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‘Shows what an interest you have in the station,’ Morgan said bitingly. ‘You want to turn on another twenty-seven days of sunshine for your enjoyment, when we’re crying out for rain. We’re going through the worst drought for twenty years, stock are going short of feed, prices have fallen, and farmers are screaming for Government aid to save them going bankrupt. Several townships right here in North Canterbury are completely out of water, and have to have it all carted to them, but as long as you get a good suntan, that’s all that matters!’

Katriona went pale. She did not need to look at him now. She had her answer as the angry sarcastic words slammed into her. Through her rainbow of tears she watched several brightly coloured game fowl clucking round the silos with their chicks, then looked beyond to the stags and hinds in the park. She took a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t know.’

‘Oh, you didn’t know,’ Morgan mimicked her soft reply. ‘Did you care? Do you want to know anything about Evangeline or do you just want to drift around enjoying the sunshine and scenery, and careering round the country in fast cars?’

His words cut her as if they were whiplashes. He was so unfair! She whirled round to face him, her blue eyes stormy, and her red hair flaming in the morning sunlight. ‘Yes, I care. Yes, I want to know everything about this place. I want a little more than I can see, I want to know what it takes to run something as big as a sixty-three thousand-acre station. I’m not unintelligent. I want to learn. Who’s going to teach me? Are you volunteering?’

He roared with laughing. ‘Yes, I’ll teach you. What do you want to know?’

His change of mood caught her by surprise, and her mind went blank. She must come up with one question. ‘How many sheep do you have?’

‘We run fourteen thousand Corriedale sheep. Next question?’

‘How many cattle?’

‘A thousand head of cattle, mostly Herefords. They run on the Organ Range. They’ll be mustered in while you’re here. Do you want to see that?’

‘Yes. Will I be here long enough? How long does it take to muster a range of mountains?’

‘One day. It’s all done by helicopter. I drive out to bush camp with the men. Tay goes up in the chopper and shows the pilot where the cattle are and they herd them down to the flat. We drive them into the yards and draft them off, truck out those we’re selling. The whole operation is completed in one day. Next question?’

Fascinated, Katriona stared at him, then realised he was waiting for her question. ‘Don’t you use any horses?’

‘No, not for work, they’ve all been phased out. I still have an interest in horses—that’s why I have Somali. The children have their ponies. There’s Carla’s hunter, she does quite a bit of Show riding.’

Katriona was not interested in what Carla did. ‘You said you have a deer farm. Is that what you call the deer park?’

‘No. We have nearly a thousand deer. If you want more exact figures come to the study after dinner tonight and I’ll get out my diaries. You’d probably be interested to see all the newspaper clippings of the very beginning of the deer farm. The previous manager started it off on a very solid foundation so we’ve just followed on, but the whole thing was purely experimental at the start. Nobody really believed they could be farmed. Next question?’

‘Where are the deer?’

‘They run up on number one hill block. Do you want to go and see them? Actually you get a really good view of the whole station from there.’

‘Yes, please, I do ... want to see them.’ Katriona was appalled to hear herself stammering, but everything was happening so quickly.

‘Right. I’ll take you tomorrow afternoon.’

She wanted to keep him talking. ‘Is that all Evangeline that way?’

‘All you can see this side of the Hope. That’s Bush Knob over there across the road from Horseshoe Lake, there’s Kakapo Block and further down Summerdale ... see, towards Hanmer.’

‘Where’s Summerdale?’ demanded Katriona. It seemed to her that he was just waving his hand at a lot of mountains.

He moved close to her. ‘That big hill there.’

Oddly breathless, she followed his pointing finger, then protested, ‘That’s not a hill, that’s a whole mountain.’

‘My hills, your mountains, Katriona.’

Something in his voice made her look up to meet his steady grey eyes, and her vivid blue eyes "were trapped and held for one timeless moment with no barrier between them, no pain, no bitterness. Colour flooded her cheeks as she became aware that she was shaking and that her shoulder was against his arm and he would know the effect he was having on her. She stepped smartly away as if she had been scorched. Morgan chuckled. She would not forgive him for that. He had leaned against her deliberately, knowing from long experience with dim-witted adoring females that she was very vulnerable.

Angrily she touched the shed she had been sitting by. ‘What’s this building?’

