‘Adam, I wanted to talk to you.’ The girl brushed past Joanna and caught at his arm possessively. ‘Where have you been?’
‘Out on the veranda discussing business with Miss Dowling.’ He smiled down at Bonney and his face revealed his affection for the pretty young thing. ‘What have you got on your mind, honey?’
Joanna blinked a little, for that endearing term sounded strange on the lips that looked so firm, as if only used to giving orders. She drew away from the couple and stood admiring the flowers in a vase on the table, which was circular and laid for four people. Aunt Charly had insisted from the start that Joanna dine with the family.
She felt awkward, however, for she couldn’t help but hear what Bonney said to her tall guardian. ‘It’s about having a little car of my own — Adam, you more or less promised, and I’d love taking lessons from you.’
‘You’re a bit young yet to drive a car, Bonney.’
‘I’m almost eighteen.’ Out of the tail of her eye Joanna saw the girl reach up and caress his lean brown cheek. ‘Please, Adam. If I had a car I could drive out to the Farlins’ place and visit with Mona. We were at school together and I miss my friends.’
‘You’re welcome to go in the jeep, honey, whenever you want to go and see your friend.’
‘It isn’t the same, going places in that old jeep with Jim Long driving.’ A sulky note came into the girl’s voice. ‘You aren’t going back on your word, are you? You said I could have something special for my eighteenth birthday, and it’s only a month away.’
‘I had in mind a real little thoroughbred for you, maybe a silver-tailed roan—’
‘A horse!’ Bonney broke in. ‘I already have Satin and she does for riding when I’m in the mood. But I’m not really the equestrian type. My limbs are too delicate.’
Even as Joanna smiled to herself, Adam gave a laugh. ‘You look pretty robust to me, Bonney.’
‘I’m built like a ballet dancer,’ she said indignantly, ‘and I won’t let my legs get bowed with too much horseback riding. Suppose I decide to go on the stage?’
‘Last week you were thinking about becoming an air hostess.’ He glanced over the girl’s head at Joanna and there was in his eyes a deep smile that made Joanna think of lakes lit by flashes of sunlight. Striking eyes in that rugged brown face. ‘What were you like at seventeen?’ he asked. ‘Did you want to be a ballet dancer, or nurse to a doctor?’
Even as Joanna considered the question, she saw Bonney flick a look of dislike over her. It chilled her, made her realize that she was the outsider at Raintree.
‘I was always so enthralled by my twin’s ambitions that I had no time for any of my own,’ Joanna said with a brave lightness, a wish that she was less sensitive and more like Viviana in her ways. ‘My sister went on the stage and she loves the life and has that glow about her that lights her up on the stage.’
‘I suppose she’s prettier than you?’ said Bonney. ‘There were twins at my school who weren’t a bit alike. Is your sister a chorus dancer?’
‘At the moment,’ said Joanna, feeling a little like shaking this spoiled young ward of Adam’s. ‘Viviana is starring in a show in New Zealand.’
‘Why didn’t you go there instead of coming here?’ Joanna flinched and felt again a bleak sense of loneliness among strangers, and then before she could say that lack of money had stopped her from flying to her sister, the Boss swung Bonney to face him and he looked very stern about the eyes and mouth.
‘One of these days, young lady, I shall take Vance’s advice and tan your breeches. If you’re old enough to drive a car of your own, then you’re old enough to be polite to whoever comes under the roof of Raintree.’
‘Vance!’ Bonney said scornfully. ‘He’d like to be the boss here, then he could put me in the kitchen to work. He hates me!’
‘Don’t be silly.’ Adam tweaked the girl’s hair. ‘You’d get along all right with Vance if you didn’t argue with him about everything. Most females get along fine with him.’
Bonney gave Joanna a long stare, and it was a relief when Aunt Charly came limping into the room, followed by Tilly and Peg in the spotless aprons they wore for serving dinner each evening. This was a bit of grandeur Aunt Charly liked to lay on for the Boss, along with the candlesticks of old silver and the flowers that made the evening meal such a pleasant one.
After dinner Adam went to his office to talk to someone over the radio-telephone. Bonney followed him, and Joanna caught the way Aunt Charly frowned. ‘She’s after something again, and Adam gives in to her because of the way she lost her folks. Vance wouldn’t be so soft with her.’
