The mountain that went to the sea (9 page)

`You know him — ' Jeckie asked, her eyes wide open.

'Of course. Everyone knows Joe Blow. There are Joe Blows all over the place—'

Jeckie looked puzzled.

He laughed as he watched the changing shadows in her face.

`Joe Blow can be anybody or everybody,' he explained. `He's the do-gooder and every town has at least one. As I said — he could be a nuisance — if he's a noisy one.'

Jeckie's face fell. 'You mean "Joe Blow" is just a sort of nickname given to a certain type of person? Not just the name of one real person?'

`That's right. He's a type. That's all.' Jason's smile eased

and a shadow of thought crossed his eyes. 'Just a type.

Sad. isn't it? No more and no less. Poor fella, since he's

a do-gooder, he deserves a better name, don't you think?'

'I'm disappointed. Andrew and Barton seem to speak of one single person called "Joe Blow". I was awfully curious, but I didn't like to ask — who, what and where? I'm really a very inquisitive person, you know.' She put her head a little on the side as she smiled at him apolo-getically. 'An awful weakness, isn't it? Do I have a nuisance value, too?'

'Like the fact that your left shoe is never quite properly wedded to your left foot?' he asked, smiling.

'Me and my shoe!' she laughed. 'Two nuisances rolled into one. You put my shoe on my foot again. I'm a bit careless about my possessions, I think. I'm always kicking off my shoes at home. I don't even really know why. Just a bad habit, I suppose.'

'Home? Where is home? Somewhere down the south west of the State, isn't it?'

'Yes. Five miles out of Green Valley. We run some sheep, some cattle and breed horses — all in quite a small way.'

'Yes. I've heard that.' He was studying her, but in an amused way. Jeckie wrinkled her brow.

'But how would you know? I mean . . . we're strangers. Almost . .

'We shouldn't be—Cousin "Juliet called Jeckie". I am one of your cousins— in a very distant way, you know.' Jeckie was startled.

'Another relative? However many do we have? But please— why do you call me Juliet-Jeckie? Oh, I know. You heard Barton call me by my name when he came for me at the airport.'

'Did he? I don't remember.' His eyes were still smiling; almost laughing. 'Most likely I heard the news of "Cousin Juliet's" imminent arrival over the transceiver. The open session, you know. Let me see. That would be two or three days ago.' He vvas looking at her quizzically as if wondering whether she minded that 'cousin' intimacy when he had said her name. 'Somewhere along the air-waves the "Juliet" became "Jeckie". I rather like that. Much more friendly,' he added.

It was her turn to laugh. 'Oh, that transceiver! Everyone listens to everyone else on the open session. I haven't experienced it but I know that is what happens north of Twenty-six. Nothing's private! But why —'

At that moment a wiry, thin woman came into the store through the door in the rear.

`Oh, there you are, Jason,' she said. 'I'm sorry I left the store for so long. A dingo got in amongst the chickens last night. I've been wiring up the fence. Not too much damage done, thank Ranger. He didn't bark much, but of all things he'd been trying to round up the dingo. Did you ever hear of such a thing?'

The dog had heard his name. He lifted his head and pricked his ears. His tail thumped busily on the floor.

`Good boy, Ranger,' Jason said, looking down. 'If you have no sheep to round up, then any old wild dog will do, eh?'

The kelpie's tail thumped again.

`Of course he understands every word?' Jeckie said doubtfully.

'Oh, absolutely. You'd be surprised! But I haven't introduced you to Mrs Stringer. This is Jeckie, one of the Ashendens, Maria,' he said. `Jeckie, may I introduce to you the doyen of storekeepers — Mrs Maria Stringer.'

`Pleased to meet you, I'm sure,' Mrs Stringer said.

`How do you do,' Jeckie replied. 'I think I must have my geography all wrong. I thought this was your store, Jason.'

`I own the ground, but don't run the store. The store is Mrs Stringer's province,' he said.

`You're staying out at Mallibee? Miss . . . er . . .' Mrs Stringer wore an expression of acute curiosity.

