Belinda meanwhile was laboriously lifting a framed photograph from the bedside table. “Fath-er,” she said once more. Then she turned to old Marco and asked: “Fath-er, Molly?”
The old eyes opened, watched the child, then flicked: “Yes.” Roslyn, accustomed now to the messages of the eyes of the sick, had no doubts about that “Yes.” Tired from even that effort, old Marco drifted off again.
Roslyn looked at the photo that Belinda held up. It was one of Marcus, taken years ago when he was younger, less sophisticated, less arrogant. A smiling face, quite a pleasant face, rather immature and rather boyish then, but still unquestionably Marcus Moreno She helped Belinda put it back on the small table, then went to the door. “You can come in now, Connie,” she called.
“Mr.. Marcus is still doing the nights, isn’t he?” asked Connie when she came in. She looked anxious, and Roslyn supposed she had made her own romantic plans.
“Yes. But just now you can take over Belinda until he’s ready. I’ll watch here. Usually Belinda is in bed by this time and doesn’t need supervision, but she’s had a long sleep this afternoon and won’t be drowsy yet.”
“Pretty kid, isn’t she?” said Connie cheerily, obviously relieved that she was not to be called upon much longer. “Spitting image of her father.”
“Was it you who showed her his photo?”
“No need to ... she’s him and the Morenos all over again. Not at all like her mother. Very fair, her mother. When she first came up here people said—”
“That will do, Nurse,” Roslyn cut her short.
“She calls you that, doesn’t she, she says Nurse, only she says it quite differently.”
“Because she means a different thing. Please take Belinda out now, I think Mr. Marco is stirring again.”
Roslyn watched the paper-thin eyelids move, then open slowly. How often had she sat beside a bedside and seen this happen, the tired eyes of a tired person trying to focus, then identify. Old Marco tried now, but it was quite a while before he could look at Roslyn.
He seemed confused, so she spared him the ordeal of trying to piece together by telling him: “I brought Belinda up to you, Mr. Moreno.”
The eyes flicked.
“She calls you Molly.”
A ghost of a smile now in the eyes ... a quick oblique flick to the photograph on the table.
Roslyn picked up the photograph. “Father,” she said, as Belinda had done.
She saw the eyes flick back. “Father.”
So it was like that.
There were steps down the hall and Marcus entered the sickroom. He did not look at Roslyn, he studied old Marco. Presently he asked about medication for the evening watch, and she told him. She also urged him to waken her if he was at all unsure through the night.
“I’ll do that,” he nodded.
“The kid is on the verandah,” he informed her, “with Connie, who is obviously raring to go. You sign off now and get your first night’s sleep. First night! My God, it seems a year of nights.”
He watched her till she got almost to the door, then he called softly: “I’m sorry about this homecoming, Sister, it’s been one heck of a return.”
“It does seem longer than just noon since we reached here,” she agreed.
“Tomorrow may be better,” he hoped. “At any rate we won’t have a Nino incident.”
“But someone else?”
“You would cope,” he assured her.
“You really believe that, don’t you.”
“For what other reason than your efficiency would I have brought you up here?”
For what other reason? But there could be only one reason, only one important reason. The reason of his daughter. Roslyn looked at the man in wonder. At no time had he ever said: “I’ve come for my child.” Always he had come on behalf of old Marco. No doubt there had been a collapse between Nanette and Marcus, but even in broken marriages the child of the marriage is a dear and a precious thing, an intrinsic thing. Yet for four years apart from the remuneration that old Marco and not Marcus had caused to be sent, there had been nothing. What kind of man, what kind of man was this man? she thought.
“Goodnight,” she said before he could question her look.
It was pleasurable as it always was putting the small girl to bed, hearing her prayers, telling the story that only ever reached halfway before Belinda slept was the same sweet process. But somehow tonight Roslyn found her interest wandering. When Belinda’s lids grew heavy and she fought with sleep, Roslyn kept looking at the window and the soft darkness beyond it. When finally sleep won and she slipped the baby into bed, Rosalyn crossed to the window and that soft darkness as if compelled there.
