Wife to Order: An Australian Outback Romance

by Lucy Walker

  Why, oh why, hadn’t she run away to Wybong just as Tony had run away to Two Creeks? Had she … unknown to herself … wanted to stay?

  When she had first sat in that study with Uncle Tam and looked at Oliver Reddin she had looked down at her hands in order to think in privacy so the open candour of her eyes would not tell the tale of her thoughts.

  Her heart had welled in excited wonder at being in Oliver’s presence, and at finding the executor her father had named was this striking well-dressed man with an air of authority. His firm cultivated voice had awoken something in her that had made her wish only to hear him speak … never mind what the meaning was of the words he uttered.

  ‘Yes,’ Carey thought, burying her face in her pillow on her wedding night, ‘I thought he was ‘terrific.’ That was it! That was the real truth of it! I stayed because of him. Not because of this big house … or the big wedding … or because Two Creeks is green and rich and so beautiful. Not even because of Tony. I stayed because of him. But I wouldn’t even tell myself that.’

  Having thought all this out Carey was more distressed than ever that Oliver had been cold and indifferent to her.

  She was a woman scorned. Where had she read that?

  Well, she would show him that she didn’t seek any emotional overtures from him whatever. She would not be a clinging wife. He would receive in return from her just as much as he gave. At the moment he gave her a home, and Tony. Her home and Tony was all that she would care for herself.

  Two Creeks, and yes, her own farm.

  Uncle Tam had said something about Harry Martin coming down to help with the farm.

  She and Harry and Tony! Yes, together they could get on with the farm. With Harry’s help that too could be made to blossom the way Two Creeks blossomed.

  Thus her thoughts went on and on between dozes, all through that night. Early in the morning she fell into a heavy exhausted sleep.

  It was eleven o’clock when she awoke. Oliver, fully dressed, came into her room.

  He stood at the foot of her bed.

  ‘So you are awake, Carey,’ he said. ‘I thought it was time to call you. I’ve decided to return to Two Creeks this afternoon. Will that disappoint you?’

  Carey was barely awake for it had been the sound of Oliver coming into her room that had disturbed her.

  ‘Two Creeks?’ she said dazedly. ‘Yes … I want to go to Two Creeks. And to my farm. Now we can begin to put my farm in order, can’t we? I mean now that I’ll be living at Two Creeks we can begin to work on my farm. Harry Martin is coming to help me …’

  Vaguely, for a moment, her thinking and disturbed dreaming of the night was all one with the reality of the morning.

  ‘And Tony,’ she said with a little more eagerness. ‘One day Tony could manage the farm for me … when he is grown up.’

  Oliver stood at the foot of her bed and looked at her.

  ‘Is this your form of building castles in the air, Carey?’ he asked. ‘Your farm … Tony … this Harry Martin? Is that what you have been thinking?’

  Carey was wide awake now. She pulled the sheet up high under her chin.

  ‘Yes,’ she said firmly. ‘I know just what to do now. I’ve a great many plans …’

  ‘And that’s why you married me?’ he asked with an edge of sarcasm in his voice.

  ‘Well, there were two reasons,’ Carey said thoughtfully. ‘You asked me first … no, you didn’t. You told me to marry you. I thought it would please you. The other reason was the farm, of course.’

  Oliver Reddin appeared to look at her curiously.

  ‘And which are you going to put first? Two Creeks or your farm?’

  ‘Two Creeks,’ said Carey without hesitation. ‘You see, that will be my duty …’

  ‘And the farm your love?’

  She nodded. All sleep was gone from her now. She was wide awake. That is what it would have to be. It could have been so different if he had kissed her last night … if he had begun to warm to life a spark of love between them. Whatever else he thought, he must never, never be allowed to think that she had felt something deep and stirring in her heart about him. Nor must he ever be allowed to think that she pined and craved for words or gestures of affection like a dog hanging round his master’s heels near meal-times.

  Perhaps this is why he didn’t marry Jane Newbold. He didn’t love anybody … not even anyone as beautiful as Jane. He was a cold hard man … and only wanted people who were useful. Jane Newbold certainly wouldn’t be useful at anything but shining in a drawing-room or at society weddings.

