He looked at her with interest. “Quite an entrepreneur, aren’t you? You’ve got the Lancaster head for business. You might be right.”
“I am right,” she said.
“I’ll think about it.”
“I thought there were lots of trees on Acacia,” she said.
“There were. Dad told me that the whole boundary was planted with trees. The new owners chopped them down.”
She turned and looked at the property on the other side of the road. “Now that’s how I imagined Acacia.”
He turned and looked across the road at the rusty gate leading to a winding track lined with trees. A rough wooden sign painted in uneven black lettering hung lopsidedly from the top rung. “Eumeralla. There was an article about it in this month’s farming magazine. I’ll show you when we get back.”
Keith’s pleas to Gabriella to have a shower had gone unheeded. When they arrived she was sitting on the verandah with an ashtray full of cigarette butts beside her. Greasy hair hung in a tangled mess down her back, and her unshaven legs looked more like a man’s.
Fiona burst into tears.
Before going to bed that night Fiona wrote in her journal.
Dalby
February 1972
Gabby’s in a terrible state. She responded to me a bit, but I’m sorry I cried when I saw her. I couldn’t help it. She used to be so fastidious. She’s five years younger than I am, but looks ten years older. We had salad and mangoes for dinner – it’s too hot for anything else. Gabby didn’t do anything to help, just sat around smoking.
Her house is beautiful. Dad did a brilliant job. Outside it’s rustic and you can’t see it through the trees. Inside it’s sophisticated. The doors, window frames and skirting boards are unpainted, waxed timber. The door handles are white china with a gold rim. Mum’s taste is evident, but she’s incorporated Gabby’s personality into the scheme.
Keith said that building the house with Brett’s insurance money was the only sensible thing she’s done since he died, but I think the money is the reason she’s depressed. Because she doesn’t have to work, she’s got nothing to do all day. She’s not even interested in the garden and she used to be crazy about gardening. If she hadn’t got any money she’d have to work and if she’d had children they would keep her busy. Also, children would have been a part of Brett and she would feel that she had something of him left.
On the way back from the airport this afternoon I nearly told Keith I was adopted. But I remembered that years after I’d told Catriona and Kim, they used it against me. The memory of Catriona’s face twisted with enmity as she said that the Lancasters were too good for me, still hurts. Why didn’t I tell him? Probably because I would have had to tell him about my real mother being an alcoholic. If he despised me too, I couldn’t bear it.
I’m looking forward to seeing Dad tomorrow. I bet Mum will tell me I look thin or too pale, comments designed to make me think I’d be better off at home with her. But if I tell her I don’t need to be looked after, she’ll sulk, so I’ll try and be nice and accept her smothering hugs with fortitude, even though they repel me.
The stars are so bright here – not washed out like in the city. And you can see so many more. I’d like to move here. I could ask Ansett for a transfer and spend the weekends with them. Since we grew up we seldom see each other. We’re in danger of becoming a family who only meet at weddings and funerals.
***
Virginia hugged Gabriella.
Keith marvelled that his aunt, who wore a smart white linen trouser-suit, neither flinched or recoiled from her rank body odour and breath. ‘Maybe it’s because she used to be a nurse,’ he thought. His Uncle Alex looked at Gabriella with compassion and shook her hand. Gabriella flopped on the sofa, which was upholstered in cream cotton, and lit a cigarette.
Virginia went over to her. “You can’t go to your mother’s funeral looking like this. When you’ve finished that cigarette go and have a shower and dress in clean clothes.”
“I haven’t got any.” Gabriella’s tone was conversational and Keith was surprised. Usually she sounded sulky or defensive.
“Fiona will lend you something, won’t you, darling?”
“Yes, of course.”
Gabriella flicked the ash into the ashtray on the coffee table in front of her. “And a shower and clean clothes will make me feel better?”
Virginia sat beside her. “Yes.”
“How?”
“When you look in the mirror, Gabby, what do you see?”
Gabriella smiled derisively. “I don’t look in the mirror much these days.”
“But when you do, what do you see?”
“A hag.”
“What else?”
Gabriella looked at her defiantly. “A dirty hag, with greasy hair and a muddy skin. Satisfied?”
“Are you satisfied with looking forty when you’re twenty-one?”
She sucked on her cigarette and inhaled deeply. “So ... I go and have a shower and wash my hair and shave my legs and dress in clean clothes and when I come back here Brett will be sitting on the sofa?”
Virginia shook her head.
“Didn’t think so,” said Gabriella.
Virginia reached over and took her hand. “If you go to bed tonight without having a shower or cleaning your teeth, and throw your dirty clothes on the floor instead of putting them in the washing machine – will Brett be here in the morning?”
They stared at each other. Keith, aware of the stillness in the room, held his breath.
“Will he, Gabby?”
“No,” she whispered.
“Do you like looking like a hag?”
“No.”
“If you have a shower and wash your hair and dress in clean clothes, you won’t look like a hag, will you?”
Gabriella shook her head.
Keith expected her to break out of her compliant mood and say, “You’re just like everyone else – if I get a job I’ll get over it.”
