She cried for a little while but she was reasoning with herself. If she could just forget that she’d been cheated by Ross, looking at it logically, if she hadn’t ever been made love to, how could she miss it? Ross would still be her friend, the only difference being married made to people’s lives was that they lived under the same roof and slept in the same bed. She remembered one of Granny’s sayings, Time sorts out most things. Perhaps it would sort this one out too.
She went back into the room. There was enough light to see he was still awake, lying there waiting for her, his eyes glimmering in the dark like a cat’s.
‘What have you decided?’ he asked.
‘That we stay together and try to work it out. So maybe you don’t want to make love to me –’
‘I do,’ he interrupted her. ‘I just can’t.’
Dulcie sighed, took off her housecoat and got into bed. ‘Maybe that will change. We’ll just go along as we are now and see what happens.’
‘But how can I expect you to live like that?’ he asked. ‘It isn’t fair.’
‘I don’t know any different, do I?’ she pointed out. All at once she was bone-weary, she didn’t want to talk or think about it any more. ‘Now, let’s go to sleep because I’m tired.’ She turned out the light and lay down to show this really was the end of the conversation.
But she could feel him lying there tense and unhappy and her sympathy was aroused. ‘I love you, Ross, however you are,’ she whispered to him in the darkness.
He let out a big sigh and his hand reached out for hers under the covers to squeeze it. ‘I’m sorry, Dulcie,’ he whispered. ‘You deserve more.’
Ross fell asleep long before she did. She lay there listening to his breathing and to the sound of the fan spinning above their heads. You deserve more. She’d had that said to her almost as many times as Trust me, and it sounded just as insincere. Perhaps the truth of the matter was that she’d been singled out at birth for disappointment and sadness. She supposed she would just have to learn to live with it.
Chapter Twenty
‘You crook, Dulcie?’ Bruce asked, giving her a sharp look. ‘You can go back to bed if you are. I’m sure May won’t mind me taking her to the station on her own.’
It was Dulcie’s fifth day back at the farm, and she had just finished clearing away the breakfast things. May was in her old bedroom packing her case.
‘I’m fine,’ Dulcie smiled weakly. She knew she looked pale and had dark circles under her eyes. ‘It’s just so hot at nights in the caravan, that’s all.’
She had braved it out, managed to convince them all that she and Ross had had a wonderful time in Kalgoorlie and she hadn’t a care in the world. May’s presence helped in this deception for she tended to monopolize conversations at mealtimes, each afternoon she and Dulcie went to the beach together, and in the evenings they all went out to the pub.
May was a tonic for everyone, she was effervescent, chatty, fun and daring. She had one of the new bikini swimsuits, and the sight of her exposed tummy had raised the eyebrows of all the older people of Esperance. John had taken her to the Friday night dance while she and Ross were in Kalgoorlie, and by all accounts most of the single men were desperate to dance with her. Dulcie didn’t feel the least bit jealous that her sister received so much attention, she took pride in it, and was delighted that old friends like Sergeant and Mrs Collins liked her too. By day, whether Dulcie was doing her routine chores or out with her sister, she could put aside the sadness inside her. It was only the nights that were torturous, for it was hot and cramped in the caravan, and so hard to sleep when every slight touch was a reminder Ross wasn’t a real husband.
Yet he was so lovely in so many other ways. He got up in the morning and made her tea, he talked to her more now than he ever had before, he had fixed up the caravan so it was like a little palace, and he’d gone out of his way to be extra specially nice to May.
But May was going back to Perth today, and it might be months before they saw one another again. Although Dulcie couldn’t confide in her sister about Ross, it had been so good to have some feminine company, and she understood now why Betty had set so much store by her women friends.
‘I suppose the caravan would be much hotter than the house,’ Bruce said anxiously. ‘Maybe you ought to come back in the house till the end of the summer?’
‘No, the caravan’s our home now,’ Dulcie replied. She knew if she was that close to Bruce he might work out for himself what was wrong. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll get used to the heat.’