  Carey offered a half-smile over the edge of her sheet at Oliver.

  ‘If you wouldn’t mind going outside now,’ she said quietly, ‘I will get up and get dressed. I suppose you’ve had breakfast long since.’

  ‘I have,’ said Oliver dryly. He had looked amused and then annoyed when Carey had suggested his going outside. ‘I told the maids to leave you to sleep. I’ll ask Ada to bring you in some tea now and then you might come downstairs for lunch at one o’clock. My mother and sister are remaining in their rooms as they are exhausted after yesterday’s celebrations. Ada can help you pack.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Carey.

  Her blue eyes, quickly veiling the sadness that was in them, watched him turn and walk over to the door.

  Perhaps it was because he was so much older. Thirty-seven was what he had written against his age in the register at the church. It was on her marriage certificate. And she was eighteen.

  Perhaps if she smiled when he turned round … It was so very hard to play at being something that wasn’t truly herself. She was older than her years or her looks … if only he realised it.

  But he did not turn around. He put out his hand behind him and shut the door.

  Carey lay in her bed looking at the closed door. She bit her lips to prevent them trembling.

  Lunch, Carey decided, was a silly affair. She decided this so as not to let herself grow sadder or to spoil the lovely day outside.

  Oliver sat at the end of the dining-room table and she sat round the corner on his right hand. Every time the maid came into the room Oliver talked to Carey about various people who had been at the wedding. When the maid went out of the room he fell silent. Trying to match her demeanour with his, Carey fell silent, too.

  ‘It is necessary to be polite and courteous to all these people if and when we meet them again,’ Oliver said of the wedding guests. ‘You won’t be seeing much of them after we return to Two Creeks. I spend most of my time on the station. The Reddin family is an old Melbourne family and for the sake of tradition … as well as for Mother’s and Millicent’s sakes … I uphold some of the customs and keep the social ties. Hence the size of this wedding.’

  He paused, lifted his head and looked down the length of the dining-room towards the window as if the patterning of sunlight and shadow in the trees outside had drawn his attention.

  ‘Christenings, weddings and funerals,’ he added, with a touch of the sardonic. ‘They are the events that keep us all together.’

  It had been on the tip of Carey’s tongue to say, ‘We’ll be able to provide the wedding and the funerals, and leave the christenings to someone else,’ but she decided Oliver was not the kind of person to whom one made jokes like that. At … laughter. From Oliver it would have brought silence and perhaps anger.

  Carey sighed imperceptibly. Oliver probably never guessed she had thoughts like that. How did she tell him she did? How did she tell him anything?

  Immediately after lunch Oliver made arrangements for their departure. Cases were put in the boot of the big car outside the main entrance. A station wagon was to follow with Carey’s new trunks and other cases.

  Carey wore the pretty suit and hat she had worn the day Oliver had called for her at Mrs. Cleaver’s house. At the last minute she went upstairs to say good-bye to Mrs. Reddin and Millicent, and to thank them for all their trouble over the wedding.

  ‘Don’t thank me, my dear,’ Mrs
. Reddin said from the pillowed recesses of her bed. On a table beside her was a great silver tray with covered silver dishes. She had had her lunch brought to her in her room. Millicent, now sitting in her satin dressing-gown in an arm-chair, had shared it with her there.

  ‘If we didn’t have a wedding … or something like that … it wouldn’t be worth keeping up this big house. Sometimes I think …’

  ‘You shouldn’t think so much, Mother,’ Millicent said. ‘This house is our home. It is a symbol of our position in Melbourne.’

  ‘Yes, dear, but all the other big homes in the St. Kilda Road are being bought up for schools or hotels …’

  ‘Mother!’ said Millicent sharply as if to chasten a blasphemy. She turned quickly to Carey. ‘You are to see that Oliver does nothing about selling this house,’ she ordered. ‘It is the Reddin home. It must never be a school or a hotel …’

  ‘Is this house Oliver’s house?’ Carey asked innocently.

  There was a momentary silence.

