Текст книги "Beyond The Blue Mountains"

Автор книги: Jean Plaidy

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is it right for me to call you by it? Perhaps I will… when we are alone! It will be necessary to remember when others are present. It will be necessary not to show by a look…”

She paused, wondering how he would take this suggestion that love between them was to be no isolated incident.

He said: “I have plunged you into this deceit you who are so young and have been entrusted to my care.”

She laughed softly.

I said I would tell you something, if you would not despise me.”

“Despise you! It is you who should …”

She laid a hand on his lips.

“No,” she said, ‘the fault is with me. It is I who am wicked, abandoned. You see, I could not bear to think of your going miles away. I wanted to see you … so I came to your door … and asked if I could help…”

He was enchanted. He would not know that a woman could be like this. He thought her naive, more innocent than ever. How repulsive were those women like Lucille, who stood guard over a virginity which one had no wish to assail, who handed out favours one did not greatly desire, as though they were the most precious gifts on earth! And here was this girl, this innocent child, giving so freely, and so naively confessing that she wanted to give. He was overcome with tenderness.

“Listen to me, Carolan,” he said. This must never happen again. I cannot understand myself, I must have been possessed by the devil.”

She gazed at him. Physically he was magnificent; his features were not unattractive. She liked his simplicity: the puritan in him appealed to her because Marcus might be many things, but never a puritan. Marcus was a liar and a cheat: he would caress one with his eyes, with his words; he was full of artifice: he would suit his methods to the woman of the moment Why think of Marcus, knowing him to be a cheat? Now here was Mr. Masterman … Gunnar, as she would think of him in future … a man of power in the colony, and a man who was more completely in her power than Marcus could ever be. A simple man, a puritan. A man who had strayed from his virtuous path because he could not resist Carolan Haredon, his convict servant. He did not seek passion; his love was natural and pure as the wind and the sun and the rain; Marcus’s was something grown in a hothouse, cultivated, seeming delightful because so much care had been spent on it, completely artificial. Yet there was no natural recklessness about Gunnar. Why, he had locked both doors leading into his room before he had made love to her! Now Marcus was the essence of recklessness. Marcus was unsafe, and that locking of the two doors was in itself a symbol … a symbol of safety and security which one must enjoy if one walked beside this man. She had learned cunning from Marcus perhaps.

“You see, Carolan,” he said, his brow wrinkled, ‘that there must be no other time. It will be difficult, but I shall go away, I shall spend much time at the stations.”

“Tell me about the stations,” she said.

He was rather slow of speech, reluctant to enthuse, but he gave her a picture of a lonely station surrounded by grasslands where sheep fed and cattle were raised and wild horses tamed. It appealed to something in her. She imagined the two of them living there, cooking their own meals after a day in the open, making love out of doors. Mr. Masterman, the master. When men spoke of him there was awe in their voices. She thought of his trembling before her, whispering that there must be no more; and she smiled, for she knew it was for her to say whether or not there should be any more.

She listened to his description of a muster. She could feel a horse between her knees; she could feel the wind on her cheeks as they galloped … both of them together. He belonged to fresh air and camp fires, and it was pleasant to think of enjoying these things with him.

She was almost happy; if only she could forget this nagging ache for Marcus she could be happy. Gunnar Masterman offered such balm to her wounded vanity. The master who was in the power of his servant. The strong man who could only be weak with her.

She lay against him.

“Tell me more. I want to know all about you.”

