Further Down The Road

3

Further Down The Road

    Hugo Kent sometimes thought, in his more fanciful moments, of which he did not have many, that being the head of a large corporate conglomerate was rather like being the captain of a ship. Say, a battleship or an aircraft carrier. You had all the authority and, for want of another word, power, that anyone could possibly desire, not to say all of the responsibility; but it was impossible to have friends amongst even the senior officers, and in fact extremely inadvisable even to try. There were enough internecine power struggles at KRP without the CEO’s adding fuel to the flames by forming yet more factions. And then, one had to watch one’s back. Not quite so much, now, as when he had been younger and had first taken over from the uncle who preceded him in the post: he had men whom he trusted—as much it was advisable to trust anyone—in key positions, now.

    Possibly not all heads of large conglomerates would have taken the analogy with a battleship’s captain quite so far as did Hugo Kent: he also felt it incumbent upon him to set the tone, both ethically and morally, of KRP, just as his uncle and father had done before the merger with Pointer’s, when Kent, Reardon had already diversified into finance and property after becoming the largest combined legal and accounting practice in the country; and as his grandfather had done before them, when Kent, Kent, Johnson and Hyett had made the daring move of buying out Reardon Chartered Accountants Pty Ltd; and, indeed, as that stern be-whiskered lawyer, his great-grandfather Hugo Kent had done, when he had shocked the Melbourne Establishment by not only buying himself into that epitome of respectable Melburnian law firms, Johnson and Hyett, but also by insisting on keeping on his scruffy Sydney office and his scruffy Sydney practice.

    The fact that the first Hugo Kent had made a modest fortune out of his scruffy Sydney practice, which he had turned into a very large fortune by judicious investments, was of no relevance, and indeed very little interest, to the Melbourne Establishment. That Hugo Kent had been forty-nine when he had bought into Johnson and Hyett. By the time he was sixty he was the senior partner, judiciously married to a Hyett daughter, and with four sons. His eldest son became head of the firm and the second an eminent judge; it was, however, to be another generation before the Kents were to feel themselves members of the Melbourne Establishment as of right. And by then, it might have said to have been too late: their horizons had broadened. The present Hugo Kent’s mother, who had been a Johnson, still lived in the handsome two-storeyed house in South Yarra which the first Hugo had bought for his Hyett bride. But the machinations of the Melbourne Club, as it was known to the disaffected ninety-nine point nine repeating percent of the country that was excluded from it, were of neither interest nor relevance to the present Hugo Kent. Nor were Victorian politics, or New South Wales politics, or even Australian federal politics. KRP, and Hugo Kent with it, had simply outgrown all that. Head Office was in London. The Australian main office was in Sydney. KRP Corporate Advisory Services had an office in Melbourne, true, but it handled only local matters: corporate audits, insolvencies, corporate re-engineering, and so forth.

    KRP had a name for probity and Hugo Kent had a name for stern uprightness. And both a very strong sense of what was due to his position and a very strong sense of the consequences to the company’s reputation should he allow himself to indulge in the sort of moral lapse which the media was only too ready to seize upon in any figure remotely in the public eye, these days. He kept himself firmly out of the public eye, true: but any extra-marital involvement would undoubtedly have resulted in unpleasant publicity. Added to which, he was an innately fastidious man, to whom the idea of such an involvement did not appeal.

    So when the conscientiously laconic Mr Pete Dawkins from the South Australian station with the typically unpronounceable name appeared on the balcony with a bevy of pretty girls in tow, Hugo Kent did not consider for so much as a single instant that one of them might be, or could be, for him.

    Since it was, after all, New Year’s Eve, he did not signal disapproval when the younger men went off to dance with these girls. Or murmur into Ward Reardon’s or Martin Jarrod’s ears that that might not be advisable. If there was any involvement that might look like distracting any of the young executives from their jobs, or interfering with their marriages, that would be a different story. Though Hugo would not, of course, speak to them directly. Naturally he was supremely uninterested in New Year’s Eve dances at the back of beyond: but not to have put in an appearance would have been unworthy of him. But to involve himself in the jollifications on the same level as the young men who worked for him would have been most inadvisable indeed: that sort of thing encouraged familiarities which both parties regretted the next day. Hugo Kent, in short, knew his duty; and he also knew how to keep a proper distance. He kept it.

    Eventually the supper seemed to be served: at all events there was a rush for the double doors. Brian Atkins, his PA, and after him both Ward Reardon and Martin Jarrod suggested that he might care for them to fetch him something; but Hugo waved them kindly away, saying there was no need for that: he’d get something for himself, a little later. He waited until the little tables set round the edge of the dance floor were filled with diners, and then went slowly downstairs. There was very little there that he cared to eat; and there was no-one to serve him. He had unconsciously expected the sort of buffet of which the Americans, in particular, were very fond: Hugo had suffered innumerable business buffet breakfasts, lunches and dinners in the States. There were normally three or four white-jacketed waiters hovering behind the long tables ready to carve you some ham, or help you to a slice of tasteless turkey; but here there was nobody. He was not, however, helpless, and he got himself a plate and some cutlery and looked thoughtfully at the still-laden tables before him.

    Kitten’s heart beat very fast; her whole body seemed to glow with excitement and determination. She felt as if this was the moment she had been born for. She got herself a plate and a knife and fork and went and stood at his elbow. After a moment he glanced her way.

    Kitten licked her lips and smiled up him uncertainly. “Are you all by yourself, too?”

    “Er—not exactly,” replied Hugo stiffly.

    “The girls I was with have all found partners,” said Kitten sadly.

    Hugo was now on his guard, though probably she was as innocent as she looked. That was to say, she might be looking for a casual pick-up, but it was a thousand to one she had no idea who he was. “Really,” he said flatly, not making it quite a question and not making it quite flat enough to be downright rude.

    “You’re English, aren’t you?”

    “No.”

    “Aren’t you? You said ‘rallih’, it’s usually the supreme test,” said Kitten artlessly.

    “Is that so?”

    “Yes.” She looked at him sideways. “I get it: a very nice school.”

    “Mm.” She was not so badly spoken herself: he did not, however, remark on this.

    Kitten flicked him another sideways glance and decided she’d stick with the nice voice that she had practised for years but only trotted out on the rare occasions when she had to speak to a client on the phone, at work. She produced a plaintive sigh and looked up at him with an innocent, timid expression, reflecting it was an awful pity she’d worn such high-heeled sandals. Though fortunately, he was quite tall. “Please could you pass me the ham? I can’t even reach it, let alone lift it.”

    It was right at the back of the table, and though quite a lot had been eaten, there was still a goodly portion on the bone. But no loose slices.

    “Certainly,” he said with a little smile. He reached across and hefted the platter. The plump little girl in pink cleared a place for it and he set it down.

    “Thanks. –Oh, dear, where’s the knife?” she said in dismay.

