Broken Threads

by Tessa Barclay

  ‘So I heard. I heard she was renowned for her pulchritude.’ Jenny was smiling.

  ‘Oh, that’s Chalmers ‒ I can hear him say it. Aye, renowned for her pulchritude ‒ a lot of men have wanted Dinah Bowerby and she’s always held herself aloof.’

  ‘Until now.’

  ‘Yes, until now.’ He felt for words. ‘You must understand that at that time Dinah didn’t know I was married. I’d never said anything about it to the people I met during my travels in the bush. Afterwards …’ Once again he coloured up. ‘After she’d given herself to me she took it for granted we would be married. I had to tell her then that I had a wife in the Old Country.’

  ‘And what did she say?’

  ‘At first she was shocked. She was strictly brought up, you understand ‒ in an orphan school where they talked about hellfire and so on. In taking a lover she felt she had sinned in some degree. Having slept with a married man was like … like asking for eternal damnation.’

  ‘Poor girl,’ sighed Jenny.

  ‘It was partly because she was so overset that I told her you and I had drifted apart, that I’d decided to make a new start. She was content with that.’ He paused. ‘Out here, you see, it’s what you are and what you do here and now that counts. I’ll wager there’s many a man doing well in some little settlement with a new wife and family who left a wife or a fiancée in England. There’s a sort of tolerance ‒ not for wrong-doing among your friends and neighbours because you have to be able to depend on those, and they on you. But for what you may have done in the past that you’ve left behind ‒ there’s a suspension of blame on that.’

  ‘Was that why you asked Chalmers to buy a family farm for you? You were going to set up anew with Dinah?’

  ‘Oh, don’t, Jenny! It sounds so … so impossible when I hear you say it in that soft Scots voice of yours!’ He sighed. ‘That’s one of the things it’s marvellous to hear again ‒ your voice is as beautiful as your face. I’ve missed that sound …’

  Jenny knew at once that Dinah Bowerby had an unattractive speaking voice. She condemned herself for finding that very cheering.

  ‘The farm was for you and Dinah, though?’

  ‘I suppose so. I was trying to decide what to do. Then I got a terse message saying you had no interest in buying a small farm. At first I was very angry. “What does she mean, telling me what I can do and what I can’t do” ‒ you know how it is. And then I thought how awful it was to think of buying a farm for my mistress when I would have to use money from William Corvill and Son. It brought me up short. I think it was that, almost more than anything else, that made me draw back.’

  ‘Did Dinah know about buying the farm?’

  ‘Oh yes. And when I put it off she was very distressed. She said I was trying to get rid of her, and I of course tried to reassure her, and instead of making things better it made them more confused. But the Daniells, for whom she’d been working, began to get worried, so she moved off to a place about eight miles up the road near Murramurra ‒ she cooks for them.’

  ‘You go to see her?’

  ‘Last time was ten days ago. We had another quarrel … though she coaxed me round before we parted.’

  ‘A fine fix you’re in, Ronald Armstrong.’

  ‘Don’t I know it.’

  ‘And what do you intend to do now?’

  He nodded to himself. ‘I’ll go and see her. When I tell her my wife has come, she’ll understand it really is over. I don’t want to use you as an excuse, but nothing else seems to convince her. She’s … she’s not a clever woman, you see, Jenny. She takes a stand and then she can’t listen to reason. But I mustn’t put the blame on Dinah. It’s all my fault.’

  ‘Ach, it will come out all right, so long as we really love each other and want to keep our marriage. You do love me, Ronald?’

  ‘Oh, Jenny …’ He took her in his arms and began to kiss her with a longing that had something of desperation in it. Her response was as deep and eager as his.

  The couch of ferns cradled them. Around them the bright birds piped in the trees, grasshoppers trilled a descant. The world whirled around them to become a haze of colour and sound and scent, coalescing at last into a jewel point that glistened with the ultimate reward.

  ‘I love you, Jenny. No matter what I may have done, I only ever could love you.’

  ‘Yes, Ronald my joy, I know it. And you’re the only man for me.’

  ‘No one is like you, Jenny. To me no woman on earth is your equal.’

