by Peter Watt
When Fiona entered the room, she saw her mother sitting in a large leather chair by the closed drapes and her pale face stood out starkly in the gloom. Fiona sat on a divan at the opposite side of the room, because she did not want to be near her mother.
‘You know, Fiona, that your husband had David murdered,’ Enid said in a flat voice by way of greeting her daughter. ‘He . . . and Captain Mort.’
‘Granville had nothing to do with David’s death, Mother,’ Fiona retorted in a shocked voice at the blunt accusation. ‘You are obviously overwrought by events and have a need to blame someone. You cannot make him a scapegoat for your understandable grief,’ she said.
Her mother sighed heavily. ‘I know your husband was somehow behind David’s death,’ she replied bitterly. ‘As surely as I know my son was murdered.’ She fixed her daughter in the gloom and Fiona returned the hostile glare.
‘You should know all about murder, Mother. Did you not arrange to have my son murdered?’ she hissed with all the venom of the pent-up hate she felt for the stern woman who had ruled her life for so many years. ‘Or was the so well-informed Enid Macintosh ignorant of the nature of baby farms?’ she added savagely.
Enid glared at her daughter. Had they been torn this far apart that each accused the other of murder? It was true that she had given instructions for the baby to be disposed of at a baby farm, but Molly had not only betrayed Fiona, she had also betrayed her. It was only when she was long gone that Molly had sent a letter confessing the actual whereabouts of the baby boy. A letter which she had dictated to her parish priest, who had suggested it was best for Molly’s peace of mind.
Enid had read the letter then destroyed it, as it did not matter to her that Molly had given the baby to the Duffy family to be raised. At least he was out of the way. One way or the other, Molly had satisfied the contract she had made with her and both had got what they wanted. But Enid had let her daughter believe that her baby had been sent to a baby farm and from that day to this Fiona had hated her mother, with no hope of reconciliation, for the perceived infanticide.
‘You could never have married your husband,’ Enid spat back with venom equal to that of her daughter’s, ‘if you had kept the bastard of your lust . . . You were ruined goods.’ Mother and daughter were like two cobras swaying for the fatal strike in the darkened room.
‘There is so much pain when you lose a son, isn’t there, Mother?’ Fiona retaliated.
‘David was also your brother,’ Enid reminded her. ‘Or have you forgotten that, Fiona?’
‘No, Mother,’ Fiona replied as her voice broke and the tears flowed. ‘I have grieved for the dearest and gentlest man I have ever known.’ She wiped her eyes angrily with a small handkerchief, as she had not wanted to show any weakness in front of her mother. ‘But there is nothing more than grief that I can feel for David now,’ Fiona continued. ‘No one can bring him back. Besides, Mother, you taught us to be strong, no matter what. And I am strong, Mother. Stronger than you will ever know. I can thank you for knowing what duty is. Oh, and there is loyalty. You taught us the importance of loyalty. Well, I am loyal . . . to Granville. The Macintosh name will die now that David has gone. There are no other male heirs to inherit the name as all I seem to be able to bear are girls. And you know, I’m glad I have only girls, because the name will die when Father has passed on.’
Enid listened before interjecting quietly, ‘And me, Fiona. You forget that I carry the Macintosh name and the name will be alive as long as I am.’
Fiona gave a short and bitter laugh at the irony.
‘And I now carry the White name,’ she replied. ‘When my daughters come of age they will marry. And I swear that all memory of the Macintosh name will be erased forever. I swear that, Mother. The memory of Angus, you and Father, will be eradicated as if you never existed.’
Enid paled. Her daughter’s talk was akin to sacrilege! ‘If your father had heard what you have just said, he would cut you from his will,’ she said in a trembling and emotionally charged whisper.
‘You can tell him whatever you like,’ Fiona retaliated. ‘But who else is there left to leave the companies to? No, Father will at least leave me the companies as the only remaining person who carries his blood and my husband will ensure that they go to bigger and better things in time. Without him, we are nothing. Father is only interested in Glen View since Angus was killed. And you, despite all your threats, will hope that some day I will see reason and do as you tell me and possibly leave my husband. Well, Mother, you will be hoping until hell freezes over.’
