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- Herausgeber: Karin P Schaefer
- Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
- Sprache: Englisch
Do you love horses and a rattling good read? If you do, then BlueBuckle is a book for you.
Artist India Levy arrives in the New South Wales Highlands town Burragong to sell her grandmother's house. She'll be back in London pursuing her ambition to become a portrait artist within a couple of weeks. But India was never going to simply slip in and out of Burragong. Her grandmother, Grace, was much loved, especially by the Highlands Hunt Club, and her friends are determined to slot India into the gap left by her death.
But not everyone was a fan of Grace's. Lady Blythe, owner of Whistlejacket Thoroughbreds with her golden son, Lucien, is right at the top of the list. Seeing an opportunity to at last best her rival, she begins weaving the unsuspecting India into the glamorous world of the Blythes and Whistlejacket Thoroughbreds.
How does the dying Whistlejacket stallion, BlueBuckle, help India escape Lady Blythe's manicured grip?
How and why does BlueBuckle decide that life is worth living after all?
How do Grace's friends help India with her unexpressed grief and deal with their own when, suddenly, their lives start "going to shite".
Read on and find out.
BlueBuckle is a story about how horses influence our lives and how we influence theirs. It is also a romp, a yarn about characters that will be familiar to those that have a hoof in the horse-world and endearing to those that do not. It is a story of love, in its many forms.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020
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About BlueBuckle
Do you love horses and a rattling good read? If you do, then BlueBuckle is a book for you.
Artist India Levy arrives in the New South Wales Highlands town Burragong to sell her grandmother’s house. She’ll be back in London pursuing her ambition to become a portrait artist within a couple of weeks. But India was never going to simply slip in and out of Burragong. Her grandmother, Grace, was much loved, especially by the Highlands Hunt Club, and her friends are determined to slot India into the gap left by her death.
But not everyone was a fan of Grace’s. Lady Blythe, owner of Whistlejacket Thoroughbreds with her golden son, Lucien, is right at the top of the list. Seeing an opportunity to at last best her rival, she begins weaving the unsuspecting India into the glamorous world of the Blythes and Whistlejacket Thoroughbreds.
How does the dying Whistlejacket stallion, BlueBuckle, help India escape Lady Blythe’s manicured grip?
How and why does BlueBuckle decide that life is worth living after all?
How do Grace’s friends help India with her unexpressed grief and deal with their own when, suddenly, their lives start “going to shite”.
Read on and find out.
BlueBuckle is a story about how horses influence our lives and how we influence theirs. It is also a romp, a yarn about characters that will be familiar to those that have a hoof in the horse-world and endearing to those that do not. It is a story of love, in its many forms.
Contents
To Miss Moo, who opened my heart to everything I didn’t know about horses. This tale is for you.
When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk:
He trots the air; the earth sings when he touches it;
The basest horn of his hoof is more musical
Than the pipe of Hermes.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE – HENRY V
WHO’S WHO & WHERE’S WHERE
1
‘Come on Jeffrey, out.’ India Levy gave Jeffrey’s collar another tug and with a deep sigh the old greyhound tumbled out of the car and onto the grass. At the front door of Mars House, however, his years fell away. He impatiently bumped India’s calves with his nose as she fumbled with the keys and the door at last opened, he pushed past and disappeared into the gloom of the hallway.
India followed reluctantly. The air was still and smelt of cold wood ash and dust. Everything was much as she remembered. In the living room, the cavernous fireplace, mystical Aboriginal desert paintings, the sofa placed to catch the warmth of the fire. In the dining room, the long oak table, her drawings and paintings, professionally framed worthy or not forming a frieze on the wall. She picked a pair of reading glasses up off the keyboard of the laptop open on the table and quickly put them down. The glasses, the laptop, the horse magazines on the sofa, they all told the same lie − Grace, her grandmother, had just gone out to feed the horses, or to Burragong for the weekly shop. She would be back any minute, clucking for her glasses, making the rooms of Mars House feel small with her long stride.
India recoiled from the thought. Grace was dead and dead meant gone, no longer, extinction. Mars House was now just a shell, an empty shell.
She flicked a light switch. Nothing. She went to another. The same. She sat down on the edge of the sofa. Come night, she would be sitting in the dark with the cold cutting through her and she would be even more hungry. She had planned to stay at a B&B while she organised the house sale, but that was before she had been landed with Jeffrey; it hadn’t crossed her mind that the friend of Grace’s who had taken him in wouldn’t want to keep him.
She rose and went to the pantry, hoping to find some dog biscuits, but there were none. She would have to drive back to Burragong.
There was just enough wood in the basket by the fireplace to get a fire going. In the garage, however, stacked against the wall on the other side of the horse float, there was enough for a few weeks at least. She began loading the wheelbarrow.
When the fire was at last throwing out some heat, she drew the firescreen and went to find Jeffrey. He was in Grace’s room, on her bed. Her eyes averted, she covered him with a blanket: the solicitor who had contacted her in London said that Grace had died in her sleep.
The road to Burragong wound through lightly timbered grazing country. The cattle were chunky, the horses rugged to their ears. Iron gates and tree lined driveways flashed past, along with glimpses of sprawling houses, tennis courts and riding arenas. Amongst such opulence, Mars House was a poor relation.
But even a poor relation in the Southern Highlands was worth far more than she’d imagined, India discovered as she studied the windows of the real estate agent offices on the Burragong high street. She would have enough money to buy a decent sized flat, or maybe a bedsit and a cottage in a village like Burragong so that she could escape when London oppressed her. She’d be able to give up her job and paint fulltime, hopefully until the commissions started coming in.
