Cane Music

by Joyce Dingwell

  “You and Fath-er,” Belinda repeated.

  Well, I deserved that, Roslyn admitted that night in bed, Belinda long since giving out her little possum snores from the room next door. I had a bad thought in my mind the thought of kidnapping Belinda, and I deserved what she said, or rather whom she said.

  Fath-er.

  Belinda was quiet the next day. Roslyn told her at breakfast that Doctor Carlton would be up to get Ness and take her back early in the afternoon.

  “Don’t go,” said Belinda.

  “I have to see to sick people, and Belinda, don’t say ‘Blinda sick’ again.”

  “Krysanthe,” Belinda, who apparently got round the chalets, “was sick and you came up here.”

  “Yes, darling,” agreed Roslyn abstractedly ... but she was not abstracted later. She was remembering those thoughtful words of Belinda’s and wondering could a baby of her small years be so contriving.

  Carl arrived soon after lunch, and since he was busy Roslyn did not keep him waiting.

  “Goodbye, precious,” she told Belinda.

  “Bye,” said Belinda with deflating indifference.

  “Funny little baggage, isn’t she?” Carl said on their way back to the coast. “Must take after her mother. Certainly the Morenos aren’t icicles.”

  About to argue that, Roslyn stopped. Marcus Moreno could be as cool as a southerly wind, but even when the chill was felt, a heat was felt ... somewhere ... as well.

  For some inexplicable reason Roslyn felt heat in her own cheeks.

  “How is Krysanthe?” she asked presently.

  “Good. Successfully operated on. We actually managed to fly in two doctors from Townsville. It was a near-rupture, but thank heaven, we got it in time. Incidentally, Marcus did a great job on that cradle. It helped immensely.”

  “The water has gone down in one day,” marvelled Roslyn, looking over the side of the Cessna.

  “I told you we soon recover.”

  “Belinda as well?” Roslyn said with a sigh.

  The doctor gave her a quick sympathetic look. “Getting over you, is she?”

  “Yes. Of course that’s what I wanted ... I mean, I had to want that. Well, didn’t I?”

  “You can tell your heart what to do,” he reminded her gently, “but it won’t always do it.” He attended to some controls for a few moments. “What makes you think she’s cut loose?”

  “You saw her casual farewell.”

  “I saw Marcus’s, too.”

  Roslyn looked at him in astonishment. “Where on earth does he come in?”

  “If you don’t know then I’m pleased not to tell you.”

  “Really, Carl, you talk in conundrums at times!”

  He shrugged and grinned, then began preparing to descend.

  The chaotic happenings that had been Roslyn’s introduction to her new coastal post proved now reasonably under control, but Roslyn still found there was plenty to do. Even had there been a lull in surgery, there was work begging up at the hospital, and Roslyn was leaving for the clinic after the last patient a few days later when Mrs. Marriott called out that Clementine was ringing.

  She went back, saw Carl already speaking into the receiver, so went to withdraw again. Belinda had got over me, she told herself, so I must get over her.

  “Wait, Ros.” Carl held up his hand, and, her heart beating unevenly now, her mouth becoming dry, for twice she had heard the doctor say her baby’s name, Roslyn obeyed.

  “Yes,” said Carl into the mouthpiece. “Yes. Nothing else you can tell me?” A pause. “Right, then. Right away.” The phone went down. “Jump to it, Sister,” Carl said in his usual cheerful way, but Roslyn, experienced now in certain nuances in his cheerfulness, said:

  “Is it Belinda?”

  “Yes.”

  “Accident?”

  “No.”

  “Then—”

  “Look, Sister, you’re holding things up, you’re also being less than ethical. I don’t know what’s wrong with the kid, and Marcus doesn’t, either. He’s gone through his entire home doctor, he says, and at the risk of a false alarm he wants me to come.”

  “I should think so,” snapped Roslyn.

  In the plane soon afterwards she asked: “Where’s the pain?”

  “Throat.”

  “Throat!” Had Belinda been immunized for diphtheria?

  Had she skipped a booster ? Mumps—they could be tricky. Tonsils ... Oh, there were a dozen things.

