by Daphne Clair
'Just like—the cottage you found,' she heard herself saying calmly. She remembered him saying earlier, It isn't what I thought J wanted, but ‑He had brought her today because her mother was tied up and not able to come with him to see it.
'Yes,' he said calmly, picking up his knife and fork.
Stacey picked up a fork. It felt very heavy, and she looked at it minutely, wondering in a vague way if it was made of lead.
'She'll envy you,' she said, watching fascinated as he cut off a piece of perfectly cooked steak.
'Oh, I don't think so,' he said with quiet confidence, raising his fork to his mouth, and his eyes to hers.
Stacey quickly looked down and began attacking her own steak. But her movements seemed to be in slow motion. She remembered the estate agent's assumption that she was Alex's fiancée, even though she wore no ring. People didn't make that sort of assumption lightly, surely. Alex must have said something to give him the impression that he was planning to marry. For instance, 'I've changed my mind about my requirements —the lady 1 plan to marry has a hankering after a Colonial relic.'
The steak was perfect, tender and juicy—and it tasted like straw. She took a gulp of the fine wine Alex had ordered to go with it, and said lightly, 'It's a pity she was so busy today, and couldn't come with you to see it.'
'She can see it another time,' he said easily. 'I'm glad you were free, Stacey.'
He smiled at her over the rim of his glass, and she told herself to stop being ridiculous, clenched her teeth and managed a small smile back.
She refused a dessert, and Alex also waived the remainder of the menu and asked for two coffees to finish off the meal.
'You didn't finish your steak,' he observed.
'It was delicious, but rather large,' Stacey excused herself.
He didn't reply, only looked a little sceptical. He must know by now that she had a very healthy appetite.
'If you're going to buy that house,' she said, 'it will be some time before it's ready for occupation, won't it?'
'Yes. About a month, at least.'
'So you'll be with us a bit longer.'
'That's right. Will you mind?' he asked.
'No, of course not. Why should you think I would?'
'You weren't keen to have me in your home at first, were you?'
'I don't remember that I ever said so.'
'You didn't need to say so. Be honest, Stacey. You didn't like me, did you?'
'Not very much, at first,' Stacey admitted.
'And now?'
'Are you fishing, Alex?' She slanted him a slightly provocative smile. It was a moment or two before he answered with a slight quirk of his own mouth, but his eyes were not really smiling.
'I'd really like to know, Stacey. It's quite important to me.'
It would be, she supposed, if he hoped to be her stepfather some day. The thought brought an actual physical pain in her chest. She looked down and quietly took a deep breath. 'I don't dislike you any more,' she said. 'Surely you know that.'
The arrival of their coffee interrupted them, but after spooning sugar into his, Alex returned to the subject.
'I was sort of hoping,' he said mildly, 'for something more positive than simply a lack of dislike.'
Stacey looked up from sipping her coffee to find him looking at her quizzically.
'I—suppose we're friends, now, aren't we?' she said hesitantly.
'Are we?' He didn't exactly frown, but she had the impression his eyes had narrowed very slightly. 'Well. I suppose that's a start.'
Rather puzzled, Stacey smiled tentatively. 'It can't really matter that much, can it?' she said. After all, she and Fergus were both well over twenty-one, not children any more. And she couldn't imagine that Alex would let a small problem like her erstwhile dislike stand in the way of his happiness—or that of the woman he might want to marry. Her mother.
Stacey drank the rest of her coffee quickly, telling herself she would just have to get used to the idea. She would not do or say anything to stand in her mother's way. This hollow feeling inside was simply a natural reaction to the idea of her mother marrying again, but it would be most unfair to show it in any way.
Alex had not replied, but he put down his empty cup with some little force, and when she had finished he pushed back his chair quickly as though anxious to go.
Stacey looked up into his face as he pulled out her chair for her. It looked rather grim, but at her questioning look he smiled a little, as though trying to reassure her. But the smile was merely a movement of his mouth, and didn't touch his eyes.