Thankyou Grace. Thankyou.
She found everything she needed on the bustling high street. A supermarket for candles, cheese, fruit and wine and biscuits for Jeffrey, a bakery for pastries to quiet her stomach, a café for a much-needed coffee. In the Op Shop she bought a woollen beanie and a thick tweed overcoat that smelt of mouldering leaves.
The shopping stowed in the hire car, she cocooned herself in the coat and gulped down the latte. Jetlag was making her feel rubbery, but she had thought that while she was in Burragong, she should get some flowers for Julie Rice, Grace’s friend who’d been looking after Jeffrey. If Julie knew that she was going to sell Mars House, she might take Jeffrey back or help find him another home.
2
Gill Findlay left the callistemon stems she’d been working into an arrangement and went to the front of the shop. A tall, pale young woman with long ribbons of ivory coloured hair as dubiously clean as her coat was studying the buckets on the floor. There was something familiar about her. Perhaps she’d been in a fashion magazine or on TV. Young things that looked like they’d just come from a photoshoot or music video set were not uncommon in Burragong.
Feeling double her almost forty years, Gill hid her reddened hands behind her back and nodded at the bouquets in the fridge.
‘There are those too. Or I can do you up something if you’ll be about the village for half an hour.’
The young woman glanced at the fridge then returned to scrutinising the buckets.
Not much money, Gill thought. She pointed at a bucket of Oriental lilies. ‘They’re good value. They smell divine and they’ll keep at least ten days with some care.’
The young woman lifted a bunch of the lilies out of the bucket and cupped her palm to catch the drips from the stems.
Gill took them from her and led the way to the counter. ‘Do you want a card with them?’
The young woman thought a moment then said in a very English voice, ‘Thank you, yes. To Julie from Jeffrey.’
‘Julie, Jeffrey? The voice.’ Gill stared. The arrow-like eyebrows, the elegant jawline − it must be, it could only be. She smoothed her apron and attempted to push her ratty bob into some sort of shape.
‘You’re Grace’s granddaughter, India. I’m Gill, Gill Findlay. Welcome to Burragong.’
‘Actually, my name’s Ann.’
‘But you are Grace’s granddaughter?’
The young woman nodded and put some money on the counter.
Gill pushed it back towards her. ‘Don’t worry about it. You must come for dinner as soon as you’re settled. My daughter Olivia adored Grace. We all did. She was a great friend.’ Gill wrote her mobile number on a shop card. ‘But in the meantime, call if you need anything. Anything at all.’
After India had left the shop, Gill returned to her workbench. But it was impossible to concentrate. Everyone had assumed that India would return after Grace’s death. But when she had not and the weeks passed, it had seemed that she had no intention of ever returning. Mars House stood empty and would remain so, the grass getting longer, the garden wilder.
But now …
Gill threaded fronds of wattle through the fire engine red blooms of the callistemon and set the arrangement in a wide necked tube so she could adjust the stems. Grace’s death had come as a shock. No one had known about the cancer. No one except Grace. And India, Julie Rice firmly believed. But Julie firmly believed many things: that her cats were reincarnations of Egyptian gods and priests for one.
The phone rang and presuming it was Julie calling to say that India had been to pick up Jeffrey, she answered it saying, ‘Doesn’t she look like Grace.’
‘Grace?’ came the nasal voice. ‘Who looks like Grace?
Gill mouthed a silent ‘fuck’. It was not Julie Rice but Janet Reedhead, Whistlejacket Thoroughbreds’ housekeeper.
‘Sorry Janet. I was talking to a friend and the line dropped out. I thought it was her ringing back.’
Janet Reedhead was not put off so easily. ‘You were talking about Grace Levy, weren’t you?’
‘No, no. About my friend’s goddaughter Grace. Now, flowers. What do you need? I’m flat out.’
Her tone telling that she knew she was being falsely served, Janet Reedhead turned to the business of her call; she was after all a busy woman with heavy responsibilities.
‘Twelve arrangements, six for the house and six for the guest rooms and cottages.’
‘A full house for the opening meet then. I don’t suppose we’re giving out names?’
‘I don’t suppose we are,’ Janet sniffed.
‘Oh well, I’ll see them all at the meet anyway,’ Gill said cheerily, unable to help reminding Janet that while she might be the owner of a lowly flower shop, she was on the right side of the divide.
‘And I’ll need everything tomorrow,’ Janet said. ‘Brian will be in at ten. He’ll be pushed, so don’t keep him hanging about.’ Brian, Janet’s husband, was Whistlejacket’s all-duties man.
‘Serves you right,’ Gill told herself as the line went dead. She hated snobbery but Janet Reedhead brought out the worst in her. She added Whistlejacket’s order to the book. Twelve arrangements! She ought to be grateful for the business, but with an already lengthy list of orders for the weekend and a wedding, she’d be lucky to be awake during the opening meet. Not that she’d really mind. If she hadn’t been on the hunt committee and her daughter Olivia not counting down the days to the meet, she’d have happily given it a miss. The hunting she lived for began when the social hunters faded away. Grace had been the same.
The phone rang again. She ignored it and went to the stock refrigerator. The ringing stopped and her mobile started. She veered from the fridge to the workbench and filleted her phone out from among a tangle of smashed stems and soggy ribbon and checked the caller ID in case it was Olivia.
