Out of Alice (28 page)

Frank, when they found him in the throng, said, ‘Come 'ere, you skinny thing,' and hugged her too. The kiss he planted on her cheek was flavoured with his beery breath. She stood with Beth and Jack to wave them off, watching the little red car dwindle in size down the straight stretch of bitumen.

Jack blew out a breath. ‘Well, we've still got a match to win. Not that I like our chances much.'

‘Neither do I,' Sara said frankly. ‘I wonder if the Australian Cricket Board knows about Bungy? He could be their new secret weapon for the next international match.'

Jack laughed. ‘Anybody can be bowled out. Just not always soon enough. But that's life.'

Jack's prophecy proved correct. Bungy's side had stacked too many runs for the other team, whose batsmen were quickly taken out. Jack himself scored five and Rinky's husband Jim was out for a duck. With the game over, the Calshots took their leave mid-afternoon, Sara riding in the back of the station wagon with the children. Jack, who always carried his tools, remained behind to take a look at the diesel motor on the roadhouse bore, which Alec had been unable to start. ‘Probably nothing major,' he told them. ‘Christ, that bloke's so useless with engines he couldn't tell a right-hand thread from a left. If it's nothing much, I'll be home later tonight. Otherwise they'll find me a bed and I'll be back when I am.'

The Marshalls followed them home, peeling off with a fanfare on the horn at the horse-paddock gate for the back road past Kileys bore. Sara waved at the departing car and settled back in her seat with a yawn.

‘It was lovely to see Clemmy again. She looks so well. Colin is really sweet with her, though I hate to think what he'll be like in the delivery room.'

‘Why?' Becky predictably asked.

‘Mrs Marshall's going to have a baby,' Beth said. ‘Sometime next year.'

‘Cool. Can we go and see it when it's born?'

‘We'll see. How are you doing there, Sam?'

‘I'm okay, a bit tired. Did you know, Mum, that Joey's raising five poddies all by himself? Three of them are bull calves and if they make it through the drought, Mr Hazlitt said when they get sold Joey can keep the money for himself. He's gonna buy a new saddle with it.'

‘Is he? Well, he'll have earned it.' Beth twisted in her seat to look at him. ‘You do look a bit washed out. No more activity for you today, my lad. Becky will have to get the goats in alone.'

‘I'll go with her,' Sara volunteered. ‘Unless you want a hand with something?'

‘No, that's fine. But only if you want to, Sara.'

‘I do.' She smiled at Becky and gave the hand the girl had slipped into hers a little squeeze. ‘I won't be able to much longer, so I'd best make the most of it while I'm still here.'

Becky looked dismayed. ‘You aren't leaving us?'

‘Not right away, chicken, but the holidays are coming. I'll have to go then. You don't want to be doing sums still at Christmas, do you?'

‘No, but you could stay – can't she, Mum? I thought you were gonna be here always! I thought we'd have Christmas together. If it doesn't rain first, Uncle Jack's gonna build a special shed out at Kileys for us, and he said we'll make a tree out there, and tie wishes on it —' Her voice broke, she battled for a moment with a trembling lip, then burst into tears. ‘I don't want you to go, Sara! You're my bestest friend.'

‘And I still will be.' Sara met Beth's eyes in the mirror and raised helpless brows as Len slowed at the front gate. ‘We'll always be friends and maybe I'll come back next year if your mum still needs me. Besides, I'm not leaving tomorrow. There's plenty of school time yet, and there's the break-up party and everything.'

‘You mustn't be selfish, Becs,' Beth admonished gently. ‘Sara has her own family, you know –' she caught Sara's urgent shake of the head and changed tack mid-sentence – ‘and I'm sure she has other friends she'll want to see. And
they'll
want to see her too.'

Becky glared at her mother. ‘She hasn't got any family either! Only her mum – and she doesn't like her. I heard her tell Nan so. So why would she want to stop with her?'

‘Yes, but she might have found her father now.' Beth cast an apologetic look Sara's way. ‘So you should try to be glad for her and hope that it's true. I know you're upset but Sara's life is hers to order.'

‘How?' Becky ignored this and turned a demanding gaze on her governess. ‘I'm not stupid! You can't just find fathers like that.'

‘No, you can't,' Sara agreed, getting out. ‘It's a strange story and I don't really know if he wants me yet, because it's a long time since he's seen me. Not since I was younger than you. Look, the sun's behind the mill already. Let's get after the goats and I'll tell you all about it, but you can't tell anyone else. Not Harry or Mrs Murray. You have to promise that first.'

