At Home With The Templetons (26 page)

‘I mean it, Henry. I’ve had enough. If you don’t sort this out, and I don’t care what you have to do to fix it, go back to fulltime work, sell everything we own, sell the Hall, to hell with the rules of the inheritance, but if you don’t do something, I’m leaving you. And I mean it this time.’

‘Eleanor ‘

‘I mean it, Henry. I mean it.’

As silently as she could, Gracie tiptoed up the stairs and into her room. She was finding it hard to breathe. Her chest felt all funny and tight and when she held out her hands she saw that they were trembling. For five minutes, she did nothing but sit on her bed, trying to forget everything she’d just heard, wishing she hadn’t heard it, wishing she could tell someone but knowing there was no one to tell - not Charlotte, not Audrey, not Nina.

She couldn’t even tell her parents. They’d told her off often enough for listening when she shouldn’t.

Hearing a car, she ran to the window in time to see her father drive away. Where was he going? Was he leaving them? She couldn’t stay in her room any longer.

She ran down the stairs and into the kitchen. Her mother was there, calmly preparing two trays. ‘Hello, Gracie,’ she said. Gracie blurted it out. ‘Is everything all right?’

‘Everything really couldn’t get any better, Gracie. Thank you for asking.’ She was speaking in that strange overly polite voice again.

‘I’m sorry I’m not good enough at the cooking yet or I’d do all this for you. It’s not fair that you do all the work around here.’

Her mother’s tight expression softened. ‘I know you would, Gracie.

And I’m sorry if I snapped at you then and I’m sorry in advance if I snap at you tomorrow. Things around here are all a bit -‘ ‘Atmospheric?’ Gracie suggested.

To her relief, her mother briefly smiled. ‘Yes, Gracie. That’s it exactly. It’s a bit too atmospheric around here. Help me with one of these trays, would you, before I throw them both on the ground in a temper?’

Upstairs, Gracie carefully laid Audrey’s tray at her door, then watched in amazement as her mother left a similar one outside Hope’s room, stood midway between their two doors and shouted. ‘Audrey? Hope? Are you listening to me?’ Gracie had a strong feeling that both Audrey and Hope were up and listening at their doors. Her mother lowered her voice but not by much. ‘Afternoon tea is served, but not for long. I’ll do this for you both until the weekend and that’s all. After that, you come down if you’re hungry or you starve. It’s your choice.’

Another long pause, and then one voice.

‘Fine,’ from Hope’s room. Nothing from Audrey’s. ‘Good,’ Eleanor said.

After that, Gracie decided she didn’t want to be inside any more. She’d go and find Spencer and Tom instead, even if they did tell her to go away again. She made her way to the dam. Only Tom was there, sitting on the bank, baiting up string. He looked up and smiled at her. ‘Hi, Gracie.’

She settled herself beside him on the dirt bank. ‘Have you caught anything?’

‘Not yet. Spencer thinks it’s the bait we’re using. He’s gone to get something different.’

She wasn’t surprised they hadn’t crossed paths. Spencer knew all the short cuts between the dam and the Hall but refused to pass them on to her. ‘Can I watch?’ ‘Of course. Do you want to have a go?’

She shook her head. She still didn’t understand the attraction of yabbies. They looked disgusting and apparently tasted like mud. ‘It’s good having you here with us, Tom.’ ‘It’s good being here, Gracie.’

‘Are you homesick yet? Do you need to ring Nina?’

He smiled. ‘I’m fine, but thank you.’ He held out the string. ‘You sure you don’t want to have a go?’

‘No, thanks. I might get pulled in and I’m not a good swimmer.’

‘They’re about as strong as an ant, Gracie. I think you’ll be fine. And I promise I’ll grab hold of you if I see you heading for the water.’

She was secretly enjoying the thought of Tom rescuing her when she heard a shout behind them.

‘Tom, don’t let her hold it!’ It was Spencer, back again. ‘She’ll let go if we get one.’

‘I wouldn’t,’ Gracie said, indignant.

‘Did you get the new bait?’ Tom asked as Spencer reached them.

He shook his head. ‘Mum chased me out of the kitchen.’ He sat down with a thump beside Tom and started skimming stones across the surface of the dam. After a minute, Tom put down the string and started throwing stones too. He offered Gracie a stone, and even showed her the best way to throw it to make it leap across the water. On her first try it skimmed the water three times.

Gracie couldn’t believe it. She was here, playing with Spencer and Tom, and they hadn’t told her to go away!