He told her about the Swedish mother who had died on the journey across the Atlantic. He had been born, he told her, just over thirty years ago, during that year and this always seemed strange and very significant to him when Lord North became Prime Minister of England, and Captain Cook discovered New South Wales. He was a man, he assured her, who for ever tried to override superstition, but did she not see the significance? Who had been responsible for the loss of the American colonies? Chiefly Lord North and his half-crazy monarch. Who had been responsible for the opening up of this colony? Captain Cook! Did she see now what he meant? He, Gunnar Masterman, had been born in that year when the fate of America and of New South Wales was decided. He had always seen it that way. When he was quite a small boy, he and his sister Greta and his parents had left America for England, for his puritan father had been a staunch loyalist and had no place in the New America. Gunnar remembered only little of his life before the journey across the sea, during which his mother died. It was a new life for them all on the other side of the water; it was a step from moderate prosperity to a desperate privation. The Old Country had little hospitality to offer those of her loyal sons who had fought for her three thousand miles away; there were little reward but vague promises of a chance in the new country discovered by Captain Cook, promises which did not materialize. His father was a strange man; he did not complain; he had tried to make puritans of those people who lived in the fever-infested huts and haunted the low taverns along Thames-side. It was a self-appointed task, and he starved and preached, though at the wharves and on the barges he did work sometimes. It was there by the river that he met his second wife. She was beautiful and abandoned; she picked up a living from the sailors and wharf-men who frequented the taverns. He took her to his shabby little home and married her, because he must have wanted her as his son now wanted his convict servant. Listening, Carolan felt a tenderness for the man and for his son twining itself about her cunning. She saw the eldest of that poor family, a tall, lean boy, almost hungry. They kept a lodging-house by the river at one time a squalid place; but the stepmother could not be weaned from the gin bottle, and the father from the saving of souls; and thus they could not expect to become successful lodging-house keepers. They had several children, and Gunnar, who had hazy recollections of a sunnier life, soon decided that they could not go on living that way. He began to earn money, carrying parcels, loading barges… anything to earn some money.

“I never told anyone else,” he said wonderingly.

“Why do I feel I have to tell you? I think it is because I have fallen in love with you, and you are so generous that it seems wrong not to tell you the truth about myself.”

Carolan felt tears pricking her eyelids and the tenderness within her deepen. I shall never fall in love again, she assured herself. It is well to be loved, but not to love.

He told of winter and the icicles hanging from the gables of the lodging-house, and the cold wind sweeping up from the east, all along the river; pumping water in the yard; chilblains, coughs, colds; some of his brothers and sisters dying off, and his father, preaching in the market place, and his mother, going to bed and refusing to get up until the weather changed. He it was who must wash the children and feed them. Was this Mr. Masterman?

He told of summer. The appalling heat of houses crowded together, and the stench of decaying rubbish in the gutters. Of armies of bed-bugs that could not be kept down himself a campaigning general, a candle his weapon of rats that lived on the stores in the warehouses near the river and who overflowed into the house.

The candles flickered. They would be out in a moment. She had no idea of time, nor did she care. She thought of Lucille, sleeping her drugged sleep in the nearby room, who knew nothing of this man’s life before he had married her; and if he had told her, what would she understand of stinking gutters, of rats and bugs, of a praying father and a drunken mother!

She saw his face, set, determined, and it was easy to see the young Gunnar there, the boy who made up his mind, as he looked across the ill-smelling river, that he would escape.

“You do not wish to go back to England, Gunnar?”

“No!” he said fiercely.

“No!”

“Nor II England for you is poverty, chilblains, and pumping water from a pump in the yard. I know. The water used to freeze, and it was slippery in the yard. You could have cried with the cold, if you had been anyone but yourself, Gunnar. You would never cry at anything; however bad it was, you would only say “I shall escape from this.”

He said: “Why did you not come here ten years ago? Why did I not find you here when I came?”

“You would have married me … a convict! Why, you married Major Gregory’s daughter. It was a good match. It gave you a position in this town.”

He flinched. Now he was uneasy. A moment ago he had forgotten Lucille. Now he must remember she was here, in this very house, a room dividing them.

She wished she had not said that, but she was tactless by nature, and she wanted to know him absolutely.

“I have made you sad.” She moved nearer to him.

“I am sorry. How can you know what you would have done?”

He said reproachfully: “Surely you know that if it had been possible to marry you, I would have asked you to before … before…”

“Before this happened!” she said, and she felt on safe ground now, knowing her man.

“Tell me the rest,” she said.

“When I was nearly eleven, I decided to get away. I felt grown up. My sister, who was nine, could look after the little ones. I hated the lodging-house; it was getting lower and lower. My stepmother was almost always drunk. My father wanted to teach me how to be a preacher; and I saw that if I followed in his footsteps there was nothing for me but poverty.”

“So you ran away, Gunnar?”

“Not until I knew where I would run to. I had a job offered me in an inn in Holborn, and there I was a pot-boy. I was there for a year; then I took up with a travelling salesman. We went about the country with a packhorse; we sold all manner of things, and when I had learned how it was done, I thought how much better it would be if, instead of working for someone else, I worked for myself. So I saved money and I bought goods which I sold again. I was frugal. I never paid for a bed in summer;

I slept under hedges and haystacks and in alleys, and so I saved money.”

