White Feathers (38 page)

‘They make a lovely couple, don’t they?’ he said.

‘Joseph and Erin? Yes, they do, and I’m happy for them, I really am.’ She watched as he took a last draw on his cigarette then flicked the burning butt at a shrub. ‘I am, you know,’ she repeated. It was obviously important to her that he believed her.

‘Yes, I know.’

‘Good,’ she said, then added, ‘Can I have one of your smokes?’

Leaning against the potting table, Owen rolled two more cigarettes, lit them and handed her one.

‘Da doesn’t like me smoking, either,’ she reflected. ‘Although plenty of women smoke these days. Da’s a bit old-fashioned sometimes.’

‘He’s your father. He’s allowed to be.’

‘D’you think so?’

‘He loves you.’

Keely raised her eyebrows disdainfully at him. ‘It’s only smoking.’

Owen shrugged again, and they fell silent. There was laughter and a burst of applause from the direction of marquee and Owen turned towards it. ‘We’d better get back, I suppose.’

Keely reached out and took hold of his sleeve. ‘No. Come for a walk with me, up to the daffodil paddock. I don’t feel like going back just yet.’

He considered her for a moment, her shining eyes and the gleam of the porch light in her hair, and then, against his better judgment, nodded and proffered his arm.

They followed the path that bisected the kitchen garden, picking their way carefully as the light from the house faded, but as they neared the gate leading into the daffodil paddock, Keely suddenly stopped.

‘Hang on, I need to get something first.’

She reappeared several minutes later, with something clutched in her hand.

‘What have you got there?’ Owen asked.

She held it up and grinned wickedly. ‘Da’s brandy flask. Can’t go on a picnic without brandy.’

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY

F
rom the summit of the hill Keely and Owen could see the warm and welcoming lights of the homestead below. Immediately to the left was the translucent glow of the marquee and the individual torches placed strategically about the lawn so guests could find their way to and from the house, and to the right the stables and the darkened sheds housing the vehicles and farm implements. Between the sheds and the lower slopes of the daffodil paddock sat the black shape of the hay barn that serviced the flatter reaches of the station.

It was cold, and Owen removed his jacket and draped it around Keely’s shoulders. Reluctantly admitting to herself that you couldn’t in fact climb a steep, grassy hill in high heels after more than five glasses of sherry, she had taken her shoes and stockings off halfway up and left them sitting incongruously on a tree stump. Owen couldn’t see Keely’s bare feet in the dark, but he had no doubt they were purple with cold. She didn’t seem to mind though. Perhaps that was because since reaching the summit they’d imbibed at least half of the contents of Andrew’s brandy flask. Owen wondered if anyone had missed them yet.

Something small and hard stung the back of his hand and he looked up. The moon was too obscured by clouds to see anything
much at all but a nebulous darkness above them, but he could smell the tang of rain on the wind. Another drop hit him, and then another, and he clambered unsteadily to his feet, pulling Keely up with him.

‘It’s going to pelt down. Come on, we need to get back.’

She laughed and pulled away from him. ‘Why? I like the rain!’

‘You won’t like this,’ Owen warned. ‘I think there’s a storm coming.’

Keely shrugged out of his jacket and tossed it back at him, just as the skies let go, the sudden, violent rain accompanied by a brilliant flash of lightning and an earsplitting crash of thunder. Within seconds they were both drenched. Keely spun around and around, her arms wide open and her face towards the sky, her eyes shut tight against the stinging rain.

Owen made a grab for her and she dodged out of his way, laughing wildly. He finally succeeded in hooking her by the neck of her dress, which was now plastered to her body, and began to half carry, half drag her back down the hill. She almost got away when he stopped to retrieve her shoes and stockings, but when another fork of lightning scattered sharp black shadows across the ground and thunder exploded almost directly above them, she seemed to suddenly appreciate the danger, and snatched at the front of his sopping shirt.

‘Down there!’ she yelled directly into his face, her breath heavy with brandy fumes.

‘
What
?’ Owen bellowed.