  “You left out emergency tracheotomy,” said Carl drily, evidently reading Roslyn’s panic. “For heaven’s sake, Sister Young, your young relative, or whatever she is, has a sore throat.”

  “Sore throat?” she echoed.

  “That’s how it was reported to me by Marcus, who incidentally is not as cool and collected as I would have thought of him, since he actually babbled ‘Sore froat.’ It must be catching.”

  “What is? What has she got?” Roslyn had missed the joke. She was only thinking of Belinda.

  “An over-protective sister, mother, aunt,” said Carl. “Calm yourself, Roslyn, or I’ll turn back and take someone in your place.”

  Roslyn calmed herself, but when the Cessna landed on the Clementine paddock she was out before Carl could come round and catch her.

  However, she was caught. By Marcus. He steadied her a moment, then nodded to the waiting jeep. The three of them climbed in, then made for the homestead in the cane.

  CHAPTER NINE

  What was wrong with Belinda?

  However, she was caught. By Marcus. He steadied her a moment, then nodded to the waiting jeep. The three of them climbed in, then made for the homestead in the cane.

  Doctor Carl Carlton, after a lengthy examination, had to admit he was nonplussed. He could find no possible source, no cause, nothing at all, and Belinda, probed and questioned again, persisted with her initial: “Sore froat.”

  “But there’s no redness at all, young lady. In fact you’re a very healthy normal pink.” Carl was peering down the little mouth again.

  “A tongue ulcer, perhaps ... they can be painful,” Roslyn suggested anxiously.

  “No—nothing.” He shook his head.

  “A bad tooth, even at three.”

  “I can’t see anything at all. However, there is a slight rise in temparature.” The doctor frowned. “No,” he decided presently, “it couldn’t be that.”

  “Couldn’t be what?” asked Roslyn in trembling.

  “It just couldn’t, that’s all. She’s only an innocent infant.”

  “Couldn’t be what?” demanded Roslyn again.

  “Strategy, intrigue, machination,” the doctor shrugged.

  “Well, I say it could,” came in Marcus by their side. “Also I say it is. As well as being innocent, our sweet little lady here possesses all those other things you said. And why not? She’s been well, primed.” But he kept his glance from Roslyn.

  “But could she be shrewd enough to scheme all this?” doubted Carl. “At three?”

  “Of course she couldn’t,” came in Roslyn sharply.

  “Though I suppose even a child,” continued Carl, in his absorption not hearing Roslyn’s defence, “could subconsciously create such a situation that called for such strategy.”

  “I won’t believe it,” protested Roslyn.

  “I will. And not subconsciously either. Also, if a good spanking will help—” It was, of course, Marcus.

  Roslyn bristled, “Over my dead body!”

  “Gladly,” Marcus said. “Only before you do that final thing, I propose to do the same as I do to Belinda to you. After all, why should you slip out comfortably and painlessly?”

  Carl Carlton continued: “The pulse is a little rapid.”

  “Of course,” Marcus nodded, “she’s excited over the fuss she’s causing. Look, kid” ... bending over Belinda ... “if you’re not up and around in two minutes I’m going to belt the daylights out of you!”

  “Really—” said Roslyn.

  “An
d Ness, too,” added Marcus grimly.

  Belinda sat up. “Better.” She smiled angelically.

  “But not after I’ve finished with you,” said Marcus. “Now where’s that hairbrush?” However, he must not have sounded to Belinda like he sounded to Roslyn, for the small imp just crumpled up with laughter.

  “I’m sorry, Carl,” said Marcus presently. The three adults had moved away from Belinda’s bed by now while Connie dressed her. “I never dreamed she was foxing. Oh, I had a suspicion, I’ll admit, but she did stick it out, and she never left her original story.”

  “Sore froat,” nodded Carl. “Stubborn little piece, but can you wonder? A Moreno?” he grinned.

  “I thought the other side of the family might provide a counterbalance.” Marcus looked across at Roslyn.

  Roslyn ignored the look. “What happens now?” she asked.

