Midsummer's Eve Read online

  “Yes,” said Helena, “I was going to do it. I wanted it to seem like an accident. It could have. It could seem as though I had come up here for some fresh air and fallen overboard.”

  “Helena, how could you think of doing such a thing? How could you hurt us so!”

  “I didn’t think. I just believed that it would be better for us all.”

  I put my arm round her and held her against me.

  I said: “I am going to take you back to the cabin. You’re going to lie down.”

  “No,” she said. “I want to stay here. I feel comforted by you … both of you. Matthew knows about everything. I’ve told him.”

  “I knew there was some trouble,” he said. “I did not know of what kind. I have just been praying that I could help, and this was God’s answer. I was here at the right moment.”

  “You saved me from that,” said Helena.

  “Thank you, Matthew,” I said.

  “Now we have to convince her that she must never try to do this again. It’s wicked. It’s criminal. It’s taking life … your own and your child’s.”

  “Yes,” said Helena, “I know. But I felt so lost and frightened. I really don’t know how I can go on. I know that Annora and her parents will look after me until the baby is born, but what then? I’ve got to go on for the rest of my life with everyone knowing that I have a child and no husband. How can I do that?”

  “You can,” I said. “We’re going to help you.”

  Silence fell on us and we sat there for a long time listening to the sea thrashing the sides of the ship.

  There seemed to grow up between Helena and Matthew a special relationship. He had saved her and I was sure he could not help feeling a glow of satisfaction because of that. Anyone would be gratified to save someone’s life—but with Matthew it went deeper than that. He had made it his mission in life to succour his fellow human beings and Helena had given him the most obvious chance he had ever had.

  He talked to her a great deal about his object in life. I would come upon them sitting in the alcove; he would be talking and she would be staring out to sea; whether she was listening or not I was not sure, but she sat on silently while he talked.

  We went ashore at Capetown—a party of us, as we had done in Madeira. It was wonderful, after so much rough weather at sea, to be on dry land and in warm sunshine. Moreover Capetown will always be for me one of the most beautiful places in the world. I think it was because I felt happy on that day.

  I was so relieved that Helena was still with us. I could not have borne it if she had succeeded. In my heart I should have blamed Joe and I could never forget the sight of him, standing there putting the incriminating papers into his pocket. Between them he and Uncle Peter had ruined Helena’s life; and I had played my little part in the drama by making Joe’s task easy.

  But she had been saved in time by Matthew and from now on I was going to be extra watchful. I looked at the blue calm waters, the great Table Mountain and the beautiful Bay and I felt more at peace than I had for a long time.

  The day passed all too quickly and we were at sea again. Now we were in the calm and peaceful waters of the Indian Ocean and delightful weather seemed to have its effect on us all.

  Helena said to me: “I wish I could go on sailing like this forever. I never want this to stop. But it will have to soon and then …”

  I said: “Remember we are here with you, and when the baby is born we are going to love it so much that everything will have been worthwhile.”

  “Promise you won’t leave me,” she said. “Promise you’ll stay with me forever.”

  “I will be with you as long as you need me.”

  She smiled and seemed almost happy.

  We were astounded when the news broke.

  Matthew announced it after we left the dinner table. There were my parents, Jacco and I, and of course Matthew and Helena and the Prevosts.

  Matthew said: “Helena and I are going to be married.”

  We all stared at them. We had seen no real sign that there was any special attraction between them. Of course they had talked now and then, but Matthew was so enthusiastic about his mission in life that he talked earnestly about it to anyone who would listen.

  For a few seconds no one spoke. Jacco recovered himself first.

  “Well, congratulations. They say this sort of thing does happen on ships.”

  “Helena and I have made up our minds,” said Matthew. “We shall be married as soon as we reach Sydney.”

  My mother kissed Helena and I said: “I hope you will be very happy, dear Helena.”

  “This calls for a celebration,” said my father. “I wonder what they can offer us.”

  Helena was blushing and the unusual colour in her face made her look quite pretty. Matthew seemed delighted. His face was shining with virtue; and the thought came into my mind that the proposal was another of his good works. He looked very young and I thought: Is he being very noble? And does he understand what this means?

  Helena stood there holding Matthew’s hand. There was a look in her eyes which I had noticed in the alcove during the storm. She was like a drowning person clinging to a raft. I felt very uneasy.

  My father was saying, “I am going to organize something. We must drink to this engagement. I’ll see what I can get. We’ll ask the Captain to join us in half an hour in our cabin.”

  We left Helena and Matthew walking the deck and went down to my parents’ cabin.

  “Well, this is a surprise,” said my mother.

  “It’s Matthew performing another of his good deeds, I believe,” put in Jacco.

  “I feared that,” added my mother.

  “He is so earnestly good,” I said. “He really does want to spend his life helping others.”

  “Supplying their needs,” mused my father. “What does Helena need most now? A husband. So Matthew offers himself.”

  “And Helena … what does she think, I wonder,” said my mother.

