Frontier Wife (21 page)

“Just out of interest, if you had found hay, how would you have paid for it?”

“I would have offered to work it off; or if that failed, I’d have taken a mortgage out on the farm.”

Despair settled on them like a funeral shroud. The last time she felt so wretched she was in the clutches of those horrible mountain people.

Chapter Ten

Mid-morning the next day, Adam turned up with a happy, excited Jamie riding beside him. Touser bounded about under the horses' hooves, somehow managing not to get trampled. Adam rode a large bay gelding twice the size of Jamie's brown pony.

“Tommy.” Jamie dismounted and raced across to her. She hugged him tight, lifting him up into the air and swinging him around a couple of times.

“Did you have a nice time?”

“We did lots of good things.” He covered her face with wet sloppy kisses.

“Jamie,” Adam said.

“Yes?”

“What did I tell you?”

He wriggled free of Tommy's arms. “A good stockman always sees to the comfort of his horse and dog, before doing anything else.” The child recited the instructions in a piping voice.

“All right, do it.”

He scampered back to his pony.

“Good boy, I'll make a stockman out of you yet.”

“Will I look after your horse, too?”

“No. I want to speak with your brother then I'll be going. Good morning, Tommy.” Adam touched his hat, as if just remembering her existence.

“Good morning, Mr. Munro.”

His lips tightened at the coldness of her greeting. “I wish to speak with your brother.”

“He's in the shed.”

Adam tethered his horse and followed Jamie towards the back yard. Tommy returned to the kitchen and started making scones. In the middle of rolling out the dough, she heard the men's voices.

“I have no objection.” David chuckled. “I don't fancy your chances though.”

A grinning David preceded a tight-lipped Adam into the room. “Adam has something he wants to ask you. I'll go out the back and keep the young fellow amused.”

“You have something you wish to ask me?” She dusted the flour from her hands.

He stood in the middle of the floor his feet planted slightly apart, his arms folded across his broad chest, arrogance oozing from every pore. “I've spoken to your brother, who has no objections. I want you for my wife.”

“What!” Her ears must be playing tricks on her.

“You heard me the first time. I want you for my wife.”

“Me? Your wife?”

“Yes.”

No mention of love, just want. Even in the heat of the kitchen her limbs froze. This cold ultimatum wasn’t the way she expected a man to ask for her hand in marriage. Bended knee would have been a dream come true but she would have settled for tenderness or warmth.

“Why give me the honor?”

He ignored her sarcasm. “Because you're suitable.”

“Me suitable?” Hurt made her voice shrill. “To be the wife of the High and Mighty Mr. Adam Munro, with his forty thousand acres of prime frontier land?”

“Yes.” He ground the word out. “You can give me the sons I need.”

“I find your proposal obscene.” If he loved her she would be the happiest woman in the world right now.

He brushed aside her protest. “I need a presentable wife, who has a fondness for children. You qualify on both accounts.”

“What about Miss Bothroyd?”

“Suitable in one respect, not the other. I want the wedding to take place as soon as it can be arranged.”

This couldn't be happening. She blinked away sudden tears, because he wanted a brood mare, not a wife. “I should be flattered that you now find me suitable for your purposes, but the answer is no.”

He stared at her as if he couldn’t believe his ears.

“I told you, the answer is no.”

His lips tightened and his jaw thrust out with undisguised determination. “I want you for my wife. I'm a wealthy man, within reason I can give you anything you want.”

She made to speak.

“Let me finish.” He had not moved his stance so much as an inch. “If you're worried about Jamie, don't be. I’m fond of him and naturally he will make his home with us.”

“I'm sorry. I don't love you, and you don't love me.”

“Love! My father thrashed all that nonsense out of me when I was ten.”

“It isn't nonsense. You can't live your life without love.” She looked at him. His eyes, cold as ice floes, made her shiver.

“I don't need love. I want strong healthy sons and you can give them to me. You have spirit. I like that in a woman. It’s necessary in a frontier land like Australia. You're a slight little thing.” His gaze ran up and down her body, boldly assessing. “A bit narrow around the hips, maybe, but together we could produce fine sons.”

“Is that all marriage means to you, a chance to beget sons?”

“Yes, I've made up my mind.”

The sheer arrogance of the man took her breath away. “You can unmake it, because the answer is still no.”

“You're not meant to live like this.” He waved his hand about, encompassing the room with one dismissive movement. “I have a large comfortable home; you could wear fine clothes. Later we could take a trip to England, if you like. Think what I can do for Jamie.”

She made to speak, but he waved her to silence.

“I know you want him to have a good education. I can provide that, even send him to Eton. If David attended there, he would have no trouble being accepted, and I can afford to pay his expenses.”