But this time it was Julie Rice. Despite having decided that she now couldn’t afford a minute’s idleness, she answered and listened a while before agreeing. ‘Oh, she picked Jeffrey up earlier. She must have come back into town then. He wasn’t with her. I couldn’t help staring either. Yes, stunning. Well, except for the turnout. But she’s an artist. Yes, yes, funny about the name. Grace only ever called her India. But anyway …’
She broke off as Julie described the sketch of Jeffrey India had only just minutes ago left with the flowers. ‘I didn’t see it,’ she said, disappointed. ‘Yes, I know she’s a portraitist. No, I didn’t get the impression she was peering at me. You did? Oh, I doubt it. Do you think she’s planning to do animals as well? I wouldn’t mind getting her to do the Cairns while she’s still affordable.’
Again, Gill paused, listened and then replied. ‘No, I don’t think she’s come for the opening meet. There’s nothing planned anyway. And as far as I know, she doesn’t ride. Must go. Bloody Janet Reedhead just rang. Whistlejacket’s got a full house for the meet and Janet wants the flowers tomorrow morning.’
3
India peered in Blooming Beautiful’s door. The front of the shop was in darkness but there was a light on at the back. Hopefully Gill didn’t leave it on for security. She knocked again.
After a minute Gill appeared. Her salt and pepper bob was awry and her apron and the wrists of her sporty hoody were soaked. She looked like she’d been battling her way up a blustery beach.
‘Oh, hello,’ she said as she opened the door. ‘I thought I heard someone knocking. People don’t usually want flowers this early, but I do get the occasional frantic husband who’s suddenly remembered it’s his wedding anniversary.’
‘We’ve been for a drive,’ India said, gesturing at Jeffrey. ‘My body clock’s all out. I saw the light and wondered if I could charge my mobile and computer?’
‘Of course,’ Gill said.
The back of the shop was a mess of buckets, headless flowers, stripped stems and bits of ribbon, foam and wire. India slid her laptop and phone out of her tote and set them on the table while Gill cleared some space on the desk and juggled with the powerboard to make room for a couple more plugs.
‘That’s a very smart coat,’ Gill said, admiring Jeffrey’s bright blue woollen coat.
‘I think Grace knitted it,’ India said. ‘There’s a cupboard full of them at Mars House.’ Last night, just before she had passed out, she had attempted to struggle into a mohair number, thinking it would keep her warm in bed and not realising it was a dog coat.
‘Grace was a great knitter,’ Gill said.
‘I suppose it passed the time.’
‘Time was something Grace never had enough of. She knitted jackets for rescued penguins and premature babies too,’ Gill said, her voice even more crisp. ‘Sorry, that sounded ratty. Not enough sleep, I’m afraid.’
India pointed at the orchids on the workbench. ‘Those are amazing.’ The flowers’ white throats were streaked with what looked like tiny rivulets of fresh blood.
‘Aren’t they. I’d love to meet whoever or whatever it is or was that came up with the idea of flowers. Though what you’d say to such an extraordinary intelligence I can’t imagine. “Hi, I like your work” wouldn’t quite cut it.’
Gill admired the flowers then said, ‘I don’t suppose you could get us a coffee? You’d be saving my life. Jeffrey can stay and keep me company. Pregos’ll be open. Up the high street and left into the first lane. It’s the best coffee. Better make mine a double shot.’ She produced a bed for Jeffrey from under the workbench and got some change out of the till.
Glad to have something to do, India headed out into the new morning.
Despite the early hour, Pregos’ outside tables were mostly occupied. The coffee must be good. She quickened her step and then stopped, her stomach tightening. Van Morrison’s “Moondance” was coming from the café, the Irish balladeer’s peaty voice clear and distinctive in the still morning air. An image came into her mind, a photo, her “naming” in a friend of her parents’ yurt. Her mother, cradling her, had flowers in her hair and her dress clung to her braless breasts. Her father’s collarless shirt had pointed sleeves that hung down over his hands like a jester’s and his feet were bare. It was 1998, the age dawning not that of Aquarius but of a new millennium. The revolution had fizzed out decades ago, a small fact that her parents had chosen to ignore. “Moondance”, their anthem, had probably been playing at the so called naming.
She pushed the image from her mind and her balled hands into the coat’s gritty pockets and continued towards the café.
When she got back to Blooming Beautiful, Jeffrey raised his head and slapped his tail against the side of his bed.
‘He’s certainly much brighter, Gill said. ‘Happy to be home, I expect. He was wretched after Grace died. Some say animals don’t grieve, but it’s rubbish. Lillian wanted to put Jeffrey on Prozac but Julie wouldn’t. The fact that he was suddenly living in a cattery can’t have helped either. If you didn’t notice, Lillian and Julie’s house is overrun with cats. Egyptian Maus. I don’t generally mind cats, but those give me the creeps. They hide behind things and stare and you get the feeling that they’re trying to hypnotise you. I’d have taken Jeffrey myself, but my two torment him. They get either side of him and bark until he doesn’t know where he is. Grace had to leave him in the car when she came over.’ Gill took a sip of the coffee. ‘This is heaven. I might have to send you back for another.’
Well that counted Gill out as a possible home for Jeffrey, India thought. She’d had no luck with Julie Rice, either. The ferocious faced little woman had grabbed the flowers and sketch of Jeffrey and disappeared back into the house before she’d had a chance to say anything more than ‘thank you’.
‘I was wondering,’ Gill said, ‘if there was any chance you could do the shop for a few hours this morning if you haven’t got anything planned? I’m desperately behind with the orders.’
India thought for a moment then said, ‘Yes, I could.’ There was still some time before the real estate agents opened and Gill might look after Jeffrey while she went to see them.
Gill rattled off a volley of thanks and following her instructions, India began putting buckets of flowers about the polished concrete floor. Jeffrey wandered along behind her, catching her gaze and pressing against her legs when she stooped to place price cards beside the buckets. This done, they started on the chaos around Gill’s workbench and it was suddenly time to open the shop.
