Settling the Account (10 page)

Both boys nodded.

‘That’s my good fellows,’ Jack said, giving
them each an affectionate cuff. ‘And make a good job of that
firewood, too, or you’ll be chopping another lot tonight instead of
eating your dinner.’

He stood on the wharf and waved them off a
few days later, watching the boat until it was out of sight.
Strange how those boys of his could still seem like little fellows
even though they were shooting up like weeds. There seemed to be
some grit in his eyes; at least there was something making them
prick uncomfortably as he tried to catch a last glimpse of the boys
before the boat disappeared around a bend in the river mouth.

Silly to think that the house was going to
seem empty until the boys were home again. It was certainly not
going to be quiet; John and Sophie’s three boys would see to that,
and Jane would probably bring her brood up to visit more often
while Susannah was away. He had to resort to using his fingers
while he ran through the names of Harry and Jane’s children; there
were five of them now, with one-year-old Louisa the latest arrival.
There would be no shortage of little ones around, with the noise
and agreeable chaos they generated. But he would miss those young
boys of his.

He gave a surreptitious wipe of his sleeve
across his eyes, glancing around to see that there were no prying
stares, and turned to walk over to the buggy. Tomorrow, he decided,
he would go and visit Amy. There was nothing like seeing his girl
to cheer him up.

*

Susannah’s father died two weeks after she
went up to Auckland, and she and the boys were away for five weeks
altogether. Thomas and George came home rather subdued from their
first close contact with death, as well as from the weeks of being
confined to their grandmother’s house or her small garden instead
of the acres of bush they were used to treating as their
playground, but they bounced back with the resilience of the young.
They had the sense to suppress any signs of exuberance in front of
their mother, but as soon as they had changed into their old
clothes and were safely out of her sight they headed for the
nearest patch of bush at a run, whooping with delight at freedom
regained.

Susannah, too, was quiet as Jack drove them
home, but her silence was taut and tight-lipped. The black cloth of
deep mourning accentuated her sombre air as she sat beside him with
her head held high, her body exuding the peculiar rigidity that
Susannah seemed so much more capable of than any other woman he had
ever known.

Jack felt awkward in the face of her austere
silence, and he avoided Susannah for the rest of the day, knowing
he was being cowardly as he did so. But he could not hide from her
when they were alone in their bedroom. He sat in bed and watched
her putting away her clothes, still moving with that uncanny
stiffness even though she was now wearing a loose nightdress in
place of her unyielding day clothes.

‘You all right, Susannah?’ he asked.

‘Yes,’ she answered, hardly opening her
mouth long enough for the clipped monosyllable to escape.

‘You seem a bit upset.’

‘It hasn’t exactly been a pleasure
trip.’

‘No, I know it hasn’t.’ He waited for her to
say something else, but she continued unpacking in silence. ‘You’re
a bit worn out from the boat, too. You want to take it easy for a
couple of days.’

‘There’s not much chance of that in this
house, is there?’ She shoved the wardrobe door closed, then sat
down to brush her hair, tugging at it with a savageness that made
Jack wince.

‘Your family all right?’ he tried.

‘Don’t try and pretend it matters to you
whether they are or not.’

Jack hid his irritation with an effort. ‘I’m
just trying to—’ He saw a quick heave of her shoulders. ‘You are
upset, aren’t you?’

‘No. Leave me alone.’

‘Susannah, it’s only natural you should be
upset about your pa. You don’t have to try and make out you’re
not.’

Susannah turned to face him. ‘Why should I
be upset about Father? He never liked me. He never even wanted me.
I was meant to be a boy. He told me that often enough—how he had to
wait all those years for a son. I was just a nuisance. I wasn’t
even pretty, not like Constance. He never called me his little doll
like he did her. He never wanted me to sit on his lap.’

Jack struggled to make sense of her
outburst. She seemed to be distressed over things that must have
happened nearly thirty years before. ‘Now, don’t talk like that,
Susannah. It doesn’t seem right, saying those things about your
pa.’

‘Don’t speak ill of the dead? Why shouldn’t
I? He never had anything good to say about me.’

