‘Like my brother, I’m not a betting man.’
‘Then why are you here, mate?’
‘For the spectacle, and to show Amy what a country race meeting is like.’
Joe shook his head. ‘Blimey, you McLeans are an odd lot.’ His grey eyes looked to where the Afghan jockeys were starting to mount their camels. ‘Better go have a word with them before the race starts.’ So saying, he turned on his heel, ducked under the rail and swaggered towards the waiting mounts.
‘Let’s find a good spot to watch the race. I’ve heard that it’s very different from watching horses run,’ Danny said, grinning expectantly. He took her elbow and they began to move to the white-painted rails of the racetrack, near the turn into the straight. ‘From here we can see them cross the line.’
Apparently all the people at the race meeting were as keen as Amy and Danny to see the camel race, and the crowd pressed forward, three deep along the railing, everyone jostling for the best view. The starter’s pistol went off in the back straight and ten camels and their riders were off. As they rounded the turn into the home straight, the sight of animals more than six feet tall, their necks stretched out as they raced, their huge hooves kicking up the dirt, was something to behold.
A rider came off his mount, sat up on the ground and thumped the soil in frustration, while the riderless camel stopped and began to forage on grass near the railing. One camel wouldn’t run in a straight line and kept veering to the left, while two camels, numbers four and two, were in the lead and locked in serious competition to win. Amy smiled with delight as the race unfolded. Riders bobbed up and down on their camels’ backs, which looked to be a precarious exercise, and carried long, thin sticks that they used on the animals’ flanks to encourage them to go faster. With the coloured saddle blankets, plaited leather reins, tassels swaying in the breeze, and the riders’ outfits, it was a rare, colourful sight.
‘Come on, number four!’ Danny yelled excitedly.
The lead camels rushed by them towards the finish line, with the others in hot pursuit. The first two were neck to neck. A klaxon horn sounded by the race adjudicator told the crowd there was a winner.
‘Who won?’ Amy wanted to know.
‘Don’t know. A number will come up on the board next to the finish line in a little while.’
There was an expectant hush in the crowd as all waited to hear which camel had won the race so the lucky punters could go and collect their winnings. Less than a minute passed before the number four was lifted onto a board, and then, just as the crowd began to disperse, another number was put next to the four: number two.
‘It’s a dead heat,’ Danny told her. ‘Numbers four and two have won the race. Let’s go to the area where they present the prizes. I want to see Joe hand over the fifty quid. You know, sometimes he can be as tight with money as his dad.’
Amy nodded. She knew it to be so. Joe had squeezed every pound he could out of her father when they’d negotiated the sale of the Duchess.
By the time they reached the presentation area, a small crowd of curious onlookers had formed around the winning camels and their riders. Joe, looking impressed with himself, stood up on a sturdy timber box and raised his hands for people to quieten down. ‘Wasn’t that a great race, folks? A dead heat between Mohammed El Ali on number four and Abdul Dadleh on number two.’ He fished his right hand into the breast pocket of his suit coat. ‘As arranged, I’m pleased to present both riders with an equal share of the fifty pounds prize money: twenty-five pounds each. Well done, chaps.’
A gasp went up in one section of the crowd. A dull buzz of murmurings came from several Afghans who’d come to watch the race.
‘That’s pretty lousy, Joe,’ someone in the crowd yelled. ‘They both won the race. They should get fifty quid each.’
‘Hear, hear!’ came the general consensus from the crowd.
‘It’s not like you Walpoles can’t afford it,’ a woman called out cynically. ‘Be a sport, Joe. Do the right thing.’
Joe blinked three times, then shook his head. His eyes narrowed on the crowd, trying to locate the hecklers. It was obvious that he didn’t want to fork out another fifty pounds, though to many it seemed the right thing to do.
‘The…the prize money was fifty pounds. Th-that’s all they’re entitled to.’
Several men cupped their hands around their mouths and called loud boos.
‘Tight arse,’ someone shouted raucously.
Joe caught Danny’s gaze and mouthed to him: ‘What should I do?’