At mid-morning, after a smiley man with a huge stomach had left with arms full of native flowers, the doorbell jangled and the cry of ‘mum, mum’ filled the shop. Two teenage girls appeared, one fair, tall and athletic looking like Gill and the other dark-haired and stocky. They were identically dressed in skinny jeans and oversized tshirts and waving mobile phones.
‘My daughter Olivia and her friend Hazel Teo,’ Gill told India. ‘They’ve got a pupil free day.’ She pulled a face at the girls. ‘Another one. Hello. Let me finish these roses and I’ll introduce you.’
Olivia Gilbert gave India a dismissive glance then seeing Jeffrey, now back in his bed, rushed over and knelt beside him. Hazel followed more slowly.
‘Mum, it’s Jeffrey,’ Olivia said. ‘Has Janet dumped him? Is he coming to live with us? What about the Cairns? They’ll drive him mad.’
‘Jeffrey’s back at Mars House,’ Gill said. ‘This is Grace’s granddaughter, India. Sorry, Ann. Stand up and say hello.’
Hazel smiled at India. ‘Hello,’ she said politely. ‘I thought your name was India.’ She started to giggle.
Olivia stood up and said to India, ‘Jeffrey’s breath smells. I bet Julie’s been feeding him cat food. Grace only gave him chicken necks. She believed in them absolutely. Unlike mum, who gives ours any rubbish that’s on sale.’
‘Liv,’ Gill said sharply. ‘You’re being rude. You too, Hazel.’
Olivia met her mother’s stern gaze with an equally fierce one of her own, then her face crumpled as she too began to giggle. ‘Sorry India, we’ve been doing assertiveness training at school.’
‘It’s not even a subject, Liv,’ Hazel protested.
‘Dad rang,’ Olivia said to her mother. ‘He’s not coming down. He said that between the shop and the opening meet you’ll be a nightmare. And he’s got a lot of papers to mark.’
‘More likely he’s got a date with one of his students,’ Hazel said under her breath. ‘Multum in Parvo.’
‘That’s so not funny,’ Olivia said.
‘You don’t even know what I said,’ Hazel giggled.
‘I so do. It’s Latin. Hazel’s very screwed up,’ Olivia said to India. ‘She’s got no father and Mrs Teo wants her to be a judge.’
‘Come on Liv, we’ve got to go,’ Hazel said. ‘Mum’s doing our nails,’ she explained to India, waving her fingers like a Bollywood dancer.’
‘In a minute,’ Olivia said. ‘Are you coming to the opening meet?’ she asked India.
‘India’s only just arrived from London and I’m sure she’s got lots of other things she wants to do,’ Gill said. ‘Now buzz off. If I don’t get these orders finished, we won’t be going to the meet either.’
Olivia rolled her eyes. ‘Bye AnnIndia. See you at the meet. Jeffrey’ll be looking forward to it. Grace always brought him. And don’t forget about the chicken necks. Grace went to the butcher next to the Sourdough Bakery.’
Olivia put her arm through Hazel’s and dragged her towards the front of the shop. The bell jangled and everything went quiet. Very quiet.
‘Sorry,’ said Gill, threading ribbon through the yellow rosebuds she had worked into a posy. ‘Olivia’s not always so bolshy. Fourteen’s a terrible age. One day they’re mini adults with all the wisdom and the weight of the world on their shoulders and the next they’re like two-year olds in a supermarket. Do you know how many kids are on anti-depressants? Over a hundred thousand, if you can believe it.’
India did believe it. She taught drawing in a school favoured by celebrity parents. ‘It’s the same in the UK.’
Gill removed a less than perfect petal off one of the buds with a pair of tweezers. ‘And I bet a lot of the parents are on the same drugs. Being a parent’s almost as complicated as being a kid these days. Though some seem to manage okay. Hazel’s mother’s pretty much brought up Hazel and her brother Toby on her own. Toby’s doing medicine and Hazel’s aiming at law, hence the Latin.’ Gill laughed. ‘We don’t know what she’s saying half the time. If you want a spectacularly good haircut, her mother’s salon’s the one. A Cut Above. It’s just off the high street.’
India checked the time on her now charged phone. The morning was getting on.
‘I was wondering if you’d keep Jeffrey for an hour or so while I visit some real estate agents? I’m selling Mars House.’
‘Oh,’ Gill said. ‘What a shame. Poor Jeffrey. Sorry, I’m being as rude as the girls.’
4
Fingers keeping beat to Pink on the steering wheel, Lucien Blythe motored down the highway towards the Highlands and Whistlejacket, towards home. The Hong Kong trip had been a success. With his friend George Manning he had gone to pre-dawn gallops and race meets, toured stables and dined with Hong Kong Jockey Club execs. And with George’s daughter, Opal, he had done other equally satisfying but far more exciting things. And to cap it off, two Whistlejacket bred horses had had big wins on the track.
He smiled at his reflection in the rear-view mirror, his face was as photo ready as ever. If George had found out about the frolics with Opal, however, the picture would have been not so pretty. He might even at this moment be feeding the crabs on the bottom of Victoria Harbour. Just as the horses in George’s multi-storey stable were trained for Happy Valley and Sha Tin’s richest purses, so too had Opal, his only daughter, been prepared for the rarer richer reaches of Hong Kong’s establishment. But like all young thoroughbreds, Opal thrilled quickly and had a mind of her own and she was determined that her gilded cage be filled with trinkets of her own choosing. Watch this space, Lucien thought, putting on the indicator for the Mittagong exit.