  “Helena is so lost and bewildered,” I told them, “so frightened that she will cling to anyone who offers help.”

  “This is a very special sort of help,” said my mother. “Oh dear, I hope it works out well for them.”

  “He has the rest of the voyage to think about it,” my father reminded us. “Perhaps it was all suggested on the spur of the moment. It may be that by the time they get to Sydney …”

  “Who knows?” I said.

  “They’ll be able to marry easily in Sydney if they are still in the mind to,” my father explained. “There won’t be a lot of ceremony. They are so used to girls coming out to be married and so they get through the performance with the utmost speed.”

  “She was so worried about the baby,” I said. “That’s what she is doing it for.”

  “I understand that is her reason,” put in my mother. “As for him … I imagine he has rather a simplified picture of life.”

  “Most good people have,” I replied.

  My father looked at me and smiled. “There speaks our wise girl. Now listen to me. This is their affair. What we think of this hasty marriage is of no account. They have to work it out for themselves. They have to live it. It’s up to them.”

  “It may well be that it will work out all right,” said Jacco. “I should imagine Matthew is just about as easygoing as anyone could be.”

  “As long as he can pursue his own virtuous road,” said my father. “And Helena knows him up to a point. I know their acquaintance has been brief, but they have met every day, so compared with friendships at home when a friend or lover is seen perhaps once a week, their meetings on this ship are tantamount to months of acquaintanceship on shore. Let us wish them good luck and hope that all will be well.”

  “There is nothing else we can do,” my mother pointed out. “They have made up their minds.”

  Helena, I thought, because she needs marriage for her baby and he because he needs to make sacrifices and do good works.

  I wondered if they w
ere really the right reasons for a marriage.

  The Captain arrived with two bottles of what he said he kept for special occasions. Mrs. Prevost was tittering with excitement and even Mr. Prevost seemed to have forgotten his absorption with the land for a while. The Captain made a little speech in which he said that it was not the first time romance had come to his ship. There was nothing like ships for romance.

  Helena and Matthew stood there accepting the congratulations—Helena still flushed and looking almost happy, or perhaps that was relief; and Matthew had a look about him of such shining pleasure which could only come from the awareness of his virtue.

  He was a very good young man and I felt that I loved him for saving Helena from the rough stormy sea and then giving her a chance to escape from a situation which she found so intolerable that she was ready to die to be rid of it.

  The days began to speed by. The atmosphere of the ship was changing. We were about to leave that closed world in which we had lived for so many weeks. It had been rather an unreal world, I thought, looking back. Now we were coming into reality.

  People changed subtly. The Prevosts were abstracted and in Jim Prevost’s eyes there was a look of faint anxiety. He had been so sure on the way out that he was going to find what he wanted. Now he was not so sure. As for his wife, I thought she seemed a little nostalgic, as though she was suddenly realizing all she was losing. After all, it must be a great wrench to go to a new country, a new life. I could understand their feelings.

  And Matthew? He was becoming very excited at the prospect of finding the material he needed for his book. I could see the dreams in his eyes. He was going to marry Helena; she was to be his disciple who would share in his work. He had a simple uncomplicated way of ordering his life. Helena had changed too. It may have been that the baby was having an effect on her. Perhaps it seemed to her now like a living person—her very own child. I wondered how often she thought of John and whether she was peacefully contemplating a life ahead with Matthew. I think she was still in a bemused state, but I believed she felt herself fortunate to have found a man who would act as father to her child.

  As for myself and my family—it was different with us. This was merely a visit and when it was over we should all go back to life as it had been before.

  My father was perhaps a little quieter than usual. I daresay he remembered a great deal of that part of his life when he had come to her in chains—figuratively—a prisoner of Mother England, to submit to the humiliating ordeal of being chosen as someone’s slave during seven years of bondage. And my mother would share his mood for their lives were so closely interwoven, and even, at periods, when she was a child, she had known him and thought of him in that land overseas.

  Jacco was exuberant. He was longing to explore. He had found the entire voyage exciting and interesting, as it had been for me but for Helena’s problems.

  And so we came to Sydney.

  I stood on deck as we approached what has been called the finest harbour in the world. And what a sight is was! It was early morning; the sun was just coming up and the sea was pale aquamarine, calm and beautiful. My father, standing beside me, slipped his arm through mine. I turned to look at him and I saw the faraway look in his eyes. I knew he was thinking of arriving here all those years ago. I turned from him to look at the magnificent harbour with its cove-like indentations fringed with foliage and numerous sandy beaches.

  My mother came and joined us and we stood silently together.

  It was some time before we could go ashore. We had said our goodbyes to the Captain and those members of the crew with whom we had become friendly. The Prevosts were with us when we went off. They said we must keep in touch and my father explained that we should be staying at the Grand Hotel in Sydney for a little while and then we should be going to a property he owned some hundred or so miles north of Sydney. It was known simply as Cadorsons and was near a place called Sealands Creek. Knowing a little of the land, he would be happy to advise them at any time they cared to call upon him. That seemed to give them a certain comfort and it was clearer than ever that now their dreams were about to be realized they were growing very apprehensive.