‘
Down there
!’ She gesticulated wildly towards the bottom of the hill as water cascaded from her flattened hair and down her face. ‘
The barn, it’s closer
!’

Owen turned to where she was pointing, then grabbed her hand and started to run. They both slipped over repeatedly before they reached the huge barn doors, which they found firmly shut against
them. Dodging around the side to a smaller door, Owen shoved it open and they fell into the deep, musty blackness inside. The sound of the rain on the corrugated-iron roof far above was deafening.

He swore as he ferreted through his pockets for matches. After several soggy strikes, one finally caught and he held it up, its weak flare illuminating a small sphere around them.

‘Where’s the light?’ Keely asked.

Owen gestured back towards the door. ‘It’s over here somewhere.’

He groped around then tugged on a cord swinging gently down from the blackness. An insipid light came on. The barn was half empty, as some of the hay had already been fed out, but there were still stacks of it piled up in the back half of the building. In the gloom, halfway up the mountain of hay, Keely saw three pairs of unblinking yellow eyes — the barn cats, staring suspiciously back at her.

‘Oh,
do
excuse us,’ she said, and giggled.

Owen was smoothing water from his hair. ‘What?’

She pointed. ‘The cats. We’ve interrupted their sleep. Or their mousing, or whatever it is they do out here.’

They both ducked instinctively as another peal of thunder crashed overhead, the rolling boom reverberating around the inside of the barn.

‘Christ, that was close,’ muttered Owen nervously.

He wasn’t going to admit it but the thunder was disconcertingly reminiscent of the terrible and incessant racket of the big guns in France. He wondered how James and Joseph were faring.

He spread his drenched jacket over the closest heap of hay and sat down heavily, uncomfortable now in his wet clothes. Thank God it wasn’t too cold in here; they’d go back to the house when the rain slowed a little.

Keely stood looking at him for a moment, then sat down with
her muddy feet stretched out in front of her, a bedraggled sight with her rat’s-tail hair sticking to her skull and her dress ruined. Owen thought she had never looked more beautiful.

He noticed the hairs standing up on her forearms. ‘Cold? Do you want my jacket again?’

‘No, I want this,’ she replied, reaching for the coat and extracting the brandy flask from an inside pocket. She unscrewed the lid and took a long swig, then passed it to him.

‘You’ll be sorry tomorrow,’ he warned.

‘Then have another drink and be sorry with me.’

He’d already exceeded his limit and knew he was in for a headache in the morning any way, so he accepted the flask. Brandy certainly had a warming effect on the body, if nothing else.

‘Actually, I am quite cold after all,’ Keely said and, scooting over to him, rested her head on his solid shoulder.

Owen looked down at the tracks the rain had sculpted through her hair. She smelled nice, of some sort of floral perfume with a heady, musky undertone, and he wondered whether the deeper scent was her own.

He also wondered what he should do next. He certainly knew what he wanted to do, but every facet of his conscience told him it would be wrong. Keely was the daughter of a family who had shown him nothing but generosity and kindness, she was the sister of a young man he had come to care about very much in France, she was a troubled spirit, and she was very drunk. And so was he. But, oh God, she was tempting, and a certain part of his body was acknowledging this fact in a very embarrassing manner. He hoped she hadn’t noticed, and bent his right knee in an effort to conceal the rigid lump in his trousers.

She put her head up then, and said, ‘My lips are cold too,’ and reached up to kiss him.

Her lips
were
cold, but only on the surface. Underneath he could
feel a soft, warm pulse that matched his own. He sat perfectly still for several seconds, struggling mightily with his principles, but when he felt her cool little hand begin to slide down the front of his shirt towards his groin, his principles found themselves suddenly and resoundingly defeated. In one swift move he had her on her back and was lying half on top of her, his right leg between hers and his pounding erection hard up against her thigh.

He was shocked at the depth of his lust. They were both fully clothed but he could feel every inch of her body, every contour and every curve, and every tiny movement she made. He gazed down at her for a moment and when he saw her lips begin to move in a slow, lazy, inviting smile, he was gone.

