by Dorothy Cork
He woke her in the morning before it was light. He had made tea, cooked steak and eggs and toast, and they breakfasted together in the kitchen with the electric light burning. By sun-up they were in the Land Rover, travelling along the track away from the homestead.
Edie leaned back in the seat feeling a sense of almost unwilling pleasure and excitement. Drew was right; she should make the best of it. This, for instance, would be something to remember when it was all over and she was back in Sydney with Barb, nursing her old people again.
Drew wore a black shirt, black pants, and her eyes
went again and again to his long brown hands on the wheel of the car, and then to his profile, which she was beginning to know by heart. The sky had lightened, galahs showed rose-coloured breasts as they rose in great flocks to swim through the clear early morning air. The paddock fences were squared in sharply against the growing brilliance of the sky on the flat horizons, and she saw a lone emu moving, unhurried, confident, its big, feathered body oddly turtle-shaped, its legs and head half hidden in the long grasses as it stopped to feed. Clouds were lifting high into the sky above the edge of the world to make a floating pattern above, and silvery shafts of sunlight merged with the soft golden haze on the eastern horizon. Everything was new and beautiful and clean and unknown, and deep within her Edie felt a sort of hunger stirring. This could be a wonderful world.
Half an hour later, the day had lost its dewy freshness, its magic air of mystery and unreality. The air was growing hot and breathless, and they had driven into harsh scrubby country. As they came through the mulga a while later, everything seemed suddenly to be obscured by clouds of red dust. Across the plain that opened out ahead of them there were horses and men, jostling cattle, the rough rails of holding yards, while closer at hand under the trees, a scattering of gear and canvas proclaimed that they were at the muster camp.
Drew braked and turned to look at Edie for what seemed the first time in hours, his grey eyes assessing, enquiring. She blinked, trying quickly to veil her instant reaction, which had been one of slight shock. How could she possibly put in days and days—and worse still, nights and nights—out here in these primitive conditions? Water glinted through the trees, and in the shade of some big trees a man, evidently the
camp cook, was making preparations for a meal. A whip cracked, a stream of cattle came reluctantly across to the yards in a cloud of dust, and Edie clenched her teeth.
`Sorry you came?'
Drew's eyes mocked her and she said instantly, 'Why should I be? It's—very interesting.'
`You reckon so?' He smiled lopsidedly. 'It's a pity you don't ride. When the novelty's worn off, you may find you're just a little bit bored.'
`Couldn't I learn to ride?' she retorted, and felt pleased at his look of surprise.
`I guess you could—if you're game.'
Well, she'd married a man like Drew Sutton. She should be game enough for anything.
Presently she had a mug of tea poured from a huge steaming billy, and as she drank she made the acquaintance of several laconic and quietly curious stockmen. Later, Drew set up a primitive tent for her away from those other rough shelters.
`Where will you sleep?' she asked him.
He shrugged and said drawlingly, 'Where I'll be expected to sleep—over here, with you.'
`With me?' she repeated.
`Near you,' he corrected himself dryly, and she coloured fiercely and changed the subject.
`When can I learn to ride?'
`You can have your first lesson in just five minutes. I'll have a quiet little horse saddled up for you. As quiet a horse as you can expect out here,' he added, his eyes glinting.
Edie felt a spasm of fear, but she didn't put a voice to it.
She had never been on a horse in her life and she was thankful that none of the men were around when a
little later Drew helped her into the saddle. But your left foot in the stirrup—now up you go
She looked at him helplessly and unexpectedly his hands went around her waist and he swung her up as if she weighed nothing. She felt herself miles above the ground on this 'little' horse, and her hands trembled as he put the reins into her hands and adjusted the stirrup leathers. In a frighteningly short time, she was riding at his side away from the yards and the camp, at first at a walk, but soon, as her horse followed his, at a trot. It wasn't difficult after all, although she was aware she hadn't fully adjusted to the rhythm of the horse's movements—and that later on she was going to feel very stiff and sore indeed. Drew gave her a few elementary lessons, and warned her against doing anything too drastic—Tull too sharply on the reins and you're likely to be thrown, in your state of inexperience.'