  ‘Hush, man. I’m no marvel, God knows. But if you love me, that makes me special.’

  They lay for a time renewing vows that had been forgotten. Then passion took them in her grasp once more. This time there was no slightest apprehension to mar their unity. She held him in her arms and took his body to her with every sinew, every nerve, every wish and hope of her soul.

  Spent, they slipped into languor. But it was hot and they grew restless. Jenny half sat up, reaching for her clothes.

  ‘No, come along,’ Ronald protested, seizing her hand. He drew her to her feet and pulled her with him. Half-running they made their way along the river bank until they came to a bend where the water had formed a pond. He put his arms around her, overbalanced them, and they fell into the cool yellowish-brown pool.

  Jenny gave a shriek of alarm. But almost at once she found her feet and stood up. The water was only waist deep. They bathed and splashed like children playing truant from school. Ronald amazed her by catching a fish with his hands, scooping it up to throw it on the bank.

  Later, clad in only the minimum of clothes, he grilled the fish over a fire of dry twigs. They ate it with their fingers, and drank water from the stream.

  Then they lay down in the shade to while away the heat of the afternoon. They slept, woke to kisses and caresses and the long pleasure of making love, with the wilderness beating to the same pulse that measured their heartbeat.

  When they returned to Daniells farm, they found Heather being led round the back paddock on a sturdy little pony. The pony was being held by Mabel Daniell, with Baird plodding grimly in the rear.

  Heather waved as they came up. She was beaming with delight.

  ‘So you’re a horsewoman!’ cried Ronald. ‘That’s a good thing ‒ it’s one of the most useful talents in this country.’

  ‘She’s a natural,’ said Mabel. ‘She’s got no pony at home, Mrs Baird tells me.’

  ‘No, she never seemed to want to … But then the coachman was the one who tried to put her up, and she shied away from him.’

  ‘She can take lessons on Goodie, if she wants. The jackaroo can teach her.’

  ‘The jackaroo ‒’

  ‘That’s the apprentice boy, Harry ‒ he does all the odd jobs around the place,’ Ronald explained.

  ‘A bit simple but good with the livestock.’

  ‘I don’t know …’

  ‘I’ll keep an eye on her, never you fret,’ Baird said. ‘If she wants to learn …?’

  ‘Aye, she should be encouraged.’ Every change in Heather, every improvement, was important. Bringing her out to meet the real world was one of the most important things Jenny had to achieve.

  Bob Daniell came home in time for tea. ‘The blackfellows over the ridge were saying they’d seen Mrs Armstrong,’ he remarked.

  ‘You talked to them?’

  ‘Yair. Off to Tarrabinna Spring, I gather.’

  ‘I never got the whole story from them about the plant that gives the tan dye ‒’

  ‘You might catch ’em up at Hoke’s place. They like to stop there, there’s honey in the woods just above it. But I reckon they won’t tell you much about the dyes. I don’t think they know themselves how they do it.’

  ‘Do they just wander about as and when they please?’ Jenny inquired, struggling with the mountain of food Mrs Daniell had piled on her plate.

  ‘Right. Nomads, that’s what they are. You give ’em employment, they stay a few weeks or months and then one day you go
to their camp and they’ve gone. Still, they spread the news around the district. By now everybody within a radius of ten miles knows Mrs Armstrong has arrived.’

  She met Ronald’s eyes. The unspoken question was, Would Dinah know? He nodded imperceptibly. He sighed, and she too felt a moment of unhappiness.

  ‘Besides,’ Bob added, grinning, ‘Gunder’s gone off visiting. He’ll be spreading the word.’

  ‘Gunder? He scarcely opens his mouth,’ Jenny objected.

  ‘But he nods and shakes his head when folk question him. Oh yes, I reckon everybody knows you’re here, Mrs Armstrong.’

  Later, after he’d said goodnight to Heather and spent some time in farming chat with Bob, Ronald set off for his camp by the stream. There was no room in the house for him to sleep without turning out Baird to a bed in the hayloft.

  Jenny walked part of the way with him. ‘Come out to me, if you’re lonely,’ he said in a whisper as they said goodnight.

  She gave a low laugh. ‘What, into the wild Australian bush?’

