Amy's Touch (24 page)

‘All right.’ Amy gave in, hoping she had enough energy to drag herself down Queen Street to Primrose Cottage before she collapsed. She was almost to the double swing doors of the ward when Dot Quinton caught up to her.

‘Amy, before you go…’ Dot glanced at the bed where George now slept peacefully. ‘I want you to know how—’ she faltered. She was a proud woman, and eating humble pie did not sit well with her. ‘That Ben and I are grateful for all you did for our boy. I won’t forget it.’

Amy saw a glimmer of admiration and respect in the older woman’s eyes and knew how difficult it had been for Dot to say what she had. ‘Thank you, Dot.’ But…was Dot intimating more than just a simple thank you? Had she turned the proverbial corner and become an ally in Amy’s quest to form a country women’s league?

Tired as Amy was, she smiled as she walked out into the sunshine. Time would tell…

T
he light was so strong it hurt, and Danny threw his forearm over his eyes in an attempt to block out the brightness. God, why did he feel so dreadful? Now that he’d woken, his head was beginning to throb, his mouth was as dry as the Flinders in the peak of summer, and he had an abundance of aches and pains throughout his body, especially in his gut. And another thing: why was he so damned hot? A moan fluttered from between his lips as the answer came. He was dying, he had to be! No one could feel this bad and go on living. But then, through the fogginess of his brain, a memory surfaced, which made him recall that it wasn’t the first or even the second time he’d felt this way…

Eyes still closed against the light, Danny McLean’s free hand felt the ground around him and discovered that he was lying on what seemed to be loose dirt. He moved his arm slightly and opened an eyelid. The sky above was a clear, bright blue fringed by an abundance of trees, the shapes of which were not instantly familiar to him. Where the hell was he? Curiosity getting the better of his physical state, he lifted his forearm completely off his face and opened the other eyelid. Blinking several times, it took a while for his pupils to adjust to the light. As he gazed about he realised that he was on a beach! Laboriously, he scratched the five-day stubble on his jaw, pushing his thought process to remember the last place he’d been. There came a blur of fragmented memories…a hotel bar, noise, cigarette smoke, a crowd of rough men and a few equally rough women, but little else.

He shook his head, but stopped because it made the throbbing worse. He’d been in an alcohol-induced haze for weeks, months even, but all the alcohol he’d consumed had only dulled, not erased, the memories. He could still recall Amy and Randall at Drovers, the look of love in their eyes. Yes, when he concentrated everything came back to him. Writing those letters to Amy and Randall; hitching a couple of rides to get to Adelaide; catching a train to Melbourne. There’d been a few drunken fights in Melbourne pubs. Oh yes, more than one or two! And then taking a job as a deckhand on a freighter that sailed from Melbourne to Brisbane and to several South Pacific islands. While on board, he’d lost half the money he’d brought with him—on poker games. Aahhh! The South Pacific: was that where he was now, hung over on some isolated tropical island? But which one?

As the fogginess in his brain cleared he recalled how miserable he’d been and how there had been times, too many of them, when all he’d wanted to do was to curl up into a tight ball and let the world roll over him. There’d been days and nights of anger, of aching for Amy and knowing that another man, his own brother, held the key to her heart, and slowly a deep, simmering bitterness had grown inside him.

Randall had the looks, the brains and someone who loved him—lucky bugger!—and what did he, Danny, have? Nothing. Yet because he was the type of man he was, as time had passed he’d found a degree of forgiveness and understanding for what had happened. He’d never dreamed the grand plans Randall had for Drovers Way. All he’d ever wanted was Amy, and for her to be happy, and because her happiness was more important than his own, he had stepped back and given
them
their chance. Hard as it was, he’d been big enough to do that.

Still, the more he thought about it the more he wondered where his magnanimity had left him. In a limbo of uncertainties, with no idea as to what he was going to do for the rest of his life. Grumbling under his breath, he sat up and waited for the throbbing in his head to recede. The sunlight was so bright that he squinted as he studied the scene around him.

A disgusted grunt acknowledged the empty whisky bottle, which lay just out of reach. An onshore breeze was warm against his skin and whispered through the trees and shrubs around him, and turquoise water lapped the shoreline in low, curling waves. A foot or two above the water he watched a seabird skimming, wings
outstretched, searching for food, and about half a mile out to sea waves crashed over a natural reef. It was perfect, an idyllic place, but there was nothing idyllic about him being here.

What a fool he had been, getting into this position. Homeless and without direction or friends. He reached into his trouser pocket, searching for the wad of pound notes he’d wrapped in an old cloth and put there. The money was still intact.

