by Daphne Clair
With a swift change of mood; he then chose a short poignant poem, a translation of a famous Maori song composed by a chief who was held prisoner, and longed for his tribal homeland. It ended:
'Waters of Kawhia!
O, far are you from me;
Long severed, I stand here.
As swift flows the river
So down fall my tears.'
Then came a pathetic, funny, and perceptive little verse about a young man from Tonga, where life was simple and uncomplicated, emigrating to New Zealand and trying to adjust to living in a city of twentieth-century bustle and sophistication.
'Your turn,' Alex said then, getting up and handing the book to her.
'Oh, no!' Stacey laughed. 'I'm not an English teacher.'
'You can read, can't you?'
'Not aloud!'
'Why not?' he asked reasonably. 'It's a lost art, I know. But I'm sure you can if you try. The Victorians used to do a lot of reading aloud. It was one of their chief entertainments in the home.'
'The Bible and "improving literature", wasn't it?' Stacey smiled.
'Mmm, I believe so. Not that the Bible doesn't contain some hair-raising tales of adventure and mayhem.'
'I should think the Victorian papa probably edited those bits out,' Stacey remarked.
'Possibly—though in some respects the Victorians were not as prudish as we tend to think. Now stop stalling and pick a poem.'
'Yes, sir!'
'Did I sound like a schoolmaster?' he asked, a little ruefully.
'A little. Here's a nice short one, anyway.'
'Chicken!' he teased, dropping back on to the divan. 'Let's hear it, then.'
She began a little hesitantly, but it was a rhythmical little poem about a couple of pit-sawyers, back in the days of the ten-foot two-man saw, hardly more than a statement of comradeship between the two men—me and me mate. She soon began to enjoy reading, almost forgetting her audience of one, and when she had finished looked at him enquiringly to see if he approved.
'Thanks,' he said. 'I enjoyed that, although it's hardly appropriate for your voice.' As she made to hand the book back to him, he said, 'Like to try another?'
She shrugged and began to read the next poem in the book, not realising until after the first verse that it was a love-poem, from a young girl to her lover. She hesitated then, but Alex said quietly, 'Go on.'
It was a beautiful poem, but towards the end rather passionate, and although she kept her voice steady she felt herself flushing faintly as she neared the end.
She waited a few seconds before she looked up, and found Alex regarding her with an odd expression which she was unable to read.
He got up without comment, and took the book from her, closing it as he did so.
'I've kept you up too long,' he said. 'Thank you, Stacey.'
He stepped back so that she rose unaided from the love-seat, smiling at him a little hesitantly.
'I've enjoyed it,' she said. 'Thank you for introducing me to poetry again. I'll get that other copy for you. Goodnight.'
He opened the door for her and bade her a rather absent-minded goodnight, she thought.
As she got ready for bed, she wondered, not for the first time, why Alex was unmarried. It still seemed likely that he was divorced. She wondered if her mother knew the answer to that. She and Alex seemed to be quite close. They had a lot in common, he had said, hadn't he? And he had said she was attractive, and he thought a lot of her. So did Stacey, of course, but— Alex was a man, only eight years younger than her mother. Was it possible that‑?
It was something Stacey didn't want to think about. She chided herself for that, aware that she had no right to grudge her mother any happiness that might come her way. Her life had been no picnic so far.
But I wish it wasn't Alex, she thought, as she was drifting off to sleep. I don't want it to be Alex.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Alex had become so much a part of their lives that Stacey felt a distinct shock of surprise when she found that he was seriously thinking of leaving them.
He met her at the door one day as she returned home from work, and as she passed him with a quick greeting, shot out a hand to grasp her arm.
'How about coming with me to look at a house?' he asked.
'Now?'
'Yes. The agent is waiting for me there. I said I would meet him in twenty minutes. Your mother isn't home—I saw her at the school and she said she was tied up and would be late home, so could we all fix ourselves a meal. Come with me to see this place, and I'll give you a meal at a restaurant, right?'
