The Shadow of the Lynx (15 page)

Stirling could never bear any criticism of his father.

“The day makes no difference.”

“No,” I agreed.

“It would have been cruel on any day, but on Christmas Day it is worse because it makes nonsense of all Christmas means.”

“We can’t allow people to run off when they want to and then come back and expect us to kill the fatted calf.”

“Perhaps not, but they could have been given some food and help.”

“It wouldn’t surprise me if Adelaide did.”

“But he wouldn’t help them. He’s a very hard man.”

“He knows what he’s doing. He has to show these people that they can’t walk off to look for gold one day and come back the next when they’ve failed to find it.”

Stirling’s jaw was obstinately set. I realized in that moment that I was jealous of his love for his father. It would always be Lynx who came first with him.

We argued the point during our ride and we finally quarrelled when I said he hadn’t a mind of his own and readily accepted everything Papa told him. He retorted that I was a self-opinionated schoolmarm who thought that because I

had once taught little girls of five I could teach my elders . yes, and betters.

I galloped on ahead of him, hurt and angry, because I was beginning to build up a picture of being with Stirling for ever, marrying him and having Lynx for a father-in-law. I was not sure whether I wanted the latter or not. I wished that there were no Lynx and that Stirling’s father had been an ordinary sort of man. And then I thought: No, I wouldn’t like that. I could not imagine the place without Lynx. My growing relationship with him excited me. I was exultant because he was not indifferent to me. I wanted him to be interested in me, to listen to me, to respect me and to grow fond of me. I wanted to be important to him. But I wanted to be more important to Stirling than anyone else in the world and while Lynx existed I felt that never would be.

The next day Stirling behaved as though there had been no quarrel between us. He was treating me as though I were his sister. I did not want this but I felt happily secure because our relationship was one which would strengthen as it grew and I was certain that in due course I would be as necessary to him as he was to me.

The Lambs were never mentioned again. I liked to think that Adelaide had helped them and I felt sure she had. Mary was happy again and growing noticeably larger. I saw Jemmy often in the stables; he had developed an assurance which must always have been not far from the surface. I often heard him whistling at his work and I felt so happy because we had been able to help him. Therefore I was surprised when one day in early February Jemmy was reported missing.

It was the same story. He had confided in one of the stable boys that he was going off to find gold.

When Lynx heard, he laughed.

“That’s another of them,” he said.

“Don’t take him back when he’s had enough of the gold fields.”

He asked me that night to have a game of chess with him after dinner.

We did not play immediately, though, and I believed that he wanted to taunt me about Jemmy, for Stirling had since told him how eager I had been to help the boy when we had found him on the ship.

“It doesn’t do to play the ministering angel, Nora,” he said.

“Come, you are going to drink a glass of port with me.” He filled the glasses.

“You see how your Jemmy has turned out.”

“Surely you can understand the desire to find gold?”

“I understand it. I have experienced it.”

“Then why are you so hard on others?”

“I’m not concerned with others—only with myself.”

“You condemn these people because they go off to look for gold.”

“You are mistaken. All I say is that I will not have them back when they fail. I will not have my servants walking off when the whim takes them. They are free to walk off, it’s true, but not to come back.”

“The Lambs …”

“Ah, you hated me then, didn’t you?”

“I thought you were very hard and on Christmas Day too!”

“My dear, sentimental Nora, the day has nothing to do with it.”

“So Stirling said.”

“You have thrashed the matter out with him?”

“I have discussed it with him.”

“And attacked me furiously.”

“Yes, but he defended you.”

He smiled. Then he said, “Nora, life is hard, you know, and it is no use being soft in a hard world. You are too sentimental, too emotional. You will be hurt one day.”

“Are you sentimental? Are you emotional? No! But you have been hurt so hurt that you have never forgotten it.”

He raised those bushy eyebrows and regarded me. Then he held out his hands so that his long shirt cuffs were pulled back and I saw the scars on his wrists.

“Manacles,” he said.

“Fetters and chains. The marks are still there.”

“They have no meaning now. You are no longer fettered. You are in command. You rule the lives of all those around you.”

“But the scars remain.”

“In your heart as well as on your wrists.”

He was silent for a moment and his eyes narrowed as he went on, “You are right, Nora. What happened to me is something which will never be forgotten. Only when a certain action has been taken can the score be settled.”

His eyes blazed and I knew that he was thinking of revenge.

“How long ago did it happen?” I asked.

“It is thirty-nve years since I came out nerc … in chains.”

“And you still talk of settling the score!”

“I shall go on thinking of it until the settlement is made.”

“It is a long time to harbour resentment.”

“For such an injury?”

“Times have changed since those days. People are perhaps less cruel.

Could it be the times which were to blame? “

“I do not see it that way. But for one man I should never have been obliged to endure those months of degradation and humiliation.”

“But you are here now. You have everything a man could wish for. You are a king in your world. You have a son and daughter, and most people go in fear and trembling of you. Isn’t that what you want?”

He looked at me and smiled slowly.

“You are a bold girl, Nora. You don’t care in the least that you offend me with your criticism.”

Then like you hate criticism, I know. All the more reason why some should not be afraid to give it. “

“And you have chosen yourself for that role?”

“I am determined to show you that I am not afraid of you.”

“Suppose I asked you to leave my house?”

“Then I should pack my bag and depart.”

Where to? “

“I am not without some qualifications. Remember I taught at Danesworth House. I could be a teacher or governess in some family.”

“A sad life for a proud woman.”

“Better than being where she is not wanted.”

His blue eyes were fixed steadily on me.

“And do you think you are not wanted here?”

“I am not sure.”

