by Julie Mac
The young horse’s eyes still bugged, and he continued to make a high trilling, snorting noise, but Sam pushed him up towards the fence, talking to him all the time.
‘Bring Annie up alongside,’ he instructed Kate, without raising his voice or turning his head. ‘He needs to learn there’s nothing to be scared of.’
Kate squeezed her legs, and the mare obligingly walked forward to stand at the fence, her ears pricked forward, but her body relaxed.
For five minutes, Sam forced Blue to eyeball the calves—which eventually lost interest and walked away. By the end of five minutes, Blue too was pretending he didn’t know what all the fuss was about, and they walked on up the fence line, side by side, Sam totally relaxed in the saddle.
‘He’s a silly young bugger sometimes, but he’s got heaps of potential,’ he explained. ‘I bought him because I discovered he was a grandson of Trojan’s sire. I couldn’t resist the temptation of taking him on as a youngster and training him.’
‘Oh,’ Kate’s throat had tightened and she felt as though she had ridden into a shadow.
Sam looked across at her then eased Blue to a halt.
‘Hey, don’t keep beating yourself up over what happened to Trojan. Okay?’
When she nodded, he nudged Blue on and Kate’s mount moved forward too, perfectly in sync.
‘It’s just that I should have thought a little more, and been a little more patient. If I hadn’t been in such a rush to get the job done and get to the board meeting, it wouldn’t have happened,’ she said quietly.
Sam shook his head.
‘If it’s any comfort,’ he said, ‘I’m quite convinced now the plane didn’t frighten Trojan. He was a veteran of dozens of A&P shows, street parades, and any number of other events. Loud noises didn’t worry him. At one stage, he used to graze next door to an airfield where small planes were landing and taking off all the time.’
‘You’re kidding.’ She lifted her eyes towards him hopefully.
‘Not a bit. He even used to make a game out of racing the planes as they came down the runway. I think now that’s what he was doing that day. You said you couldn’t see the horses, and from memory you flew over the strip a couple of times.’
‘I did.’ Kate nodded slowly and stared at the distant forest. Unconsciously, she’d drawn Annie to a stop and Sam stopped too, turning Blue to face her.
In her mind’s eye, she could see the airstrip under her and the sheep scattering towards the trees. She felt again the buck of the plane as she banked and circled once more. The steep grassy strip beneath her was bare of animals.
‘Trojan and Blue must have been under the trees,’ Sam said quietly. ‘He came out only after you’d started to touch down, and a frightened horse wouldn’t do that. You saw what happened with young Blue just now. He was scared and all he wanted to do was run away from the source of his fear. Horses in the wild always choose flight before fight.
‘Trojan, that day, was running in the same direction as the plane, not away from it. I think he must have seen the fence and decided to cap off his fun by showing off and jumping it.’
Sam walked Blue closer to Kate’s mount. ‘He was doing something he enjoyed, and he didn’t quite make it. Will you remember that?’
When she nodded, he said, ‘Good. Now let’s see how you go in a nice slow canter all the way up this fence line and we’ll stop by those trees at the top.’
Kate felt light, as though a lead weight had been thrown off her shoulders. She relaxed deep into Annie’s sway back and let her hips rock back and forth in an easy rhythm as the old horse took the hill in long, sure strides.
The view from the top was magnificent. The farm’s rolling acres stretched in front of them, the grass parched brown beneath the relentless February sun. The only patches of green were the scattered groves of trees. In the distance, to the right, the big red corrugated iron roof of the homestead was visible, and Kate could just make out the much smaller roof of the beach cottage, far below them on the coastline. From here the ocean looked a deep blue, and the long sweep of the bay, with its creamy strip of sand, was more beautiful than anything she’d seen on a postcard.
‘I love the view from here,’ she said quietly.
‘So do I.’ Something about his tone made her glance sharply across to him, and to her surprise she saw bleakness in his eyes and a tightness about his mouth.