‘Well, you want to forget all that now,
especially if it upsets you. Anyway, you had a nice time with your
ma, didn’t you? It’s good that you could spend a bit of time with
her, help take her mind off things. And she’d have liked seeing the
little fellows.’

‘Mother didn’t show much interest in the
boys. And she had plenty of visitors calling, she didn’t seem to
have any great inclination to talk to me.’

‘She must have been pleased to have the
little fellows around,’ Jack protested. ‘They’re her
grandchildren.’

‘That doesn’t matter to Mother. It was
different the other time I took them, when they were tiny. You
couldn’t tell if they were boys or girls at that age. But she’s not
interested in them now. Not with Constance’s children to fuss
over.’ Susannah’s lip curled slightly. ‘Constance has daughters.
She’s got two boys as well, but it’s the daughters that Mother
worships. Three of them, and according to Mother they’re the most
accomplished creatures you can imagine. Pretty and talented, and
the apples of Mother’s eye. She wasn’t a bit interested in a pair
of great clumsy boys.’

Jack felt a rush of indignation at the
notion that his sons could be considered inferior to any other
children, but he had no intention of encouraging Susannah’s mood.
She seemed to have brought decades worth of resentment home with
her. He struggled for useful words, but could find none.

‘Mother never thought anything I did was as
good as Constance,’ Susannah said. ‘She used to say what a pity I
wasn’t pretty like Constance, or had a nice singing voice like her.
It was always my fault when anything went wrong. She’d always beat
me, never Constance. She’d say Constance was too young to know any
better, and it was up to me to keep an eye on her. Now she thinks
Constance’s children are better than mine. Because I haven’t got
daughters. Because I’m not pretty.’ There was a rawness in her
voice as she finished.

‘I never thought your sister was as good
looking as all that,’ Jack said. ‘No better looking than you are.’
That, he realised, did not quite sound like a compliment. ‘You’re a
fine looking woman, Susannah.’ Not a beauty like Annie had been,
but then there was no one like his Annie. And Annie had never had
the proud carriage of Susannah; the ability to wear fine clothes as
if she had been born to them. Not that she had ever had the chance
to learn.

Susannah seemed hardly aware of his
presence. ‘And to have
her
speak to me like that,’ she said
in a voice so low that Jack barely caught it. ‘All those nasty
little remarks. She always smiled when she said them, too.’

‘Who? You’re not talking about your ma, are
you?’

‘No. Charlotte.’

Now, who on earth was Charlotte? Jack
couldn’t recall ever hearing her mentioned before. He had certainly
never heard Susannah speak of anyone with such a weight of
bitterness as she had used for this mysterious Charlotte. He was
tempted to ignore Susannah’s mood and hope she would snap out of
it, but the sight of her lips trembling as she stared into the
mirror troubled him.

‘What did she do to upset you?’ he asked,
sure that no good would come of the question, but unable to resist
the prompting of his conscience.

Susannah spoke without looking at him. ‘What
do you care? You’re not interested in what happens to me.’ There
was a bleakness in her voice that spoke of unhappiness far more
plainly than her usual wounded tones.

Jack leaned back against the pillows and
sighed. ‘I’m asking you, aren’t I? I wouldn’t ask if I wasn’t
interested. Hop into bed, Susannah, you’re getting cold sitting
there.’

To his surprise, for Susannah was not
usually eager to obey him, she rose from the chair and sat on the
edge of the bed, moving almost like a sleep walker. But she made no
move to lift the covers and slip beneath them.

‘She was so sly about it,’ she went on in
the same low voice. ‘She’d smile that conceited smile of hers and
say, “Oh, how
nice
it must be living in the country. What a
relief never having to worry about keeping up with the fashions.”
Or, “I do envy you, Susannah, not having to think about whether a
dress is stylish or not. Life must be so much simpler. Why, I
sometimes spend an hour of a morning deciding what pair of gloves
to wear.” Then she’d pull off a glove and show off whatever diamond
ring she happened to be wearing that day. And she’d look at me as
if I were an old scullery maid or something.’

‘She sounds a nasty piece of work. You don’t
want to take any notice of people like that.’

‘How could I help taking notice of her? She
was there every day, then they’d come around of an evening. She’d
get Constance joining in with her, too—Constance said people seem
to age faster in the country. She thinks I look old and dowdy. And
I
do
,’ Susannah said despondently.