  ‘Didn’t you know?’ asked Millicent with a sudden wary note in her voice.

  Carey shook her head.

  ‘I don’t know what is or isn’t Oliver’s,’ she said. ‘But I’d never ask him to sell anything he values. Or that you and Mrs. Reddin value.’

  ‘We value everything in it,’ said Millicent. ‘If you were to alter things you would cause my mother great unhappiness.’

  Carey felt as if she had stepped unexpectedly on an ants’ nest.

  ‘I don’t think that is a bit likely,’ she said. ‘You see, Oliver likes Two Creeks best. So do I. He also likes to retain his Melbourne connections. He told me. So I feel sure Cranston will stay just as it is …’

  She could see the stiff defensiveness gradually seeping out of Millicent’s erect figure.

  ‘As long as Oliver thinks that way it will be all right,’ Millicent said. She looked at Carey steadily out of a pair of eyes made hard by anxiety and suspicion. ‘You do rather look the kind of person who will be guided by Oliver,’ she said at last. ‘I’m sure we’ll all get on very well together as long as you don’t … well … don’t upset us here at Cranston.’

  ‘Yes, dear,’ Mrs. Reddin said. ‘I don’t see why you can’t live happily at Two Creeks and leave Millicent and me happily here. I do sometimes wonder why we keep such a big house on. It’s really a white elephant in these times …’

  ‘Mother!’ said Millicent, exasperated.

  ‘Yes, dear,’ Mrs. Reddin said, ‘I know how you feel. But you see, it’s going to be all right with Carey after all. I know you wanted Oliver to marry Jane because Jane absolutely adores this place. I’ve always rather thought, dear, that Jane wanted it as a kind of setting. We might be better off with Carey after all.’

  Carey was so surprised at this revealing conversation she could think of nothing to say. She was sure Oliver was not in the least likely to consult her about any plans he might have in view that concerned the house or his mother and Millicent. She didn’t, however, want to say this because Millicent had already made it clear she thought Oliver had taken to himself a child-wife with no particular will of her own. That stung Carey in the place where her pride was most sore.

  She patted Mrs. Reddin’s hand.

  ‘Please don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I would never do anything that would make you unhappy. You see, that would make Oliver unhappy, too.’

  ‘If you have the capacity for doing anything about Oliver’s happiness or unhappiness I will be very surprised,’ Millicent said wearily. ‘He arranges all that side of his life himself.’

  Now just what does she mean by that? Carey wondered.

  ‘One thing,’ Millicent went on. ‘He’ll have to give up his little Melbourne jaunts when he doesn’t explain where he’s going or with whom. That will be a form of self-discipline marriage will impose on him. Nothing else has ever interfered with Oliver having his own way.’

  ‘We have a lot to do on Two Creeks and my farm,’ Carey said quietly. ‘I expect we won’t want to come to town for a long time.’

  ‘No,’ said Mrs. Reddin. ‘And when you want a holiday I suppose you’ll want to go back to ‒ to ‒ what was the name of that place, Millicent?’

  Millicent shrugged.

  Carey did not feel inclined to tell them. She had told them before, several times. She leaned forward and kissed Mrs. Reddin on the forehead. Millicent showed no signs of wanting to be kissed so Carey looked at her, smiled, and said:

  ‘Good-bye, Millicent. I hope you will come to Two Creeks before long.’

  ‘Yes, I’ll have to do that,’ said Millicent in a voice heavy with duty. ‘All the curtains should be taken down before Christmas. And the pantry and store gone through. I expect to be there quite a week when I do come. There is always so much that has to be done at Two Creeks.’

  Carey as she went out of the door and down the staircase thought about those words of Millicent’s. They worried her more than the thought of Cranston and its future. When Millicent came to Two Creeks she expected to supervise the annual cleaning and renovating. That might be very hard to avert. Carey didn’t know much about Oliver’s attitudes but of this one she was certain. He didn’t want Millicent taking over the homestead every time she came out. He had asked Carey could she manage Millicent on the very day he had said they should get married.

  ‘I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it,’ said Carey to herself.

