by Judy Nunn
‘That’s very kind of you, Foong Lee,’ Henrietta replied, ‘but I think I’ll take Malcolm home to Bullalalla.’ Beside her, she was aware of Paul’s surprised reaction. ‘It’s been a long day and he’s tired.’
‘Of course,’ Foong Lee agreed, ‘another time.’
‘I thought you were staying tonight at Aggie’s,’ Paul said, quietly easing her aside.
‘I was, but I …’
‘And I thought we were having dinner together.’
‘I didn’t say I would, if you remember.’ She realised that she sounded brusque. She didn’t mean to, she wasn’t angry with Paul for his complicity, she wasn’t even angry with Aggie anymore, they both meant well. But she needed to be on her own. ‘I’m sorry if it’s a disappointment,’ she said, ‘but …’
‘It is.’
‘… but I’d prefer to take Malcolm home, we’re both tired.’
‘Are we all going back to my place?’ They were interrupted by Aggie, dishevelled, her hair a mess from being tugged at by tiny children, her clothes in disarray from playing hide and seek with the older ones, and her eyes sparkling with the success of her party.
‘Henrietta says she’s going back to Bullalalla,’ Paul said. ‘She won’t listen to me, it’s up to you to convince her otherwise, Aggie.’
Aggie was instantly deflated. A look of concern replaced the sparkle in her eyes. ‘Oh Henrietta …’
‘Forgive me, Aggie, I really must,’ Henrietta immediately interrupted, she couldn’t bear to hear another apology. She hated seeing the regret in Aggie’s eyes and she hated the knowledge that she was ruining the woman’s moment of triumph. ‘Malcolm didn’t sleep well last night, he’ll be much more comfortable in his cot at home.’ She tried to make her excuses sound as reasonable and sincere as she could. ‘And quite frankly, so will I,’ she smiled. ‘I was saying to Paul earlier, Malcolm kept me awake half the night, I really am exhausted.’
Aggie nodded guiltily and she looked so unhappy that Henrietta hugged her. ‘I’m sorry, Aggie, really I am.’
‘So am I,’ Aggie said quietly.
‘Don’t be,’ Henrietta whispered in her ear. ‘I’m not angry anymore, thank you for caring.’
Paul looked at the women, bemused. What the hell was going on? But as Henrietta went off to collect Malcolm, Aggie refused to acknowledge the query in Paul’s eyes; she wasn’t ready to share confidences yet.
‘I’ll be here for hours cleaning up, Paul, you drive Henrietta back to the house, I’ll get you the key.’ She fetched her front door key from her handbag. ‘Just tell her to leave it under the doormat,’ and she disappeared.
They talked about the party on the drive back to Aggie’s, Paul aware that Henrietta didn’t want to discuss what had happened and Henrietta grateful for his sensitivity in not asking.
He packed her suitcase into the Landrover, strapped Malcolm into his seat and embraced her as he said goodbye.
‘Don’t forget, Henrietta,’ he said, ‘if ever you need me …’
‘Yes I know, Paul. Thanks.’ She kissed his cheek and got into the car.
Malcolm slept during the two-hour drive home to Bullalalla and he was still sleeping when she pulled up in front of the house, it was four o’clock in the afternoon. Gently she lifted the child from the car and carried him inside, she’d get him settled and come back for the suitcase later.
The house was deserted. Of course, Henrietta realised, Nellie would be at the storeroom near the slaughter yards handing out the rations, Pearl was no doubt helping her.
Henrietta carried the little boy upstairs and into the nursery, and he half woke as she undressed him and put him in his cot, but he was fast asleep again as she tip-toed to the door. Perhaps it was just as well she’d come home, she thought, the child was utterly exhausted.
As she quietly closed the door behind her, she heard muffled noises coming from the room next door. The master bedroom where she and Terence slept. Had he come home from the muster? She turned the knob and pushed open the door.
The black and white of their skin was shocking, it was the first thing that struck Henrietta. They were standing by the bed, both naked from the waist up, and Terence’s sleek, tanned body looked strangely white against Pearl’s blackness as he grasped her to him. In their struggle, neither saw Henrietta. Terence’s back was towards her and he was ripping at Pearl’s skirt. It came away and he threw it to the floor. Pearl’s eyes were tightly shut and she was gasping as he pushed her towards the bed, tearing at her panties, his mouth at her throat as if he wanted to devour her.
