Master of Moonrock Read online

  ANNE HAMPS0N Master of Moonrock

  Thane Benedict was the last person Loren Knight would have chosen to be her guardian. However, there it was: he was indeed to have charge of her until she was twenty; and here she was, at Moonrock, his vast cattle station in the middle of Australia's Outback, for the next two years.

  Thane tucked Loren's arm in his and they strolled towards a bush track where white gums spread their silver branches and twisted, mottled trunks shone like silver in the light stolen from a full moon. A romantic night, full of sound laughter and music drifting out from the shed. Gradually, as they lengthened the distance between them and

  the shed, the music faded and became lost altogether.

  “Where are we going?” Loren asked.

  He glanced down, his face appearing more lean and angular than ever in the shadows cast by the gently-swaying branches of the trees.

  “I'm your guardian, remember? -- you can relax.”

  The brooding silence of the bush dropped again, oppressive and intense. Over the moon a thin veil of cloud writhed and swirled, throwing stealthily-moving shadows across the eucalyptus scrub....

  CHAPTER ONE

  The first time Loren Knight met Thane Benedict she bit him, because he had tripped her up, although quite by accident. On this occasion Loren was three years old and Thane fifteen. All the grown-ups had laughed at Thane who blushed to the roots of his wavy black hair while wiping the tiny trickle of blood from his hand. The second time Loren Knight met Thane Benedict she pinched him hard, because he had pulled her hair, and again everyone laughed.

  ‘Serves you right,’ said his mother, taking Loren on her knee. ‘You must learn not to tease little girls.’ On this occasion Loren was four and Thane sixteen. He had not tugged her hair very hard, or with the least degree of malice. In fact, he was only playing with her. The following day he and his parents left for their cattle station in Queensland, Australia, and small as she was Loren expressed the hope that they would never come to see her aunt and uncle again.

  But they did. This time Loren was thirteen and leggy as a

  foal; Thane at twenty-five was tall and bronzed - the result of hard living in the Outback. Loren’s cousin Janet fell for him in a big way and would breathe in and out soulfully every time she set eyes on him.

  ‘He’s so suitable for me,’ she would persistently pour into Loren’s unresponding ear. ‘Twenty-five and twenty. That’s just the right difference in age. Don’t you agree?’

  ‘Do you mean you’d like to keep company with him?’ Loren was driven at last to inquire, the emphasis revealing more than words ever could.

  ‘Can’t see why you don’t like him. He’s tough and hard

  and - sort of frightening! ’

  Disdain looked out from Loren’s soft brown eyes, though all she said was,

  ‘He pulled my hair once - but I pinched him, and everyone laughed and he went red. Aunt Sophie said that I bit him when I was three, but I can’t remember that. I can remember pinching him, though. ’

  Janet’s fair brows arched attractively as she raised them. She was pretty in a doll-like sort of way, fragile in appearance and, consequently, she could adopt the helpless female role most effectively - a great advantage when a girl was as fond of the boys as Janet.

  ‘I’ve had my hair pulled dozens of times. That’s no reason for disliking Thane.’

  ‘Uncle Thomas says you like having your hair pulled. ’

  Uncle Thomas was Janet’s father; he and his wife had taken Loren when she was two and a half years of age, her parents having died within six months of each other.

  ‘Maybe I do like having my hair pulled.’

  ‘Then perhaps Thane will pull it for you.’

  Janet glanced in the mirror and smiled to herself. _

  ‘I certainly wouldn’t pinch him if he did.’ A wry twist of her lips before she added, deliberately assuming an attitude of fear, ‘I should be too terrified of what he’d do to me.’

  ‘I think you’re stupid!’

  ‘Because you don’t know anything about romance, that’s why,’ retorted Janet disparagingly. ‘You don’t even know as much as I did at your age. What’s the matter with you? Why don’t you grow up?’

  ‘I am growing up!’ The trouble was that Loren had never looked her age, and people unacquainted with it took her for about eleven. And so, when her Aunt Sophie promised to let her have her hair put up for the Christmas party Loren’s excitement was apparent for at least a week beforehand.

