Midsummer's Eve (27 page)

I sank down beside a clump of shrubs.

Was I walking round in circles? Was I walking farther away from the house? I had no way of knowing.

The best thing was to wait until the mist cleared. That might be hours. Oh, how foolish I had been. I should have started back as soon as the mist began to rise; I should never have sat down and dozed. I should have taken the warnings more seriously. I should never have gone out alone.

Must I stay all night here? What of the dingoes? I should imagine they would be rather unfriendly. There were native cats … wild, I expected.

I was now very frightened. There is nothing worse than being undecided in such a situation. If only I knew what to do … to go on walking or to stay where I was.

And while I was trying to make up my mind I heard a sound which seemed to come from a long way off. It was the call I had heard one man give to another when they wanted their whereabouts known. “Cooee.”

With all my strength I called back: “Cooee.”

I waited tensely; and then the call came again. I answered it. It was coming nearer. I went on calling and the answer came back.

Then Gregory came riding through the mist.

He leaped from his horse and with his hands on his hips stood regarding me sardonically.

Then he said: “You little idiot. How many times have I told you …?”

“I know. I know. But who would have thought it would suddenly be misty like this?”

“Anyone with any sense,” he retorted.

He took me by the shoulders and shook me.

“You ought to be spanked,” he said. He laughed familiarly. “And I’d like to be the one to do it.”

I tried to wriggle free but he would not let me go. Then he bent his head and kissed me firmly on the lips.

I was furiously angry. I had been very frightened, almost on the verge of despair, and my relief had been intense when he had ridden out of the mist, and now here I was out here … in this mysterious land, and he had dared to do what I knew he had been threatening to ever since we met.

I freed myself and stood a few paces back from him.

“I’m glad you came, but …” I began.

“Well that’s a nice start,” he replied, mocking me I knew.

“How did you know I was lost?”

“The horse came back. He had more sense than some.”

“He … came back?”

“Thank your stars he did. Otherwise you’d have been in for an uncomfortable time, young Annie.”

“I have told you I don’t answer to that name which is not mine.”

“You’re in no position to give orders now are you, Annie? You’ve got to knuckle under now and do what dear kind Greg tells you.”

“Take me back to the house.”

“Say please, Greg.”

“Please.”

“All right. That’ll do. Come here.”

“Please do not attempt to do that again.”

“What if you were to ask me to?”

“That I can assure you will never happen.”

“Don’t be too sure of that.”

“Do my parents know I’m lost?”

“No. No one knows. They would have been out of their minds to think their little daughter was lost in the outback. You’re a precious little chick, you know.”

“Perhaps you should remember that.”

“Oh, I do. I do. Otherwise I wouldn’t be handling you with the kid gloves. I’d be giving you something to remember me by.”

“What would that be?”

“Would you like me to show you?”

“I really don’t know what you are talking about.”

“You will, Annie. One day you will.”

“Are we going back?”

He nodded.

“You’ll have to ride with me. I don’t know if that will offend your ladyship’s finer feelings … but there is only one horse.”

“I realize that.”

“Come on then.” He leaped onto the horse, then leaned over to lift me up beside him. He kept his hands on me longer than necessary. “You’ll have to hold me round the waist,” he said. “Hang on … tightly.”

“I know.”

“All right. Let’s go.”

My relief was intense. Soon I would be home. The mist would not deter him.

He walked the horse through the scrub.

“You must have felt very pleased to see me,” he said. “You were getting scared, weren’t you? And you were right, too. It’s no picnic spending a night in the outback, I can assure you, unless you are in the right company. That was a pleasant night we spent on the way out. Do you remember how I guarded you? Well, you wouldn’t have had me there if I hadn’t come out to look after you, would you?”

I was silent.

“Hold tighter,” he said. “Don’t want to fall off, do you? Do you know, I am really rather enjoying this. Riding to the homestead with my Annie’s arms around me.”

I took them away.