She was shaking her head from side to side and trying, ineffectively, to push him away. He tore her panties from her and she opened her mouth as if to scream her protest, but she didn’t. Her eyes opened wide instead and Henrietta saw in them not only revulsion but resignation. Horror-struck, she realised that the girl was prepared to accept her rape. And in that same instant Pearl’s eyes met hers.
Terence unbuckled his belt, he didn’t know why the girl had stopped fighting, he’d liked it better when she struggled, but obviously she knew her place and she’d given in. Then he saw the look in the girl’s eyes and he turned.
Henrietta stood frozen at the door. There was a moment’s silence. Then she said, ‘Let her go.’ Terence had already released his grip on the girl, but Pearl remained motionless, afraid to move.
‘Go on,’ Terence said, ‘get out,’ and Pearl ducked for the door.
‘Collect your clothes, Pearl,’ Henrietta said, ‘get dressed and wait for me in the hall, I’ll take you to your mother.’
Henrietta wondered at the calmness of her voice. The first jarring sight of them had sickened her, then seconds later, the recognition of Terence’s intent to rape had repulsed her. Now she felt nothing. She was numb.
Pearl submissively gathered up her clothes and dived out the door, her eyes averted, terrified.
‘What do you mean, you’ll take her to her mother?’ Terence, having recovered from his own shock of discovery, was derisive. ‘The girl’s a slut.’
‘You were going to rape her.’
‘She asked for it.’
Henrietta remained staring at him. Standing, still numb, by the door, wondering why she couldn’t leave.
‘For God’s sake, Henrietta, do you think she’s a virgin?’ Terence buckled up his belt. ‘She’s been sleeping with one of the drovers for months, she’s a slut, she’s anybody’s.’ It had been driving Terence mad watching Pearl go down to the native camp the nights when the drovers came home. He’d lusted after her for years, but he’d always done the right thing. Pearl was, after all, ‘family’, in a bizarre way, and he’d sated his appetite for black velvet elsewhere. But now the girl was of age, and she was sleeping around, and Jesus all of his mates did it with the blacks, it was common knowledge. Just as it was common knowledge that the wives turned a blind eye. Terence knew he’d overstepped the mark by taking the girl into the bedroom, he was willing to concede that, and he cursed the fact that Henrietta had come home unexpectedly, but he really didn’t understand that he’d done anything so terribly wrong. Henrietta’s silence and her look of revulsion annoyed him.
‘Christ, Henrietta,’ he said, picking his shirt up from the floor, ‘when will you realise you’re not in the old country, things are different here. It’s just a bit of fun, she’s a black and she was panting for it.’
‘No she wasn’t.’ Henrietta needed to get away, the numbness was wearing off and she couldn’t bear to be in his company. ‘I’m leaving,’ she said, ‘and I’m taking Malcolm with me.’
She turned to go, but in two quick strides Terence was upon her, whirling her about, his annoyance now blind anger. He struck her so forcefully across the face that she was knocked sideways and fell sprawling to the floor. She sat up groggily, her cheek aching, a ringing noise in her ear.
He stood towering over her. ‘You’ll never take my son. And if you ever try to leave me I’ll find you, Henrietta.’ He pulled her to her fee
t and she stood, still a little dizzy, as he supported her. ‘I’ll find you and I’ll kill you.’
For the first time in the five years of their marriage, Henrietta recognised the madness in her husband. She’d seen flashes of it before, she realised as she stared back at him. Images spun through her mind. The day when he’d made her ride Florian. The day when he’d taunted her with the slaughter of the steers. But she’d not seen his behaviour as that of a madman, and she’d never feared him as she did now.
Terence was pleased with her submissiveness. He led her to the bed and sat her down. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said gently, ‘I shouldn’t have brought the girl into our bedroom, I’ll never do it again.’ As she looked up at him, something in her eyes, frightened as they were, must have prompted him to add, ‘I’ll never go near her again, I promise.’ He reached out his hand and softly stroked her hair. ‘And I’m sorry I hit you, I’ll never do that again either, I give you my word. But you must never threaten me, Henrietta, you must never leave me. Besides,’ he said, still stroking her hair, ‘where would you go? How would you live?’
