Master of Maramba

by Margaret Way

Carrie’s headlong flight took her down the grassy slope to the sanctuary of the lagoon. Her insides were contracting, a taste of bitterness was in her mouth. That grass was so thick and plush the heels of her sandals were sinking into its deep pile. She could smell the water, hear the ghost of music in the vibration of the reeds, see the luminous heads of hundreds of white arum lilies. Inevitably her mind grappled with the thought of snakes. What to do next? Wait until her heartbeat had settled and she had regained her composure before making her way back up the slope onto the path. She didn’t know if she had it in her to hum some snatch of melody to warn of her approach. Hadn’t Lindsey told him the governess had gone for a walk? Or were both so far gone as not to care?

  Bemused, Carrie hovered in the dark shadows at the water’s edge, relegated to the role of unwitting voyeur. The things one saw through windows! Enough to shatter lives. Darkness was all around her. She couldn’t be visible from the house yet moments later she saw Royce McQuillan’s tall figure silhouetted against the brilliant lights from the lobby before he strode out onto the verandah like a man in need of a great breath of fresh air.

  He stood for a moment, looking out into the night, then he plunged down the stairs.

  Carrie’s need to avoid him burned so strong she found herself taking off, running through the grass following the upward contour of the lagoon until she could reach the protection of one of the great shade trees. From there, after a minutes respite, she could make her way to the house, perhaps entering through one of the multiple sets of French doors. Entry by stealth, she thought. My first night and I’m sneaking back into the house.

  It’s all your fault, Royce McQuillan, she thought, her mind locked into an obsessive replay of what she had seen. Lust? Guilt? Anger? Degrees of all three. Carrie realised she was trembling, her breath coming in little keening sounds through her nostrils. If she fell she could ruck an ankle. This was like some hellish dream.

  “For God’s sake!” A man’s voice astonished her. How had he got there? Yet arms like steel bands locked around her, bringing her flight to a shuddering halt. “If I live to be a hundred I’ll never understand why women do the things they do,” Royce McQuillan rasped.

  She tried to laugh but, couldn’t possibly succeed. Instead her breath spasmed. “I’m sorry I became disoriented in the dark.”

  “Couldn’t you have stuck to the path?” He could feel the tremble in her body through her silky taut skin, moonlight pearling down on a face sheened with heat. He recognised the sensation every time he touched her. Tried to disconnect it.

  “I wanted to look at the water.” She was fighting for breath, for control.

  “Listen.” He continued to keep hold of her, barely preventing himself from shaking her. “I can’t tell you more than one time. Don’t go straying from the paths at night. Especially don’t go walking around near the water. Some areas are swampy, you could have got locked in reeds. I would have thought you’d have more sense. You haven’t even got anything substantial on your feet. Little bits of leather!”

  “I forgot. I’m sorry.” She stood like a statue within his arms, willing herself to feel nothing. “I won’t do it again.”

  “Hell, girl, it’s my responsibility to see you’re safe,” he said with sharp impatience.

  “Look, I’m all right.” Carrie felt her energy returning as though she had drawn off some of his virile strength. “I don’t need you to walk me back.”

  He turned her face fully to look at him. “Something has upset you.”

  “I can deal with it.” Her body went very tense.

  “Tell me.”

  “I’d rather die first.” Hostility flooded her.

  “It must be pretty awful. You were out on the path, weren’t you?” His voice cracked with a kind of contempt.

  “I hope I’m not going to have to account for all of my movements?”

  “Ahh, the little flash of hostility. Such a dead giveaway.”

  “I really don’t want to talk about it.” Indeed she didn’t, feeling sealed off in a strange world.

  “You don’t have to hide anything from me,” he jeered. “You saw something—you thought you saw something—that made you so uncomfortable you tore off into the night?”

  “Why don’t we just leave this?” Carrie knew immediately her voice sounded too tense, too judgemental.

  “How sanctimonious can you get?” he swore gently. “Leave what?”

  She dropped her head, her hair falling around her face like a curtain. “I suppose sometimes only the truth will do.”

