Ghost Gum Valley (43 page)

‘Von Starbold was intent on acting the diplomat. “I appreciate your sense of honour, young man. But there is no need for us to proceed with this. I will leave the Colony today as I intended and your mother's honour will remain untarnished. You are but sixteen years. I am six-and-thirty, and a former soldier. You are clearly disadvantaged, young man.”

‘I remember I said something like, “Better disadvantaged than dishonourable like you! Pistols are quick and final.”

‘Von Starbold slowly unfastened his military jacket and flung it aside. His white shirt was open at the neck, his breeches tied with a sash around the waist. I had brought my second, where was his?

‘I remember every word he said that last morning. “I have no need of a second, young master. This is a private matter to be settled between you and me.' Like an officer he ordered the young ostler to return to his bed and tell no one what he had seen.

‘The next thing I remember I was standing back to back with Von Starbold. It all felt unreal, like two actors on stage in the final act of a play in which one of them must die. I heard Von Starbold giving me instructions as if this were no more than just another of our lessons. I heard the paces being counted as we walked away from each other. Turned. I heard the order to fire...'

‘My hand shook as I fired. I was surprised by the red stain on his white shirt. It opened like the bud of a rose but von Starbold remained standing on his feet, smiling.'

Marmaduke refilled his pannikin and drank deeply. He knew he must soon put his confession into words for the first time.

‘I was mortified when my opponent did not return fire. Then, with great deliberation, he aimed his pistol in my direction, tilted it and fired into the ground.'

‘Right until that moment I had wanted to kill von Starbold but seeing him lying there bleeding, I felt sick.

‘He reached up and gripped my hand. “So. Life is being full of surprises, eh, young sir?”'

‘I panicked. “I'll fetch a doctor,” I said.

‘Von Starbold shook his head. “Stomach wound, nothing to be done. You have learnt well, my young friend, I'm proud of you. But next time, aim for the heart. Death comes quicker. Do one thing for me! You can't refuse a dying man's last request,” he said.

‘“Never be forgetting this. You did not take my life, I gave you yours!” His fingernails dug into my hand. “I have no son. So take this – it was my father's. Wear it for me in good health.”'

Marmaduke withdrew the gold watch from his pocket and held it in his hand. He read the expression in Isabel's eyes and knew it was a mirror image of his own suppressed pain.

‘I can't get his dying words out of my head. They return to haunt me when I'm caught off guard. Drunk or sober. In a crowded room or alone. I can't escape them. What the hell did it mean? That he
wanted
to die?'

Isabel said gently, ‘It seems clear he respected you for protecting your mother's honour. Perhaps he wanted to leave you free from guilt.'

Marmaduke's voice was bleak. ‘One night recently just at the moment I brought a woman to climax she gave a cry that shook me
to the core. My mind flashed back to that terrible day I found my mother being raped. I don't know whether to blot out that memory or try to recreate in my mind the exact sound of my mother's cries.'

He saw that Isabel was holding her breath as if in denial of what might come next.

‘Do you see, Isabel, why I'm haunted by the night I killed my mother's rapist? Seven months after that fatal night Mother died in childbirth, the babe trapped inside her womb. Was it Garnet's child? Or fathered by von Starbold in an act of rape? And was my tutor my mother's rapist – or her
lover
?'

There were no answers. Never would be.

Isabel reached out and touched his arm. ‘I'm sorry I can't comfort you, as other women do.'

‘You listened as a friend. Thank you, soldier.'

Later that night as Marmaduke fell exhausted into a deep sleep he was conscious of Isabel's gentle hands drawing a blanket over his body, putting a fresh log on the fire and the smell of his sandalwood soap on her body as she lay down and nestled against his back.

Chapter 30

The breeze carried into the nursery the exotic sweetness of frangipani blossoms. Isabel decided that an Australian summer needed a fresh vocabulary to define adequately its contrast with the northern summers of her childhood. Muted sounds came from the sprawling convict village beyond the house but although the air was languid it also seemed charged with some electrical current – as if nightfall promised something she had never experienced.

