Tears of the Moon - Di Morrissey [27]
Olivia couldn’t respond with any levity and her voice trembled. ‘I hope you won’t be gone too long—I’m afraid … the natives, this place, the baby due so soon … ’
‘I would run all the way if I could. But you must be strong, my dear. You have the revolver—all will be well. We knew it would take great faith and courage to do this.’
Olivia didn’t answer. She’d known courage would be called for, but she didn’t expect to be tested quite so harshly or quite so soon.
Conrad set off towards Cossack the next morning, boots firmly laced, water bag and rifle slung on his back and panama hat shading his fair English skin from the sun. With his coppery hair and pale grey eyes, he did not quite fit the image of an intrepid adventurer.
He had shown Olivia once again how to use the gun and urged her to keep the small fire burning and to stay out of the harsh sunlight. As she watched his slight figure disappear through the sandy scrubland, resolutely walking to the arrow of his compass, Olivia broke down and wept. She cried out of loneliness and fear, for him, herself, their child, and the unknown life they faced.
They had both grown up in south London but had met when Conrad came to work at her father’s emporium as the bookkeeper and accountant. He had become smitten with the pretty and very bright young woman who had shown a keenness and aptitude for learning bookkeeping as well as serving behind the counter. Conrad had successfully courted her and Olivia’s father was relieved his only child had chosen a suitable husband. He increased Conrad’s responsibility and salary.
A year later he had died and, after long talks with Conrad, Olivia, as sole inheritor of her father’s estate, sold the shop and used the capital to finance their plan to make a life in Australia. While they knew litde of the land, they were told skilled farmhands were available for those taking up leases.
Conrad was a good, kind man but seeing him in this new and forbidding place, Olivia wondered how well she really knew him and how he would manage.
Her thoughts drifted back to her own situation. At first she had cowered close to the shelter, but then sparkling water, the call and dart of sea and shore birds called to her. Hesitantly Olivia walked to the water’s edge and stood gazing at the wavering line of the horizon which was marked by a long dark line of clouds. She looked down at her feet. Shells, pebbles and broken chunks of coral were embedded like jewels in the sand. Impulsively she sat and pulled off her boots and thick cotton stockings and set off along the beach towards a distant headland.
When she returned, her feet were sore—she had never walked so far without shoes. Her bonnet trailed by its ribbons behind her, the combs from her hair were in her pocket and her thick russet curls were tickled by a faint breeze from the sea. It was liberating and invigorating and she felt the child within her stir with what she believed must have been pleasure.
She ate some bread and pickled meat, drank a little water and settled to a peaceful sleep, though she could still feel the motion of the ship after so long at sea.
That night the peace was shattered. The great storm which had been building up over the Indian Ocean smashed its way to land. Lashing rain and whipping winds screamed around Olivia as she huddled terrified, while it seemed the earth and heavens were caught in some exploding climatic war. The shelter was shredded, boxes and baskets turned over and rolled along the beach, the fire drowned in moments. Olivia inched back into the denser bush, tripping and slipping, picking her way by the flashes of lightning, then clung to a tree and prayed that she would survive this night. She also prayed for her husband, hoping that he had reached the township before this nightmare began.
In the calm of the following morning she picked her way back to her shelter. Debris littered the beach and her little camp. Laboriously