Mud and Gold (11 page)

They were soon surrounded by a crowd of
well-wishers; the sea of smiling faces made Frank feel awkward. The
thought that all those people knew just what he had been doing all
week brought a blush to his face. He was amazed that Lizzie could
talk to them all with no sign of embarrassment; but then, that was
Lizzie. Nothing ever seemed to discomfort her.

Frank noticed Amy hovering on the edge of
the crowd, patiently waiting for a chance to talk to Lizzie. He was
about to point her out to Lizzie when Arthur put a hand on his arm
and manœuvred him off to one side.

‘Everything going all right, Frank?’ Arthur
asked quietly.

Frank gave him a smile that turned into a
grin. ‘Yes. It’s going really well, Pa.’ He stifled a yawn as he
spoke.

‘Good lad. I knew you wouldn’t have any
trouble,’ Arthur said. Frank yawned again, belatedly covering his
mouth with his hand. ‘Well, Frank, I would tell you to start
getting a bit more sleep,’ Arthur said with mock sternness. ‘Except
I know that’s one piece of advice you wouldn’t take a bit of notice
of!’

Yes, marriage was the best thing that had
ever happened to him, Frank decided as the days wore on into weeks.
Life had become so comfortable with Lizzie around. The house was
spotless, and tasty meals appeared on the table without any effort
on his part. His clothes were washed and ironed, and his own clumsy
attempts at mending were replaced with neat stitches. And best of
all, every night instead of a cold bed he had Lizzie’s soft body
snuggling up against him in the warm darkness.

Ben’s ‘few days’ stretched on, and Frank was
relieved when he could dry off his herd. Milking the cows, even
once a day, was a long, wearying task when he had to do it with
Lizzie’s help instead of Ben’s. Lizzie did her best, but she had
not milked in years, and was much slower than Ben. Frank wondered
occasionally where Ben had got to, but life with Lizzie was too
full for him to think about his brother very often.

Lizzie seemed to feel the need to rearrange
the house as soon as she was installed as its mistress. She
announced it needed tidying up, and Frank left her to it. All the
dishes were moved around on the dresser until Lizzie was satisfied,
and the larder was completely reorganised. She shifted the parlour
furniture into a new arrangement and moved rugs from room to room.
It made her happy and it didn’t do any harm, though Frank was taken
aback when he opened a drawer in the bedroom one morning and found
it full of Lizzie’s underwear instead of his own.

‘Where’s my stuff, Lizzie?’

‘Oh, I moved it. You had it all shoved in
that drawer, and it looked really untidy, so I pulled it out and
went through it. Some of your things needed chucking out, but
they’ll make good rags. The rest is all folded nicely in that
drawer there.’ She indicated a lower drawer. ‘You need some new
combinations, Frank.’

‘Do I?’

‘Yes. You’ve only got three pairs, and one
of them can’t be mended much more. You can buy some this week. I
went through all your clothes yesterday and rearranged them, they
were all in a muddle. It’ll be much easier for you to find things
now.’

Getting used to his clothes’ being in
different places didn’t seem much to ask, especially when the
bedroom was new to him anyway. There were other changes, but Lizzie
had good reasons for them all. She liked to serve dinner half an
hour earlier than Frank was used to, because it gave her more time
to get the bread made afterwards. Fresh bread every morning was
worth the small effort of adjusting to a different meal time. And
Frank could understand why Lizzie didn’t want him to wear his boots
to the table, though it was difficult to remember to take them off
in the porch.

‘Frank, you’ve done it again,’ Lizzie said
one lunch-time, shaking her head at him.

‘Sorry.’ Frank pulled the boots off,
dislodging a few clods in the process.

‘Careful! And don’t just drop them in the
porch like that. Put them tidily against the wall.’

‘Is that all right?’

‘That’s nice. Now, hurry up before your soup
gets cold.’ And very good soup it was, too, Frank thought as he
spooned it up.

‘I’ve got most of my work done this morning.
Ben’s room must need an airing by now, I might give it a tidy up
this afternoon.’

Frank looked up from his soup in alarm. ‘No,
don’t do that, Lizzie. Ben wouldn’t want you to interfere with his
things.’

‘I’m sure he’d like to have his room tidied
and nice, and men never do that sort of thing for themselves. Look
what a muddle your drawers were in before I sorted them out.’