He unlatched the catch, still smiling. ‘This is an overflow accommodation for the shearers. There are two bunks, water laid on, power for lights and points. Usually there’s plenty of room for them all down at the cookhouse, but if we have the fencers in and a couple of extra musterers, some of them end up here. Before that it was the school-house. Come in. See, there are some of the kids’ posters on the wall still, and look, a bow of pine cones painted gold.

Must have been for their Christmas celebrations. Tay and I were at school here.’

Katriona wandered in, looking at the two bunks and the rest of the small room. Why, she could live here. She would be out of Morgan’s way. It would be a real escape until her father came back. She only half listened to Morgan.

‘Before that it was the station cookhouse. There’s a man up the Lewis Pass road who would only be too happy to tell you all about this cookhouse. He owns a station now, but he started his career at Evangeline when he was only fifteen. He came here about 1917 and has a great memory. He’ll tell you all about mustering on foot and when all the work was done with horses.’

He had her attention now. Hands on hips, her head thrown back to see him better, she narrowed her eyes to conceal her thoughts from him. When he was smiling as he was smiling now she would follow him to the ends of the earth if he asked her.

‘He’ll give you a real understanding of the history of the station. He was the cow boy here and had to milk the cows at the end of each long hard day’s work. He really appreciates getting bottled milk delivered. He can tell you about carting the wool out to the Landing with horse and wagons, and driving to Culverdun in a terrible snowstorm to pick up farm machinery. He was here when the ’flu swept this country after the First World War. He could make this place come alive for you.’

‘I’d love to meet him.’

‘And he’d like to meet you. He’s a fine old gentleman. He’s a good friend of your father’s. He really stuck by him when ... when ...’

As if a heavy cloud had come down between them Katriona knew he meant when her mother had run off leaving her father crippled, and himself orphaned. She had been foolish to think they could be friends. She walked swiftly out into the sunshine and stripped off her thick sweater, her slender well-proportioned body outlined against the blue sky, her unruly waves haloed by the brilliant sunshine. ‘It’s too hot,’ she explained perfunctorily as Morgan joined her.

Morgan cleared his throat. ‘Look, Katriona, I’m sorry...'

‘You’re sorry! What have you got to apologise for? It was my mother who killed your parents—yes, I know all about it. I asked Tay last night. If you’d been honest with me when we met in Edinburgh I wouldn’t have come here to open up old scars.’

‘I know you wouldn’t have come. That’s why I didn’t tell you the whole story.’ Morgan faced her squarely.

Katriona flared angrily, ‘Oh, you didn’t worry about opening old scars and wounds, did you, Morgan? You just wanted to inflict a few new ones.’

Morgan’s eyes were molten steel pools of fury. ‘Don’t be a complete idiot. Nothing was further from my thoughts.’

‘Prove it. You wouldn’t let me stay with Tay and Amber where I would have been happy. You were going to sack them if they kept me. You wanted me back at the homestead so you could get at me, so that Carla could make mincemeat out of me. That’s your idea of a joke. Well, it’s not mine. I want to stay here until my father gets back from his trip. May I have your permission to do that?’

‘The hell you have! You’ll stay in the homestead where you belong. I’ll have no argument.’

Katriona threw her sweater on the ground. ‘I’m sleeping here whether you like it or not. You haven’t got any good reason to refuse me.’

‘You’re not. I’ll switch off the power and water and rip out the bunks if that’s what it takes to convince you.’

‘Then I’ll sleep on the floor,’ Katriona threw at him furiously.

‘Oh, no, you won’t. Your father put you in my care. You camp down here tonight and I’ll come and carry you home.’

Resentment and rage burned through Katriona, but she knew she was beaten. ‘I hate you, Morgan Grant! ’

'I'm not worried. I think you’re a feather-brained female with an over-vivid imagination. You be in my study at eight tonight. You can have your first lesson on farm management.’

‘You can be in your study at eight tonight, but you’ll be all on your own. I don’t want to learn anything you could teach me. I don’t think you’re even human ! ’

Morgan stepped closer. ‘If you’re going to have hysterics, go ahead and get it over. I’ll slap your face and then we may be able to talk rationally.’

Katriona swung her arm backwards. ‘I’m not going to have hysterics, and if anyone is going to have their face slapped it isn’t me.’

