The Heart of the Matter

by Lindsay Armstrong

  CHAPTER ONE

  Clarissa Randall stared out of her bedroom window over the historic acres of Mirrabilla but didn't see the dun gold grass of the winter paddocks, the mobs of sheep or the dark blue-green of the gum trees that lined the meandering path of Mirrabilla Creek as it wound towards the horizon.

  Instead, in her mind's eye, she saw a montage of her close family, past and present. Her beloved but remote father; her brother Ian—so young; her exceptionally beautiful mother; Sophie ... And Robert Randall with his dark good looks and his curiously dynamic yet at the same time withdrawn personality.

  Something of an enigma, she had once heard his father say of Rob. And in her youthful heart she had pondered this, not to know how many years later she would still be pondering it.

  She sighed suddenly and came out of her reverie. As she turned away from the window she was conscious of an odd, very slight prickling of her skin, and wondered why it should be doing that. But her silent bedroom yielded no answer and her thoughts slid away to something more concrete—such as what she'd let herself in for on this cold, bright winter's day.

  Horizons was a weekly television programme that featured different Australian lifestyles, places of historic interest, people of interest, and when the request had come, asking Clarissa for an interview and footage on Mirrabilla, her first inclination had been to decline.

  But she'd shown the letter to Rob and he had thought otherwise. 'But I'm not of any interest to anyone,' she'd said with a grimace. He had raised a dark eyebrow at her and murmured that the Kingstons of Mirrabilla had always been of interest to other Australians. Then he'd added that of course if she didn't feel up to it, not to worry about it.

  Which had the immediate effect, she thought ruefully, of making me insist that I was perfectly able to handle it and of writing back that same day to Moira Stapleton to accept. Then, just as I was getting quite interested in sorting through all the old papers and memorabilia I could find, Sophie got that nasty virus, which is how I got myself landed with Evonne Patterson, press secretary, PR lady extraordinaire and I don't what else...

  A tap on the door broke her thoughts at that point. She just knew it was Evonne and forcibly restrained herself from saying—speak of the devil!

  She called instead, 'Come in!'

  Evonne Patterson came in with her usual model's walk and restrained smile. She was about twenty-six— several years older than Clarissa—but despite looking and dressing like a model, and possessing great dark eyes and an unusually pale skin, she was, Clarissa knew, extremely efficient at her job. One of the reasons Clarissa was so sure of this was simply that Rob would not tolerate anything less.

  Which is why she's in my bedroom now, Clarissa reminded herself. Apart from Sophie's virus, she's here on Rob's behalf. I just know to make sure nothing goes wrong. I just wish she didn't make me feel—slow and dull, sometimes.

  'The crew has aimed, Mrs. Randall,' Evonne said. 'Oh. Oh, very nice." she went on as she eyed Clarissa

  critically. 'Mr. Randall would approve, I'm sure, although...' She broke off in mid-sentence.

  Clarissa waited for a moment as those large dark eyes were narrowed thoughtfully. She was actually an inch or so taller than Evonne Patterson, but had often found it was no advantage—unless feeling like a leggy colt could be called advantageous.

  'You were going to say?' she asked.

  'I just wondered if your hair would be better up—I mean, it looks very nice,' Evonne said slowly. 'But for the outside shots—well, it's a bit windy.'

  Clarissa turned to her dressing table mirror and encountered an unusually stubborn look in her eyes, which at first startled and then amused her. Didn't know I could look like that...! However, there's no point in being stubborn for stubbornness sake, as Mrs. Jacobs would say!

  She looked at herself equally critically in the glass. She had chosen, after much heart-searching, to wear a soft, misty-grey tweed pantsuit. The jacket was beautifully tailored and rather like a man's hacking jacket, and there was a matching waistcoat which she wore over a cornflower blue, finest pure wool sweater with several fine gold chains of varying lengths. A pair of black patent leather pumps with little heels completed the outfit. Not too dressy, she'd decided, but dressy enough to show that I'm the lady of the manor, which is what I'm supposed to be portraying, I presume, and practical. But to get back to the point in question...