His mobile rang and IDing the caller, he listened for a moment and said, ‘See you in about twenty. Don’t wash those fingers.’
A short while later, he pulled up at the Burragong Cricket Museum. The museum was having a busy day − despite it being a Friday, there were at least three tourist buses and numerous cars in the carpark. He entered through the side door for which as a board member he had a key and after letting himself into the office, sank into one of the armchairs and allowed himself to be lulled by the muffled narratives of the interactive displays coming from the museum’s main hall.
And then here was Christie, bare legs Barbie doll long in pink Louboutin pumps. He slid her white linen shift up over her thighs and pulled her against him so her hands, fumbling to undo his jeans, were sandwiched between their groins.
‘Hi,’ he said into her ear.
Christie freed her hands, slipped her dress off over her head and undid his shirt and rubbed her breasts against his chest.
Thinking about Opal’s hard little breasts, he turned her round and bent her over the desk.
‘Missed me, did you?’ Christie said a few short minutes later.
He put a finger to his lips. A friend had been caught using this same office for a similar purpose and been booted off the board. He pulled Christie against him, her heels putting their groins at equal height, as perhaps had been the designer’s intention.
‘Of course,’ he lied softly into her very blonde mane.
Minutes later they were dressed and standing in the carpark beside Christie’s Mercedes. Christie’s mobile rang and she waved him away, slid into the car and took the call.
He was halfway to Burragong when her name appeared again on the caller ID, her voice once more that of a prime-time newsreader.
‘See any good horses or Chinese pussies in Hong Kong?’
‘Both,’ he answered. ‘How’s Dig?’
Christie was married to Digger Fahey, a Sydney advertising scion.
‘Creaky, but still making squillions.’
‘I hope he’s planning to send me some mares this season.’
‘You’ve already got his best,’ Christie said.
Lucien laughed and cut the call.
A short time later, as the gates to Whistlejacket Thoroughbreds swung open, he let out a contented sigh. Home. He drove along the avenue of Ash trees past the homestead and towards the stables. The housekeeper, Janet Reedhead, who believed herself closest of all the staff to the throne, would be getting sourer by the minute but he wanted an update on the new stallion, BlueBuckle. The stallion, purchased from a Kentucky stud, had arrived from quarantine as he was setting off to Sydney for the flight to Hong Kong. Whistlejacket’s manager, Donnacha Keough, had hurriedly backed the prize horse off the truck and everything appearing to be fine, he’d gone on his way a happy man. Not long after, however, in Donnacha’s words, things had gone ‘completely to shite’.
Donnacha was on the phone in his office in the hospital stableblock. Lucien caught his eye and looked pointedly at his watch. Donnacha drew a circle in the air, signalling that the person on the other end was going on. His usually lank dark hair looked like it had had the Vivienne Teo treatment and, as if tickled by the memory of something sweet, a smile played about his lips. Things must still be going well with Leila, Lucien thought. Pity. Leila should be setting her sights higher, a lot higher. Though her build was all about work, her open, freckled face and sweet chin and thick chestnut hair made her worth a second look. And there were those long thighs, made for cradling a man’s hips. She had also done an internship at Ireland’s National Stud − it was probably there that she’d developed the unfortunate taste for tricky Irishmen.
Donnacha ended the call. ‘Feed merchant’s changing the brand of foal mix. Wanted to go into every detail in case we had any concerns.’
Lucien was not interested in foal mix. ‘How’s the stallion?’
Donnacha shook his head. ‘Starting to look like an RSPCA case. Lucky he’s up at the old yards.’
‘Has Nelson seen him?’ Lucien asked. Nelson Cherry was Whistlejacket’s vet.
‘A couple of times, from outside the yard.’
‘Let’s go and look at him, then. We’ll walk,’ Lucien said. He’d been sitting for the better part of twelve hours and needed some air in his lungs.
They headed off through the stables, Sorrows, Donnacha’s woolly terrier following at a safe distance; Lucien intensely disliked dogs about his heels.
‘The dorm crew are doing some work for a change,’ he said, pointing to the swept floors and clean stalls. Whistlejacket’s labour was mostly supplied by visa workers, some on gap years, others working their way around the world. Their accommodation was a converted shearing shed known as the dorm, hence they were called the dorm crew.
‘A couple of the new Germans are handy,’ Donnacha said.
The old stallion yards were at the end of a laneway that ran between the weanling paddocks, colts on the one side, the fillies on the other. Lucien and Donnacha were still some distance from the yards when they heard the pounding of hooves.
‘Sets up when anyone’s headed that way,’ Donnacha said. ‘Buggered how he knows. You could understand if it was someone in a vehicle but not when it’s someone on foot.’
The pounding grew louder. A chill went down Lucien’s spine.
‘I see what you mean about an RSPCA case,’ he said as they reached the yard.
The stallion’s blue-grey coat was black with dried sweat and every rib was visible. Seeing them, he stopped for a moment then came at the fence with such speed that they both stepped back.
‘Shit!’ Lucien said as BlueBuckle slid to a halt, reared and struck out in the direction of their heads. ‘No wonder Nelson wouldn’t go in the yard.’
BlueBuckle dropped back onto his feet, wheeled, galloped around the yard and came at them again.
‘Did you speak to quarantine?’
‘I did,’ Donnacha said. ‘They said he was testy and needed an experienced handler but that’s nothing out of the ordinary. The horse transport company said the same. Cherry did say something about a brain tumour. We’d never get the hoss to the surgery though, and even if we did somehow get it into the yard the mobile xray’s not likely to give a good enough image.’
‘Stop his water. The hay too.’