Joanna gazed in some surprise at Charlotte.
‘Don’t let it surprise you that Vance has more sense when it comes to women.’ Aunt Charly gave a chuckle as she led Joanna into her snug sitting-room. ‘He has a lot less when it comes to business matters - take a chair, child, and tell me, has Adam been sensible with regard to you? Is he satisfied that you’ll be good for his beloved Raintree Valley.’
Joanna smiled as she sat back in a cushioned cane chair and let her eyes dwell on the old-fashioned comforts of the room, and the long zinnia-patterned curtains. ‘He isn’t entirely convinced that I’m right for the job, but he likes the way I get along with Bushy, and with you, Aunt Charly.’
‘So he’s letting you stay for my sake?’
‘Yes, I think so.’ Joanna leaned forward to a little table on which stood some framed photographs and she picked up an oval one with a silver surround. It was of a girl in a fur bonnet with a muff held against her. Charming, youthful eyes smiled with happiness, with an expectancy that made her very lovely.
‘I had been skating on the lake near our home at Hampstead the day that was taken.’ Charlotte spoke nostalgically. ‘The little things one remembers. Leaves frozen under the ice, a blackbird calling and hot chestnuts round a charcoal brazier.’
‘Do you sometimes wish you had stayed in England?’ Joanna asked.
‘Do you mean,’ Charlotte’s still youthful eyes held Joanna’s, ‘do I wish I’d never let myself fall in love with a faraway stranger?’
‘You would probably have married in England and been happy,’ Joanna said softly.
‘Every girls wants a happy love,’ Aunt Charly agreed. ‘But she wants something else besides - romance and challenge and colour. She wants to live like a heroine, not like a humdrum keeper of a home, and girls of my generation were no less adventurous than those of today, who seek experience beyond their own shores. Was it the call of your twin, or the call of something more primitive that brought you halfway across the world, Joanna?’
‘I ... I don’t really know,’ Joanna said honestly. ‘I never envied Viv her free spirit, but when she invited me to join her I never hesitated for very long. I could see Gran would be all right with her widowed sister, and I was over twenty-one.’
‘Did it frighten you when you found yourself all alone in Australia?’
‘It alarmed me—’
Aunt Charly gave a chuckle. ‘If men really knew how spunky we really are! You were miles from home with only a few pounds in your pocket, but without getting into a dither you found yourself a job. That’s what perplexes Adam. You look as soft as wattle—’
‘Wattle?’ Joanna broke in.
‘Our name for mimosa.
‘Oh—’
‘Well, mimosa’s a pale gold, airy-fairy flower, isn’t it?’
‘And you think that’s how I strike the Boss, as an airy-fairy bit of fluff on a slim stalk?’
Aunt Charly was still laughing when the door opened and Adam strolled into the room. He glanced from the older woman to the much younger one and his right eyebrow formed part of a question mark. ‘Is it a joke for sharing with a man?’ he drawled, and the room and its old-fashioned knick-knacks seemed suddenly too small to hold so high, wide and free a man.
‘It’s a joke I’d love to be able to tell you,’ laughed Aunt Charly, ‘but I don’t want to lose Joanna now you’ve said she can st
ay to brighten my old age. Where’s Bonney?’
‘Having a galah session with a girl friend at Danabarra. The things girls find to natter about! Something about a new skin cream, and the latest pop record by some fellow called Engelbert.’
It was Joanna’s turn to break into a laugh, which a flash of the sky-grey eyes couldn’t stem.
‘Girls will be girls,’ said Aunt Charly reasonably. ‘Now don’t prowl, Adam. You’ll break one of my porcelains and I set store by them. Sit down, do, and smoke your pipe - if you have to.’
He looked around him, as if for a suitable chair, and Joanna pressed a thumb against her lips and tried to control their quivering. He looked like a stag in a china shop and if he didn’t sit down soon something on one of the whatnots would go flying. Their glances met as he lowered himself to a sofa with chintz cushions. Amusement tugged at the left corner of his mouth, and it gave her a tiny shock that he should be sharing her thoughts.