  She pushed her hands into the pockets of her jacket and swung her head so that her long, streaky-fair hair swung out. It came to well below her shoulders and it settled into a shining, springy but well-mannered curtain.

  My best asset? she pondered, examining her slightly darker eyebrows, golden skin which would never be dramatically pale and her blue-grey eyes which didn't flash magnificently but did have rather long thick, curving lashes.

  Yes, she decided, my best asset—why is it that Evonne always makes me feel insipid as well as everything else? As if I blend rather well into the winter landscape?

  'Perhaps you could just tie it back, Mrs. Randall?'

  Clarissa closed her left eyelid in the barest wink at her reflection and turned from the mirror. 'I think I'll just leave it,' she said tranquilly. 'I never feel really comfortable with my hair up.'

  'Well, tied back...’

  'Or tied back,' Clarissa said evenly. Which was not altogether true because she frequently wore it tied back, but it seemed important to take a stand about something. But she managed to smile at Evonne Patterson.

  For which effort she received an unusually warm smile in return. 'Of course you're right,'' Evonne said ruefully. 'It's so beautiful it's a pity to hide it—I was only thinking of the practicalities, but one can go through life being too practical, can't one?' She shrugged quizzically and smoothed her scarlet suit, which she wore with a black blouse.

  Clarissa stared at her and discovered that she'd had the wind taken right out of her sails—but not only that, she now felt as if she was being vain about her hair. How does she do it? she wondered. Why does she do it, or is it my imagination?

  She turned away and bit her lip and counted to ten beneath her breath. And thought, it probably is my imagination—rendered even more fanciful than usual

  this morning because I'm suddenly terrified about this interview, I think. Why on earth did I agree to it? Who knows what could come out, I never thought of that. What did I think, apart from being foolishly goaded into it by what Rob said? That it might be a ... a sort of tribute to my father and Ian because they'd loved Mirrabilla so much?

  She took a deep breath and turned back to Evonne. i gather Miss Stapleton isn't here yet?'

  'No. She's travelling independently of the crew, apparently.' Evonne grinned suddenly. 'They call her Cleopatra behind her back—I overheard them.'

  'Do they?' Clarissa grimaced, I think I'd better have a cup of coffee, then, while I've still got the time, to fortify me!'

  'You'll be just fine, Mrs. Randall,' Evonne assured her. 'Er ... what about Sophie?'

  'Clover has taken her into Holbrook with him to do a few errands. She doesn't need to be here for it all.'

  'Oh. About the dress I suggested...?'

  Clarissa directed a very firm glance at Evonne Patterson. 'I thought it was too dressy for Sophie,' she said calmly, however. 'I've told Mrs. Jacobs what she's to wear. Will you join me for a cup of coffee, Evonne?'

  'Thank you.' Evonne Patterson glanced at her long scarlet nails that exactly matched her glossy lips and scarlet suit, and added, 'By the way, Mr. Randall rang while you were showering. He asked me to tell you that he might be home later today, after all.'

  'Oh, I do hope so!' Clarissa replied.

  Moira Stapleton, who was the compere and one of the produce
rs of Horizons, was beautiful, Clarissa decided. Golden-blonde, very chic and not at all Cleopatra-like. She also had a reputation for integrity as a television journalist, in fact a very high reputation, which made it something of an honor to be featured on her programme.

  But after a while, Clarissa could see where the Cleopatra bit came from. For although she was warm and friendly, she was also utterly decisive and very persuasive. Which was how Clarissa came to change into riding gear and do a sequence herding sheep with her favorite black and white border collie, Mem.

  'After all,' Moira had said, 'sheep are what Mirrabilla is essentially about, aren't they? Over the years—many, many years—the Kingstons have built up a most respected flock of merinos. Besides which, Mrs. Randall,' she had added quietly, 'I want to capture the essential you, as the last of the Kingstons and doing something which I believe you love.'

  Clarissa had hesitated and wondered how she'd dug that out.

  'I did mention that we would want something of this nature to Miss Patterson,' Moira had said then.

  A tiny silence had fallen and for once Evonne had suddenly looked acutely uncomfortable.

