The Shadow of the Lynx (16 page)

I gave an exclamation.

“That’s it,” I said.

“You went there with Stirling,” he replied.

“He told me how your scarf blew over the wall and you both went in..”

‘3 suppose he tells you everything. “

“Whoever tells everything? But I know a great deal of what is in Stirling’s mind. After all, he is my son.”

“And you love him as you never loved anyone else.”

“That’s not entirely true. I am capable of affection. I don’t give it freely, but that may mean that when I do I have the more to give.”

“How could you paint that house when you have never seen it?”

“Who said I have never seen it? I have lived in that house, Nora. I know it well.”

“You lived there! It was yours! So that is why you have built one to look exactly like it.”

“What conclusions you jump to. I lived there, it is true;

but I did not say that it was mine. I worked there for a year in the humble position of drawing-master to the young lady of the house. “

“And Stirling happened to discover it …”

“You are wrong again. Stirling went there because he knew the house was there. I told him to go.”

“So that was why I had to meet him in Canterbury. Miss Emily Grainger said it was a lit tie odd.”

“It was at my request that he went there.”

“You wanted to know if it had changed since you were last there.

Houses don’t change much. It’s the people living in them . “

“Ah, there you have it. I wanted him to see not so much the house but the people living in it.”

“Because you knew them long ago. He did not say so. He didn’t even tell them his name. I don’t think they asked. It was all a little odd and unconventional.”

“He would not have told them his name. That might have been unwise.”

“There was some quarrel with this family?”

He laughed bitterly, harshly. Then he said.

“I was hardly in a position to quarrel with them. I was, as I said, the young lady’s drawing-master. They were rich then. I don’t think they are so happily placed now. Times change. The old man was a gambler … and not a clever one. I believe he lost a

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great deal of money after my departure. “

“A fact which appears to give you some satisfaction, I gather.”

“You gather correctly. Would you not dislike someone who condemned you to exile from your own country, to seven years’ servitude in a penal settlement.”

“So it was the owner of WhiteladiesI’ ” Sir Henry Dorian, no less. “

“For what reasons?”

Robbery. “

“And you were guiltless.”

“Completely so.”

“And could you not prove your innocence?”

“If I had had justice, yes. But he and his friends saw that [ had not.

I was in his house unlawfully, he said. I was in his house and not at his request, but the object of my visit was not to steal. ” He smiled at me.

“You have an enquiring mind, Nora,” he added lightly.

“I admit it. I want to hear more. I remember the place so clearly. I felt when I was there it was important to me in some way. I had no idea at that time that it was connected with my new guardian.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“A wonderful old place. How I should like to own such a house!” His eyes gleamed with covetousness.

“I have built this place—a poor imitation. No! I want the stones which were used hundreds of years before. There is only one Whiteladies and it is not this one.”

“You have a very comfortable house of the same name.”

“It’s a fake, Nora. I hate fakes.”

“It serves well.”

“It serves as a substitute until …” He stopped. Then he laughed and added, “You wheedle, Nora. You lure confidences from me. And the fact that I allow you to, shows you that I already think of you as my daughter. Now isn’t that strange? I am not a sentimental man to drool over a daughter—yet I allow you to tempt me to talk.”

“It is always good to talk. I am your ward. I have seen this house and the people there. There was the girl, Minta her name was, and there was Mamma.”

“Tell me about her. Stirling could not describe her. Women are better at that sort of thing than men.”

“Why, Mamma would be the one to whom you taught drawing!”

Me nodded.

“She was old … well, perhaps not old, but she seemed so.”

“To you she seemed old—as I do.”

“No, not you. One would not think of age in connection with you. But she seemed fretful and concerned about her health. The girl was charming. And there was someone called Lucie.”

“Fretful,” he said and laughed lightly. He indicated the canvas he had already shown me.

“Was she like this? I drew from memory.”

Then I knew of whom the picture reminded me. It was the girl Minta, of course.

