The Tartan Touch (6 page)

He gathered up the sleeping-bags and threw them in the back of the ute, while I doused the fire and covered the remains with soil in case an ember should spark into life after we had gone, I took a last look round our camp of the night and felt a certain sadness. I had enjoyed my first taste of the Australian bush, It had been a brave interlude before the reality of being Mrs
.
Fraser on Mirrabooka.

The names of the places had a weird sound, not that
there were many places in fact. We went through Mount Magnet, which
Mr.
Fraser said was nearly home, and a place called Cue, followed by Big Bell, the old mining centre, and we still drove on and on. Then quite suddenly, in the middle of nowhere in particular, Mr. Fraser pushed his hat further down over his eyes and said in exultant tones, “This is Mirrabooka! From now on every inch of land belongs to us.”

I looked about eagerly, but there were only the grey-green mulga trees to look at, just as there had been for mile upon mile behind us. Only the dazzling gypsum flats of Lake Austin had been any different. Lake Austin only held water if the rains had been exceptionally good, which was rare on the Murchison, and so the railway and the road both run slap through the middle of it.

“It’s—it’s very dry,” I said. Try as I would, I couldn’t keep the disappointment out of my voice.

“Right,” Mr. Fraser agreed laconically
.
“But you soon get to see the other things apart from the dust and the mulga.” He began to point out the different vegetation, taking great trouble with my ignorance. There were more varieties of trees than I would have believed, such as sandalwood, and what he called oak trees, and desert oaks, and cork oaks, gidge, kurrajong, quandong, native poplars and native pines, and, in the dried up creeks, were river and salmon gums. He even showed me a yeelbar tree, a rarity on the Murchison. It had a bright white trunk and leaves that divided into three, but there were none to be seen just then, for it shed its leaves in winter and it now had a vivid red blossom which went before the leaves would come again.

“It’s a fine country, don’t you think?” he said.

I tried to answer him
.
I tried to find the words that would please him in his pride in this great heat-scorched land of his. But there were none that came to me. I longed for the tender hues of Scotland; the blues and greens and the purple of the heather and the distant hills. I was sick with longing, or I thought that I was.

His grey eyes studied me seriously. He was plainly at a loss to know what to do with me.

“Four years isn’t a very long time, is it?” I said bravely.

“It depends,” he murmured.

“Ay,” I sighed, “but the seasons won’t mark the years here, stirring up longings for other things. In the manse, I would long to be free, often and often, wicked as I knew such thoughts to be, with my father ailing and there being only me at hand to nurse him—”

“And now you find yourself in a new prison?” he said dryly.

I looked about me again at the harsh prospect of Mirrabooka.

“I’m not so daft!” I denied with spirit. “You shouldn’t heed me blethering on about things that can’t be changed! If I were back at the manse, I’d be sick for the sight of this country, In an apple orchard I’d long for an orange—”

“And here you long for an apple?” he supplied for me
.

I smiled, ashamed of myself. “If it were crisp and juicy,” I confessed.

To my surprise, he seemed more amused than angry, “I think we can find you some apples at the Homestead,” was all he said. “First thing, I’ll fetch them to you myself!”

I shook my head at him, rebuking him with a look. But I no longer felt the coldness of the outsider and I thought perhaps I could love his land a lit
tl
e after all.

“I thought we’d have little else but mutton to eat,” I confided, I hoped subtly changing the subject.

“Oh, my word, no! Almost anything can be kept in the freezer these days. We have turkey and home-made hams, beef as well as lamb, and even the odd crayfish flown up from Geraldton!”

Try as I would, I couldn’t restrain my laughter. “And apples!” I said.

“And apples!” he confirmed. “Especially apples!” And thus it was that he brought me home to Mirrabooka, ostensibly as his wife, and I had my first sight of the house where he lived, the place I was tied to until his ward, Mary Fraser, came of age and could take her own place in the world.