  Helena and Matthew were to stay with us for the time being. I knew that Helena wanted to stay with me, but Matthew wanted to go off in search of material as soon as possible. But for the time being we should all stay at the hotel until my father had discovered what accommodation there would be for us at the property at Sealands Creek.

  We went from the dock to the Grand Hotel in our buggy and as we rode along my father expressed his amazement at the change in Sydney since he had last seen it.

  “It is quite different,” he said. “When I was last here the narrow streets were quite dangerous because of the pigs, dogs and goats which would be getting under your feet. The buildings were shacks. Now the streets have been made wider and the buildings …”

  “Well, it was rather a long time ago,” said my mother.

  “Yes. I heard that Macquarie had worked wonders.”

  I said: “It must be an extraordinary experience … coming back after all these years.”

  He nodded. “It brings it all back. I can see myself standing on deck with the rest of us, half blinded by the brilliant light after weeks shut up in the hold, waiting to be selected by those who would be our masters for the next seven years. But that is all in the past. Here I am with my family, and soon I shall be seeing the property I managed to acquire in spite of my degrading arrival.”

  “You should be proud,” said my mother. “How many could do what you did?”

  “Quite a number, I assure you. Just look at this city. It might be an English provincial town. It shows what can be done with energy, determination and convict labour. Look at those warehouses. Some of them are quite imposing. I would never have believed it.”

  We had arrived at the Grand Hotel which though it did not quite live up to its name was comfortable. There were red felt curtains everywhere held back by brass chains. They added a cheerful colour to the surroundings.

  We were regarded with some curiosity by the people in the foyer of the hotel, but I expect they were accustomed to arrivals from England for I learned later how many people, like the Prevosts, were coming out attracted by the cheapness of the land and the labour of convicts which meant that they could start to build a fortune without a big initial outlay.

  My father had arranged for the bulk of our baggage to remain at the docks until it could be sent straight to the property.

  And so we had arrived in Australia.

  Outback

  THE DAYS WHICH FOLLOWED were full of new experiences.

  Helena and Matthew went through a marriage ceremony in accordance with the custom here; and my parents with Jacco went to the property which was some two hundred miles north of Sydney. I wanted to go with them but Helena was so frightened at being left without me that I said I would stay behind. My father’s idea was that he and my mother should “spy out the land” and find out what living conditions at the property would be like. He knew there was a dwelling house and that in the interests of the property it had been added to over the years; but he did want to make sure that conditions would not be too primitive, and before we moved out he wished to investigate.

  The manager of the property had come to Sydney to welcome us. He was a man of about thirty with strong features and dark curly hair. His skin was very bronzed and his hearty manner seemed to us a little brash, but I think that was more or less natural to people here for although they had originally come from England, life here had changed them. I had the idea that some of them despised us for our courteous manners and more refined way of speaking. Gregory Donnelly was a man of the country. Strong, uncompromising, independent, contemptuous of those unlike himself, a man who would be ready to face any difficulty and, I imagined, make a good job of extricating himself. He was what Mrs. Penlock would have called “a real man.” I felt a faint revulsion towards him on the first day we met.
/>   “Hi … ya,” he said. “So here you are, Sir Jake. I’ve been expecting you for years. We’ve got a lot to show you.”

  “This is my wife,” said my father.

  “Lady Cadorson,” replied Gregory Donnelly, bowing his head with a gesture of respect which he managed to convey that he did not feel.

  “My son … my daughter …”

  Did I imagine it or did his eyes linger on me with a hint of speculation? I felt myself growing hot under his scrutiny. I felt he was trying to see too much of me, to sum me up in a somewhat crude manner.

  “So what’s your plan, Sir Jake?”

  “I’m coming out to take a look at things. We all want to come out. We have two more with us … a relative of my wife and the man she will be married to very soon. We didn’t expect they would be with us, and I am wondering what accommodation there is out there. That’s what I want to make sure of.”

  “Well, there ought to be room. There’s a shack adjoining the place which I could move into. Casual labour use it, but there’s no one there now.”

  “We’ll come and take a look,” said my mother.

  “That’s best, Lady Cadorson. I don’t promise the ladies there’ll be what they’re used to.”

  “We shall probably be able to get a few things in Sydney,” suggested my mother.

  “Reckon there’ll be no trouble at all. It’s a fine town, Sydney. Every time you come in there’s something new. Buildings seem to spring up overnight. There’s plenty of labour about. Should be another cargo coming in soon.”

  My mother looked horrified to hear human beings referred to as cargo—criminals though they might be.

  Gregory Donnelly had a meal with us and there was a great deal of discussion about what would be needed. Helena and Matthew had been introduced to him. I saw his quick appraisal and dismissal of Helena which angered me. There was an arrogance about him which I found distinctly irritating. He was a disturbing man; his essential masculinity made one think of relationships between men and women and I would rather not be disturbed by such thoughts.