“It is a little Uke the girl,” I said.

“But she is not so helpless looking No, the woman in the chair was not like that. Perhaps she might have been years ago.”

“Thirty-five years ago when she was seventeen. She was beautiful then, but she was not very good at drawing. I was going to marry her.”

I was beginning to understand. She was the daughter of the house in which he occupied a minor position. I thought of Jessica’s account of his arrival at Rosella Creek.

“So you went to the house to be her drawing-master and you decided to marry her. You admired the house and you would like to have been master of it.”

“I did admire the house and I should have enjoyed owning it, but in those days I was nineteen years old and sentimental. I was even romantic. You may find that hard to believe, but it was so. I fell in love with Arabella and she with me. I was egotistical. You smile. You are thinking. Yes, I can believe that! It was true. I believed myself to be as good as any man and I could not conceive that her father. Sir Henry Dorian, would not welcome me as a son-in-law. I was the drawing master it was true. I had nothing but my talents; but on the other hand I could have managed his estate as it had never been managed before. If he had not been such a fool the family might not now be reduced to … well, scarcely penury—but it must be trying to have to consider every shilling when you have a position to uphold and have been accustomed to luxury.”

“Tell me what happened.”

“He was outraged by my suggestions. His daughter to marry her drawing-master! No. He had some neighbouring fop in mind for her.

Someone of the right family. Very different

from the drawing-master. Bella and I decided to elope. There was a maid in the house in whom she confided. Silly Bella! The maid turned traitor. I had been dismissed from the house so I came back one night for her. She had been locked in her room; so I took a ladder from one of the potting-sheds and setting it against the wall climbed into her room. She gave me her jewels and I slipped them into my pockets. At that moment Sir Henry with four of his menservants burst into the room. There, Nora, I have told you the story. “

“But surely she explained to them.”

She tried to. She wept. She entreated her father to listen. They said she was shocked and did not know what she was saying, that I had threatened her and she was afraid. They were determined to be rid of me. They knew that if I had stayed in England I should in time have persuaded her to come to me. So what an excellent opportunity this was to get me out of the country, to arrange it so that I could not come back. ” He lifted his hand and the lynx eyes in the ring glittered.

“It is a terrible story,” I said.

“You would be sure of that if you could picture the filthy prison, the convict ship. I was chained, Nora.” He held out his wrists again.

“The chains made sores; the sores festered. I was battened down in the hold for months on end with all the scum of England. Robbers, prostitutes, murderers … all going to Australia. Cargo for the settlers, cheap labour at the best. I remember the day we arrived in Sydney and how we came up on deck; the brilliance of the sunshine, that blue sea around us, and the birds. Yes, what I remember most vividly were the brightly plum aged birds—red-winged parrots, rainbow lorikeets, yellow-crested cockatoos and pink and grey galahs. They swooped and chattered above that sea and the thing that struck me was that they were free. Have you ever felt envious of a bird, Nora? I was then … and then I despised myself and started thinking of revenge. One day I would take it, and that made me want to live.”

“Soon after you arrived in Australia you were married.”

“Yes. I married the mother of Adelaide and Stirling.”

“She was the daughter of the man into whose hands you had fallen.”

“Why, you know a great deal of my history. I knew you were inquisitive.”

“It interests me. You quickly forgot your devotion to Arabella.”

“I never forgot my devotion to Arabella. That is one thing you can’t accuse me of—fickleness.”

“But you married.”

“Maybella. She was a Bella too.”

“Don’t tell me you married her because of her name.”

“No. She could have been Mary, Jane, Grace, Nora … any name you can think of. What’s in a name?”

“But at least you could call her Bella.”

“Which I did.”

“And did she remind you of that other Bella?”

“Never.” He sounded contemptuous.

“Poor Maybella!” I said.

“It was I admit a marriage of convenience.”

“Convenience for you—perhaps inconvenience for her.”