Jeckie Bennett, but please call me Jeckie. Everybody does. My mother was one of the Ashendens. I don't claim the Ashenden name, except in theory.'

`Not like Miss Isobel then? She claims it all right! Oh well, each to his own!'

Jeckie did not know how to answer this, so she said nothing.

Mrs Stringer's name exactly suited her very thin figure. She moved behind the counter at the back of the store and began tidying paper sheets lying loose on the counter top.

`Bennett . . . Yes, that's right,' she went on, not looking up but watching her hands at work. 'You must be the daughter of Frances. Frances's mother was the first Andrew Ashenden's fifth child. But she was his first daughter ..

Jeckie made a faint moaning sound.
'Oh, please . . . not here too !
Does everybody have to relate everything and -everybody back to Andrew?'

`Andrew the First, that was,' Mrs Stringer went on in a flat, expressionless voice. 'He was the first surveyor —after the explorer Gregory—to map this part of Australia. From here the plateau eventually runs eastward into the Gibson Desert, you know. So he could hardly have gone any further, could he? He was given the Mallibee acreage as a reward. Isn't that so, Jason?'

Jason bent down to rub the dog's ears.

`That is so,' he said with mock seriousness. 'Mrs Stringer is invariably right in a matter of local history, Jeckie.'

`You seem to know all about it, too,' Jeckie said doubtfully. She didn't know whether these two people — and the dog — were having a small joke at her expense.

'Of course I do,' Jason said quietly. 'People round here wouldn't let me forget. Take Mrs Stringer, for instance — '

Jeckie was still curious to know why Jason had claimed her, Jeckie, as a cousin, but she didn't like to interrupt Mrs Stringer.

`Why shouldn't we know all about the first Andrew?' that lady was saying drily. She shifted her attention from the neatly stacked papers to the business of dusting the shelves behind her with a giant-sized turkey-feather duster. `You're the Shire President, Jason. So you've a right to know — being related too. Through your mother, of course.'

`You're the Justice of the Peace, too, Jason,' Jeckie said, poking the 'cousin riddle' temporarily to the back of her mind. 'Warden of the Wardens' Court, and owner of the petrol station and this store — '

`The ground upon which the store stands,' Jason corrected her, mischief in his smile.

`The ground on which the store stands,' Jeckie amended. `And — well, what else is there? Barton had a whole list of things you are in this district.'

`Barton?' Jason raised his eyebrows. `I'm flattered he

shows such an interest. I thought nobody from Mallibee ever mentioned my name. Penalty rate, I understand, is expulsion from the firm.'

Jeckie sat on a sack of sugar standing by the near wall.

`Does everyone right across the tableland from the coast to the Gibson Desert always talk in conundrums?' she asked. She looked from Jason's wryly smiling face to Mrs Stringer's straight back and quite unsmiling expression.

'Well, what you don't know is best not learned,' Mrs Stringer remarked with a touch of acid. 'Best you go and see if Barton's ready to start up again, miss. He's an impatient one — I know that.'

'Yes, thank you. I think I'd better do just that. Goodbye, Mrs Stringer. Goodbye — '

'Jason — as a name — will find me anywhere, Jeckie. Most people have heard of me.'

Now was clearly not the moment to ask for more about the 'cousin' relationship. It could be embarrassing.

'Thank you. Then it's goodbye . . . Jason,' Jeckie said, her blue eyes very blue, as she tried to reflect absolute composure while she hoisted herself upright from the sugar bag, then turned to go outside again. Jason, she thought, was not so much regretting her going as being busy watching her feet. Maybe he was standing by to catch a shoe should she chance to kick one off.

Actually, she very nearly did just that . . . as a way of scoring one up on him — just for fun.

'Barton,' Jeckie said when they were aboard the re-plugged Rover and a mile out across the spinifex plain from the store, 'Why is everyone in our family against Jason? He said we are related — in a very distant way. Something about being cousins —'

'We don't recognize him as a member of the family,' Barton said bluntly. 'He let us down. For money, of course.'