He had delivered his proposal in such a cold-blooded, unemotional manner it sucked the warmth from her body. “I'm sorry, the answer is still no.”

Angry color stained his cheeks. It was obvious he wasn’t used to not getting his own way. His whole body tensed and became rigid. “I want you for my wife, pretty English rose. You accused me of being ruthless once and I admit it. If you don't marry me, you'll find out exactly how ruthless I can be.”

“I won't marry you, now or ever.” Her eyes flashed blue flames of defiance.

“I'll bring both you and your brother to your knees before I'm through, that's a promise.” He turned on his heel and strode out of the room.

As soon as he left David returned, the grin on his face fading when he noticed her distress. “What happened? By the speed at which Munro departed, I take it you turned him down.”

“It was awful. When I refused him he threatened to bring us to our knees.”

“What can he do? I don't have any stock left for him to confiscate except the mares. He's short of feed and water so he won't want them.”

Tommy said no more, just doggedly continued with her chores. David didn't understand. He hadn’t seen the fury on Adam's face, nor did he know how pain rent her heart asunder.

****

As Tommy sat darning a hole in Jamie’s shirt one evening, David stormed inside. “This is the limit. Munro dammed the creek further upstream; there's only a trickle coming through to us now. What am I supposed to do for water?”

“Can't you stop him?” She threw her sewing to one side and leapt to her feet.

“How?”

“Go to the law,” she raged. “Have him locked up. It’s illegal. He can’t do this.”

“The law! Munro and his kind are the law on this frontier. People like us stand no chance of getting justice. I should have let that friend of the Reverend Lawson shoot his mares like he planned. No wonder he wanted to offload them onto me. I saved him from spending money on bullets.”

“It was too good a chance to miss out on and Jamie loves the pony. You weren't to know Adam Munro would do such a contemptible thing. It’s because I refused to marry him. This is his revenge.”

He paced up and down like a caged lion. “I'll have to water them by hand from the well I suppose, what else can I do?”

“Maybe you could take them down to where the water is dammed.”

“Three miles there and back? Sorry, not this fellow.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “I'm acting like a swine, but, Tommy, I'm at my wit’s end.”

“I thought Adam took his sheep down south.”

“He did, most of them have gone. He needs the water for his cattle. A pity Jim isn’t here to advise us. If only it would rain.”

Rain would be a godsend. Adam Munro’s head on a platter would be even better. How could a man be so despicable? So vicious and vindictive, just because she spurned his marriage proposal. She inwardly railed against the drought and Adam Munro.

They scanned the horizon as hundreds of others did each day. Nothing, except a great expanse of blue dominated by a large red ball of fire. The ground was so cracked and dry now, when David tried digging down for water, his shovel hit rock-hard clay.

Each day, David led his horses over to the well, brought up water in the bucket then emptied it into a trough, time-consuming work; but not as back-breaking as carting water in buckets to keep their small vegetable plot going. In the evening, with Jamie and David's help, Tommy trudged backwards and forwards, watering one section per evening. She could have wept watching her once flourishing garden struggle for survival.

She let her flower garden die, but worked desperately to keep the vegetable patch going. With little money they had to be as self-sufficient as possible. Reverend Lawson, a keen gardener, sent over a bucket full of tomatoes each time David called in to see him for their weekly game of chess.

What kind of idiot did he take her for? She stopped to have a rest between the well and her garden and ran a trembling hand across her perspiring forehead. If he played chess it wouldn’t be with the minister. Then there was the weak excuse about going over to the Manse to fix Mrs. Lawson’s piano. Tommy gave a tired chuckle, and flicked some of the water out of the bucket onto her face.

****

The heat continued unabated. Day after day the sun seared down, turning the ground into a cracked dustbowl. They received no word from Adam, so she began to relax again. They only had the horses and two house cows now. David killed the last of their sheep and she salted as much of the meat as she could. Once they ate this they would have to go without.

After a heated argument, Tommy persuaded David to take her remaining jewelry to the bank to sell. All day she fretted on the outcome. When David returned at sundown, she watched him leading his horse. By the droop of his shoulders she knew he carried bad news.

She rushed out to greet him. “What happened? Didn't you get a good price?”

“The bank wouldn't touch them, said no one wanted to waste money on jewelry now. I couldn’t even get money using the farm as collateral. Munro must have spoken to the bank manager. When I asked him outright he as good as admitted it.”

He threw his hat on the verandah. His hair was damp, plastered to his head, his face streaked with dirt where the dust and perspiration mingled.

“I'm sorry, this is my fault. He's doing this because of me.”