‘You?’ Jack said in genuine amazement.
‘You’re the most stylish woman I’ve ever seen!’

‘How would you know?’ Susannah snapped.
‘What would you know about style or fashion?’ She looked away, and
her eyes became unfocussed. ‘What would I know about it myself?
Buried in a place like this. I’ve turned into an old frump.’

‘Don’t talk like that, Susannah. You’ve let
this Charlotte upset you. You want to forget about her.’

‘I
can’t
. I keep thinking about those
things she said. I never thought anyone could be so nasty to
me.’

‘Who’s this Charlotte woman, anyway? Why was
she hanging around there all the time, getting you down?’

Susannah’s expression became wary, then
defiant. ‘She’s James’s wife.’

The heat of his anger took Jack by surprise.
He did not trust himself to speak for a moment, and when he did his
voice came out as something close to a growl. ‘So he’s got married,
has he? The next girl’s father was a bit too fast for him, eh? Got
caught before he could put a bastard in another girl and ruin
her?’

‘Don’t be disgusting. Anyway, if you must
know, they haven’t any children.’ Her face turned bitter again.
‘Charlotte had the cheek to say how gauche my sons are—“natural”,
she called them, but she said it to be nasty—and she hasn’t even
got any children herself.’

‘Why did he marry her, then, if he didn’t
have a gun at his head? What makes this Charlotte good enough for
your precious brother when my daughter wasn’t?’

‘Because her father’s rich.’ Susannah spat
the words. ‘That’s why. He certainly didn’t marry her for her sweet
nature.’

The old hurt and anger was like bile in
Jack’s throat. ‘I didn’t know I was meant to buy a husband for my
girl.’

‘He just sat there and let her say those
things to me,’ Susannah said, her face a mixture of pain and
bitterness. ‘He never once said anything to stop her.’

‘I’ve heard about enough talk of him,
Susannah.’

She went on as if to herself. ‘He didn’t
seem to care. He didn’t even want to talk to me.’ There was no
trace of anger now, just the confused pain of a child unable to
comprehend why it was being punished. ‘We used to be so close. He
used to love me, I know he did. Now he doesn’t care.’

‘That’s enough,’ Jack said, but he might as
well not have spoken.

‘I used to give him my allowance when he’d
spent all his. I used to buy him things he wanted when he couldn’t
talk Father into it. He’d dance with me at balls when no one else
wanted to. There were always plenty of men wanting to dance with
Constance, but hardly any of them ever asked me. But James always
would. We’d dance and dance, and he’d make me feel so proud.’ She
managed a crooked little smile. ‘He was so tall and handsome. I
always felt proud to be dancing with him, even if he was my
brother. He said he liked dancing with me better than with other
girls. I was the best dancer he knew. He’d tell me I was pretty. He
made me feel like I was. No one else wanted me, but he did.’ Her
face crumpled. ‘Now he doesn’t want me either. He doesn’t
care.’

‘He should have married Amy,’ Jack
muttered.

‘I wish he had!’ Susannah’s voice rose to a
shriek. She turned away from him and stared at the wall. ‘I wish he
had,’ she echoed in a whisper.

She seemed to be muddling up things that had
happened twenty or thirty years ago with what had upset her over
the previous few weeks, and getting herself in a dreadful state in
the process. Her anguish spoke for itself, but Jack had no idea how
to cope with it. Especially when he was fighting hard to keep his
own anger silent. It was time she pulled herself together.

‘Settle down, Susannah. You’re a grown woman
with two young ones of your own, there’s no need for you to be
going on with a lot of nonsense. You’ll make yourself ill if you
keep running things over in your mind. You’ve had a bit of a rough
spin up there, I can see that, but you want to just forget all that
and get yourself back to normal. Auckland’s a wearying sort of
place, especially when you’ve got family troubles.’

‘I’m not going up there again. They don’t
want me.’ She turned a defiant face to Jack. ‘I’m never going there
again.’

‘Please yourself. Hop under the covers so I
can put the lamp out.’ He did not wait to see if she would obey
before he plunged the room into darkness.