The Road Home

by Margaret Way

  “You know it’s you two who have opened up a whole new world to me,” Mrs. Saunders went on as though nothing was happening. “DNA testing. Never crossed my mind! But now! I could be entitled to a share in the station. It’s sitting on sacred land. Our sacred land. You have no right to it, the lot of you. But I don’t think I want to make trouble. You can pay me out. I’ll go away like Miss Helena.”

  Stefan swung on her, looking capable of real violence. “You frightened her away.” He stared at the woman as though she had crossed some uncrossable divide.

  “Not me who chased her away from here,” the woman said. “Ghosts. Phantoms. Maybe the Kadaitcha Man, like Mr. McKendrick says. The Kadaitcha Man could have put a spell on her. Or it could have been a powerful female member of a tribe charged to cause death. Maybe it was the outside world calling. She asked for help to get away and got it. Many possibilities, don’t you reckon?”

  Neither Erik nor Stefan spoke, though they appeared absolutely united in thought. They had lived all their lives close to the wild heart of the continent. They had lived with aboriginal culture. They knew all about the Kadaitcha Man and magic rituals. They knew all about curses put on certain individuals, the methods of execution used. In Erik’s childhood, the station’s head stockman had died without being either poisoned or injured but through bone pointing. A method of magic that never failed to kill. The practise still continued, but very much in secret. The Kadaitcha Man wasn’t any mythical figure. The Kadaitcha Man was real.

  Kurt had come around, shuffling his booted feet on the floor.

  “You’re okay. You’re fine. Stay still for a moment,” Isabelle reassured him, brushing a lock of his blond hair from his clammy forehead.

  “My whole world has changed,” he muttered hoarsely. “I’m not the person I thought I was anymore.”

  “Neither am I.” Isabelle looked with kindness into his colourless face. “I’ll get you a glass of water.”

  “I’ll get it,” Bruno said. “Stay with him.”

  Bruno was only gone a moment. He handed the glass of water to Isabelle, who held it to Kurt’s lips.

  “Thank you. Thank you.” He handed the half-empty glass back to her, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “Let’s get you up.” Bruno extended a strong arm, drawing the younger man to his feet.

  “All right, son?” Stefan finally emerged from his stupor.

  “What do we do now, Dad?” Kurt asked timidly, ill with shock.

  “God Almighty, I want nothing else but the truth,” Stefan cried. “Helena was forced out of this house.”

  “Sir, I don’t believe Mrs. Saunders is the answer,” Bruno intervened, speaking calmly and with a good deal of persuasion. “Admittedly, she had formed the habit of playing cruel pranks on Helena. Revenge, I would suggest. Revenge against the entire Hartmann family, who lorded it over her, if not mistreated her. Mrs. Saunders—I believe the Mrs. is a courtesy title—hated everyone at the house. Understandable, if she actually is, as she claims, Konrad Hartmann’s illegitimate daughter.”

  Erik Hartmann’s still handsome face had become deeply grooved. He tried to clear his throat. “She’s lying,” he said, as if with his last breath. “That woman could never be my half sister. Christian’s half sister. It’s not possible. You talk about the Kadaitcha Man; our God should condemn her to hell.”

  “He’s not going to do that.” Mrs. Saunders was unperturbed. “The old man didn’t know. My mother never told him. She feared we would be banished to some other station or even killed. Easy enough out here. Especially then. My mother made a respectable marriage. Her husband, my dad, died only a few years back, as you all know. She died when I was fourteen and I started work in this house as a maid set to do all the hard cleaning and the polishing, helping out in the kitchen. That’s all any of you thought of me, a servant. Only I had a taste for power, even if it was only in small things. Years later, I became Mrs. Saunders, the housekeeper. No husband. No children to cling to me. I wanted a better life.”

  “You wanted my wife out of the way?” Erik accused her with burning eyes.

  “I hated her sure, but I didn’t lay a finger on her. Didn’t have to. Didn’t the tongues wag about her? She craved sex, that woman. She was having it off with that boy.”

  Isabelle interjected, “What boy? Piers Osbourne?”

  “Him and your dad.” Mrs. Saunders wagged a cruel finger at Stefan. “The fool couldn’t get enough of her.”

