“Hold up now. I already said I never meant no offense.”
“She would kill it, would she not? She would kill it and gut it and move on to the next. You are that rabbit, Mr. Collins.There are thousands of you out there. We can have ourselves another sales agent before you’ve even got back on your horse.But what would you be without us? Where’s your next Broken Ridge?”
Shifting in the chair, dabbing himself furiously with his handkerchief, he stammered, “Look, all I’m doing is asking for faircompensation. Seven and a half, six even, anything just to—”
“I don’t think you’re listening to me.”
“Fine. We’ll stick at five. But I still want to talk to Billy about this.”
“This is my station, not Billy’s, and no, we will not stick at five. We are done, Mr. Collins. Our relationship is over. Iwill not have you come uninvited into my home, insult me, patronize me, make demands you would never dare make of a man, thenexpect us to continue as before. We are finished—as, I would wager, are you.” She gestured to the door. “Now you may leave.Hardy will show you out.”
At the sound of his name Hardy opened the door and stood waiting.
“But . . . we have a contract!” Collins spluttered.
“You’ll receive a written termination. I’ll get on to it right away. The speed of the mail these days, I daresay it will reachyour office before you do. Or you can wait in the atrium while I write it, however you prefer.”
“This is outrageous! You can’t do this! Twelve bloody years!”
“Don’t make a scene, Mr. Collins. Good day.”
Coldly she watched him snarl and bluster to his feet then scurry like a scolded child from the room. Hardy closed the door behind them and when she was sure they were gone she let out a long breath and fell back into her chair. She noticed his glass on the desktop, the lip marks and fingerprints smeared on the side. She cringed. A little laugh escaped. A giddiness at what she’d just done. She regretted none of it. The man deserved every word. She stood and went to the cabinet and leafed through the papers until she found the Collins contract, took it back to her desk, and readied her pen.
* * *
She had almost completed her paperwork when an hour later there came a knock on the door and Hardy announced that anotherrider was approaching on the track. Katherine laid down her pen and sighed. “Surely not Collins again?”
“I don’t believe so, ma’am. In fact it looks a little like Mr. McBride.”
She hurried outside and from the verandah railing watched him come. There was certainly a resemblance. Square shoulders, thickchest, a similar way of holding himself on the horse. But this wasn’t Billy. The horse was too knackered, the clothes toounkempt, the rider leaner, trimmer, stronger, younger; hatless, with light fair hair. Trailing a hand along the railing sheturned onto the stairs and came down very slowly, rocking slightly on her bad hip, not once breaking her stare. It might havebeen anyone, one of the men from the compound, a merchant up from town . . . so why this surge of excitement, this flutteringdeep inside?
He beat her to the bottom of the staircase, dismounted and walked forward, lifting his gaze, those searching blue eyes, andwith a gasp Katherine recognized him as the boy who had stood terrified with his brother in the bedroom just behind her, askingif their sister was still alive; the boy who’d never seen a Christmas tree until she showed him hers; the boy in whose saddlebagshe’d hidden a packet of lemon lollies, before sending him off to a massacre; the boy who’d come back irrevocably changed.
She pulled up short on the final few steps. His expression had not changed since seeing her. Unsmiling, riven with deep unease.Gripping the banister she descended to the track, gravel crunching softly under her shoes.
“Tommy? Is that you?”
He nodded timidly. Running his thumb over his knuckles, wringing his dust-covered hands. And she knew then, with absolute certainty and a knifelike pain in her chest, that her fool of a husband had died. This scheme of his, this plan . . . he’d gone out there and got himself killed. She folded her arms defensively, tears brimming as she asked, “Is it Billy?” then dripping when Tommy’s grimace confirmed that it was.
Her gaze slid over the sun-drenched hillside, the shadows gently lengthening, the daily sundial of the trees. It felt inevitable,really. In a way she had always expected this, that one day someone would ride up and tell her Billy was dead. A fall, a quarrel,a drunken brawl. He was never going to go nobly, or drift away in his bed at a grand old age. Roughly she swiped a tear fromher cheek and asked Tommy, “How?”
He looked about uncertainly. “Here?”
“I want to know.”
“All right.” Awkwardly he shuffled foot to foot, then: “He found me, came to the house, only he was followed. It was one ofNoone’s men.”
“Shot?”
“Long-range rifle. He never saw it coming. Went out happy in the end.”
She scoffed—of course he bloody did. Oblivious even to his own death. But as the laughter faded she found that she was reeling,the ground lurching, nausea rising up; she reached for the banister behind her but missed it, stumbled, her heels struck thebottom step and she fell. Tommy lunged and caught her, helped her down, Katherine groping for the solidity of the staircaseand sitting gratefully on the steps. She smoothed her skirt then went on rubbing it rhythmically back and forth, unable tofill a breath, the sun blinding suddenly, hot as a soldering iron, while her mind tumbled forward into her future like a bucketdown an empty well. The children would grow up fatherless. She was a widow, again. Stuck out here, alone save the house staff;she would not remarry, she knew with startling clarity, not now she didn’t have to, not now the only man she would love inher lifetime was dead.
Hesitantly Tommy sat down beside