Oh, my daughter, you will never win against me, Enid thought with savage determination. I know a secret that will one day bring you and that man you call a husband down.
‘I think you have said enough, Fiona,’ Enid answered quietly. She had regained control of her emotions and as far as she was concerned the conversation and her daughter’s visit were at an end. ‘I am sure you can make your own way out.’
Fiona stood to leave and there were tears of anger in her eyes. Anger for her mother not seeing the damage she had done over the years.
Fiona swept from the room, past the servants hovering downstairs, to her carriage waiting in the driveway. The coachman helped her through the open door.
‘Miss Penelope White’s house,’ she ordered. The coachman flicked the short whip over the two perfectly matched greys and the coach wheels sprayed stones as they left the house of Fiona’s birth. She did not look back.
Enid watched her daughter depart through the partly drawn curtains of the library. The pain for the loss of her son was also a pain for the loss of her daughter. She had always loved Fiona but she had never been able to tell her so. And now they were bitter enemies, locked in a contest of wills.
She felt her head swim. She had not eaten enough over the days since the arrival of the telegram and she slumped back into the comfort of the big leather chair which David had always sat in whenever he was in the library. How had the family come to this point? Where had it all started?
Vaguely the name Duffy, an obscure Irish family of no social consequence, crept into her conscious thoughts. Had it all started with the death of the Irish teamster on Glen View? Or had the troubles begun with the now long-dead young Irishman who had sired Fiona’s bastard? Had the diabolical twist of fate in the two diverse meetings brought about events that had a common factor of terrible destruction? Duffy and Macintosh! The names were linked forever in blood.
‘Oh David, my beautiful boy, I have killed you,’ Enid cried out as guilt burst like an infection from an angry red cyst. ‘I have killed you, as surely as I have been blind to where my ambition would lead us all.’
She swooned and desperately groped for the long curtains draped on the wall by the window. Betsy heard the thump in the library just as she had heard the terrible cry of anguish from her mistress.
Penelope lay alone on her bed dressed only in a body-clinging silk chemise and she revelled in the wonderful feeling of freedom she had out of the constricting hooped dress that lay in an untidy pile on the floor. Bustles might be all the fashion but they were not a practical step towards female comfort. They were cumbersome and ridiculous in the Australian climate. She wondered idly at the mentality of those who designed such clothes. Why was it that women had to slavishly follow what people in faraway Europe dictated as fashion?
She ran her hand down her flat stomach and along her thighs and her fingers lingered tantalisingly between her legs. She felt a sense of pride in her body, which she knew aroused men with its sensuous curves.
The crunch of gravel in the driveway distracted her from her self-exploration. She had not expected visitors for the afternoon. With a languid sigh she padded across to the window where she drew aside the curtain and was surprised to see her cousin Fiona alight from her coach. Penelope could see that Fiona appeared visibly distressed. Had something happened between Fiona and her despicable brother, Granville? she questioned herself.
‘Fiona! Up here,
’ she called down from the bedroom window. ‘Tell the maid you are coming straight up!’
Fiona glanced up to see Penelope framed in the window with her long hair tumbling freely about her bare shoulders, trapping the rays of the late afternoon sun in a golden spray. The curtain at the window fell back and Penelope disappeared from view. Fiona made her greetings at the door and the maid led her up the staircase to her cousin’s bedroom.
When she opened the door to Penelope’s bedroom she was not surprised to see her cousin sitting brushing her hair and wearing only a silk chemise, as Penelope cared little for social inhibitions.
‘You have been to see your mother,’ Penelope said as she let the brush run through her hair. ‘At first I thought my brother might have caused your obvious distress. But looking at you now, I know that only your mother could have caused that much distress to you.’
Fiona leant against the door, as she felt faint from the emotional trauma of the confrontation with her mother in the library.
