished,
I
could do that. Then suddenly, without warning, Miss Cloud was galloping, too, chasing instinctively after her stablemate. Although Frances was aware of all the things she should do, she was too surprised to do any. She simply gave Miss Cloud her head, and somewhere around the circuit she did what she vaguely knew was inevitable unless she managed to bestir herself sufficiently to check Miss
Cloud—she came straight down and off her back and was on the ground before she knew.

For a moment she stayed there more from surprise than anything else, then, getting resolutely to her feet, she reached out and grabbed the reins of Miss Cloud, who had stopped and taken the opportunity to crop from some enticing grass at the verge of Burn’s new circuit, and resolutely remounted. Letting Miss Cloud know who was holding her this time, she cantered round to where Burn sat on his saddle, feet long in the stirrups, leading forward to watch her through narrowed eyes.

She anticipated ... and deserved? ... sarcasm. She waited for West to draw Jason’s attention to what, when eventually he started to ride, he must
not
do. But
Burn
West’s words surprised her.

‘Good girl, France. After a fall that’s the only way to come home.’

Back in the homestead and lingering over a hot bath with lashings of salt to help a few bruises that were already showing purple, Frances could not help smiling to herself. She was sore, but not in spirit. ‘Good girl,’ he had said. She warmed herself ... quite absurdly, she reprimanded herself
... in the praise.

The morning lessons the next day had Jason racing so far ahead that Frances reported a little dubiously to
Burn
that she felt at any time he would leave her behind.

‘We’ve our first batch ready to send back to the Education Department.’ She handed the completed pages to Burn. ‘Will you see about getting them away?’

‘I did think we could take them up ourselves,’
Burn
answered, accepting Jason’s first efforts, ‘but Doctor
Muir can’t get off this week. Yes, I’ll dispatch them for you. Still keeping the sonno to mornings only?’

She looked at him for guidance. ‘I did intend to, but
if you want it differently
—
’

‘I’m all for it. Like you, I don’t believe the enthusiasm will leave Jason, but if I can do anything to keep it there in its present stage I’ll do it.’ He smiled. ‘No, I asked that because I have another aspect here to show you. You won’t be able to join in, not at your present level of equestrian proficiency, but I do believe you’ll enjoy watching the cutting out of the primes.’

‘What’s that? Don’t forget’ ... Frances was humble ... ‘I’m a townie.’

‘Not that much of a townie.’ He took out his makings, his eyes actually teasing her as he rolled and moulded and enclosed and lit. ‘It’s what I said, France, it’s cutting out the primes. Incredible though it may seem, this Riverina has a bit of this
going on besides wheat, sheep, fruit, rice, you-name-it-we’ve-got-it.’

‘What?’ she asked.

‘What would you guess with cutting out the primes?’

‘Cattle, I think.’

‘Good,’ he awarded. ‘Cattle it is ’

‘In the irrigation area?’

‘I didn’t say that, I said the Riverina. There’s good cattle at Coolamon, Ganmain and’ ... he paused ... ‘where I’m going to take you and the sonno, to Harry Springs.’

‘Are there springs?’

‘No,’ he grinned, ‘not now. Plenty of sunbaked
plains, and that’s what cat
tl
e like. I haven’t many
—
’

‘They’re yours?’

‘I told you that my father advised a mixed plate. Yes, I have this little property.’ He told her the size, which sounded anything but little to Frances, and she said so.

‘It’s not even a pocket handkerchief when it comes to cattle. I was up at a station in the Northern Territory where the size went in thousands of miles, not hundreds of acres. It was there I got the feeling for cattle, but of course they were not suited right here at West of the River. But I think you’ll like the Springs. It’s not “pretty” country, but
—
’ He shrugged.

On
Burn
’s direction Frances cut short the lessons the next day, then, a picnic hamper in the seat beside the driver, they set off. Frances as usual sat in the back in case of rough patches in the road when Jason might need to be steadied.

As soon as they left the actual irrigation area the gold started creeping in—flatness instead of gentle undulations. By the time Burn indicated with a wave of his hand distant Harry Springs, it was a golden world. Golden-green grass. Gold distance. Even a gold mirage that had Jason clapping his hands. ‘Stop,
Burn
,’ he called, ‘we’ll be rich, it’s a golden lake
!’

‘Only it isn’t there, sonno.’
Burn
pulled up, though, to explain the wonder of a mirage to the little boy. While he did so he nodded for Frances to take out the hamper and pour the flask tea. ‘A crime to offer tea from a Thermos in the bush, but we haven’t much time. Also, the country’s dry and at least this way there’s no fire risk.’

They ate after Jason had gone to make sure for himself that his father was right, that there was no golden lake. He mused thoughtfully afterwards over his chicken and salad sandwich. ‘It didn’t look pretend,’ he puzzled, ‘yet it was.’

