Master of the Outback

Maggie reached for the glasses she was too vain to wear in public. “We’ve got a cracker here, Gena.” She slapped a satisfied hand on top of the thick manuscript. “I thoroughly enjoyed it. Your readers will too. A stirring tale—great romance, extremely touching in places, all those amazing insights, and your usual clever twists.”

Genevieve’s heart lifted. “I’m glad you like it, Maggie. I owe a lot to you.”

“Maybe a bit,” Maggie conceded. “But you’re a born writer.”

“I’ve always had a compulsion to write going back to my childhood.”

“Of course, dear—a prerequisite.” Maggie looked up tosmile. Maggie smiled often—unlike Rhoda. “So what next?” Maggie asked.

Genevieve shifted back in her chair “I think I’ll take a break, Maggie. A complete change of scene—maybe six months or so. I’ve been going at it pretty intensively, as you know. Losing my grandmother hit me very hard, and then there was the debacle of my engagement.”

“You’re well rid of him,” Maggie huffed. Maggie never kept her strong opinions to herself. “So he was a good-looking charmer? He turned out to be a traitor. As for that treacherous creature Carrie-Anne!” Maggie threw up her hands in disgust.

“I’m over it, Maggie,” Genevieve said. Well, not completely. A double betrayal was hard to take.

“As I’ve told you before, dear, you’ve had a lucky break. Think—it could have happened after you were married. He could have betrayed you zillions of times over a lifetime. Honest to God, it brings tears to my eyes. Success puts men off, you know, love,” she confided for the umpteenth time.“I should know.”

Maggie had been twice married, twice divorced. Now she was eyeing Genevieve speculatively across the table, her pearly white teeth—the result of expensive cosmetic work—sinking into her bottom lip.

“You wouldn’t consider a break in our fabled Outback, would you?” She asked on the off-chance, with no real expectation of Gena’s saying yes. “You’d be staying on a famous cattle station in the Channel Country. It’s owned and run by one of our most prominent landed families. I can line someone else up, but I thought you could handle it. Have a well-earned holiday as well—recharge the batteries, maybe get inspiration?

Out of nowhere Genevieve experienced one of those moments of searing awareness that came like a thunderclap. She didn’t understand what prompted these moments, but she had come to think of them as a window opening up in her mind.

“What are we talking about here, Maggie? A working holiday?” Her voice sounded calm, but there was a betraying tension in her face.

Maggie’s alert brown eyes sharpened. She hadn’t missed a bit of it, though she pretended not to notice. “That’s it exactly.” Maggie could sense Gena’s inner disturbance, even if there didn’t appear to be any apparent reason for it. “If you’re interested, of course, Gena. Should be a piece of cake for you, with the bonus of an Outback holiday.”

“More information?” Genevieve requested, knowing in advance what Maggie was going to say. It had been long recognised by the family that Michelle had had an extra sense. She had inherited it. No denying genetics.

“Of course, dear.” Maggie lowered her eyes, giving Gena a little time to gather herself from that all too brief moment of—what, exactly? “A senior member of the family—Trevelyan is the name, Miss Hester Trevelyan, who’s had the sense to avoid marriage—needs a ghost writer to help with the family history. That would be from colonial days. And she might want to bring in their illustrious Cornish family background. Richard Trevelyan emigrated to the free colony of South Australia in the mid-1800s. We know there was a big influx of Cornish migrants from the mid-nineteenth century right up until after World War II. It was actively encouraged by the government, I believe.”

Genevieve made a real effort to calm her agitation. “After the demise of their tin and copper mines. Cornish mines were known to traders as far back as ancient Greece. It was thought that with their wealth of experience and expertise Australia was the place to come for mining families. The New World—a new beginning. We still refer to Yorke Peninsula in South Australia as ‘Little Cornwall’.”

“So we do!” Maggie exclaimed. “These Trevelyans have their own family crest.”

“How very jolly!”

“The Cornish side of the family did own tin and copper mines, as far as I know, but Richard Trevelyan was the last in a line of sons. He wanted to make his own way, so he decided to found his own dynasty in Australia. Apparently he was more interested in sheep and cattle than in getting involved in the mines—though I believe the Trevelyans are heavily involved in the mining industry. Also real estate, hotels, air, rail, and road freight. You name it. A lot of diversification going on there. The current cattle baron is Miss Trevelyan’s great-nephew, Bret Trevelyan. Bret short for Bretton, I guess. Bit of information on him: he’s just thirty, still unmarried, one of the most eligible bachelors in the country. He was once engaged to the daughter of another well-heeled landed family, the Rawleighs. Obviously the grand romance and the unification of two dynasties fell through. His parents divorced when he was in his early teens. An acrimonious split, I believe. The mother ran off with a family friend—tsk, tsk. The father never remarried. He was killed in a bizarre shooting accident on the station. Apparently a guest’s rifle discharged when he was climbing over a fence. I don’t know the full story. There’s a younger brother, Derryl, and a sister, Romayne. Romayne married the Ormond shipping heir two years back—remember? It was a big society wedding. Got a lot of coverage.”

“I remember.” Genevieve sat quietly. She knew all about the Trevelyan family.

“The cattle station is vast—on the Simpson Desert fringe,” Maggie continued. “Djangala, they call it. Aboriginal. No idea what it means. You don’t pronounce the D. They also own a chain of cattle and sheep stations across Queensland, New South Wales, the Northern Territory and the Kimberley. So they’re super-rich and very proud of their heritage.” Maggie sat back, intrigued by Gena’s initial reaction. It was almost as though she had thrown a switch. “Miss Trevelyan is well into her seventies, but apparently still in good health.”

Genevieve concentrated on breathing in and out gently. She hoped she didn’t look as perturbed as she felt.