“The truth, please.”

“I think you have made a promise to my father and that you are a man who likes to keep his promise if …”

“Pray go on.”

“If keeping it does not inconvenience you too much.”

“Well, Nora, let me tell you that having you in this house does not inconvenience me one little bit. If there was any sign of this I should cease to think of your existence. You have been truthful with me, so I will be truthful with you.

SOL.

-E ; 97

I will say that I did not altogether dislike the addition to my family. I wanted sons, but daughters are very well, and can be useful.

”

“Then I am of use?”

“I am not displeased with my family. Come, let us have a game. You still have to win the set, you know.”

We played. I was aware of his growing interest in me. And was elated by it.

Stirling was right. One could not live under his roof and not be affected by him.

The hot summer weather was with us. I would work in the kitchen or in the garden in the mornings and in the afternoons try to find a shady spot under a wattle tree and lie and read, although the flies—and I had never seen so many before-were a pest. It was more comfortable to sit in Adelaide’s cool sitting-room and sew with her or read aloud to her as she sewed, which she very much enjoyed. She liked Jane Austen and the Brontes; she was as passionately interested in the English scene as her father was. Sometimes Jessica would creep in and sit and listen while I read. I must confess that I always felt a little uneasy at such times. She would sit very quietly, her hands folded in her lap, and I had the impression that she wanted to be alone with me so that she could talk to me about those days when Lynx had first come to Australia and settled into the place which was then called Rosella Creek.

So passed that summer and when the weather showed signs of becoming a little cooler Adelaide suggested that we take another trip to Melbourne. There were several things she wanted; it was easy to get them brought to the house because one of her father’s businesses supplied goods to the small shops and traders on the gold fields but as Adelaide said, it was a luxury to choose for oneself from a large selection. We could put up at The Lynx and this time, as I was accustomed to the country and was now a very creditable horsewoman, we might ride and I could try camping out, which was often more convenient than waiting on the Cobb coaches. Stirling could accompany us and there should be another man of the party. Someone would certainly have business in Melbourne and wish to join us.

During the summer evenings I had played chess with Lynx

several times, ne invariaoly aispiayed a rattier sardonic amusement because he knew how desperately I wanted to beat him. It had become rather an obsession with me and it was typical of our relationship. I had always wanted to show him that I was not in awe of him; perhaps the fact that I continually stressed this showed that I was.

But those evenings in the library with the rose-quartz lamp beside us throwing its rosy glow over the chessmen had become part of my life. I found a certain content in sitting there, watching those long artistic hands with the green jade signet ring. I would grow tense with excitement when I could see him checkmated in a few moves, but he was always ready with some devastating counter movement which turned my attack into defence. I would look up and find those magnetic eyes on me, full of mocking laughter, brilliant with pleasure because he always enjoyed showing me that however I tried to outwit him, he would always win in the end.

“Not this time, Nora,” he would say.

“What a pity. They are such unusual pieces. Look at this castle. So delicately formed. And when you win, you will still play with me, won’t you? [ should not like the games to cease just because the set has changed hands.”

I began to learn more and more of him; in fact there were times when he seemed to lift that invincible barrier which he had erected round himself. When it was there he was the Lynx, proud, invulnerable, all powerful. But it could be lifted and in some way I had found a means of doing it. It had begun when he had shown me the fetters on his wrists; and then there was the time when he showed me his pictures.

I was a little early going to the library for our game because my watch was ten minutes fast. I knocked but there was no answer so I went in. He was not there, but a curtain on one side of the room had been drawn back to show a door, and this stood ajar. I had not known that there was a door there.

I stood for a while in the room. I had never seen it when he was not there and it was surprising how his absence changed it. It was now an ordinary room—pleasantly furnished, it was true, with its thick rugs and heavy velvet curtains, strong oak chairs and the books lining the wall. A library which one would find in any English country house! On the oak table stood the chess set in readiness for our game.

I crossed the room and looked through the open door. He

was there but he did not see me immediately. On a table before him were several canvases and I remembered then what Jessica had told me about the picture of himself which he had set up to make the aborigines afraid of him.

He glanced up and saw me.

“Why, Nora,” he said, ‘is it time? “

“I am a little early. My watch is fast.”

He hesitated—something I had rarely seen him do before. Then he said:

“Come in.”

So I went in. On an easel stood a canvas and on a chair lay a paint-spattered jacket.

“This is my sanctum,” he told me.

“Have I intruded?”

“On the contrary, you are here on my invitation.”

“You are a painter.”

“Is that a question?”

“No. I know it.”

“Are you surprised? You did not expect me to have such talents?

Perhaps you consider I have no talent. Judge for yourself. “

He linked his arm through mine; it was the first time there had been any demonstration of affection.

“These pictures on the walls are my work,” he said.

“Then you are an artist.”

“You are not a connoisseur—that much is evident.”

“But these pictures …”

“Lack form, technique, or whatever you like to call it. They are not really very good.”

I had paused before a portrait of a woman. I thought I had seen the face before.

“Well, you like that?”

“Yes. It’s soft and gentle and the expression is … good.”

“What were you going to say before good?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps that she looked helpless, clinging, entirely feminine.”

He nodded and drew me to the next picture.

“Self-portrait.”

There he was. It was a good likeness and I guessed he was an easy subject. The mane of fair hair, the beard, the pride in the expression, and the animal quality—all these would be easy to capture in a facile way. Some of the arrogant power of the man was missing, but that was inevitable.

Then he took me to the table and showed me the canvases there. I saw it. The house. The real Whiteladies. The one

Stirling and I had seen when we climbed the oak trees.