Danny’s response was immediate. He pulled out his wallet and pretended to take a note out of it. Joe nodded, his bony shoulders slumping in defeat.
‘All right. All right. Fifty pounds each. Now, is everyone happy?’
‘Yeah, mate,’ another anonymous voice called from the crowd, ‘everyone but you.’
The unpleasantness averted by Joe’s forced generosity, the crowd began to move away. Joe came over to Danny and Amy.
‘Good for you, Joe. You did what was right,’ Amy praised, sensing his ego was bruised from the crowd’s heckling.
Danny gave him a hearty pat on the back. ‘Well done. Bill would be proud of you.’
‘Yeah. Sure.’ Joe’s lip curled in self-derision. ‘I was planning to use that fifty quid for a bet on the last race, and you can rest assured I won’t be offering any prize money for any blamed camel race again. Not until I’ve inherited my father’s money and properties.’ Thoroughly disgruntled by the experience—he’d hoped to big-note himself and have people admire him for providing the prize money in the first place—he turned on his heel and strode towards the area where several bookmakers had their stands.
Danny chuckled as Joe walked away. ‘Our friend Joe is not a good sport.’
Friend? It was a sign of Danny’s character that he considered Joe Walpole a friend. Amy was quiet for several moments, considering what she wanted to say. ‘I can’t see anything nice about him. As a Christian I have looked for good points in his nature, but I find him singularly lacking in that respect. He’s nothing like his sister.’
‘Beth’s all right,’ Danny conceded. ‘She’s good for Randall too. Since he’s been seeing her he seems more…’ he paused, trying to find the right word, ‘…relaxed—at peace with himself.’
Amy took Danny’s words to heart. She thought so too, which in a strange way added weight to the decision she had made earlier. It was time to move forward, to get on with her life, and doing so was something she wanted to share with Danny. Did it matter that she wasn’t madly in love with him, like the romantic love they wrote about in books? She was very fond of him, she respected and admired him, and she knew he would take good care of her. Love would come, in time.
‘Do you think Randall would be happy to be best man at our wedding?’ she asked out of the blue.
‘What?’
‘I—I’ve made up my mind, Danny. We should get married.’
She watched his stunned expression turn to joy, and smiled. It didn’t take much to make Danny happy. She hoped it would always be so.
‘You’re sure?’ His hands grasped hers. He didn’t bother to hide his elation. They were going to get married! One hand reached up to caress her cheek and then he brushed a wisp of hair off her forehead. What a wonderful life they were going to have together.
‘Very sure,’ Amy replied.
And there, in front everybody and anybody, he drew her into his arms and kissed her.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Randall’s mind wasn’t on the job at hand. He was supposed to be tracking several stray steers in a thick, scrubby area of land. His thoughts, however, kept boomeranging back to Danny’s announcement at breakfast that he and Amy were getting married. He should be happy for his brother, so why wasn’t he? Danny deserved his chance at happiness and Amy Carmichael was a good enough woman, but a question nagged at him: was she right for his brother? And if not, why not?
A tree branch flicked across his upp
er chest, scraping the skin exposed by his open-neck shirt. He bent the branch back till it snapped, the action disturbing his train of thought, but not for long. As his gaze focused on the ground, trying to pick up the steers’ trail, internally he was doing considerable soul-searching for the answer to his query. Amy wasn’t right for Danny because…
Randall pulled on the reins sharply and brought his horse to a stop, the steers he was trying to find forgotten. He knew why! Damn it to hell and back, yes, he did.
His features settled into a grim expression as the preposterous reason etched itself into his brain. He wanted Amy for himself! There, after so long, the thought, the need, had forced its way through his subconscious and he couldn’t ignore it.
A derisive smile curved his mouth as the admission took a firm hold. God, he loved her. It wasn’t logical that he did—they couldn’t be near each other without bristling, and her confidence and independent streak confounded him, though they also made him admire her. Then he remembered with great clarity that moment at Bill Walpole’s birthday dinner when their hands had touched, if briefly. He had never felt anything like it before or since—the sensation had dazzled his senses. His feelings defied all common sense as far as he was concerned, but without any encouragement from her whatsoever he had fallen in love with Amy Carmichael. With a certain fatalism he now accepted that it was so, just as he knew the sun would set in about four hours’ time then rise again in the morning.