‘The hay won’t be a hardship,’ Donnacha said with the hint of a smile. ‘He just tramples it anyway.’
Bloody Irish, Lucien thought. The worse a horse behaves the more they like it. ‘And make sure nobody else comes up here. If anyone asks, BlueBuckle’s still in quarantine.’
BlueBuckle reared again, his nostrils livid caverns, his eyes the dark of murder.
‘You fucker,’ Lucien said setting off back down the laneway. He’d been months searching for a stallion to upgrade the Whistlejacket stallion roster, one the stud could afford to buy outright, and now it seemed that he’d bought a ten-million-dollar lunatic. Fuck, fuck and FUCK.
5
India woke with Jeffrey’s back pressed against her side. She lay for a while enjoying their shared warmth. Strange − she would never let a lover stay over or if the bed they’d ended up in was his she’d be gone from it not long after the sex, but she didn’t mind Jeffrey’s company while she slept.
She dozed off then her eyes sprung open. A real estate agent was coming at eight thirty and another at ten. She ought to tidy the kitchen and living room at least, and maybe cut back the shrubs around the path to the garage if there was time. The agents were bound to want to see the yard as well and it was a fight to get to the garage and the paddock beyond.
She slid reluctantly out of bed. The air was icy; even inside the tweed coat she was still cold. But at least now she could make tea. By some fluke, she’d discovered that the gas to the stovetop hadn’t been turned off. How much gas was in the bottle was anybody’s guess, but she’d worry about that later.
The tea drawing in the pot and there being no plug for the bathroom sink, she put an enamel bowl from the laundry into the sink and poured in the remaining hot water. The smell of leather soap rose on the steam. She could hardly meet the estate agents smelling like a saddle! She opened the cupboard over the vanity. Chanel Body Lotion. That would do it. She added a few drops to the water, dropped the coat on the floor, stripped off her pyjamas and set to work with the flannel, avoiding any glimpse of her naked body.
Cleanish and dressed, she dampened the hairbrush and forced her hair – it needed washing – into a semblance of straightness, braided it and flicked it over her shoulder out of immediate sight.
Where had the time gone? The first agent was due in half an hour. She stowed Grace’s computer and glasses in the pantry, along with the horse magazines from the sofa. In the living room, she noticed for the first time the doghair on the sofa, the drifts of dust and Jeffrey height smudges on the walls. Oh well, whoever bought Mars House would likely gut it anyway. She looked around with a feeling almost of regret; as a child she had thought Mars House a palace.
She took her plate and wine glass from last night to the kitchen and was about to boil some more water to wipe a few surfaces when the doorbell made its funny growling.
‘Rob Marks,’ said the fifty something man on the doorstep. ‘Argyle Real Estate.’ He gestured at the door. ‘The bell sounds like it’s got a nasty disease. Ringtones are the thing these days.’
‘I used to think there was a fairything living in there when I was little,’ India said, dizzy from his aftershave and the clashing colours of his olive and lilac shirt. ‘My grandmother fed it after I’d gone to bed. It liked potato chips’
‘Lovely time, childhood. Sorry for your loss. Of your grandmother, I mean. Grace wasn’t it. Let’s get started. Weekends are my busiest time. I’ve got an open house in an hour and an auction.’
But suddenly Jeffrey was between them, bony bottom butting Rob Mark’s shins, eyes fixed on India’s face. Rob Marks swatted him away. ‘Not a fan of dogs,’ he said, fussily brushing the knees of his trousers.
India steadied Jeffrey and then beckoning him to follow her, settled him on the sofa in the living room. He couldn’t know that Rob Marks was here to sell Mars House, could he? It was possible. Grace believed that animals knew much more than humans allowed and shared many of the same feelings. She stroked Jeffrey’s ears. ‘Sorry,’ she said guiltily. ‘I’ll work something out for you, I promise.’
Rob Marks was in the first room off the hallway.
‘Good size,’ he said.
She looked around the room, unchanged since she had claimed it for herself when she had come to live with Grace. She’d been eight and had chosen it not only because it was clean, but because it was the room closest to the front door, to the outside, to safety. She stepped back into the hallway.
They went quickly from room to room, Rob Marks stopping to scan ceiling, walls, windows, floor, fittings and furnishing. In the dining room he stood in front of her drawings and paintings. ‘Some of these aren’t bad.’
India left him and went and joined Jeffrey on the sofa. There was the sound of cupboards being opened and closed. Sniffing. The laundry door banged.
‘You knew my grandmother?’ she asked when Rob Marks reappeared.
‘Not me, my sister. She’s horsey as well. Now, the paddock. There’s a path through the garden I believe. That’s if we can find it. Common problem with these deceased estates. Before you know it, the garden’s a jungle and the spiders have taken over the house.’
‘I don’t mind spiders,’ India said.
‘Animal mad like your grandmother, then,’ Rob Marks said, making it sound like a disease.
Swatting away the shrubbery with the same determination with which he had gotten rid of Jeffrey, he led the way to the garage then the paddock.
‘It’s about ten acres, I think,’ India said, finding his aftershave even more oppressive in the outside air.
‘Shame it’s not subdivided.’
‘Subdivided?’
‘Turn this into two, ten blocks and you’ll quadruple the value of it as a single lot. Possibly more than quadruple. With Burragong prices the way they are, buyers are looking further afield. The blocks’d sell in a flash. Subdividing costs, but what you have to think is that one block is going to cover the outgoings and the rest is profit.’ Rob Marks paused to give India time to absorb this. ‘But if that’s not the way you want to go, tin tacks, I’d be putting the place on the market for …’
A huge amount.