Having bathed after their return from the bivouac, Isabel tried to remain cool before she dressed for dinner. Wrapped loosely in a silk robe, she lay across the bed, fanning herself as she idly turned the pages of old volumes from Marmaduke's bookcase. Curious as to which authors and literature had comforted the loneliness of his youth, she hoped this would give her some insight into his mind, the cause of his swings of mood and bouts of melancholia.

Distracted by the sounds of Marmaduke washing his hair in the next room, she smiled to herself. It reminded her of bathing a dog. No doubt he would emerge smelling of that distinctive Indian sandalwood soap that she knew had been part of Queenie's ritual when bathing him as a small boy – a touching sense memory linking him to his childhood.

Isabel tried to avoid her own image in the full-length Gothic mirror that Garnet had ordered to be moved to the nursery to await her return. Carved from mahogany, it stood tilted on its intricately carved stand, one of the many luxurious pieces Garnet had imported. She recognised it from an illustration in
The Repository of Arts
which each month had proclaimed its endorsement of the latest English and European fashions in architecture, landscape, interior décor and works of art fit to grace the finest town and country mansions – styles that the Quality in New South Wales copied.

This mirror was certainly regal enough for one of the royal princesses but Isabel's reflection showed an anxious head full of paper-curlers that she hoped would emerge as decent curls to camouflage her half-shorn locks.

Thumbing through books half hidden at the rear of Marmaduke's boyhood bookcase, she came across a curious volume sandwiched between
An English Gentleman's Journey by Elephant Through the Punjab
and
The Memoirs of a Scottish Merchant's Career in the East India Company.

The mysterious book was wrapped like a gift in gold-threaded Indian silk. Its title page bore the name
Miranda Gamble
in faded copperplate script. Emblazoned in theatrical flourishes she recognised Marmaduke's handwriting in his name,
Marmaduke Garnet Gamble
. There was also a footnote which read,
translated from Hindi by Colonel James McAlpine
.

Intrigued by the discovery of a work by Miranda's father, a Scottish Highlander who evidently had the soul of a Hindophile, Isabel idly turned the pages. At first glance the text contained archaic words and descriptions beyond her understanding. But the volume's naively coloured illustrations soon proved a very different matter. Her shock discovery of the true nature of Vatsayayana's
Kama Sutra
made her sit bolt upright, her cheeks inflamed. The more pages she turned the more amazingly contorted were the positions assumed by the innocent-looking little lovers enthusiastically engaged in their execution. Isabel was breathless with amazement.

God in Heaven! Tangled arms and legs everywhere. They might as well be tied in knots. How do they get out of these positions? Is this what Marmaduke does with his sweet ladies?
An appalling thought struck her.
Does he perform
all
of this with them?

At the sound of Marmaduke's light tap on their adjoining door Isabel thrust the manuscript under her pillow and hastily assumed a cool demeanour.

Marmaduke's half-dried hair flowed freely over the shoulders of a paisley dressing robe loosely knotted across his naked chest. He came armed with a bottle of wine and two wineglasses. Trust Marmaduke never to be loath to try a new vintage, on the excuse that he had bought shares in a new winery in the Hunter Valley and had high hopes their wines would in time rival imported vintages from France and the Rhine.

‘There's time for us to sample this new claret before we dress for dinner. Forgive my state of
deshabille –
too damned hot to dress one
minute before absolute necessity. Being forced by fashion to wear those infernal stiff collars is as Hellish as seven years under Captain Patrick Logan at Moreton Bay.'

Isabel let the callous remark pass. ‘I'll fix it for you if you'll lace me into my gown.'

‘Deal,' he said but on the point of handing her a wineglass he hesitated.

‘What's wrong, Isabel? Your face is scarlet. Not going down with some fever?'

Isabel realised she had betrayed herself by her involuntary glances at the book protruding from beneath her pillow. He clearly recognised the Indian silk cover.