  ‘It couldn’t be any wilder than we were today. Besides, we still have a lot to talk about.’

  She hesitated. ‘I’ll come,’ she said. ‘After everyone has settled down.’

  The moon was high when she slipped out of the door. Scattered on a slate-blue sky, the stars seemed larger and brighter and with a softer glow than in the northern hemisphere. She had no difficulty following the path to the stream. Ronald came to meet her as she parted the brush near his lean-to.

  They sat for a long time on the fallen log, each with an arm about the other’s shoulder, listening to the quiet breathing of the night.

  ‘I want to talk to you about Dinah,’ she said at length. ‘It’s clear she knows by now that I’ve come. What is best to do next?’

  ‘I’ll have to go and see her, tell her that it’s really over ‒’

  ‘Ronald, I think I should go.’

  ‘What? Certainly not! It’s my mess and I’ll clear it up!’

  ‘I think it would be better if I spoke to her. You see, I know what she’s going through.’

  ‘I don’t see ‒’

  ‘You don’t know all that’s happened to me. There was a time, when I was even younger than Dinah, that I was in love with a married man. I had to give him up but the parting was so cruel that it left a scar ‒ I still shudder when I think of it. So I’d like to be the one to speak to Dinah. I have a fellow-feeling.’

  ‘I absolutely forbid it!’

  But by the time she rose quietly in the dawn light to go back to the farm, she had convinced him it should be left to her to see Dinah Bowerby.

  She made the trip next day, leaving Heather happy in the care of Baird and Harry the apprentice boy. She borrowed a little trap with a lively, stringy pony. The road was easy to follow ‒ you had only to look for the tracks of other wheeled vehicles on the dry ground.

  Eight miles off was Durramurra, a station on the southern slope of a long, shelving hollow. The selector here had been lucky ‒ the streams were shallow but still ran with energy despite the long dry spell, and the grass, though patched with scrub, was holding up under the searing heat. There were fences of carpentered wood and wire, not thorn brakes. The house itself proved to be much larger than Daniell’s, part of it even having an upper storey.

  She drove up. Guard dogs barked and cavorted. A blackfellow ran up to hold the pony. She stepped down, and was greeted by Mrs Fowler, wife to the owner.

  ‘You’ll be Mrs Armstrong,’ she said at once.

  Jenny didn’t say, How did you know? She said, ‘How do you do,’ and held out her hand. Mrs Fowler looked at the kid driving glove with admiration, and shook hands.

  ‘Been expecting you,’ she said. That was clear, for she had on what looked like her best gown. ‘Come in and I’ll give you a cup of tea. Hot, isn’t it?’

  Jenny went thankfully into the cool of the house. It had more elegance than Daniell’s, with lace-edged antimacassars on the chairbacks and lace curtains at the inner windows. Coolness was retained by a wide verandah all round the house with windows shaded by holland blinds.

  The scene was almost bizarre. Mrs Fowler had set out her best china on an embroidered cloth, and there was even a silver cakestand with scones and two kinds of cake. ‘Do you take milk and sugar?’ Mrs Fowler inquired, lifting a Wedgwood teapot.

  ‘Milk, please, no sugar.’

  And so they conversed in genteel tones until Jenny had drunk a cup of tea and sampled a scone with home-made quince jelly.

  ‘You want to see Dinah, I suppose,’ Mrs Fowler said as they set down their teacups.

  Jenny nodded.

  ‘Now, I don’t want you to think I approve of her goings-on just because I gave her a job. But I can’t manage this place on my own and the Abo girl I had just upped and went. So I was glad to get Dinah, for she’s a good worker and the men like her grub. And in any case I thought it’d be sorted out by and by when the two of them got married.’

  ‘I understand,’ Jenny said faintly. This forthright interest in someone else’s affairs was totally unlike the hints and nods of the townsfolk of Galashiels.

  ‘You could have knocked me down with a feather when Gunder said the lady who’d turned up was Mrs Armstrong.’ Her hostess surveyed Jenny with great interest. ‘Is that corded cotton, your dress?’

  ‘It’s a fabric called repp. The weave is used in silk and wool too.’

