Beyond The Blue Mountains - Plaidy Jean (читать книги бесплатно полностью без регистрации сокращений .txt) 📗

“What did you sell, Margery?”

“Everything you can lay your tongue to. lovey.”

“Lay your tongue to! What a lovely way to express yourself.

“Margery, I wish Papa would let you teach us, instead of Miss Kelly.”

“Lor’ love me! I ain’t the scollard she is.”

“Her brother went to Van Diemen’s Land, Margery.”

“So I hear, poor soul.”

“Do you know what it’s like there, Margery?”

“It’s the most terrible thing that could befall a man, I’ve heard.”

What joy there was in talking to her. She suggested a hundred and one forbidden things. When she talked of men, her lips quivered and she pressed them together as though she was afraid something would slip out that you shouldn’t hear because you were a child. She gave away so much that was exciting; how much more exciting must be those things which she suppressed. There was always the hope that she would tell more. Sometimes when she drank and drank she would say something, then clap her hand over her mouth or look over her shoulder and say: “Don’t you get saying a word I tell you, to your Papa or Ma!”

Poll was slopping water all over the kitchen floor. Soon Katharine and Margery, perched on their chairs, would be marooned on islands.

The sea’s getting higher every minute, Margery.”

There now, is it? And then what’ll we do?”

“We’ll be drowned or we may be rescued. Margery, have you ever been marooned?”

“No. But I’ve known plenty of sailors!”

“Sailors! Oh, Margery! Do tell.”

“Sailors is much the same as other men, in a manner of speaking. They go off to sea though, and they comes home again and that makes a bit of difference.”

“Did you ever have a sailor husband, Margery?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

“Did he go off to sea and come home again?”

“He did. And a bit too soon sometimes. A sailor ought always to let a woman know when he’s coming home.”

“Was he your first, Margery?”

“Oh, no, ducky! Not by a long chalk.”

“Margery, my Papa had a First Wife, didn’t he?” Margery looked over her shoulder. Katharine took the glass from the table and handed it to Margery.

“Here. Margery, have a drink. I know Papa had a First Wife.”

Margery drank and smacked her lips.

“Old-fashioned little thing, you are no bones about it!” Katharine knelt on her chair and leaned towards Margery; she put her face so close that Margery could see the fine texture of child’s skin; like milk it was for whiteness, and she’d got a powdering of freckles across her nose, which made her skin look all the more fair. Dead spit of what her mother must have been at her age. And she’d be such another, with her wheedling ways. Little monkey! Still, Margery looked forward to her visits. It was pleasant to know the child came down so often to see her, to talk to her. She’d had a fondness for the child ever since she was born; had never taken to the boys one half so much. She put out a hand and touched the tender young cheek.

“It is a smut?” said Katharine.

“No, not a smut.” It made you feel funny, thought Margery. Here she was. a lovely bit of flesh and blood. Golly, it did something to you to see her; bright eyes, and what a tongue, eh! What a one for questions! There was no stopping her. What’s this? What’s that? It made you feel sort of powerful to know that you had had a hand in the making of her. But for you, things might have been very different. She might not have been sitting there now. Her mother might have gone off with that Marcus, and the mistress might still have been… Margery shut off from that. Mustn’t think like that … not with the child there, staring at you so close she’d see any flicker of your eyelids. It would be “Margery, what are you thinking of?” in a minute, if she knew anything! Besides, no one could say… All that was done with, had been done with eleven years back.

And now what had the little girl on her mind? She was a regular one for getting things on her mind.

“I know Papa had a First Wife!” What did she mean? Margery knew she ought to turn the conversation, but for the life of her she couldn’t.

“What’s this?” she said.

“What’s this?”

“Papa had a First Wife!” whispered Katharine.

“Well, what of it? What of it? There’s no law in this country to stop a man marrying again if his first wife’s dead, that I know of “Oh.” said Katharine.

“She is dead then!”

“Of course she is.”

“Margery, did you know her?”

“Know her!” said Margery.

“Know her!” Purple colour was in Margery’s cheeks. The children had to know some time, hadn’t they? It was the talk of Sydney at one time. To marry so soon after… People were shocked. She wondered the master did it. But there was something headstrong about the master. Marrying like that two months after she died, and the baby born a cool three and a half months later this Katharine here. No wonder the child felt something was wrong! No wonder people talked! No wonder they were still talking!

“Yes,” said Margery, “I knew her.” This was success undreamed of.

“Oh, Margery, what was she like?”

“Sickly.” Here, this wasn’t the way to talk to a child, this wasn’t. Oh, but things got dull in a kitchen. And since she’d married the master, the excitement seemed to die down. There they were like any other couple, eating together, sleeping together and having children. There was something in those two that overcame scandal, just as it would overcome most things that stood in their way. They fought all the gossipings. all the slanders. For a time Mr. Masterman was very unpopular. And she went about the house, carrying her child with the dignity of a queen. But there had been a certain triumph about her in the last months of her first pregnancy, as though she had worked out something and brought it off. That was the impression she gave. It wasn’t until after the child was born that that room, where the first Mrs. Masterman had died, seemed to take on a special significance. It was only then that she made it into a guest room and moved up to the second floor.

Murder’s a funny thing. It won’t let you test. It would make you feel a bit funny to have had a hand in murder. You’d keep remembering, thinking of the one you’d killed. I wouldn’t like to be no murderer. Did she murder the first Mrs. Masterman? Or did he?

Overdose of a drug she took for sleeplessness. Nobody knew where she’d got it from. Nobody knew she’d been taking it When people took overdoses of drugs just in time to let Their husbands marry girls who were in trouble, you couldn’t help sitting up and taking notice. You couldn’t help feeling this delicious creepy feeling all over you.

“Sickly?” prompted Katharine.

“Always ill.”

“Did Papa love her very much?”

“Now how should I know?”

“You would know. Were you in the kitchen then?”

“Yes I was then.”

“You must have known, Margery. You know everything.”

Such flattery was irresistible.

“And what if I did?”

“Then you shouldn’t say you didn’t know!”

“If I have any cheek from you, Miss, I’ll get down the whip over the mantel.”

“That’s for convicts, Margery, not for me.”

“Well, and are you so far removed from convicts…”

“What, Margery?” . It was getting dangerous, but Margery liked danger.

“What do you mean, Margery? I’m not so far removed…”

“One man’s as good as another. Miss. That’s what I mean.”

“A convict is as good as a free man?”

“As a man he might be.”

As a man! What did she mean? Intriguing Margery!

“Oh, I like talking to you!” She put her arms round Margery’s neck.

“Here, steady! Trying to strangle me?”

“You smell of grog.”

“Well, and it’s a good thing to smell of.”

“My Mamma smells of violets.”

“I’ve no doubt she does. There’s some that gets on better than others in this world.”

“Do you mean Mamma got on better than you? Is that why she smells of violets and you smell of grog?”