‘Well, well, well, Isabel. Your catholic taste in literature never ceases to surprise me. Most well-bred English ladies would be content with Samuel Richardson's
Pamela
,
or Virtue Rewarded
, where the heroine is so pure she faints at the mere suggestion of the hero's lust. But then you're a far more adventurous young lady, eh?'

Marmaduke's eyes were laughing in amusement. Isabel decided that attack was the best weapon of defence. She waved a hand airily at her pillow. ‘I can't understand why anyone would find that Indian nonsense romantic.'

‘I reckon romance is like beauty – in the eyes of the beholder. But in my experience women find some of the
Kama Sutra
's ideas quite exciting.'

Isabel still harder tried to appear uninterested. ‘I suppose men like you need to attend a school for libertines to learn all that stuff?'

‘Personally I learnt on the job.' He clinked his glass against hers then stretched out languidly like a leopard across the foot of her bed.

‘The truth is, Isabel, I was born clumsy in bedroom matters. It required the patience and expertise of a retired courtesan to teach me the art of pleasing a woman in bed. I discovered that time and a willing partner are all that's needed. Call it by whatever euphemism you will – the connection, consummation, shagging, lust, or the bible's polite ‘Cain knew his wife'. Whatever. To me the art of becoming one flesh is God's greatest gift to man.' He added, ‘And woman.'

Isabel held her breath.
He's just waiting for me to hang myself.

She found her voice. ‘I must take your word for it. I never intend to find out.'

To cover her confusion she began to unwind her paper curlers.

‘So that's how it's done, eh?' Marmaduke watched her progress with interest. He sipped his wine in silence but his lazy eyes never left her face. On impulse Isabel decided to break down the barrier she had created around the forbidden subject.

‘You assume that because I conceived a babe it must follow...' She began to flounder. ‘I remember full well how I gave birth. But I don't know how I
came by
that babe. I don't even know what a naked man looks like. Greek statues always have fig leaves
down there
.'

To her surprise Marmaduke did not laugh but nodded politely.

‘There's nothing to fear, Isabel. Men come in all colours, shapes and sizes but we're all pretty much the same down
there
. Except some of us are circumcised, like those of the Hebrew persuasion. Some of the British nobility and the royals tend to favour the snip but the working class can't afford the additional fee. No doubt Garnet had me tidied up as a babe to follow the fashion set by the upper classes.'

Isabel was stunned by how effortlessly Marmaduke explored taboo subjects.
Even physicians wouldn't discuss this with a female patient. But it is interesting.

‘I may be a rogue in many ways, Isabel, but no woman has ever had cause to fear me or my body. I would hate to think that you were the first.'

Isabel tried not to bite her lips but she knew every twitch of her body betrayed her taut nerves.
Where are these revelations leading? Why can't I simply walk away? He's not holding me prisoner, except with his eyes.

‘Do you remember how you felt learning to swim, Isabel? You conquered your fear of drowning. Didn't that give you a sense of freedom?'

At her nod of agreement he continued. ‘If I promise not to touch you and reassure you that you won't even need to
look at me,
will you allow me to banish your fear of a man's body?'

‘Is this some kind of cruel joke?'

‘Far from it.' Marmaduke seemed intent on studying the bed canopy above him. ‘Tell me, what did you think of the old priest's sermon in chapel this morning? The story of Adam and Eve and the snake.'

Isabel's voice sounded breathless with nerves. ‘It made me sad. Eve paid a heavy price for her curiosity and disobedience, to be banished forever from that beautiful garden. Adam was a coward to lay the blame on her. It was half his fault.'

‘Agreed. Ever since Eve men have blamed women for arousing their lust. Most unfair. If we blokes can't control our God-given lust that's not the fault of the fair sex.'

‘The law doesn't agree with you.'

‘It seldom does. As Shakespeare said in
Henry IV
, ‘The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers.' He added quickly, ‘Edwin excepted of course.'

He eyed her speculatively. ‘Well, my young actress, to put your mind at rest on the subject of fig leaves, let's play a game before we go down to dinner.'

He beckoned her to follow him. ‘We're now going to step inside this mirror.'