After a few minutes, though, she got a bit bored of skimming stones. ‘Does anyone want to play a word game?’ she asked. ‘No, Gracie. Word games are stupid,’ Spencer said, tossing his last stone away. ‘So is skimming stones. What about hideand-seek, Gracie? Want to play that?’

‘Out here? The three of us?’ She was thrilled.

‘Sure. You hide first, okay? We’ll count to two hundred to give you time to find a really good spot and then we’ll come looking for you.’

She frowned, suspicious suddenly. ‘Isn’t it one person seeks and the others hide?’

‘Usually, but we’ve made up our own rules. It’s more exciting this way.’

Tom spoke then. ‘Spencer ‘

Spencer ignored him. ‘Okay, Gracie? Off you go.’ He glanced down at his watch. ‘Now!’

As Gracie took off at a high speed towards the neighbouring paddock and its clump of trees, Spencer made a show of loudly counting to a hundred before he turned to Tom and grinned. ‘That worked better than I thought. Come on. Let’s go watch TV.

‘What about Gracie?’

Spencer shrugged. ‘She’ll give up after an hour or so. I’ll tell her we couldn’t find her.’

‘That’s cruel.’

‘What’s the alternative? She hangs around us for the rest of the day?’

Tom stood up. ‘You go and watch TV I’ll find her.’ ‘You’ll regret it. We’ll never get rid of her now.’ Tom just walked away.

In her hiding place three paddocks away, Gracie’s heart was racing. She’d tried two other spots before this one, convinced each time she could hear Spencer or Tom coming towards her. She’d crouched low, darting from tree to tree, not daring to look back in case they caught sight of her. Finally, she’d found this spot, a large clump of rocks next to a small group of trees. She’d had to push past a spider’s web to tuck herself into a crevice and been alarmed to see a row of ants crawling over the nearest rock too, but it was too late to move. Spencer and Tom would be seeking her any minute now.

Five minutes later, she was still there. Her heart rate had settled a little, but she was now transfixed by the ants. They were definitely getting closer. She also had a horrible feeling that the spider’s web wasn’t empty.

She tried to shift a little to make herself more comfortable and discovered she couldn’t move her left foot. It had got wedged between two rocks. She tried to pull it out and felt a sharp twist of pain. Oh, no! First ants, then spiders and now she was stuck here, so well hidden they’d never be able to find her. She’d be out here all day. All night. She started calling their names, wanting to cry. But if they found her crying, they’d never let her play with them again. She blinked the tears away. ‘I’m here!’ She tried again, more loudly. ‘I’m here. Spencer! Tom! I’m stuck!’

Five minutes passed before she got an answer. It felt like an hour.

‘Gracie? Where are you?’ It was Tom, not Spencer.

‘I’m here!’ She couldn’t ‘reach up enough to peer over the rock. ‘In the rocks!’

Several minutes later she heard the crunch of dry leaves, then a moment later Tom appeared. She’d never been so happy to see anyone. ‘Oh, Tom, thank God. I’m completely stuck.’ She knew it was okay to tell him. He’d always been kind to her. She spoke in a rush, explaining how she couldn’t move. ‘I was getting a bit scared.’ ‘That’ll teach you to hide so well.’ He got down on his knees beside her hiding place and reached in, grasping her ankle. ‘Can you move now?’ She tried. It was still stuck. He pulled at the largest rock beside her and grasped her ankle again. ‘Now, Gracie?’

This time her foot moved, a rattle of stones falling as she pulled it out of the gap and wriggled her body sideways out of the hiding place. ‘Freedom at last!’ she said, trying to joke, brushing away all the dust on the front of her dress. ‘Well done,’ Tom said, smiling. ‘And you definitely win the game. I’d never have found you if you hadn’t called out.’

To her embarrassment, her eyes filled with tears. She quickly wiped them away. ‘I’m sorry to cry, but I’m just so relieved to see you. I kept imagining what it would be like if I wasn’t found, if I was stuck here all night, in the dark and the cold …’ ‘Oh, poor Gracie.’ He reached across and ruffled her hair. ‘You wouldn’t have been here all night, I promise. I’d have found you eventually.’

Gracie looked around. ‘What happened to Spencer?’ ‘He had to go home to get something.’

‘You won’t tell him I cried, will you? It’s just I gave myself a fright.’

‘I won’t tell him, I promise,’ he said, as they started walking back to the Hall together.

They’d gone just a short way when he stopped and reached into his rucksack for something. ‘Here, Gracie, have this. Just in case you get another fright some time.’

It was an oldfashioned silver whistle. She took it from him, turning it over in her hand.

‘Mum gave it to me when I was a kid,’ Tom said. ‘In case I ever got lost or in trouble. I’m too old for it now but you can have it if you want.’ ‘Really?’