It was Friday night, so her mother was probably doing some weekend shopping, Stacey supposed. Evidently Alex had wanted her opinion of the house, and now Stacey was here, had decided to ask her instead.
About to refuse, she looked up to find him smiling at her, and in his eyes there was an eager look she had seen once before—when he had asked her to share the book of poems.
'Give me five minutes to tidy up and leave a note,' she said.
'I'll write the note,' he offered. 'You've got five minutes to get pretty.'
She made a face at the suggestion that she wasn't, and heard him laughing as she went down the passageway to her room.
'A house?' she queried him, as they drove off exactly six minutes later. 'I thought you were looking for a flat or a town house?'
'I was, but as I told you, it's difficult to find one with a bit of garden. This is something rather different, but it may just suit. It's actually a colonial cottage, about eighty to a hundred years old, that a builder has taken in hand and is restoring. It's one of a row of six that he bought.'
'For reselling? Speculating?'
'Yes. I've had a look at the outside. At the moment it looks pretty run down. But there is one in the row that is almost finished. We will be looking at that, too, to gain some idea of what can be done.'
'It sounds interesting.'
'Yes, I thought so. You must be prepared for a bit Of a shock, though, when you first see my dream home.'
'Is that what it is?'
Alex grinned. 'Maybe. I can see potential, anyway. Actually it was the sight of a magnificent old magnolia tree growing in its garden which first attracted me.'
When he stopped outside the cottage and said, 'That's it. What do you think?' Stacey was unable for a moment to say anything. It was narrow and two-storied, the steep corrugated iron roof showed rusty patches through the remnants of faded red paint, and the paint on the weatherboard walls—what remained of it—was an indeterminate sickly fawn with a bilious yellow tinge. The steps that led up to the small verandah were rotting, and half the balustrades which enclosed it were missing. A small front lawn was so overgrown that the grass was three feet tall and the struggling heads of a few neglected roses and hydrangeas barely showed above it. But the magnolia was truly magnificent. As tall as the house itself, it had been planted in the middle of one side of the lawn, and its dark glossy leaves were a perfect foil for the enormous waxy white blossoms it bore. Neglect seemed to have bothered the old tree not a bit.
'The tree'—Stacey said—'is lovely.'
Alex laughed. 'I told you the house was a shocker.
But wait until you see what can be done ‑' He broke off as a car drew up behind them. 'Here's the agent now.'
They got out and the man came to meet them, shaking hands with Alex and then turning to Stacey with a smile. 'And is this your fiancée, Mr Lines?' he asked.
'Just a friend, Mr Towers. Miss Stacey Coleman.' Alex seemed quite unembarrassed as the man shot him a quick look and apologised for the mistake. He seemed about to say something more, and then think better of it. Alex, eyeing him blandly, said, 'Could we see the restored one first, do you think? I think Miss Coleman finds it a bit difficult to imagine how this could be made attractive and liveable in again.'
They walked up the street a little way, to a slightly larger house, evidently of the same vintage, but completely transformed. The weatherboards wor
e a new coat of fresh off-white paint, and the windows were finished in blue, with decorated shutters on the upstairs ones. The roof had evidently been entirely renewed and was also painted blue. The steps had been repaired recently, as new wood testified, and the magnificent front door with brilliant stained glass panels had been bought from the site of a demolished old mansion to replace one which the agent said had been past repair.
Inside, a wide hallway was carpeted in deep blue which also covered the stairway to one side. Kauri panelling on the walls had been stripped of many layers of old paint and lightly varnished to show off its beautiful grain. The rooms had been as far as possible restored to their original state by a clever mixture of modern repair work and old but still sound fittings from demolished houses of similar vintage. Modern papers with an old-fashioned flavour enhanced the walls, and the kitchen, entirely modern and functional, nevertheless remained in keeping with the age of the house by dint of its panelled cupboards and a vinyl floor-covering that looked remarkably like old-time brick tiles.
Upstairs the bedrooms were spacious and light, the high, moulded plaster ceilings newly painted white.