    Hugo investigated and found a carving knife lurking behind a towering creation of lettuce leaves in the shape of a peacock’s tail. Set in front of it was the remains of a pile of quartered tomatoes, unpeeled sliced raw capsicums, cucumber slices, and strips of carrot and celery. And the odd raw onion ring or two: reeking. Plus some sliced watermelon that if he hadn’t been in the country of his birth he would have assumed had got there by mistake.

    “The sort of people that think that’s a salad also think that salad greens are for decoration,” she said detachedly.

    “Er—yes.” Hugo carved ham. “Enough?”

    “Yes. Thank you.”

    He removed some excellent leaves of three different varieties of lettuce from the peacock’s tail and laid them on his plate. “Want some?”

    “Lots, please. I’ll have some of that endive, too: that’s definitely decoration!”

    He piled their plates with decoration, smiling just a little.

    “Jellied beetroot,” she noted detachedly, moving on.

    Hugo winced, and followed her. He ignored the hard-boiled eggs in commercial mayonnaise. With a pinch of curry? Very probably. At the mushroom salad he hesitated.

    “Watch out for the raw onion rings in that, they’ll be diabolically strong,” said Kitten detachedly.

    “Thank you for the warning. What’s it dressed with?”

    “If I had to guess, I’d say that Paul Newman’s bottled non-vinaigrette salad-dressing muck. Diet, or something.”

    He looked at her cautiously. The pretty little face—good God, unless his eyesight was failing it wasn’t slathered in goo: what a perfect complexion! Uh—it was quite expressionless. “Is this a leg-pull?”

    Kitten twinkled at him. “You’ve never been to a supermarket in your life, have you?”

    “No,” replied Hugo calmly.

    “I didn’t think so. It’s not a leg-pull. If you’re wondering what all this is, it’s macaroni salad, rice salad, different sort of pasta salad, rice and carrot salad, green lasagna noodle salad, potato salad. There’ll be at least three different sorts of potato salad.”

    “Rubbish,” he said mildly.

    Kitten smiled. “Just you wait.”

    They edged past a denuded platter of fried chicken, a platter of crustacea, and a row of avocado halves filled with prawns in, Hugo did not verify this empirically but he felt there was no need to, commercial mayonnaise. God: more pasta salads? And a large platter that had once held sliced salami. And did still hold two dried and curling slices.

    “Here: potato salad Mark II and III,” she said with a pleased smile.

    She was right, by gosh and by golly. The first one had been your basic potato salad. Possibly with onion in it. Number II made a feature of diced raw green pepper. Number III’s unique contribution was sliced raw red pepper, plus, er, sultanas? They both still featured commercial mayonnaise, mind you.

    “If you can find a fourth variety of potato salad,” said Hugo, not pausing to ask himself why he was saying it to some dim little Australian girl in a too-tight pink dress, “I’ll give you anything your heart may desire—if Lallapinda can provide it.”

    “That does leave the field wide open!” said Kitten with a laugh.

    “Yes,” he said, smiling. “Has anything been done to those small tomatoes?”

    “No: basic cherry tomatoes are considered very up-market. You not only don’t use supermarkets, you don’t read Australian House & Garden, do you?”

    “No,” he said drily. “Do you?”

    “Only professionally,” lied Kitten blithely. “I’m a clipper,” she explained, peering at a platter of oysters.

    God. Opened and every last one of them dead as a doornail. “Don’t touch those!” he warned.

    “I wasn’t going to.”

    “Good. Oysters are not edible, and not safe to eat,” Hugo Kent explained on a grim note to the dim little Australian girl in the too-tight pink dress, “unless they move when you squeeze the lemon onto them.”

    Kitten knew that. But she fell on the clue with a huge surge of relief: he was the sort of man that liked to teach you things! Well, most of them wanted an audience, of course. But at least now she knew that he liked to feel superior to you and he liked it if you didn’t know as much as he did. And were humbly willing to learn. And also, of course, if you were naycely spoken with it. Yuck!

    “You—you don’t mean alive, do you?” she squeaked.

    Hugo’s long mouth twitched very slightly. “Mm.”

    Stuck-up Pommy-lover, thought Kitten grimly, the immense and heterogeneous amount of knowledge she had absorbed from her clipping activities not having informed her that the habit of eating dead oysters had undoubtedly been introduced to the Antipodes by the Colonial master race.

    “Help,” she breathed in awe.

    “On the contrary: one would almost certainly be calling for help if one ate these corpses,” he said grimly.

    Oh, yeah: hah, hah, thought Kitten. She gave an obliging giggle and shot him an admiring look.

    Hugo smiled, just a little. “May I ask what a clipper is?”

    “I work for a press-cutting agency: current-awareness service, they call themselves these days.”

    “I see,” he said limply.

    “I usually do the French, German and Italian papers, and sometimes Spanish, if there’s a demand. And anything Scandinavian, of course, but they usually don’t need them. And the English papers, we’ve got one client who wants those scanned regularly. But I still usually have time left over to help out with the Australian ones. I’m learning Chinese, so as I can help Jay Wong, but it’s an uphill battle, I don’t seem to have much of a visual memory,” she said sadly.

    “You’re learning to read Chinese characters?”

    “Yes. Um, excuse me mentioning it,” she said politely, “but I think they might have been keeping the turkey warm for hours after it was cooked.”

    Hugo winced, and put back the slice he’d just carved.

    “You really don’t know your way around, do you?” ventured Kitten on a shy note.

    “No,” said Hugo with a sigh.

    “Well, you warned me off the oysters, I’ll give you that,” she admitted with a little smile, pinkening as her eyes met his.

    “Yes. Uh—” Hugo licked his lips without realising he was doing so. “What do you advise me to eat, then?” He looked limply at his plate. “Besides ham, lettuce and these small tomatoes.”

    “Um…” Kitten looked dubiously at the array before them. Besides the salads there was also a cauldron of kangaroo-tail soup but as the temperature had been thirty-eight all day she didn’t think Hugo Kent would fancy it any more than she did. “Ham, lettuce and cherry tomatoes,” she admitted.

    Hugo gave a startled laugh. “Yes!”

    Kitten went very pink, as dimples appeared in the lean cheeks, the line of the winged jaw was suddenly accentuated, the dark grey eyes went all slanty, and the utterly irresistible little dint in his chin actually moved as he laughed! He was the most desirable male human being she had ever met in all her twenty-five years.

    Hugo Kent looked down, smiling, into the rounded pink cheeks and wide blue eyes uplifted to his and without really realising that his pulses had quickened and most certainly without pausing to reflect that it was injudicious, said: “Well, what about this fourth variety of potato salad?”

    “Oh! Yes!” said Kitten with a giggle, her blood pounding. She licked her lips and looked up and down the table with eyes that had gone blurry with mixed desire and anticipated triumph.