‘Really. And if you ever get lost again, just blow it and I’ll come and find you, okay?’

Gracie felt the colour rise in her cheeks. She held it in her hand for a few more seconds, feeling the smooth cool of the metal, before pushing it safely to the bottom of her pocket. ‘Okay,’ she said.

She was still smiling when they reached the Hall.

At boarding school in Melbourne, Charlotte had just broken part one of her big news to Celia. She was now being subjected to a furious barrage of questioning. ‘Ethan’s nanny?’ Celia said. ‘You? I don’t believe it, Charlotte. How dare you!’

‘What do you mean? I thought you’d be delighted for me.’ ‘Delighted about what? That you’ve somehow pulled the wool over not just my cousin’s son’s eyes, but my elderly, rich, divorced cousin as well. Do you think it hasn’t been obvious what you’ve been doing every weekend? What you’ve actually been up to? Weaselling your way into my family like this for your own ulterior motives?’ ‘Weaselling? Your very nice, not-so-elderly cousin kept inviting me to spend my weekends looking after his even nicer young son. I accepted his invitations. What’s weaselling about that?’

‘It was all because of this stupid family boycott of yours. How dare you use my family to get yourself out of your own mess. I won’t have it, Charlotte.’ ‘That’s too bad, Celia. Because you have no say in it.’

‘Yes, I do. I’ll ring my cousin and tell him you’re not to be trusted. That if he wants anyone to look after his son, it should be me, his blood relative, not a complete stranger.’

‘You think he hadn’t thought of that? You think he wasn’t planning on offering you the job, until he saw how dismissive you were of Ethan that weekend we were there?’ ‘I was not dismissive. I was just busy, talking to ‘

‘The sheep farmer who is now your boyfriend who you have talked about incessantly since then? Just as well you weren’t supposed to be minding Ethan, then, isn’t it?’ ‘But if I’d known it was an informal job interview, of course I’d have paid more attention to him. It’s not fair, Charlotte. What is it, a paid job for the rest of their time here?’

‘Not exactly. A paid seven-days-a-week job. Well, not quite seven days. I get a day-and-a-half off each week.’

‘It’s fulltime? But how? What about school?’

‘Have you forgotten we finish school at the end of the year? Or that those of us who have already decided not to bother sitting exams that we already know we’re going to fail can finish up any time we like, particularly once we turn eighteen and are officially adults?’

Celia blinked. ‘You’re leaving school early?’ At Charlotte’s nod, Celia only looked more confused. ‘But what do your parents think about that? And how can it be fulltime? My cousin and Ethan are only in Australia for another ten days. We’re h

aving a farewell party for them next week.’

‘I know. I’m helping organise it. It’s a farewell to Australia party for them and for me.’

Celia went still. ‘You’re going back with them? Back to America? You?’

Charlotte made a mock bow. ‘You are looking at the newly appointed fulltime Chicago-based rather-well-paid if-you-don’t - mind-me-saying nanny to one Master Ethan Giles.’

‘No way. Ethan’s my relation. If anyone goes to America, it should be me.’

‘But you weren’t offered the job, Celia. I was. You’ve barely ever spoken to Ethan.’

‘He’s a kid, what could I possibly have to say to him?’

‘It’s your loss. Ethan’s great. I really like him and he really likes me. We’re friends.’

‘Friends? He’s an eight-year-old boy. How can you be friends? What are you up to, Charlotte? You’re going to go over there, have all your expenses paid, get your green card and then just disappear? Leave them in the lurch? That’s it, isn’t it?

‘Why can’t it be just what it seems?’

‘Because it’s you. Because this is all completely out of character and I don’t trust your reasons. And I don’t believe your parents have agreed to it, either. They’re hardly going to let you go off across to the other side of the world with a pair of complete strangers to do a job you’re not remotely qualified to do. Have they even met my cousin? How do they know he’s not going to make a pass at you the moment you’re on the plane?’ She stared at Charlotte then. ‘Oh, my God. That’s it, isn’t it? He already has. You’re having an affair with my cousin. Charlotte, you tramp.’

Charlotte laughed. ‘Celia, for God’s sake. No, I’m not having an affair with your cousin and nor is there a flame of desire flickering between us, waiting to combust as soon as we land on American soil. You’re right. My parents probably won’t agree to this. In fact, I’m sure they’ll be horrified at the idea, but the fact is, the moment I turn eighteen -‘ She lifted her wrist and glanced at her watch, ‘which is in less than one week, four days, three hours and whatever number of minutes, I am in charge of my own life, my own passport and my own future, and there’s nothing they can do about it.’