Jeckie's eyes widened as she stared at Barton's profile. 'Please do tell me more,' she begged.

'He is about as much your cousin as Andrew and I are your cousins. Third cousins, I think it is. I gave up counting years ago. He is descended from — '

'Oh no, Barton. I couldn't bear it. Don't tell me how

far removed he is from Andrew the First or I'll scream. Is everybody in the district related?'

'Not all — but some. Jason — was. Till we cut him off.' 'But why?'

'Never mind why, Jeckie. It's best not talked about. He was a let-down for everyone at Mallibee. If you mention the subject anywhere near Andrew, well — it's likely Andrew could go looking up his rifle, then take himself off on a hunting trip. Aunt Isobel, Jane — the lot of us — we don't want to talk about it.'

'Please, Barton! Don't say anything so silly as Andrew looking up his rifle. People haven't gone shooting their kith and kin — out of vengeance — since the Middle Ages. It really does seem to me that you're all a bit out of time — the way you go in for ancestor worship. And — '

'And nothing,' Barton interrupted abruptly, as he slewed the wheel round to miss a lump of ironstone at the side of the track. 'Nobody goes in for ancestor worship, let alone worship of that old tycoon, Great-Grandfather Andrew. The family feud is all to do with money. M.O.N.E.Y. Nothing more glamorous than "filthy lucre".'

'Did Jason inherit a share of Mallibee, too?'

'That he did. He is descended from one of the daughters' sons. So a different surname. Now I'm not going to tell you
anymore
. The whole subject bores me — except when I think too much about it, then I just get hopping mad.'

'But if I'm a family connection I have a right to know.'

'Nuts to that, Jeckie love. Read your Book of Common Prayer and you'll find we're all so far apart we don't even crack a mention as amongst relatives. The only connecting link is that raking share in Mallibee. So forget it, will you?'

'You really mean you're not going to tell me ... ?' 'I do.'

'Then I'll find out from someone else,' Jeckie said flatly. 'Because I like Jason. I don't want to think badly of him. Not without evidence.'

She faced forvvard again and presented a haughty profile to Barton.

He grinned. 'Atta girl,' he said. His right hand came off the steering wheel and he patted her knee. 'That's the fighting spirit of the Ashendens.'

'My surname is Bennett with a double "n" in the middle. And the Book of Common Prayer — you mentioned it first — doesn't give me any claim to Ashenden anything. Much less spirit.'

'No claim to anything Ashenden? Tut, tut, Jeckie. You are your mother's only child, aren't you? And she still holds a one-sixth share in Mallibee.'

`Who's talking about money or property now? Jason Bassett doesn't seem to me to be the only sinner in that respect.'

Barton grinned. 'Well, you would come up to see us all. Who put you up to it, Jeckie? Aunt Isobel from afar or your own most respected maternal relative?'

Jeckie felt the only way to harden herself against these half-jesting innuendoes was in the old adage: 'If you can't beat them, join them.' That way she didn't have to have a conscience, let alone distaste for the thought that seemed uppermost in every Ashenden's mind — the value and ownership of property. They all seemed to talk only of how soon could other branches of the family get hold of one more scrap of property scrip that would make up the composite Mallibee.

Something inside Jeckie rebelled against the way the distant relatives gossiped. Even those, in distant parts, who had no claims whatever ! The only way to hide her rebellion, since she was a guest of the Ashendens, was to put a hard cover over it. She must — for the duration —at least pretend to be one of the Ashendens.

'I wanted to come myself,' she said at last, not quite truthfully. She could not admit she had run away. This was the only place she had thought of — in her state of wounded pride — to which she could come.

'Neither Aunt Isobel nor my mother persuaded me.' She was looking straight in front and holding her head high. 'I knew they occasionally wrote to one another, and that is all. I came because I needed a holiday and because I knew Mallibee was a family property, and I might just as well see for myself —'

'See the property, or see the Ashendens?' Barton asked, still teasing.

'You and Andrew are the only ones with the actual name of Ashenden so I suppose you mean yourselves,'