A groan of frustration forced its way out of his throat into the still country air. He didn’t need this complication in his life, not when things were starting to go well at Drovers Way. For the second consecutive year the property had made a healthy profit, most of which was being ploughed back into improving breeding stock and the cultivation of another acre of wheat. He even had a long-term plan to fully refurbish the homestead.
Well, what are you going to do about Amy, about your feelings for her? a voice inside his head asked.
The answer came quickly enough: nothing. She had decided that Danny was the man for her, and he loved his brother too much to do anything that might destroy his happiness. He shook his head, trying to clear the muddled thoughts within. Somehow, unpalatable as the thought was, he would live with the knowledge that Danny and Amy were going to be man and wife.
What about Beth Walpole? The question popped into his head. It had become abundantly clear that she had feelings for him and…she was all right, was Beth. They got along, understood each other, and she knew the needs and demands of the land in a way that Amy Carmichael most likely never would. He could do a lot worse than Beth Walpole, he concluded, even though he had little admiration for her father or brother.
Then marry her, the voice advised.
Randall’s dark eyes narrowed as he tossed the idea around in his head. He might never come to care for Beth the way she cared for him, but many a marriage had been founded on less than what they’d have: mutual respect and admiration. And in his case, if he decided to go that way, it would have to be enough.
He lifted his hat off his head to wipe his sweaty brow, and tried to bring his thoughts back to what he was meant to be doing. Where the hell were those steers? Using his knees, he urged his horse forward and found a break in the scrub, which led to a clearing. A frown marked his tanned forehead as he studied it. The summer grass had been flattened, and, cleverly woven into the bushes, so that only a keen eye would notice, were branches and twigs that formed a natural-looking corral. In patches of bare earth many hoofprints were clearly visible.
‘What’s going on?’ Randall muttered to himself.
He got off his horse, tethered the reins to a tree near some grass, and thoroughly inspected the area. No wonder he could find no physical trace of the steers. To one side of the ‘natural’ corral he found an old fire pit. He kicked the ashes with the toe of his boot: they were several weeks old. Hands on hips, his gaze narrowed in concentration. It wasn’t hard to work out what had happened to the stock.
Cattle duffers. The cunning bastards had seen that Drovers cattle were strung out, most of them in pastures well away from the homestead. They had built the corral then rounded up probably ten to twenty steers, altered the brand from McL to something similar, such as McU or McD, then driven the beasts off Drovers land, selling them wherever they could pick up a reasonable price. The duffers knew that a small number of steers wouldn’t be missed by graziers, possibly not even when they were mustered for branding or selling.
It was common knowledge that Drovers Way and other properties had, periodically, been the target of cattle duffers since the land had first been settled. He remembered stories his father had told him, one in particular about his grandfather catching a gang trying to make off with almost half the herd. Grandfather Howard had been out hunting kangaroos and had shot and killed one man, wounded another, and the other two had fled at top speed, never to be seen in the Flinders again.
A muscle flexed angrily in Randall’s jaw as he thought of the stolen cattle. How many had been lost, and how often had the duffers raided their stock? But, more importantly, how were they going to be stopped? And stop them he would, he decided, for once the word got out that the McLean brothers couldn’t be duped, other duffers would give Drovers Way a wide berth.
Remounting, he rode out, taking particular note of the landmarks around him so he could find the area again.
‘Cattle duffers. Are you serious?’ Jim Allen asked with a chuckle as he, Danny and Randall each drank a glass of beer, sitting on the back verandah in the twilight.
Randall nodded. ‘I’ve telephoned a few properties. We’re not the only ones who have lost stock. The bastards seem well organised. They come in, raid a couple of properties, drive the stock off then disappear for several months, before coming back again for another go. They’re probably doing it all over the Flinders and making nice money for themselves.’