  ‘Is that right? And the hat ‒ did you bring that from the Old Country?’

  ‘No, I bought it in Sydney. Bonnets at home have narrow brims.’

  ‘Narrow brims,’ said Mrs Fowler, recording it in her memory.

  ‘If you could tell me where to find Dinah?’

  Mrs Fowler took her to the door and pointed. ‘She took to her heels the minute Marty ‒ that’s the Abo ‒ said you were coming. You’ll find her in the dairy, that’s the shed at the far end with the stone walls. She’s probably making butter ‒ working off her energy on the paddle.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  She knew Mrs Fowler stood and watched her until she reached the door of the dairy. She opened it and walked into the cool dimness.

  At first, after the glare of outdoors, she could make out almost nothing. Then she saw a figure sitting next to the butter churn at the far side of the shed. She was tall and well-made, clad in a faded high-necked print dress. Her hair gleamed, a rich light chestnut.

  Jenny had come all across the world to confront her. For this was the other woman.

  Chapter Twenty

  Dinah Bowerby kept her head turned away.

  ‘If you’ve come to tell me I’m a wicked woman, don’t bother. I’ve heard it all from Ma Fowler.’

  Jenny hesitated. ‘That’s not why I came.’

  ‘Why, then?’ The girl looked at her at last. The blaze of anger was in the dark blue eyes. ‘What are you here for? If you want my Ron, you can’t have him.’

  Jenny looked around for something to sit on. She didn’t want to stand over the other girl like a scolding schoolmarm. She saw a wooden box by the whitewashed wall, dragged it over, and sat.

  ‘I’ve come a long way to meet you,’ she remarked, ‘so let’s try to talk sensibly.’

  ‘I can’t understand why you’re here!’ Dinah cried, forcing the handle of the butter-paddle up and down in the churn with fierce energy. ‘What made you come? You’ve given up all your fine life back home and it’s not as if you really care about him!’

  The voice was without modulation, rather nasal in tone. Jenny understood what her husband had been hinting at. It was strange that a girl so beautiful to look at should be so unpleasing to listen to. It was strange, and sad.

  She ranted on, banging the paddle up and down in the narrow wooden tub, turned away so that she couldn’t see her listener. ‘And you didn’t want him when he was home in Scotland so why ‒’

  ‘What makes you think I didn’t want him?’

  ‘It’s plain to see, ain’t it? You were
all taken up with your business concerns, hadn’t time for your man ‒’

  ‘Did Ronald tell you that?’

  The thud of the butter-paddle stopped. ‘It was easy to read between the lines of what he said ‒’

  ‘The trouble with reading between the lines is that you can imagine what you like in the blank space,’ Jenny said. ‘Did he ever speak about our little girl?’

  Dinah sat back on her stool. ‘He never mentioned even you, until … until …’

  ‘Until you began suggesting a wedding.’

  ‘So you’ve discussed it with him!’ It was almost a snarl of resentment.

  ‘Of course. I had to know how matters stood. After you’d been to bed together and you wanted to get married, he told you he already had a wife. That’s right, isn’t it?’

  ‘You’ve no need to be so tart about it ‒’

  ‘I don’t mean to sound tart. I’m not blaming you or him. He told you he couldn’t marry you because he was already married, and spoke about me ‒ that’s clear because you’ve got some impression of me, no matter how wrong I think it is. What I asked was, did he speak about Heather, our daughter?’

  Dinah let her hands fall loosely into the lap of her gown. She stared at them. ‘He said he had a little girl. I told him it didn’t matter.’

  ‘We lost her ‒’

  ‘What? When?’ There was genuine shock in the harsh tone. ‘Last time he spoke about her, he took it for granted she was still alive ‒’

  ‘No, no,’ Jenny broke in, quickly trying to put it right. ‘Heather is alive. I meant it literally ‒ we lost her, she was stolen away.’

  Dinah frowned. ‘You’re joshing me.’

  ‘No, truly. I don’t want to go into a long story about it, but Heather was missing for almost a whole year. When I got her back she took up my entire life. She was so … so changed, so scared and shocked, I couldn’t think about anything else.’

  ‘Why are you telling me this? Is it some kind of trick to get sympathy?’