She spent the rest 'qf the morning in the saddle, though far from all of it with Drew. A good part of the time she merely sat her horse in the shade of the trees and watched the activity going on around her. She watched Drew in particular, naturally enough, and it was impossible not to be impressed at his performance on his tall black stallion.
Lunch was steaks and potato and bread, washed down by mugs of black tea. The men had some sort of boiled pudding, but not Edie, and it was a relief to her when Drew suggested she should spend the afternoon at the waterhole. -
`That way you can keep cool and get yourself cleaned up in privacy as well—you're in a pretty dusty state and I reckon you've had enough riding for one day. Muscles feeling sore?'
Not yet,' she said.
She didn't go straight to the waterhole after the men resumed work. She sat on the red earth, her back against a tree trunk, watching the cook cleaning up, watching the activity going on around the yards. The cattle were milling about, the dust was rising in clouds, and the ringers were continually bringing in more mobs. Most of all, as in the morning, she watched Drew on his black horse, with that long stockwhip of his. It was fascinating to watch him use it to pick out a beast from the yards—curling it with lightning speed through the air, using magic to bring a specific animal where he wanted it so it could be drafted into another yard. She could have watched for hours, she thought, and then discovered she was on the point of falling asleep. The only thing that kept her awake was the growing soreness in her muscles. A long hot soak in a bath would have been just the thing, but there was no bath here, no hot water, no shower even. Presently she got up stiffly from the ground and went back to the tent Drew had put up for her use. One side of it was completely open, and there were two bedding rolls on the ground—his and hers. She hadn't given him her gear but had packed it in a flight bag, and from there she took out her swimsuit and went rather nervously away from the camp towards the waterhole she'd seen earlier.
It was unexpectedly cool and shady there, with dry sparkling red sand all around and tea trees leaning over the water. Cockatoos, perched in eucalypts a little further off, shrieked occasionally, and lizards basked in the sun or moved slowly through the stiff grasses. Edie got quickly into her swimsuit and was soon in the water. It was sun warmed and gentle and deep enough to swim, and she spent a long time there.
When she went back to the camp, the work was still
going monotonously on, and she sat in the Land Rover, because although it was hot, it was kinder to her aching muscles than sitting on the hard ground. Drew appeared to have forgotten her completely, for he never once glanced her way. For her part, her eyes, screwed up against the sun, followed his every movement, even though she felt more than a passing irritation with her own fascination. Drew Sutton at work. Her cattleman Her husband.
She was stunned when later he rode straight over to the Land Rover as if he had known all the time that she was there, and leaned down from his horse to look at her.
`How goes it, Mrs Sutton?'
She felt her heart jump and an instant protest rose to her lips, but somehow she stifled it, and instead gave him a wry smile.
`I'm beginning to pay for my enthusiasm,' she told him.
`I'll give you a massage later,' he promised her, and her eyes widened. He spran
g down on to the ground and holding the reins loosely in his hands leaned in at the open window. 'Isn't that the right treatment—seeing you can't indulge in a long hot soak, nurse?'
`Yes,' she said, embarrassed. 'But I can manage without your ministrations, thank you. I'll be all right tomorrow.'
`What's the matter? Are you afraid I don't know anything about muscles? You'll find I'm quite an expert at easing your aches and pains.'
She pressed her lips together. 'That's—that's not the point. I just don't happen to want you to—to massage me.'
`Oh, for God's sake, are you going to add coyness to your other foibles? You're in the bush now—there's no
room for sensitivity and bashfulness.'
Her other foibles? What exactly was that supposed to mean? On the point of asking him, she changed her mind. She leaned across and opened the car door on the other side and climbed out.
`I'm going to see what the cook's doing,' she told him over her shoulder—and hoped he didn't notice how stiffly she walked as she made her way across to the truck.