*
Later that evening as she was preparing some paper for a watercolour painting she was planning, using the small laundry off the kitchen, she heard him telling her mother about the house. They must have known she was there because she was running water and generally not being very quiet, so the conversation was hardly private. She heard Alex enthusiastically describing the features of the cottage, and her mother's obviously fascinated comments.
'Stacey thought you would like it,' said Alex.
'I'm sure she's right,' Helen answered. Raising her voice she called, 'Stacey! Want some coffee when you've finished in there?'
'Yes, please,' Stacey called back. 'I'll be with you in a couple of minutes.'
Alex appeared in the doorway a moment later.
'What are you doing?' he asked, seeing the paper she was carefully lifting from the water.
'Preparing it for painting,' she answered briefly.
'Got a picture in mind?'
'Yes. Actually, I thought I'd like to paint your cottage—as it is.'
For a moment he didn't react at all. Then a pleased and amused smile appeared. 'Dinkum?' he asked, the old Colonial slang sounding odd coming from him, and waking a nebulous echo of the night he had read poetry to her, including one about an Aussie swagman with a twangy accent.
'Yes,' she said positively. 'I fancied it.'
'What—only the house?'
When she caught his meaning, she smiled a little reservedly. He was joking, of course, but flirtatious remarks to her in front of her mother didn't seem to her to be in the best of taste, even if not meant at all seriously. •
They took their coffee into the sitting room, where Fergus was immersed in marking homework books for his classes. He grunted appreciation as Stacey put down a cup by his elbow, and continued to wield a red pencil as he sipped his coffee.
'Have you sketched the house?' her mother asked.
'Not yet. I thought I might go over this weekend some time and get a sketch done.
'I'll take you,' Alex offered. 'I would like to have another look myself.' He turned to her mother. 'Want to come and see it?'
'Yes, please. I'd love to.'
'Are you going to buy a house, Alex?' Fergus asked, surfacing for a few moments from his pile of exercise books.
'Probably,' Alex replied. 'I've promised to let the agent know my decision next week.
After my mother has seen it, Stacey guessed. You needn't worry, Alex. She's going to love it.
She pictured her mother waking in that upstairs bedroom with the magnolia tree outside the window, and Alex reaching out to pick a creamy, waxen blossom for her. The picture made her feel sick. She scolded herself fiercely, reminding herself that all children of any age found it difficult to imagine their parents in a romantic role. She would get used to the idea.
They went to the house on Sunday, Alex having persuaded the agent, without much trouble, to let him have the key for a couple of hours. Stacey, armed with her sketchbook and pencils, and a board holding her newly prepared paper, declined to go inside, saying she would like to stay and begin her preliminary drawing. She watched Alex take her mother's arm to help her up the damaged front steps, and determinedly went to work. Perhaps they would like the finished painting for a wedding present.
She worked quickly, and by the time the others returned to the car she had a good outline of the proposed painting ready, and was scri
bbling in notes about colours.
Her mother looked animated and pretty, and without prompting went into raptures about the potential of the dilapidated little cottage. 'You are going to buy it?' she appealed to Alex.
He smiled at her teasingly. 'Since you so wholeheartedly approve, of course I am.'
Helen laughed prettily, and Stacey's hand tightened on the pencil she was holding, digging it into the paper so that the lead snapped. Carefully she put it away and slipped her sketchhook into the large bag she had brought to hold it.
'We can stay a bit longer if you like,' Alex offered, watching her. 'There's no hurry, if you want to work some more.'
'No, thanks.' She wanted only to get away as fast as possible. 'I'm finished for the moment,' she assured him evenly.
Later, he came on her working in front of the window in the sitting room, applying a background wash to the paper.
'You're good,' he commented, looking at the finished sketch waiting for colours to be applied. 'Why didn't you take an art course after school, Stacey? Was money too short?'
'It just didn't seem worth it,' she said.
'Why not?'