“You’ll never stop loving Brett,” Virginia continued. “But being on your own and brooding all day is making you more wretched. When you look in the mirror now you’re Gabby, the grieving widow who does nothing all day but sit around lamenting. If you get a job you’ll still be a grieving widow, but you’ll be doing something important. Now, we’ll sort out something for you to wear tomorrow. Do you have a black dress?”
“No.”
“I packed two,” said Fiona.
Virginia stood up. “Good. Come on, Gabriella. Fiona, you come too.”
When his sister obediently went into the bathroom, Keith looked at Alex in astonishment. “Mum and I have been telling her that sort of thing for ages. How come she listened to Aunty Virginia?”
Alex smiled. “Her nurse-to-patient tone of voice. You don’t ask a patient to do something, you tell them firmly but kindly. If Virginia had got upset and begged her, she would have ignored her too.” He smiled drily. “And Virginia’s got an air of authority. If she tells someone to do something they do it. Even me,” he said, half jokingly.
“Do you want a beer, Uncle Alex?”
“Not just yet. I’d better get these cases unpacked.”
An hour and a half later, when Keith had made a salad for lunch and Alex had set the table, they heard the click of shoes on the slate floor. Fiona and Virginia walked into the room smiling. A transformed Gabriella stood between them. Her hair had been cut and washed. Shining waves the colour of bronze fell to just below her ears. Her brown legs were smooth and she was wearing red shorts and a white camisole top. The olive-brown skin on her face glowed and her cheeks were pink.
Keith stared at her. “You’ve cut your hair.”
“Is that all you can say?” asked Virginia.
“Typical man,” said Fiona.
“You look great, Gabby,” said Keith, giving her a hug. She smelt of soap and toothpaste and Fiona’s perfume.
“Yes,” said Alex. “You do.”
Gabriella smiled self-co
nsciously.
“I’m starving, “ said Virginia, walking over to the table. “Let’s have lunch.”
“What’s happening to your mother’s house?” Alex asked, picking up the jug of iced water.
Keith thought about the small weatherboard house, in the country town with its population of three hundred. The beautiful garden his father had planted, with its mixture of wildness and cultivation, disguised its plainness. In the seven years since his death it had become wild, owing to his mother’s inability to keep the weeds at bay. The once neat vegetable garden with grass paths between the rows of beds was now an overgrown mess. The trellis their father had erected round the water tanks, to hide their ugliness, had collapsed beneath the weight of the vine she had not pruned. This time next month there would be nothing left of childhood memories or of his parents, just a vacant house for strangers to buy.
“I wanted to buy it. I asked the owner if I could rent it for two years till I’d saved the deposit, but he wants to sell it straightaway.”
“Oh, Keith, for goodness sake, we’ll give you the deposit,” said Virginia.
Alex nodded. “Of course we will.”
He shook his head. “It’s very good of you, but when someone gives you something you’re forever in their debt ... and I’d hate that.”
“It’s not as if you asked us – we offered. We’re family,” said Alex.
Keith grunted. “Family. Like Dad and Uncle Johnny and their father – and Margot. Sorry, Uncle Alex. Sometimes I forget you’re Margot’s brother. That was rude of me.”
“You were right,” said Virginia vehemently. “Acacia should be yours.”
“Don’t start that again,” Alex said wearily.
Keith saw that Fiona and Gabriella were uncomfortable. Ashamed that he had churlishly turned the offer of a loan into a dispute, he sought to change the subject. “Aunty Virginia, did the Mitchells’ own Eumeralla when you were on Acacia?
His mother’s reaction had prepared him for evasion, but not the look of shock on both their faces. “They were written up in a farming magazine,” he continued, looking questioningly at his aunt.
“We didn’t know them.” Virginia’s normally well-modulated voice sounded high pitched and fraught. She picked up her glass and drank some water.
Keith was puzzled.
“We passed Acacia on our way back from the airport,” said Fiona. “We couldn’t see the house.”
Keith noticed that Virginia’s face was white.
“What’s the matter, Mum?” asked Fiona.
“It’s the heat.” She stood up. “I’ll go outside.”
Alex followed Virginia. Fiona, Keith and Gabriella looked at each other.
“What was that all about?” asked Keith.
Fiona shook her head. “I haven’t got a clue.” When Alex and Virginia were out of sight, she lowered her voice. “Keith, let Dad give you money so you can buy your mother’s house.”
“I don’t want to be in someone’s debt.”
“Listen, Acacia was nothing to do with Dad, but Margot’s his sister and they get on well. When Dad started his property development business she gave him money to help him get started. Think of it as Margot’s money.”
“And therefore yours,” said Gabriella.
Later that afternoon Alex sat on the verandah and tried to read the biography of Florence Nightingale that he had found in Gabriella’s bookcase, but he was too perturbed to concentrate. The knowledge that Fiona had been so close to Eumeralla appalled him. He felt guilty whenever he saw Keith. If Jonathan and Laurence had inherited Acacia, Keith would have been a wealthy young man and Acacia would have been a better place under his guardianship.
