"I could not, Carolan. You do not know how weak I have become. If I was weak before, I am doubly so now.”
"You must live. You must bear him many children, for that is what he wants, and that is the way you must expiate your sin.”
"My sin... Carolan!”
The murder of his child ...”
"I am too ill, Carolan.”
"Remember," said Carolan, and her voice was commanding," 'no more drug tonight! You would need a double dose for it to be effective tonight, for you have taken one dose already today.”
"Carolan, are you going to leave me now?”
"I am going to leave you to sleep.”
"I cannot sleep.”
"You must. Try to calm yourself. You need sleep.”
"But I cannot sleep ... without...”
"Goodnight," said Carolan.
"Remember what I said. Goodnight.”
Carolan went to her room, and lay on her bed. staring at the ceiling.
She was exhausted.
Katharine Masterman
Katharine Masterman awakened early that December day, but the sunshine was already streaming into her bedroom. She experienced a disappointment, for as soon as she was fully awake she remembered that Christmas Day was still three weeks off, and realized that she had only dreamed that it was Christmas Day, and that she was at the breakfast table looking at the presents piled high beside her plate. Three weeks to go I It might as well have been three years, for three weeks is an age when one is ten years old.
She threw aside her mosquito net, and got out of bed. This was her own room, right at the top of the house where the nurseries were. From her window she could see the dazzling sea, and cockatoos and parakeets, white and so brilliantly coloured that it was sheer pleasure to watch them. She stood there, watching them now, and forgot her dream in her desire to fly as they could. She spread out her arms and swooped about the room, uttering cries of delight, until the exertion made her so hot that she remembered the boys in the next room. In a moment she would have them running in, swooping about her room crying: "I'm a cockatoo!
I can fly fastest!" They always imitated her; they were so very young.
James was eight, Martin six and a half, and little Edward just four.
She felt superior in wisdom; ten was so very much older than even James, and she had heard Margery say that girls grow up quicker than boys.
She sat down on her bed, swinging her legs to and fro, wondering what she would do today. It must be a special day because she had dreamed it was Christmas. No day of course could be like Christmas Day, but it could be made exciting. But how?
She was tall for her age, rather thin, with blue-green eyes and a little more red in her hair than Carolan had had at her age; she had a quiet introspective air, reminiscent of her father, and her mouth was like his too. She drove the entire household to distraction with her capacity for asking questions. Where? Why? What...? Almost every sentence she spoke began like that. She would sit quietly watching people, seeing behind them the background of all they had told her over a number of years, all skilfully fitted together by herself until it made a complete picture. At some time they had all felt a little uncomfortable before the candid scrutiny of those calm blue-green eyes.
She would pull them up sharply over any small divergence from a previous story.
"Oh, but before, you said ..." It was disconcerting. But they loved her; she was the favourite of all the children, although James was the eldest son, and Martin and Edward were boys, and people wanted boys.
She knew though, by the way Mamma looked at her and Papa looked at her, and the way Margery said: "Now, what do you want in my kitchen?" that they loved her best of all.
It was good to be loved; it gave one such a sense of happy security.
Papa took her out to the stations with him sometimes; she would ride beside him in her neat outfit, and when they met people, who always had something to say to her, Papa got quite pink as though he liked very much hearing them say what a fine girl she was becoming.
She had a less clear picture of Papa than of anyone. She supposed that was because he was so important.
"Your father is a very busy man!”
"Your father is a very clever man!" How often had she heard that. But she didn't know things about him as she did about Margery and Miss Kelly and Poll and Wando. He was just Papa, a very clever man and a very busy man, who went pink when people stopped to talk to her.
Conversation with him was not always satisfactory; he would not be lured into disclosures. Mamma could be lured more easily than he could.
"Papa, do you wish I were a boy?”
"No.”
"But don't you want boys?”
"Why ... yes.”
"The eldest is always supposed to be a boy. Why did you have me a girl?”
"You cannot choose these matters, Katharine.”
"Why not, Papa?”
"Because they are arranged for us.”
"Who arranges them?”
"Does not Miss Kelly teach you to read your Bible?”
"Yes, Papa, but there is nothing about arranging there. Do you have to pray hard if you want a first-born boy?”
"Yes.”
"Then didn't you pray?”
Her questions were relentless, and Papa always, sooner or later, took the grown-up way out.
"Little girls should not ask so many questions.”
"Oh... but Papa, didn't you pray? I should have thought God ought to have answered your prayers. I think it mean of Him not to have made me a boy if you wanted a boy.”
"Hush, Katharine!”
"Why must I hush?”
"Because it is unsuitable for you to talk in this way.”
"Of first-borns and God?”
"Yes.”
"But in the Bible there is a lot about first-borns and God. God killed all the first-borns.
"Oh, Papa, suppose He killed all the first-borns in Sydney! That would be me ... oh, but it wouldn't, because it would be the first-born boys.
That would be James.”
"Now look here, nobody is going to kill any first-borns in Sydney.”
"But how do you know, Papa?”
"Because I do.”
"He told you? Oh, but Papa, if He told you that, couldn't you have asked Him why He didn't make your first-born a boy?”
"We will drop this ridiculous subject.”
No. you could not talk to Papa. There were lots of things she wanted to say to him. She almost said on that occasion: "Papa, perhaps it is something to do with your First Wife." But she dared not; there was something about Papa which could be very forbidding. But she knew there was a First Wife. She had heard Margery talking to Miss Kelly about it, talking in whispers in the way grown-ups do talk about a shocking subject, even when they do not know there is someone listening who should not hear.
Margery whispered: "It fair gives me the creeps to go up to that first floor.”
"That was where it happened, was it?" whispered back Miss Kelly.
"That was where it happened. And him and her ..." The whispers were so low-pitched that it was impossible to hear from outside the kitchen door. Him and her? Who? Papa and Mamma, or Papa and the First Wife?
"Positive of it!" said Margery.
"You only have to work it out. Miss Katharine will tell you that.”
She herself tell them? How could she, when she did not know!
"Not," said Margery, 'that I blame them... him or her!”
Blame whom? Papa and Mamma? Of Papa and the First Wife?
Exciting! Fascinating! Not that she thought much about it, for you cannot go on being excited about something that consistently remains a mystery. It was only when some overheard word came to her ears, or she was oppressed by the silence of the first floor where the guest rooms were, that she thought that the discovery of the secret would be the most exciting thing that could happen. At other times the thought of the Blue Mountains excited her far more.