Rob Marks drummed on the top of the gate with his fingers. ‘Your grandmother had a lot of stuff. It’ll all have to go. Burragong loves a garage sale. Some’ll come just to stickybeak, but you’ll be surprised what they’ll buy if the price is right. My sister could help with the horse gear and she could do something with the Aboriginal paintings as well. She’s got connections in Sydney. And don’t forget the Op Shops. Burragong’s takes furniture. I’d get a dealer in first. Your grandmother had some nice pieces.’
Rob Marks looked at India to make sure he still had her attention. ‘But I’d give subdividing some serious thought.’ He handed her a business card. ‘I’m in the office in the mornings. No need to make an appointment, just drop in.’
He was gone, at last.
India sat back down beside Jeffrey, careful not to disturb his what looked to be exhausted sleep. She had thought that selling Mars House would involve agreeing on a price, signing a contract and handing over the keys and then waiting for the money to hit her bank. She hadn’t given a single thought to what was in the house. The saddles and bridles in Grace’s office, the racks of Jeffrey’s coats, the furniture, Grace’s clothes and books − it hadn’t occurred to her that they were also something she would have to deal with.
The doorbell grringed again. Jeffrey woke and his tail thumped the cushions.
‘Stay here,’ she told him.
A lithe young man, glowing with cleanliness, stood on the doorstep. He held out a hand.
‘Xavier, Xavier Swift.’
Fearing to dirty the manicured hand, India brushed the air near it with her own. ‘Ann Levy.’
‘I thought your name was India.’
‘It’s Ann.’
‘But you are . .?
‘Grace’s granddaughter? Yes.’ India looked over Xavier’s shoulder towards the road. ‘I’m expecting a real estate agent.’
‘That’s me,’ Xavier said brightly. ‘You called in at our office yesterday.’
India held the door open. ‘I’m afraid I haven’t done much to the house,’ she said, thinking about Rob Marks’ disparaging looks.
‘Glad to hear it. It wouldn’t be Mars House without dust and doghair.’
Jeffrey’s tail thumped even harder when Xavier sat down beside him.
‘Hi gorgeous. I bet you’re pleased to be home.’ Xavier looked up at India. ‘He didn’t eat for days after Grace died. I would have taken him but Julie Rice got in first. He was a rescue dog, you know. Those scars along his spine are from cigarette burns.’
‘She was happy enough to see him go,’ India said, remembering Julie Rice shoving Jeffrey into the hire car.’
‘He’d started snapping at those Egyptian cat things, that’s why. They used to pounce on him when he was asleep.’
India pushed her fist into her stomach as it rumbled loudly. ‘Sorry. I haven’t had breakfast.’
Xavier patted his own very flat stomach. ‘Me either. I was at the gym at six. Let’s go to Pregos and have a feed. You’re probably living on stale bread and celery. The power’s off of course.’
‘You don’t want to look around the house? At the paddock?’
‘Know it all inside out. Anyway, you don’t really want to sell. Why would you? Anyway, you can’t. It’s Jeffrey’s home.’ Xavier stood up. ‘Come on, I’m panting for a coffee. Do you think Jeffrey’s warm enough? It’s freezing in here.’
The thought of food was too much for India to resist; the last proper meal she’d had was two days ago on the plane. She’d talk to Xavier about the house and Jeffrey when her stomach wasn’t making a fuss. And when she was sure he really was an estate agent − he seemed too young, in his pristine white shirt and black trousers, a schoolboy still.
Xavier’s shiny black BMW, numberplate XAV-LFL, made her think this suspicion had been wrong. The car was way too much of an expensive toy for a schoolboy.
‘Looking for love,’ Xavier said, explaining the numberplate as he held open the door for India. ‘My horse’s name.’
He slammed the door and in a short minute they were flying towards Burragong, Xavier pointing out properties he had sold and so often murmuring ‘friend of Grace’s’, causing India to crane her neck to catch some detail of a disappearing house or farm.
After some fifteen minutes, Xavier pulled off the road and killed the motor in front of an imposing pair of wrought iron gates. The ironwork was shaped into feathers and India could see that when it opened, the gate would give the impression of a pair of wings rising on the air overhead.
‘Whistlejacket Thoroughbreds,’ she read from a plaque fixed to one of the massive sandstone gateposts.
‘Home of the most beautiful thoroughbreds in the Southern Highlands and the most beautiful shit in Burragong,’ Xavier said. ‘Excluding myself, of course. Tragically though he’s straight as time’s arrow. We’ll be putting a guard at Mars House when he gets a glimpse of you.’ Xavier waved at the camera on one of the gates. ‘Morning, Lucien.’
The trees lining the driveway were streaked with crimson, as if a drowsing god had knocked over his wine, sending its lees falling to earth. India took out her phone to capture the iron feathers, the wine splashed trees, but noticing the outline of a rearing horse on the plaque, she stopped.
‘That’s Whistlejacket.’ The stallion painted life-size for its owner more than a century ago by the equally famous equestrian artist George Stubbs. The etching on the plaque was Whistlejacket’s exact outline.
Xavier nosed the car back onto the road. ‘Grace sent me a postcard of it when she was visiting you once. She said Whistlejacket looked so real she wanted to give him a carrot.’
‘It’s an extraordinary painting.’ It was in a room of its own at the National Gallery. Grace had gone to see it every time she came to London.
The car picked up speed, and the countryside was once more an olive blur. But what were those people doing? India looked back but the car had rounded a bend. She searched her mind for any remnants of what she had seen. Nothing. She must have imagined it: the bush clearing, the circle of huddled figures.