  ‘I’ve made the appointment,’ Aunt Sophie told her coming in loaded with the shopping she had taken from the car which was standing in the drive outside.

  ‘ Silvester himself is doing it for you.’

  Loren’s big eyes shone.

  ‘I shall look at least seventeen! ’

  Her aunt smiled at that.

  ‘Wait until you’re as old as I. You’ll not be adding four years to your age.’ Mrs. Knight took off her coat and laid it over the back of a chair. ‘This Christmas shopping seems to go on forever. Already I’ve another list in my head for tomorrow.’

  ‘ Sit down and have a little rest while I make a nice cup of tea for us.’ Loren loved having tea alone with Aunt Sophie; it was cosy and intimate and Loren could talk to her heart’s content, whereas when Janet or Uncle Thomas were there one or other of them usually monopolized the conversation. Loren looked at the two shopping bags her aunt had put on the settee, and at the three large brown-paper parcels. ‘It’s exciting! I love Christmas!’

  A few minutes later she was in the kitchen, making the tea and thinking of what Janet had said about Thane being just right for her. If Janet married Thane she would go to live in the wilds of Australia - Loren checked her thoughts. Thane was a confirmed bachelor, so Mr. Benedict had said when he and his wife came visiting yesterday, and Mr. Benedict had seemed rather upset by the idea that his only son would never marry.

  The Benedicts were here on one of their periodic visits

  to England. Their daughter Mary, having met an Englishman when on holiday, had married him and they had two teenage children. As Mary would not leave her husband to look after himself, and as he could not neglect his business for any length of time, it was Mr. and Mrs. Benedict who had to do the travelling, if they wanted to see their daughter and their grandchildren. Thane had come as a matter of course when he was young, but it was nine years since his last visit and he had not wanted to accompany his parents this time, so Mr. Benedict had said. But Mr. Benedict now suffered from a heart ailment and his wife had refused to travel with him unless her son came too.

  ‘I wish Thane Benedict wasn’t coming to our party.’ The words slipped out when Loren was bringing in the tea tray and her aunt looked up and frowned at her.

  ‘You’re a silly little puss over Thane. What you have against him I fail to see.’

  Loren grinned, self-deprecatingly.

  ‘I don’t know myself - not really.’

  ‘Uncle Thomas and I and Mr. and Mrs. Benedict have been friends for many years - from long before you were born - so naturally they’re all coming to our party.’

  Loren poured the tea and handed her aunt a cup.

  ‘Where did you meet them? I mean, they’ve always lived in Australia, haven’t they?’

  ‘Yes, they’re Australians by birth. We met them when we went over to Sydney to see your grandmother. She had gone there a few years previously and was living with her sister. The Benedicts were staying with some friends of theirs who lived next door to Grandma and that’s how we met them. We went about together a great deal while we were there, and we’ve corresponded ever since.’

  ‘Were they on holiday in Sydney? They were a long way from their cattle station so they m
ust have been on holiday, Loren decided, even before her aunt spoke.

  ‘Yes! they’ve always believed in taking holidays periodically - Mr. and Mrs. Benedict, I mean. Thane would vegetate on the ranch if he had his way - or so his mother says.’

  ‘Janet says they’re coming this evening, for supper.’ Loren sat down on the floor and looked up at her aunt, who was seated on the settee beside the parcels.

  ‘Yes, they are.’

  Loren sipped her tea, and reached for a biscuit. The Benedicts had been over several times since coming to England last month, and Thane always brought them in the car he had hired for the duration of their visit. Once or twice he had stayed with them, but on other occasions he had merely dropped them and gone visiting somewhere else, calling for them later. That was how Janet came to see him; each time she sighed rather loudly and sort of twinkled at him. Yes, that was quite a good word to describe the way Janet looked at Thane, Loren decided. And she fluttered her lashes, which were fair but Janet darkened them and curled them, and sometimes she would even wear false eyelashes -although her mother and father grumbled at her and said she hadn’t improved herself at all.

  She put her false eyelashes on that evening, and all sorts of cream and colour and lipstick.

