Dulcie gulped back a gasp, put the breakfasts down on the table and hurried out again to get the others.
She was staggered, not just that Ross had been right, but that Bruce was big enough to admit it. She didn’t think that many men would be so honest. She waited breathlessly, half expecting Ross to come back with some smug remark, but he didn’t.
‘Next time you feel there’s something wrong with one of my animals, just tell me,’ Bruce said, his voice softer now. ‘There’s a right and a wrong way to go about everything, and you’ve got a knack of getting up anyone’s nose. After you’ve finished your breakfast you can unpack your stuff, unless you really want to go. You’ve got the makings of a good stockman, and I don’t want to lose you.’
‘Thanks, boss,’ Ross replied. ‘I didn’t want to have to go.’
‘Men!’ Betty exclaimed a little later when she got up. ‘They’re all as stubborn as mules. I had to make Bruce go and check the cow himself this morning, just in case Ross was right. He didn’t want to, and the lad would have shot off without even a goodbye. Still, it’s all over now. Let’s hope we don’t have any more nastiness like that again, it twists me up inside.’
‘Me too,’ Dulcie agreed, hoping this wouldn’t make Ross even more big-headed now. ‘Are you feeling better now?’
Betty smiled. ‘There wasn’t much the matter with me, I just thought it best to keep out the way. I hope Ross has learned his lesson though, my Bruce won’t stand for anyone trying to tell him how to run his farm, not even me.’
Late in the afternoon Dulcie went over to the cattle pens because another calf had been born during the morning. Ross was there, raking out dirty straw, so she admired the new calf, watched it for a little while, then went over to see the cow that had caused the trouble.
Her stitched wound was a bit puffy and red in one small area, yet when Dulcie had looked at her the previous day she didn’t think it was like that then, or Bruce would have noticed it himself. She asked Ross what made him think something was wrong. ‘I don’t know,’ he shrugged. ‘Just a feeling, but the same feeling tells me she’s on the mend now too.’
‘It wasn’t very smart to be such a know-all with Bruce,’ she reproved him gently. ‘If you hadn’t turned out to be right, you’d have been gone by now.’
‘Would you have cared?’ he asked, his head down.
‘Of course I would,’ she said.
‘But does that mean you’d still be my girl?’
Dulcie blushed, he had never referred to her as his girl before. ‘It would be difficult to be that if you went miles away,’ she said.
‘So you wouldn’t have left with me then?’
Dulcie was about to retort that of course she wouldn’t have, but she stopped herself just in time, realizing that implied she didn’t care, which wasn’t so. ‘Would you have wanted me to?’ she asked.
He blushed then and turned his head away. ‘Yeah, I reckon so,’ he mumbled.
A sweet, warm feeling ran through her, she moved closer to him and put her hand on his arm. ‘I didn’t know you felt that way,’ she said in a low voice.
He lifted one hand and touched her cheek very softly, his eyes meeting hers. ‘I don’t know how to say stuff like that,’ he said. ‘I thought you’d just feel it.’
She needed that clarified. Was he trying to say he loved her? ‘I thought you saw me as just a friend,’ she said.
‘You are that too,’ he replied, then paused as if searching for the right words to explain what he meant. ‘But you’re special. I want you with me for ever,’ he finally blurted out.
‘You mean, like, getting married?’ she asked, her voice hardly more than a whisper.
He nodded. ‘But I don’t know how, we wouldn’t have anywhere to live, would we? Not unless we moved away from here.’
Dulcie was thrown into confusion. Not only was that the last thing she expected to hear today, but in her mind proposals were supposed to be made by moonlight, with all problems swept away by the couple’s desire for one another. Yet here they were on a grey June day, by a stinking cow pen, and Ross hadn’t even taken her in his arms to show her this was an important moment.
‘Other couples get round that sort of thing,’ she stammered out.
‘You mean you would marry me?’ he asked, his tawny eyes full of surprise and delight. ‘Really, Dulcie? You aren’t kidding me?’