She had first overheard the name Trevelyan in a conversation between her maternal grandparents when she was twelve. Her grandparents had returned home on one of their periodic visits to celebrate her birthday. She had been about to enter the room to tell them lunch was ready when she was stopped in her tracks by the sound of her grandmother’s voice. It had literally throbbed with pain. Even at that tender age she had known the pain sprang from a deep well of anguish—as if the event Nan spoke of had straddled her life and caused her the deepest torment.

Genevieve had since come to realise what was the past for some people was as yesterday to others.

Nan had been speaking of a tragic event in her youth, the trauma of it still fresh in her mind. Genevieve had hung back, a strange jangling in her ears. She hadn’t been deliberately eavesdropping. She couldn’t have moved even if she had wanted to. One peek had revealed tears pouring down her grandmother’s face. The grief she’d suddenly felt had—incredibly—been a variation on Nan’s own.

Afterwards, she hadn’t dared ask who the Trevelyans were. She’d had to find out for herself years later. She wasn’t about to tell Maggie the story now. She would be agog. But Genevieve knew beyond doubt that she would take on the role of ghostwriter for Hester Trevelyan. It was the only opportunity she would ever get.

CHAPTER TWO

Two weeks later.

HER nightmares came for her by night. Unlike most dreams, they didn’t vanish on awakening; they stayed with her. She knew what caused them. The shock entry of the Trevelyans into her life.

Her maternal grandmother’s first cousin, Catherine Lytton, had died in tragic circumstances on the Trevelyan family’s Djangala Station in the late 1950s. It reassured Genevieve to know any family connection of hers would be difficult to trace. She wrote under the pen-name Michelle Laurent, and she was going to Djangala as Genevieve Grenville. She had insisted Maggie did not mention her blossoming literary career, let alone her pen-name. Maggie hadn’t been altogether happy about it, but had given in to Genevieve’s adamant request. It was essential she go incognito. Everything was organised for her trip.

Djangala had escaped being contaminated by scandal. Catherine’s death had been deemed a tragic accident. A city girl, she had stepped too close to the crumbling edge of an escarpment the better to admire the stupendous view. The ground had abruptly crumbled beneath her, hurtling her to her death on the plain below. The Trevelyans and the police officer who had headed the investigation had been in totalagreement—an accidental death that had devastated them all. A beautiful young woman with her whole life before her!

Not a word of the marriage proposal Catherine Lytton had received from Geraint Trevelyan ever surfaced. Only Catherine had written ecstatically about it to her favourite cousin.

Trevelyan had later gone on to marry Patricia Newell, long stuck in the wings as his future wife. Catherine had been on Djangala as companion for her friend Patricia. The two young women had gone to boarding school together and had kept up their friendship.

Once again the wheels of fate were set in motion.

Geraint Trevelyan was Bret Trevelyan’s grandfather.

Genevieve’s father, who had torn strips off Mark and Carrie-Anne, had given his approval of her new assignment, thinking it would hasten the healing process and that the Trevelyans were a splendid pioneering dynasty. He had no idea of Genevieve’s true motivation. The Grenville side of the family had never learned Nan’s secret. But Genevieve, given such an unforeseen opportunity, was determined on learning the truth about the final days of Catherine’s life. She’d had a burning curiosity since the age of twelve—both because she was family and, it had to be said, due to her nature as a budding writer—to solve this mystery. Mysteries cried out to be solved.

Had Catherine’s death simply been a disastrous accident? Or was there more to it? Had the Trevelyan family buried the truth, as Catherine’s family had had to bury her broken body? The “accident” might well have revolved around the eternal triangle. People did terrible things for love.

Old faded photographs of the two young women revealed they had been physical opposites. Catherine tallish, very slender, with strawberry blonde hair, deep blue eyes and porcelain skin; Patricia petite, a little on the stocky side, with fine dark eyes and an abundance of dark hair. The photographs, all of them taken between the ages of sixteen and twenty-two, showed two young and untested girls.

Derryl Trevelyan, the younger son, was picking her up at her front door. They were to drive to the commercial airfield when the Trevelyan King Air was on standby to fly them to Djangala.

It was almost time to leave. She took one last look in the pier mirror.

Portrait of a serious-minded, bookish young woman, capable of taking on a challenge with no thought whatsoever of being on the lookout for an Outback millionaire.

Maggie had allowed her to read Miss Trevelyan’s curt letter.

Please don’t send me some glamorous young woman. Someone imagining she’s going to have a good time along the way. Such young women annoy me. I want someone dedicated, serious about their work. I will possibly keep odd hours, depending on my health. There will be free time, but this is first and foremost a job. Not an Outback holiday. I don’t need anyone, either, who will run off home when she realises just how isolated we are. A plain young woman would suit, as long as she’s not dull and she knows what she’s about.

Given such parameters, Genevieve had deliberately played down her looks. Her Titian mane was drawn back tightly from her face and pinned into a thick coil at her nape. She wore the lightest make-up. She wore a silk shirt, but the colour was a subdued chocolate, and not her usual skinny jeans, but comfortable tan trousers and tan boots. To further enhance the scholarly look she’d had clear glass put into bookish frames.

She would have laughed at herself, only she felt anything but lighthearted. She was going into the Trevelyan desert stronghold where Catherine had been trapped.

A young man struck a languid pose against the passenger side of a late model hire-car. He was wearing casual clothes, but managed to look the very picture of sartorial elegance.

“Ms Grenville?” He looked her over. No smile. Clearly she was a big disappointment.

“That’s right,” she responded pleasantly. “Would you mind giving me a hand with my luggage?”

A slight hesitation, as though he was above such things. “Certainly.”