Midsummer's Eve

Did I tell you I had had another letter from Gregory Donnelly?”

"Oh, what's going on out there?”

Gregory Donnelly was the man who was looking after my father's property in Australia.

I had heard his name mentioned from time to time.

"He wants to buy the property," said my father. "It might be a good idea to sell.

It really seems quite absurd to keep it. It's just a sentimental notion. I want to say, I went out as a slave and now I'm the owner of property there.”

"Why not let him have it if he wants to buy?”

"I'm thinking of it seriously. But I think I ought to go out just to have a look at it.”

My mother looked alarmed.

"You'd come, of course.”

"Of course," she repeated.

"I should come too," I added.

"Certainly you shall come. Jacco too. We'll all go.”

"I wonder," I said impulsively, "if we shall find Digory.”

There was silence, almost as though they were trying to remember who Digory was. Then my father said: "My dear girl, it would be like looking for the needle in the haystack. People come in from miles away looking for convict labour. He could be on the other side of Australia ...

Victoria, Western Australia, even Queensland. It's a big place, you know.”

"Poor boy," said my mother. "I am afraid he would have had a hard time of it.”

"No doubt he has settled in by now," added my father. "One does after a time. We'll think about this trip really seriously, shall we?”

"You have talked about going so often," I reminded him, and I really did not think anything would come of it.

When the Hansons came we discussed the proposed trip with them. They were very interested.

"If the land is profitable," said Rolf, "it seems a shame to sell it.”

"It is too far away to handle," replied my father. "This estate is enough for me.”

The Hansons talked a great deal about their own estate, which had been growing larger over the years. They were constantly buying land. My relationship with Rolf had changed once more. When he came to Cador I guessed it was to see me. He explained his interest in Dorey Manor far more to me than he did to anyone else. He had given up all thought of the law. He wanted to be a landowner on a large estate as my father was. That was what appealed to him and he grew lyrical talking of the land.

As for myself I thought about him a good deal. He still had a very special effect on me. I was, in a way, in love with him as I had been when I was a child. He was very interested in me, too, and my Parents watched us with a certain smug expression which I believed meant that they thought we would marry one day.. Should we? I felt very uncertain about my feelings for him. Physically the prospect filled me with delight while in my mind memories of that night would intrude and torment me. I was certainly excited y him; I loved to be near him; I fought against those memories and tried hard to assure myself that there had been some mistake; but always there would be that shadowy third, that figure in the grey robe who could not be made to disappear.

Once when I was riding with him I led the way into the woods past the burnt-out cottage.

I longed for him to talk of that night and the part he had played in it. But I could not bring myself to mention it. I had a fear that he would say, "Yes, I was there.

I was the one who led the mob to what they did. I wanted to know how they would react in such a situation and whether they would be as their ancestors had been before them." And I felt that once he had admitted that, all would be over between us. And, illogically, although I longed to hear, that was the last thing I wanted to know.

I obviously preferred to go on in uncertainty rather than be faced with the truth, which would finish my relationship with him forever.

I was very young and inexperienced of life. Days were so dull when he did not come.

I wished I was older, more capable of knowing myself, more able to understand my feelings. I should be able to face this, to ask him what really happened and to accept the truth whatever it might be. But I was not.

"When does the proposed visit to Australia take place?" he asked my father.

"Oh, it needs a certain amount of planning. Besides, I'm not sure about it. I want to turn a few things over in my mind first.”

I said to my mother afterwards: "I believe this is going to be like all those other trips we were to make. Papa is too fond of Cador to want to leave it for long.”

She was inclined to agree. "I shall try to persuade him to sell that property to Gregory Donnelly and cut off all ties with Australia," she said.

"I somehow don't think he wants to do that. It must have been a very significant part of his life and he wants to keep a stake in it.”

"I'm not sure that all this hoarding of memories is good. Anyway we shall be going to London and Ever sleigh soon. I want to see Amaryllis and you'll enjoy being with Helena. She will give you all the dos and don'ts about coming out.”

"Shall I have to do all that?”