Marion Lennox - The Last-Minute Marriage

‘That’s why we’ve come,’ Ruby said triumphantly. ‘I knew you two couldn’t do the investigations. You had to stay on the farm and be happily married. I was planning on sending one of Marcus’s solicitors but then I thought, maybe I could do it. And Darrell decided to come, too.’ For the first time she looked a little disconcerted. Embarrassed, Marcus thought, stunned.

But she was moving on.

‘And guess what we’ve found?’ she told them. ‘Hattie’s medical records. Marcus was right. The tests here said her calcium levels were through the roof before she left Australia. Once she had medical attention in the States, her records there confirm it. The calcium levels would force any judge to concede that her judgement was significantly impaired for at least six weeks before her death. Darrell and I have been here for two days and we’ve been working hard. We’ve had legal opinions from Australian lawyers and we’ve had legal opinions from US lawyers. They concur. The new will doesn’t stand, Peta. The farm is yours. Married or not, Charles can’t touch you.’

Peta stared, not immediately comprehending. ‘It’s… The farm’s mine?’

‘It’s yours.’ Ruby was still smiling. She cast a sideways glance at Marcus, expecting him to be pleased. ‘Marcus told me to do everything to get the will overturned. He suspected this.’

‘He suspected…’

‘He wasn’t sure, of course, or he’d never have married you.’

‘No.’ Peta looked blankly at Marcus. ‘No. Of course he wouldn’t.’

‘So now all you have to do is get the marriage annulled,’ Darrell told them. And then he, too, smiled. Teasing. ‘You can use the old non-consummation line. Unless, of course, you have…’

‘No,’ Marcus snapped. ‘We haven’t.’

‘That’s good,’ Ruby told them, her smile fading. She looked from Peta to Marcus and back again, for the first time seeming to sense the deep undercurrents running between them. ‘I’m glad you’ve had that much sense.’

‘Ruby…’

‘Well, that’s what we came to tell you,’ she said, setting down her lemonade glass with a definite clink. ‘Adam and Gloria presented Charles with the legal evidence invalidating the will last night our time. The evidence is indisputable. Peta, the farm is yours and no conditions apply. So… There’s no need to keep on with the marriage. I’ve brought the annulment forms. If you both sign them you can go on with your lives as if this had never happened. Marcus, there’s no need for you to stay.’

‘No.’

‘Unless you want to,’ she added. ‘You really could do with a holiday.’

‘This isn’t much of a holiday,’ Marcus told her and Peta flushed.

‘Our accommodation isn’t quite five-star,’ Peta muttered. She, too, lay down her glass and turned to Marcus. ‘So you can go home?’

‘Yes.’ There was nothing else to say.

‘I need to thank you. So much…’

‘There’s no need.’

‘There is.’ It was an absurdly formal little tableau but there seemed no right way to go forward from here. ‘I can’t… I don’t know how to repay you. If I could think of anything…’

‘My offer still stands,’ Marcus told her while Ruby and Darrell watched in silence.

‘What-to make our marriage last?’

There was an audible intake of breath from Ruby but Marcus didn’t move his gaze from Peta.

‘That’s right.’

‘Marriage when you can fit me around the edges.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ he told her. ‘We could do this. If you’d be prepared to give it a chance…’

‘It doesn’t have a chance.’

‘What doesn’t have a chance?’ Ruby demanded and Peta turned to her, despairing.

‘He wants to build me a mansion, right here, instead of my veranda. He wants to visit for a couple of weeks a year and for the rest of the time he wants to install me in his black marble apartment and keep his bed warm for the twenty minutes a day he can spare for me.’

‘That’s not fair,’ Marcus snapped.

‘What else are you offering?’

‘I run a financial empire, Peta,’ Marcus told her. ‘I’ve never asked anyone else to marry me…’

‘And I should be really grateful,’ Peta told him. ‘I’m sure Cinderella did it really well. But not me.’

‘What else do you want?’ They were almost unaware that Ruby and Darrell were staring, agog. This was too important to be distracted.

‘You.’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘Then figure it out,’ Peta told him. She sighed and her shoulders slumped as the rest of the world appeared to enter her consciousness again. She turned and faced Ruby and Darrell. ‘I’m sorry. You’ve been so good. Do you have to go back to the States immediately or can I put you up here for a night or so? My accommodation’s pretty basic.’

‘It looks great to me,’ Darrell told her. He looked sideways at Marcus. ‘I’ve spent months on a battlefield. Marcus has, too. I’ve no need for marble tiles.’

‘Will you go straight home?’ Ruby asked Marcus and Marcus tried to get his addled brain to think. He might as well. This was stupid. What was Peta expecting? That he share her gumboots? He hadn’t worked so hard all his life for this.

‘Yeah,’ he told them. ‘I will.’

‘I haven’t had a holiday for years,’ Ruby told him, still eyeing him with a dubious look that said her mind was running at a tangent. ‘Do you mind if I stay on?’

‘Go for it. Just as long as you like pink.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with pink,’ Peta flashed. ‘If you’re happy you don’t notice.’

‘Of course you notice.’

‘Get a life, Marcus,’ she told him.

‘It’s you who’s refusing-just because you don’t like black marble.’

‘If you think that’s the reason I’m refusing then you have rocks in your head,’ she told him. ‘I’m refusing because you can’t see that it’s not important. That I’ve offered the only thing that’s important and you haven’t a clue how to return it. And I’m not even sure that you want to. Ever.’

He left half an hour after Harry returned from school. He could have left earlier but the thought of leaving before saying goodbye to the kid was almost impossible.

And saying goodbye even then was incredibly hard.

‘I sort of hoped you guys might have made it long term,’ Harry told him, trying not to let his almost-manly chin wobble. ‘I sort of liked cooking. And you helping with projects and stuff.’

‘Your brothers will be home soon.’

‘Yeah, but they don’t stay and they’re not the same. And you made Peta smile…’

‘Only at the start.’

‘Yeah, but you could again if you wanted to,’ Harry said with perspicacity. ‘Couldn’t you?’

There was no answer to that. ‘I have to go.’

‘Did you say goodbye to Peta?’

‘She’s milking.’

‘You’re mean,’ Harry said. His jaw set a little and he moved around Marcus’s car and gave a kick to the tyre. ‘I thought you were a friend.’

‘Harry…’

‘See you.’ He picked up his school bag and sloped off into the house.

Darrell and Ruby were nowhere to be seen. Peta was in the dairy.

There was no one to watch him drive away.

He went.

Peta was putting cups on one of her favourite cows when she heard his engine start. She turned and watched as his lovely little Morgan turned out of the driveway and headed out towards the highway.

Terrific. He was gone.

She put her head on the cow’s warm flank and wept.

‘Are you going to tell me what that was all about?’

It was late that night. Darrell and Harry had both gone to bed, Harry reluctantly but Darrell because his head was still halfway between New York and Australia. Peta and Ruby were left alone. They gravitated towards the veranda and sat, watching the moon out over the ocean.