'I was going to get married—I thought. David had to finish his training, and I had to have a job to keep myself, and help him pay his way through university.'
She glanced up and found he was looking grim. 'It was a partnership,' she said defensively. We didn't want to wait until David had qualified and could earn money to support us both. The old-fashioned bit about, the man having to be the breadwinner didn't bother us.'
'And you decided all this while you were still at school?'
'Yes.'
'How old were you when you decided to marry David?'
'Fifteen. David was eighteen. We both knew what we were doing.'
'So young?' He raised his brows sceptically.
'Yes. It isn't possible—or right—for a lot of people, I know. But we found each other early. We were lucky—so we thought.'
'Until he died.'
'Yes. Until he died.'
Alex was silent for a moment, watching the long strokes of her brush on the paper before her. Then he said, 'When he had qualified, would you have gone into a course then—an art course?'
'Oh, no! We hoped to start a family, then.'
'I see. Do you still want a family?'
The brush wavered, and she lifted it from the paper and carefully dipped it into the wash, and wiped the surplus moisture away. 'I suppose so,' she said. 'If I ever marry.'
'Are you still thinking of marrying Graeme?'
'Thinking of it, yes—if it's any of your business.'
'I happen to feel it is—and I can't help it if you find that—unwelcome. You'll just have to accept that ‑'
Fergus came in with a query for Alex, and they went off together, leaving Stacey alone.
I will just have to accept—what? she wondered. That Alex was going to marry her mother? Or that he at least wanted to. Had they decided yet? Probably not definitely, because if so she and Fergus would have been told, surely. Perhaps her mother was hesitating— it was a drastic step to take after all these years, and Helen, who had always been shy and not at all adventurous, would be hesitant about entering into marriage with a man she had really only known for a few months..
It was only a few months since Alex had come into their lives, Stacey reminded herself. Even though sometimes she felt he had always been a part of them. He was, she supposed, that sort of person. He seemed to just fit, somehow, as though he belonged, even though his presence had acted also as a catalyst, an agent of change. Her mother had become more outgoing and confident since he came, and Stacey had been disturbed, stimulated, maddened at times, yet somehow more alive than at any time since David had died. Only Fergus remained unaffected, and perhaps that was because he was male, or perhaps just because of his own easy-going, unflappable personality.
CHAPTER NINE
The days were turning summery, and the commercial world was already beginning to hint that Christmas was just around the corner. Fergus and Alex began to be preoccupied with third term examinations at the college, but Alex also had on his mind the preparation of his new home. The sale had gone through quite quickly and he was now the legal owner, although alterations and repairs were not nearly completed.
Once or twice Stacey had driven round there by herself to add details to her painting before the changes obliterated the picturesque dilapidation which she wanted to capture. On her second visit, she noticed that workmen had left a pot of paint on the ground near the verandah, and a ladder leaning against one wall. She regarded these thoughtfully, and decided that she might add these small details to her painting.
Fergus brought a girl home to dinner one Sunday night. Stacey, who had been on several more tramping expeditions, was not surprised to recognise her as the girl he had been interested in on her first time out with the club. The 'new girl' Fergus had vaguely mentioned once or twice, evidently.
Her name was Tricia Newman, and Stacey and her mother both liked her very much. Although it was unusual for Fergus to bring home a girl, they both carefully treated the occasion as nothing for special remark, for which Fergus was apparently grateful, for he gave them both a peck on the cheek before bedtime. The mark of affection was out of the way for him, as was the quick, gruff, 'Thanks, you two,' which he flung at them before going off to bed. Stacey and her mother exchanged an amused, questioning glance with each other, but nothing was said. They would contain their curiosity until Fergus decided to tell them more.
All the same, Stacey made a point of talking to Tricia the next time she went out tramping. Alex was not with them on that trip, having stayed home with the declared intention of going over to the house later to start work on the garden. The workmen had finished the outside, which now looked quite respectable, and the grounds would be free for his ministrations.