She stood listening, listening to the night wind through a million sugar leaves. Cane music for a lullaby for Belinda she thought, then suddenly, almost unbearably, she was turning away again. Cane music for something else, for lovers as Nanette and Marcus must have been. It had not lasted, but it still had happened, two people standing together, and not, as Roslyn now stood, alone.
Roslyn listened to the plumes sighing their song and felt a sting of tears.
CHAPTER SIX
There were no tears in the morning; Roslyn, had she been reminded of them, would have declared they had never fallen. She awoke at first light, feeling wonderfully refreshed. The chaotic events of her first day at Clementine must have exhausted her, for, in spite of those moments at the window last night listening to the wind in the cane, she had slept as soon as she had laid her head on the pillow, and not wakened until dawn.
She checked Belinda, then showered, dressed and descended to the sickroom. It had been a long session for Marcus Moreno as well, she was thinking, he would have been as tired as she had been, and she did not intend him now to stay on duty any longer than was necessary. This morning’s early awakening had helped her there, she told Marcus cheerfully after she had greeted him, for she was not naturally prompt like that.
“A lazybones,” he suggested.
“No, but I do have to tap my brow.”
“What?”
“Four taps for four a.m., five taps for five, etcetera.”
“What happened if your think-clock was fast or slow?”
“Then I was early or late. How is the patient?”
“Excellent. Take a look at him yourself.”
Roslyn did. She noted the healthier colour, the better skin tone. When she took the pulse it was neither thin nor thready. But she was not deceived by the apparent improved condition. Years of experience had made her sadly knowledgeable of the fact that before the wave finally withdraws, it surges up the sands stronger than ever. This was a stage, she knew, a phase that nearly always happens. The upward surge before the last ebb.
“Well?” he asked.
“Yes, he looks very good indeed. Please go now, Mr. Moreno, you really must sleep.”
“Yes,” he agreed, and turned. But before he left, he crossed to the windows, big French windows that opened out to that front verandah to which they had climbed yesterday. Was it only yesterday? It seemed much longer than that.
“The sun is buttering the top of the cane,” he remarked idly from the window. “I always like the look of it at first light.”
The old man was quietly sleeping, so Roslyn could cross to his side and look. Later on, Marcus Moreno was saying now, the shining grass would be silver green instead, but at this moment it shone palely yellow. Sun-buttered. He smiled again.
Once the eye left the lawns, gardens and shrubberies, Roslyn found, the cane began ... then went on and on. As far as Roslyn could see it went on. Miles and miles of tall sweet grass, miles and miles of butter as well as sugar at this crystal hour.
They stood watching a while, then Roslyn turned back to the patient, and Marcus went to the door.
“I’ll grab some kip,” he called, and left them.
The old man wakened soon afterwards, and Roslyn was able to sponge and generally freshen him up. Propping him a little higher wi
th cushions, she decided he looked so well she could go out and fix him a small meal, bring a cup of coffee in for herself.
But she only got as far as the door. Marcus Moreno was coming up the bamboo-runnered hall with a laden tea waggon.
“You were to go to bed,” she said sternly.
“I meant after this,” he told her.
She looked at the waggon, it simply held everything that could possibly be wanted for any meal, let alone breakfast.
“Did you fix it yourself?” she inquired.
“No. Antonio. We’re early risers here. The same as the cane, we enjoy a buttering of sun before the really fierce rays burn down. There’s far too much food, I told Antonio so, but he insisted on including everything so that Sister could choose what was needed.”
“That’s good thinking,” approved Roslyn, selecting an egg from a dish of eggs.
“As you see, there’s enough for you, too,” Marcus indicated.
“More than enough. What does he think I am?”
“A worker, like we all are up here—we work hard, eat hard, live hard. Love hard.”
She pretended not to hear that last, and busied herself with selecting the patient’s meal.