She arched her neck to give him unrestricted access to the smooth whiteness of her throat, and grunted in pleasure as he nuzzled and then bit. At the same time he moved his other leg between hers and began to rub himself against the firm mound at the junction of her thighs. She scrabbled with the buttons on his shirt, tearing the bottom two off in her haste. His chest was damp and his nipples erect, but not as erect as hers. Supporting his weight on his elbows now, he caressed the tops of her round breasts, swearing in frustration when he couldn’t get his hands far enough down the front of her dress to touch the enticing flesh there.

He rolled off her and urged breathlessly, ‘Sit up so I can undo it.’

But she beat him to it, reaching behind to unhook the row of fabric-covered buttons that fastened her gown at the back. Halfway down she gave up, tugged the sleeves off her shoulders and slid the top of the dress down to her waist. Underneath she wore a satin and lace bust bodice, and this too she pulled at frantically so she could bare her breasts to him. He sighed as he ran his hands over them, then lowered his lips and kissed the erect nipples until Keely moaned deep within her throat.

It was the last straw for Owen: he reached for the hem of her
dress, hauled it up to her hips, yanked off her knickers and climbed on top of her. She was ready, warm and slippery and reaching for him as he guided himself into her. She uttered a single, unladylike grunt as he entered and began to thrust, hard and passionate and utterly out of control. He didn’t feel her fingernails as they raked his back, and he didn’t hear her as she gasped and cried out a name that wasn’t his.

It had taken them hardly any time at all, but as they lay together in the prickly hay, sticky with sweat and giddy with alcohol and spent desire, it occurred to neither of them that their few minutes of wild, reckless passion would bind them to each other for the rest of their lives.

October, 1918

Keely had very reluctantly acknowledged her own pregnancy barely a week before Erin announced hers. The difference was that Keely hadn’t told anyone yet. The entire household was absolutely delighted for Erin and Joseph, and the announcement gave rise to much good-natured teasing among the men about how busy Joseph must have been on his wedding night.

He had in fact been busy, and so had Erin, but not making babies. When the storm had broken, there had been a mad rush to get everyone and everything out of the rapidly disintegrating marquee and into the house. It had turned into a sort of game, with most of the participants — already invigorated by the generous provision of liquid refreshments and then excited by the spectacular weather — dashing between the marquee and the house with armfuls of food and drink, chairs, children and assorted wedding decorations. How they all managed to jam themselves into the house Tamar never knew, but the resulting evening was thoroughly
uproarious and memorable, and ‘the night of the storm when Erin and Joseph got married’ became a part of local history.

Those whose transport was not reliable or robust enough to navigate the weather stayed the night at Kenmore, sleeping in various makeshift beds and in assorted stages of semi-undress. Fortunately there was plenty of food left over and Mrs Heath was able to feed all of the impromptu guests the following morning.

Erin and Joseph, who had not been allowed to escape from Kenmore until around one in the morning, had been almost dead on their feet and collapsed as soon as they arrived home, wet and cold because the station truck — which Joseph had now mastered with the help of his new leg — first wouldn’t start, then had leaked copiously during the short trip to their new house. They lay together naked and shivering in their recently purchased marital bed, between equally new and wonderfully crisp cotton sheets, and giggled hysterically about the whole affair. Then they settled, savouring their closeness after the long months spent apart, and fell asleep in each other’s arms within minutes.

The following morning, though, they finally came together as husband and wife, and their lovemaking was as thrilling and as satisfying as it had been almost three years earlier, although this time their surroundings were infinitely more intimate. Erin calculated that it was then, the first morning of their married life together, that their child was conceived.

Telling the family was almost as rewarding as telling Joseph had been. She had suspected for some weeks, but she and Joseph kept the news to themselves until several months had passed, just in case something untoward happened. Nothing did — in spite of Erin’s private fears because of what had happened after the
Marquette
— and at the beginning of October they made their announcement. Erin was worried that Keely would take the news badly, reminded yet again of her disastrous relationship with Ross
McManus and the dreams and plans she’d been forced to abandon, but she seemed genuinely pleased, although Erin had been puzzled by the wry smile on her cousin’s face.