Back with the Family, she related her encounter while they ate the baked opossum Keeper had speared. She learned that George was the son of an important person, the local governor. He was out of favor because all he wanted to do was paint pictures, instead of anything more productive. Because his family was wealthy he could get away with it, but he remained an embarrassment. They wanted him to get a trade, marry, and become a solid white citizen.
Several days later she had seen him again, painting a handsome tree. Rebel had not realized the tree was handsome until she saw his painting. He could fathom the inner spirit of a tree as he did that of a person, and render it on parchment. She smiled at him, and saw him melt. He was already smitten with her. She delighted again in having that effect on a young man. He was a White Settler, while she was just a tawny native girl, but in this respect she had power over him.
This time she proffered another kind of deal: language. She knew how to talk English, but also knew she was clumsy, with a strong “barbaric” accent. That made her an object of tacit ridicule when she had to interact with the white settlers. She wanted to do something about that.
She broached the matter directly. “Teach me to talk like an English Lady,” she said. “I will give you this.” She took his hand and set it on her bare breast.
George almost fainted, but soon enough the deal was made. She let him feel her all over as he drilled her on correct British pronunciation. She was an apt student, and within a year she could talk his language as well as anyone could, and he knew her body as well as any stranger could. He never tired of refreshing his awareness of it, however.
When hands were no longer enough, she let him use his mouth, kissing her lips, breasts, and buttocks. His stiff desire was almost painful for her to witness, but she pretended not to notice. They had come to know each other about as well as a white and a native could, considering that any such association was frowned on by both sides. They were, in their fashion, friends. And of course he was in love with her, though he knew she was older, and married, as well as being native. Hopeless in three ways.
But she no longer needed his lessons, so the deal was over. George was desperate. She was, it seemed, the only woman he had this sort of relationship with, or even wanted it with, and he didn’t want to give it up. He knew she didn’t love him, but that she would honor any deal she made. “What do you want?” he asked. “Anything! Please!”
She considered. This was not a contact or an offer to be lightly dismissed, and she did like him personally. Thus it was that their relationship advanced to the next level. In exchange for useful tools and supplies, she gave him sex, guiding him gently through his initial nervous clumsiness. She realized that this was a significant part of his attraction to her: she never misunderstood him, made fun of him, or denied him. He could do anything with her, and she accepted and encouraged it with grace in a manner she knew a white woman would not. She was not at all wary of an erect penis, or dismissive of one that was less turgid following orgasm. She did not protest when he buried his face in her cleft, sucked on her nipples, or poked his finger into her rectum. None of her orifices were forbidden to his exploration or possession.
He reveled in it, and she liked it well enough. He was so eager, so enthusiastic, so teachable. He soon learned how to arouse her, to make her climax by using his tongue, which was something her husband Harbinger seldom did. George was thrilled to make her react in this manner, knowing she was not pretending; it shifted some of the interactive power to him and simulated the love he truly desired from her. As affairs went, this was very good.
What, then, of Harbinger? That was another aspect of a more complicated situation. Rebel was sterile, and could not give him children. She felt guilty. At first it had not bothered him; affected as men were by her appearance, he had insisted on marrying her anyway, though her sister Haven was really a better match for him. But as time passed it bothered him more. She knew she would have to leave him, to free him to marry Haven and have a family. But he refused to hear of it.
Thus, slowly, had developed the tacit compromise. Rebel went shopping for things the Family really needed, paying for it in the way she had. When she did, Haven went to him, giving him what Rebel was taking elsewhere. He knew it, and was not entirely easy with it, but they did need the items, especially the tools and food, as drought and restriction to the worst lands made them hungry. It was not as if Haven was a bad exchange. She was full-fleshed and accommodating, and she genuinely liked him and would have married him had he not preferred Rebel. He had always liked her too, and this gave him access to both of them. He never would have done it, had they not been desperate, but it had its compensations.
There was nothing like going chronically hungry to adjust attitudes, even those relating to sex and marriage. Both women were skilled foragers, using their digging sticks to get many kinds of tubers, and picking many nuts, fruits and collecting seeds. But the drought made the pickings increasingly slim, and they had to compromise.
Now Rebel reached George’s house. She checked to be sure no one was in the area, then knocked lightly at the rear door. Surely by this time George’s family had caught on that he had a woman, but this was permissible providing he was discreet. It was the way of British men, and to this extent George was conforming to the pattern expected of him.
He heard her and opened the door immediately. She stepped into his glad embrace. “Oh, Rebel! I missed you so!”
“It has been only three days,” she reminded him.
“I miss you when it’s only three hours!” He kissed her hungrily. “But why are you here? I wasn’t expecting you until next week. I have no food.” For normally she came to him once a fortnight, giving him a good evening.
“I’ll explain in a moment,” she said. She had decided that it would be better to handle the sex first, then discuss the problem when his mind was less distracted.
