The Mutual Look

by Dingwell, Joyce

  Donnelly, also prepared, had a manoeuvrable small car awaiting them. Jane found the gears familiar, and within minutes the trio were on a track that Donnelly indicated.

  It ran, a narrow earth ribbon, through the lush green swathe of the plateau until the rolling paddocks ended, then it descended cautiously, for caution was needed down the steep cliffside, past peaks, gorges, sudden deep gulches, great isolated rocks, splaying waterfalls into a valley. Between keeping her attention strictly on the track, Jane darted brief looks ahead, and saw, in the distance, that paddocks fanned out once again from the valley towards the coast, mostly cleared paddocks for cultivation, but in the dent of every small rise in them blue-smudged shadows from the overlooking mountains in the unfolding golden-green of the grass.

  `It's beautiful!' Jane had stopped the car.

  `The pool,' came an impatient duet from the back seat. With a little sigh, Jane reduced another gear and started carefully down once more.

  She would have loved to have known the trees. When she asked the twins they said, 'Gums, of course.'

  Not all of them. Some of these are quite different.'

  `Red gum, silver gum, scribbley. There's billions,' they tossed. They were obviously anxious to get to their goal.

  There was no trouble in finding the pool. Rounding a bend at the bottom of the cliff, a grassy bank under willows with a wide golden sand frontage ... the gift of the Urara residents, Jane remembered from William Bower ... greeted them.

  It was a charming spot; the residents could not have chosen better. The water idled by in a gentle pace that would never alarm new swimmers, but it moved sufficiently to keep it clear and singing, in fact the only addition to its shine and sparkle was a floating leaf.

  Also, a man, swimming now towards Jane, lifting his hand in delighted greeting.

  It was John, and, just as delighted, Jane raised her arm and waved back.

  `Who is he?' asked Roberta, but she did not wait for an answer. Robert had beaten her in, so there was no time for Jane's explanation.

  Jane herself wasted no time as well. William Bower had said that the shelf of the rivulet was a safe and gradual one, but the sparkle of the water was enticing, the children obviously unafraid, so she must be extra careful. She was grateful to John that he caught the purpose and did not hinder her with any talk until the first lesson was over, and the children, a little tired, were launching bark boats from the bank.

  They had done exceptionally well, they were fluid children, agile, fit. They would be naturals, Jane thought.

  `Perhaps,' said Robert, 'our real mother and father were Olympic swimmers and we've taken after them.' So the

  twins had been told the truth, Jane gleaned, and evidently, by their contented faces, told in a wise way.

  `We were chosen, you know, Jane,' Roberta added casually.

  That had been after they had emerged on Jane's insistence almost waterlogged from the stream. Now they lazily launched boats and Jane could turn and greet John.

  didn't expect you.'

  told you I was a Uraran.'

  'Yes, but it was only yesterday we left the ship.' It seemed impossible to Jane it was only that, so much seemed to have happened.

  'You thought it would take me longer,' he nodded. didn't waste any time. Also, I'm just arriving now.' 'You haven't been home, then?'

  `No. I always carry trunks for the times when I pass this spot—it's a lovely place, isn't it?'

  'It's beautiful.' She told him William Bower's plans for the teaching of the children.

  'That's wonderful. I'll be seeing you, then.'

  'How far away are you?' she asked.

  'You passed it,' he told her.

  'I'm sure we didn't pass a house.'

  'Like to bet on it?' he grinned. 'Call the kids and we'll go there for lunch'

  have a hamper.'

  'Then you can eat from it if you want to be independent. However' ... the twins, having finished their launching, returning ... make rare Johnny cakes.'

  'Johnny cakes!' They took it up in a delighted chorus.

  'Why not?' John laughed. 'My name is John ' He turned to Jane. `I'll take one, you take the other. Follow me.'

  Jane hesitated, at once the thought of William Bower crossing her mind, but the first lesson had been successfully concluded, the children were eager to go and ... With a smile she took Robert and got into the small car.