  “And you’re sufficiently sure of your facts to know it? Let me spare you the telling, Carrie. You looked into the house and saw Lindsey and me having a few heated words?”

  “Something like that,” she confessed in a low voice. Even now he hadn’t settled down.

  “Why should it upset you so badly?” He stared at her. “It’s hardly any of your business.”

  “I don’t see it like that. I was very disturbed.”

  “You thought you’d actually stumbled on an illicit love scene?” he scoffed.

  “No need to be so cutting.” She felt a wave of shame.

  “No need for you to play the shining paragon of virtue, either. So bright and so innocent. For your edification, Miss Russell, I am not, repeat, not having an affair with my uncle’s wife, if that’s the conclusion you jumped to. Did you really think I was? Did you really think that of me?”

  She shook her head wretchedly. “No, I didn’t. I certainly didn’t want to. But she’s in love with you. You must know that.”

  “That’s what it looked like?” he asked in a harsh, drawn voice.

  “That was the message I’ve got since I arrived.”

  “Congratulations!” he groaned.

  “What did you say to her?” Carrie found herself asking before she could stop herself.

  “Just who the hell do you think you are?” he asked in amazement, trying to rein in his own feelings. “You’re obviously not happy just being Reggie’s governess.”

  “I’m no more a governess than the hostess of a game show,” she said with a spark of anger, not going to stand there and be humiliated. “I didn’t pick the place and I didn’t pick the time. I just happened to look into a brightly lit room—”

  “Be sure to add, and passed judgement on what you saw.”

  Carrie glanced up at the moon as if for guidance… “So I regret what happened. I regret if I’ve offended you. I know you’d never betray your uncle.”

  “Is there anything you’d like to add to that?” he demanded, closing his fingers around her wrist.

  “Yes, don’t be mad at me. Please.”

  Abruptly he relented, his thumb almost absently stroking the transparent blue-and-white inside skin. “Okay, a cease-fire. We’ll walk for a while, then we’ll go back to the house. But first I’d like to tell you the idea of Lindsey’s being in love with me is a joke. An embarrassment. There’s a whole body of literature about women who put themselves through torture with their ridiculous longings. To put it crudely, Lyn isn’t getting the kind of sex she wants and she seems to want it pretty badly that’s my interpretation anyway, but she’s not getting it from me. We can all be very certain about that. I’ve made it so plain I expect she’s going to devote the rest of her life to hating me.”

  “Lord!” Carrie ached. “Love is an illness.”

  “Not love.”

  “It must seem like it. Sexual confusions. Couldn’t Lindsey and your uncle live somewhere else? I understand he’s very well off.”

  “A fact that appears to have all but destroyed him,” he answered bluntly.

  “Your uncle should be enjoying life. He’s a charming man.”

  “And kind, which I remind you, I’m not. Cam’s too withdrawn if not actually out of it. In many ways he’s his own worst enemy.”

  “That’s sad.” Carrie’s voice wavered. His touch was inducing such excitement.

  “Okay, it’s sad, but I’m losing patienc
e.”

  “They’re such an unlikely couple.” She toyed with the idea of pulling her hand away but didn’t.

  “Hell, he’s not the only man to marry the wrong woman.” His voice carried self-disgust. “Cam and I between us have made it a family affair.”

  She tried to absorb some of his anger. “You’ll meet the right woman,” she promised.

  “What, are you going to set up shop as a clairvoyant now?” he scoffed, glancing down at her silky head, her pure profile outlined against the gilded purple of the night.

  “No, I’m just trying to be cheerful.”

  “How sweet of you.” The vibrant voice was attractively discordant.

  “Don’t be bitter. The smartest people can make terrible mistakes.”

  To her surprise he gave a hoot of genuine laughter. “Catrina, for one so young your insight is tremendous.”

  “Insightful. That’s me. Dammit!”

  “Hey, I like it.” Before she knew what he was about, he turned her to him, cupping her oval face in his hands. “What are you doing in my life?”