“So you think you’ll have too much.” His voice came from the window again.
“I certainly will.”
“Then I believe I’ll stop a while and join you. The sun has climbed up, so there’s no more butter on the cane, so I’ll take mine from the butter dish instead, if you don’t object.” He crossed back and fixed himself some toast.
“You would be better in bed,” she reprimanded.
“As a nurse you should know you can’t sleep on an empty stomach.”
“You must have had something through the night.”
“That was the night, now it’s this morning, and I’m hungry, Sister Young. What do you say, Marco?” He turned to the mute old man. “Are you inviting me to share your meal?”
The patient’s lips actually curved in a half smile, the mouth moved though no words came.
“See,” said Marcus, “he thinks I should eat.” He fixed two laden plates, one for Roslyn, one for himself.
“I don’t want it,” she refused. “Not that much, I mean, I’m strictly a tea and toast breakfaster.”
“But you’ll have it all the same,” he insisted. “You’ll need it up here.”
“Because this is that sort of state or because the boss says so?”
“Two eggs enough?”
“Oh, really—”
“Yes, really. I say, look at Marco, he’s enjoying all this. I think he thinks we’re having a family argument.”
“Well, it is an argument.”
“But not family?”
“Don’t be absurd!” she snapped.
However, Roslyn did look at her patient, and she saw that certainly he was being entertained. With a vexed sigh she accepted the proffered plate, and after the first bite found that after all she was hungry.
Marcus finished first, yawned, patted Marco’s silver head, then left. An hour later Connie came in, and after briefing her, Roslyn went upstairs to rouse the baby. She bathed Belinda, put her in shorts and T-shirt, then took her down to the kitchen, where Antonio, an adoring slave already as all Italians are when there is a small person, produced a breakfast to Belinda’s liking.
After the meal, Connie still watching the patient, Roslyn took Belinda for a walk.
They passed the chalets, the women living in them while their men cut coming to the doors to smile and nod, then, after crossing a small bridge, found themselves all at once on the rim of the cane.
Belinda was wide-eyed. Each long sweet stem must seem like a giant beanstalk to her small size, Roslyn thought. The little girl was particularly overjoyed when she encountered a cane toad—her frog yesterday had only been the garden variety—but Roslyn was less than thrilled. It just showed the difference between them, she thought reluctantly, Belinda, though Roslyn hated to admit it, really had her roots here. She willingly would have caught and fondled the toad, something that would have sent Roslyn racing back to the house again in horror.
“No, darling,” she said.
Strangely, considering her enthusiasm, Belinda did not argue back, in fact she neither answered nor moved. Suddenly she was standing stockstill. Her eyes were on something just ahead of them, and apprehensively Roslyn came after her. A snake met her startled gaze—a second snake, she sighed inwardly, for Belinda. In the cane there are always snakes, she had been warned of that, so they had better retreat at once. Thank heaven, she thought, that after all Marcus had administered that little lesson to Belinda, there was no fear now of the child stepping forward to examine the reptile.
But something quite odd was happening. If Belinda was not stepping forward, she certainly, also, was not stepping back. She simply stood looking, she could have been a small statue, and for a moment Roslyn wondered if she was mesmerized; she knew that snakes could do such things, or at least that they had done them with birds.
“Come along, darling,” she urged.
No answer.
“Belinda, we have to get back to Molly.”
Still no response.
“Belinda—”
“Quiet,” ordered a soft voice that Roslyn thankfully recognized as Marcus’s. “The child evidently knows,” he said, still softly. “She senses that she mustn’t move until it moves first.”
“Moves where?”
“To its nest.”
“Nest?” queried Roslyn.
“Well, presumably it has to have some kind of headquarters if it has young ones.”
“Young ones?”
“As a member of the nursing sisterhood you’re rather naive,” he observed. “Don’t you know that snakes also reproduce? Otherwise we wouldn’t have them with us now.”
“Oh, I know that, of course, but ... But a nest? Actually a nest?”