  They retraced only a few hundred yards, then turned into

  a side track making its own canyon as it wound through thick trees. From his several yards ahead of her, John called of the trees : `Blackwoods. Sassafras. Mahogany.'

  `Not all gums,' Jane told Robert.

  There were small musk trees and tree ferns, too, fallen logs from dead trees covered with lichen, mosses and old man's beard. In fact there was so much overgrowth and undergrowth that there seemed no room for anything but leaves.

  But there was room for a house, Jane found, negotiating a bend after John had, a low, oiled-timber one, looking as at home as though, like the trees encircling it, it had grown there, too.

  Delighted, Jane got out. It was a lovely place, built to fit in with the woods, with John's hopfields further along the valley, with the eucalyptus distillery he was telling her he also had, though it was tucked away in a fold of the hill, he said, behind the house. 'I have to include all the variations I can, Jane, these times competition is tough.'

  He was making the Johnny cakes, for the twins would give him no peace, he said ruefully, until he produced the promised batch.

  `Me, too,' smiled Jane, looking at John's frothing mixture. 'Why,' she asked, 'such a big house?'

  `I've always intended it for a family house.' John looked up from his mixing at Jane.

  `I hope you have your family, John,' she said.

  The Johnny cakes were wonderful, there was not a crumb left. There was also no room in the twins for Harry's offerings. Jane wondered if Harry might tell William Bower about that.

  After the meal, John took them down to his timber section, and Jane stood sadly with him by some of the bigger trees marked for cutting.

  `Yes, I feel the same,' John nodded, sensing her mood, `but that's life, Jane. Come and see a brighter side ... at least it goes to provide a brighter life.'

  `The hops?'

  `Yes.'

  It was not a large hop garden, just more bread and butter, John told her, on his plate. Some of the fellows in the district had gone in entirely for hops, he said, and when the picking was on, the valley was worth visiting. New Australians came in as well as the old ones, and the variations in the cooking, and, at night, in the dancing, was exciting.

  `We'll come,' promised the twins.

  To pick, too?' asked John. 'Being a small grower I don't hire hands as the others have to do, and I'd be glad of help.' He showed the children and Jane how he had provided vast networks of strung wires for the hops, supported by a forest of poles. 'Self-grown poles,' he boasted.

  `Now come and examine the third home-grown product, the distillery. Tell me if you see a difference in the trees, Jane.'

  They were certainly gums again, but instead of Robert's `billions' of varieties, there seemed only one type.

  `It happens,' John said when she told him this. 'Sometimes a valley of blue gum builds up a stronghold and won't let anything else in. It doesn't happen frequently, and that's where I'm lucky.'

  `Why, John? Don't you like the other gums?' This valley of John's was all blue gum.

  `An identical valley of trees makes for a good eucalyptus yield. I'm getting twenty gallons a week from this little acreage, Jane. You could say the oil is the jam on my bread.'

  He told her his simple but effective method of piping off and condensing. As he spoke he rolled leaves in his hard workman's hands, and sniffed them, and Jane did the same. They smiled across at each other.

  The children had come with them, but must have got bored with the technical explanation and sauntered off. When they did not return
in the next ten minutes, Jane started to fuss.

  No need for worry,' insisted John comfortingly, 'though it looks a formidable wood they can't go far where we stand now.'

  'The Australian bush—' Jane feared.

  'Should be treated with respect, I'll give in, but right here it's a corner, and they can't get out unless they climb out, and I hardly think' ... looking up at the ramparts ... 'they'll do that. I'll give them a cooee ... that means come here, did you know? ... and they'll be bounding back.'

  But they didn't bound back. At the end of another five minutes John repeated his assurance of safety, to which Jane replied : 'Perhaps, but I hardly like returning the twins late on my first day.'

  He agreed with her on that, and gave another summons, louder than before, following it with : 'Come out, you two, or no more Johnny cakes!'

  They came bounding down a track, full of apologies. 'The man in the bush kept us,' panted Roberta.

  'Kept you, you mean,' corrected Robert. He added, 'He wanted to sculp her.'