She seemed to have calmed down, so Terence crossed to the shirt which lay on the floor where he’d dropped it. He stooped and picked it up. ‘And surely you wouldn’t wish to cheat your son of his inheritance,’ he said, slipping it over his shoulders. ‘Not that you’d be able to take Malcolm with you in any event. If you walked out on our marriage, any court of law would grant me custody of the boy.’ He sat beside her on the bed, buttoning up the shirt. ‘It’s silly to make threats, Henrietta. I love you, you know that.’ He kissed her gently. ‘I love you and you’re mine. Never forget that you’re mine, Henrietta, never ever forget that.’ He kissed her more deeply and Henrietta, too fearful to resist, submitted to the kiss.
‘There you see? It’s all over.’ He held her to him, caressing her tenderly. ‘We’ll forget that it ever happened.’
‘Yes,’ she whispered. She had to get out, she had to get away from him.
He took her face between his hands and looked at her. ‘You do believe that I love you, don’t you, Henrietta?’
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I do.’ Despite his madness, she knew that he loved her, she could see it in his eyes, in the anxiousness with which he awaited her reply. It was his love that she most feared, she realised.
‘Good.’ He relaxed, rising from the bed to tuck his shirt into his trousers; it was evident that the episode was over.
Henrietta somehow found the strength to say, ‘I’d like to go back to Aggie’s tonight, as I’d planned, if that’s all right.’
‘Why?’ His eyes clouded once more as he turned to her.
‘I promised I’d meet with the others this evening and help clean up the hall after the party.’ Desperation lent her strength, it was as if her life depended on the credibility of her lie. ‘I only brought Malcolm home because he didn’t sleep well last night and he was terribly tired. I was going to leave him with Nellie and go back to Aggie’s.’
‘I see.’ There was an ominous pause. ‘And what will you tell your friend, Aggie?’
‘Nothing.’ Her response was not prompted by the inherent threat in his tone. Never would she tell anyone what had happened this afternoon. ‘I’ll tell Aggie nothing,’ she said.
‘Good.’ Chameleon-like, he relaxed once more. ‘It’s all forgotten then?’
‘Yes it’s all forgotten.’
‘I’ll take your things to the car.’
‘My suitcase is still in the Landrover,’ she said, thankfully remembering she’d left it there. It added to the credibility of her story. ‘I’ll just check on Malcolm.’
Moments later, as she closed the nursery door behind her, Terence met her on the landing and they walked downstairs together.
Pearl was not waiting in the hall as Henrietta had instructed her, the girl was nowhere to be seen. It was hardly surprising, Henrietta thought, she’d probably heard the violence of Terence’s reaction and run for her life.
Pearl had indeed heard the boss strike the missus, and she’d heard the missus fall to the floor. As she’d scrambled into her clothes on the landing, she’d heard everything. She’d scampered, terrified, downstairs to the back door. But she hadn’t run away. She’d left the back door open to afford a quick getaway and she’d crept back through the kitchen. If the boss was killing the missus then she must run for help. But as she’d peered through the door to the main hall, all had been silent from above, and she didn’t dare go back up to look.
Now, as the two of them came downstairs, she was surprised to see they were behaving as if nothing had happened.
‘Malcolm will need to be fed in about half an hour,’ the missus was saying.
‘I’ll do it myself,’ she heard the the boss answer, ‘and I’ll get my own dinner, I’ll give Nellie the night off.’
Pearl watched them walk out the front door together. Thank goodness the boss hadn’t killed the missus. She ducked through the kitchen, she’d keep well out of the boss’s way tonight. Thank goodness the missus had saved her from having to sleep with him, she’d hated him touching her. She wished he hadn’t told the missus she was a slut, because she wasn’t. She’d slept with no-one but her fella, they’d been together six months now, and they were going to get married next season. Pearl closed the back door quietly behind her, she hoped the boss wouldn’t come at her again.