He’d worn his akubra on the ride; now, Kate thought—uncomfortably—the combination of low-slung hat, day-old beard and granite eyes gave him a distinctly menacing air. She remembered her first impressions the day Trojan had died. Then, she’d thought he looked savage. It was a far cry from the look of rakish devilment she’d seen on the beach today.
She had no idea why he was tense. Had it been the talk of Trojan? She didn’t think so. And then a simple truth dawned: she had been born to this beautiful piece of land, whereas Sam Shanahan had been born to nothing. She felt the need to explain, to make him understand that while the farm would soon be hers, it would not come as a gift but as something she would pay money for and continue to nurture and invest in over the years to come. She took a deep breath.
‘My great-grandfather, James McPherson, bought the farm after he became successful in the building business. But he had less interest in the farm than the business, and he handed it on early to his son, my grandfather.’
She slanted a look across to Sam. There was no softening of his features—in fact, if anything, his face had hardened further. She looked away from him, took another deep breath and ploughed on.
‘Grandad farmed it all his life, apart from when he went to the Second World War and a twenty-year period when he joined old James in the business. He put on managers then, but as soon as my own father was old enough to take a hand in running the business, Grandad retired to the farm. This was where his heart was.
‘When he died, he surprised us all by leaving it to my father’s sister, Rose, who he hadn’t spoken to for over thirty years.’
She turned in the saddle so she was facing Sam. ‘I’m going to buy the farm from her.’
She almost flinched at the emotion emanating from him at her words. She saw his nostrils flare in much the same way Blue’s had earlier, but instead of his eyes widening as Blue’s had, they narrowed almost to slits and his body was rigidly still.
Chapter 9
Blue, too, felt the tension and skittered nervously. Kate drew a sharp breath of alarm, her eyes riveted to Sam’s face as he fought some inner battle.
When he spoke, his voice was low and perfectly controlled—so much so that Kate thought she must have imagined his inexplicable flare of emotion.
‘Your aunt told you she would sell the farm to you?’ he queried quietly.
Kate looked away from his questioning gaze.
‘Well, not in so many words.’
‘In how many words then?’ he persisted.
Kate shrugged uncomfortably; aware she had been slightly economical with the truth, even to herself, in her assumption that her father’s estranged sister would sell to her.
Sam stared at her for a second, then suggested they walk on. ‘We’ll take a loop route back to the homestead and you can tell me all about it.’ He put pressure on his reins to turn Blue towards the track. ‘I’m interested.’
They walked side by side, the horses heading for home on autopilot, their reins loose and their heads relaxed. Kate avoided looking at Sam as she spoke.
‘I met Rose for the first time when she came to Grandad’s funeral last October. I always knew, of course, that Dad had a younger sister. He told me Rose had argued with her parents early on. Apparently, Grandad couldn’t stand the man she married, they had words and she and her husband left New Zealand. Dad thought they’d gone to the United States. Anyway, he never heard from her. Rose cut herself off from the rest of the family.’
Sam made a sudden grunting noise. She looked across and saw he was coughing. ‘Dust in my throat,’ he muttered. ‘Carry on.’
‘My father tried to track her down several times,’ continued Kate. ‘He hired a private detective and at one stage he managed to find a telephone number—not in the States, but in Australia. He phoned, but she made it plain she had no wish to resume contact of any sort with the family. She was obviously very angry over what had happened.
‘Dad phoned again a few months later, with the same result, then he tried writing a letter, but it came back to him, unopened, with the message “Return to Sender” in her handwriting. He gave up. She obviously was not interested in making contact, and he felt no purpose would be served by pushing it.’
‘And her parents? Did they give up too?’
‘Grandad was very hurt by her departure. No one was allowed to mention her name in his presence for all those years. When Grandma died at the beginning of last year, we tried phoning the number my father had found years ago. Of course, she’d moved on from there. We placed ads in papers all over Australia but heard nothing from her.