  She had no time to answer even if she could because he bent his head to kiss her parted mouth. Gently…so gently, yet her heart beat like a wild thing, nibbling at her cushioned lips as he might at wild strawberries. It was utterly bewitching, emotive enough to make her want to cry. She could have spent her life kissing him. Yet when he finally withdrew his beautiful seductive mouth from hers she could only find a stammer. “You said you wouldn’t k-k…kiss me again,” she reminded him.

  He nodded. “I meant it, too. At the time.” His tone was both erotic and tender as he pushed the hot silk of her hair behind her ears.

  “Well, you shouldn’t do it. I can’t think straight,” Carrie answered.

  “That’s your punishment,” he said crisply. “Never, never, spy on me again. I’m your employer, after all. Which is a kind of shame.” He caught her hand and began to swing it, urging her on toward the house.

  “Did you have these little problems with my predecessors?” she couldn’t resist asking as he hauled her up onto the path.

  “They weren’t as shatteringly attractive as you are,” he mocked. “I just can’t believe it! I didn’t know you a fortnight ago.”

  “It is odd,” Carrie agreed as he steadied her. More than odd, astonishing! Suddenly after all the many long months of her crushing disappointment the whole world looked different. She raised her face to him as they walked up onto the drive.

  “Look at the stars,” he said, pausing to rest his hand on her delicate shoulder. “The Southern Cross. Orion the mighty hunter with his jewelled belt. The others like diamond clusters through the trees. No matter what happens to us they never change. They endure.”

  “As we’re supposed to do,” she said quietly, feeling the warmth and the energy spreading out from his hand. She had to find a way out of her own confusions. Her long years of training couldn’t be lost.

  “Sometimes things get worse before they get better, Catrina,” he warned as though he had read her mind. “Put up a fight.”

  “I’m going to.”

  They lingered for a little while longer, he talking, Carrie listening, perfectly in tune with his mood.

  Neither noticed the woman standing in the shadows of the upstairs verandah. Nor did they know how long she had been there.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  REGGIE, to everyone’s delight, slipped virtually overnight into another skin. She became a pleasant and co-operative child blossoming under Carrie’s gentle understanding hand, secure in the knowledge Carrie really liked her, for Carrie’s approval and quick affection for this motherless little girl was transparent.

  By the end of a month, in the light of what had gone on before, they had established an excellent working routine; three hours of lessons in the morning; two in the afternoon. Again contrary to all Carrie had been told, Reggie proved an apt pupil. The trick Carrie had found from her own teaching experiences with gifted young musicians was to make the subject matter interesting, something she gave much thought to. That done, learning flowed very naturally. Reggie had a large vocabulary for her age—even excluding the swearwords which continued to pop out from time to time—but her disinterest in numeracy took an upward turn when Carrie hit on using an assortment of large, brightly printed cards to help Reggie see problem-solving more as a game.

  Meal times, too, were much less of a battleground. Even Mrs. Gainsford had to admit Carrie’s methods were working. Reggie learned how to make her own breakfast smoothies—banana remained the favourite—and Mrs. Gainsford capitulated to the extent “kid’s meals” were on the menu with Reggie making a big concession by eating certain julienned raw vegetables she could dip in a sauce. All this along with many chocolate-flavoured malted milks resulted in a pleasing weight gain. Reggie had never had such a benevolent guiding hand. And it showed!

  So it wouldn’t be all work and no play, they often drove out for a picnic lunch followed by a nature ramble always within a specified distance of the homestead. Royce McQuillan had put at Carrie’s disposal a nifty little Toyota Rav 4 which gave her considerable mobility. In fact she sometimes thought he would give her just about anything if it would make her stay happy and Reggie a contented child.

  Reggie adored their little forays into the bush but not for the life of her could Carrie cajole the little girl into learning to swim. There was a beautiful big swimming pool in the rear garden of the homestead but of far more interest and pleasure to Carrie was a wonderful rock pool fed by a fresh water spring some four miles from the main compound. Almost perfectly moon-shaped, it nestled in the shelter of a series of low jutting rocks massed like an amphitheatre, crystal-clear, rather cold even in extreme heat, surrounded by tall spears of blue native grasses overhung at this time of the year by a feathery tree with dazzling yellow, large-petalled flowers.