She felt her hand caught and held firmly from behind, and turned to find Tay standing there. ‘Oh, Tay!’ All her anger drained away as she looked into his smiling blue eyes.

‘Oh, Katriona, my friend.’ Tay let her hand go and ruffled her curls. ‘Morgan is too big for you to handle physically. Weight for age, he’d eat you alive. Look at my eye, a real shiner. Walked into a door. Now you wouldn’t like to wear one like that, would you, Katriona? Oh, morning, Morgan. All well with you?’

‘Good morning, Tay,’ Morgan replied coldly.

Katriona giggled, and inched a little closer to Tay. ‘May I come to dinner with you and Amber tonight, please?’

‘You’re always welcome, Katriona. Bed and board any time you wish.’

It was nice to have someone big for a friend, someone who was not scared of Morgan. She looked at Morgan’s still dark face. ‘Will you make them pack up and leave if I have a meal with them?’

‘I will not.’ His anger seemed to ebb away too. ‘If you weren’t so childish and immature you wouldn’t ask such a question. Feel free to eat wherever you wish. Talk to anyone on the station. Maybe some of the men can teach you something about Evangeline, seeing you feel you can’t learn anything from me. But you sleep at the homestead.’

Katriona sighed deeply as he strode away. ‘I made a bit of a mess of that, Tay, but thanks for turning up when you did.’

‘When I saw you chuck your sweater on the ground I thought you were throwing in the towel and I came rushing over to put a bit of ginger into you. What did I find? You were getting ready to beat him to pulp. Come on, Katriona, you won. Smile! If I hadn’t stopped you, you’d have pulled a real David and Goliath scene. You were quite safe. Morgan doesn’t hit women.’

‘You’re wrong, Tay, I didn’t win. I lost horribly. We were doing not badly and he was going to teach me all about the farm, and then it came up about Ross being hurt and away we went. It will always be that way.’

‘You mean you’ll always spark each other off. Yes, I think you might, but that’s good. Morgan likes someone with a bit of spirit. If you’d gone all humble and apologetic you wouldn’t have got anywhere with him. If you’d try to sex him up the way Carla does in her slinky, slimy, slithery way, you still wouldn’t have made any impression ... she doesn’t. Look, you handled it just right. When he left he was angry, bewildered and frustrated. He isn’t used to being pushed backwards by a miniature female tornado. Women usually fall all over him and bore him to tears. He’s not bored with you.’

In spite of Tay’s cheering words Katriona felt dejected as she went towards the homestead. She could have gone on a visit to the neighbouring farm, learnt something of the economics ...

‘Hi there, Katriona!’

In the middle of the yard were Gary and Jeff Travers with a flock of sheep. They both greeted her enthusiastically, explaining that they had just returned from Hope Valley Station.

Gary was still the spokesman. ‘Morgan yelled for us to come back when the shearers arrived. How fares the battle with the bewitching blonde?’

‘Oh, Gary, your poor car! ’ Katriona’s hand flew to her face as she remembered the damage she had caused. I’ll pay for the repairs.’

‘No way. Every dent in that old bomb is beautiful to me. She wears them proudly like war wounds. I’ve had a look and she suffered no internal injuries, so quit worrying.’

‘You’re sure?’ Katriona was vastly relieved.

‘Of course he’s sure,’ Jeff contributed. ‘If you can think of any way we can help you get back at that one, count us in. We’ve got a few old scores to settle. She’s a pretty mean bit of work to set you up like that.’

Katriona gasped in amazement, ‘You think she set me up?’

‘Of course she set you up,’ Gary chimed in. ‘You wouldn’t have touched Morgan’s car unless she’d virtually forced you to. Everyone agrees.’

‘Everyone?’ Katriona stared at him. ‘You mean all the people on the station?’

‘All the people on this station and some of the other ones. In fact everyone who knows Carla.’

‘How would they know?’

‘We have telephones,’ Gary replied with a grin. ‘And Morgan had to ring me about the car ... then some of the boys were visiting from the Lewis station. News like that travels fast... adds a bit of variety to life.’

Katriona shook her head in wonder. ‘I don’t know. One moment you feel so cut off from the outside world, then you tell me this and it makes everyone seem close and interested and involved. And they all think I was set up. Incredible! I thought everyone would blame me.’