Soon she was naked and on his raised bed. The shorter time since their last connection did not seem to dampen his ardor at all. He licked her breasts and plunged into her, not trying to make her climax with him. It was a pattern they had discovered: his first exuberant effort warmed her up while taking off his desperate edge, and then the second or the third brought her to her own orgasm without stress. He loved all of it.
After he spent, and relaxed, and fetched her some of the white’s bread and jam she liked, she broached it. “A white family has been killed. We didn’t do it, but know we will be blamed. We’ll be wiped out. Can you help?”
He was silent a moment, pondering. She knew why: if the Family got killed, she would be dead too, and he would have no lover anymore. He had strong personal motive to do something, if anything could be done.
“I must ask Father,” he said. “I must tell him of you. He can act, if he chooses to.”
“But does your father want to know about your connection to me?” she asked, sipping the ale he provided. It was strong stuff, making her dizzy, which was why she took it cautiously. She had to conduct business with a clear head. “I mean, surely he does know, but he wouldn’t want it to be openly recognized. I’m native.” As if he didn’t know. It was simply a reminder that there were cautions about letting this personal association be more widely known.
“It’s not that, exactly. Lots of men have native mistresses. The–the girls don’t make demands.”
And that was an advantage for a man, as well she understood. The native girls were compliant and obliging, knowing their place. Having no choice. “Unlike me,” she said with irony.
He choked. “I didn’t mean it like that! I love you!”
“I’m teasing,” she said gently. “We have always understood the basis for our relationship.”
“No we haven’t.”
She rained an eyebrow in the British manner she had learned. “Haven’t?”
“I understand your basis,” he said doggedly. “You need things. You pay for them. I love the way you pay for them. You’ll do anything I ask, and some
things I wouldn’t dare ask, and some things I wouldn’t even know to ask. You seem to exist to give me pleasure. Which is why I’m so thrilled when I somehow manage to give you pleasure. That gives me more joy than anything else. But you don’t understand my basis.”
He was evidently talking about something other than sex. This could be mischief. “And what is yours?”
“I want to marry you.”
Mischief indeed. “George—”
“I know, I know! You’re older, you’re married, you’re native. I don’t care about any of that. You’re the only woman I can relate to with comfort. I love you and I want to marry you.”
“There is one more thing,” she reminded him gently. “I’m barren.”
“Yes. So you can be with me with no risk. I bless your barrenness.”
This was new. She had assumed that he never thought about pregnancy or babies. Most men didn’t, with mistresses. “So even if I were British and single and your age, I would not be suitable for you in that manner. Your family would never let you marry me.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
“I am not sure I understand.”
“It’s political. We just got our independence. Australia is now a Commonwealth nation, instead of a Territory. We’ll be running our own affairs.”
“Affairs,” she agreed, smiling.
“I mean politically. It’s not the same.”
She kissed him. “I was teasing again. I know the language, thanks to you. But how does that relate to you and me? We remain in opposite camps.”
“And our people mistreat yours horribly. I hate that. But we pretend it isn’t so. That we treat you well.”
She laughed. “Good luck making that case!”
“Father wants to make it. To show that we settlers are not the bigots the British are. He might let me marry you, to prove how well we treat you people. It’s a lie, but truth hardly matters in politics.”
That was something dramatically fresh and different. She needed to think about it. So she made time by distracting him with the second episode of sex. She kissed him and stroked him, wrapping her legs about him, and in due course had him worked up to another eruption within her. It wasn’t as if he had any objection to her effort, whatever her reason.
“Oh, Rebel!” he gasped. “It’s no lie that I love you!”
She needed to discuss this with her family. But first she had to get this quite clear. “George, would you marry me, if your father allowed it?”
“Yes! Oh, Rebel—”
“I have not said I would do it. I just want to know what the prospects are.”
“Would you do it?”
“If that were the way to save my family, yes I would.”
“Then I’ll ask Father! To save your people, and to let me marry you.”
“Tell me what he says.” She kissed him again. “George, it seems unlikely that he will agree. Don’t get your hope up.”
“There’s nowhere else for my hope to be. I know that to you it’s just another payment for a service. I’m willing, nay, eager to have you on that basis. Rebel, Rebel, if I married you, maybe in time you would come to love me. Please say it’s possible.”
That much she could grant. “It’s possible.”
“I’m so happy!”
“You’re welcome.” She did fear that both of them were in for serious disappointment, for different reasons.
“But there’s one thing.”
“Oh?”
“Father might make demands.”
“Fathers do,” she agreed wryly.
“You would have to dress like us, stay in town, and not see your people.”
“But you wouldn’t tell if I sneaked out on occasion to see them.”
“I wouldn’t,” he agreed. “But also—”
“What?”
He changed his mind. “Maybe not.”
She didn’t like this. “What?” she repeated.
He fidgeted. “Your religion, for one thing. You would have to be Christian.”
“What is entailed?”
“Going to Church on Sundays. Believing in Jesus Christ our Savior. No more plant spirits and things.”
“I would have to profess belief in your god in the sky,” she said.
“Yes.”