“Hey! Be careful,” he said. “A sudden jolt and you’d be off.”

I put my arms back. He patted one of my hands. “Do you know, Annie,” he said. “I’m very fond of you.”

I said: “How far are we from the house?”

“Far enough to give us time for a little chat.”

“There is nothing to be said which cannot be said in the house. Let’s go faster.”

“Trust me to know how we go,” he retorted. “I could see you becoming a fair dinkum Aussie … in time. This place will grow on you like it has on me. You’re free out here. You’ve done with most of the rules and regulations … you go your own way … you’re a real person.”

“I feel I
am
a real person at home,” I said.

“Oh, so polite … saying the right thing or what’s expected of you. How do you know what people are really feeling?”

“Sometimes it’s better not to know.”

“That’s something I don’t agree with. Annie, let’s get to know each other. You’re so standoffish. Sometimes I think you don’t like me very much. But that’s not true, is it? That’s just your English hypocrisy.”

“In the language of the fair dinkums, it’s true,” I said.

He laughed.

“You and I would get along fine, Annie.”

“Let us at this moment concentrate on getting back to the house.”

“Tell me, do you have a lover in England?”

“You are being impertinent.”

“I just wanted to know. It’s important to me.”

“As far as I’m concerned this conversation is over.”

“As far as I’m concerned it’s still on. I give the orders at the moment, Annie. Where would you be now without me?”

“I daresay I could find my way back.”

“Shall I put you down so that you can do so?”

“Don’t be absurd. Just go on … quickly.”

“I must say you are the most ungracious maiden in distress I ever rescued.”

“I suppose the others were eager to repay you for your services?”

“That’s just about the case, Annie. Let’s be serious. I like you. I like you very much.”

I was silent. How much farther had we to go? I wondered. I was a little afraid of him and the alarming thought came to me that I was at his mercy.

“Just suppose that you and I got together …”

“Got together? What do you mean?”

“Suppose we married.”

“Married! Are you sure you are feeling quite well?”

“Never better. It’s been a dream of mine ever since I saw you to have your arms round me like this.”

“Of necessity.”

“Oh I’ll settle for that … for the time being. It would be just right. You’re the sort. Plenty of spirit. That’s what I like. I reckon you and I were made for one another.”

“And I reckon you have a touch of the sun. They say it brings on hallucinations.”

“I’m just looking truth straight in the face. I want you, Annie. I think of you all the time. Now I’ve seen you, there’s no one else who’ll do for me. Think what we could make of this place. We’d expand. We’d have a house in Sydney. We’d have people … entertain … just so that you wouldn’t miss the Old Country. You could play the gracious lady. It would be pretty good, I promise you. You don’t say anything …”

“I’m just stunned,” I said.

“You’d only have to tell me what you want and it would be yours.”

“Very well. I want to go back to the house.”

“You’re a hard woman, Annie,” he said, sighing deeply with mock resignation; and just at that moment the house loomed up out of the mist.

I was greatly relieved.

He leaped down and turned to lift me. He looked up into my face and we were very close to each other for a second or so. Clearly I saw his thick dark hair curling about his temples and the mockery in his eyes; and twinges of alarm came to me in spite of the comfort of seeing the house so close by and knowing my family was there.

He kept his hand on my shoulders and I said quickly: “Thank you for bringing me home.”

“There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you,” he said. “Remember that.”

I turned and ran into the house.

My mother came into my room followed by my father. Gregory had come into the house and told them how he had rescued me.

They were very disturbed.

“I cannot understand you, Annora,” said my mother. “The times you’ve been told about going out alone!”

“I didn’t go far. I should have been all right if it hadn’t been for the mist.”

“That’s one of the hazards,” said my father impatiently. “You should be ashamed of yourself.”

“I am,” I said. “Do stop scolding. I promise I won’t do it again. I want to go home … soon.”

“Well thank Heaven for Greg,” said my mother. “And thank goodness your horse came back. It was wonderful of Greg to go and look for you.”

