South of Capricorn (3 page)

‘Sit down and be quiet!’ snapped Gail at last, acutely aware of the surprised and disapproving stares of other passengers.

‘I won’t! I’m going to stand up all the way—so there!’

A rather stout gentleman with heavy moustaches and protuberant eyes, noticing the scene as he made to take a seat opposite, looked down at Leta and said sternly,

‘Do as your mother tells you, young lady! Sit down at once! You’re a very naughty little girl! No, don’t you dare to interrupt me! My word, but you want a good smacking. Do as I tell you—sit down beside your mother and be quiet!’

Stunned for one disbelieving moment, Leta then did no less than kick out at the man, catching him just below the knee.

‘Leta!’ exclaimed Gail, horrified and fervently thankful that her parents could not witness this scene. ‘You naughty girl! Say you’re sorry, at once!’

But this was too much to expect. Instead of the apology the man received a pettish, ‘Mind your own business!’ before Leta put out her tongue at him. For the rest of the flight he spoke neither to Leta nor to Gail, but his glances at Gail from time to time left her in no doubt at all of his opinion of her as a ‘mother’. She would have liked to disillusion him, just for her own comfort, but she refrained, deciding that it did not matter much what he thought of her, seeing that she and he would never meet again.

At Brisbane Gail and Leta changed to a train and to her relief Leta fell asleep and from then on Gail could read her book in peace. However, after reading for a while she became interested in the scenery as the train travelled through the highlands of the Great Divide into the area of brigalow scrub and sub-tropical wood lands. The sun began to sink, but there was still some time to go before the brief twilight fell.

The twilight would last about twenty minutes, Gail had been told, and after that darkness would descend rapidly. And it was almost dark before the train drew into the station and Gail felt rather apprehensive on noticing that there was very little sign of civilization. For example, there was no real town; certainly there was no sign that cars could be hired. Suddenly aware of her failure to make the appropriate inquiries when in Brisbane, she approached a railway official and explained what she required. His eyes opened wide before he shook his head, scratching it meanwhile and appearing to think he had met a madwoman.

‘There’s no car here,’ he informed her at last. ‘Not one to hire, that is. Why, a car could be waiting here for a twelvemonth for someone to come along and want it. No, miss, you’ll have to wait for the Over- lander.’

‘When is that?’

‘What’s the Overlander?’ piped up Leta who, having been wakened from her sleep, was not in the best of moods. ‘I want a taxi, so you’d better get one! Gail, get a taxi!’

Ignoring her, Gail turned again to the man, repeating her question. The Overlander would not be here that night, she was told.

‘Then where can we stay? Is there an hotel?’ She asked the question automatically, even though a glance around had told her that this was no place where visitors would be found. It was merely a stopping off place where the passengers would be met by relatives or someone else who happened to be expecting them. A couple had just entered a big overlanding car which was covered with yellow dust and carrying on its bumpers several canvas water bags; Gail watched as the car moved away. Another one was waiting, but no one came towards it. The train moved and gathered speed while the driver of the car stood by the door and watched it, a deep frown on his bronzed and furrowed brow.

‘There’s no hotel,’ the railway official was saying, his interest now with the man by the stationary car, rather than with Gail and her problems.

‘But—’

‘Your people not arrived?’ interrupted the official, calling to the man.

‘I can’t think what’s happened.’

‘How far have you come?’ Although he had put the question, the official was already moving away.

‘From Vernay Downs,’ replied the man, and quite naturally Gail’s heart gave a little jerk.

‘Vernay Downs?’ she repeated rather hastily, as if afraid the man would enter the car and drive away. ‘I’m going there!’ What unbelievable good luck, she was telling herself, not stopping to think of the difficulties that must inevitably follow in the wake of her impulsiveness. ‘Could you take us, please?’

The man frowned and strode towards her, his eyes running over her and taking in her travel-stained appearance.

‘You’re going to Vernay Downs?’ He sounded incredulous, she thought. ‘Are you expected?’ His tone said quite clearly that she was not expected.

‘No, I’m not expected.’ Already she knew a tinge of uneasiness, but this in no way lessened her determination to get a lift. ‘I’ve brought something very important for a Mr. Kane Farrell.’

The man’s puzzlement increased.