Danny had no idea how long he sat looking around, trying to put his thoughts in order, searching for a reason to get off his backside and do something with his life other than drift like a bit of flotsam on the sea. That was what his life was at the moment: he was bobbing along, going with the currents and the prevailing winds, not in control of anything…especially himself.

Amy wouldn’t like to see him like this, he thought suddenly. Thinking about her automatically made his spine straighten. He ran fingers through his wavy brown hair, and stared down at his crumpled clothes and shoeless feet. If she were to suddenly come walking along the beach and see him looking as he did, she would be upset and disappointed. The thought was fanciful, he realised, for she was thousands of miles away, but it was enough to galvanise him into action.

As he stood up he experienced a wave of nausea and dizziness, which eventually ebbed away to a dull headache. What to do? What to do? First he had to find out where he was, then, he made himself a promise, he would set about getting work and straightening himself out. He began to walk along the shoreline, just beyond the tidemark, towards another inlet around the curve of the beach.

As Danny got closer to the inlet he saw a rickety jetty that stretched some forty feet out into deeper water. Tied to the end of the jetty was a boat; he recognised its lines as those of a lugger, but the sails had been removed and a motor and smokestack fitted. The stack was belching a thin trail of smoke. The boat was also in need of a good scrub and a coat of paint. He’d seen many such ships on his tour of duty on the freighter and guessed that the lugger was an island trader, taking goods from island to island. A line of natives, dark-skinned men and women with tightly curled hair and wearing sarongs that barely covered their bodies, were unloading crates, boxes and bags of produce from the ship in a human chain along the jetty, up into the jungle and out of sight. One of Danny’s eyebrows lifted in appreciation as he heard them singing in their own language while they worked.

Stepping onto the jetty he made eye contact with one of the natives. ‘Where am—what is this place called?’

Unable to understand English, the native shrugged his shoulders, pointed to a man on the boat, then walked on with his load balanced on his shoulder.

They didn’t speak English. Of course. Why would they? With jerky footsteps Danny continued down the four-foot-wide jetty to the lugger. A burly middle-aged man, his hair streaked with grey, dressed in oil-stained trousers and an unbuttoned white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, was supervising the offloading of cargo.

‘Ahoy, mate,’ Danny called. He memorised the name of the lugger as he spoke. It was called the
Geraldine
. ‘Can you tell me where I am?’

The sailor displayed a set of crooked teeth as he grinned. ‘Mister, you look like you’ve crawled out from under some garbage scow. We’re on the island of Fiji, at a village five miles south of Suva.’ He looked Danny up and down again. ‘White men around here are few and far between. How in God’s name did you get here?’

The man’s accent was foreign, probably European, Danny thought as he scratched the stubble on his jaw again. ‘Can’t quite remember,’ was his honest answer.

The sailor gave an understanding nod. He stretched out his hand to Danny, who quickly shook it. ‘I’m Abe Hennin, and the
Geraldine
is my ship. I can spare a mug of tea if you want it.’

Danny ran his tongue around his dry mouth. The thought of tea was very appealing. ‘I’m Danny McLean. Tea would be great, but what I need more is a shave and a wash and, if you have one, a job.’

‘Been to sea before?’

Danny frowned. For a moment or two he had difficulty remembering the name of the freighter he’d shipped out on from Melbourne. ‘I was a deckhand and general rouseabout on, uummm, the
Crista Marie
.’

Abe studied Danny for about thirty seconds, then said, ‘I know that ship. One of my lads, a native, has quit to go back to his village in the hills, and…’ he paused, as if trying to size up Danny’s character, ‘the
Geraldine
could do with another hand. When we’ve unloaded here I have to pick up cargo from the Suva docks; we sail with the tide to deliver the cargo to the Tongan islands.’

Danny straightened and looked Abe squarely in the eyes. ‘I’m your man, if you’ll have me.’ Then, becoming aware of his dishevelled appearance, he glanced down at his sand-encrusted feet.

‘All right, come on board. You can get outfitted at the docks before we leave.’

‘Sounds good.’

‘I run a dry ship, mind.’

Danny stared uncomprehendingly at his new employer. ‘What’s a dry ship?’

‘No alcohol. I don’t care what you do when we’re in port, but when we’re at sea there’ll be no liquor.’

Danny grinned. ‘That will suit me just fine.’

‘Go along to the galley, Danny. Ask Ming—he’s the cook—to get you some food and a mug of strong tea.’

Danny gave Abe an informal salute. ‘Aye, aye, Captain.’