Adam Corraine was not a man for the hearth and the cushion; he was built for the open country, made to stretch out beside a campfire under the stars. Would he ever marry and take the chance of being domesticated? It was something she couldn’t imagine, but Raintree was built to last and he would want a son of his own to take over when the time came.
‘Do you ride, Miss Dowling?’ he asked suddenly, and she couldn’t help but be aware of the flick of his eyes over her ankles and slender legs. Mimosa flitted through her mind, pale gold and fragile.
‘As a country child it was something I learned young and liked.’ She smiled. ‘Your cousin Vance warned me that I would find the bush horse harder to handle.’
‘I’m quite sure you would.’ Adam tinkered with his pipe but didn’t light it, while Aunt Charly sat at ease in her armchair and shared a lazily interested look between Joanna and the Boss. Her plastered ankle was propped on a footrest, her eyes were still a charming blue as they gazed from the network of lines the years and the sun had etched into her once-lovely face. There was no air of regret about Charlotte Corraine, only pride in what she had helped to build.
‘We keep several polo ponies in our stables and they’re well trained.’
‘Polo ponies?’ Joanna exclaimed.
‘Yes, there’s a polo club at Danabarra, and Vance and I play when we aren’t busy. We send the ponies by truck, and Aunt Charly and Bonney drive in with us for the game.’ A slightly sardonic smile crisped the edge of his mouth. ‘There’s a small hotel, a bank, a store, and the club. To an outsider the place might seem rugged, but we like it. It’s the nearest thing we have to civilization.’
Joanna shot a smile at Aunt Charly. ‘Mr. Corraine has got it into his head that I’ll find it hard to settle down so many miles from a beauty salon or a teashop. I told him it’s my twin who is the gay and lively one.’
‘I think you’ve plenty of life in you, Joanna. You flit round that big kitchen of ours like a summer bee. It’s very pleasant, Adam. Our shy Joanna sings when she thinks no one is listening.’
‘You’re making her blush,’ Adam drawled.
You’re the one, Joanna wanted to protest. You with those grey eyes that don’t miss a thing.
‘Is there any particular pony that I may ride, Mr. Corraine?’
‘Brindle should suit you. He has a friendly nature, and it will be good for Bonney to have a riding companion. Do you like my ward, Miss Dowling?’
‘She’s extremely pretty.’
‘Yes,’ he looked thoughtful, ‘she has grown into a pretty thing.’
‘You’re spoiling her, Adam,’ warned Aunt Charly. ‘She’s learning fast what a big pair of eyes can do to a man, and if you’re not careful you’ll have trouble on your hands.’
‘You mean with one of the boys?’
‘Well, if you’ve noticed that she’s pretty!’
‘You talk, Aunt Charly, as if I go around with my eyes shut.’
‘On the contrary, Adam. Anyone can see that you have twenty-twenty vision, but you are inclined to devote most of it to cows, machines, and grazing land.’
‘Meaning I don’t always see what is under my nose?’ He frowned and looked rather arrogant. ‘The stockmen know me, and they know I won’t tolerate any pranks involving Bonney. She’s not more than a child.’
‘She’s almost eighteen. Your own mother was a bride at that age.’
His frown deepened. ‘Are you suggesting I find a husband for Bonney?’
‘I’m saying that she has too much time on her hands, and you know the old saying about the devil and the idle.’
You mean it might be a good idea to let her go and work as a nurse?’
‘Nurse my foot!’ Aunt Charly almost snorted. ‘Tell her to help out more, here at Raintree. She could assist Joanna and learn how to cook and make a good pot of tea. It’s your place, Adam, to let her know that we all do our bit here, and that acting the princess isn’t good training for any girl who hopes to land her man.’
‘Her man?’ Adam quirked an eyebrow. ‘I suppose you know who the fellow happens to be?’
‘I have my suspicions.’
‘But you’re not sharing them?’
‘Romantic old maids revel in secrets, Adam.’
‘An old maid, you?’ He rose to his feet, leaned over Aunt Charly and kissed her temple beneath the grey hair that held gleams of auburn, as if always youth would linger in this woman who had lost the man she had wanted but who had not turned bitter. Instead she had served and loved the Corraines, and right now she touched the hard brown cheek of Adam Corraine as if in him she saw the realization of long-held dreams.
Aunt Charly would want this strong and able master of Raintree to take a wife ... was it possible, Joanna wondered, that she had Bonney in mind for him?
