Walkabout Wife Read online

  She flicked her shawl across her shoulders feeling the cool smoothness of its touch, aware of an inward thrill as she imagined it the touch of his hands ...

  CHAPTER TWO

  His car was a Ford Fairlane, big and comfortable and quiet, and in a few minutes they had left the lights of the small town behind them and were driving along a flat, dead-straight road, gravel-surfaced, and lit only by the stars. He pulled up finally in the deeper dark under a huge tree by the roadside, switched off the ignition, and turned to Edie. For a brief instant she imagined he was going to take her in his arms, but she was wrong.

  `I suppose you're wondering what this is all about,' he said.

  `Yes.' She clasped her hands nervously and tried to see his face, to match it to a voice that by now was familiar and decidedly attractive.

  `Well, I'm going to be quite honest with you—I don't want you to accuse me of trickery.'

  He paused, and she felt an odd thrill of apprehension

  run along her veins. 'What—what do you mean?' Instead of answering, he asked, `Do you smoke?' `Hardly ever, but

  `But you'd like a cigarette now? I would too.' Seconds passed while he lit first her cigarette and then his own, and then he leaned back in the seat and said, `First of all, you know I'm a cattleman.'

  `Yes, of course. And—and I know your cattle station is called Dhoora Dhoora. What does that mean?' she added, mainly out of nervousness.

  `Roughly speaking, it means walkabout—or maybe a day's walk ... But it's not exactly my station, and that's more or less the crux of the matter. It's where you come in, in fact.'

  `I don't know what you mean,' she said as he paused.

  `I know you don't. But I'm about to tell you. I've lived on Dhoora Dhoora all my life. My father managed the outstation, and after he died, which was when I was sixteen, I moved over to the headquarters to live with my uncle, who was the boss and the owner. I started working on the place full time as soon as I left school, and I've run it for the past nine years or so—since my uncle's death.' He drew on his cigarette a couple of times, and Edie had the feeling he was working out what to say next, but so far she had no idea how she came into the picture.

  `Philip, my uncle,' he resumed presently, 'was the eldest of the three Sutton sons, but he never married. That left me and my cousin Greg as the two possible heirs if the place was to be kept in the family—and it was something of an obsession with the old man that it should be—and that it shouldn't be divided up. Well, I had an advantage over Greg, although our fathers were twins, because I was the older by five years and more

  importantly, later on, because I was engaged to a girl of whom my uncle vastly approved.'

  Effie felt a strange shock to know that he had been engaged, yet it would be impossible to imagine there had been no girls in his life, and she asked awkwardly, `You—didn't marry her?'

  `She died of meningitis a month before we were to have been married.'

  `Oh, I'm sorry—'

  He ignored her expression of sympathy and continued matter-of-factly, 'My uncle made a will in my favour after the engagement was announced, and shortly after, he died unexpectedly of a heart attack. In fairness to Greg—who, I forgot to tell you, lived and worked on the property too—he'd added a clause to his will that, if I were by some chance still unmarried by the time I was thirty-five, then Dhoora Dhoora was to go to Greg, provided he was married. You may find all this boring, but do you follow?'

  `Yes.'

  `Well then—when I tell you I'll be thirty-five on the eighteenth of next month, you'll understand why it is I need a wife in a hurry.'

  Edie's lips parted in a silent gasp. In a curious and illogical way, she felt she'd been deceived. Because—because she'd pictured a lonely cattleman longing for a wife—though certainly that image hid been shaken somewhat since she'd met him. She drew a deep slow breath and said evenly, 'Yes, I guess I do understand. I suppose your cousin's married already?'

  `So far as I know, he's not. But you can count on it he'll be married before D-day.'

  `He'll advertise too?' she asked with a humour that was forced.

  `He won't need to,' Drew said abruptly. 'But before

  you say the logical thing—that he has as much moral right to Dhoora Dhoora as I have—I'll make this point: He's taken absolutely no active interest in the property since my uncle died, even though we benefit from it equally. Next month the sharing period is ended—the station goes to one or the other of us, and this I know—that Greg will sell Dhoora Dhoora if he gets hold of it. My aunt will see to that.'