  They drove out west along the great highway. Already the route was beginning to be familiar to her. The Flemington Race Course, the other suburbs with their gardened wooden villas so fresh looking in the Sunday calm, and their gay modern colours. Out into the flat treeless country where the paddocks were yellow with dandelions, then suddenly dipping into undulating country with the mountains in the distance.

  They passed through Melton that was a town not so very unlike Wybong. Only the greenness of the countryside around was different. Otherwise there were the verandas outside the small shops … the pub at the corner. Across the Creek through Bacchus Marsh they went, then climbed upwards into the hilly country that was the first footfall of the Great Dividing Range.

  Oliver drove at a great speed. The big car under them was so beautifully sprung it seemed as if they drove through the air instead of on the ground.

  Only when cattle were grazing near the fences did Oliver slow down. Then it was merely a safety precaution for he was looking closely at the cattle.

  ‘Too many Frisians in that herd,’ he said once. ‘Can’t think why Rollinsons don’t build up their Jerseys.’

  Ten miles farther on there was a bunch of sleek horses grazing fifty yards off the road. Oliver pulled up the car this time, and getting out crossed the road and leaned on the six wire fence. When he came back to the car he was smiling.

  ‘Single Dane’s progeny,’ he said. ‘If I had those three foals I’d make racers of them. Bill Smart will try to turn them into hunters … and won’t succeed.’

  When they had driven into Melbourne the day Oliver had taken her to Mrs. Cleaver’s house, Carey remembered his preoccupation with what went on on other people’s stations and farms. The difference between a station and a farm in this part of the country, he explained, was size and equipment. The nearer to Melbourne you got, the smaller the acreage, though often the richer.

  Oliver’s manner relaxed a great deal now. He spoke quite often about the properties they passed. Carey could see that he had only one love, one real interest in life. It was what went on on the land. He had forgotten she was his wife, or his problem. She was simply someone to sit there in silence and listen while he made comments on the state of the pastures or crops; the fitness or otherwise of the stock.

  And Carey did sit in silence. She intended to learn everything there was to be learned about this part of Victoria. She had a farm of her own to think about and nothing was plainer than that the rearing of stock on it would be a totally different thing from the vast area cattle stations out of Wybong.

  Th
ey sped along the beautiful winding road ever going up and up and up towards the mountains.

  Oliver did not seem to notice her silence any more than he noticed the speed. When Carey noticed the speedometer reading eighty she ceased to watch it. In this high-powered car it didn’t feel like eighty miles an hour, anyway.

  Chapter Eight

  Night had fallen when they turned into the home paddock of Two Creeks. Even in the starlight the white painted cross pieces of the fence looked so well cared for … so rich … that Carey felt a swelling of pride in her heart.

  For the first time she realised she had not only come home, she had come to her home. Two Creeks was hers, too. Something to cherish and be proud of.

  She was astonished at the lifting of her spirits. This was something she hadn’t thought of before. This was hers. Not only somewhere to live, but something to care for.

  ‘Oh, I’m so glad we came home to-day,’ she said, as the car pulled up in the gravel way below the veranda steps. ‘This is much nicer than staying in Melbourne.’ Oliver had shut off the engine and was opening his door when she spoke. For the first time since they had left Melbourne he seemed to realise her as a person with a special claim to have wishes about where she should be on any Sunday or Monday.

  ‘You like the country better than the city?’ he asked.

  ‘Of course,’ Carey said. There was a note of happiness in her voice. ‘I’m a country girl, aren’t I?’

  Oliver got out and walked round the car to open the door for her. She got out of the car and stood looking out between the trees to where the paddocks were dark pools of distance between the white painted fences. She seemed unaware that he was standing silently beside her.

  Suddenly she ran across the lawn and stood leaning against the fence of the home paddock.

  ‘Oh, the beautiful smell of it! And I’ve always taken for granted that tremendous span of sky. I’ve only had bits of it in Melbourne. But now …’

  She realised she was talking to herself. Oliver had stood silent by the car a moment and then had begun to take the cases from the boot of the car. He paid no attention to Carey’s ecstasies.