Trial By Marriage

‘Surely I deserve a bit more than that for… slaying so many dragons in a manner of speaking?’ Every husky, sexy intonation of Wendy’s voice carried clearly on the cold night air.

‘What did you have in mind?’

‘This,’ she said, and Sarah couldn’t help herself. Her eyes had adjusted to the darkness and she could see both Wendy and Cliff Wyatt—not in any great detail but their outlines—and she saw Wendy move into his arms and gaze up into his eyes. They stood like that for a long moment then she saw Cliff Wyatt’s dark head lower to the paler glimmer of Wendy’s up- turned face and their lips meet.

That was when she turned and slipped away around the other side of the house.

‘But do you believe in Father Christmas, Miss Sutherland?’ Billy Pascoe said. He was a thin, in- tense, trouble-prone child with awkward dark hair that seemed to grow straight upwards and resisted his mother’s every attempt to tame it.

‘Well, it’s generally only little people who believe in Father Christmas, the tooth fairy and the Easter Bunny, Billy, but I must admit that last Christmas I could have sworn I saw someone who looked exactly like Father Christmas getting around Edgeleigh on a horse—.’

‘You always tell us we’re not allowed to swear, miss!’

‘Yes, I do but this is a different kind of swearing and has nothing to do with the saying of rude words—.’

‘Anyway, he’s supposed to be on a reindeer and that was—’

‘Perhaps his reindeer were sick, Billy,’ Sarah inter- posed smoothly. ‘And now, as it’s two minutes to three and nearly time for the bell, you can collect the art books, Billy—Billy,’ she said calmly, and outstared him firmly until he subsided grudgingly and did as he was told. ‘And you, Ben, can put away the paints.’

Ben sprang up and did so obligingly—anything to do with art and painting appealed to Ben—then he said, looking over Sarah’s shoulder. ‘Oh, here’s Uncle Cliff!’

Sarah didn’t turn but reached for the bell and swung it. ‘All right, off you go.’

Cliff Wyatt waited until they’d all tumbled out of the schoolhouse before he said anything. Then he strolled in front of her and remarked, ‘That was a masterpiece of diplomacy, Miss Sutherland. I quite thought he’d got you over the matter of swearing.’

Sarah grimaced. ‘It’s the likes of Billy Pascoe who keep teachers honest. How long were you there?’

He grinned. ‘Not long—you seem to have a large proportion of under-nines in your school.’

‘I have three teenagers actually but there’s an exam coming up so I gave them study leave after lunch. It’s easier for them to work at home sometimes.’

‘Any budding geniuses?’ he queried.

Sarah shrugged. ‘I don’t know about that but Donald Laws on, Cindy’s brother, is very bright and should be able to go on to university—with a bit of luck.’

‘Such as?’

‘His father’s approval,’ she said quietly. ‘Jim is still a bit staggered, I think, to find he has a son who is more interested in the Theory of Relativity than cattle. And, to be honest, I’m getting out of my depth a little. He should be at a proper high school with a science

department but—’ she smiled briefly ‘—I’m sure

they’ll work it out. Have you come for your tour of the facilities? Where would you like to start?’ she added briskly.

He studied her for a moment with a faint frown in his eyes then said, ‘Perhaps not.’

Sarah eyed him exasperatedly. ‘Why not?’

‘I don’t think this would be a good time for it.’

‘It’s a much better time now that school’s finished rather than sneaking up on me when I’ve got Billy Pascoe pinning me to the wall about Father Christmas in front of a whole lot of younger kids,’ she said crossly.

‘So that’s why you’re angry? But I thought you handled it very well—’

‘I’m not—angry,’ Sarah denied frustratedly and none too truthfully.

‘Constrained, then?’ he suggested. ‘As if I’ve done something to alienate you further?’

Sarah stared at him and discovered that her heart was beating oddly with a little pulse of panic. Surely he couldn’t have divined her peculiarly ambiguous state of mind since she’d witnessed him kissing Wendy Wilson on the veranda last night?

‘You’d be better off telling me,’ he said after a strangely tense little pause.

Sarah came to life. ‘No! I mean no, there’s nothing. Look, I’m quite fine actually so why don’t we get it over and done with… ?’ She trailed off on a lowering note as she realised how that sounded. ‘Oh, hell,’ she added hollowly, ‘perhaps you’re right.’

What he would have said then was to remain a mystery because as he looked her over with the frown still in his eyes Ben and Sally popped back into the schoolhouse demanding to know if he’d come to fetch them or what. ‘Yes,’ he said slowly, ‘why not?’ And added expressionlessly, ‘Another day, then, Miss Sutherland?’

‘Thank you. Yes. Whenever it suits you,’ Sarah said and groaned inwardly at how craven that sounded.

It was two weeks before she had anything more than passing contact with Cliff Wyatt but it was impossible to be unaware of his presence daily on the property. Her pupils and their parents were full of his doings, the changes he was making, and there was an air of hope and expectancy about the place rather than the sad feeling of whistling against the wind that had pre- vailed before it was sold.

It also became evident that Cliff Wyatt was not all sweetness and light, as Sarah could have told them, but an exacting boss who expected everyone to give their best and who could be coldly, cuttingly and sar- donically unpleasant in a devastatingly accurate manner when they didn’t. Nevertheless, this on the whole engendered a spirit of respect, she judged—and discovered that that irritated her as well.

All in all, she thought with a sigh once, the wretched man has contrived to set me on an uneven keel and I can’t seem to right myself. If I didn’t have to hear so much about him it might help and, of course, if I didn’t have to see him at all, that would help even more…

But it was not so easy to avoid seeing Cliff Wyatt although it was generally at a distance, but, even so, his height and easy carriage made him unmistakable, as did his air of authority, and, whether he was riding a horse, climbing into the helicopter which he piloted himself sometimes or simply striding to and from the homestead, she not only saw him often but felt the same stupid impact as she had the first time she’d laid eyes on him.

Of course it has to go away, she told herself more than once. I’m twenty-six! I’m not a giddy girl—and I don’t like him. You simply can’t be a rational adult and be obsessed with a man you don’t like…

That was how, unfortunately, as it turned out, on one of the occasions when she did come into contact with him briefly she also came to be more friendly than usual towards Tim Markwell, the vet, who was with him when they all met as she was shepherding the children back from a ramble they’d taken as part of a nature-study class.

Tim was not as tall as Cliff Wyatt but good-looking in a quiet way with a kind, gentle manner towards animals and humans alike. He flew his own plane from Longreach where he was based and his surgery covered hundreds of square miles. He was in his early thirties, she judged, and it was only after she’d bestowed a particularly warm smile upon him that she found herself hoping against hope that Mrs Tibbs had been wrong, and remembering uneasily that she’d been right about Wendy Wilson, though.

‘Hi, Sarah,’ Tim said easily but with a faint tinge of surprise in his eyes. ‘Been studying the local flora and fauna?’

‘Yes,’ she said wryly, ‘and I’m all talked out on the subject.’ In fact she did feel a bit tired, she realised, but for no real reason that she could fathom.

‘Why don’t you give them an early day?’ Cliff Wyatt suggested after subjecting her to a penetrating scrutiny.

‘Oh, no.’ Sarah looked shocked. ‘I couldn’t do that!’

‘Ah, but I could,’ he said, and turned to address the group of kids, who, delighted at their stroke of good fortune, needed no further invitation to scamper off delightedly.

‘How could you do that?’ Sarah said incredulously.

‘It was quite simple,’ he replied gravely but with a tinge of irony.

‘Well, you shouldn’t have!’

‘Why not? A couple of hours off isn’t going to harm them and it might even do you a bit of good.’