She compared him with Marcus. Marcus, choosing the reckless way, the way that led to trouble; Gunnar, choosing the safe and sure road that led to success. Marcus picked pockets and cheated; Gunnar made plans and went without food and bedding. Marcus was a convict, clever and cunning though he might be; Gunnar was a successful man. She had been right to hitch her wagon to this steady star. But she wanted Marcus. She wanted his merriment, his quick wit, his knowledge of life, his passionate eyes and his caressing hands. She half turned away from the man beside her, sick of the whole business, wishing she could go back to that moment when she had stood at his door with the candle in her hand.

She was not listening to him. He had made his little successes and had decided to come to Sydney. He had discovered the government were willing to help men possessed of some small capital who wished to emigrate to New South Wales. There was more hope for a rapid rise there than in the old country, where a man must have, in addition to determined ambition, a string of noble ancestry behind him. So he waited till a passage could be found for him, free of charge on a store ship, and out he came. And the rest was simple, for men such as he was were needed in New South Wales, and his flair for organization had stood him in good stead. He had risen rapidly; he had married Major Gregory’s daughter; he had a fine house in Sydney; he was accepted everywhere. He was Masterman of Sydney.

“It is interesting,” she said, ‘particularly to me. You see, you went gradually up, which is so much more satisfactory than going down as I did.” Briefly she told him the story of her life. He was shocked by the conduct of the squire more so than he was by the injustice of her and her mother’s being thrown into Newgate.

“My poor child!” he said.

“How cruelly life has treated you … and to send you here… to such a monster!”

But she would not have it.

“Please!” With a pretty gesture she laid her fingers on his lips “I believe you are the best thing that has ever happened to me.”

“My poor child … My dear child!”

“Gunnar,” she said, ‘you have no children. Did you want children?”

He did not answer, but held her tightly against him.

“I too,” she said, and she thought, If I had a child, I should cease to think of Marcus, cease to think of Everard. A child… a child of my own! And a child should have a father to whom it could look up. Not a lecher like the squire; not a weak man like Darrell; not an attractive philanderer like Marcus. It was not men like that who made the best fathers. It was the calm men, the practical men, the puritans who would perhaps be a little stern, but firm and wise and kindly.

She wanted to show him how happy he might have been had he, ten years ago, met Carolan Haredon in Sydney instead of Lucille Gregory. How wicked I have grown, thought Carolan. Did Newgate do this to me? Or was the evil there, waiting to grow, and was the Newgate climate such as to nourish it?

He was saying: There is something else I want to tell you, Carolan. You will despise me for this, you who are so truthful and honest.”

“What! You have been dishonest then?”

“My name is really Morton. I changed it when I came out here.”

She said soberly: “Masterman is a good name. I like it, and it suits you. Why should we not choose our own names! It will be a good name to pass on to your children.”

“I shall never have any,” he said. He added desperately: “You must go now, Carolan. You see, it is so difficult, and it was so wrong…”

She said: “Oh, my darling, it is not so easy for me.” And she saw how the endearment delighted him and charmed him. who seemed unable to speak them himself.

“You must go,” he said, ‘you must!”

She moved nearer to him; she put her arms round his neck and pressed her body against his.

“Carolan!” he said.

“My dear…”

He must know that it was not for him to say she should go;

from now on, she would command. She liked him, this master of men. He appealed to her senses, if not to her heart, and her senses were important to her; she had gone too long unloved. She could accept his caresses, even if, as she did so, she might dream of Marcus. To see him, the good man, falling deeper and deeper into what must seem to him unbridled sin, stirred in her that bitter contempt of law and order which Newgate had nurtured in her.

Now he was throwing away every one of those good resolutions he had made but a second ago.

“Gunnar. Please, my dear, do not go away tomorrow. I could not bear that.”

“No,” he said fervently.

“I cannot go. Of course I cannot go tomorrow… Just another day

…”

Carolan went about holding her head high.

