Joan Kilby - The Cattleman's Bride

“Yes, well…” Anne pulled her hand away to run her slender fingers over a string of colored beads from Nepal. “Are you actually traveling all the way to Burrinbilli?”

“You make it sound like the end of the earth. Not that that would worry you.” Every year Anne practically begged her, in vain, to come along on her yearly buying trips to Third World countries.

Sarah moved the bead display to one side and hoisted her briefcase onto the counter. “Wait till you see what I’ve got for us.”

“Not another electronic gadget, I hope. I still haven’t figured out the clock radio-cum-coffeemaker you gave me last Christmas.”

“Oh, Mom.” Sarah handed her an instruction booklet. “How are you doing with the laptop?”

“Don’t ask.”

“It would make your business so much more efficient if you’d only let it.”

“I’m a Luddite, I’ll admit. But I don’t have room in my brain for programming instructions for a dozen different machines.” Anne flipped through the pages of the booklet. “What’s this, now?”

Sarah pulled two identical cellular phones from her briefcase. “Aren’t they great? They also do fax and e-mail. We’ll be able to communicate at all times.”

Anne took one and gingerly turned it over in her hands. “When someone invents a device that facilitates genuine communication between people it’ll be worth a fortune.”

“Mom. Don’t go all airy-fairy on me. Now watch. You press this button to make a phone call. That one to send a fax, and that and that for e-mail. Don’t worry about the Internet connection. I’ve hooked you up to my server.”

“I’ll never use it.”

“Try it,” she urged. “You’ll be surprised.”

Anne put the cell phone down and held up her desk phone. “You can call me on this. And you’ve already got a cell phone. Why do you need another?”

“I thought it would be fun. This is an updated model that’s compatible with Australia and Japan. The new digital system spans the Pacific. Cool, huh?”

“Amazing.”

Sarah ignored her mother’s dry tone and packed her phone back in her briefcase. “Why don’t you come with me to Queensland? It would be so much more fun going together.”

The bell over the door tinkled. Two teenage girls entered, smiled a greeting to Anne and disappeared behind a rack of cotton dresses from Ghana.

“I can’t leave the shop just now, darl’.” Anne gestured around her at the displays of colorful bric-a-brac.

To Sarah the store looked just as it always did—cluttered and colorful and a little too retro for her taste, but not desperate for attention. “Your friend Mandy would take care of the place for you.”

“She left last night for two weeks in Mexico.” Anne, her face suddenly troubled, reached out to stroke the hair away from Sarah’s cheek. “You’re the sweetest girl in the world, but are you sure you want to do this?”

Sarah gave her a tight smile. “Not entirely. I’d really miss you if you moved back there.”

“Then why don’t you sell your half of the station and buy the apartment you have your heart set on?”

Sarah dismissed that with a wave of her hand. “What would I want with an apartment? I’m too young to settle down.”

“What about what’s-his-name, Quincy—?”

“Quentin.” Sarah rolled her eyes. “He gets a rash every time the word marriage is mentioned and rushes off to phone his analyst.”

“I thought he was an analyst.”

“He is, but apparently Physician Heal Thyself doesn’t apply to shrinks. Anyway, I’ve decided I can’t marry him. I want a real man.”

Anne laughed. “And what is that, darl’?”

“I don’t know exactly, but it’s not Quentin.” She glanced at her watch. “I’m on my way to the travel agent. Are you sure you don’t want to come? I could book us two seats. You’ve never been back except for Pop’s funeral, then Nana’s, and that was years ago. We could have so much fun together.”

Anne’s eyes clouded. “There are too many ghosts, darl’, living and dead.”

Sarah studied her mother’s face, totally not understanding her reluctance and certain it was time those ghosts were laid to rest. “Mom, all my life you’ve sacrificed for me. At last I have a chance to do something really special for you.”

“I appreciate the thought more than I can say. You have a good time in Oz. You can tell me all about it when you get back. If nothing else you’ll have a break from work. It’s been what—two years since you’ve had a holiday?”

“Something like that. I’m looking forward to this trip. You know, discovering my roots and all.”

A tiny smile curled Anne’s mouth. “Maybe you’ll decide to stay.”

Sarah laughed. “Not a chance.”

“Make sure you pack lightweight clothing. It’s heading toward summer down there and it gets hot.”

“I’m going shopping right after I arrange for my ticket.”

“Take care, darl’,” Anne said, hugging Sarah close. “If you run into Len Johnson, tell him…” She trailed off, her cheeks tinged with pink.

Sarah didn’t think she’d ever seen her mother blush before. “Tell him what? Who’s Len Johnson?”

The teenage girls came up to the counter with an armload of scented candles. Anne nodded to them before replying, “Just someone I used to…know. On second thought, you don’t need to tell him anything.”

Sarah moved aside so the girls could lay their purchases on the counter. “This is going to be so cool,” she said. “Seeing your old stomping grounds, meeting your old friends…”

“Don’t expect too much,” Anne warned. “Compared with Seattle, Murrum is just a dusty little town in the back of beyond.”

“I’m going to love it! Anyway, it’s only for two weeks. I’ll be back before you know it.”

SARAH SHIFTED uncomfortably on the bus seat. The hem of her skirt had ridden up and her bare thighs were sticking to the vinyl. She’d been traveling for over thirty-six hours and she felt grimy and hot and sweaty. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d brushed her teeth.

The air-conditioning had broken down hours ago. The second-last passenger got out not long after. The sun was a yellow glare in a frighteningly immense blue-white sky. The flat red earth, sparsely covered with dry grass and dotted with cattle, spread to a distant horizon. With a shudder she pulled her gaze back inside the bus. Outside was too big, too empty, to look at.

Australians might affectionately call their country Oz, she thought moodily, but out here the yellow brick road was a dusty red track across hundreds of miles of nothing and it led away from Seattle, the Emerald City, not to it.

Out of the heat haze appeared the silhouettes of houses and stores. Oh, thank heavens, a town. Like the other towns she’d passed through, the shops had false fronts, wide streets and broad wooden awnings that shaded the sidewalk. They looked a little like towns of the Old West except for the occasional palm tree, which destroyed the illusion. The bus passed a tiny wooden church and a big, ornate hotel with a second-story veranda before slowing to a halt beside a boarded-up train station.

Murrumburrumgurrandah. The town’s moniker rattled along the sign above the platform like an old man’s phlegmy cough.

Shielding her eyes from the blinding sun, Sarah stepped off the bus onto the hard-packed red dirt beside the road. The heat hit her like a dry sauna, sucking the moisture from her skin and turning her ivory linen skirt and top as soft as dishrags.

While the driver retrieved her luggage Sarah stood in the shade of the corrugated-iron bus shelter and fanned herself with the magazine she’d bought in Sydney. It kept the flies off but didn’t provide much of a breeze. If she didn’t get to someplace cool right now she was going to expire of heat exhaustion.