‘Well, soon you’ll see something that’s not pretend, sonno, and believe me, they’re almost as valuable as a
golden lake.’

‘The cat
tl
e?’ Jason asked.

‘Yes. I’m rather proud of Garo Garo.’

‘Is that its name? It’s funny.’

‘It’s aboriginal for lying down, and that’s what the plains do, just lie in the sun—but not the cattle, as you’ll soon see.’

There was no need to tell Jason to hurry up with his sandwich, he swallowed so fast that he nearly choked and had to be slapped on the back.

‘We’re not in that much of a hurry, sonno,’
Burn
remonstrated.

More golden paddocks, golden distances, even another golden lake, only this time Jason looked scornfully at it and said, ‘You’re only pretend, you don’t kid me.’

Then they were turning in at gates ...
Burn
let Frances do the honours ... and travelling a very different avenue from the one that led to West of the River. There were no tree plantings here. There was not even the inevitable peppercorn to shade the way to the house. Then when they got to the end of the drive there was no house!

‘No,’ smiled
Burn
at Jason’s gasp, ‘no one lives here. If they ... or I ... do come, we put up in the gunyah.’

‘Is that a gunyah?’ Jason was looking rather disgustedly at the skimpy shack which was the only building in sight.

‘Gunyah means a hut.’

‘It is,’ demanded Jason. He had got out by himself, he was getting pretty good at it now, but he was not going to waste any effort, for walking was an effort to the little boy, on examining the hut. He began moving laboriously to a sliprailed fence. It would take the clumsy leg some time to get there, so when
Burn
opened the unlocked hut door and indicated to Frances to enter, she did.

There was nothing inside except a bed and a packing case table with a Primus on it.

‘Bit rough,’ he grinned.

‘Yes.’ She was annoyed that her answer came out indistinctly. The almost monk-like austerity of the shelter affected her quite oddly. She could see this uncluttered man in this room, its complete absence of unessentials matching his direct nature. She could see him coming in of a night, making a simple meal, perhaps reading by the candle she saw on a shelf and then going to bed.

‘Well?’ he asked, and she gave a little start, caught out as she was in her thoughts.

‘Nothing,’ she said defensively, ‘I mean
—
’

‘Nothing is the sonno’s prerogative, one we’re trying to break him of. Tell me, France, what
were
you thinking?’

‘That—that it looks like you.’

‘Do you really think that?’ He had not taken his hat off when he came into the gunyah and now he pushed it to the back of his head.

‘You mean I look the part?’ he asked her. ‘The celibate?’

She looked at him in surprise. How could he say this when outside his son
—

‘Because I’m
not,
you know.’ His eyes held hers.

‘Oh, I know that.’

‘You do, France?’ he had come a step forward. ‘This room,’ he said, ‘is not as it looks, it’s for blossoming. After all, poor though it is, it’s still a roof tree, and trees blossom.’

He had stepped forward again and across the dark, bare ... celibate ... room was looking at her, imprisoning her glance. And suddenly the celibacy seemed gone, the blossoming, the
potential
blossoming, was there.

‘France!
Burn
!’ came Jason’s injured shout, ‘what are you doing in that gudyah?’

‘Gunyah, sonno.’
Burn
emerged to the light again, and Frances followed.

A horse was untethered from a post beside the little water tank. Jason asked in amazement where it had come from.

‘Bert Patterson has a holding over the hill,’
Burn
told him.

‘I can’t see any hill.’

‘Well, there is one,’ said
Burn
, ‘or at least we call it that.’

‘Like Harry Springs?’

‘Yes. When I come over to cut out the primes I get in touch with Bert to leave Bruce here.’

‘Is he Bruce?’

‘Yes.’

‘Can I ride him?’

‘No, sonno.’

‘Doesn’t he like legs like mine?’

‘I’ll tell you something, he likes only my legs, or at least puts up with them. Bruce isn’t a Candy or a Miss Cloud.’

‘Or Major.’

‘Not even Major. Now, you two, strictly behind the fence and no further.’ Burn went across to Bruce, addressed him a moment, then climbed up.

Bruce was a big brown horse, and showed his spirit once by rising up on his hind legs, wheeling at
Burn
’s direction, retreating from the rails, then coming back at them at a fast pace to hurdle dizzily across.

‘Ooh ...
!
gasped Jason, enthralled, and Frances felt
l
ike echoing it. She watched fascinated as
Burn
cut out the primes, so intent that he did not notice the arrival of a brown-skinned horseman until one of the riding boots went up on the fence rail beside her and a pair of strong tanned arms, shirt sleeves rolled, leaned on the upper rail as the man drawled of himself, ‘Name of Patterson, miss. I’ve come to tie up what
Burn
cuts out. Pretty sight, isn’t it? He’s a dab hand at cutting, is
Burn
—learnt it up in the Territory. I will say this for West, he lea
rn
s everything the proper way, from pumpkins to pigs. Watch this cut.’