    “There,” she said at last, with a tiny sigh.

    Unaccountably Hugo’s glance had wandered to the plump bosom in its pale pink satin casing. A little flush rose to his high cheekbones. “Yes?” he said quickly.

    “Down here.” Kitten walked steadily towards it, though she felt rather dizzy.

    “No, isn’t that the sultana variety?” said Hugo with a smile.

    “No: look again.”

    He looked again. “You’re right: sliced black olives.”

    ”Yes.” Kitten tilted her head to one side and looked up at him naughtily. “You did say anything my heart could desire?”

    “That Lallapinda can provide,” he said drily, suddenly wary again.

    Kitten sensed she had overdone the flirting. She looked away, her lashes fluttering, and hesitated. After a moment she said in a tiny, shy voice: “At this very moment, actually what my heart desires is, um… Not to have to go back in there by myself!” she confided in a rush, looking up at him, slightly breathless.

    They were very close: she smelled deliciously of freesias, or was it of some shrub Mother had had in the garden at South Yarra when he was a boy? In spite of the air conditioning, or possibly because of the fact that Mr Bailey had refused to turn it up to anything like a liveable level, the room was warm: Hugo was also very warm and he fancied he could feel the warmth coming off those plump, pale, pearly curves. He swallowed.

    “It’s all right: forget it,” she said sadly. “I think I might go outside, it should be a bit cooler by now.”

    Hugo hesitated. Then he said: “May I come too?”

    Kitten went very pink: partly with excitement, partly with triumph. She had gambled, and won. He didn’t want to be seen with her in front of his staff, but he did want to be with her! “Mm!” she said shyly, nodding. “If you’d like to.”

    “Yes. –Look, I’ll just fetch us some champagne,” said Hugo, forgetting his earlier decision not to touch the stuff: it was some local muck, the sort his father used to say you could tell was Australian, it was all piss and wind. “Would you like that?”

    Kitten nodded speechlessly, smiling at him tremulously.

    When his straight back had disappeared through the double doors, she relaxed against the table, and let out her breath in a great sigh.

    “Well done, young Kitten,” drawled a laconic voice.

    “Hi, Pete,” said Kitten feebly.

    “Had a bet with meself,” said Pete Dawkins, eyeing her drily, “that if any of you girls could get the Lord High Muckamuck to unbend, so to speak, it would be you, young Kitten.”

    “Well, if he comes back, you’ll have won it, won’t you?” she replied placidly.

    Pete sucked his teeth. “Yeah.”

    They waited.

    Hugo Kent hurried back into the room, smiling, his plate in one hand, a bottle of champagne tucked into one arm and two champagne coupes in that hand.

    “Bingo,” murmured Pete Dawkins, drifting away.

    Kendall Burgoyne didn’t really look very much like Richard Gere. The silvered hair was, as several persons present in the Lallapinda ballroom, and at least one person out on the Lallapinda verandah had remarked, very smooth. He did have rather a large nose but his face was wider, heavier and ruddier than the famous actor’s. His mouth was wider, too, and Sloane Manning was secretly rather annoyed to find herself thinking it was a nicer mouth than Richard Gere’s: better shaped. His tallish figure was wide-shouldered but thickened a little round the middle, though he confided to her that he regularly went for a run every morning.

    “So do I,” said Sloane, smiling.

    Kendall had already found out that she lived in Sydney. “Really? Perhaps we should run together, then!” he said with a laugh.

    “Mm. I’ll just run over from Manly to Double Bay and then we’ll run together,” she said drily.

    He smiled. “Is that where you live?”

    “Yes. I share a flat with my sisters and a couple of other girls. It’s quite handy, really, though the rents are astronomical: that’s why we’re sharing.”

    “I see. Never fancied a place of your own?” he said casually.

    Sloane of course recognised this hint. Depending on the type of man making it, not to say the depth of his pocket, it could be followed by a suggestion that she get her own place, a suggestion that he help her to get a place of her own, a suggestion that he find a nice motel, or the offer of a convenient flat or beach house that a friend of his just happened to have spare at the moment.

    “I suppose I’ve fancied one, but affording it’s another matter. And I don’t know that I’d want to live alone: you hear such awful stories, these days, don’t you? And no place is really proof against an intruder.”

    Kendall Burgoyne assured her that with modern precautions and a reliable service... He went on for some time about these necessary adjuncts to the trendy lifestyle of the well-off inhabitants of Double Bay, and after a period of pure boredom Sloane realised it was just another version of the “Why don’t you get a place of your own?” line.

    “Yes: why don’t I get myself a place of my own that I can’t afford and spend a fortune putting in alarm systems I can’t afford,” she agreed drily.

    He looked apologetic, but also hopeful. “It would be more convenient, in many ways.”

    Yeah, in many ways! thought Sloane in indignant amazement. “I suppose it would,” she murmured, looking away from him.

    Kendall said in a very low voice: “Think about it, Sloane. Perhaps we could talk about it, once you’re back in Sydney?”

    Sloane swallowed, and licked her lips, and swallowed again. They were sitting by themselves a good distance away from the Muwullupirri lot: they’d been dancing for a while but then he’d said why didn’t they sit down for a bit, so she’d agreed. She glanced cautiously over at his wife and said in a low voice: “I’ll give you my card, shall I? That’s got my business number on it.”

    “Uh—yeah,” he said limply.

    Sloane produced a RightSmart card from her purse.

    “RightSmart,” he noted dazedly.

    “We’re a temp agency, specialising in domestic service. Your wife might like to use us,” she said briskly.

    “Uh—yeah.”

    There was a short silence. Sloane let him squirm, she figured it wouldn’t do him any harm.

    Then she said: “The flat’s got a silent number. My sister Ingrid was married at one stage and the guy kept pestering her.”

    “I see.” Kendall felt in his inside breast-pocket and produced a gold-nibbed Parker. “Here.”

    Sloane wrote her home phone number down. Well, they could always get it changed again, if necessary. It was amazing these days how cooperative Telstra could be, now that they were facing strong competition from Optus.

    Kendall Burgoyne had breathed warmly all over her as she wrote. Now he said, breathing warmly, and putting his hand over hers and not taking the pen out of it: “Maybe we could have dinner some time.”

    “I’d love to,” lied Sloane, smiling at him.

    “Great!” he said, squeezing her hand. He put the pen back in his pocket and said: “Shall we dance this one?”

    It was a slow one: most of those who were neither too bloated nor too drunk to dance were in clinches—Nev Bailey had considerately dimmed the lights. “Yes: I’d like to,” said Sloane.

    He got up immediately, beaming. On the floor he merely pulled her against his hard-on, pressed it into her, and shuffled his feet, clasping her back with both hands as he did so. Sloane had expected this. She put her hands lightly on his shoulders, and shuffled her feet, too.

    After quite some time, during most of which Kendall breathed heavily with his eyes shut, he said hoarsely: “Put your arms round my neck, okay?”