  'All right,' Clarissa had said. 'Give me a few minutes. I'm afraid with Sophie being ill; Evonne was seconded in at the last minute to take over at this end. We probably had a crossed wire...' And she'd wondered why she was making excuses for Evonne Patterson, for that matter why Evonne had made no mention of this, but in the rush to get changed because they were already on a tight schedule, she didn't have time to ponder it further.

  In fact it was only over lunch that she thought of it again. Mrs. Jacobs, who had been at Mirrabilla for as long as Clarissa could remember and who proudly

  held the dual roles of housekeeper and nanny, had set up a buffet on the verandah which seemed to be warmly appreciated by everyone.

  But as Clarissa ate, Evonne appeared to be anxious to make up for what had happened in the morning, and with every bite she took, Clarissa could feel that anxiety until Evonne suggested, 'You'll probably need to take a shower, Mrs. Randall, as well as get changed. Should we ...?'

  'Don't tell me I'm looking windblown, because I know it,' Clarissa said with a laugh, and was surprised to see Evonne colour faintly.

  'I just wish I could look as gorgeously windblown as you can, Mrs. Randall,' Moira Stapleton put in. 'I guess we'll all need brushing up, but we don't need to bolt this delicious lunch.'

  'What about Sophie?' Evonne said then, apparently restored to normal and with an interrogative look at Clarissa.

  'Mrs. Jacobs will take care of her, Evonne,' Clarissa said steadily, and neither of them noticed the slightly curious look Moira Stapleton cast them.

  '... Mrs. Randall, I did explain to you that the sequence we've done things in is not necessarily how the final show will appear—we often interpose and cut backwards and forwards, and it's quite possible that the chat we're about to have will be broken into segments.'

  'Yes, I understand,' said Clarissa. She was showered and back in her pantsuit and her hair gleamed and rippled.

  Moira Stapleton smiled at her. 'You've been terrific so far. And it was a marvelous tour of the property you took us on. As for you on horseback!'

  'Thank you,' smiled Clarissa.

  'So now I thought we might discuss your background and then do a tour of the house and its treasures.' They were sitting in the drawing-room and Moira Stapleton glanced at her crew. They came to attention and she turned back to Clarissa and bowed her head briefly. 'Mrs. Randall, you were born here at Mirrabilla, weren't you? A direct descendant of the first Bernard Kingston who came to Australia in the eighteen-fifties to find his fortune.'

  'That's right. He came to look for gold, actually, and spent some years prospecting in the Ballarat and Bendigo fields—with no success, though, so he turned his attention to sheep. And for some time he was a jack of all trades—drover, shearer, wool classer in places as far apart as Wilcannia and the Diamantina, as you'll see from his diary.'

  'So he acquired a great knowledge not only about sheep but outback, eastern Australia, and not only that, being an educated man, kept a diary?'

  'Yes. But as well as a great knowledge, he also had a great love of the bush. In fact, if he hadn't met my great-great-grandmother and if his elder brother hadn't died unexpectedly and with no heirs, he might have spent his life wandering. But he married Lucy Winthrop and took her back to England, where he sold up most of what he'd inherited and with the money, came back and bought up Mirrabilla.'

  'Why this area particularly, Mrs. Randall? Do you know?'

  'He loved the Murray River and the Snowy Mountains, and this is fairly close to both.'

  'It was also a very astute buy—this area is home to some of the world's largest sheep studs,' Moira Stapleton said. 'And this in fact is the original homestead?'

  'Well, it's been added to over the years.'

  'And it looks to be in excellent condition—and so picturesque, not to mention enormous!'

  'It's been fairly recently renovated,' Clarissa told her, glancing up at the high ceiling. 'But basically it's astonishingly sound considering how old some parts of it are.'

  'Why did you look up at the ceiling9' asked Moira.

  'Well, the original one in here was a pressed iron one with lovely moldings that I used to know off by heart, almost. Unfortunately, it had rusted in parts and we finally had to replace it. I'm still not used to the new one.'