“She was eager for it.”

“Did she ever regret it?”

“Jessica has been talking to you, I gather. Poor Jessica! She was very jealous of Maybella.”

“She gave me the impression that she was devoted to her.”

“She was that, too. People’s motives are so mixed. Yes, certainly she was devoted to Maybella. She nursed her through her many illnesses.”

I forbore to mention that I knew what those illnesses were.

“She wanted to be in Maybella’s place,” he added.

“She wished she were the daughter of the house so that she could have been the one to bring you out of bondage.”

“How discerning you are! And how we talk! All that is over and done with.”

“But you said it was not. You said you would never forget.”

“I shan’t forget,” he said vehemently and I saw the ring glitter as he clenched his hands.

“But it is past now. Come, let us have our game.”

He drew me into the library and we sat facing each other over the board as we had so many times before.

He was absent-minded that night and I almost beat him. He rallied in time. He did not want me to win—whether it was because he did not want to give up the chess set or because he hated to be beaten by a woman, I was not quite sure. Both probably.

But that night of confidences had drawn us closer together.

He might have become a little wary of me and felt that he had betrayed too much—but we were closer for all that.

After that we planned our visit to Melbourne. Stirling, Adelaide and myself were to be accompanied by one of the men from the property; we could do the forty miles or so into the town, taking about three days which would mean camping out for two nights.

“Just a little trip for Nora to try,” was Stirling’s description of the jaunt.

We would not take more than we needed, pointed out Adelaide, because it all had to be carried. We had sent on ahead clothes and things we should need for our stay at The Lynx in Melbourne so that they would be waiting for us when we arrived. Then we could be elegantly and fashionably clad;

we could do our shopping and have our purchases sent to Whiteladies;

then we would journey back, camping on the way.

We were taking a few spare horses and a couple of pack horses; and we should carry a little in our saddle bags. There was a tent which could be used for Adelaide and myself. Stirling and the man who was to accompany us would sleep under the stars. It all sounded exciting and I was looking forward to it.

It was only an hour or so before we were due to start that t discovered that the man who was to accompany us was Jacob Jagger.

“That man!” I protested to Adelaide.

“He has to go into Melbourne on business and he said he would like to take this opportunity.”

“I shouldn’t have thought he could have been spared from the property.”

“Really, Nora! What do you know of the property?”

“Well,” I floundered, ‘he’s supposed to be the manager of it and . “

“Even so, he doesn’t have to remain there all and every day.”

“I don’t like him, Adelaide.”

“Oh, I daresay he’s no worse than anyone else ” It was that affair of Mary. “

“It happens now and then.”

“But she said that he … forced her.”

“Girls tell these tales. We didn’t hear anything about the

forcing until she was going to have the baby. “

“She seemed to me as though she were absolutely terrified.”

“Of course she was when she knew she was found out. It’s always the same story. And you mustn’t judge people by the standards you’ve been used to in England. People out here are … isolated. These things happen. My father understands this. He is never hard on these cases.

Mary is receiving every consideration, so stop being sorry for her, and don’t be hard on Jacob. “

I didn’t care what she said. I didn’t like the man.

When he arrived he grinned at me.

“I’m happy to be making this trip,” he told me; and I lowered my head coldly and looked away. I was glad Stirling was with us.

Riding along in the early morning, revelling in the aspects of the bush, listening to the birds, now and then catching sight of some wild animal or bright plumage, I refused to be depressed by the presence of Jacob Jagger and my thoughts turned to Stirling.

They were pleasant thoughts. There he rode beside me, now and then turning to smile at me or point out some feature of the countryside which he thought I might have missed. I was contemplating the difference he had made in my life and how important he had become in it. There were times when it seemed that Lynx was more often in my thoughts than his son was, for I thought a great deal of Lynx. I accepted him as the dominant figure on the scene. Stirling reminded me of him in many ways. He was a gentler, kinder version of his father.