    “Your wife likes you to dance like that with stray girls you pick up at Outback New Year’s hops, does she?”

    “Don’t be like that,” he said hoarsely into her ear.

    Sloane put her arms round his neck. This had the effect of crushing her raised breasts against his chest, which was probably what he’d intended. The more so as he’d long since discarded his jacket. As had most of the men in the room: what with all the food and drink and dancing, the atmosphere was pretty soupy.

    Sloane began, against her will, to feel a little soupy herself. She swallowed hard: she would not let herself fall for Kendal Burgoyne: if they had any sort of relationship she would be utterly in charge of it, and if she went to bed with him, which she still hadn’t decided about, it would be entirely on her terms. Added to which he wasn’t all that attractive, really!

    Sloane hadn’t had a relationship of any kind for over two years. She had had one pretty disastrous thing with a very much younger guy which had dragged on for three years, at the end of which, having finished his uni course, he’d simply disappeared. Without even saying goodbye. All of Sloane’s flatmates could have told her so: she had chased Marty because she’d fallen for his looks, and Marty had been flattered at first but then quickly become bored by the whole bit. Especially since he wasn’t nearly as bright as she was and she didn’t bother to flatter his ego or defer to him in any way. –The girls would perhaps not have put it like that, but they had all recognised, even Melodie, that that was what the trouble was.

    As the dance ended a very angry female voice said, very close to them: “You’ll have to excuse my husband, Miss Manning: he gets a bit silly when he’s had too much champagne. Kendall, dear, I’m sure this nice girl would much rather be dancing with one of those boys from KRP; for Heaven’s sake stop bothering her!”

    Sloane stood back with a little smile. “I’m not bothered, Mrs Burgoyne. Thanks for the dance, Kendall.” She gave him a nod and walked away before the expected row could break out.

    Cal Wainwright was chatting placidly with Kendall’s friends George and Julie Carter, who were also staying at Muwullupirri, and Bob and Ruth Keating, who had come over to his table to wish the heir to Muwullupirri the compliments of the season. And incidentally, on Bob’s part, to ask him whether he’d thought any more about standing for the Party in the up-coming state by-election, and on Ruth’s part, to ask him if he knew who those boys dancing with the Manning twins and their little friend were. Cal flicked a casual glance at Sloane but didn’t say anything until the Keatings had pushed off again, Ruth very pleased to discover from Sloane that they were young execs from KRP in Sydney (though she had never heard of KRP), and Bob less pleased to discover what he’d known already, that Cal had no intention of standing for anything, local, state or federal, now or in the future.

    Then he said: “Come and dance, Sloane.”

    Sloane hesitated. Cal gave her a grim look. “Oh—all right,” she said feebly.

    As soon as they were on the dance floor he said grimly, not pulling her against him: “What the Hell are you and Kitten up to?”

    “Nothing,” said Sloane in a hard voice.

    “Don’t give me that! One minute she’s all over poor old Kendall, and next minute she disappears in the general direction of Hugo Kent from KRP—don’t give me that innocent look, Pete Dawkins saw the whole thing: they’re out on the verandah, as if ya didn’t know—and you’re all over poor bloody Kendall!”

    “I suppose you do know who he is?” said Sloane in a shaking voice.

    “What, Kendall Burgoyne? Of course I flaming do, Sloane, I’ve known him for over thirty years!”

    “Then you know that his father was responsible for ruining our family.”

    “Bullshit. Never saw anyone less ruined in me life than Dick Manning. And don’t kid yourself your dad would ever have wanted to stay on the farm, he’s been an electronic whizz-kid all his life. Couldn’t wait to get off the place and do his engineering stuff.”

    “It would still be in the family!” said Sloane in a shaking voice. “Dad could have—have put a manager in, or Kym could be managing it. And maybe Grandpa would still be alive!”

    “Still alive and pushing ninety, yeah. Okay, maybe Robert Burgoyne did do all right out of that mining venture and maybe your grandfather did get a raw deal: yeah. But none of it’s Kendall’s fault, so if you’ve got some bloody silly scheme in your head of getting him in trouble with that bitch of a wife of his, just forget it, okay? Shit, he was about fifteen when his dad came out here, Sloane!”

    After a moment Sloane said in a low voice: “I know that. –Is she a bitch?”

    “Mm? Oh: Joyce? Yeah. Gives him Hell in the intervals of spending his hard-earned with both fists: you know the type.”

    “Yes; well, possibly I wouldn’t mind the chance of being the type!” said Sloane in a high, shaking voice.

    Cal frowned. He pulled her gently against him. “Don’t talk like that. You’re worth more than that, Sloane.”

    Sloane’s mouth tightened. “Anyway, nothing Kitten or I do is any business of yours.”

    Cal was silent.

    “Is it?” she said angrily.

    He took a deep breath. “No.”

    Sloane bit her lip. “I’m sorry, Cal. I—well, I never thought Kitten was right for you, but it would have been nice if— Well, you know.”

    “Mm. Well, she’s far too young for me, it would never have worked out. But when something like her takes notice of you, I suppose any natural bloke— Oh, well: water under the bridge.”

    Sloane swallowed. “Is it?”

    “Yeah. Actually,” said Cal Wainwright with a wry smile, “the thought of being tied up to her for life makes me cringe all over. You know: the sort of thing where you wake up shaking, and thank your lucky stars it was only a bad dream and never happened!”

    Sloane smiled a little wryly. “Mm.”

    “Sorry, I suppose that was bloody rude: she is your sister.”

    “That’s all right. She’s too young and far too silly for you.”

    Cal hesitated. “Look, if she’s too young for me, she’s a Helluva lot too young for Kent: he must be in his fifties, for Pete’s sake.”

    “Yes. But she is an adult: it’s none of our business.”

    Cal sighed. “No.”

    They danced in silence for a moment. Sloane thought idly that it was a pity he was such a hidebound, dyed-in-the-wool macho Aussie bore, because he was nice, really, and not bad-looking... Oh, well.

    “Look,” he said in a low voice: “I mean it when I say you can do better than Kendall Burgoyne, Sloane. Just forget it, eh?”

    “Why? Because he’s a mate, and you’ve known him for thirty years?” said Sloane in a nasty voice.

    “Uh—partly that, if you want to put it like that: yeah. And partly because I’ve known you all your ruddy life, and l don’t want to see you get hurt.”

    Sloane bit her lip. “It’s still none of your business.”

    “Right. But it was lucky for you I didn’t decide it was none of my business that last time you were out here when your grandfather still owned Lallapinda, and that brute of a black bolted with you and I found you three hundred yards from the track, two miles from the Muwullupirri gate, with a broken leg and a lump the size of an emu’s egg on your head!”

    “Don’t be silly, Cal,” said Sloane limply. “That was years ago.”

