Sarah accepted the challenge, said “How really appetizing!” and tackled it with every appearance of being famished. She rose from the table feeling she didn’t want to see food this side of nightfall. There was still a gleam in the hazel eyes, but this time she thought that beside the amusement they held respect.
He said, crisply, “Right. If you’re still of the same mind as you were last night, we’ll inspect the cottages, and you can choose, which you prefer.”
Sarah’s tone was offhand. “Oh, don’t bother. I don’t want to hold up your work. I’ll just pick the one farthest away.”
She noticed him set his jaw.
Outside was a jogger cart, with a three-quarter-bred draught horse in the shafts.
“Would you perhaps prefer the car?” asked her partner.
Sarah, thought the tone sarcastic. She answered “Hardly. I scarcely imagine you drive the car through the meadows ... I mean paddocks, of course.”
Rory decided it for them. He hopped into the jogger. “Come on, Sarah, let’s get going. What’s come over you?”
Sarah ignored Mr. Alexander’s proffered hand and threw a long leg over the side. Thank goodness for a full-skirted uniform.
The air was glorious, with a tang of the sea in it, and a breath of the mountains, beside the homely blend of farmyard aromas. It blew the wheat-gold hair back from Sarah’s brows.
“You’d better take the first cottage,” Grant Alexander advised her. “Nearer the house if you want anything—say help from Mrs. Mac. It’s not half as lonely a position either.”
“I shan’t want any help, and we discussed loneliness last night. I imagine that the farther we are away, the less likely are we to disturb the even tenor of your ways, Mr. Alexander.”
“I’ve no intention of allowing you to disturb it however near or far you may be.” His sudden laugh was disconcerting.
Sarah realized she shouldn’t have brought the children with her. They were all for the cottage nearer at hand. It had a long, concrete-floored porch that would be ideal on wet days. They could play all sorts of indoor games there, and the whole house was set to the sun. The other was shaded by overgrown pines and blue gums.
Grant Alexander, watching her shrewdly, said, “I hope you’re reasonable enough to take the one that will provide better living quarters for the youngsters, rather than persist in taking the other merely to spite me.”
He had her there, Sarah knew. She said, in as casual a tone as she could achieve, “You make yourself of too much importance, Mr. Alexander. After all, even if this cottage is nearer, it doesn't mean we have to see very much of each other beyond what the homestead business entails, and possibly much of that can be done through the solicitors.”
The children had run outside. He looked at her. “You surprise me, Miss Isbister.”
“I surprise you ... how? Surely you don’t think I’m likely to expect to see much of you after the way you received me?”
He said slowly, deliberately, “I thought you would set yourself out to undermine my resentment. I was sure you’d not have given up as easily. You won’t often admit failure, I should imagine. I was quite sure you’d at least attempt to bring me under your spell.”
Sarah said in a tight voice, after she had swallowed, “Mr. Alexander, I find you quite insufferable. I’ve nothing to say to that ... so will you please take me back to the house to get our luggage. This cottage is quite adequately furnished. I was told our stuff would come over by air and be despatched from Blenheim today, so I’ll have plenty of linen and china. I’d like to settle in today.”
His look was keen. “Take what you want from the house. It’s half yours ... legally.”
“No, thank you. We’ll use our own.”
They walked out, a tangible hostility between them.
Mrs. Macfarlane was most surprised they would not be in for midday dinner. “You’ll have more than enough to do, settling in, I’m thinking, without doing a meal forbye ... and with an unfamiliar range and all.”
Sarah smiled mechanically. “Oh, the sooner I get used to it the better. Besides, there’s that small electric rangette, as well. I’ll use that to start with.”
Mrs. Mac packed her some cold mutton, put a carton of vegetables in the jogger, some lettuce, radishes, potatoes, bread, rhubarb, and some packets of stores.
“You’re like all Scots,” she said, “gey independent ... a fine thing and all to be.”
Sarah ran upstairs for their overnight bags. Grant shot a look at his housekeeper. “She’s not only independent, she’s gey clever too.”