His face was suddenly transformed. A smile was spreading from ear to ear, that wary look she was so used to, gone. He was handsome now, every feature softened, his eyes sparkling. ‘I can’t believe it,’ he gasped. ‘I want to hug you but I can’t ‘cos I’m so dirty.’
It was only then that Dulcie noticed he was filthy, his hands, forearms and clothes all daubed with dirt and cow manure, he even had bits of straw in his hair. ‘Maybe we ought to wait then until you’re cleaned up,’ she said laughingly. ‘I don’t expect you smell so good either.’
‘I’ll take you out after supper tonight,’ he said eagerly. ‘We’ll go to the Pier Hotel.’
Dulcie leaned forward and kissed his grubby cheek. She felt as though a million bubbles were bursting inside her, and she didn’t know how she was going to go back to the house and prepare a meal as if nothing had happened.
‘After supper then,’ she said, smiling with her mouth, eyes and her whole body. ‘I can’t wait.’
‘What is this?’ Dulcie looked suspiciously at the dark red liquid in the glass Ross had just brought her. It was half past eight and they were in the private bar of the Pier Hotel. There was no more than a handful of people in there, mostly middle-aged couples talking quietly, but the main bar next door was very busy and noisy with men only.
‘It’s port and lemon,’ Ross whispered. ‘That’s what ladies drink.’
Dulcie had never tried any kind of alcohol before, and she thought this drink smelled like cough mixture, but if Ross thought she should be trying a grown-up drink then she was prepared to like it. She sipped it cautiously and found it wasn’t that bad.
They sat for a while in awkward silence, neither of them knowing what they should say now they were here. Ross was wearing a hairy, badly fitting grey suit, a white shirt and tie, his auburn curls suppressed with some kind of oil. But although Dulcie was touched that he’d dressed himself up like this for her, rather than wearing the denim jacket and open-necked shirt he normally wore when they went out, he looked awkward and uncomfortable.
‘Did you say anything to Betty?’ he asked eventually.
Dulcie said she hadn’t, but that she didn’t know how she kept it to herself as she was so excited.
‘I reckon we’ll have to tell them together,’ Ross said. ‘Maybe tomorrow night after John and Bob have gone off to the pub. I can’t say anything in front of them or they’ll start ribbing me.’
‘You want to tell them?’ Dulcie said in surprise. As he was so secretive in most things she’d half expected he’d insist they kept it to themselves at least for a while. But it pleased her, it meant he really was serious.
‘When will we say we’re going to get married, Ross? They’ll want to have some rough idea.’
He shrugged. ‘I suppose when we’ve found somewhere to live. Maybe there might be something here in Esperance.’
Dulcie liked that idea, a dear little house of her own to come home to every night. But when she said that, Ross looked at her really oddly. ‘You can’t carry on working once we’re married,’ he said. ‘That isn’t right.’
‘But what about Betty? She needs me.’ Dulcie frowned. She hadn’t expected that. ‘Besides, the money would be useful and what would I do all day alone?’
‘You’d look after our home of course,’ he said.
Dulcie thought she’d let that slide by, it wasn’t important now. She wanted to talk about weddings, May being her bridesmaid, and for Ross to hold her hand and tell her he loved her.
After two drinks in the hotel they went down on to the pier to look at the sea. It was cold, windy and very dar
k, but the sky was studded with stars, and the port and lemon had given Dulcie a rosy glow inside.
‘Ask me properly?’ she said when they reached the end of the pier, turning to him and putting her arms around his middle.
He grinned sheepishly and cupped her face in his hands. ‘Will you marry me?’ he asked, kissing her nose.
‘Yes, I think I will,’ she giggled. ‘But only after you’ve said the other bit.’
‘What other bit?’
‘Well, men usually say it before they ask a girl to marry her,’ she prompted. ‘It’s the reason they ask.’
He frowned, dropping his hand from her face to her shoulders. ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ he insisted and she didn’t think he was joking.
‘I love you?’ she said questioningly. ‘Or don’t you? Maybe you only want a wife to cook and clean for you?’
‘Of course not,’ he said, looking shocked she would say such a thing.
‘Well, maybe you don’t love me then?’ she teased.