Not the woman who has just been thrown over, thought Margery. Not if I know anything about it. And talk about arrogance. She would flounce into the kitchen, for all the world as if she were mistress of the house. Lovely she was though, so that Margery forgave her. Her hair was soft and all shining__and if she wasn’t dressing it up fashionable now! And she had a new frock; and she had secrets in her eyes. Hard as nails she was too. Bright and glittering and beautiful with her mermaid’s eyes green as the sea… icy cold sometimes too!

Golly. thought Margery. Am I to be frightened of her, and that in my own kitchen? Why don’t I have a talk with Mr. Masterman about her? Wasn’t I put in charge down here in the kitchen?

But she was rarely in the kitchen now; she detached herself. She no longer slept in the basement. She had her own room upstairs.

“Mrs. Masterman wants me near her in case she needs me in the night.”

Did you ever hear the like? The mistress doted on her; as for the master, he seemed struck dumb. Not a word in protest had he raised, and him such a stickler for his rules and regulations! So up she had gone, and now she was demanding that Poll should take up her own special bath water!

And this, said Margery to herself, is where I do put me foot down. Bedrooms is one thing; frocks is another … and so is fashionable hair styles; but when it comes to having bath water sent up… that is where I has a word with the master.

But somehow it did Margery good to look at her, even though, when she came flaunting down to the kitchen, it was all she could do to stop herself boxing the girl’s ears. Rather her any day, thought Margery, than that moping Esther. Miserable little slut, whining and praying, getting up every morning white as a sheet; scared out of her natural, that was what she was. Serve her right too! And one of these days the master would have to be told.

“Now tell me, Margery,” he would say, ‘what was this man doing in the house ?”

“I don’t know. I don’t really!” muttered Margery.

“A nice bit of trouble this is. Things is going to happen in this house and happen soon, or I’m very mistook.”

She rocked backwards and forwards, laughing. She hadn’t enjoyed herself so much for a long time.

He came often, that Marcus, and with him that Tom Blake. They couldn’t keep away from Carolan, neither of ‘em. And the haughty piece pretended not to care a jot about them, tossed her head, threw a smile at Tom though, and looked through Marcus as though he wasn’t there. Funny. And funny-I-don’t-think when the master gets to know they’ve been coming here. The cheek of them, coming into the yard to pay visits just like they was gentry. Marcus had a word with Esther, tried to cheer her. told her he’d look after the baby, tried to show her that what had happened wasn’t much, nothing to get frightened about. He would go on talking to the miserable girl, and Mistress Carolan would flounce in, and if looks could kill she would have killed him, but Margery wasn’t born yesterday and she knew how it was with both of them … crying out for each other, that’s what they were. It made you feel funny to see them.

One afternoon Margery was in the shed near the pump when Carolan came into the yard. It wasn’t often that Carolan went into the yard. The summer had faded now and the winter was on them. It was chilly in the yard, but something queer about the way she stood there as though she were waiting for someone, made Margery cautiously shut the shed door and decide to wait and watch. She did not have to wait long before Marcus came swinging into the yard for all the world as though he owned it; and peering through a crack in the door Margery saw his face and she guessed they had arranged this meeting.

Ho! Ho! thought Margery. So it’s making it up, is it, me lovelies! So you’re coming to your senses at last!

“Marcus!” said Carolan.

“Carolan! Carolan!”

The way he said her name was in itself a declaration of love. He had a beautiful voice. She’s hard as nails to say no to a man like that, and her not cut out to do without men no more than I was.

“I want to talk to you about Esther.”

“Is that why you sent for me?”

“She is very unhappy, Marcus. She is thinking of death. I saw her take up a knife and look at it in a longing way, as though she were thinking death would be a way out of her troubles, for life has become unendurable for her.”

“What can I do about that?”

“What can you do? You are the cause of it; you will have to do something.”

Tell me what, Carolan.”

“Marcus, you are a brute! I wish we had never met you. Poor Esther, you have ruined her life. You know how she feels. She believes herself to be utterly damned.”

“You put all the blame on me, Carolan.”

“Because that is where it belongs!”

“Now. now, me lady!” muttered Margery.

“That ain’t fair. It takes two to make a quarrel and it takes two to make a baby; that’s my way of thinking. And to see the way you’ve been treating that Esther, it would seem you thought all the blame was with her!”

“Carolan! Carolan!”