  `I—see,' Edie said slowly. She saw why he didn't want his cousin to inherit, but she still didn't at all see why Drew had had to advertise for a wife. She felt certain there must be dozens of girls who would say yes to Drew Sutton if he asked them to marry him! As it was, Edie Asher, a perfect stranger, had been called in to save the day. And suppose she said no, that she didn't want to be in it?

  He said into the darkness, 'What are you thinking? You surely can't be surprised to know that I have rational grounds for wanting a wife in a hurry?'

  `I suppose not,' she agreed reluctantly. `But—but you don't want a wife at all, really, do you? You just want to fulfill a condition, so you can inherit a cattle station.'

  He laughed briefly. 'I want a wife—a family. I want to be able to hand Dhoora Dhoora on to my son. Oh yes, eventually I want a wife, Alfreda, make no mistake.'

  In the darkness she saw him turn his head in -her direction and she felt her breathing quicken as at the same moment she became burningly aware that his thigh was-touching hers. She wanted to move, but she didn't do so. She didn't want him to know she was conscious of that point of physical contact.

  But of course,' she heard him say, 'I don't expect to get myself, a wife this way. When I advertised my

  idea was to make a marriage that was simply a formality —a legal contract for the sake of expedience, an alliance that could be annulled once my affairs were settled. And by the way, I shall pay you a generous sum of money for services rendered,' he finished coolly.

  Edie moved her position abruptly so as to break that unnerving contact with him that threatened to disturb her concentration.

  `Don't you think it's a little unfair to—to trick someone into coming all this way for one thing and then explain that you want something quite—different?'

  `Unfair?' he repeated, sounding surprised. 'No, I wouldn't call it that. A girl who answers an ad like mine is taking a big gamble anyway and should be very glad to escape with her virtue intact and a four-figure sum in her bank account. No, I don't think I'm being unfair at all. And from my own point of view, it's a sure and certain way of getting what I want.'

  But—what about me?' she asked, feeling a pulse begin to hammer at her temple.

  `You? Haven't we more or less established that you're not a frustrated female? You won't end up on the shelf simply because this particular marriage isn't going to be a real one at any rate—I'll stake my life on it.'

  `What if I tell you I've changed my mind—I don't want to go on with it?' she said huskily, and felt him move impatiently beside her.

  `Now that I would take very badly,' he said, his voice harsh. 'Though short of literally twisting your arm or beating you up--and luckily for you I'm not the type to do that—I'm aware I can't force you to honour what I regard as a promise.'

  `A promise?' she exclaimed. 'I didn't promise you anything!'

  His broad shoulders lifted in a shrug. 'No? In my book you did. You came, didn't you? You knew you'd written the winning letter—you accepted the plane tickets, the cheque.'

  `I haven't touched your cheque,' she broke in. 'It's in my pocketbook—I'll return it to you as soon as we go back to the hotel.'

  `As you please.' There was a brief silence and then he said in a coldly level voice, 'Well, what's all the shilly-shallying about? Are you trying to tell me you're not going through with it? You were just amusing yourself, is that it?'

  `No,
I—I wasn't amusing myself. It wasn't anything like that.'

  `No? You mean you really wanted to marry a stranger? Well then, suppose I were to say we'll make it a real marriage after all—you'd like that a whole lot better, would you? The idea of someone you know nothing about making love to you appeals to you, does it? Not necessarily me—just any cattleman of any age who wants a young and nubile woman in his bed.'

  Edie swallowed hard. He sounded so hard, so cynical. Thoughts of arranged marriages flew wildly about inside her head. She had been so eager to persuade herself they worked, that she wasn't really doing anything so extraordinary or impossible. But she was, of course, and when she thought what kind of a man he could have been—and what he could have asked of her—she shuddered to her very soul. She wished now that she had kept quiet, too, and not babbled on about unfairness.