‘I do, I wouldn’t want to marry you otherwise.’
Dulcie had to be satisfied with that, because it was clear he wasn’t going to say the words. So she pulled him closer to her and waited to be kissed. His lips brushed hers lightly and moved away to her cheek, but Dulcie held on to him tightly until his lips came back to hers, and at last he kissed her with some feeling.
‘I love you, Ross,’ she said, when they finally broke away. ‘We’re going to be so happy.’
*
‘Married?’ Bruce looked at Ross in astonishment. He had wondered why Ross had told John and Bob he wouldn’t go down the pub with them tonight, and why he had hung around until they left the house. Then Dulcie had come into the room too, and Ross had blurted out that he wanted to marry her.
‘Oh, I didn’t mean right now,’ Ross said hurriedly, taking Bruce’s astonishment for disapproval. ‘We don’t have enough money, or anywhere to live. We just wanted to tell you, that’s all.’
Betty smiled warmly. ‘We’re really happy for you, it’s wonderful news, isn’t it, Bruce?’
Bruce got out of his chair and beamed at them. ‘Of course it is.’ He kissed Dulcie’s cheek and shook Ross’s hand. ‘You just took me by surprise, that’s all.’
Betty got Ross and Bruce a beer, while she and Dulcie settled for tea. They chatted awhile about all the difficulties about where they would live, then Bruce suggested getting a caravan for them.
‘If we put it close to the bunkhouse or the barn we could link up the electricity and the water,’ he said eagerly. ‘That would be far easier for you than driving back and forth into town.’
Dulcie was thrilled at this suggestion and looked at Ross to see his reaction. He looked guarded, but he said nothing, so by that she took it that he wasn’t going to make an issue of her not working.
‘January would be a good time to take the plunge,’ Betty said. ‘With the harvest over and all. Or is that too soon?’
Ross smiled. ‘Not too soon for me. What do you think, Dulcie?’
‘Just perfect,’ she said dreamily.
Chapter Sixteen
May took off her sandals and in bare feet walked along Cottesloe beach to where a group of young men were playing ball in the sea. She’d seen this same group on her day off the previous week, and although none of them had spoken to her, the tall, dark-haired one who had appeared to be their leader had looked at her with interest. She hoped that today he might speak.
It was January and already very hot even though it was only ten in the morning. Mrs Wilberforce had given her a lecture this morning about not getting burnt, but May felt she was already sufficiently tanned to stay there at least until midday, by which time she hoped she might be invited to go for a drink somewhere in the shade.
As she got closer to the men, she felt their eyes on her, but she pretended not to notice and stopped to lay her towel down on the sand. Then, unzipping her dress, she let it slither down her body to reveal her new turquoise swimsuit. It was the most gorgeous one she had ever seen, not the cheap ruched and elasticized kind like most women wore, but smooth, thick satinized cotton, and boned to give her a glamour-girl appearance. She had stolen it from Boan’s department store, wearing it out under her clothes, for there was no way she was going to pay eight guineas for a swimsuit, however lovely it was.
She stood for some little time, sweeping her hair up into a pony-tail, perfectly aware the men were watching her. Finally she sat down and took a magazine out of her bag to read.
May knew she was as close to physical perfection as it was possible for a girl to be, her figure was the ideal, her legs were long and shapely, her face and hair were flawless. But in the eight months since she’d left St Vincent’s, she’d come to see that looks weren’t all she needed to get on in life. Mrs Wilberforce’s friends had made her very aware of this, for though they were always pleasant to her face, she had heard them refer to her as the St Vincent’s girl, and the poor wee thing, as if she had some terrible affliction.