  Stefan Hartmann’s dark eyes were glazed over. “You’re lying. Tell us you’re lying.”

  “I’m not. Mrs. Abigail Hartmann could back me up. She knew all about the secret love affair. I didn’t need to tell her—she’s a smart woman—though I tried to protect her. She was kind to me. Not like that cruel bitch, Myra.”

  A loud, disturbing groan emanated from Erik’s throat. “Do you mind if we leave this for a while?” he begged, holding up his hand in a desperate gesture. “I can’t take anymore.”

  Stefan Hartmann’s head was bent, as if in defeat. “Neither can I. None of us is going anywhere. We can speak of these matters much later in the day. My wife always said this is a house of secrets. She was right. But not even she could guess at how much has been hidden, and so deep.”

  “I love you, Dad,” Kurt abruptly burst out, his voice trembling.

  “I love you too, son,” Stefan said quietly, before he turned to address Bruno and Isabelle. “Look, I can see this is a big shock to you both as well. Even your father couldn’t have known what we’ve heard this morning, McKendrick. Will you both be all right on your own? Why not take a look around the station? You can take one of the jeeps, but remember, don’t go far.”

  “What if we take a couple of horses?” Isabelle asked. “Bruno and I both ride.”

  Stefan nodded. “I’ll get someone to look after you. Hard hats, mind.”

  “Of course,” Bruno answered.

  “Look at the two of you, shattered, humiliated, brought face-to-face with reality!” Mrs. Saunders crowed, giving Erik and Stefan a smile that offered no quarter. “I don’t lie. The tests won’t lie. Much as you wish it otherwise, I’m one of you. And so’s she!” She threw out a hand to include Isabelle. “You can’t bear to hear it, I know, but I’d say she’s Christian’s granddaughter. Not yours, Erik, my longtime secret lover. Don’t dare to deny it.”

  Erik Hartmann’s features looked carved out of stone. “You’ve learned very little if you think you can cross me, Orani.”

  “You don’t know how good it is, seeing you lose control,” Mrs. Saunders countered. Her still-arresting face was filled with such immense hatred, the sensitive Isabelle could feel it rolling over her in waves.

  Chapter Seven

  The stables complex was a short distance from the house. It was huge, with a traditional timber barn that took pride of place. The massive doors at one end of the structure were fixed back in place. Flanking the doors were brassbound wooden planters filled with verdant lemon trees, the golden citrus fruit out of season. The courtyard for mounting and walking the horses was equally impressive.

  It was only midmorning, yet the sun was blazing from a cloudless blue sky. Isabelle was wearing plenty of sunblock, a silk scarf to protect her nape and a long-sleeved white shirt to protect her arms, though she had rolled the sleeves back some way. Bruno, with his Mediterranean skin, was wearing a short-sleeved blue shirt with his jeans, but he had tied a protective red bandana around his neck. He looked enormously dashing but totally unconcerned with his appearance.

  “Can’t see anyone about,” Isabelle said, her voice uneasy. She felt thoroughly unnerved by the events of the morning. Life was becoming way too complicated. Hilary, for all her intimidating aura, wasn’t in the same league as Mrs. Saunders when that lady got underway. Mrs. Saunders, aka Orani, was a genuinely frightening woman, shaming Erik Hartmann, who had stood mute and staring until a fierce denial had been forced out of him.

  “Bound to be someone,” Bruno said,
striding ahead. “I’ll take a look.”

  He reappeared a moment later accompanied by an aboriginal boy, around sixteen. “Mani here will help us,” Bruno said. He had an arm clapped around the boy’s shoulders while the boy was looking up at him with a kind of wonder on his face. Fascination, Isabelle thought. Bruno had the capacity to fascinate men and women alike. It was a quality beyond physical beauty. It had life, movement, vibrancy.

  “Mornin’, miss.” Mani gave Isabelle a jaunty smile. He waved them both inside the barn. “Come in, please. Take yah pick.”

  “Thank you.”

  Most of the stalls were empty. Mani led them along the wide passageway. At their approach to the right, a gleaming dark bay threw up its handsome head, nostrils flaring. “Now there’s a beauty!” Isabelle said, not sure she could handle such an obviously spirited horse.