‘Kane Farrell?’ Again his eyes ran over her, and then he looked at Leta, who at this moment was endeavouring to stuff a whole bar of chocolate into her mouth.

‘Something very important—and yet you’re not expected?’

She coloured slightly, her uneasiness increasing.

‘I’m afraid I can’t explain,’ she said apologetically. ‘I mean, I can’t tell you what it is that I’ve brought.’

‘It’s me,’ interposed Leta, both cheeks bulging with the chocolate inside them. ‘That’s what it is!’

The man then produced a weak sort of grin before returning his attention to Gail.

‘Do you really mean to say that you didn’t let the Boss know you were coming?’ he asked with a bewildered shake of his head. ‘How did you expect to get from here to Vernay Downs?’

Ignoring his second question, she said,

‘The Boss? Do you work for Mr. Farrell?’ ‘That’s right. Cattleman—stockrider. Ever heard of them?’ His sentences were drawled out, yet short. His hands, half tucked into the pockets of his slim-fitting denims, were as brown as his face; and Gail wondered if he typified the men out here. Toughened by the weather, he certainly looked the part of the outdoor man whose task it was to look after the cattle, out in the wide open spaces.

‘Yes, I’ve heard of stockriders,’ answered Gail. ‘But you’re the first one I’ve met.’

He held out his hand, introducing himself as he did so.

‘Dave Campbell—at your .service.’

‘I’m Gail Stafford, and this is Leta.’

‘Your daughter?’

Gail shook her head, and after a slight hesitation he asked if she were married. She said no, then ventured to inquire if Kane Farrell was married. No, returned Dave, adding that Kane Farrell lived only for his work, Gail felt a prickle of nerves as she heard a murmured, ‘Kane Farrell,’ coming from beside the car.

‘I’ve come all the way from England to live with my daddy—’ broke in Leta, and Gail said swiftly, noting apprehensively that Dave’s eyes had widened in an interrogating stare,

‘Leta dear, please don’t interrupt when we’re speaking. In that suitcase over there—the small one—you’ll find another bar of chocolate.’

‘Will I?’ Sheer wickedness looked out from those bright blue eyes—eyes vivid and large and so inordinately attractive at times. Yet for the most part of the time they might have been the eyes of some she-devil, such wicked glints did they possess. ‘I’ll get it, then,’ and off she went, carrying an air of triumph which made Gail wonder how her father would deal with her. Would he be strong enough to master the wretched child? But that was his problem, or would be soon, she thought, not without a great deal of satisfaction. There he was, sublimely unaware of what was coming to him, the man who believed he had got away with his dastardly treatment of poor Sandra. It was not as if he didn’t know about his daughter. Sandra had written to him twice, informing him of Leta’s existence. Both letters had been ignored. Would he suffer any pangs of remorse when the fact of Sandra’s death was made known to him? Gail thought not, since he must be a man totally devoid of feeling not to have given some sort of help to the girl he had treated so badly.

‘You didn’t answer my question about your getting from here to Vernay Downs,’ Dave was saying, having, to Gail’s infinite relief, once again taken no notice of what Leta had said. ‘Supposing I hadn’t happened to be here?’

‘I thought I could have hired a car.’

At this his eyes opened wider than ever.

‘You did!’ he exclaimed. ‘Here?’ He spread a hand and she once again took in the dusty station with its primitive platform, the single shed that constituted the station ‘buildings’, the utter loneliness of the place. ‘You weren’t very well advised, obviously.’ The merest pause and then he added, ‘Well, your luck happens to be in. Little girl,’ he said to Leta, ‘you take the back seat—’

‘I want the front seat!’

This was sheer awkwardness and Gail, overwhelmingly grateful to the man Dave, could have shaken her till she cried. However, she wasn’t even given the chance to speak as Dave, after the first start of surprise, said firmly and authoritatively,

‘Leta, get into the back of the car.’

‘I-’

‘Because if you don’t, then you won’t go in it at all!’

The child’s face swelled as air was allowed to fill her cheeks. She turned purple with temper and Gail found herself apologizing. But Dave intervened, with another warning, and after a struggle within herself, Leta capitulated.

‘Good gracious!’ exclaimed Gail without thinking. ‘You’ve won!’