May had imagined, too, that there was nothing very difficult about being a maid, yet she’d soon discovered that wasn’t so. Domestic work at St Vincent’s was of the most basic kind, scrubbing and polishing floors, washing up and laundering ordinary cotton dresses. She had never been taught to cut bread thin enough for the kind of dainty sandwiches Mrs Wilberforce expected when her friends came to tea, or how to iron the kind of delicate garments she owned. Laying a table, cooking and even answering the telephone were all traps to show her ignorance. Many times she had in fact seen herself as the poor wee thing, and cried as she worked because however hard she tried to remember all the instructions she was given, she always seemed to blunder. She mustn’t slop tea into a saucer as she handed it to someone, there was one cloth for cleaning the toilet seat, another one for cleaning the bath. She had never answered a telephone before, yet not only was she expected to ask who was calling, but take down any message too if Mrs Wilberforce was out. Spelling had never been her strong point, and so many of the callers had strange names she couldn’t even pronounce, let alone spell correctly.
She could still recall with dismay the lunch party Mrs Wilberforce had thrown just after she arrived. Two of the ladies winced as they put their forks in their mouths because they tasted the silver polish. How was she supposed to know that cutlery had to be washed in hot soapy water after cleaning? When Mrs Wilberforce said she thought that was obvious, May had burst into tears. It wasn’t obvious to her, she’d never cleaned silver in her life before.
The days were endless drudgery, clean this, prepare that, why haven’t you dusted that lampshade, why have you forgotten the butter knives again? Her head reeled with trying to remember jam spoons, napkins, pickle forks, to put soda, crystals down the sink after washing up, to plump up cushions and never put anything hot or wet on the dining-room table.
Yet the hardest thing of all to adjust to was the idea that a maid should be silent and almost invisible. She’d had the idea that she would be almost like the daughter of the house, that in return for doing their housework she would watch their television, read Mrs Wilberforce’s magazines, eat with the family, sit out in the garden and be included in conversations. This wasn’t so. She was just a servant, and when she wasn’t working, her own room was where she had to be, and she ate her meals alone in the kitchen.
For the first few weeks Mrs Wilberforce was constantly ringing her little silver bell and asking where the marmalade or the butter was. May often wanted to snap at her and say breakfast to her was a bowl of lukewarm Granuma, and how on earth did they think she could make three-minute boiled eggs, a pot of tea and all that toast, all at the same time!
She had to rush her own breakfast and be at the front door to hand Mr Wilberforce his briefcase and hat, and brush down his jacket before he left the house. She couldn’t think for the life of her why a man expected anyone to do that for him.
Maybe it wasn’t quite so hard now she’d learnt what was expected of her, b
ut she still resented that except for going to night school twice a week, she was kept busy all day until around eight in the evening. Granted, on days when no one came to tea, or Mrs Wilberforce went out, she had a couple of hours in the afternoon when she could go out, to the shops or down to the river to sit in the sun, but almost every week they had guests for dinner on one night, and she had to be there, waiting on them until they’d left the dining-room, sometimes till as late as ten.
Yet however hard May thought her job was, she had learnt from the other girls at night school that she would be a fool to run away before she’d got her diploma in shorthand and typing. Girls who worked in shops or as office juniors were paid less than her, and they said it was difficult to find somewhere affordable to live. Yet May envied them so much when they talked of going dancing at the Embassy or the Calypso on Saturday nights. Mrs Wilberforce said she was much too young for such things, and pointed out that coming in at nine-thirty twice a week from night school was late enough to be out at her age.
Yet fed up as May often was, she always woke on her day off feeling joyful and expectant. Sometimes she even thought fleetingly she was lucky. She had after all, with Mrs Wilberforce’s help, managed to distance herself from Mother. She called twice in the first month May started the job, but Mrs Wilberforce made it plain she didn’t like unexpected visitors, and since then she’d only telephoned occasionally. May could cope with telephone conversations and it was easy enough to wriggle out of any invitations to lunch by saying Mrs Wilberforce needed her that day. As long as Mother knew she was doing her job properly, attending night school and going to Mass every Sunday, she had no excuse to call round. The relief May felt that she would never again have to submit to her degrading, perverted embraces, was enough to make her feel affection for the woman who stood between herself and Mother. Maybe this was only on good days, when she hadn’t burnt, broken or spoilt something and Mrs Wilberforce praised her. Yet deep down she knew her mistress was a fair, good-hearted woman who really did have May’s future at heart, and even if not entirely happy with her lot, she knew she could be considerably worse off.