He waited till Sarah was back in the jogger before he spoke to her again. He jerked his head in Mrs. Mac’s direction.
“See what I mean?”
“See what?”
“A conservative body, my housekeeper. She was full of righteous wrath about your coming, and look what’s happened. It’s either your Orcadian birth, or your fatal charm. You have quite disarmed her. Your technique is superb. I’d thought you’d only turn it on for men, from all I’d heard, but it seems they all succumb, men, women, and children.”
Sarah said, “If you’ve quite finished, Mr. Alexander, I’d like to get going.”
The children came out of the cottage, received an armload of stores each, and went back.
Grant Alexander said, “You didn’t get an advance on the estate from the solicitors’ representatives before you left London, did you, Miss Isbister?”
Sarah said, “They offered one, but I didn’t need to accept it. I had enough to get us here. I felt it was better to wait till I arrived, and deal with the head office. I also,” her tone was smooth, “wanted to find how I would be received. I wanted things done ... if possible ... in as amicable an atmosphere as might be.”
His eyes doubted her motives. “I wish you would be honest and above board. You realized, as anyone would, that I would probably resent you. But you hoped, when we actually met, that I would succumb, as my uncle did, to your personal charm. In fact, you probably hoped to feather your nest still further.”
His eyes were watching her, as keen as a hawk’s. At his last words Sarah’s chin jerked up. “What on earth can you mean?”
“Don’t you know?”
“Would I ask if I did?”
“I wouldn’t know. I’ve not had much experience with women like you. Shall I put it more clearly, my dear Miss Isbister? I meant you might easily have thought why stop at a half share in the homestead!”
Sarah gazed at him uncomprehendingly. The man thought: Heavens, what an actress she is!
The blue eyes looked wide, candid, puzzled. He was surprised at the sudden urge to wound her that surged up in him. Something born of resentment that women who were—outwardly—the embodiment of any man’s dreams could be so despicable in their motives, so ugly and small in spirit.
He said deliberately, “Oh, spare me the wide-eyed innocent look. You didn’t succeed in getting one partner to the altar, but you might be minded to have a shot at the other. So I’m telling you I quite see through your would-be disarming ruse of refusing to accept any money till you got here.”
He waited for the bright, betraying color to run up into Sarah’s skin, but it didn’t. She gazed at him unseeingly, her color ebbing till he actually knew a moment of alarm in case she should faint. She said, through lips that scarcely moved, “Just bring the stuff in, will you, and ... go!”
He did exactly that, said goodbye to the children, hesitated at the door, looked across at her, changed his mind, and went.
CHAPTER THREE
The sheer physical effort demanded by the settling in and cleaning up did something for Sarah. It loosened up her taut nerves and muscles, and she knew it would be good to be achingly tired tonight so that she might sleep.
She was glad to find she could have a bedroom to herself. In a room of one’s own, one could shutter oneself into the privacy of weeping, with no one to ask questions. It was a matchless privilege.
Rory and Pauline set to work with a will, putting their things away, exploring every cupboard and cranny, running outside every now and then to poke around the garden enclosed in its loose stone wall.
Pauline was given a sun-room where on the wide windowsill she could accumulate again a collection of cacti.
“Mrs. Mac had a lot, Sarah, on that little verandah. She said I could have any bits of them I liked, if I would fossick out some dishes for them. She’s going to show me how to make a little Maori pa, in an old meat dish, with matchsticks for palisades.”
Rory was in ecstasies because his room contained huge cupboards. “I’ll be able to get all my Hornby train sets and Meccano things in here. And my stamp albums. This is a fine place, it’s got a door right out on to the back verandah.”
The tight band around Sarah’s heart eased a little. Oh, how much better than an orphanage for them. I can surround them here with the atmosphere of home, of love, the knowledge that they are secure, wanted. Beyond that, she didn’t ask anything, not even the cessation of hostilities between herself and her reluctant partner. If that was the price she must pay for the children’s future, then she would pay it.