Winter in the Flinders Ranges was more than half over by the time the flu epidemic ran its course in and around Gindaroo.

Several people, both young and old, had succumbed to secondary infections, which led to pneumonia and, sadly, death. The nursing staff and those who’d come in to help out had worked themselves to the point of exhaustion, and at the end of it Amy had seen a softening in people’s attitudes towards her—although some continued to snub her, and a few others talked about her behind her back. There was Bill Walpole too, subtly spreading his viciousness, not that everyone took a great deal of notice of what Bill said, because many did not like the man. All in all, it was an ongoing battle she simply had to ignore. Other things, such as her country women’s league, were more important.

Amy was well aware that the hospital wouldn’t have managed as well as they had without the support and commitment of Patsy, Valda and Erica, which was the example she’d led with at the latest meeting of her fledgling country women’s league. Twice as many women attended regularly as had come to the first meeting, including a vocal Dot Quinton who, after the experience with George, had become one of Amy’s staunchest allies.

‘It’s time we formed a committee to work out a constitution and goals for the league,’ Amy said. ‘A committee of four should be sufficient. Could someone suggest who to nominate?’

‘I’d like to nominate you, Amy, and Winnie Cohen,’ said Dot Quinton.

‘And I’ll nominate Rena Fairbairn,’ said Meg Barnaby.

‘What about Margaret Walpole?’ Randall said from the back of the room. ‘She’s well known in the community for her charity work.’

‘Margaret isn’t here, Randall, and she’s not shown any interest in the league,’ Amy replied. She liked the fact that he came to all the meetings, even though she knew the reason: it gave him the opportunity to have a few words in private with her afterwards. He’d probably suggested Margaret thinking it might soften Bill’s ongoing meanness.

‘Viss respect,’ Erica Liszt said, ‘Margaret’s a nice person, but more often zan not she does vat her husband tells her to do. I sink ve need free-sinking vomen on the committee, not zose who simply do anozer’s bidding.’

‘Hear, hear,’ came the general response.

‘If it’s acceptable, I’d like to offer myself as a nominee,’ said Beatrice, Reverend Whitton’s wife.

‘Of course it’s acceptable,’ Amy assured Beatrice. It would be good to have the minister’s wife on their committee, to give it more credibility.

Amy quickly formalised the nominations into a committee and they settled on a future date to meet at Primrose Cottage. After that, Amy declared the meeting closed.

‘You must be mightily pleased with yourself,’ Randall said quietly from behind her as Amy helped Meg and Winnie stack the last of the chairs.

For a moment or two Amy wasn’t sure whether he was genuinely pleased for her or if he was being a touch sarcastic. ‘It’s going well. The flu epidemic, sad as it was, brought the community together.’

‘Whether you admit it or not, you were the driving force for that, Amy,’ he voiced his opinion, while waving goodbye to Winnie and Meg as they left the hall.

‘Perhaps.’

It was so good to see him. She hadn’t laid eyes on him for over a month, and seeing him now, dressed formally in a suit and starchedcollared shirt and tie, his hat in his hand, made something twist and tighten inside her chest till it became hard to breathe. For a while, when she’d been run off her feet at the hospital, she had sometimes been able to convince herself that perhaps what she’d felt for Randall was only a passing infatuation. But seeing him now made it impossible to deny the truth. She loved him, was in love with him, and…Oh, what was the point in trying to deny it? She could fill her waking hours with ‘distractions’ such as work and the country women’s league, but when she lay in her bed at night, staring at the
darkened ceiling, he was the one who dominated her thoughts, fuelled her desires.

For several seconds she allowed the ache for him to encompass her body, her spirit. The needy part of her wanted to give in to it, not to worry about what anyone thought, but common sense told her that would be foolish and would give Bill Walpole more ammunition to use against them. She still wasn’t sure they were destined to be together—as Danny had said—and she just knew instinctively that the time wasn’t right for it to happen.

He was staring at her, waiting for her to look up at him, to capture her gaze. She obliged, and the look in his eyes revealed so much: need, wanting,
love.
It made her try to retreat. ‘I—I have to go,’ she murmured, breaking her gaze from his.

His reply came as a whisper. ‘I don’t want you to.’

Then, before she realised his intention, he drew her into his arms and tilted her chin up so he could kiss her. The warmth of his lips raced through her senses, igniting in an instant a near-unquenchable need. Her heart throbbed madly inside her chest, the breath caught in her throat, and, without conscious volition, one of her hands came up to caress his face and smooth a strand of black hair off his forehead.