“It was miraculous … the way he came across you,” added my father.

“Well, he gave the bush call and I answered.”

“There’s not much he doesn’t know about this country,” said my father admiringly. “But we’ll go home as soon as we can. I begin to feel a bit homesick, too. Don’t you, Jessica?”

My mother admitted that she did.

“As soon as this business of Helena’s is settled we’ll go. And I think I shall sell to Greg. He’s made a jolly good thing of this place and I fancy he’d do even better if it were his own.”

“Promise me,” said my mother to me, “that you will never do anything so silly again.”

I promised.

She hugged me for a moment and I felt so glad to be back with them; but I heartily wished Gregory had not been my rescuer.

I found sleep difficult that night. I kept going over what he had said. There was such purpose in his eyes and I think it was that which frightened me.

Maud had said once on some very trivial matter: “Oh, Greg wants it and Greg always gets what he wants.”

Ominous words. But I was my own mistress. No one was going to force me to do what I did not want to.

Sleep would not come.

It was midnight when I heard a movement near my window. There was someone out there … close to the door.

I stood at the window and looked down. It was Gregory. My heart was beating wildly. How dared he! Was he coming in? What did it mean? But the door was locked. It was always locked at night. He himself had said that we must lock up carefully because of prowlers who might be looking for something they could pick up. Bushrangers were hardly a danger. They would not attack a household where there were so many men about.

Did he think he was coming to me? For what purpose? The answer was obvious. Did he think he could overpower me with his magnetic charm—or whatever he thought it was? Did he think he was irresistible to me? To come to the house was a very bold thing to do. I only had to scream and I would wake my parents along the corridor. If my father caught him he would be dismissed. He would never have a chance of owning the place.

A movement along the corridor. Someone was there. I opened my door and peeped out. I saw Polly Winters in a low-cut nightdress exposing her considerable bosom as she went silently to the door.

I shut my door and listened. The front door was opened … just a whisper … almost imperceptible. They would both have had long practice of this sort of clandestine nocturnal event.

When I opened my door again, they had gone … into Polly’s room.

I thought: This is intolerable. And under my father’s roof when only today he had asked
me
to marry him.

The man is a monster, I told myself.

I went back to bed, but not to sleep. I lay there thinking about riding on the horse with him. I was more angry with him than I had believed I could ever be with anyone.

I had thought it would be a good idea to be ready for him when he left the house in the morning, to confront him and let him know I understood where he had spent the night.

I wanted to tell him how I despised him, and that I would let my parents know the sort of man he was. I would let him see that he was not the mighty conqueror he imagined himself to be.

I must have dozed for it was fairly late when I arose. I heard Maud in the kitchen. She always let herself in very early and two of the women came to help her get the breakfast.

So I was too late to catch him.

I did not tell my parents. I did not see how they could send him away. He was so necessary to the property. Why should I bother about his relationships with women? It was not as though Polly had not welcomed him. She must have arranged to let him in.

Helena was getting very near to her confinement. She was surprisingly calm. She said to me one day: “I feel so much better since Polly’s been here. She’s so comforting. She’s always telling me about ‘her little babies.’ She does love them so much.”

People had so many sides to their natures.

I tried Maud.

I said to her: “Don’t you think Polly is too fond of the men?”

“Well, she’s certainly fond of them,” said Maud.

“And they of her, I imagine.”

“Men are always fond of women who are fond of them. It flatters them and there’s nothing they like better than a bit of flattery.”

“Don’t you think some of them like women who don’t like them at all?”

“Oh, that’s in a different way. That’s the challenge. They like that, too.”

“It seems to me they like all sorts.”

“That’s probably right.”

“I er … believe Polly invites men to her room at night.”

“That wouldn’t surprise me.”

“And you … think we should accept that?”

“There’s not another midwife round here and once the baby starts to come she’ll forget about the men. She’s one of the best at her job. You have to put up with people’s ways if they’re good at what they’ve come to do.”