  'Scalp should be more like it,' John scolded mildly. 'Don't worry, Jane, I know the old fellow. He comes here now and then ... it's an abandoned woodman's humpy round the next valley and free for all ... to live with nature. Quite harmless.'

  'Not so old,' said Roberta, but Jane took no notice of her ... then. She was bustling the children to the car.

  Ve must get up to the plateau at once.'

  Although the climb was steep, the little car took it well. The moment they were on the flat, Jane accelerated to home.

  She was garaging the car when Donnelly came across. `No troubles?' he asked.

  No, everything went wonderfully.'

  'Wish I could say that about the stud.' Like all the employees, even though Les Donnelly was a mechanical and

  not a horse man, the horses played a very big part in his life.

  `Anything wrong?'

  `The old mare Wendy is foaling. She must be all of twenty-one years.'

  `That's advanced,' nodded Jane, then, seeing the concern on Donnelly's face, 'But lots of mares do it successfully.'

  `Reckon it's the mare and not the newcomer that's concerning the boss. He loves that old girl.'

  `I wonder' ... Jane hesitated ... 'I wonder if I could go across. I haven't got a degree or anything like that, but I have had experience.'

  `I reckon that would be real fine, miss,' Donnelly said eagerly. 'As I said, we all love Wendy. Hop in the jeep and I'll take you to the western paddock. That's where the old girl is.'

  Forgetting the hamper she had not removed yet but had intended to, glad that she had dropped the children at the house, Jane got into the jeep.

  The western paddock was a quarter of a mile away. `Wendy always foaled here,' Donnelly related. He stopped the jeep by the fence, and Jane got out, climbed some bars, then walked quietly to the small group of men gathered round the foaling Wendy.

  William Bower glanced up at her as she came, and had she not known that cool man now she would have said that there was a flicker of gratefulness at her approach. As for Tim, the vet, there was no mere flicker, there was a welcoming smile.

  The smile was soon wiped away, though.

  Wendy's no good,' Tim said.

  The next ten minutes were a bigger nightmare than Jane ever had with Rusty back at Little Down. For there they had never lost a mother, only horses in general, since horses have their life span, too, and must go on. But never, Jane recalled, a mare in foal.

  But now they lost Wendy. The foal was born, an im-

  petuous filly whose robust fight to enter the world, plus

  Wendy's advanced years, certainly caused Wendy's death.

  But although the mare was haemorrhaging, she lived long enough to give the little girl the first vital feed. Most foals, Jane knew, die without that initial suckling of colostrum, which contains the maternal anti-bodies to protect the baby from disease.

  Then Wendy died. She was twenty-one, she had the credit of many children, some of them quite famous, she had enjoyed a full life ... but Jane understood when William Bower pushed his hands, not needed any longer, into his coat pocket and turned and walked away.

  Impetuously she ran after him. 'Mr. Bower—' He wheeled round.

  `I'm sorry,' she said.

  `She was old,' he replied shortly, but she understood it was only a cover-up.

  I'll watch the foal,' she offered.

  `Yes, do that.' He got into his car and went back to the stud. Jane went to the wobbly, spindly-legged little girl, gazing around her with astonished eyes. She wiped her, then said : 'Nine ounces of vegetable extract, dried skim milk, calcium, edible oil, dextrose and glucose was our Little Down formula, failing, of course, a foster-mother.'

  `Which we don't have,' said Tim.

  `Then if I feed her hourly on that?'

  `It will be wonderful,' the vet accepted. He covered Wendy and sighed : 'Green pastures, old girl.'

  A float was coming out and Jane took the foal with her into the box. Tim came, too.

  `Boss is upset,' he said. 'A man has to be when it's a thing like this.'

  But when Jane emerged from the stables after making arrangements with Tim which feeding hours would be hers and which his, William Bower was waiting outside the door for her, and the tone of his voice as he asked her to come across to his office was no longer the tone of a distressed

  man. In fact he seemed in full control of whatever position he ... and presumably Jane, since he had come for her ... found themselves. All his sentimentality was gone, he was hard and cool again.