“Oh, please stop saying my name in that way. If it is meant to be affectionate, it does not seem so to me. I see right through you, Marcus. You have no scruples whatever; you are completely without honour; you are absolutely despicable.”

What a tongue she had. And a fool he was, for all that he seemed such a fine gentleman. She wanted him to take her now and not to mind if she kicked or yelled. Let her yell; it would do her good. Let her kick; she was a kicker anyway.

“There is only one thing to do. Esther will die of a broken heart, or she will kill herself. I know Esther. She can never beat the shame of this. You must marry her.”

“Marry her. You talk as though we were in conventional England:

“Esther is conventional, as England made her. You are rotten, as England made you.”

“And you are hard and cruel and cold as ice!”

“I am trying to do the right thing for you both.”

“Carolan, have you no sympathy, no understanding?”

“No sympathy, but complete understanding, I fear. You must marry Esther. Nothing else will make her live. I know her, and I am sure of that.”

“My dear Carolan, you are talking the most ridiculous nonsense. Marry Esther! Have you forgotten that we are convicts?”

“Convict! You! What an evil world this is, when such as you can feather their nests, and such as Esther, innocent Esther, can become your prey! I tell you you shall marry Esther.”

“It is impossible, Carolan.”

“You talked of marrying me.”

“I should have had to arrange it very carefully.”

“Well, this is arranged. I have arranged it.”

“What do you mean? Carolan, you simply do not understand. We are slaves, all of us. We have been here but a short time. We shall have to wait, shall have to prove that we are worthy of marriage.”

“Worthy of marriage! You certainly are not. If Esther were not such a little fool, I should tell her to have nothing more to do with you, to think herself lucky that, though she has been foolish enough to make you the father of her child, you are not her husband.”

Margery chuckled. Ha! Ha! My beauty, you’re giving it away. All that bitterness, and you pretending not to care! You’re jealous … jealous as they make ‘em, and of that snivelling, praying wretch. As for you, me fine gentleman, you’re not so smart. You can’t see what she’s thinking, can you?

“But you see, Carolan, it is impossible; if it were not, I would marry her. She is a sweet girl, and I behaved, as you say, very badly. It is up to me to make amends in the way she wants me to. But it is not possible, for she has been assigned to this house…”

“It is possible. I have spoken to Me Masterman, and I have his consent to your marriage.”

“You… have what…?”

He might well be surprised. Margery almost burst out of the shed. You spoke to Mr. Masterman… you! And who are you to speak to him Didn’t he put me in charge of the kitchen? Isn’t it my place… Carolan had folded her arms across her breast, and she stood there, rocking on her heels, laughing to herself, hating him in a way that was really loving him; and yet stubborn as a mule with the fierceness of a tigress.

“You have spoken to Mr. Masterman… you, Carolan?”

“Oh, yes. Marcus!” Her voice was edged with light laughter, bubbling laughter that was somehow sharp and meant to cut into his pride, murder any hopes he might have had.

“Mr. Masterman and I are friendly… very friendly indeed.

Margery let loose an expletive. She clapped her hands over her mouth; her face was purple with fury; her hands itched. Had she been neat the whip that hung over the mantelpiece she would have reached for it and she would have laid it about those insolent shoulders. She was speaking in that way of the master!

“I am sure,” she said, haughty now, verily the mistress of the house and the yard and of the kitchen and of him and of herself, ‘that I can arrange it satisfactorily.”

Marcus was taken off his guard.

He said: “I see.” Then he burst out: “You… you slut! So that is it. I see. I might have seen before. How long?” And those two words betrayed his defeat, his love for her.

“What is that to you?”

“It makes me laugh!”

“I am glad you are amused; though why you should be I quite fail to see.”

“You, my haughty Carolan … and that… puritan! His name stands for virtue in the town. Tell me, Carolan, how did you manage to seduce the fellow?”

She flashed out angrily: “How dare you talk in this way I He is a better man than you will ever be. I am happy now. Why should we not? He is in love with me.”

“I do not doubt it, Carolan. Masterman. The prude! The puritan! I shall split my sides with laughing.”

“It would be the best thing that could happen to you if you. killed yourself with laughing. For Esther too, I am thinking!”

“Carolan__forgive me I It is so funny … so funny. You and Masterman. You will have to play your cards very carefully, my dear.”