CHAPTER FOUR

Mirrabooka w
as an awkward kingdom. Mr. Fraser, the king, ruled with an easy hand, but until now he had had no consort to run the house other than as the bachelor quarters of a busy man who spent the greater part of his days out of doors. It had all been different, he told me, when his mother had been there, but since his father had died, she had married again and seldom visited the Murchison,

To my eyes, it was a house of stature
.
It was built on a single floor, with plenty of rooms, most of them furnished with some of the loveliest furniture I had ever seen, some of it really old and brought from Scotland with the first of the Australian Frasers. But it was the gadgets that truly amazed me. There was a gadget for everything! The whole house was air-conditioned, but that was only a beginning
.
There were deep-freezers, refrigerators, store cupboards to make one gasp—even an electric kettle and an electric coffee percolator, the
li
ke of which I had never even thought of possessing. At the manse, we had only the kitchen range and we were grateful for it.

It was sizzling hot outside and there wasn’t a sheep in sight as we drove up the front of the house. Mr. Fraser came round to my side of the old ute and held out his hand to me.

“I reckon it would be out of place to carry you ove
r
the threshold,” he said.

“I should think so!” I retorted.

“Pity,” he said, without a glimmer of a smile
.

“
Oh no!” I exclaimed. “I can stand on my own two feet!” I hesitated, wondering how it was that I was in two minds as to whether I should
like
him to carry me into the house. “The MacTaggarts—”

“Are independent to the point of being stubborn!” he finished for me.

“And just as well too!” I came back quickly.
“
We’re not ones to have romantic notions about a great deal of nonsense!”

He gave me a truly wicked look through his grey steel eyes. “An apple a day keeps the doctor away!” he taunted me.

It was base of him to take advantage of my weakness, There’s not a body in the world who doesn’t feel, the pull of his own native land. I professed not to have heard him, for my pride was somewhat dented, and, ignoring his outstretched hand, I took my first step on Mirrabooka soil.

The coolness of the air-conditioning was as soft as the water from the
burn
that ran past the manse
.
Outside the sun and the Frasers could c
ru
sh my spirits, but inside I felt the advantages were all mine. I could breathe again.

“Well?” Mr. Fraser asked me as I looked around in amazement.

But I never answered him, for a young girl came slowly into the room.

“So you’re back!” she said to Mr. Fraser.

“With a wife,” Andrew returned through clenched teeth.

The young girl laughed. “I’ve heard all about
her
!” she said with contempt. “Mother says she’ll never do as Mrs
.
Andrew Fraser!”

“Mary
!
” Andrew rapped out, in a voice I had never heard before and never wanted to hear again.

I stopped him with a look. Mary Fraser was a beauty of some note. Her brave red hair could compete with any that had set the Highlands on fire, any that I had seen at least. It was no wonder that he wanted to keep her near him. I wanted to feast my own eyes on that vivid colour, which was only matched by the grass-green of her eyes.

“Are you Mary Fraser?” I asked her gently. “I am Kirsty.”

She didn’t want to smile at me, but I imagine she was naturally charming and found it hard to be anything else, even when her loyalty to her mother drove her.

“Kirsty MacTaggart?” she said with amusement.

“Kirsty Fraser,” Andrew put in, his temper still hot in his eyes.

“Ay, Kirsty MacTaggart,” I agreed calmly. “That’s the name I was
born
with and it suits me well.”

Mary laughed. “Yes, it does,” she said positively. “It’s funny, coming from the same place as my mother. You’re not at all alike!”

I raised my eyebrows. “Nor are you and Mr. Fraser, come to that!” I retorted.

Mary was intrigued. “
Mr.
Fraser,” she repeated, “I like that! It suits you, Andy. It suits your autocratic manner. Perhaps that’s what I shall call you?”

He glared at us both, “Don’t you dare! One foolish female is enough to bear with at a time!”

Mary grinned at him. “Who’d have thought you’d find a wife cute enough to beat you at your own game!” she teased him.

“She has decent manners,” he reproved her.

“Too right,” she drawled. She turned her laughing eyes on me. “Though my mother doesn’t think so,” she added.

I blushed painfully. “I can’t think why I said w
h
at
I did,” I confessed wretchedly. “I shall apologise to your mother, of course, when she comes—”

“When she comes?” Mary said on a note of enquiry.

“Did you not know? She said
she
was coming on a visit quite soon,” I told her.