“Actually. But don’t urge me to show you. A snake will never go out of its way to attack you, but if you’re in its way to its nest, it will. Look, it’s leaving now. The kid must have listened to an inner voice telling her what to do.”
“She didn’t the other day.”
“That was down there, this is up here. The north. The north that’s born in her.” He bent over and picked up Belinda and put her on his shoulders, and it was a proud action, a pride in Belinda Moreno. Particularly the Moreno? Roslyn could not help thinking that.
The three of them started walking again.
“Tell me more,” Roslyn appealed of Marcus. “I mean, I might have the baby with me another day and encounter another mother.”
“Then you mustn’t have her with you, must you, in short you mustn’t come here at all. Good lord, there are plenty of walks without getting yourself into the middle of the cut.”
“I haven’t. I mean ...” Roslyn’s voice trailed off guiltily. Looking around, she saw that she had permitted the pair of them to go much further into the cane than she had intended.
“I’ll forgive you this time,” he said magnanimously. “Cane is a hypnotic thing, it sort of grabs you in. But so can a hungry mechanical harvester. Also a manual knife is pretty nifty in cutting you down to size. You’re looking a little squeamish, Miss Young.”
“Tell me about the snakes,” she asked again. She added: “About the toads, too, for it was a toad that first inveigled us here.”
“A real sugar girl, isn’t she?” he grinned of Belinda, “blood tells, there’s no denying that. A southern youngster wouldn’t be seen near the beasties, yet she wants one as a pet. Just like—” But his voice trailed off.
“Are the toads peculiar to this state?” Roslyn asked when it appeared obvious that he did not intend to finish his sentence.
“Yes, but they’re not natives, they were brought here to eat the cane beetle, they were imported from Hawaii. Now” ... a shrug ... “we want something to eradicate the toad, though I reckon I have the answer. Let loose a bunch of Belindas and the fellers
will be accounted for quick-smart, for I’m sure they wouldn’t be much good after being carried, as she carries frogs, by one leg.”
“What kind of snakes are there here?” Roslyn inquired.
“Venomous,” he said succinctly. “That will be enough on your plate, Sister, don’t try differentiating between the benign and the non-benign, or treating any of them like you treated your old Bill, the Carpet, or you might not live to find your answer.”
“Yet you say they don’t attack you?”
“Only if you stand between them and their nest. When they have young, they’re as savage as any possessive mother, and it’s then that they’ll come at you. Fortunately, this one had a few alternative routes to her nursery, for she didn’t wait to do battle, but you may not always be so lucky.”
“Snakes is naughty,” called Belinda righteously from Marcus’s shoulder.
“Yes, my pet, but most often so is man naughty to snakes. For my part, unless a snake is threatening me I never go out of my way to kill it. It has its part in life as I have, otherwise the Maker wouldn’t have included it.” They had reached a field being mechanically cut, and Roslyn watched fascinated as the great monster dealt with the tall grasses. In no time the spoil was being loaded into trains, though everyone said trams, and being transported to the bulk loading.
“I’m showing you the process in the wrong order,” he apologized, “this is the finish and we should have started with the planting.”
“I saw it,” she reminded him. “I saw all the crops in their different stages of growth, and the whole looked like a checkered quilt. It was beautiful.”
He nodded, then went on.
“Before the harvesting there’s the burning off, of course, to get rid of the trash. That’s when the mice and the roaches and the field rats run out. But it’s still beautiful in fact I know of no lovelier sight than a cane fire at night. This field we’re approaching now is being manually cut since unfortunately it lies in a position that seems to attract every direction of wind. We employ the same gang every year because we know for certain that for all our modern mechanism we will still need the boys. Wild weather plays Old Harry on these windward fields, and wild weather is one thing you can bet on up here in the north. After the winds have finished, no mechanical means on earth possibly could cope. That’s when man comes in with his knife. This field was left in a diabolical state. Patricia certainly left her mark.”
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