Dave looked oddly at her.

‘It’s a damned funny business,’ he said, and it was as if he were having the greatest struggle not to ask questions of her. But he managed to control his curiosity as he proceeded to put the luggage into the boot of the car. The porter came out and offered help; he looked relieved, and it was not difficult for Gail to guess that he had been worried about having a woman and child on his hands until the arrival of the Overlander.

‘Well, we’re off!’ Dave said good-bye to the porter and soon the car was leaving the station. ‘I expect you know we’ve a very long way to go?’

‘Yes, I do know that.’

‘We’ll make camp quite soon. I’ve driven a long distance today already and I don’t feel like driving in the dark.’

‘Make camp?’ came the voice from the back seat. ‘Is that camping?’ and when Dave said yes, it was, Leta continued, ‘I’m not camping—’ She stopped, swallowing, as her mouth was full of chocolate. ‘My teacher went camping and she got bitten by scorpions.’

‘You’ll not be bitten by scorpions, little girl,’ Dave assured her soothingly. ‘In fact, you’ll enjoy camping. It can be fun. I loved it when I was a kid like you.’

‘I’m not a kid!’

‘Touchy, isn’t she?’ Dave was driving fast and his attention was on the road. ‘Some relative of yours?’

‘My dead cousin’s child.’

‘You had to bring her with you?’ It was obvious that already Dave was wondering how anyone in her right mind would bring a child like Leta with her.

‘I had to, yes.’

‘I’m extraordinarily fond of kids as a rule—’ He stopped, aware of his indiscretion, but in any case Leta was soon in with,

‘You like children, but you don’t like me?’

‘Little girl-’

‘I don’t like you, so there! I don’t like anybody! I might not like my daddy—’

‘Leta!’ interrupted Gail, but Leta continued,

‘I promised to call him Daddy, and say what Gail told me to say—’

‘Be quiet, Leta!’

‘—because she’s giving me chocolate and lots of things, but I don’t know if I will like him—’

‘I said be quiet!’ Gail was red in the face, wondering what Dave was thinking about all this, and what conclusions he was coming to. ‘That’s enough! Any more and you won’t get the chocolate, or anything else!’

‘Not get it? Then I won’t say the things you’ve told me to. I won’t say, “Hello, Daddy,” so there!’

Dave turned his head and slanted a glance at Gail.

‘Funny business,’ he muttered again, and then lapsed into silence. But he seemed deep in thought... and Gail wished that she had the power to read those thoughts. However, there was one thing she was thankful for: Leta had not mentioned who her father was.

‘THAT’S the Southern Cross.’ Dave spoke as he took the car off the Bitumen and on to a bumpy road which led to the banks of a creek. ‘It’s a wonderful sight, eh?’

‘Beautiful.’ Awed the tone as Gail took it all in, the night sky over this vast land, the stars and the moon, the indistinct outlines of various rises in the land, rises which helped a little to relieve the monotony of these apparently endless plains.

‘We’ll make camp here.’ Dave stopped and got out, with Gail following. Leta said she was staying where she was.

‘Don’t you want anything to eat?’ asked Dave in surprise.

‘I’ve got some chocolate. Shut the door, I’m cold!’

Gail apologized and said that Leta was tired. Dave, though frowning, agreed and, obeying Leta’s second and more imperious command, he closed the car door.

‘The camping gear’s in the back. If you’d collect some dry wood we can make a fire.’

Gail did as she was told, watching Dave out of the comer of her eye as she went about picking up small dead branches which lay on the ground close to the dry creek bed. Dave was tall and strong, the kind of man she had always admired. He was quiet, working with speed as he made camp. Leta watched from the car; she slowly became a shadow behind a window as Gail moved away into the darkness of an Australian night. But as the fire got under way the glow lit up an area all around and Leta in the car became a figure encased in fiery red—like Satan’s cub, Dawn would have said, for Dawn had the most vivid imagination of anyone whom Gail had ever met. Satan’s cub clothed in fire.

Gail wanted to speak to her, so she watched Dave as he busied himself, waiting for him to move farther away from the car. She had no wish that what she had to say to Leta should be overheard. At length the opportunity came and Gail went swiftly over and opened the car door.