By the time they had returned to the other cottage and Mr Towers ushered them inside, Stacey was able to visualise a similar transformation taking place within its walls.
At the moment, these were covered with depressing stained and faded paper that was even peeling off in large sections, revealing different but equally depressing layers beneath. The rooms were smaller than those in the other house, but with care and imagination could be converted to cosiness rather than pokiness, as the agent pointed out.
Looking into the tiny kitchen, Stacey recoiled in horror, but Alex laughed and took her arm, saying, 'Think of it done up like the one up the road, Stacey. That green horror of a stove replaced with a nice new one, the window enlarged—at present that small apology for a window does rather remind me of a cell, I admit—and some new cupboards.'
'And a fridge,' Stacey added, joining in the game. 'But where would it go?'
'Over here,' said Alex, opening up a tall cupboard which had once been the meat safe. 'We'll take this out and make room for a fridge. The whole kitchen would have to be remodelled, anyway. I wonder,' he added thoughtfully, looking at the corner where the ceiling seemed to slope down before joining the wall, 'if there's room for a pantry there. That must be the stairs, surely?' he queried, turning to the agent.
'That's right, Mr Lines. There is a cupboard under the stairs which opens from the hall. But if you would prefer to convert it into a pantry, I'm sure the builder would be happy to do that for you.'
They went into the hall and inspected the cupboard, deciding it would be perfect for a pantry if a door were to be built in on the kitchen side.
'Be careful on the stairs,' the agent warned as he led the way, testing each narrow tread before resting his full weight on it. 'We think they're all right, but one or two boards could do with renewing. That will all be done, of course, as a condition of sale.'
Stacey cast Alex a slightly humorous look before following the other man up the narrow flight and round the little clockwise turn at the top.
A bathroom and three bedrooms opened off the small landing. Stacey gazed in awe at an enormous bathtub on straddled iron legs with fanciful clawed feet, reposing in slightly seedy splendour on a cracked linoleum patterned with incredibly enormous fleur-de-lis in orange on a brown background. Since the outside of the bath and the walls had been painted, presumably by the most recent occupants of the house, a peculiarly vivid mint-green which clashed wonderfully with the shiny blue tiles surrounding the wash-basin which stood in one corner, Stacey could only be relieved that the linoleum was faded.
Alex, too, was looking a little stunned by the colour scheme, and she gave him a demure little smile and said, softly, 'Love your dream home, Alex.'
Solemnly he said, 'I hoped you'd like it.' But his eyes were laughing with her as Mr Towers, with a doubtful smile at them both, hurried them along to the bedrooms.
These were not over-large, but compared well with most modern rooms, although lacking the convenience of built-in wardrobes. The front one looked out on the magnolia tree, and Stacey was fascinated to see a perfect six-inch-wide creamy blossom within inches of the windowsill.
'Shall I pick it for you?' Alex asked, watching her.
Stacey shook her head, smiling. 'No. But wouldn't it be lovely to wake up to?'
She turned to him and he was looking at her with an odd expression. 'Yes, wouldn't it?' he agreed.
For some reason she felt herself flushing, but fortunately the agent was speaking to Alex, distracting his attention.
'The tree is rather large, but it doesn't affect the light in this room much. Of course downstairs it could make the living room a little dark ‑'
'The living room could do with another window at the side,' Alex suggested as they re-negotiated the stairs. 'That would add more light without having to interfere with the tree. All the same, the loss of a few branches wouldn't substantially damage it,' and done carefully it could let in quite a lot more light, too;'
'The last person who looked wanted to chop it down,' Mr Towers said. 'But I'm rather fond of trees, myself. It would be rather a pity.'
'It would be a sacrilege!' Stacey exclaimed, shocked at such wanton lack of imagination. 'Alex would never cut it down, would you, Alex?'
He gave her a slanting smile and shook his head. 'It was the tree that first made me interested in the place,' he reminded her. 'That, and the ground at the back.'