‘Grandad seemed to fade away quickly after Grandma died—he just seemed to give up. When he went, we advertised again, and this time she replied. She came to the funeral.’
Kate fell silent.
‘And?’
‘And she was a nice lady, a lovely person.’ A lump had formed in her throat and she swallowed hard. ‘Dad and her both cried when they saw each other. I cried too. It was terribly sad to think they’d wasted all those years.’
She thought she heard a sharp intake of breath from the man riding beside her, but when she glanced across, he was looking ahead, his face expressionless.
‘The farm?’ he prompted presently, his voice soft, but she heard the undertone of steel.
‘She stayed in New Zealand only for the day of the funeral and the day after. Dad arranged for a reading of the will, and we discovered Grandad had left the farm to her. He was obviously trying to mend fences—too late, but it was a conciliatory gesture nonetheless.
‘My father was thrilled for his sister. He had no desire for the farm himself. Maude, his new wife, is definitely a city person.’
‘And your aunt? How did she handle this—this peace offering?’
‘She seemed … bemused by it all. I had the impression she was too settled in Australia to think of ever moving here herself. I asked her for first refusal if she was thinking of selling, and she said she’d very much like to keep the farm in the family.’
They were moving through a grove of big, old, puriri and karaka trees, the trunks gnarled and grey and solid as time itself. The horses’ hooves scuffed in the carpet of dry leaves on the track, and high in the shadowy canopy, a pair of tuis executed their elaborate and beautiful love duet.
Sam had taken the lead now through the narrowed track; he turned in his saddle, his dark brows drawn together in a frown, the lines etched deep on his forehead and cheeks.
‘So I take it your aunt has no family—no children—of her own?’
Kate shook her head. ‘Not that we know of. She’s married for a second time, and she spoke of her new husband frequently, but there was no mention of children. My father told me he’d asked her about family, and he said she’d just looked sad and said she’d lost a child years ago. My dad hates anything remotely emotional, so he left it at that. He was looking forward to visiting her just now while he and Maude are in Australia on their way back from Europe. He’ll have more to tell me when he returns.’
Sam shook his head and Kate agreed with his unspoken sentiment: her Aunt Rose’s story was one of sorrow.
***
They arrived back at the homestead shortly before the last rays of sun painted the hills gold behind them. They sipped on dewy cans of cold beer while they untacked the horses and sponged water on the sweat patches under the saddles, then they led them to their paddock.
‘Have dinner with me,’ Sam said as they walked back to the house. ‘I’m buying.’
She laughed. ‘Don’t be silly. There are no restaurants within thirty kilometres. I’ll heat up something from my freezer.’
‘Hey! Who said anything about restaurants? Don’t you know about Jim’s Takeaways down at Waikauri township? I’m willing to bet old Jimbo makes the best fish and chips in the Southern Hemisphere.’
She laughed again, relieved to see his tension of earlier had dissipated. Besides, she was exhausted after a day of work, swimming and riding, and Jim’s fish and chips sounded infinitely more appealing than the microwave dinner she would otherwise be pulling from the freezer back at the cabin.
She drove the ute back to the beachside house, then joined him in his Range Rover for the six-kilometre drive south into Waikauri. The rough gravel road wound inland for most of the way before heading back to the coast shortly before the township.
Jim’s fish and chips lived up to their promise, the snapper superbly fresh and succulent, and the chips cooked to crisp perfection. They walked down to the estuary with their paper-wrapped package and sat side by side on the edge of the jetty to eat, their legs dangling over the edge.
Daylight had evaporated by the time they were ready to leave—but not before they’d seen the bulbous black clouds forming in the sky out to sea, like great purple and yellow-tinged bruises.
‘We might get some rain from that. God knows, the farms around here could do with it,’ said Sam.