Bonney, with her big tarn-brown eyes and her way of snuggling beneath the wide spread of Adam’s shoulders. He was indulgent with the pretty thing ... maybe as yet she had not sparked the fires in that powerful frame, but Aunt Charly was wise. She had hinted that Bonney cared for someone, and Adam had looked arrogant, as if no man but he would have the love of pretty Bonney Ryan.
Saturday morning came with a blue sky pebbled with gold, and there were singing birds in the blue gum trees.
Today Vance was due home from Once-Lonely, and tonight there would be dancing in the barn-hall with its long corrugated iron roof and its shining cedarwood floor, laid long ago by order of King Corraine. Meetings and discussions took place in the barn-hall, including the ladies’ club organized and run by Charlotte.
Joanna knew herself to be a source of curiosity to the valley wives, for not only was she English but she was single, and they’d be watching closely at the dance to see which bachelor stockrider she favoured. She must favour none ... Vance least of all! He was a Corraine and it wouldn’t do to give rise to speculation by dancing more with him than with some of the other boys.
She smiled and with floury hands she walked to the open door of the big kitchen and gazed out at the vegetable garden bordered by golden buttercup trees. She looked forward to seeing Vance, and hoped he had missed her a little. Tall, sun-brown Vance, with a subtle resemblance to his cousin Adam that you saw one minute and missed the next. She found her thoughts fixed for a brief moment on Adam. Would he attend the dance? As Boss of the community he would no doubt put in an appearance, but Joanna couldn’t picture him on the dance floor. He was far more at home in the saddle of Blaze, his chestnut with the raking lines and the one blaze of white on the forehead beneath the wild sweeping mane.
Suddenly through the garden there came a young woman in a full blue skirt and a lacy peasant-type blouse.
She carried a basket on her arm and wore a linen sunhat. Her eyes sparkled darkly as she came with grace down the path between the cabbages and potatoes.
‘Buon giorno, signorina.’ White teeth flashed in a friendly smile. ‘I am Lenita, the wife of Boye Dawson, and I thought it time we introduced ourselves. I come from Italy before I marry Boye, and always we bring some small thing w
ith which to greet a newcomer.’
With a charming gesture the girl held out the basket and there surrounded by green leaves was a pot of basil. Nurtured, tended, and growing far from Italy. Joanna wiped her hands quickly on her apron and took the pot. She smelled the basil and felt the sting of tears behind her eyelids. ‘How kind of you,’ she said huskily. ‘Nothing could please me more.’
‘May the basil grow as our friendship grows.’ Lenita’s eyes were frank and appealing as they dwelt on Joanna. ‘I thought from seeing you that first day that you would be nice to know. I have wanted to come and greet you, but Boye said I must wait in case you went away again.’
‘Did everyone think I would go away?’ Joanna’s smile was wry.
‘Boye was told by the other men that Signor Corraine looked staggered when he saw you by the monoplane. They thought,’ Lenita gave a breathless little laugh, ‘that he would bundle you back on the plane and order Vance to fetch someone bigger and stronger for the home-helping.’
‘I had come all the way from Sydney and he wasn’t getting rid of me as easily as that.’ Joanna caressed the smooth sides of the pot of basil. ‘I’ve wanted to come and see your baby - may I come, Lenita, now the Boss has accepted me as part of the Raintree Valley community?’
‘But of course,’ Lenita looked delighted. ‘I should be so pleased for you to come and admire my little Carlo. Such a baby! He grows so big and Boye is so proud of him. A man likes so much to have a son, and I shall always remember the look on my husband’s face when he saw Carlo for the first time. Such a smile! As if he held the world in his arms.’
At these words a little chill of emotion ran over Joanna, but for the life of her she didn’t know why a sudden vision of Adam Corraine should float into her mind. She neither cared, nor was she involved in that intimate aspect of his future, and she said quickly to Lenita: ‘I’ve been baking treacle tarts. Aunt Charly and the two girls, along with Bushy, are over at the barn-hall hanging bunting for the dance tonight.’
‘You are looking forward to the dance?’ Lenita smiled with the happy confidence of a girl who had found her man and was delightfully happy with him.
Raintree Valley Page 6