    “Mm. –I bloody nearly didn’t investigate: thought you were a rock with a strange-shaped shadow, at first. You know what you felt like when I picked you up?”

    “What?” said Sloane uncertainly.

    “Uh… Well,” he said with a smothered sigh, “this winter I hit a kanga with the bloody ute. Just a young one, not much more than a joey. It must have been old enough to leave the pouch, though: didn’t see its mum anywhere around. I thought it was only stunned, so I got out and had a look at it, but it had a broken leg.”

    “What’s shooting a wounded joey got to do with me falling off a horse? It wasn’t a kanga that made that pig Black Panther bolt, it—”

    “No, I didn’t shoot him. I picked him up and took him home. Splinted the leg.”

    Sloane looked up at him uncertainly.

    Cal’s irregular features had flushed a little. “Bloody stupid: all right. But— Oh, well. I suppose the bloody pundits are right when they tell you not to interfere with wild animals. Anyway, that particular wild animal must have had internal injuries or something, because he died. Might have spared myself the trouble.”

    “I see,” said Sloane, blinking a little.

    “He felt just like you did, when l picked him up. Collection of warm little sticks with a bit of skin round them. Nothing to either of you.” He paused. “Nothing much to you now, actually. Do you eat regular?”

    “Yes! For Heaven’s sake!” said Sloane with a shaken laugh. Oh, dear: the macho man going all sentimental over, of all things, a wounded kanga? Wonders ’ud never.

    “I bet you don’t. Bit of lettuce and some cottage cheese and you call it your tea: don’t tell me. And don’t try telling me thin’s In, or some such garbage: we get the bloody TV out here, ya know!”

    “I’m perfectly fit and healthy. I’m just naturally thin.”

    “Yeah.” After a moment he said: “Mum said to ask you all over to afternoon tea tomorrow, if I saw you tonight.”

    “What, so as she can feed me up on scones?” said Sloane with a laugh.

    “No! –Well, yeah!” he admitted, grinning. “She’ll make those, all right. No, but she’d like to see you girls again.”

    “Kitten, too?” croaked Sloane, swallowing. Not that Mrs Wainwright, who was in her early seventies, had known the whole of it, by any means. But enough: it had been all over the district that Cal was spending that summer in Kitten Manning’s pocket.

    “Well, I must admit she could probably do without her. No, well: with her or without her!”

    “I’d like to,” said Sloane slowly. Kendall Burgoyne would be there, of course. Also of course, his wife would make very sure he was unavailable. On the other hand, wouldn’t it drive him mad to see her, Sloane, so close and just out of reach? Ye-es... Yes, she thought it might be just the thing to give him that extra push that would actually make him ring her once he was back in Sydney, instead of just remembering the whole bit as a holiday might-have-been.

    “Good. Well, pop over in time for afternoon tea, then?”

    The two properties adjoined each other not all that far from Lallapinda’s gate, but Muwullupirri’s homestead was way out beyond Lallapinda’s north-eastern border. Sloane twinkled at him. “Pop over two hundred-odd K: yeah. We’ll do that, Cal.”

    “I couldn’t fit you all in the Cessna.”

    “No!” said Sloane with a laugh. “We’ll make it, don’t worry. –Though rumour has it you carted those idiots from KRP out here from Port Augusta in the Cessna: how did you manage it? Don’t tell me you made two trips just for them!”

    The sheepish expression endemic to the macho Aussie male when reprimanded by a female of the species came over his irregular, not unhandsome features. “Uh—yeah,” he muttered. “Didn’t take that long. Couldn’t leave the poor blokes hanging round at the airport waiting until young Murray Keating might or might not turn up to collect the—”

    “Don’t go on.”

    “Don’t think they realised there wouldn’t be a taxi laid on, you see.”

    “And you were too soft-hearted to let them stew there until they did realise it, mm. Did they even offer to pay for the fuel, Cal?”

    “Uh—well, no. Heck, what’s it matter? I make that trip—”

    “You and the depressed rural economy, mm,” she said, smiling up at him.

    Cal smiled back uneasily.

    “We’ll be there in good time for afternoon tea, and tell your mum thanks very much!” said Sloane gaily.

    “Yeah. Right,” he said, very relieved. He held her more firmly, and put his cheek against hers.

    After a startled moment, Sloane let him. What the heck, if it turned Kendall Burgoyne green with jealousy, so much the better.

    The wide stone verandah was dim. To their rear, strips of light from the ballroom’s windows made a patchwork effect on the ground. On the verandah itself there was only one lamp on, up at the far end by a potted palm. Kitten led him competently away from the dining-room’s French window and over to a swing seat. It was more than wide enough for two, certainly, though possibly not wide enough for three. Hugo sat down beside her, with some difficulty manoeuvring champagne bottle and glasses. They ate and drank busily for a while, not talking. Hugo had time to wonder if he’d misinterpreted her signals: perhaps she hadn’t wanted his company, after all.

    “The ham’s all right,” she said.

    “Yes.”

    Kitten looked at him from under her lashes. There were many ways she could phrase her next remark, which was going to be on the champagne. “Do you like this?” was too bald, he might smell a rat. Or he might just say “No”—she could feel him getting cold feet. “The champagne’s nice, isn’t it?” would make her sound too dumb, she didn’t think he’d care for that. On the other hand, if she said: “The champagne’s awful, isn’t it?” she’d sound too knowledgeable.

    Finally she said on a dubious note: “Do you think this champagne tastes all right?”

    Hugo’s mouth twitched. “Do you?”

    Kitten gave an artless sigh and looked up at him hopefully. “I don’t know anything much about wine, really. Everybody else always seems to like champagne, so... And I do think the bubbles are fun. But I don’t much like the taste.”

    “No?” Hugo speared a cherry tomato with his fork. “How would you define it?” he said with a twinkle in his eye. He put the tomato in his mouth and looked quizzically at her.

    Kitten took a deep breath. “I know you’re going to say I’m silly. But to me, it tastes too sweet and too sour at the same time! –There!” she said defiantly, pouting.

    Hugo chewed and swallowed. “I don’t think you’re silly at all. That’s perfectly correct: it is far too sweet, no doubt because they’ve laden it with sugar. And they did that in order to disguise the fact that it’s far too acid, which is the taste you’ve defined as ‘sour’.”

    Kitten looked at him in awe. “Really?”

    “Really!” he said, smiling. He told her a lot about how to taste acid and sweet, how to detect sulphur in a wine, how to appreciate its nose—if it had one—how to... Kitten looked up at him wide-eyed, now and then licking her lips or nodding seriously. She knew all that: she’d been to three separate sets of wine-tasting classes. At the third she had finally learned what she had been aiming at: the tastes of a really good champagne, a really good burgundy, and a really good dry white. Two, actually: one had been a hock and one a Graves. The people at all three sessions had been without exception nerds, not excluding the tutors, but Kitten had expected that.