  “What should happen is that spanking I spoke of, plus a warning that if she stages such a deceit again she’ll get a double dose. But seeing I’m outvoted by the medical side?” ... he looked inquiringly first at Carl who nodded, then at Roslyn, who did not nod but whose tightened lips gave her answer ... “I think we’d better use other methods. Taking into consideration that Belinda has gone to such pains to bring Miss Young back, I think we’d better give her to Miss Young. For a week, that is.”

  “I’m glad you said that,” applauded Carl. “For a moment I thought it was going to be Miss Young back at Clementine again. And that I couldn’t stand. Not my right hand.” He smiled at Roslyn.

  “I couldn’t stand it, either,” said Marcus. He turned to a now-dressed Belinda. “You’re going to the coast, young madam.”

  “No,” said Belinda.

  “My God!” Marcus said wearily. He waited until be counted five on his fingers, then he said with patent suffering: “What is it you do want, Belinda?”

  “I want Ness.”

  “Well, I just told you you’re going down to the—”

  “And,” tacked on Belinda, “Fath-er.”

  “Father?”

  “You, too. Fath-er and Ness.”

  It seemed they had reached a deadlock. Marcus Moreno stood for a very long moment looking at Belinda. Then he looked at Roslyn. Then he looked somewhere between them, but Roslyn could not have said at what he looked, nor certainly what he was thinking.

  But, typical of this man, this self-assured, self-certain man, he came to a decision. Acting so quickly that Belinda did not quite know what was happening to her, he picked her up, took her out, packed her into the car, nodded for Roslyn and Carl to climb in as well, and had them all at the field, and in the Cessna, before Belinda could realize what it was all about.

  “Fath-er!” she called in deep hurt, and only then, and briefly, did Marcus soften.

  “Blinda,” he said, and kissed her. “One week, Muffin,” he told her, and his voice was rough.

  “Fath-er is naughty,” announced Belinda as the small plane took off. She added for Carl and Roslyn: “Blinda is Muffin.”

  “Yes, darling, I think we guessed that,” said Roslyn. “Father wasn’t naughty, though, you were—you put him on a spot.”

  “What spot? Where?”

  “Making him—Oh, never mind. Look back at Clementine.”

  “It’s grown little,” said Belinda.

  “That’s because of distance.”

  “What’s distance?”

  “Distance is space between ... I mean ... Oh, stop grinning, Doctor Carlton!”

  Belinda scrutinized the doctor. “He is not so.” She began looking again at the diminishing Clementine, and as she did she muttered under her breath: “Old people is silly.”

  “She’s stringing quite a phrase or two now,” Carl commented tolerantly. He did not comment on the composition of the phrases.

  “Yes, she’s come on splendidly.”

  “That’s our tall state for you.”

  “No, it’s just her age. Every day in a child’s life—”

  “My, we are factual today! Hold on, Muffin, we’re going down.”

  “That’s Fath-er’s name,” rebuked Belinda, but not very defensively. Her attention was on the field now coming up to meet them. She obviously enjoyed the landing, and was out of the craft before Roslyn.

  Belinda settled down quite happily at the surgery. She made friends with Mrs. Marriott and took it upon herself to usher in Carl’s patients. She was certainly very friendly with Carl, and once Carl said what Chris had said. He looked at Roslyn and told her:

  “You know, I wouldn’t mind Belinda as well.”

  This time Roslyn did not look inquiringly at the speaker and repeat: “As well?”

  She knew what Carl was saying, and—and why not? Why not? It was well known that arranged marriages were successful marriages; each partner went into it not expecting any wonder, so when the wonder did come, it was doubly wonderful.

  But after a moment, her senses prompting her again, she replied: “I guess Mr. Moreno would have something to say about that.”

  “To do with you?”

  “Heavens, no!” Roslyn laughed incredulously at such an idea.

  “Then Belinda?”

  “Yes. After all, she’s his—”

  “Admitted, Roslyn, but you’re connected, too, remember.”

  “There’s a matter of priorities,” she smiled.

  “And a priority of love? You’ve loved her much longer than Marcus.”

  “I don’t think that counts. Please, Carl, let it rest. But thank you all the same for saying these things.”

  “That’s all right,” he accepted. “Also I can delay more things I have waiting to be said. But there’s something I’m going to say now. It’s: How would you like a trip to Little Cockle?”