‘I’ve been thinking of getting Ross to build a real house for you,’ Bruce said. ‘The site of Sam’s old house the other side of the barn would be a good spot. The caravan will be no good once you start a family.’
Dulcie’s heart plummeted. In all her efforts to make everyone think she and Ross were radiantly happy she hadn’t actually considered that unless the situation changed there would be no children. ‘A real house would be nice,’ she forced herself to agree. ‘But there’s no hurry, Bruce, we’re fine as we are.’
May came out of the bedroom wearing blue cotton slacks and a white broderie anglaise blouse, her hair tied up in a pony-tail with a blue ribbon. She had a deep suntan now and she looked very lovely.
‘Do you think this is all right for travelling in?’ she asked. ‘It’s going to be so hot and sticky.’
‘I should think it’s perfect,’ Dulcie said, remembering how awful she’d found the same journey. ‘But have you got a cardigan handy? It might get cold overnight.’
May nodded, peering at herself in the mirror over the fireplace. ‘I’ve left my hat for you, Dulcie,’ she said. ‘I doubt I’ll get a chance to wear it again, and it’s so awkward to carry, but you could wear it for the christening.’
Dulcie’s skin prickled uncomfortably.
‘Give her a chance,’ Bruce said jovially. ‘She hasn’t been married five minutes.’
Dulcie watched the train leaving Esperance until it was just a speck in the distance, tears running down her cheeks. She had made May enough sandwiches to feed an army, she had drinks, magazines and books to read, and she was going back to a place where she was wanted and needed, yet Dulcie was still worried she’d be as miserable on the long journey as she herself had been five years earlier, and she knew she was going to miss her company.
Bruce put his arm around her and drew her to his shoulder. ‘You will see her again soon,’ he reassured her. ‘For all that city talk she comes out with, she was taken with life down here, she’ll be back.’ He wiped her face dry with his handkerchief and kissed her comfortingly on the forehead.
‘What if she does go to Sydney when she’s eighteen?’ Dulcie said as they walked back to the car. ‘We won’t be able to see one another then.’
‘Yes you will.’ Bruce grinned at her and tweaked her cheek. ‘Haven’t you noticed transport is improving all the time? I wouldn’t be surprised if ordinary people like you and me couldn’t fly across Australia before long. There might even come a time when you could fly from here to Perth! Look how many people are coming this way to live now!’
Dulcie nodded. He was right about that, Esperance was changing rapidly. She’d heard that in 1953 the population was only 700, yet by 1959 it had more than doubled, and more were coming every week. New shops had opened in the town, houses were being built, and all the little guest-houses were having a boom time. She knew too that all the farmers were doing really well, the prices for cereals, wool, beef and lamb rising steadily. Bruce had kept increasing both her wages and the men’s each year – the twelve pounds a week she got now was a far cry from ten shillings at the Masters’.
‘We’ll go in the milk bar and have some coffee before we go home,’ Bruce said. ‘It’s going to be a bit on the quiet side there without May around.’
May left on Thursday, and she was due back in Perth on Saturday morning. When the telephone rang around five o’clock on Saturday afternoon, Dulcie ran to it, expecting it was May saying sh
e’d got home safely. But it was Mrs Wilberforce.
‘I’m concerned because May hasn’t arrived back,’ she said, her tone worried. ‘Did she leave you as arranged?’
‘Well yes, Mrs Wilberforce,’ Dulcie said. ‘I saw her on to the train myself.’
‘Where is she then?’ the woman asked.
‘I don’t know. Maybe she’s just gone to see a friend in town before returning home,’ Dulcie suggested.
‘I shouldn’t think that’s very likely. Not carrying two heavy suitcases – she would just get in a taxi.’
Dulcie was about to say that maids couldn’t afford to just get in a taxi, when she remembered May had only one suitcase. It would certainly have stuck in her mind if there had been two. Who would go away for just a week’s holiday with two?
The old habit of loyalty between May and herself was too deeply ingrained for Dulcie to blurt this out. She confirmed again that May had left, and said she would telephone later tonight to see if she had turned up.