  ‘Do I look glamorous?’ She was in her room and Loren had come in to watch the proceedings. She was sitting on the bed while Janet performed before the mirror. Janet swirled round as she spoke.

  ‘You do look beautiful, yes,’ admitted Loren. ‘Your cheeks are a bit too red, though.’

  ‘Red? They’re supposed to be peach - subtly peach,’ she corrected, picking up the rouge-block and turning it over to show Loren the printed name of the colour. ‘If Thane doesn’t notice me tonight then he never will.’

  ‘Would you marry him?’ Loren thought again of what Mr. Benedict had said about his son’s being a confirmed bachelor.

  ‘Like a shot!’

  ‘You wanted to marry Robert Mellor,’ Loren reminded her undiplomatically.

  ‘That was only a passing phase. ’

  ‘But supposing Uncle Thomas had given his consent? You’d have been stuck with him for life - and it’s obvious you didn’t really love him because you never even speak to him now.’

  ‘Well, I’m not married to him - and stuck with him, as you term it - so I can’t see the point of discussing him.’

  Loren hitched herself further on to the bed so that she could swing her legs.

  ‘I don’t know how you can have so many. I only want one.’ Janet laughed, turning to the mirror again and picking up a comb.

  ‘That’s what you think now, but wait until you’re a bit older-’ She stopped, regarding Loren through the mirror. ‘I don’t know, though. Your looks’ll have to improve or you’ll never get even the one you’re talking about.’

  Loren flushed scarlet.

  ‘James Kingsmill thinks I’m beautiful!

  ‘Him! Lord, who’d have that one anyway?’ Janet did something to a curl on her forehead and replaced the comb on the dressing-table. ‘Come on, they’ve arrived; I can hear Thane’s voice.’

  He seemed to take a great deal of notice of Janet that evening, and when it was time to go he smiled at her and ‘I’ll see you at the dance on Wednesday, then?’

  “Yes. Good night, Thane. ...’ The soulful sigh issued from Janet’s rosebud mouth.

  ‘She’s a soppy thing!’ Loren exclaimed disgustedly almost before the front door had closed behind their visitors. _ ‘You’re jealous, that’s what it is,’ put in Janet before her mother could comment on what Loren had said. ‘I expect you want him to notice you, that’s what it is.’

  ‘No such thing,’ interposed Mrs. Knight mildly. ‘Loren’s

  only a child. Why should she want Thane to notice her?’ Janet looked a little sulky at that and went upstairs to bed. She always sulked if spoken to in this way and when she had gone Mr. Knight gave a little shrug and said,

  ‘You know, Mother, I shan’t be sorry when our Janet’s married.’

  Well, perhaps Uncle Thomas would have his wish sooner than he expected, because after the dance Janet was all glowing and tensed up - sort of. And when it came to getting ready for the Christmas party she was upstairs the whole of the afternoon. The party was held on the Wednesday of the following week and because the Christmas rush was over Silvester spent a great deal of time on Loren’s hair, and when she emerged she could not resist stopping before every shop window, not to examine the goods, but to twist and turn her head so as to see her hair from all angles.

  ‘Well ... I don’t know, child,’ was her uncle’s thoroughly disappointing comment on Loren’s parading before him, turning her head in all directions. ‘You’re a pretty little thing as you are - always were.’

  ‘Thomas,’ put in his wife, ‘Loren’s had her first real hairdo and she wants you to admire it.’ She made a face and ended disgustedly, ‘Men! ’

  But Loren was very happy with her hair-do and especially as Janet said it gave her real glamour, and that it had added at least three years to her age.

  The Knights’ house was large - a Victorian place they had renovated — and the rooms were high and spacious. Tea was laid in the dining-room and in the sitting-room was the Christmas tree, and as Mrs. Knight had bought presents for everyone, it was literally hanging with pretty parcels all tied up with exciting paper and coloured ribbons.

  Tea was a noisy affair with everyone laughing and chattering and pulling crackers with his or her neighbour. Thane sat opposite to Loren and he held out his cracker to her. She pulled and as the contents dropped on to the table he said, ‘A diamond ring for you and a paper hat for me.’