  On this particular day they had finished their picnic lunch. Reggie dressed in a pink T-shirt and shorts, sat on a large flat rock overlooking the pool, watching Carrie taking her swim.

  “You look like a mermaid,” Reggie called as Carrie floated on her back, her hair streaming around her.

  “It’s lovely in here.” Carrie would have loved to induce the child to enter the water. But all in her own good time.

  “No way!” Reggie shook her head. “There are spirits at the bottom of the pools.”

  “Spirits?” For a moment Carrie thought she hadn’t heard right. She swam over to the child, treading water. “Did you say spirits?”

  “They’ll get you, too,” Reggie warned.

  Carrie shook her head. “This is a beautiful place, Reggie. Can’t you feel peace and harmony all around you?”

  “Yes, I can,” Reggie answered simply, “but there are all spooky things, too.”

  “Who said?” Carrie pulled herself out of the pool, water streaming from her slender long-legged body, clad in a streamlined dark blue swimsuit with a splash of green and yellow flowers.

  Reggie ran to pick up Carrie’s towel, passing it to her and gazing up at Carrie with open admiration. “You’ve got a beaut figure.”

  Carrie could feel herself smiling. “Why, thank you, Reggie. I’m getting a lot of exercise these days.”

  “Uncle Cam told Royce you’re the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen. And you know what? He said it in front of Lindsey.”

  “Ouch!” Carrie rubbed herself down briskly, thinking Lindsey wouldn’t have liked that.

  “Uncle Cam just says what he thinks.” Reggie smiled. “He’s a nice man, isn’t he? But so quiet.”

  “He’s a perfect sweetie,” Carrie said honestly. She had got to know Cameron McQuillan better. “I think his quietness is the result of a lot of unresolved sadness, Reggie.”

  Reggie, justly proud of her word comprehension was lost. “I just forgot what that means?”

  “Unresolved?” Carrie asked.

  Reggie nodded.

  “It means sadness not properly dealt with. When your uncle Cam
lost his first wife the grief was so terrible he couldn’t ever break it down into little pieces. Something he could manage. It has never gone away. Some people are like that.” Carrie thought of her own father and the unresolved grief over her mother he had expressed. “Men can feel things very deeply.”

  Reggie nodded in near adult agreement. “So why did he marry Lyn then?” she asked reasonably.

  “He must have thought she’d bring joy back into his life.” Carrie towelled her hair. “She’s a striking-looking woman.”

  “That’s not her own blond hair,” Reggie said. “Haven’t you seen the roots?”

  “Lots of women colour their hair, Reggie. It looks good.”

  “She doesn’t frighten me anymore,” Reggie said, pitching a small pebble across the water.

  “I should hope not,” Carrie breathed, very protective of the child.

  “She did. She even told Ina she never thought I was one of them.”

  “One of what?” Carrie looked at her in dismay.

  “I dunno. I think she’s mad. Anyway she’s the one who told me about the spirits at the bottom of the lagoon at home. Evil little things that will catch you around the ankles and drag you down to the bottom. She knows I can’t swim. I would drown.”

  Carrie made a note to speak to Lindsey. “I could teach you to swim in no time, Reggie, if you’ll let me.” Carrie put certainty and commitment into her voice. “You could never be frightened with me?”

  “Don’t be silly! You’re neat! I’ll think about it, Carrie,” Reggie promised. “But not today.”

  “That’s okay.” Carrie was satisfied with that much progress. She ran a wide-toothed comb through her wet hair then pulled it back into a ponytail. “I suppose we should think about starting back,” she said regretfully.

  “Don’t you want to dry off?” Reggie was happy where she was.

  “I’d like to.” Carrie weakened.

  “I love it here.” Reggie sighed in contentment as Carrie spread her towel on a rock then lay down in the shade of the overhanging tree, with diamond chunks of sunlight falling on her long legs. After a while Reggie spoke. “You know we’ve got crocs on Maramba?”