‘Okay. Does Uncle Jack know?' The lure of a story drove her tears away. ‘Is it like the one about the dog and the little boy that you told me?'

‘Uncle Jack does know. And it is, a bit. I forgot him for a long time, then I remembered, and it was the same with my dad. But get your hat first.'

Inexorably, more swiftly than Sara wished, her remaining time at Redhill flew by. The magpies' song marked off each dawn and the hot red line of the sunset each dusk. Jack, back from the roadhouse, worked with Len either bulldozing scrub, checking waters or doing the lick run about the bores. Both men came home with the smell of the drought on them – of dust and diesel and the sour whiff of smoke and death when there had been carcasses to handle. A week after the cricket match Jack and Sara sat together on the verandah, the first time they had been alone since their return from Arkeela. She suspected that he was deliberately avoiding her and the knowledge hurt. Silent and awkward for the first time in his company, she watched the lightning slash across the darkened sky. There was no rain, just the distant crackle and tear as jagged white lines zipped across the heavens.

‘Dry storm,' he said abruptly as the last flicker died away.

‘Yes.' Sara couldn't keep the disappointment from her voice.

‘The rain'll come. One day.'

‘I'm sure, but it's like the bowling now, isn't it? A matter of time.'

He sighed, neither agreeing nor arguing, and changed the subject. ‘Have you thought about what you'll do when your story breaks? It can't be long now. Markham said they'd print it the moment your DNA results were known. You'll have reporters swarming all over.'

Sara frowned. ‘What's the point? The story will already be out there. I should think they'd be more likely to chase my father than me.'

He grunted sardonically. ‘They call it human interest, Sara.
How does it feel to know you're the daughter of a multimillionaire?
That sort of thing. We can lock the horse-paddock gate but the media are like vultures. A padlock won't stop them.'

‘I don't know. Hide inside, I suppose. There's no law says I have to talk to them.'

‘They don't give up that easy. What about when you leave? Becky said you are.'

‘Well, obviously I must; another fortnight and school will finish and with it my job. I suppose I'll go and see him. My father,' she said slowly. ‘He'll know by then. Paul must be able to tell me how to find him.'

‘He might come to you, once he has proof. Why would he wait?'

She swallowed. ‘I'm hoping he will but it's a big thing to do, isn't it? For him and for me. I'm scared he'll . . .'

‘What?' Jack finally asked as the silence stretched.

In a small voice Sara said, ‘Not want me.' He started to protest and she cut him off. ‘Jack, he's already mourned and buried us – me, Benny, my mother. He's an old man. Why would he want it all back now? He's moved on, made another family. He's left the bush and all the memories behind. He must have wanted it so or why sell the stations? Paul said he had two but now he's into transport and commodities and other things. What if I'm just an unwelcome reminder of all the stuff he's left behind him?'

‘He won't think that! And just supposing for a single moment that he did, he's still human, which makes him curious. Of
course
he'll want to see you, Sara. You're his flesh and blood.'

‘I don't know.'

He said roughly, ‘I thought you were smarter than that. How long have you been thinking this rubbish?'

Sara shrugged in the darkness, which made it easy to lie. ‘It just occurred to me today.'

She had grappled with it every night since her memory returned, her emotions on a roller-coaster of dread, excitement and apprehension, because what if the golden-armed man she remembered had turned into an indifferent stranger who, at best, found her presence tiresome? It was why she hadn't wanted Beth to assume, as she had, that Sara would be flying home to family life once she left Redhill. You might wish that loved ones hadn't died, and cry for their return, but time had a way of stitching closed the holes they left in life. What if this was the case with her father when they met? Her half-siblings too – could they be expected to welcome a cuckoo in the nest? What would the son think; he must consider himself heir to the Randall business empire. Not that she had the least expectation or interest, but would a seventeen-year-old believe that? She sighed and lied again. ‘I expect you're right. It was just a thought. Which reminds me – are you coming in for the school break-up? We've been practising all week for the concert.'

‘No.' He sounded indifferent. ‘The kids'll have to give me a private show sometime. I'll be needed here to run the waters while you're all gone.'

‘Unless it rains first.' Her disappointment at Jack's words bit deeply. Sara turned her gaze to the starry, cloud-free night where a mo­poke was making its distinctive call. She heard him snort as he rose.

‘I don't believe in the tooth fairy. 'Night, Sara.'