But after she’d put the phone down, Dulcie’s mind spun with other possibilities. If May had set off with two suitcases, she must have left one of them at Kalgoorlie station, or even with Sadie at the hotel. There was only one reason that she’d do such a thing, and that was because she hadn’t ever had any intention of returning to Perth.
The day before May left Bruce had offered to drive her to Kalgoorlie because it was quicker by road, but she’d flatly refused, saying it was too long a drive for him. At the time Dulcie had been touched by her thoughtfulness, she certainly hadn’t considered her sister might have a devious plan up her sleeve.
She looked up the telephone number for Kalgoorlie station and rang it. The ticket clerk confirmed a young woman with blonde hair had picked up a case she’d left with him for over a week, and said she had bought a ticket to Sydney, intending to catch the 11 p.m. train.
Dulcie put the phone down and walked outside on to the veranda. She was stunned that her sister could be so cunning. She thought it was stupid and reckless to run out on a good job, and wondered how May would manage without a reference.
Yet setting all the practical considerations aside, she couldn’t help but feel a certain admiration for her sister’s pluck. It was very brave to throw security out of the window and set off to the other side of Australia when she knew no one there. But May wasn’t yet eighteen and she could be picked up by the police.
Deep concern and anxiety took over as she imagined her sister sitting on that endless train journey which took several days. She would be exhausted by the time she got there, and anything could happen to her. Did she have any money? Did she have the least idea of how to go about finding a place to stay?
Ross saw her standing on the veranda and came over from the barn where he’d been working on a repair to the plough. ‘Something up?’ he asked as he got closer. ‘You look rattled.’
Dulcie explained, and slumped down on to a seat. ‘What do I do, Ross? If I tell Mrs Wilberforce the truth about where she’s gone, she might contact the police. They could pick May up on the train.’
He sat next to Dulcie and put his arm around her. ‘Don’t worry about her, she’s a survivor. She’ll charm someone into looking after her, you can be sure of that. Don’t tell Mrs Wilberforce what you know, May will only blame you if she gets caught. Mind you, if that woman’s got even half a brain she’ll work it out for herself.’
‘I’m surprised she hadn’t already thought of it, if May took all her clothes with her,’ Dulcie said.
Ross smiled. ‘May’s quite an actress. You can bet your boots she thought up some good reason to take them all. Don’t be mad with her, Dulc, she might have been miserable there, you don’t know.’
‘If she was, she would’ve told me,’ Dulcie said dourly. ‘She isn’t a martyr like me. But what am I going to say to Mrs Wilberforce when I phone her?’
‘Nothing,’ Ross said with a shrug. ‘Just make out you are as mystified as she is.’
Dulcie had a difficult conversation with Mrs Wilberforce. The woman was upset and disappointed that May thought so little of her that she could just take off without a word. Out of loyalty to her sister Dulcie didn’t say she knew May had gone to Sydney, and tried to soothe Mrs Wilberforce by saying she appreciated all she’d done for May, and she thought it was a spur of the moment decision on May’s part, because she was burning to get an office job in a big city.
But once Dulcie had put the phone down she burst into tears. Bruce came into the room and took her in his arms to comfort her.
‘There, there,’ he murmured, holding her tightly ‘I know you are upset that May behaved so recklessly, but maybe she had good reason. I for one am glad that at least she’s well away from that bloody Reverend Mother.’
Dulcie looked up at him in surprise. ‘What’s she got to do with it? May didn’t suffer at her hands the way I did.’
‘I’m not so sure about that, Dulcie,’ he said gently. ‘Maybe she wasn’t beaten as you were, but I think she was and still is afraid of that woman. She mentioned her the day before you and Ross came home.’
‘What did she say?’
‘That the woman had kept on telephoning, and she felt she would try to manipulate her into another job of her choosing. I reckon that’s why May chose to run away now. She probably thought if she left it until she was eighteen that might be too late.’
‘She never said anything like that to me,’ Dulcie said, a little hurt.
‘Sometimes it’s easier to tell an outsider. Perhaps, too, she told me so I would pass it on to you now.’