Stacey was not surprised when she and Fergus returned home to find that their mother was out, too.
'I suppose she decided to keep Alex company,' Fergus remarked.
Agreeing, Stacey was tempted to ask what he thought of the situation, but decided against it. She did not think that her mother would relish being discussed by her children in that way. Nothing had been said, and she supposed that when there was any definite decision, they would be told.
The two of them arrived home soon afterwards. Alex declared himself pleased with his day's work, although there still remained much to be done. They had stopped off on the way home to have a cup of tea with Roger Pearce, who had a flat not far from the cottage.
'I have a standing invitation to drop in there,' Alex told them. 'Roger is very hospitable, and takes pity on lonely men like myself. Like someone else I know,' he added, slanting his attractive smile towards Helen Coleman.
'So you had a good day?' Stacey said brightly to her mother.
'Yes, very nice, thank you,' her mother agreed.
'She's too polite to admit she was bored with watching me tear down twenty years' growth of weeds,' said Alex, giving her another grin. 'But she thoroughly enjoyed her afternoon tea, didn't you, Helen?'
Stacey watched colour come into her mother's cheeks as she threw Alex a look which was partly indignant, partly alarmed and also slightly embarrassed.
'Anyway,' Alex went on, 'I got what I wanted. She was at a loose end most of the afternoon ‑'
'Only because you refused to let me help——' Helen interrupted.
'Too heavy for you,' Alex said tersely, and went on with what he had been saying. 'So in the end she wandered into the house and started planning colour schemes for me.'
'They were only ideas,' Helen protested. 'I still think Stacey ‑'
'I couldn't persuade Stacey to do it,' said Alex, looking across at her, and then flicking his glance away. 'I told you I'd already asked her.'
It was true that Stacey had refused, rather curtly. 'I'm not going to live in it,' she told him. 'Colour schemes are personal things—it's up to you.'
/>
'Sure it is. And I'm asking for your help.'
'I'm flattered, but—oh, why don't you ask my mother?' she burst out. Then, realising , that she sounded rude and ungracious, she added, 'She has very good taste, and far more experience of that sort of thing than I have.'
'Very well,' he said quietly. 'Thanks for the suggestion.'
Now he had taken her up on it, and she should have been pleased. Instead, she was irritated that he had let her mother, know that he had asked Stacey for advice first. Why had he done that? Didn't he trust her mother's taste? She was lacking a little in confidence, but her taste was impeccable, if a trifle unadventurous. Or had her mother turned down the opportunity, too —that seemed likely from the way he had apparently had to almost trick her into doing the task, in the end. Perhaps she had been reluctant because she had not decided about Alex. Stacey was still seeing Graeme once or twice a week. He seemed to have got over his pique about her taking up tramping again, and returned to being the pleasant companion whose company she had always enjoyed.
They made up a foursome occasionally with Fergus and Tricia, for dancing or a trip to a beach. Stacey suspected that Graeme was not over-keen on the beach expeditions, but accepted them with good grace because he knew she loved the sea and the chance to take long walks along the sand or across the tops of windswept cliffs to some hidden bay.
One Sunday the four of them went to Piha, a west coast beach reached by means of a winding cliff road, not too far from Auckland city, and popular because of it. The rough surf pounded relentlessly on to black iron sand which in the heat of a sunny day was unbearably hot to walk on. Surfboard riders, with varying degrees of expertise, skimmed into the beach on the waves, and swimmers crowded the patch of water marked by two flags flying on the beach. The volunteer lifesavers who planted the flags hoped that everyone had the sense to stay within this patrolled area, but if one or two over-confident and foolhardy souls decided to swim elsewhere, the rescue team would be quickly on hand if they got into difficulties nevertheless.
Stacey entered the water eagerly, diving into the waves and turning expertly to 'body-surf into the beach on their swift progress. Tricia and Graeme stayed in relatively shallow water, but Fergus and Stacey swam out to calmer water beyond the breakers for a time before rejoining the other two.