“Do not dare to breathe a word of this to anyone!”

“Oh, Carolan, Carolan!”

“If you do, I will have it known that you are a cheat and a liar. I will see to it that you are punished. I will see…”

“Ah! I see Masterman’s mistress will rule the town!”

“You heard what I said. I mean it. Breathe a word of what…”

“… of what you have so indiscreetly told me …”

“Breathe a word of it, and I will… I will have you beaten to death. I will…”

“It is blackmail! I keep quiet then about you, and you keep quiet about me. What a pretty pair we are, are we not? So admirably suited!”

Margery thought the girl was going to cry, for all she held her head so high. And as for him, he was heartbroken, for all the cruel lashings of his tongue. Oh yes, they were crying out for each other, and in spite of everything Margery could have wept for them.

“Enough of this,” said Carolan, and turned from him. Through the crack in the cornet of the shed, Margery saw her, face, saw her lips quiver.

“You and Esther can be married soon.”

“Carolan!” He was beside her, his hands on her shoulders, forcing her round to look at him.

Now! thought Margery. Now! She’s yours now for the taking … the wanton. The waster! I don’t believe that. I wasn’t born yesterday. That’s just to aggravate him, that is!

“Well?” her voice rapped out at him.

“What is it? Please take your hands off me.”

“And if I will not? Doubtless you will call your lover to horsewhip me!”

“You have no right to be here! You behave as though you are a free man instead of a felon.”

“Would your mistress think you had a right to be what you are did she know?”

“Please go at once. You are insolent.”

“I am mourning, Carolan. I am mourning for a sweet and beautiful girl whom I loved … Carolan, whose handkerchief I still carry close to my heart.”

“Were you carrying it when you seduced Esther?”

There was a confession, if he could but read the meaning behind her words. She was jealous as fury, that girl; and her daring to let the master make love to her!

I carry it always. I shall burn it when I get back. It means nothing now.”

“A pity to waste good linen. Give it to Esther, or, whoever occupies your affections at this moment.”

“I would not keep it now. Every time I looked at it it would remind me of you and your puritan together. But, Carolan, I can see you are a wise woman. Play your cards cleverly, my dear, and you may do very well for yourself.”

Thank you, Marcus. But I happen to be in love, and playing cards well or otherwise does not come into this.”

She walked towards the shed, so abruptly that Margery thought she had seen her and was coming in to denounce her. Margery’s knees began to shake. Suppose she told’ Mr. Masterman that Margery was a very unsatisfactory person to leave in charge of the kitchen! Suppose she told of laxness, of James’s coming into the basement at night! She was a power in the house. No wonder she gave herself airs and graces! She was mistress of the house.

She looked over her shoulder.

She said: “We will make the arrangements for the wedding. And we shall make them promptly. It will be well for Esther’s sake to get done with the business as soon as possible.”

She flounced into the house, and he stood looking at her, like a man who has lost everything he most wanted.in life. Queer, Margery wanted to go out and comfort him, but she dared not. She was bewildered. She did not understand life in this place as she had thought she did. Things went on under her nose, and she did not see them. She had to be careful. The house had a new mistress.

She waited until he had walked away; then she went into the kitchen. She could hear Carolan in the communal bedroom talking to Esther.

“What I want is a good strong cup of tea,” said Margery aloud. She made it, and all the time she was doing so she thought of her red hair and green eyes and the master, noticing her, trying not to let her get him at first, and then… and then… Margery laughed. Perhaps he wasn’t only half a man after all. Well she liked him for it, so there!

As for her, the arrogant piece, fancy making the master fall in love with her, and him always such a good man and always doing the right thing! But come to think of it the good ones were as bad as the others. Look at Miss Mealy Mouth saying Yes please, to the first man that asked her!

But the master and that Carolan. Well, could you blame him?

“I don’t!” said Margery, stirring her tea.

“And come to think of it, I don’t blame her either!”

When Lucille Masterman came out of a drugged sleep she talked to Carolan.

There is a change in him. Do you not see it?”

“A change? I see no change.”

“Ah. but you do not know him as I do. There is a change, I assure you. He rarely comes in here now. He is very absent-minded. He was never that before. Carolan. there are times when I have a feeling that he does not mind how ill I am, that he does not care whether I recover or not.”