  “Not for you, miss,” Mani said with a note of warning, “Rega is a one-woman horse. He belong to Orani. Mrs. Saunders,” he corrected himself quickly.

  “She’s an accomplished rider, then?” Bruno caught Isabelle’s eye. Another piece of unexpected news.

  “Bin ridin’ since she was a kid. Like me. Can ride anything. I reckon a brumby. Best woman rider I ever seen. Rega would be dangerous in the wrong hands. Not for you, miss. You need be safe. What about Honeysuckle? Honey for short. She’s as sweet-natured as they come and a lovely ride.”

  Isabelle approached the chestnut mare, putting out an upturned hand as her English friend, Emma, had taught her to do. She hoped Honeysuckle would lick her palm. The mare did.

  “Honey will be fine,” Isabelle said, her spirits picking up. It was a long time since she had been in the saddle. She would probably be a bit sore afterwards, but she loved riding. With the right horse, she was sure she could acquit herself well enough.

  Bruno pronounced himself happy with a big gelding called Rommel, which begged a question. Field Marshall Rommel, the Desert Fox, had been a greatly respected German general during WWII forced to commit suicide for being implicated in a plot to assassinate Hitler that had sadly misfired.

  It was a simple matter to saddle up. Mani handed them both a hard hat from a collection hanging on one wall. It was apparent to them both that he took his duties seriously, holding himself responsible for the safety of guests.

  “We’re off! Let’s make the best of it.” Bruno reined in beside Isabelle. He looked wonderful mounted, tall figure upright, back straight, easily controlling Rommel. The gelding looked keen for a gallop. Isabelle already knew the mare would be no match for the powerful gelding, but the mare was giving off signals she too was ready to fly across the desert sands.

  * * *

  Budgerigar exploded in their thousands, emerald and gold as they were in the wild, turquoise beaks, fine black stripes on their backs. Crimson chats and little zebra finches fed on the ground, taking no notice at all of the predatory hawks until one made a leisurely swoop, picking up a bright little victim.

  “Oh!” said Isabelle, feeling a pang of pity for the little zebra finch.

  “Wedge-tailed eagle!” Bruno pointed out the country’s largest bird of prey with a wing span of seven feet. It sat resting on a thermal cushion high above them, ready in an instant to dive with lightning speed. “That’s one effective killing machine. Believe it or not, they can take a fair-size kangaroo.”

  “As long as they can’t take a fair-size woman.” Isabelle shivered. “It’s kill or be killed, isn’t it?”

  “Rule of the wild. Man is the only animal that kills for pleasure. The animal world kills to survive.”

  “We’re what? Twenty minutes out from the home compound, and we’re in the wilds. This is as far remote from our lush eastern seaboard as the far side of Mars. I didn’t know soil could be baked furnace red until I’d come face-to-face with it.”

  “This is the oldest continent on earth, Bella.”

  “And it looks it. Still, to our amazement, it blooms.”

  “That’s the wonder of it all.”

  Ahead of them, the legendary mirage was abroad. It created silvery waterholes where none had existed since prehistoric times. “Easy to see how the early explorers were tricked into thinking they had found deliverance and lifesaving water,” Bruno remarked. “From the air it’s a flat landscape, but it doesn’t appear that way on the ground.”

  Isabelle agreed. All around them were stands of acacias and scrubby-looking mulga trees that supported many squawking families of pink and pearl grey galahs. From a distance, the birds looked like huge, fantastic flowers. To their west lay a long unbroken chain of low-lying hills, ancient ranges eroded down to what the family called the Hill County.

  Seams of opal matrix had been found there, so they had been told. The sand plains, the sand hills and the ranges were thickly sown with the most extensive vegetation type in the continent, the spinifex. The “abomination,” as one explorer had called it.

  “Watch the needles,” Bruno called to her. “Get too close and they’ll scrape the mare’s legs.”

  “Difficult not to,” she called back. “The bushes are everywhere. It’s almost like a wheat field.” The burnt gold of the spinifex plains stretched away to the far horizons.