She looked at me in blank astonishment. “And you’ll allow it?” she said.

“But of course she must come,” I said with dignity “Whatever made you think otherwise?”

The girl shrugged, “She’s not the most popular character on the Murchison,” she said bluntly, “She always thinks everyone wants to keep her away.”

“Nonsense!” I said flatly. “She’s your mother. Isn’t that reason enough for her to visit whenever she cares to?”

The Frasers exchanged glances, “You might bite off more than you can chew,” Andrew warned me, but he didn’t seem displeased by my attitude.

Mary was more specific. “It’s
fatal
to be humble with my mother!” she insisted.

I thought of the Camerons I had known back home, folk who must have been her close relations. Margaret Cameron held no terrors for me.

“Your mother will always be welcome here while I’m mistress of this house,” I said with finality. Andrew started and I was hard put to it not to blush and give the game away. I could boast all I liked, we both knew that while he was the master of Mirrabooka, I would never be mistress there.

Mary decided herself to show me the house. She took me first to Andrew’s bedroom which his parents had once shared.

“I expect you’ll be sleeping in here,” she said easily. “I’
ll
tell them to bring your luggage in just as soon as you’ve seen the whole house.”

I winced away from my own thoughts. “Andrew and I prefer not to share a room,” I said tautly.

Her green eyes glittered. “I don’t know what Andy will say to that!”

I fell into the trap, daft as I am, because I was curious to know everything I could about Andrew Fraser. “Why not?” I said.

She laughed out loud
.
“Don’t you know
anything
about Andy? He’s the greatest catch in Western Australia. Oh my, Kirsty, you’ve got a lot to answer to to all the girls round here
!”

“You mean—you mean Andrew is popular?” I suggested with difficulty.

“Popular!” she echoed. “The girls all tie themselves in knots merely to
dance
with him. And he knows it!”

“Are there so few men on the Murchison?” I asked her.

“Good gracious!” she said slowly. “Where have you
been
?
Don’t you know what mining towns are like? They’re full of men! And we have more to do with them than most of the Cockies, because Andy has mining interests apart from everything else. But leaving them out of it, there are all the other station owners, and their managers, and that’s just a start! It isn’t the competition that’s lacking, but
they
haven’t got Andy’s looks, nor his wool cheque!”

“Is he—is he dreadfully rich?” I asked awkwardly.

Her expressive eyes gave me a comprehensive look. “Bearably so!” she giggled. “But it isn’t only that! The thing is that Andy gives the appearance of being the strong, silent type. Right? But underneath he’s like some Eastern Pasha. There’s hardly a girl found here that he hasn’t had his name linked to at one time or another.”

I swallowed. “I doubt there’s a great deal of gossip—”

“
And some!”

“Well then—” I began.

“You don’t believe me!”
sh
e said reproachfully. “Well, you can, you know. He could have had his pick of any girl for miles around!”

He already had! But I could hardly tell her that. It must be hard for Andrew, I figured, to have to live under the same roof with his true love, and her a raving beauty, and never to give her a suspicion of how he felt
.

“Andrew Fraser is a fine man!” I said with such conviction that I was immediately embarrassed by my own vehemence.

“Well, naturally you’d think so!” she teased me. “
C
ome on and see the rest of the house!”

She showed me her own room and I thought how different it was from anything I had known in my father’s manse. There was a whole battery of photographs of young men, covering practically the whole of one wall. My father would have skelped me for only knowing their names, but there’s safety in numbers and Mary had enough to show herself to be completely heartwhole. She was blissfully unconscious of my instinctive disapproval, and that was something to be grateful for. My father’s ghost was to stay in the manse in Scotland. This was a new country and a new life and his ways were foreign to it. I would be foolish to allow his ideas to hold me back in the face of my own reasoning.

So I was quiet in the face of the luxury that pervaded the whole house. In time, I thought, I would manage the electric cleaners as well as anyone else. Why not? It would never have occurred to Mary, or even to the Aboriginal maid, that my instincts would have led me to go down on my knees to scrub those vast expanses of corridors. No one ever scrubbed anything here, which was not to say that everything wasn’t beautifully kept, for it was
.