Laurence and Jonathan’s wildness, stubbornness and volatile tempers had been offset by an acute instinct of what was right for the land. They hadn’t needed to go to AgriculturalCollege. From early childhood they had learned everything about the running of Acacia from their father, his managers, the drovers, jackaroos and station hands.
From the moment he had met Jonathan and Laurence, six months after Margot’s wedding to their father, he had envied their closeness. He wished that he and his brother David had shared the bond that made the Clarkson boys inseparable. Where David was concerned, Alex was just the younger brother. Alex had spent his youth regretting that he would have to leave Kingower, the family property, when he grew up. For Jonathan and Laurence there was no question of one of them leaving Acacia. Their father had made them his joint heirs. It was their tragedy that the one person for whom they had harboured an irrational hatred was Margot, their stepmother, who was admired by most people, but had been loathed by them. Being Margot’s brother and Virginia’s husband had put Alex in a difficult position when Jonathan and Laurence were disinherited and Margot was the sole beneficiary.
CHAPTER 4
Keith couldn’t sleep. He was too worried about the effect his mother’s funeral would have on Gabriella. It was almost midnight when he pulled back the mosquito net and sprayed himself with insect repellent. Opening the fly-screen door he flashed his torch along the verandah, checking for spider’s webs or snakes. He crept round to the other side of the house so he could see the Southern Cross.
Expecting everyone else to be asleep, he stopped when he heard Alex’s voice through the open bedroom window. Although he was speaking softly his voice was clear.
“If you hadn’t started raving about Acacia – ”
“My family have suffered because of Margot and another generation is still suffering,” interrupted Virginia.
Keith had heard it all before from his father. Feeling like an eavesdropper, he turned to go.
“Virginia, stop it. We’ve got other problems. Keith might decide to go to Eumeralla.”
He stopped and listened.
“Why?”
“To ask for a job. He’s restless.”
‘What a great idea, Uncle Alex,’ he thought.
To his exasperation a cicada began its ear-splitting chirping and the next few minutes of their dialogue were drowned out. The racket stopped abruptly. He only caught the last two words of Virginia’s sentence, but then he heard Alex’s reply.
“Sometimes I want to end the agony and tell her.”
“No,” said Virginia. “She’d go berserk. She’ll blame me as usual.” Her voice was bitter. “Funny, isn’t it? She has so much more rapport with you.”
Alex’s voice was patient. “Stop it, Virginia.”
“Sorry. It’s not your fault. It’s mine.”
“It’s all right, darling.”
Keith lingered, hoping their conversation would return to Eumeralla.
Instead he heard Virginia say, “Things would have been so different if Cheska hadn’t died.”
There was silence so he crept away, puzzling about what he had overheard.
Fiona’s bedroom was on the same side of the house as his and, as he passed it, he saw her writing in her journal, bathed in light from the lamp. All the rooms had doors opening onto the verandah. “Fiona,” he whispered. “Come out and look at the stars.”
“Okay.” She put down her pen and closed her journal.
She wore a white sleeveless nightdress and her straight hair hung down her back. He felt a surge of desire, but suppressed it. They were cousins and Fiona was too townie and sophisticated. Even now she smelt of expensive perfume. He preferred women who smelt natural. To him the scent of soap and skin was erotic. In his opinion men who wore cologne or aftershave were effeminate. Soap, deodorant and toothpaste were the only toiletries he used. Fighting the temptation to reach out and stroke her hair, he lit a mosquito coil and pointed out the stars to her.
“If you were lost, could you find your way home by the stars?” she asked.
“Yes. Dad taught me. He and Uncle Johnny walked out of their boarding school in Sydney one morning and stowed away in the train to Brisbane. They found their way back to Acacia by the stars. It was the only time their father ever thrashed them. He took t
hem back to Sydney and the headmaster beat them again.”
“Ouch. I bet they never did that again.”
He laughed. “They did – a month later. Their father gave up and let them stay on Acacia. He made them finish school though. They both matriculated. Not that it did them any good.”
“No.”
“Fiona, do you know who Cheska was?”
“Francesca – they called her Cheska.”
“Who was she?”
Fiona gaped at him. “You don’t know?”
Keith shook his head.
“But you must.”
He looked at her in exasperation. “But I don’t – so tell me.”
“Um.” She ran her hand over the smooth verandah rail. “Your parents must have told you. No, I don’t – ”
“I’ll shake you in a minute. Come on, who was she? I know she’s dead.”
“She was your father’s first wife.”
Keith was too astounded to speak.
Fiona cleared her throat. “Didn’t you know he’d been married before?”
“No. What happened?”
“She died just after the war ended. She had an asthma attack.”
“God. Poor dad.”
She grimaced. “Then you don’t know the rest of it. She was Dad’s sister – and Margot’s.”
“No. He wouldn’t have married Margot’s sister.”
“Why not? Mum married her brother. And this was years before he was disinherited.”
“I didn’t know Margot had a sister called Francesca. Dad talked about Ruth – he liked her. He said that David was a schemer like Margot, but I’d never heard of Francesca. He never mentioned her. Neither did Mum. Are you sure about this?”
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