  `Well, does it?' he insisted, and the next moment he had caught hold of her shoulders and twisted her round in the seat till she was facing him and so close she could feel the warmth of his breath on her forehead. He held

  her so hard she was helpless and she stayed rigid with shock, waiting for what he might do next.

  `Now listen to me, Edie,' he grated. 'I picked your letter out from the various answers I got for several reasons. You appeared to be free of possibly disapproving relatives, and as well, you weren't being enticed away from some job you couldn't go back to later. As a nurse, I calculated, you must have some intelligence, and you'd understand my dilemma and even sympathise with it. What I didn't count on—not for a split second—was that you'd be a beautiful girl with the kind of sensitive and subtle feminity that could well be any man's undoing. Believe me, it would be no punishment to me to make love to you, if that's what you want, and I think I can promise you a fair amount of satisfaction. So—'

  Her heart thudding, she put her hands on his chest and tried desperately to push him away from her.

  `I don't—I don't want you to make love to me—'

  `Then what the hell do you want? And don't for God's sake resort to tears. I'm as serious about this business as I ever was about anything in the whole of my life. So you tell me exactly what you want and we'll make some sort of an arrangement that gives us both what we want. Because believe me, I'm going to have what I want, some way or other.'

  Tears had flown to her eyes, but she blinked them back angrily. She felt so shaken she didn't know how to answer him. It would be so easy to say weakly, 'I want to go home,' and to burst into tears, but he made it plain he wouldn't tolerate that. No way could he get what he wanted if she went home, and the thing was, he had been perfectly right in what he had said. The very fact that she had come here was evidence of her willing-

  ness to marry him. But it would be embarrassing now to insist that she wanted it to be a real marriage. Besides, she didn't—of course she didn't! Meanwhile, his fingers were hurting her shoulders badly, and she searched her mind desperately to find words to answer his demand.

  At last she said shakily, 'I certainly don't want to be married to you—really married! You—you look nice enough, but I think you're too much of a—a brute for my tastes. I don't even know how much you really deserve this station you're using such tricks to get ... But I don't want to be beaten up or to have my arm twisted, so I'll do what you insist I've promised to do, I suppose. I'll marry you the way you said, and the sooner we break it up and part, the happier I'll be.'

  She heard his brief mirthless laugh as he shook her slightly and let her go.

  `It's a shame I have to hold you to your promise, Miss Asher, and I won't modify the compliment I paid you a moment ago, though I'm very much tempted to do so. You're very fortunate, if you'd only realize it. You should be thanking your lucky stars you haven't fallen into the clutches of a lecher ... In a minute or two I'll take you back into town, but first of all I'll let you know my arrangements. I've already applied for a special licence so we can be married at Mount Isa in a few days' time. I'll want some details from you—I'll let you have the relevant papers and you can fill them in when we go back to the hotel. Between now and our —wedding day you'll have a choice of staying in Narrunga or coming back with me to Dhoora Dhoora, but under the circumstances, I think you'd better opt for the latter.'

  Because, of course, she might run out on him if he left her on her own. And so she might.

  `All right,' she said stiffly. 'Whatever you say, Mr Sutton.'

  `I had thought you might like to come to Dhoora Dhoora,' he said, and his voice was subdued and meditative so that something in her responded and went out to him in an odd way. She didn't know what had gone wrong and she wished it hadn't, and she wished too he hadn't talked to her so brutally when it could all have been so civilised. 'I thought you might like a taste of outback life,' he added. `I'd imagined we could get to know something about each other and make an agreeable and pleasant thing of our brief partnership. However'—he moved to switch on the motor and the headlights, 'don't upset yourself. I shan't bother you more than I can help.'

  `Thank you,' she said aloofly, wishing futilely that they could somehow go back to the point in their exchange where it had all gone out of control—the point, perhaps, where she had suggested she might change her mind and he had become so ruthless and determined. Why had she said that? she wondered, as he turned the car and they headed back to town. Was it sheer feminine perversity because he had taken it for granted that everything was settled?—because he hadn't done her the courtesy of asking her if she still , wanted to go ahead?