  Loren laughed and picked up the ring, but before she had

  time to put it on her finger, Janet, sitting next to her idol, snatched it from her cousin’s hand.

  ‘I’ll have it! Put it on for me, Thane.’

  He glanced at Loren.

  ‘Do you want it, child?’ he asked.

  She did - but for what reason she had no idea. She shook her head, and watched as Thane put the ring on the finger which her cousin held out... her engagement finger.

  When tea was over and many willing hands had made light work of the clearing away and washing up, everyone gathered in the sitting-room where the glittering tree stood in an illuminated alcove. The adults sat on the couches and chairs while the children squatted on the floor. Loren was at her cousin’s feet, holding her head a little awkwardly because she did not want it to touch Janet’s knees. Everyone had admired her hair and she intended keeping it like this for as long as she could - in fact, the manner in which she would sleep had occupied her thoughts on and off for a large part of the day, and could she have procured one of those frames people once used she felt she herself would gladly have used it, enduring no end of discomfiture so long as her hair remained immaculate.

  Santa Claus - alias Mr. Knight - entered to a round of applause from the adults and squeals of delight from the children, many of whom were very young. Catching his niece’s eye, he winked at her from behind his bearded mask; the action somehow sent his beard askew and, forgetting all about her hair-do for one disastrous moment, Loren threw back her head and roared with laughter. Her head touched Thane’s knee, not Janet’s ... and then it happened. He ruffled her hair, instantly removing his hand as he realized what he had done.

  ‘My hair!’ Fury blazed like an uncontrolled inferno, scorching Loren’s entire body and consuming all reason. ‘My beautiful hair-do—’

  ‘Yes, I know,’ Thane apologized. ‘A mistake, kid, I didn’t stop to think—’ He broke off, wincing as Loren, having risen to her feet, gave him a vicious kick on his shin.

  Everyone close enough to see what was happening gave a little gasp, and for a moment it seemed as if Thane, having disarrayed Loren’s hair, and been given a kick in punishment, would once again be the object of amusement, for at Loren’s action dark colour had crept under the deep tan of his skin, just as it had on tho
se two previous occasions. But this time the colour resulted from anger, not embarrassment, and before Loren knew what was happening she was swung across his knee, and it was she who was the object of amusement, because of her squeals of protest and howls of pain. And when at last she was put firmly on her feet she was forced to make her way through all those hilarious people in order to reach the door of the sitting-room.

  She ran upstairs, tears of mortification streaming down her face, while her hair, more awry than ever owing to Thane’s rough handling of her, tumbled about her shoulders.

  At the age of thirteen to be so humiliated! If only she were big, she would have done something awful to him - like killing him, with a huge axe! But she was small and Thane was very large, and Loren sat on her bed and wept as if her heart would break, wept because of the party she had left, and the lights and fun and the glittering tree with her present hanging on it. She wept over the ruin of her beautiful hair-do, and over her hurt and humiliation as she could not erase the picture of all those people laughing at her, Janet, too ... Janet would be laughing still, unless Loren was very much mistaken.

  Thane came into her bedroom, his handsome face troubled but portraying no signs of contrition. And when he spoke it was easy to see that he considered her to have taken the matter far too seriously.

  ‘Come on down, and don’t be such a baby. There’s no need to hide yourself up here—’

  ‘I hate you,’ she hissed through her sobs. ‘I’ll hate you as long as I live!’

  ‘Loren, dry those tears and do as I say!’ He stood above her, massive and overpowering and inflexibly stern. ‘You asked for what you received - kicking out like that. It was disgraceful conduct for a girl of your age. Here, take this! Dry your eyes and then you can come downstairs with me.’ He held out his handkerchief to her. She turned her head away from him and he said, drawing an impatient breath, ‘You’re spoiling it for everyone. Your uncle won’t begin giving out the presents until you come down. ’ White-faced and erect on the tiny portion of bed on which she sat, Loren told him to go back where he belonged - which was to the other end of the earth, adding that if it had been to the other end of the universe it could not have been far enough away for her.