‘Lucien’s father,’ Xavier was saying, ‘had a stud farm in England called Whistlejacket. When the old man died, Lady Blythe, Lucien’s mother sold and set up in Burragong with some of the mares. Lady Blythe’s Australian, but the Blythes are supposedly related to the Marquess of Rockingham who owned the original Whistlejacket. The horse, I mean. That’s how come they can use the name.’
They found a table outside Pregos and were soon sipping coffee. After bracing for more Van Morrison, India was relieved to hear a violin concerto coming from the café.
Xavier put down his latte. ‘It’s just come to me. Saddle soap and Chanel. I smelt it when you got in the car. You smell like Grace.’ His brown velvet eyes misted with tears and his pretty mouth drooped. ‘This morning’s the first time I’ve been back to Mars House since … It’s shitty that she’s gone, totally shitty. She taught me to knit. She used to say knitting was her contribution to world peace. Less idle hands to do the devil’s work. I thought maybe she was trying to stop me masturbating. You know, idle hands, the devil’s work and all that.’
The waiter came with their breakfast. Visibly cheered, Xavier said, ‘Best don’t look. I’m a pig when it comes to food.’
But though rapidly consuming three poached eggs, a wad of smoked salmon and Turkish toast, Xavier’s face and the front of his white, white shirt remained pristine.
He pushed his plate away and signalled the waiter for more coffee. ‘Grace helped me through one of the worst times of my life.’
Her plate still more than half full, India dipped a corner of toast in a pot of tomato relish. ‘Tell me.’
‘My parents had me when they were older. I mean much older. They’d been wanting kids for years but had given up. Then I came along, the reward for years, an almost lifetime of serving the church. The old church, the church that doesn’t do gay. I was suicidal. Grace helped them come to terms with it. She saved my life. I’m only sitting here because of her.’ Xavier squared his shoulders. ‘Mum and dad don’t know that she’s gone. They’d be devastated. But they can’t remember from one moment to the next, so I don’t feel bad not telling them. They’re in a nursing home.’
And who, where … what would I be if Grace hadn’t adopted me after my father’s overdose India thought? An adult stuck in childhood? A handmaiden to her whale-serenading guru mother? Going from one man to another, trying and failing to find in them her father? She pushed her plate away and pulled her coat more closely around her.
Xavier rubbed his stomach, which showed no sign of the enormous feed he had just consumed.
‘Are you coming to the opening meet tomorrow?’
‘The opening meet?’
‘It’s the first hunt of the season. Always a big deal. Grace would have been there with bells on.’
India shook her head. ‘I’ve got to start sorting out Mars House.’
Xavier picked up his phone. ‘‘Don’t bother about that. I’ll just call Gill. We’ll take her a coffee. She’s so pleased you’ve turned up in Burragong and that Jeffrey’s been rescued from Julie Rice. It was weighing us all down. Triple shot it is,’ he said into the phone. ‘See you in a tic. India’s with me.’
‘Ann,’ India reminded him. Though she really didn’t mind India, it was a hippy name, a fake hippy name.
‘Breakfast’s on me,’ Xavier said.
India shook her head. ‘I’ll pay.’
He gestured at the tweed coat. ‘Where did you get that?’
‘The Op Shop.’
‘My point exactly. You can buy the breakfast when you start getting commissions.’
The tray with Gill’s coffee held out in front of him, Xavier slipped through the shoppers on the now bustling high street with the efficiency of an eel threading its way through water grass. Outside Blooming Beautiful, India stopped him as he was about to push open the door.
‘What do you think about subdividing gran’s paddock?’
Xavier looked pained. ‘You’ve been talking to Rob Marks.’
‘He came earlier. Before you.’
‘Rob Marks says to everyone with anything over an acre that they can doubly-quintuple their money by subdividing. What he doesn’t say is that it does the same to his commission. And what he also doesn’t say is that subdividing involves a lot of costs. For everything from specialised kerb and guttering to snow-load rated bus shelters.’
Xavier stepped back to let a woman with a yellow Labrador into the shop. ‘And he doesn’t give a fig about green spaces or habitat. If it was left up to him, the Highlands would become a giant housing estate stretching all the way to Sydney.’
‘Does that mean you’ll sell Mars House as it is?’ India asked. ‘I’d rather that anyway. I want to get back to London as soon as I can.’
6
In the direct light, Jeffrey’s eyes appeared milky pools and India wondered how much he could see. She stood at the paddock gate and watched him bound in slow motion towards the trees. What was she to do with him? At the rate things were progressing, however, he might be dead before Mars House was sold. Every time she’d tried to talk to Xavier about selling, he changed the subject and Rob Marks had made everything seem so difficult she didn’t know if she could face him again.
But there had to be someone that would sell Mars House without making a drama of it. On Monday morning she’d start again with the real estate agents on the high street.
Jeffrey ambled back and they returned to the house, and each in their coats, settled on the sofa, sitting close for the extra warmth. The woodpile was already visibly diminished so she would light the fire later, when it was getting dark.
She retrieved her sketchbook and pencil from under a cushion and began to draw. The prostrate juniper that lapped the garage wall, Rob Marks’ harried eyes, Xavier’s long hands, the little huddle of people in the bush clearing – together they made a path that showed where she had recently been, and where she might yet go.
Jeffrey woke and pricked his ears and a minute later, the doorbell grringed.
It was Olivia Gilbert and her friend Hazel. Hazel’s eyes were red and she was making whiffling noises. Olivia pushed her down the hall and into the living room and pointed at the sofa. ‘Sit there,’ she ordered. ‘And stop crying. You’ll upset Jeffrey.’
Hazel sat where she’d been told and Olivia positioned herself in front of the fireplace.