‘Hmm. Or those big black clouds may just roll away as they do at this time of year without shedding a drop of rain where it’s needed,’ countered Kate. She hoped it would rain. Her forests were tinder dry. And flying up yesterday, she’d been horrified by the scorched tracts of farmland beneath her. Farmers were already feeding out hay stored for winter; if the drought persisted, animals would go hungry. Besides, she thought, rain would be a welcome relief from the enervating heat and humidity, evident even at this time of day.
Her tiredness caught up with her on the journey home. She dozed, waking only when Sam drew up the four-wheel outside the beach house. She noticed he left the engine running. He came around to her side, opened the door, walked with her to the house. Then he was gone.
***
Only when she’d climbed into the big double bed did she allow herself to examine a truth which she’d kept firmly clamped in a far recess of her mind all afternoon and evening: when Sam had held her at the edge of the surf this afternoon, when her skin had fused with his, she’d experienced a joy of intense purity.
He was her other half, the missing piece of the corny split-down-the-middle love pendants her friends used to wear at university. She knew this now with certainty.
She trusted him. She’d trusted him today in the surf; she’d trusted him to keep her safe when they rode the horses. She trusted him with her body—and with her soul. She thought about her earlier doubts and somehow, they didn’t matter. So what if he wanted to play a part in the future of McPherson Enterprises? She pictured them sitting side by side at the boardroom table, with her father smiling across the expanse of polished wood, and her heart was light.
Her mind flicked back to their brief embrace this afternoon. He’d held her in his arms only fleetingly, but she’d shown no resistance.
He’d turned away. He must have felt the compliance in her body, must have sensed her own need. But instead, he had broken the embrace.
Why?
Justine, her brain told her. He was involved with Justine, and loyalty dictated he end one relationship before beginning another. Kate smiled in the darkness of her bedroom. Sam Shanahan was a good man, a decent man.
When Kate slept, she dreamed of Sam.
***
The thunderstorm woke her shortly after midnight. At first she was puzzled; the night was still and there was no drumbeat of rain on the iron roof. A light lit the room momentarily and she could not understand its source. Sometimes the locals drove along the beach at night to set nets—but there was no sound of an engine. She wondered if there was a fishing boat in the bay operating a spotlight. As she climbed from her bed and started to cross
to the window, she heard the distant, prolonged rumble and understood.
Kate switched on her bedside lamp, reached for her short silk robe and wrapped it over the T-shirt and briefs she’d slept in. She opened the glass sliding door that led from her bedroom to the deck and ran barefoot across the springy kikuyu grass and onto the sand.
Kate McPherson loved thunderstorms.
At boarding school, when the other girls cowered in terror at crashing explosions of thunder, she’d exulted in the power and fury of the cataclysmic storms.
She ran to the water’s edge and looked out to sea. Within seconds, she was rewarded with a flash of lightning on the horizon. It lit the sky in a brilliant sheet, bathing the headland in an eerie light, illuminating the sea in a mass of silvery phosphorescence.
She counted the seconds until the thunder growled in the distance: nine, which, if her memory of schoolgirl science was correct, meant the storm was three kilometres offshore. Or was it three miles? She shook her head. It really didn’t matter. It simply meant she was safely out of the eye of the storm here, and away from the torrential rain the clouds would drop as warm updrafts battled it out with cold downdrafts in the electrically charged atmosphere.
She half-walked, half-ran along the beach at the edge of the tide, away from the cottage and towards the jutting headland, stopping often to look out to sea, hardly registering the ocean’s eddies which swirled around her ankles and splashed at the hem of her robe. The distant sound-and-light show enthralled and excited her; she lost count of the number of times lightning lit the sky and sea and headland in its brilliance. Sometimes the lightning appeared in forked bolts, splitting the sky in a dazzling display of natural fireworks; sometimes it manifested itself as an all-encompassing sheet.
She failed to notice the advance of the storm, failed to take warning from the increasing violence of the thunderclaps, failed even to register the ever decreasing time-lapse between lightning and the ensuing thunder.
When the heavens opened and a huge explosion occurred a split second after a blinding lightning flash, Kate became possessed with a type of madness.