‘Goodnight, Jack.'

She didn't believe in much that was magical either, right at the moment. She could feel the closeness, the bond that had been between them, loosening and slipping away. It was her background, of course. She had been hopelessly naive to think that he would ever overlook it. It was just too much to expect after his experience with Marilyn. Men seemed to be universally stupid once they got an idea into their heads. Dynamite wouldn't shift it. Roger had been living proof of that in the way he'd determinedly clung to the unrealistic image of herself he'd created. Jack, it seemed, was prone to the same failing. He was fond of her but he wouldn't allow himself to take it further. City-bred Marilyn, damn her avaricious soul, had seen to that.

Sighing – it seemed to be the night for it – Sara turned away from the stars she had come to watch and went to her room to lie wakeful under the fan's cooling breath. It was ironic to feel this restless yearning for change when she actually dreaded leaving the secure cocoon that Redhill had become. As she must, and very soon, too. She was, she realised, sick of being alone, sick of sleeping alone, of having no one but herself to think of.

Once she had believed that regaining her memory would free her from the shadows of the past but it had only compounded them, introducing new worries of rejection. And soon, if Jack was right – and if Jack had a strength, it was his steadiness of vision and purpose, so he probably was right – soon she would be the object of a media scrum as well. Misery flooded Sara; she almost wished she were Becky and could relieve her feelings in a storm of tears. Better to think productively instead, about finding another job, for instance. Because whatever happened with her father, she was going to need one. Perhaps there would be something for her in the Alice? Then if Beth should still need her after the holidays she would be only a bus ride away . . .

Sara dreamed of a faceless horde of people who chased her down narrow streets past shuttered houses whose doors, when she banged on them for admittance, were all barred. Her pursuers shouted questions she couldn't understand and Paul seemed to be leading the pack. She ran desperately, bursting out through the graffiti-­covered walls of an alley into a park that became a paddock as she ran. There was a creek and the grey swathes of mulga, then the oleanders and the blessed sanctuary of the front gate. Sara ran up the steps into her bedroom and the rain blossomed behind her, greying out the paddock and the pursuing hordes, who melted away, their shouted questions lost in the whirr of the fan.

Heart thumping, gasping for breath, Sara sat up in bed and fumbled for the light. A sweet, heady fragrance filled the room, then as understanding broke upon her she jumped up to switch off the fan and listen. Surely not? But it was. There came a pattering on the iron roof, and the smell filling the night air was that of rain. She stumbled through the French doors onto the verandah and saw that the stars had vanished behind a layer of thin cloud through which a crescent moon glowed, thin as a nail paring. She caught her breath, willing the rain to fall.

‘Please, oh please!' It was a prayer, but even as the words formed, the light spatter of drops ceased, leaving only the aching of hope deferred. The clouds parted fully about the moon and the night seemed to sigh its hopelessness and defeat. Then the wind came whoo­shing out of the west and half an hour later the sky was clear again.

‘I dreamed it rained,' Sara said at breakfast. ‘Then I woke up and it was, about five spots' worth.'

‘Six,' Jack said. ‘I counted. You musta missed one.'

‘It's a start,' Len observed. ‘There might've been more to the north. I'll give Dumben Downs a call later. God, it smelled good for a moment there.' The phone rang as he spoke and he went to answer it.

‘Somebody with the same idea,' Beth said, hearing him greet the caller by name. ‘That's Munaroo. Everybody will be phoning round to see who got lucky.'

The next ring, however, had him popping his head out the office door. ‘It's for you, Sara.'

Swallowing a sudden trepidation, Sara took the handpiece. ‘Hello? Sara here.'

It was Paul Markham, his voice brisk. ‘Sara. How are you? Just to let you know the test results are back. I faxed them to Randall last night and the story's in today's paper. He'll have to have his own DNA tested for comparison but you can expect to hear from him pretty soon. I imagine he won't be queuing at the lab.'

So now it would begin. On the plus side, Sara thought, pulling her thoughts into order as she hung up, her father knew that his eldest daughter existed. The test results would surely stall any immediate repudiation of the claim. Where did he live anyway? Melbourne? Sydney? She should have asked Paul. Sara relied on tele­vision for her information; she had seldom read more of the daily news than the headlines displayed in the cage outside the newsagents'. Tonight it would all be on the telly, she thought, and then the whole world would know. She said as much to the others as she clattered her cup and plate together, her appetite wholly gone.