  Neither of them said anything further, and Edie was relieved when at last the lights of Narrunga appeared. For a girl who believed in marriage—in legal tie-ups —she reflected bitterly, she was giving herself a very strange deal indeed.

  Edie woke the next morning feeling dull and subdued.

  She had dealt with the papers Drew Sutton had handed

  her last night when they came back to the hotel, and

  then they had parted for the night. Her sleep had been restless, her dreams confused, and she had wakened several times during the night to the feeling that her life had gone sour. She tried to persuade herself that she shouldn't be upset, that she should be glad she wasn't after all expected to make a real marriage with a man she didn't know.

  After she had showered and dressed, she made up her mind to make a fresh start, to cheer up, and to apologize to Drew Sutton for the unpleasantness of last night, and even to accept the full blame for it. He wasn't asking a great deal of her, after all, and he had been honest about his requirements, and it was a situation she could accept if she looked at it sensibly.

  He wasn't about when she went along to the dining room, and she concluded he had gone to finish making the arrangements for their wedding. What a farce, she thought nervily, as she ate her breakfast. But she had no one to blame but herself. She should never have been so silly—or so naïve—as to answer an advertisement like that.

  Later, in her room, she packed the few things she had taken from her suitcase, then sat down at the dressing table to write a brief letter to Barb, telling her that she wasn't being rushed to the altar, that they had both been quite wrong about Drew Sutton, that everything was fine and she was going to spend a few days at Dhoora Dhoora and would be in touch later. She supposed she would have to tell Barb about the marriage she was going to contract, but she wouldn't tell her until it was an accomplished fact, or she might come racing up to stop it. As for the pay-off she had been promised—four figures—she didn't want Drew Sutton's money. Even the cheque he had sent her was

  all ready inside her handbag to be given back the moment she saw him again.

  She was coming back from the post office when a car pulled up beside her, and of course it was Drew. She felt the colour rush to her face and her legs turn to water, and though she told herself it was because of the chilliness between them last night, she knew in her heart it also had a lot to do with the fact that he was such an ultra-good-looking and virile man, and that those extraordinary ey
es of his had such a disturbing effect on her.

  `Been posting letters?' he asked, leaning across to open the car door for her.

  `Just one,' she said awkwardly. 'To Barbara—my flatmate.' Then, anticipating his question, she added, 'I didn't tell her the whole story. Just that I was here and —safe and sound.'

  He smiled wryly but made no comment and as the car moved on down the street she turned her head to look at him. 'I'm sorry about last night,' she said with forced brightness. 'About making such a fuss, I mean. Of course I'll—help you out.'

  He looked straight ahead of him. 'Forget it. I guess you just didn't know if you were on your head or your heels,' he said casually.

  So he was letting her take all the blame, she thought with slight resentment.

  `I've got everything lined up for Friday,' he added after a moment. 'It will be a register office wedding. You know that, don't you? I can't very well expect you to promise to love, honour and obey me until death us do part under the circumstances, can I?'

  `No,' she agreed, and looked at him sideways. 'It was very trusting of you to leave me on my own this morning.'

  She saw his eyebrows rise. 'Not all that trusting. I thought you were sufficiently chastened.'

  `Did you?' she said, feeling her anger flare. 'I've been counting my blessings, as a matter of fact. I'm having a lucky escape in a way. I wouldn't choose to marry a man like you in a million years.'

  `It would certainly be a very long chance we should be compatible under the circumstances, wouldn't it?' he said maddeningly. 'Personally I wouldn't expect to find a soulmate by such a hit-or-miss method.'

  `You haven't,' she said briefly.

  He turned his head and sent her a crooked smile. 'No doubt we'll both make one or two discoveries during the next few weeks ...'

  They left for Dhoora Dhoora that afternoon—a drive of a hundred and ninety-five kilometres over a gravel road that didn't make for fast travelling. Drew had commented as he loaded her luggage into the car, `You travel light, don't you?'