laughed easily, “I wager long before we get to Haast, it will be Simon. Come on, Kirsty.”
Going back with Gregory driving them her mind kept returning to the news item. “I didn’t think you’d have bad trivial little bits of Australian news on your day-to-day bulletins,” she said. “Something big, perhaps, like rockets going up at Woomera, or something, but not things like that.”
She’d better know if it were usual so she could be on guard.
“Oh, we get quite a bit of Australian news. Much more than Australia gets of ours, I’d say. You’ll notice it particularly at the pictures. We almost always have an Australian newsreel.”
Deep uneasiness stirred her. Did that mean the papers here Would keep it up? Because sooner or later someone would dig out a photograph of her. Kirsty felt sick. But surely, soon, the news of her real reason for flight would break. That Yorkshire girl would reach Sydney.” Kirsty didn’t sleep much. You didn’t naturally, when this should have been your wedding night. She had an idea she would not sleep really soundly till the bush and the mountain gorges closed behind her, shutting off most contacts with civilization.
Simon noticed the shadowed eyes, put it down to the aftermath of sorrow. It would be good for this girl when she had to cope with the wearing demands of three youngsters and life in a work camp with few conveniences. Nothing like sheer hard toil to take your mind off things.
It was a glorious morning, still as yet, though with a nor’west arch over the Alps betokening a high, hot wind later.
Simon felt that she was scarcely with him as he explained all the geographical features. None of it was registering. He wondered if she had not been able to weep when she lost her young husband and was still in a state of shock. She needed new relationships to bring her back to reality. Well, she’d get it in a work camp all right.
He suddenly looked mischievous, gazed into her eyes. “Do you know your eyes are absolutely toffee-brown, Kirsty. Neither brown nor gold.”
She put back her head in surprise, laughed a young, carefree laugh. “Oh, Simon, what a thing to be told! Still, a compliment’s a compliment whichever way it comes, and not to be sneezed at.”
He looked decidedly rueful. “Well, I daresay it could be put more poetically. Never mind, I still thing they’re nice.”
A little of the ice round Kirsty’s heart cracked. Then she caught her lip between her teeth. He was nice, yes, but it was all based on pity for Kirsty Brown, widow, young, lonely, quite without kin in this land of her birth. But what would he say when he knew? And what if it never came out about Gilbert’s former marriage?
Kirsty mentally shook herself. She musn’t allow herself to imagine these things. There was still plenty of time for the truth to come out. Gilbert’s wife might have failed to get through by phone; long-distance calls were tricky. Any delay on the line and she’d have missed Gilbert. She would just have to carry on meanwhile and hope Simon MacNeill would not despise her too much when he knew.
The flight to Dunedin was all too short. They went inland a little but with a clear view of the sea, eastward.
Westward were the mountains, still majestic even when a dwarfed from the air. They glimpsed a couple of brilliantly colored lakes, had a perfect view of Mount Cook, Aorangi, the Cloud-Piercer, its tent-ridge mantled in dazzling purity, the sweep of the Tasman Glacier beyond it. They saw immense power stations, a glimpse of Central Otago with its sunburned hills, the whole countryside greening as it neared Dunedin, the Edinburgh of the South.
The city flung a peninsula out to lock its harbor waters much as Christchurch had done, but there the resemblance ended, for below them the houses speckled every hill, running down to the waterfront.
They went beyond the city, circled, dipped down towards Momona, the Fertile Place, said Simon, where the airport was.
All
Going back with Gregory driving them her mind kept returning to the news item. “I didn’t think you’d have bad trivial little bits of Australian news on your day-to-day bulletins,” she said. “Something big, perhaps, like rockets going up at Woomera, or something, but not things like that.”
She’d better know if it were usual so she could be on guard.
“Oh, we get quite a bit of Australian news. Much more than Australia gets of ours, I’d say. You’ll notice it particularly at the pictures. We almost always have an Australian newsreel.”
Deep uneasiness stirred her. Did that mean the papers here Would keep it up? Because sooner or later someone would dig out a photograph of her. Kirsty felt sick. But surely, soon, the news of her real reason for flight would break. That Yorkshire girl would reach Sydney.” Kirsty didn’t sleep much. You didn’t naturally, when this should have been your wedding night. She had an idea she would not sleep really soundly till the bush and the mountain gorges closed behind her, shutting off most contacts with civilization.
Simon noticed the shadowed eyes, put it down to the aftermath of sorrow. It would be good for this girl when she had to cope with the wearing demands of three youngsters and life in a work camp with few conveniences. Nothing like sheer hard toil to take your mind off things.
It was a glorious morning, still as yet, though with a nor’west arch over the Alps betokening a high, hot wind later.
Simon felt that she was scarcely with him as he explained all the geographical features. None of it was registering. He wondered if she had not been able to weep when she lost her young husband and was still in a state of shock. She needed new relationships to bring her back to reality. Well, she’d get it in a work camp all right.
He suddenly looked mischievous, gazed into her eyes. “Do you know your eyes are absolutely toffee-brown, Kirsty. Neither brown nor gold.”
She put back her head in surprise, laughed a young, carefree laugh. “Oh, Simon, what a thing to be told! Still, a compliment’s a compliment whichever way it comes, and not to be sneezed at.”
He looked decidedly rueful. “Well, I daresay it could be put more poetically. Never mind, I still thing they’re nice.”
A little of the ice round Kirsty’s heart cracked. Then she caught her lip between her teeth. He was nice, yes, but it was all based on pity for Kirsty Brown, widow, young, lonely, quite without kin in this land of her birth. But what would he say when he knew? And what if it never came out about Gilbert’s former marriage?
Kirsty mentally shook herself. She musn’t allow herself to imagine these things. There was still plenty of time for the truth to come out. Gilbert’s wife might have failed to get through by phone; long-distance calls were tricky. Any delay on the line and she’d have missed Gilbert. She would just have to carry on meanwhile and hope Simon MacNeill would not despise her too much when he knew.
The flight to Dunedin was all too short. They went inland a little but with a clear view of the sea, eastward.
Westward were the mountains, still majestic even when a dwarfed from the air. They glimpsed a couple of brilliantly colored lakes, had a perfect view of Mount Cook, Aorangi, the Cloud-Piercer, its tent-ridge mantled in dazzling purity, the sweep of the Tasman Glacier beyond it. They saw immense power stations, a glimpse of Central Otago with its sunburned hills, the whole countryside greening as it neared Dunedin, the Edinburgh of the South.
The city flung a peninsula out to lock its harbor waters much as Christchurch had done, but there the resemblance ended, for below them the houses speckled every hill, running down to the waterfront.
They went beyond the city, circled, dipped down towards Momona, the Fertile Place, said Simon, where the airport was.
All
Similar Books