The stockmen cleaned up before dinner. Some were more fastidious than others—and some were not fastidious at all, and Edie didn't blame them after the long and hard day's work. Drew was the only man present who managed to look immaculate, and she wondered if that was because he was the boss or if it was for her benefit, but she didn't ask him. Dinner was a rough and hearty meal, and she shared hers with Drew while the men lounged on the ground, eating and talking. The sky was dark and sparks leaped up from the camp fire. In the yards, the cattle were quiet, kept so by a couple of men on horseback who rode around them constantly. The other stock horses had been hobbled and would be rounded up in the morning by the horse taller, Drew told her—before it was light, for work began then.
It was strangely dreamlike sitting in the open air with the darkness of the sky overhead, the Southern Cross bright, and the glow of the camp fire lighting the trees and the faces of the men. Edie felt really conscious for the first time of how vast a land this was—and of how small and lonely a group they were, out there on the plain. But she was tired, terribly tired, and it was a relief when Drew asked her, `Do you feel like bed?'
She closed her eyes wearily. 'Oh, I do—I do!'
`Then run along. I'll be across in a few minutes to
give you that massage.'
`No!' she protested vehemently.
`Yes,' he said implacably.
She had got awkwardly to her feet, all too aware of the tenderness of her muscles, and he'd got up too, and she looked up at him defiantly. The longing for a hot bath was almost intolerable, but all the same, she didn't want his attentions.
Yet why ever not? she asked herself a few minutes later when she had escaped from him to the darkness of her tent. The firelight didn't reach to here, and she stripped off her clothes as quickly as she was able and got into her pyjamas. It would be bliss—it would be heaven—to have her sore body massaged. And Drew claimed to be something of an expert.
She had unrolled her bedding when she became aware that he had come to the tent.
`Okay,' he said briskly. Tie down on your tummy.'
`It's—all right,' she faltered, and added firmly, 'I'm not being coy—I'd just rather get into bed and go to sleep.'
`Liar,' he said briefly, and she looked at him indignantly as he stood in the opening of the tent. It was impossible to read his expression, for the glow of the fire turned him into a dark silhouette. Faceless, he could have been any cattleman standing there. Or any other man in the world. But he wasn't any cattleman, and he wasn't any other man in the world. He was Drew Sutton, the man she had married yesterday. And she could feel a kind of warmth emanating from him. Strangely, it seemed not merely a physical warmth, but another sort of warmth as well—the warmth of a personality.
'And when he reached out his hand and said softly,
cajolingly, 'Come on, Edie, be sensible—' she turned from him and flung herself down on her face as obediently as a child.
It was all the bliss she had imagined and more to have his strong firm fingers massaging her aching muscles. He pulled her pyjama jacket up and slid the elastic top of her pants down, and his fingers eased the muscles of her back, of her buttocks, of her thighs, his hands warm and confident and comforting on her flesh. She was almost asleep before he'd finished with her, barely conscious of his telling her to turn over, of his opening the bedding roll and covering her up.
`I'll be right along, Edie,' he said then, so close to her ear she knew she wasn't imagining the words.
After that, she drifted into a half waking dream—of Drew kissing her as she lay on the hard ground, his lips against her own, their bodies, close, intimate This was how it must have been for the pioneer women who came with their men to the untamed outback, accompanied them on their mustering trips—often of necessity, because there'd be no homestead, no comforts, only a rough home of wattle and clay with beaten earth for a floor, no windows. Those women had borne children, nurtured them, lived lonely lives until they died.
Edie shivered a little in her bedding roll. What would it be like to have the comfort of a man lying here beside her? Like nothing in this world—like nothing she had ever experienced before—just as Drew's kiss two nights ago had been an entirely new experience for her. She heard the soft lowing of the cattle, the whistling of a Willie Wagtail, the sad cry of a curlew, and her thoughts drifted back to the flat she had shared with Barb in a Sydney suburb; to the man who had come home with her, kissed her on the sofa, grabbed at her,
groped for her; to how she had wriggled away in distaste and how they had never—not one of them—ever said `Will you marry me?' Marriage was an old-fashioned thing. Sex came first, and your partner might be more or less permanent or he might not. How would that sort of thing go out here? she wondered, and it seemed to have no place.