‘Penny, it was terrible,’ she said in a voice on the verge of sobbing. ‘She is saying that Granville killed David. She is out of her mind with anger and bitterness.’
Penelope rose from her chair and went to Fiona standing by the closed door.
‘Do you think my brother had anything to do with David’s death?’ she asked as she touched Fiona on the cheek gently with her long fingers. Fiona shook her head and tried to look away from her cousin’s full breasts exposed above the chemise. ‘Then you should,’ Penelope said softly and Fiona gasped and stared questioningly into Penelope’s face.
‘Granville was not even there,’ Fiona countered. ‘How could he have planned to have the natives kill David? How could you say something like that about your own brother?’
Penelope smiled as her fingers stroked Fiona’s neck and she spoke softly with an edge of bitterness. ‘Because I know my brother and he is capable of great evil. He is very good at destroying anything, and everyone. Granville loves only one thing in life and that is power. He sees all men as competitors . . . and women as a means of satisfying his rather unusual pleasures. But I think you know what I mean by that, Fiona. After all, you share his bed.’
Fiona could feel her cousin’s fingers caress her throat with lingering strokes and her moist, sweet breath on her cheek. There was a strange almost glazed expression on her face that disturbed Fiona in a way that she found compelling enough to let Penny continue to do whatever she wanted with her.
Penelope leant forward and her lips brushed Fiona’s throat while her tongue traced a thin and sensuous line up to her lips. The kiss was soft but strong. The pain Fiona was feeling dissolved and she was vaguely aware that her cousin’s kiss was causing her confused and wonderfully forbidden feelings.
No words passed between them as Fiona let her hand be lifted by Penelope to touch her breasts under the chemise.
‘Forget everything,’ Penelope whispered hoarsely. ‘Forget everything that is hurting you, my darling, and I will show you what you have always wanted. I will give you the pleasure that my brother cannot give you. I will give you the love we both crave.’
Penelope’s words were soft and seductive and Fiona knew that she did not want to resist as her beautiful cousin guided her hand down between her thighs. With her free hand, Penelope lifted the hem of her short silk chemise and Fiona felt her hand guided between her cousin’s legs.
Penelope closed her eyes and smiled with a soft sigh as she slid Fiona’s fingers into her. Fiona caught her breath as the wet swelling yielded and opened as an invitation for her to probe her sensuality. Penelope shuddered as she felt her cousin’s fingers willingly enter her.
‘Let everything out of your mind,’ she whispered in a husky voice as she gently led Fiona to the big double bed. ‘Except that you and I are together alone in this room. Let your heart rule your head. And let that passion that I know you have had for me take you to my bed. What is between us can only be between women. The softness and sensitivity of true love that does not desire to dominate. Share the ecstasy of body and soul as one.’
Fiona was both frightened and fascinated at what was happening between them. Penelope was seducing her! And yet it felt so natural between them, she thought as her face and throat flushed hot and she felt her own desire rising as an irresistible force.
‘Don’t resist what you truly feel,’ Penelope whispered hoarsely in her ear as she drew her down onto the bed and with practised hands began to strip away the clothes that separated their mutual desire. They knelt naked on the bed facing each other. ‘I will show you things you never imagined could cause the exquisite pleasures of the body,’ Penelope said as she leant forward to suckle one of her cousin’s desire-swollen nipples and Fiona did not resist.
Daniel Duffy had stared at the letter many times. Was it a trick? The letter was real enough and the ornate letterhead confirmed the identity of the sender.
‘No more appointments for today,’ he called to the front office as he took his coat from a wooden peg at the back of his office door. ‘I will be out for a while.’
It was chilly on the street outside his office as the first winds of autumn brought the cold heralding the coming winter. Daniel hailed a hansom cab and directed the driver to take him to the Botanic Gardens. He strolled around the gardens without taking in the collection of carefully selected trees and shrubs. His thoughts were on the meeting with the woman who had sent him the letter. Then he saw her.