    “How did you get to know all that?” she said at last, with a sigh.

    “Experience, mainly, I suppose.” He hesitated. “And my father was a bit of a wine-buff. We had quite a decent cellar, at home.”

    “In Australia?”

    “Mm.”

    “I didn’t know people even had cellars! Well, not unless they actually own a vineyard.”

    “I think quite a few people have cellars. Wine collecting is quite a popular hobby. Though personally I don’t care for—” Hugo told her a lot about the Australian wines he didn’t care for, a lot about the carefully selected Australian reds the cellar in South Yarra held, and a lot about the wines he drank when he was at home in England.

    Kitten allowed herself to both smile and nod, this time, though keeping up the lip-licking and the awestruck expression. “I see,” she said at last with a sigh. “No wonder you don’t think much of this, then. –I read a clipping,” she said innocently, “that said the New Zealanders tried to sue us, or at least an Australian firm, for calling their wine champagne. Would that be right?”

    He was terrifically pleased by this gambit, and elaborated on it at length, thus allowing Kitten to finish her ham and surreptitiously drink up all of her champagne. Sweet and acid or not, it was all there was.

    Hugo saw she’d finished eating while he’d been yacking. He reddened a little, hurriedly finished the remains of his own meal, and said: “Would you like some pudding? There seemed to be a fair choice, in there.”

    “They’ll all be—” Kitten broke off, biting her lip.

    “What?” he said with a laugh in his voice. “Fattening?”

    “Well, yes: pudding has to be fattening, or it doesn’t fall within the definition of pudding!” said Kitten with a giggle. “Not that, though. Um, well, I don’t want to be mean about Mrs Bailey, I know she’s been slaving over this dinner for weeks…”

    Hugo put his head rather close to hers and murmured: “I won’t tell.”

    “No!” agreed Kitten with a giggle. “Well, then, they’ll be yicky, I’m afraid. Too sweet and covered in cream.”

    “Mm. Cream or chocolate, from what I saw. Or both.”

    “Yes. Um, if there’s any pavlova, I’ll just have a bit of that, please. Not too much cream, if possible.”

    “Fine.”

    She handed him her plate. Hugo took it, looking mildly surprised, and picked up his own plate, which he had just laid down beside the swing. “No fruit salad, anything like that?”

    “Ye-es... Well, the thing is, sometimes she puts tinned pineapple in it. It makes it too sweet.”

    Hugo laughed a little. “I’ll vet it very closely for tinned pineapple, I promise!” He went off, smiling.

    Kitten sat back in the swing, eyes narrowed, meditating tactics.

    To her great relief when he returned he had another bottle. “I think this is on the Everest principle!” he said, smiling, as he opened It.

    “Yes! –Ooh!” she gasped as the cork popped.

    Smiling, he filled her glass with sweet and acid ersatz fizz. “Down the hatch!”

    “Cheers,” said Kitten, drinking, smiling into his eyes over the rim of the glass.

    “Now, see what you think of the pudding. Mrs Bailey herself was there, she helped me choose it, so I disclaim all responsibility!”

    Kitten peered at hers. Pavlova and fruit salad. Plus a meringue. Not home-made, it’d be one of those catering ones, they tasted like polystyrene. She peered at his plate. “Ooh, you’ve let her talk you into the trifle!” she gasped.

    “She did assure me it's got real sherry in it.”

    Right, real Aussie sherry, that’d be, the ning-nong. “It’s got real custard, too. Out of a packet!” said Kitten with a loud giggle.

    “God, I’d forgotten that aspect of the dinkum Aussie trifle. We used to have it at school. Never mind, it’ll take me back.”

    “Don’t eat it, you silly!” said Kitten, laughing, putting her hand on his.

    Hugo Kent gave a shaken laugh, turned his hand under the little hot one, and squeezed it gently. Their eyes met.

    Kitten’s mouth was very slightly open. The full bosom rose and fell agitatedly.

    Hugo put his lips very gently on the rosebud ones.

    After a moment, without taking his mouth from hers, he set his plate beside him on the swing, took her plate off her, set it down on the stone flags, and got both arms round her. And shut his eyes and kissed her hungrily, past wondering what the Hell he was doing or why the Hell he was doing it or whether he should be doing it at all…

    Kitten looked up dazedly into his face. “I don’t even know your name,” she said in a tiny, wondering voice.

    “Hugo,” the man said hoarsely, very flushed. “Hugo Kent.” He hid his face in her neck. “What’s yours?” he said in a muffled voice.

    “Katryn Manning. But they call me Kitten,” said Kitten faintly. She slid her hands cautiously up and down his back.

    “Kitten,” said Hugo into her neck. He nibbled it gently.

    “Oh, Hugo!” said Kitten in a shaken voice.

    Suddenly he covered her mouth with his again, kissing her greedily. She responded eagerly.

    Eventually, panting, he looked down at her. The long lashes were shadows on her rounded cheeks. As he watched the lids fluttered and she looked up at him dazedly. Hugo put one hand gently under her chin. She gulped loudly. Smiling a little, he said gently: “How old are you, Kitten?”

    She gave a little impatient sigh: the full bosom rose and fell very close to his chest. “Nobody takes me seriously. But I’m twenty-five, I’m not a kid.”

    He would have sworn she wasn’t a day over twenty, if that. He was conscious of considerable relief. Not to mention of a red stop-light that, twenty-five or not, hadn’t gone out. He couldn’t have said why he was wilfully—it was wilfully, now—ignoring it.

    “Mm. I’m twice your age,” he said wryly.

    “That doesn’t matter,” replied Kitten on an uncertain note. “I—I don’t feel, inside me, as if it matters. Do you, Hugo?”

    “No. No, I don’t. But—uh—well, there’s half my senior staff in there, not to mention a handful of very proper young executives, all ready to be horrified if I put so much as a toe out of line.”

    The satiny brow wrinkled. After a moment she said in a puzzled voice: “Are you the boss, then?”

    Hugo laughed. “Yes, I most certainly am the boss, Miss Kitten Manning, clipper!” He put a finger very gently on her nose and traced the shape of it, up and down. “Why is your nose so irresistible?”

    Kitten knew that certain men got terrifically turned on by her nose. Though she had never been able to figure out why. It was a small, straight nose, but it wasn’t obviously cute, like Melodie’s. She perceived that Hugo Kent had gone all silly over her nose. Good. “I don’t know! Is it?” she said breathlessly.

    “Mm...” he said vaguely. He kissed it lightly. Then his eyes glazed over and he put his mouth on hers again.

    Kitten’s blood raced in her veins and she kissed him back eagerly and strained her body against his and did her best to pull his bulk towards her with the little hands on his back.