  “You’ll handle it,” Bruno told her, confident she could do so. He had known that from the moment she had without assistance swung up into the saddle, gathering the reins. “The mare will help you. There’s a Big Red over there wanting to say hello.”

  “Where?” Her eyes swept around. “Oh, yes, I’ve spotted him,” she lilted, genuinely entranced. She had never seen a kangaroo in the wild. “Isn’t he just beautiful! Our boxing kangaroo.” Semicamouflaged by a great spray of olive-coloured leaves, a Big Red was standing upright on its powerful long legs, tail acting as a balance, calmly surveying the intruders into his world.

  “Herds of them ahead,” Bruno said. “The kangaroos and emus on our coat of arms are indigenous animals; camels were brought in from Pakistan and India by the British with Afghan handlers. They used camels in the early days as beasts of burden in the Outback and for exploration. Burke and Wills used them. They’ve thrived here to the extent they’ve become a real menace. Basically, they destroy everything in their path. We’re bound to see a few, considering there are well over a million in the wild heart. The largest population in the world. They love it here. We even export them back to the Middle East, where they’re superior to the homegrown beasts.”

  “Any tips on snakes, goannas?” Isabelle asked. “I need to be prepared. I’ve never in my life been on wild terrain, on foot or on horseback.”

  “There’s a slight possibility a five-foot log will suddenly morph into a sand goanna,” Bruno only half-joked. “When confronted by riders, they usually take off at high speed.”

  “Thanks for telling me that.”

  “A need to know.” He laughed.

  The land was in far better condition than they had expected. Mani had told them vast areas of the Outback had received much-needed rain some months before, as well as floodwaters coming down into the Three Great Rivers system of the Inland from the tropical North that had been lashed by not one but two cyclones. Vegetation was, as a consequence, abundant.

  One area they rode through was still covered in thousands of white paper daisies with yellow centres. They illuminated the red soil. In another area, the pink para-keelya reigned, a succulent the cattle could feed on. Further off in the distance, a huge area of desert hibiscus, a beautiful flower that favoured the spinifex country.

  “This lovely display will soon disappear under the heat of the sun,” Bruno told her with regret. “The millions of dormant seeds will regenerate with the next good rains.”

  “‘All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today,’” Isabelle said. “An old Indian proverb.”

  “I really like the way you come up with these things,” Bruno said. “The Inland goes in cycles. Drought. Drought. Drought. Then, a floral wonderland. What we’re looking at now is the end of the di
splay. The flowers are fading, as you can see. At their peak the flowering annuals create the most amazing desert gardens. They go on and on, right away to the horizon. Saltbush, cottonbush, hopbush, carpet of snow, fan flowers, poppies, spider lilies, green or lilac pussy tails waving in the wind. I came out this way once with a couple of friends, one a well-known botanist, the other equally celebrated as a wildlife photographer. The desert and the desert fringe is their hunting ground.”

  “I can see why.” Isabelle looked around, enchanted. “It seems like a miracle such exquisite blooms can not only adapt but thrive in this harsh environment. One would expect the millions of wildflowers around us would wither away in the fierce heat of the sun, yet they continue to hang on to delight the eye. I’m so glad we came, a lovely memory to store up.”

  “We’ll come back.” Bruno spoke with perfect certainty. “I’ll bring you when the flowering is at its height.”

  “Really? That sounds wonderful.”

  “I mean it.”

  “So I’m going to stay in your life?” she asked, not looking at him but straight ahead.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “What if you’re married? What if Madame Lubrinski finds you the perfect bride?”

  He laughed. “Marta has no real idea of the sort of woman I want.”

  “Better tell her that,” said Isabelle. Madame Lubrinski had not looked on her favourably.

  * * *

  A little while later, through a screen of trees, they could see an outfit of stockmen driving a sizeable lowing herd of cattle across a gully with diamond needle points of light flashing off the brackish waters. “Probably to a holding yard,” Bruno made the comment. “What do you say we take a break at the next billabong?” There was a constant glitter of water now. Swamps, waterholes, deep and shallow pools, curving billabongs with verdant banks, shaded by the ubiquitous coolabah trees.

  “That’s a great idea!” Isabelle was feeling a little sore, with sets of muscles brought into play for the first time after quite a while. “We have water, I hope.”