He drew Stacey with him to the door. 'Let's have a look round outside,' he said, and this time he led the way, with the agent trailing in their wake.
An uneven, broken concrete path led along a hedge which had gone berserk over the years, to the back of, the house.
Here the grass was just as high as in the front, but above its waving seed-heads rose three or four substantial fruit trees.
'Apples and peaches,' Alex said proudly, as though the place was already his. 'They'll need hard pruning to get them back into condition, but they should be bearing well in a year or two. And look ‑' he pulled her with him to a corner hidden by a rickety, green-mossed trellis covered with tired-looking vines. Behind it were three citrus trees, glossy-leaved although festooned with dead twigs and leaves from the vines, spiders' webs, and what looked like the remains of a ' bird's nest or two.
'Lemon, grapefruit, and—I think—sweet orange,' said Alex. 'This fellow could turn out to be a mandarin, though,' he said, thoughtfully picking off a few twigs from the nearest tree and inspecting the small hard green fruit on its branches.
'What are these vines?' Stacey asked, looking at the tangle beside her. 'These are grapes, aren't they?' she added, picking out a familiar shape among the varied leaves.
'There are grapes, yes,' he said, joining her. 'Also passion-fruit, see?' he picked another leaf out. 'And honeysuckle, probably growing wild. And also, I'm afraid, some convolvulus. It's going to be devil's own job getting rid of that!'
'It will be awfully hard work clearing this lot up,' she said, surveying the section.
'Yes, but worth it,' Alex said thoughtfully.
The agent, who had been hovering in the background, fervently agreed, pointing out the convenient size of the section, big enough to be interesting and small enough to be manageable.
'And the advantage of buying now, of course, is that so far as the inside is concerned,' he added, 'you can choose your own wallpaper and carpets, etcetera.'
'Yes, although the builder seems to have made a good job of choosing for the other house,' Alex said. 'I don't know a lot about interior decoration. How about helping me out, there?' he added, turning to Stacey. 'You're the artistic one in your family.'
'I know you're really only interested in the garden,' she teased him, evading the question. 'You wouldn't really care if the inside remained as it is, would you?'
'Not true. The bathroom, at least, will have to be redecora
ted. It reminds me of every gothic horror movie I've seen!'
He took her to dine at a quiet little restaurant where the background music was played softly and the food was superbly cooked and beautifully served. .
After a delicious seafood cocktail of sweet crayfish, tangy oysters and crisp prawns, they waited for a main course of steak and mushrooms, and Stacey said, 'You really are interested in that place, aren't you?'
'Yes, I think I am. It isn't what I thought I wanted, but I think it should do very nicely. One of the spare bedrooms will be quite an adequate study-cum-library for me, where I can put my books once I get shelves and a desk put in. And although the garden was the chief attraction, I do admit, the house has a charm of its own, don't you think?' Eyeing her raised brows, he smiled. 'Come on, Stacey, admit it. You were rather taken with it, too. I could see you mentally choosing wallpaper and hanging curtains at the windows. Don't tell me you weren't.'
So he knew. 'Clever!' she said. Then, his smile charming her into honesty, she confessed, 'I love it! It's a darling little house, and when it's loved and cared for and prettied up again, it will be a super place to live.'
'You don't think its age is a disadvantage?'
'Oh, no! Well, in some ways, I suppose, but once the repairs are done, it will be better than new, in many ways. It has character, and charm, and a sort of mellowed atmosphere—you don't get that in a new house.'
'So you share your mother's enthusiasm for the older homes, do you?' he asked casually.
'How did you know that my mother has a soft spot for old houses?' she asked, after a breathless moment.
'Oh, she mentioned it one day. She told me she has always hankered after living in a genuine Colonial relic. With narrow stairs and high ceilings, and the ghosts of the pioneer builders haunting the rooms.'
The waitress put their steaks in front of them, and Stacey noted with great clarity the steam gently rising from hers, and the slice of tomato on top that was very slightly losing its freshness from the heat of the meat.