  “To Little Cockle?” Roslyn looked at the doctor with pleasure. Of all the small gems of the Barrier Reef islands that she had gazed upon from coastal vantage points, gazed in longing, Little Cockle had delighted her most. Among the other jewels in their mirror setting, it had seemed the most precious jewel of all. Small, wooded, beached, it had seemed to take on a faerie unreality all its own, and yet Carl had told her on several occasions, it was occupied.

  “An English family has started a tourist business there,” he had said. “It’s a far cry from the Hayman, Lindeman, Molle type of accommodation as yet, but there are some people who prefer simplicity and seclusion, and the Harpurs are doing that for them very well.”

  Now Carl spoke of the Harpurs again, and particularly of young William who had had the misfortune to break an ankle.

  “Big Bill, the dad, is an intelligent cove, and seemed to understand every instruction as to cold compresses, splints, bandages, etc., that I gave to him over the transmitter. But a doctor still likes to be sure.”

  “This doctor,” smiled Roslyn fondly. She had been very impressed with everything she had seen Carl do.

  “Thank you, Sister.” The medico bowed. “So,” he went on, “I propose to call over there.”

  “Can you? Is there a landing strip?”

  “Lor’ no, it’s no more than five cent size, only the bigger islands can provide those luxuries, but we could moor a boat. It’s not all that far, either. I estimate we can do it nicely there and back in a day.”

  Roslyn’s eyes were shining. She had been longing to go out on that turquoise blue, looking-glass water.

  “I would love it,” she told Carl. Then she stopped. “Belinda—” she sighed.

  “What about Belinda?”

  “She’s fond of Mrs. Marriot but I wouldn’t like to leave her. It wouldn’t be fair on your housekeeper, and it wouldn’t be fair on Belinda. You see, I’ve spoiled Belinda, Carl, let her have everything I have. I should start discipline, I know, but I can’t deprive her all at once like this.”

  “Who says you’ll be depriving? The child’s coming, too. She’s a good, manageable kid, in spite of that foxing, I’ve been noticing that all this week. I would have no fear taking her along in the boat.”
<
br />   “You mean it?”

  “Haven’t I just said it?”

  “Oh, Carl, you’re sweet. She’ll adore it, and it will be good for her—I mean, she’s only very, young, but she’s an intelligent young, and all she sees will be tucked away in her little brain.”

  “Good, then, get her gear and we’ll go tomorrow while the present lull is still on.”

  “Gear?” she queried.

  “Oh, nothing elaborate, in fact the opposite, just a dress that won’t matter.”

  “She has plenty of those.”

  “A large hat against the sun.”

  “Yes.”

  “Strong shoes, or better still, boots.”

  That halted Roslyn. “Oh, no, she only has sandals,” she protested.

  “No good, Ros.”

  “But—”

  “You see, Little Cockle is very fortunate, it has its own reef.”

  “That’s wonderful.”

  “It is. It would also be too wonderful to miss. But you simply can’t explore it, Ros, in sandals, you must wear stout shoes. Have you stout shoes?”

  “I have my uniform ones.”

  “Good. But not the baby?”

  “No.”

  “Then we’ll buy her some,” he decided.

  “Where? All the shoes I’ve seen in the shops here are cool open type, suitable for walking the sands, perhaps, but certainly not suitable for reefs.”

  “How about school shoes?” said Carl in triumph.

  “Children of three don’t usually wear school shoes,” Roslyn told him.

  “We’ll try, anyway.”

  They did try that afternoon, they took Belinda down to the village, but they had no luck. All the school shoes were much too large for her, and stuffing the toes would have made her awkward on her feet, and on the reef, Carl said, you had to be surefooted or invite a nasty fall. “Nothing cuts worse,” he warned, “than coral.”

  “Her shoes at Clementine are at least leather and do enclose her feet,” regretted Roslyn. “She wore that kind down south.”

  “Perfect. We’ll go first thing in the morning, pick them up, then make our way to where we take the boat. It will only put us back a half hour or so.”

  “You don’t mind?”

  “Of course I don’t mind. I want you both, Roslyn, and that should underline to you how much I want one of you.”