Terence opened the car door for Henrietta. ‘What time will you be back?’ he asked.
‘About lunchtime, I suppose,’ she answered automatically. She didn’t know what to say, she didn’t know if she’d ever be back, she needed to think, there were decisions to be made.
But during the drive into town Henrietta couldn’t think. Not logically anyway. She could make no decisions, her mind was in turmoil. Images kept whirling about in her brain. The two of them, black and white, locked together. The look in Pearl’s eyes as they’d met hers. The madness in Terence as he’d struck her. She tried to rid herself of the images and concentrate on his words instead, but they too whirled dizzyingly through her brain. If you leave me I’ll find you, Henrietta, I’ll find you and I’ll kill you … surely you wouldn’t want to cheat your son of his inheritance … if you walked out on our marriage, any court of law would grant me custody of the boy.
She must force herself to think constructively. A plan, she must make a plan. But Terence was right. Where would she go? How would she live? She could return to England, her grandmother had money. For the past five years Henrietta had corresponded regularly with her grandmother, but the thought of Winifred Southern brought no comfort to her now, for the old lady was dying. ‘It’s taking such a long time Henrietta, and I so want to go,’ Winifred had written in the spidery hand which had once been so bold. ‘But oh my dear I am so happy for the richness of your life. Of course I would love to see my great-grandson as you suggest, but under no circumstance do I wish you to return. I am well looked after, and the knowledge that you are happy gives me untold pleasure.’
Was she to deprive the old woman of her peaceful delusion, Henrietta wondered. And if she were to return to England it would be without her son, Terence would make sure of that. Unthinkable. Could she do as Terence had suggested? Could she forget that today had ever happened? Impossible.
As she drove into Darwin, Henrietta’s brain felt on fire and she suddenly knew that she couldn’t go to Aggie’s. She couldn’t bear to face Aggie’s questions and she couldn’t bear to face Aggie’s answer. ‘Leave him,’ Aggie would say, Henrietta could hear her saying it. But it wasn’t that simple.
She drove to the Hotel Darwin instead. ‘Mr Paul Trewinnard,’ she said to the desk clerk. ‘Would you tell him Mrs Galloway is in the foyer.’
Paul appeared only minutes later. ‘Henrietta, you’re back,’ he said, delighted. Then he saw her face. It was ashen, and there was an angry welt on her left cheek. ‘Good God what’s happened?’ He led her to his favourite nook amongst the potted palms and held her hand as they sat together.
Henrietta couldn’t help it. Not once had she felt the desire to cry, and now she couldn’t stop. She didn’t even try. She sat, head bowed, studying her hand in his, and she clutched it tightly as the tears poured down her cheeks.
Her body was shuddering and her breath was coming in tiny gasps, she was in a state of shock, Paul realised. He took her other hand in his and she clutched that too, staring down at the tightness of her knuckles as, over and over, she squeezed his fingers, it was as if his hands were her lifeline.
Paul said nothing, and they sat, linked together, for minutes which could have been hours. Finally she stopped shuddering and took several deep breaths. She released her grip on his hands as she looked up.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said.
He took his handkerchief from his breast pocket and offered it to her. ‘I’ll organise a room here for you at the hotel, is your suitcase in the car?’
‘Yes,’ she said, taking the handkerchief from him. ‘Thank you, I’m all right now.’ She dabbed at her eyes, trying desperately to stem another onslaught of tears.
‘Of course you are. Are you parked out the front?’ She nodded. ‘Give me the keys.’ She handed him her car keys and he rose from the chair. ‘Only be a minute.’
Henrietta watched him walk over to the reception desk. She was drained and exhausted, but strangely relaxed. What a blessing, not to think.
‘I’d like to book a room for Mrs Galloway, thanks Jimmy,’ Paul said to the desk clerk, ‘and could you have someone collect her suitcase from the Landrover out the front.’
‘Of course, Mr Trewinnard.’ Jimmy took the keys and Paul signed the registration form.
‘On my account,’ he said. ‘We’ll be in the bar, let us know when Mrs Galloway’s luggage has been delivered to her room.’
‘Certainly, sir.’
He was back at Henrietta’s side within minutes. ‘You need a drink,’ he said.