‘I don’t think you should, Lizzie. I’d
rather you left Ben’s room alone.’ Frank realised that he never had
got around to warning Lizzie how she should behave around Ben.
‘Hey, I was going to talk to you about Ben, too. When he comes back
I want—’

‘Don’t be silly, Ben’ll be pleased. Eat up
your soup, it’s getting cold.’

It was hard to argue with Lizzie when she
was so sure about everything. Frank wondered briefly what Arthur
would have to say if he were there, but he brushed the
uncomfortable thought aside.

Lizzie was a good wife, and she was making
him very happy even if she was a bit bossy. Well, if he was honest,
she was very bossy. Was she getting worse? Frank wondered. Arthur
had warned him that she would. But what could he do about it? He
couldn’t hit her, he just couldn’t. Surely they could talk about
things.

‘Lizzie, I wish you wouldn’t tell me what to
do all the time,’ Frank said, trying to sound stern.

‘I don’t. Are you going to eat that soup or
not? I’ve cooked some nice chops, they’ll get all dry if we leave
them too long.’

‘You do a bit, Lizzie.’

‘Don’t you like the soup? I thought you
liked vegetable soup. You told me you did.’

‘I do, I just want—’

‘I won’t make it again if you don’t like it.
I wish you’d told me.’

‘I
do
like it. But Lizzie—’

‘Why don’t you eat it, then? Oh, I’ll tip it
out for the pigs. I
think
my cooking’s good enough for
them.’ She reached over for Frank’s bowl, giving him a hurt
look.

Frank knew when he was beaten. ‘Don’t do
that, Lizzie, I’ll eat it now.’ Maybe he would try talking to
Lizzie that evening when they sat in the parlour. Then again, maybe
they would go to bed as soon as Lizzie had set her bread dough to
rise; they often seemed to be in bed by half-past seven.

Frank smiled at the thought. He would
certainly find it hard to scold Lizzie in bed, and he had no
intention of wasting time trying to threaten her with the strap. As
long as Lizzie wasn’t bossy to him in front of other people she
couldn’t make him a laughing-stock. And it
was
very good
soup.

*

When Frank realised he and Lizzie had been
married two months, he felt a stab of guilt at not having even
thought about Ben for weeks. Where could Ben possibly have gone for
so long? When was he going to come home? And what would he say to
Lizzie when he got there? Fighting with his brother to protect his
wife did not appeal, but it might yet come to that.

‘I’ve got to find out about Ben,’ he
announced one morning. ‘It’s stupid not knowing where he is. He
can’t be in Ruatane, not for two whole months without us seeing
him.’

‘I suppose he’s gone away on holiday
somewhere,’ Lizzie said. ‘It’s funny he hasn’t written,
though.’

‘He wouldn’t write.’

‘Why not? Just a few lines to let you know
where he is, that’s not much to ask.’

‘He…’ Frank struggled between loyalty to his
brother and a reluctance to keep secrets from Lizzie. ‘Ben’s not
much good at writing.’

‘Lots of men aren’t.’

‘No. But Ben… he can’t really write,
Lizzie.’

Lizzie looked astonished. ‘Can’t he? Why
not?’

‘Well, Ben was fourteen when the school
started. Pa said he could go for a few months if he wanted, and Ma
tried to talk him into it, but Ben didn’t want to sit with a lot of
little kids. I was only ten, so it wasn’t so bad for me—there were
kids there older than me. Ma taught us our letters when we were
little, and to read a bit, but that was all. Ben can sign his name,
and he can read easy things if he takes his time, but nothing
else.’

‘Oh. That was silly of him not to go to
school. He’ll be all right, though, wherever he’s got to.’

‘He should be back by now. I’m going to find
out.’

That morning Frank went into town and
started asking questions. He spoke to Sam Craig at the general
store, but Mr Craig had no particular memory of seeing Ben.
Sergeant Riley, Ruatane’s sole policeman, was no help, either,
though he promised to keep an ear open for any news.

Then Frank remembered that Ben’s horse had
thrown a shoe a few days before Ben’s sudden departure. He rode
over to the blacksmith’s shop, where he found the broad-shouldered
Mr Winskill working at the forge.

‘Shoe his horse?’ Mr Winskill laughed. ‘I
bought
his horse off him! Not a bad animal, either. He’s in
the paddock over the back.’

Frank checked the paddock behind the shop;
sure enough, Ben’s gelding was munching contentedly from a nosebag.
Why on earth would Ben sell his horse? Especially since the horses
belonged to the farm rather than to either brother.

‘Did Ben say where he was going?’