She was alone as she had said she would be and she wore a black taffeta dress. She was bending slightly to examine a rosebush and she had the imperious air of one born to authority. She also had the delicate beauty of a woman who had never known physical labour. So this was Lady Enid Macintosh!
Daniel walked slowly towards her and tipped his hat out of habit.
‘Lady Macintosh?’
‘Mister Duffy?’
Enid’s hands were enclosed in a fur muff and she appraised Daniel. So this was the enemy, he thought. But she was not as he would have imagined her. He had expected to see a stern straight-backed woman with a set jaw. Instead, she looked very frail. Daniel was not fooled by appearances, as Lady Enid Macintosh had a fearsome reputation in the world of high finance. It was said that she was the true ruler of the Macintosh companies and not her husband in faraway Queensland.
‘I think we should walk and look at the gardens,’ Enid said and Daniel knew that she had issued a command and not a request. ‘Sadly, they are not at their best this time of year,’ she sighed and continued, ‘I suppose you are very curious as to why I should so urgently want to see you.’
‘That I am, Lady Macintosh,’ Daniel replied politely, despite his ingrained hatred for the Macintosh family. ‘Your letter mentioned the matter was of vital concern to both your family and mine.’
‘I think, Mister Duffy,’ she said as they walked slowly, feigning to examine the plants in the gardens, ‘that when you have heard me out you will agree. I believe our meeting will prove to be fruitful for us both or, should I say, for both our families.’
Although he towered over the woman as they strolled, Daniel felt awkward beside her. She had a regal manner about her that both annoyed and impressed him.
‘The damage your family has done mine is a poor start to any joint venture,’ he said belligerently, ‘if that is what you are proposing in some way. I think you must realise yourself that too much blood has been spilled between us.’ Enid nodded her head and he could see that the woman was agreeing with him. How could she dare go any further with whatever she was going to propose or say, he wondered.
‘I know what you are saying,’ she answered calmly. ‘But you must realise that my family has had its suffering. Even very recently with the death of my son, David.’
‘Please accept my sympathies for your son’s death, Lady Macintosh,’ Daniel replied with genuine sympathy. ‘From what I have heard of your son, and to my knowledge, I don’t think I could say my family had any argument with David. Only you,
your husband and your son-in-law.’
‘You are frank,’ Enid replied without rancour. ‘And you may have reason to believe what you are saying, Mister Duffy. I doubt anything I say will alter that. But believe me when I say I also damn my son-in-law to burn in hell and you might begin to see that we have enemies in common.’
Daniel tended to believe her when she said she condemned Granville White. Under the regal veneer, she appeared to be a woman who was very tired, almost beaten, and she was prepared to seek help anywhere. ‘I believe what you say, Lady Macintosh,’ he replied sympathetically. ‘I think we should move on to why you wish to see me.’
Enid stopped walking and examined a pink rose before she turned and looked directly into Daniel’s face. ‘I arranged for us to meet to talk about Patrick Duffy,’ she said quietly. ‘I believe that is what Molly called Fiona’s son.’
Daniel was aghast at the woman’s mention of Patrick. How could she suddenly recognise Patrick, when she had done all within her power to dispose of him – even have him murdered! It was as if she were discussing a bank account and not the boy she had sent away five years earlier.
‘You mean Michael’s son, don’t you?’ he growled, but Enid disregarded his hostile retort.
‘Michael is dead,’ she replied calmly. ‘That is the only reason I referred to Patrick as Fiona’s son.’
‘Michael would still be here and alive,’ Daniel reminded her, ‘if your son-in-law had not set out to have him murdered by Jack Horton who I believe works for your company.’
Enid nodded. ‘I know the facts, Mister Duffy,’ she replied. ‘But you as a practitioner of the law must be aware that knowing and proving are two totally different matters. In all the circumstances, nothing will bring Michael back. Oh, if I could go back in time, I would change everything. So many mistakes have occurred in the years past. I know I have caused my daughter to hate me. And in some way I have been instrumental in the death of my youngest son. You must believe that I would change things if I could, Mister Duffy.’