  'You love Mirrabilla, don't you, Mrs. Randall? I should imagine your great-great-grandfather would be happy to know you were here, and so caught up and conversant with the running of it, as you demonstrated this morning. Your mother,' Moira Stapleton went on, changing tack fluently, 'came from Melbourne as a very young bride and was a great socialite, wasn't she?' Yes.'

  Moira smiled. 'I didn't mean that in a frivolous sense. I believe she raised a great deal of money for charity. Do you take after her at all?'

  'Not in looks. Not so far in socializing,' Clarissa answered.

  'Do you remember any of the great parties she gave here at Mirrabilla?'

  'Oh yes. It wasn't so long ago.'

  'No. Do you miss her since she remarried and went to live in America?'

  'Naturally. And I miss my father.'

  'Its—fairly common knowledge,' Moira Stapleton said delicately, 'that Mirrabilla was nearly lost to the Kingston family recently.’

  'Yes, it was,' Clarissa agreed. 'My grandfather, my father's father, was killed in the Second World War. My father was too young to take over and my grandmother was quite devastated, so Mirrabilla went rather badly downhill. And when he was old enough, my father was faced with the task of building it up again through a difficult period for wool generally that affected even breeders. And while we were still weathering that, my brother Ian was killed in an air crash. My father was never really the same afterwards, and he himself died several years later.'

  'Leaving only you.'

  'And my mother.'

  'Of course. But let's move on from that painful part.' Moira Stapleton said tactfully, and smiled at her. 'Because in fact all was not lost, was it? It's also fairly common knowledge that there was a Prince Charming waiting in the wings, although in disguise. But perhaps you'd like to tell us about your romance with Robert Randall? Starting from the time he worked here.'

  'Oh,' Clarissa heard herself saying lightly, somewhat to her amazement, 'he didn't actually work here, although he helped out. His father was studmaster here for twenty years and naturally Rob lived here too.'

  'So you've known him all your life?'

  'Yes.' Clarissa hesitated and then smiled. 'I believe I asked him to marry me when I was about six! He taught me to ride my first pony and I thought he was utterly wonderful, even though he kept making me get straight back on every time I fell off.'

  'What did he say to your proposal?'

  'He said we'd have to wait until I was grown up and by then I'd probably have changed my mind.'

  'Which you neve
r did,' Moira said warmly.

  'No.'

  'But you were not to know—neither was he, for that matter—that he was heir to a great fortune. That his grandfather was in fact Robert T. Randall?'

  'No. It came as a great surprise to all of us,' Clarissa told her, and when Moira Stapleton looked at her expectantly, she went on, 'Except Rob's father, of course.'

  'Do tell us!'

  'Well, Rob's father and his grandfather fell out. I think they were both rather eccentric in their own ways, but it was a major rift and they never forgave each other. And it was only when Rob's father died that my father found two letters amongst his papers— one addressed to him explaining about Robert T. Randall and asking him to get in touch with him, and one addressed to Rob himself.'

  'And in the course of time,' Moira Stapleton put in, 'he was able to put Mirrabilla back on its feet, at the same time ensuring that a part of the Kingston family would still be here. That's a tremendous story, Mrs. Randall! Thank you for sharing it with us ... Cut! It really was,' she said, turning back to Clarissa. 'And I appreciate the way you told it—just simply and honestly. I was thinking now ... oh!' She looked away as the drawing-room door opened and a very small girl advanced cautiously into the room and then raced over to Clarissa. 'Well,' said Moira, 'who might this be—no, don't tell me. Sophie Randall, and right on cue!'

  Sophie Randall was a dazzling blonde with very blue eyes and just two years old—and, like the

  basically healthy child she was, had recovered almost miraculously from her virus. But it was some time before she could be persuaded to lift her face from her mother's shoulder and smile for the cameras. In fact it took the combined efforts of two cameramen, who became galvanized into portraying Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse to do it.

  'If you ask me, Mrs. Randall,' Moira Stapleton said laughingly as she eyed the antics of the crew, 'Sophie is going to be a real heartbreaker. She's already a slayer of grown men!'

  'You're not wrong,' Clarissa agreed ruefully, and then both she and Sophie lifted their heads and went still. Sophie put her little hand on Clarissa's cheek and said to her joyfully, 'Daddy come!'