‘Said he was escaping from a woman! Was some
female after him?’

‘Not exactly. Didn’t he say anything
else?’

‘No. Not a great one for talking, your
brother.’

Frank thanked Mr Winskill and went on his
way, thinking hard.

Ben had obviously wanted some money, and it
was this thought that led Frank to the Bank of New Zealand.

The manager, Mr Callaghan, was behind the
counter. ‘Goodness me, Frank, I only usually see you when your milk
cheque’s in or you’ve sold your potato crop and you’re settling up
at the store. And now you turn up when your brother was here only a
few weeks ago! What’s got into you Kellys? Wanderlust?’

‘Ben was here? What did he say? Do you know
where he’s gone?’

Mr Callaghan looked startled. ‘You don’t
know? I assumed he’d discussed it with you. This is rather awkward,
though your account was such that… come and sit down a minute,
Frank.’ He ushered Frank into his tiny office and closed the
door.

‘Your brother said you were dissolving your
partnership. Well, he didn’t say it quite like that, but that’s
what it amounted to. He said he was going to take his share and
start out somewhere else. I got the impression he wasn’t too happy
about…’ Mr Callaghan trailed off awkwardly.

‘Wasn’t too happy about me getting married,’
Frank finished for him.

‘Well, yes. Your farm’s in both your names,
so either of you has the right to borrow money on it. And to draw
money out of your account, of course, though you don’t usually have
much money in it! Your brother borrowed two hundred pounds against
the farm—’

‘Two hundred pounds!’ Frank echoed in
astonishment.

‘That’s right. There’s no hurry to pay it
back, you can take a few years if you like.’

‘I’ll have to.’ Two hundred pounds? How much
did the farm make in a year? Not enough to spare two hundred pounds
out of, Frank was quite sure of that.

‘Ben left something for you,’ Mr Callaghan
said. He opened a drawer and pulled out an envelope. ‘He asked me
to give it to you the next time you came in—he said there was no
particular hurry.’

Frank ripped open the envelope. Inside were
two sheets of paper, both with the same neat handwriting. Frank
took the top sheet and sounded the words under his breath as he
read:

‘ “
I have gone away to
get away from women with wagging tongues. I won’t be back. Don’t
worry about me. Good luck. Ben.”
 
’

Under the short message a note had been
added in the same hand.

‘ “
Written at the
express”…’

Frank stumbled on the next word. ‘What does
this say?’ he asked, passing the page to Mr Callaghan.

‘Dictation. “Written at the express
dictation of Mr Benjamin Kelly”.’ Mr Callaghan glanced at the rest
of the page and a slight smile passed over his face. ‘He’s got the
lawyer to write it for him, you see, and Mr Jamieson is making it
clear that it’s your brother’s own words, not what Mr Jamieson
wanted to write.’

‘I see.’ Frank studied the other sheet. This
had obviously been composed by the lawyer, but he recognised Ben’s
spidery ‘B. Kelly’ at the foot of the page.

‘I can’t make out all these long words—what
does it mean?’

Mr Callaghan obligingly took the piece of
paper. ‘It’s lawyer’s talk, full of “thereinafters” and
“heretofores”. But in plain English, it says your brother gives up
his share in the farm to you in return for the two hundred pounds
he’s taken. That’s quite a bargain—your farm’s certainly worth more
than four hundred pounds. The farm belongs to you now, Frank.
Except for the bank’s share, that is.’ He smiled, but Frank did not
feel able to return the smile.

Frank rode home unsure whether to feel
angry, guilty or hurt. Ben had saddled him with a debt that Frank
had no idea how long it would take to repay. But Ben must have been
desperate to get away, and it was Frank’s action that had driven
his brother from his home. Why couldn’t Ben have talked to him
about it? Why hadn’t Ben trusted him to keep Lizzie in line?

He gave a snort of disgust. Ben wasn’t
stupid. He didn’t know Lizzie, but he knew Frank. Why should Ben
trust him? It was true, after all: he couldn’t tell Lizzie what to
do. She didn’t take the slightest bit of notice when he did.

*

Amy struggled against the sluggishness of
pregnancy to get all her work done to Charlie’s satisfaction. As
she increased in bulk all her tasks took longer, but she did not
want to have to excuse herself to him. She soon had to let some of
her work slip. Charlie had never shown any sign of noticing if the
floor had been scrubbed or not, so Amy made do with regular
sweeping. And the rugs would have to manage without being beaten
for a few months.