    Hugo went on kissing her. He put one hand on a pink satin breast. God. He squeezed it gently and she gasped and squirmed. Then he put his face down there and mumbled it between them, trying to edge the satin cups down a bit as he did so. Eventually he found the zip under the arm, slid it down a little, and the cups fell off her. The breasts were very full, as he’d already seen, and although the dress had been holding them up a bit, they were pretty firm: rather tip-tilted, the nipples set cheekily and perkily— He covered one wetly with his mouth.

    Kitten held his back, sighing. He was half on top of her: she rubbed one calf against his leg, nudging his thigh with her knee. She could feel him panting into her chest. She slipped one hand under him.

    “Yes,” said Hugo through his teeth.

    Kitten slid his zip down. When she touched him his whole body jerked violently and he covered her mouth with his again, panting. Urgently he groped for the hem of the satin dress. She shuddered under him. Hugo’s ears went very red. Panting, grunting a little, he pushed the tight dress up over the plump thighs and slid his hand up the inner silk. She trembled, and gave a tiny squeak.

    “Darling,” he said on a groan. Kitten could feel his fingers touching her panties: her heart pounded and her legs trembled. She could have screamed with desire, but didn’t: if she seemed too eager for it, it might put him off: he might think she was a little tramp. No: let him think he was making all the running, it was safer.

    “Jesus!” said Hugo thickly as the hot little hand tightened on him. He probed, panting, and his finger slid into her. Kitten gasped, shut her eyes and gritted her teeth.

    Hugo lay half on top of her with his eyes shut, sucking a nipple while he worked his finger gently in her and she rubbed him. She was so wet up there... Jesus. Jesus! Suddenly he pushed her hand away, gasping.

    “Wasn’t that all right?” said Kitten groggily, opening her eyes.

    “Too all right,” said Hugo through gritted teeth. He threw back his head and gasped for breath. “God,” he muttered. He looked down at her and grimaced.

    She made a muffled noise and gave him an agonised look.

  · “Mm,” said Hugo, biting his lip. Slowly he withdrew his finger. Kitten gasped and panted.

    “I’m sorry: went too far, too fast, didn’t I?”

    “We both did,” said Kitten faintly.

    “Yes.” Slowly Hugo did his pants up. He was aware she was watching him.

    “It’s a nice one,” she said brightly.

    “Is it?” he replied, with the ghost of a laugh. “Thank you. You’re pretty nice yourself.”

    She looked up at him hopefully but didn’t say anything.

    “Uh—no: much as I’d like to, I really can’t, not with my staff in there,” he said, jerking his head towards the house and grimacing.

    “No.” Kitten adjusted her skirt carefully. “Shall we just have our pudding?” she said timidly.

    Hugo did not respond.

    “Shall we?” She put her hand on his thigh.

    He leapt a foot.

    This was a good sign: Kitten left her hand there.

    Shakily Hugo put his own hand over that little hot one. “Is—is there anywhere we—we could go, Kitten?” he said with difficulty.

    “Would your staff come into your room?”

    “Uh—it’s a suite. Well, yes, I’m afraid. And it wouldn’t do, I am a married man,” he said with a grimace.

    “I see. Is—is your wife out here, too?”

    “Oh, Lord, no. She never comes anywhere with me. And certainly not to Australia.”

    “Oh. –I haven’t got a room, we just came over from our beach house for the ball.”

    “So you’re not staying in the hotel?”

    “No.” After a moment Kitten said cautiously: “There’s the hut, but it’s quite a drive.”

    “The hut?”

    “That’s what we call it, but it isn’t too bad. It’s out on the coast, about five K further down from the beach house. Grandpa used to use it for crabbing, but when he died Mum decided we could do it up and let it as a holiday home. But it’s miles from the road, and this year we haven’t managed to let it.”

    “It sounds ideal,” said Hugo shakily.

    “Ye-es... It’s about a hundred and thirty kilometres from Lallapinda: it’s all back roads. Can you drive?”

    “Of course I can drive!” he said with a laugh.

    “Good. I’m a rotten driver and the others won’t let me drive their cars. We’d better take yours, then.”

    “Uh—damn. We flew in.”

    “Oh.”

    “This hut is right out at the coast?”

    “Mm. My brother Kym says you really need a four-wheel-drive for that track, in any case,” she said on a glum note.

    Hugo hesitated; then he put an arm round her. “Listen, little Kitten: how would this be? I could get rid of my damned staff: send them off to the next place they’re supposed to inspect, tell them I’ve decided I need a holiday. And then perhaps you and I could spend a week in this holiday hut of yours. Could you manage that?”

    If he hadn’t been holding her, Kitten would probably have collapsed, she felt so stunned. She’d expected a one-night stand and then an almighty struggle to get him to the point where he’d want it to be something more. Or, given that he’d want it, to get him to the point where he’d decide it would be something more. She nodded hard. “Yes,” she said huskily.

    “Good. Uh—your family won’t object?”

    “No!” she said with a frank laugh.

    “That’s all right, then,” he murmured, kissing her hair lightly. Mmm—freesias. “Kitten,” he said suddenly: “what is that native shrub that smells like freesias?”

    “Boronia.”

    “Yes,” said Hugo with a sigh. “That’s it: boronia! Mother had a bush of it at home: your scent’s just like it. It had little brown and yellow flowers: smothered in them. Glorious scent.”

    “Yes; I love it.”

    “Mm-mm,” he said dreamily, leaning his cheek on her hair.

    Kitten began to wonder if she’d have to prompt him about the actual arrangements: help. But then he said: “How’s this? I’ll send them all packing tomorrow—it probably won’t be early, after this do. Then I’ll borrow a vehicle and collect you around dinnertime, okay?”

    Kitten had a much better plan. She pretended to think over his suggestion. “Ye-es... I’m supposed to come over here tomorrow morning, actually. I said I’d go riding with one of Wendy’s trek groups. Not that I’m a very good rider.”

    “As a matter of fact, I think I’m slated for a trek tomorrow, too!” he said with a laugh.

    Kitten already knew this: she’d got it out of Wendy while she was waiting for him to come down to the supper table. She looked up at him submissively. “Really?”

    “Yes!” said Hugo, laughing again. “That works out splendidly! Listen, pack some kit and bring it with you. I’ll tell my staff to pack their bags, then we’ll take off on the trek, and when we get back we’ll simply hop into a four-wheel-drive and off!”

    “Righto, Hugo,” said Kitten shyly, looking up into his eyes.

    Hugo gave a shaken laugh and caught her tightly to him, kissing her fiercely. “I can’t wait!” he said into the curls.

    “Me, too,” said Kitten in a little girl’s squeaky voice.

    Pete Dawkins cleared his throat.

    “I’m not blind,” said Nev acidly.

    “Never said ya were,” he retorted immediately. “Mind you, they come back in separately.”

    “What, him and his hard-on?” replied Nev rudely.

    Pete had a sniggering fit.

    “Uh—how’s it gonna go down with Cal, Pete?” asked Nev cautiously.