‘If they come on an irregular basis, how on earth will we catch them?’ Danny’s question was pertinent.
‘That’s the tricky part,’ Randall admitted. ‘We have to work out a plan, and watch that corral area. Doing it in the daytime would be too risky. They’ll go to work around twilight, or when there’s a full moon.’
‘To do the job would take several hours, by the time they round the cattle up, herd them into the corral, then re-brand them. I reckon five to six hours for two or three men,’ Danny gave his opinion.
‘Sounds about right,’ Randall agreed. ‘They probably have a spotter who rides onto a property to check the stock’s location. If the stock isn’t easy to get to they move on to another property, work till they have about one hundred head, then drive the mob to Hawker, Port Augusta, or even as far as Peterborough.’
‘When’s the next full moon?’ Jim asked.
Danny got up and went inside. He came back a minute later and advised, ‘I checked the almanac. The next full moon is in a week’s time.’
‘That gives us time to get ready for them.’
‘Are you going to tell Constable Wallace?’ Danny asked Randall.
The McLean independence came to the fore. Randall shook his head. ‘We’ll handle the bastards ourselves. And I want to keep this quiet. We don’t want everyone in the district knowing our intention. The information might find its way back to the duffers.’
Danny looked at Jim. ‘Gee, mate, I’m starving. When’s dinner?’
Jim finished the last drop of his beer before answering. ‘Give me ten minutes. Does the prospect of spaghetti and meatballs tickle your tastebuds?’
Danny shrugged. ‘Dunno. Never had it. Is it Italian?’
‘Sure is.’
‘If it’s as good as that, that la-’ Danny strove to remember the name of the dish, ‘that one you made last week—lasagne, that was it—it’ll be all right.’
‘You’re spoiling us, Jim,’ Randall chimed in. ‘We used to be plain eaters: meat and three veg. Now we have, uummm, greater expectations at mealtimes.’
‘Just my way of
making myself indispensable,’ came Jim’s retort, accompanied by his usual cheeky grin. He got up, taking his glass with him, and walked into the house.
‘I’d like to invite Amy and her father out here for dinner one Saturday. The doctor needs driving practice now that he has his own automobile,’ Danny announced.
Randall took a deep breath. Amy being here at Drovers was something he had to get used to. ‘Of course. Think they’ll mind eating in the kitchen? We don’t have any dining-room furniture and there’s only one settee in the drawing room.’
Danny smiled confidently. ‘It’ll be fine. Amy knows you sold almost everything after the war. I just want her to see her future home and to assure her father that I can take care of her.’ He stood up, took a long look at the twilight darkening through a stand of eucalypts, and added, ‘I’ll go and set the table.’
Randall sat in his wicker chair, his features betraying nothing of his inner turmoil. In all probability living under the same roof as Amy was going to test his self-control to breaking point. He stayed there until Jim called him in for dinner.
Randall had settled into the habit of having dinner at Ingleside with the Walpoles most Saturday nights. Sometimes it was a pleasant experience, sometimes it wasn’t, depending on Bill Walpole’s mood. The man treated his wife as if she were slightly stupid, and tolerated Joe because he had no other choice. He’d also made it clear that Beth’s opinion on land and stock management was unimportant because she was a woman.
An accomplished pianist, Beth would often play classical and semiclassical works after dinner on the grand piano near the window of their beautifully furnished drawing room, and invariably that, together with a couple of glasses of port, would put Bill in a more convivial mood.
‘As usual, a splendid dinner, Margaret,’ Randall said politely.
‘Thank you, Randall,’ she replied with a nervous smile.
Bill’s wife was a small, jittery, birdlike woman in her late forties. She hadn’t had a hard life physically, not like some women on the land, but her face was weather-lined and streaks of silver glistened in her dark hair. In spite of her subservient role, Randall liked, or, more accurately, felt sorry for Margaret. She was well under the thumb of Walpole’s dominating personality, and the idea came to Randall with a little surprise that it spoke well for Beth’s character that she refused to knuckle under to her father; she rather enjoyed a ‘healthy’ discussion with him, Randall thought.
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