Copper paused angrily, then swept on. 'Bill's not a demonstrative type, but anyone can see that he adores his wife, and if she'd gone he'd have followed her, and you'd have been left short of a man. And since you've spent the last few weeks telling me how busy you are, I assumed that you would prefer it if I could persuade Naomi to stay. But are you grateful?' She flung her arms out in a furious gesture. 'No! You think you can just walk in here and snap your fingers and I'll drop everything to make a few sandwiches. And when I object, you start quoting the terms of the contract to me!
'Well, I'm a good businesswoman, Mal,' she went on, green eyes flashing, 'and I read that contract before I signed it. There was nothing in it about making sandwiches on your say-so. What there was was an agreement that I would spend part of my time setting up the project which was the only reason I married you in the first place, in case you've forgotten!'
'I hadn't forgotten,' said Mal icily. There was a white look about his mouth and he was as angry as she was. 'You never give me a chance to forget.'
'That's good coming from you!' Copper retorted, too angry now to care what she said. 'You hardly ever open your mouth except to quote that agreement at me! If you had your way I'd spend all day at your beck and call. Perhaps I should be grateful you let me sleep at night?'
'There's no question about you doing anything else at night, is there?' he said savagely, and turned on his heel. 'You're not as essential as you think you are, Copper.
We managed perfectly well before you came, and we'll manage again whether you're here or not.' He paused with his hand on the door and looked back at where she stood, rigid with temper, by the window. 'I'll make the sandwiches myself-I wouldn't want to drag you away from your important business!'
The door slammed behind him and Copper was left alone to grind her teeth and find the only outlet for her feelings in throwing a stapler across the room to where Mal had been. She had worked her fingers to the bone for him and all he could do was quote the contract at her and demand sandwiches! How had she ever thought she was in love with him? He was arrogant, selfish and a bully, and she hated him!
Too angry to sit still, Copper paced around the office. So Mal thought she was obsessed with business, did he? He hadn't seen anything yet! All that was left to her out of the whole wretched business of her marriage was the chance to create a superlative new tourist location. Copper vowed to prove to Mal that 'playing around' would produce the best tours in the country! She would show him just how obsessive she could be!
The atmosphere that evening was tight-lipped. Copper talked exclusively to Brett and was careful to say nothing that was not in some way concerned with the project. Mal himself hardly said a word, except to announce that he was flying to Brisbane the next morning and wouldn't be back until the following day.
Copper told herself that she was glad to see him go, and was furious with herself for listening for his step on the verandah all day, or noticing how empty the doorway seemed without him. That evening she and Brett sat in the creaky wicker chairs and drank a beer together, and the very air seemed to echo with Mal's absence.
Brett glanced at her shadowed face. 'Have you and Mal had an argument?'
'What makes you think that?' said Copper, not without some sarcasm. It must have been obvious that she and Mal were hardly talking to each other.
'Mal walked around looking like a thundercloud all yesterday and when I showed a bit of brotherly concern, and asked what was the matter, he bit my head off,' said Brett ruefully. 'Talk about bears and sore heads!'
It was no use pretending that nothing was wrong, Copper thought, and it wasn't as if real couples never had arguments. 'If you must know, he's being impossible!' she confided, and was comforted to find Brett such a sympathetic listener.
'I know,' he said with feeling. 'I've been doing my best to avoid him for weeks! I'm not saying he isn't a great bloke, but when he's like that the only thing to do is take cover. You should have heard him when I forgot to check the jackaroos had finished the fencing the other day! He tore me into little pieces and threw me all over the paddock.'
Brett grimaced at the recollection and then shrugged it off. 'If you think it's hard being his wife, you should try being his brother sometimes,' he said. 'At least he's in love with you.'
'Is he?' Copper was unable to prevent the bitter note in her voice. She couldn't tell Brett the truth about her relationship with Mal, but she didn't see why she should pretend that it was roses all the way either. 'You'd never have guessed it if you'd heard him yesterday.'
'He's not very good at showing his feelings, that's all.' Brett shifted a little uncomfortably in his chair. 'I haven't said anything before, but he had a bad time with Lisa. I hated her,' he said with sudden vehemence. 'She was the most beautiful woman I've ever seen, but she destroyed something in Mal. She made him hard and bitter and he was never the same again.'
Brett sighed and shook his head as he took a pull of his beer. 'That's why I was so glad when he married you- apart from my own bitter disappointment, of course!' he interposed with a grin. 'You're good for him, Copper. He shut himself off for too long, as if he didn't have any emotions at all. It's a good sign that he can get angry again.'
'I'll remember that the next time we have an argument,' said Copper with a rather twisted smile, and Brett put his beer down on the verandah.
'Tell you what, let's have a bottle of wine with our meal tonight,' he suggested. 'We deserve a treat. Mal's snug in some hotel, so the least we can do is show that we can have a good time without him!'
In the end they had two bottles, and Copper felt decidedly fragile the next day. There was no word from Mal as to when he would be back, and when Brett came in that evening, also very much the worse for wear, she asked if she ought to ring the hotel and find out what had happened to him. 'Do you think he's all right?' she said, despising the anxious note in her voice.
'Of course he is,' said Brett. 'He must have decided to stay another night, that's all.'
'Wouldn't he have let me know?'
'Perhaps he forgot,' Brett said casually, sinking down onto a chair and clutching his head. 'God, I feel awful!'
Copper ignored the state of his head. Mal would come back when he was good and ready, and not before, but it wouldn't kill him to let her know when to expect him, would it? He had probably written into his wretched con-tract that she was to wait dutifully and be prepared to serve him a meal whenever he deigned to appear!
She banged the oven door shut crossly and went to sit down at the kitchen table next to Brett. 'Do you think another bottle of wine would make us feel better?' he said.
'Would Mal approve?' she asked, and he grinned.
'No.'
Copper smiled brilliantly back at him. 'In that case, I'll get the corkscrew!'
They had just started on their first glass when they heard the sound of the plane overhead, and they exchanged glances of ludicrous dismay. 'Hadn't you better go and meet him?' she suggested, but Brett said that he was feeling brave.
'He's got the pick-up truck at the landing strip,' he pointed out. 'Let's brazen it out!'
'You're right.' Copper straightened her shoulders. 'There's no reason why we shouldn't have some wine if we feel like it, is there?'
'Absolutely not.'
The situation was so ridiculous that they both began to giggle nervously like naughty children, egging each other on with their bravado. When Mal walked in, it was to find his wife and his brother sitting at the kitchen table, convulsed with laughter.
Copper's giggles stuck in her throat as soon as she saw Mal, and her heart constricted inexplicably. Her first impulse was to throw herself into his arms and beg him not to go away and leave her again, but somehow she forced her voice to a nonchalance she was far from feeling. She wasn't the one who had swanned off to the city without bothering to let anyone know when she would return, was she?
'Oh, you're back.'
'Yes, I'm back.' Mal looked grimly from one to the other. 'What do you two think you're doing?'
'We've been consoling each other for your absence,' said Copper acidly.
'Well, I didn't mind you not being here,' Brett put in, 'but I thought it was my duty to comfort Copper.'
'It doesn't look to me as if she's in much need of comfort,' Mal bit out. 'If I'd known you were going to be like this, I would have come back on my own.'