    “Think ’e’ll be relieved, tell ya the truth, Nev. Besides, he seems to have latched onto Sloane.”

    “Ye-ah... I wouldn’t say there was anything in that.”

    “You’re probably right. His mum’d be pleased, though. Who’s that one that young Ingrid seems to have got off with?”

    Nev scratched his head. “One of His Holiness’s lot. Uh… Reardon?”

    Pete Dawkins sniffed. “Old enough to be ’er dad and then some, whoever ’e is.”

    “Mm.” Nev heaved himself off the wall. “Come on: Auld Lang Syne in a minute.  You staying on, Pete?”

    Pete scratched his chin. “Cal seems to be sober enough to get ’em all back to Muwullupirri. Might as well, yeah: promised young Wendy I’d give her a hand with her bloody trek tomorrow; saves me coming back, eh?”

    “Yeah. Have the blue room in the east wing, Pete. The bunkhouse is full of yuppies from Adelaide in designer jeans.”

    Shuddering, Pete Dawkins agreed he’d have the blue room.

    Auld Lang Syne struck up, so they hurried off to join in this typical manifestation of your dinkum Aussie New Year. Pete Dawkins, who, despite the dinkum Aussie manner, had a mind very much of his own, reflected dispassionately that they all looked and sounded bloody silly. But he’d have bet his last flattened beer-bottle top in the shape of a two-dollar coin that he was the only one there to whom the thought had occurred.

    In this he was wrong. It occurred forcibly to Sloane Manning, as Cal Wainwright held her hand tightly and sang with a will to her right, and a fat, male American tourist held her other hand tightly and sang with an equal will. And it also occurred to Kitten Manning, smiling sunnily between the drunken Greg Taylor and the even more drunken Kym Manning. Kitten was like that. Sloane knew it, of course. But even the acute Pete Dawkins hadn’t guessed it. And Hugo Kent, hurrying quietly up the main staircase in order to escape this grotesque manifestation of dinkum Aussie culture, was very far from even suspecting it.

    “Who is that bloke that Melodie went off with?” said Ingrid, as she headed the car back to the beach house.

    “Keep your eyes on the road,” ordered Sloane.

    “Come on, Sloane!”

    Sloane smothered a laugh. “Don’t you know?”

    “I know he’s a Pom,” she said sourly.

    “Not ex-act-ly,” said Sloane with great precision.

    In the back seat, Kitten gave a snigger.

    “Well, who IS he?” shouted Melodie’s twin.

    Shoulders shaking, Sloane replied: “For once in her life she’s latched on to something with money. I grant you he seems to have spent all his life in Pongo, and for all I know he went to flaming Eton like Roderick Kent, but his name is—wait for it—”

    “SLO-OANE!” shouted Ingrid.

    “Neil Reardon,” said Sloane smugly.

    Ingrid gasped, and the car wove madly all over the track. From a cautious distance behind their dust, Nikki blew a blast on her horn.

    “Yes, that’s right: Ward Reardon’s son,” said Sloane brightly. “What do you call that, when your twin’s married to your hubby’s son?”

    In the back seat, Kitten went into a sniggering fit.

    “All right,” said Ingrid mildly: “laugh. But Ward’s all right.”

    “Define ‘all right’,” said Sloane, yawning.

    “He gave her a come,” suggested Kitten, with a muffled snigger.

    Ingrid was rather flushed. “That’s one definition,” she noted.

    “Help; did you, Ingrid?” asked Sloane.

    “We went up to his room: yeah. So what? It was a pretty boring party.”

    “I hope you used a condom,” said Sloane.

    “Yes, of course!” she said impatiently. “And I said, he’s all right. –Lonely.”

    “Lonely? Ingrid, you’re getting as soft as Melodie!” warned Kitten.

    “No, I’m not. He’s divorced, see?”

    After a moment Kitten said: “Yeah, but when did you find this out, Ingrid? Before or after he put it into you?”

    There was a short pause. Then Ingrid said with a muffled laugh: “There’s a third option.”

    “During!” gasped Kitten, going off in a gale of giggles.

    “Help,” said Sloane faintly. “Truly?”

    “Yeah. Why not?”

    “He can’t have been that eager,” noted Kitten.

    “He’s eager but he knows how to pace it. –He was bloody good.”

    “Oh. Well, good,” admitted Kitten. “Sometimes older men can’t.”

    “Could Hugo Kent?” asked Sloane drily.

    “Who knows?” said Kitten airily.

    “We all saw you come in from the verandah looking like the cat that had got at the cream,” noted Ingrid over her shoulder.

    “He’s not the type to leap into bed when he’s surrounded by his staff,” she said loftily.

    “Flirting with him over one dinner’s not much, Kitten,” said Sloane.

    “Tell that to Kendall Burgoyne,” agreed Kitten.

    “She reckons he’s almost hooked,” reported Ingrid.

    “Well, no, that’s a slight exaggeration,” admitted Sloane. “He’s nibbling at the line.”

    “What about your line?” said Ingrid drily over her shoulder.

    Kitten giggled. She kicked her sandals off and curled up in the back seat, ignoring all regulations about seatbelts. “We’ll see. He might think better of it in the morning. But for the moment, I’d say he’s swallowed it hook, line and sinker!”

    “Good,” said Ingrid, a trifle limply. “Uh—you’d better get on over there tomorrow.”

    “I’m going to,” she said smugly.

    “We might have known,” muttered Ingrid.

    Sloane looked at her with a little smile. “What about you? Mrs Wainwright’s asked us over for afternoon tea. Will you be free?”

    “Um, well, Ward thought we might have lunch... Tell you what, I could bring him!”

    “If he’ll come,” said Kitten drily.

    “All right, Miss Smarty-Pants, I’ll bet I get Ward Reardon to come to afternoon tea at Muwullupirri before you get bloody Hugo Crap!” she said furiously.

    Kitten smiled. “I’m sure you will.”

    “Tell me that face hasn’t got the expression on it that I think it has,” Ingrid begged Sloane.

    Sloane twisted in the grip of her seatbelt and peered. “It has.”

    Ingrid groaned. “What are you up to, Kitten?”

    “Never mind,” she said smugly. “It may not come off. Just don’t book the hut for the next week, that’s all.”

    After a startled moment they both gasped, and the car wove all over the road again.

    Kitten curled up, yawning. “I’m going to sleep.”

    “Do that,” said Sloane limply.

    The car sped on…

    “The hut?” muttered Ingrid.

    “If anyone can do it, she can.”

    Ingrid nodded mutely. After quite some time she said: “You know what, Sloane? I’d say we were well on the way to Lallapinda!”

    Even though Lallapinda homestead now lay quite some distance to their rear, Sloane had to admit: “Yes. I really think we might be.”

Next chapter:

https://thelallapindarevenge.blogspot.com/2022/11/morning-after.html