Dulcie thought about that for a moment. ‘What can I do now, Bruce? I feel so scared for her.’
‘You can’t do anything but wait until she contacts you. But try to look at all May has got going for her. She’s got secretarial qualifications, a good personality. She’s very pretty and she’s clued up about people. She’s used to city life too, remember. If anyone can make it in Sydney, it’s her.’
Dulcie realized she must go back to Ross in the caravan. It was after eleven now and she’d said she wouldn’t be long making the phone call.
‘You are quite right,’ she said with a deep sigh. ‘And I’d better go.’
‘I’ll have a talk with Ross about building the house tomorrow,’ Bruce said, patting her shoulder. ‘It’s you and him you have to concern yourself with, Dulcie, your sister can make her own life.’
Ross was in bed when Dulcie got back to the caravan, listening to her radio. It was so hot and airless in there that her spirits fell even lower. She glanced about her, feeling irritated by how cramped it was, yet when Bruce and Ross towed it here she’d been thrilled and couldn’t wait to make it into a real home.
They never bothered to put the bed away during the day, there was no point as they didn’t use the caravan during that time. As the bed took up the whole living space, all that was left was the little kitchen area by the door. Ross had repainted the caravan all white inside, and the kitchen cupboards pale blue. She’d made blue and white gingham curtains, and a deep blue fitted bedcover, so even with the bed down it looked neat. But the reality was that the bed dominated everything, it was the only place to sit, they even had to crawl across it to get to the cupboards where their clothes were on the other side.
She sat on the end of it now, to tell Ross what had happened.
‘She’ll be right,’ he said, lying back on the pillows, his arms behind his head. He was wearing only his pyjama bottoms and his chest was tanned and deep golden-brown. ‘She’s bound to write to you soon too. Maybe one day we can go there for a holiday. They say Sydney’s beaut.’
Dulcie pulled her nightdress from under the pillow and took it into the kitchen area to change. The door of the cupboard opened back to shut off the other room for privacy, and she needed it, his rejection of her in a physical way had made her begin to believe her body was repulsive.
As she took off her clothes she told Ross about Bruce suggesting he built a house. ‘He said
he’ll talk to you about it tomorrow,’ she finished up as she came back into the bedroom part to get into bed.
His face was a picture, eyes shining with excitement and delight. He hadn’t looked like that since the wedding breakfast, but instead of pleasing her it made her feel even sadder. What good was a fine house if the two people who had to live in it were only like brother and sister?
He turned off the light and the radio, and put his arm around her. ‘Just think, Dulc, a real house of our own!’ His voice was almost squeaking with glee. ‘I’ll make it so pretty, everything just where you want it. We could have a big window right down to the floor so we can sit there in the evening and watch the kangaroos and the birds from our easy-chairs,’
She wished she could join in his excitement, she had so many ideas in her head for her dream house, collected together over the last three years. But she thought she’d rather live in an old shack, cooking over an open fire, and have passion, than spend the rest of her life in luxury and feeling rejected.
‘Goodnight,’ she whispered, turning to kiss him, and to her surprise he kissed her back the way he had when she came back from Perth. It was lovely, sweet and lingering, and she got that churned-up feeling of longing inside her again.
‘I love you so much,’ he whispered in the darkness and he unbuttoned her nightdress and reached for her breast.
Dulcie hardly dared breathe, she was so afraid he would stop suddenly, but he didn’t, he stroked her breast and kissed her again and again, his lips moving down her neck and throat until he reached her breast and sucked on her nipple.
It was like fireworks exploding inside her. She stroked his hair, his neck and shoulders, smoothing him, loving him, yet silently begging him not to disappoint her. His hand moved down her body, found the bottom of her nightdress and slowly moved up her leg and thigh.
Her heart was racing, her mouth dry, but she could hear him moaning softly and his breath becoming louder. Tentatively his fingers stroked at her pubic hair, she could almost feel his fright at having come so far, but he didn’t pull away. She moaned involuntarily as at last his finger slipped inside her, and she gave herself up to the blissful sensation, her fear vanishing.