A Changing Land(51)
‘Come.’ He extended his hand and they resumed their walk. Claire lifted her tasselled hemline above the ground as they approached the house.
‘You are a devotee of this trend in greasy wool, I believe, Mr Wetherly. Can you tell me if it will last?’
‘Who knows, Mrs Gordon? We follow market preferences like a child pining for candy.’ Within a few minutes they were on the verandah and Wetherly was assisting her indoors. ‘Our allotted ten minutes are up.’
He took her hand in the hallway. Claire turned hesitantly towards the partially ajar drawing room door. Hamish was merely a wall’s width away.
‘Business precludes me from your company, Mrs Gordon, for which I am sorry.’ He bent and kissed her hand. ‘However I don’t believe our parting will be short-lived.’
Claire gave her best smile of understanding as Wetherly strode confidently away to join her husband. As the door at the end of the hall closed and male voices rose in conversation, Claire brushed at a smudge of dust on the hall table, straightened a landscape hanging on the wall above and shook the layers of her skirt free of dust. With those three things attended to there was nothing left to do but retire to her room. In the quieting household the muffled voices of the men carried through the empty rooms. Claire thought back to their conversation and fell asleep smiling.
Jim pressed his forehead against the oval window of the fourseater Cessna and watched the countryside move beneath him like some great lumbering animal. Having left the mountains some time ago he watched, fascinated, as the land had spread out beneath him in rectangular shapes, growing ever larger as they headed north-west. It was as if he flew above a vast patchwork quilt, where sage greens competed with the full spectrum of browns: coffee, tan and russet. There were long, straight roads heading endlessly onwards, massive trucks towing second trailers, and scattered buildings and livestock massed in some areas like the pebbles on the edge of the loch. He’d not imagined a country could be so vast.
‘First visit, mate?’
Jim adjusted the headset, ‘Aye.’ He wasn’t exactly expecting a welcoming committee. In fact he didn’t even expect Sarah to pick him up. His father explained that the outback properties employed staff to assist in the running of their businesses, so he expected a car and driver and little else. That in itself was a novelty. His family wasn’t used to money, at least not the sort of money the Gordons were sitting on. He didn’t know what to expect and the thought made him both angry with himself for making the trip and nervous. He felt like a lowly crofter seeking the assistance of a wealthy Englishman and had to remind himself more than once that he was a blood relation and that the Gordons were no better than him. Jim pushed his shoulders back and straightened his spine in the cramped seat. His mother had only given him one piece of advice upon learning of his decision and that was to walk tall.
The plane was descending quickly. Jim pressed his nostrils together with thumb and forefinger and blew to relieve the pressure in his ears. He touched his breast pocket. Inside was an envelope containing the details of a specialist in estate law who would also arrange the transfer of funds to The Bank of Scotland. A scatter of ten houses or so appeared through the window and then disappeared as the plane circled towards the landing strip. They came in low. A rush of trees and gravel sped past them and then they were lifting upwards again.
‘What happened?’ Jim asked, concerned at the abruptness of the manoeuvre.
‘Roos.’ The pilot pointed to where eight grey kangaroos were bounding away from the strip and into the bush. ‘They come in for the green pick at the edge of the strip. Bloody nuisance.’
The pilot brought the plane back around again and they landed with the maximum of bumps and a screech of gravel that sent them careering off course and into the dry dirt off the edge of the strip. As the plane stopped, Jim was jolted forward. His breath caught in his throat and he decided that when he finally left this blasted place he would get a hire car.
The pilot grinned, his irregular-shaped teeth forming a flashy contrast against the dark tan of his face. ‘Sorry about that, mate. The old girl tends to do that sometimes.’
When the billowing dust finally settled, Jim saw a woman standing beside a white truck. He slung his bag over his shoulder as he walked towards the solitary vehicle. Despite his best intentions his chest lurched just a little and he automatically slowed the pace of his walk, conscious of the past. It was Sarah and she was unchanged. Her red-gold hair was tied away from her face, her hands shoved deep in the pockets of her jeans. Jim adjusted the bag on his shoulder.