  `Tim and I have come to an agreement regarding the night feeding of the foal,' Jane began. 'During the day we thought the other girls—' She stopped at a dismissive movement of his big hands. 'What is it, Mr. Bower?' she asked.

  `You recall our talk yesterday?'

  `Very well.'

  `I asked you to waive your strapping duties for a while, didn't I, and instead concentrate on the kids.'

  `Yes, you did. Then' ... believing she saw what he was after ... 'you don't want me to take over Wendy's Pride—we called her that pending

  `I wanted' ... he made a point of the past tense ... 'you to take over the twins.'

  `And you don't want it now?' she asked.

  `I don't know. I do know I want an explanation first.' `Of what?'

  `Your late arrival back from the valley. That was one heck of a long day, Miss Sidney.'

  `Yes, it was, but I can explain.'

  `Explain, too, an unopened hamper? Harry was quite upset about it. Felt he hadn't made it attractive enough. He came and asked me. In case you don't know, just as with an army, a stud marches ... should I say canters?' ... an unamused laugh ... 'on its stomach. In any concern a cook always stands top in importance, even over the boss, and Harry is a very good cook. I wouldn't care to lose him.' He waited. 'Through you.'

  `I'll speak to Harry,' she offered.

  `Telling him what? That the three of you were on a diet? That you purchased goodies from the shop that isn't there?'

  `No,' said Jane honestly, 'that we had Johnny cakes with John.'

  He looked at her a long incredulous moment. 'Are they the words of a song? Johnny cakes with John?'

  No, of course not,' she answered sharply, feeling somehow caught-out, and she shouldn't, for really there had been nothing. But still she had the stupid sensation that she had inveigled something, that she had deceived.

  'Tell me, please.' His voice was dry.

  'When we reached the beach, John was swimming there,' she began.

  'Prearranged?'

  'Certainly not. He was on his way to his house—he says he always stops for a swim.'

  'That adds up. It's attractive. All the same—' 'All the same what, Mr. Bower?'

  'All the same it all makes a tall story.'

  'I'm sorry I can't shorten it for you.'

  'Then,' he shrugged, expect I'll have to accept it as the truth.'

  Before she could answer that, tell hi
m, as she fully intended to, that he could do what he liked with the story, he came in : 'So that's why you were late. You dallied at John's.'

  No. But John did show us the timber, the hops, the eucalyptus distillery, but the children going away as they did—' Too late she realized she had said too much. She closed her mouth, but knew it could not finish there.

  'They went where?' he asked.

  'They got bored with the distillery and went away.' 'Where?' Again he emphasized it.

  'Away—I told you. Through the woods.'

  'My God!' he exclaimed.

  'It was, and is, all right. John's place backs into a mountain, there's no possibility of being lost.'

  'But they were, I gather? You said they were late in coming back.'

  No. They met this man.' Again Jane stopped, knowing she had said too much.

  `What man?'

  `John knows him. A harmless old fellow.' As she said it Jane remembered Roberta's `Not so old', but again did not dwell on it. `He comes at times and lives with nature. I think' remembering Robert this time ... `he's some sort of sculptor.'

  `So eventually you rounded them up and returned here?' `Yes. Mr. Donnelly told me about Wendy, and ...' Her voice trailed off.

  A minute went by in silence. It was a long minute. Then William Bower said : 'I thank you, anyway, for that, Miss Sidney.'

  She nodded, and the silence started again.

  `How did the kids go?' He broke the quiet. Evidently he had accepted her explanation, she thought, but how typical of the man not to admit it.

  `Good. They're very applicable. Robert more than Roberta.'

  `It's good to learn that the male sometimes leads,' he said

  drily. 'You believe then they both can be taught?'

  `I'm sure of it. Robert is practically swimming already.

  Roberta

  `Better follow suit. I've had word from the quarantine that the first contingent will be ready next week. Once they arrive you'll begin the duties you came here for.'

  Jane said, 'Of course.'

  `So if you can teach the children within five days