He had not picked up on the distinction between professing belief and actually believing. She knew just enough of the British religion to know that it had all kinds of strictures that they routinely ignored, like not killing, or lusting after a neighbor’s wife, or taking their lord’s name in vain, so she wasn’t concerned. She could be that kind of hypocrite when she needed to be. But she had the feeling that this was not the whole of his concern. “What else?”
“Maybe I’m being paranoid. No need to speak of it.”
So there was something, but he was extremely reluctant to express it. That was unusual, because she was the one to whom he expressed his deepest feelings most openly. She decided to let it pass. She would figure it out in due course. “No need,” she agreed.
They made love again, and this time she climaxed with him, powerfully. That pleased them both. Then she dressed and departed, so that he could go immediately to his father. She was not sure what would come of this, but it wasn’t as if she had a choice. If this worked, they would survive. It was in the end that simple.
“So George will brace his father, who can save us,” Rebel concluded. “But I may have to marry him and separate from you, my family.”
“Oh, Rebel,” Craft said sympathetically.
“I would rather do that than have us all killed.”
“It’s a point,” he agreed.
“So if I do that, Haven will have to marry Harbinger.”
There was a brief silence. Then Haven spoke. “Maybe we can manage that.”
So it was working out between them. “I will go in the morning to learn the decision,” Rebel said. “I may not return.”
“In that case you are mine tonight,” Harbinger said.
She was. He had impassioned sex with her, but she had the impression it wasn’t love. For one thing, it was all his, with no concern for her experience. When he was done he fell right to sleep. He had become reconciled to the inevitable. At the moment he was merely proving that he still desired her, for the record, as it were. So it did seem time. It was best for all of them, and not just because it enabled their survival. Or that Harbinger and Haven were falling in love. Or that George truly loved Rebel, and had become a better lover than Harbinger. These were all details in a larger picture.
In the morning she dressed well and walked to town. She tapped on George’s door. He was ready. “He wants to see you,” he said. “He’s considering it.”
Probably to be sure she wasn’t a dirty bare creature speaking pidgin English. She could reassure him on that score. “I will see him,” she agreed.
“Mother will dress you.”
“Mother?”
“Yes, dear.” It was an older woman, speaking from behind him. Rebel had not realized that he had company today. “You must be presentable.”
Mother had come prepared. She garbed Rebel in underwear, chemise, and an uncomfortably tight corset, overset by a full-length dress. Rebel’s breathing was restricted, but she didn’t complain. She had more important concerns than this. “Thank you,” she said faintly.
“You are a pretty one,” Mother remarked as she combed and arranged Rebel’s hair and fastened it in place with a number of little pins. “And you speak well. That’s good.”
“Thank you,” Rebel repeated.
“You will be expected to mix socially, smiling and impressing others with your manner. You will warmly endorse the treatment your people are receiving. Do you understand?”
“Oh, yes,” Rebel agreed. “I am a woman.” She did not add that this meant she knew how to lie. It wasn’t necessary.
“My husband has his little ways,” the woman continued. “Accommodate them if you can, dear.”
“I will do wh
atever I am supposed to do.”
“Perhaps.”
Rebel realized that she was missing something, again. What was it that they would not speak of directly?
The last things were a hat and shoes. Both were heavy and hot. The shoes had heels that were higher than the toes, forcing her to balance uncomfortably on them. Rebel felt as if she were confined in a portable cage. She reminded herself yet again that this was necessary to save her people. It wasn’t as though she were alone; Mother wore a similar outfit.
George brought up a coach drawn by a horse. Mother guided Rebel into it. They sat inside its cramped compartment as it clattered along the road. Was this really worth it?
“It is only for formal occasions, dear,” Mother said, evidently reading her expression. “At other times we wear comfortable clothing.”
“Formal? But I thought he just wanted to see me, to be sure I’m not a savage.”
“That too, dear.”
They arrived at the governor’s mansion, which was a larger house. Mother held Rebel’s elbow firmly as they stepped down out of the coach. That was just as well, because Rebel was in danger of losing her balance.
The governor met them in what Rebel thought might be the drawing room, though she saw no drawings there. He was a hale man of some girth, with impressive sideburns, a daunting figure.
“Father, this is Rebel,” George said. “The woman I would like to marry.”
Rebel made a British curtsy. This was part of the language she had learned.
The governor looked Rebel over, and she realized he was seeing not the layers of clothing but the flesh beneath it. She had seen that kind of gaze before, many times. He was sizing her up as a sex object. Suddenly she understood what neither George nor his mother were speaking of directly. The man was a lecher, and he wanted a piece of her.
Well, if that were part of the price of saving her people, she could do it. Assuming George and his mother could handle it. It was an area she understood. The man would arrange private trysts with her, knowing that her barrenness eliminated most of the risk, and she would maintain his favor and the welfare of her people by obliging him. She would be discreet, never causing anyone embarrassment. In time—weeks, months, or years—his interest would move on to some newer, younger woman, and she would be free of him.