She heard a movement and she knew Drew had come to the tent. In the darkness she watched him undress down to his shorts and stand for a moment against the distant dying glow of the camp fire—broadchested, narrow-hipped, almost naked. He was her husband, and yet she would be outraged if he tried to get into bed with her, to make love to her here on the bare red earth. She turned on her side and pushed the thought forcibly from her mind.
`Edie?' She felt the warmth of his breath close to her cheek, and she moved sharply.
`What?'
`You aren't asleep. Are you afraid? Do you want me to come in beside you?'
She turned away from him with a swift movement and covered her head with the blanket.
`Let me alone,' she said huskily.
After that there was silence.
Her muscles were still sore next day despite the massage, and Edie decided against riding. In any case, after lunch the men were moving on to make another camp, and Edie watched the packing up. Some of the men had been detailed to walk the sale bullocks back to the yards where they would be trucked off for sale, and she watched the mob set off. The branding and de-sexing were over, and the yards were empty, all the canvas and other gear had been packed up, and finally another
cavalcade set off, a cavalcade of men and horses, for each stockman had three horses to allow for resting, the cook had two, and there were six night horses as well as eight pack animals to carry the plant. Last to leave was the cook in the truck, and when he had gone there remained only Edie and Drew and the Land Rover.
Edie felt exhausted and she knew she looked exhausted. It was excruciatingly hot, her body ached and the thought of moving off to another camp and starting all over again had become almost too much to bear. Yet not for worlds would she have protested to Drew or told him how much she had begun already to miss the comfort of a hot shower, or the privacy of a civilized toilet. If she and Drew had been in love, it might have been completely different, but as it was, there just seemed too much to cope with altogether.
It was a shock as well as a relief when Drew, pausing to light a cigarette as he strolled across to the Land Rover,
already loaded with Edie's tent and her flight bag, her bedding and his--looked across the flame of the match to ask her astutely, 'Well? Have you had enough? Or are you ready for more?'
She didn't answer straight away. For her pride's sake, she wanted to claim to be ready for more, but on the point of doing so, she paused. She wasn't ready for more, so why on earth should she subject herself to more? Why shouldn't she go back to the homestead and sleep in a comfortable bed and take a hot bath when she wanted it instead of roughing out here? Why should she suffer to save Drew from having to come back home each night? She didn't really care if he came back or not, she wasn't afraid, and if it was a matter of conscience—or appearances—for him, then that was his worry. After all, she was the one who was doing the favour.
So she told him flatly, 'I've had enough. When I go back to Sydney I'll be able to tell my patients just what it's like to rough it at a muster camp.' She looked straight at him, not even blinking in the brilliant sunlight. 'I'd like to go back to the homestead.'
He didn't comment and after a second she added, 'If that's going to make me a nuisance, I won't object if you take me in to Narrunga and leave me there to get back to civilization.'
His grey eyes surveyed her narrowly, and then he shook his head. 'No, you're not going back to civilization, Alfreda. Is it that, or is it your old boy-friend you're thinking of ?'
Edie blinked. `Joe?'
`Is that his name? Joe, then. He has more attractions to offer you than a cattleman after all, I suppose.'
Edie found she had to make quite an effort to concentrate on Joe—slim, fair-haired, good-looking, wrapped up in his own world, which was the world of advertising. She had wrestled with him—how long ago? it seemed an age ! —on the sofa in the flat—She glanced at Drew Sutton from under her lashes and felt a strange spasm in the region of her heart. Oh no, Joe didn't have more attractions to offer than a cattleman—than this cattleman. In fact, it didn't worry her one little bit that she'd most likely never see Joe again.