Marion Lennox - To the Doctor: A Daughter

‘It’s blackmail.’

‘Yes, but it’s a very effective form of blackmail. I won’t let Cady go back to him.’

‘So call his bluff.’

‘He’ll take him. You don’t know Alan. He’s smooth and clever and nasty. He’ll take Cady-he’s done it once before. Cady was looked after physically. There were no grounds to report him to welfare. No grounds for me to take him away. But Cady…well, he’s not going back there even if I have to pay for the rest of my life.’

‘So where does that leave you and me?’

‘You and me were a dream.’ Gemma closed her eyes and there was such pain in her voice that Nate couldn’t bear it. He caught her hands and held them, willing warmth into their chill. Willing love…

‘I’ll kill the bastard…’

‘Oh, right. That’d help.’ She gave a laugh that was half a sob.

‘Gemma, this is impossible. Let me talk to him. Maybe we-’

‘Maybe we nothing.’ She took a deep breath. ‘There is no we, Nate. This is my problem. Mine. I came down here to give you your daughter. I’ve done that. And I know you’ll love her. You don’t know how much that means to me.’

‘I can guess.’

‘Nate…’ She shook her head-a desolate little gesture that made him want to wrap her in his arms and hold her. But when he moved toward her she shrank back against the pillows.

‘No, Nate, I can’t.’

‘You can’t…what?’

‘I can’t go any further with you. I’m leaving here in the morning. Me and Cady. We’ve done what we set out to do. You’ve given us-me and Cady-two weeks which we’ll remember for the rest of our lives. And that’s it.’

‘It’s not it.’

‘There’s nothing else to do about it.’

‘Maybe there is,’ he growled. He stared at her in baffled anger, his frustration growing by the moment.

‘There isn’t.’

‘There is,’ he said savagely. ‘I just haven’t thought what it is yet.’

IT WAS a tough night for sleeping.

It was a tough night for doing anything at all. Gemma lay awake and stared into the darkness and she’d never felt so bleak in all her life.

This had been a dream. These two weeks…

A dream was how she’d have to remember it, she decided. A wonderful, magical fantasy where people cared and Cady was happy and loved and she…

And she herself was loved.

So of course it was a dream. People didn’t love Gemma. Had she learned nothing over the years?

Nate loved her.

No, she corrected herself. Nate felt sorry for her. She’d leave and he’d go back to Donna or someone like her.

But it had felt so right. So wonderfully right. Like two halves of a whole, they fitted together. Man and woman.

They didn’t fit together any more. As of tomorrow she’d be gone. Back to the city to find another high-powered job to keep Alan happy. To keep Cady safe.

But at such a cost?

‘You’re letting her go?’

‘What else can I do?’ Nate had explained the situation to his uncle and Graham was as appalled as he was.

‘I don’t know. Pistols at dawn seems a good option. With only one pistol loaded.’

‘I won’t be much good to Gemma in jail.’

‘And he’s definitely the boy’s father? He does have legal rights?’

‘You know the custody laws. Unless there are exceptional circumstances, the natural parents will always win. Gemma’s had legal advice. She’s stuck.’

‘We can’t pay him off?’

‘Are you kidding?’ Nate looked at his uncle with affectionate exasperation. ‘With what? Hell, the one thing we don’t do here is make money. We might-if you ever agreed to charge people what you’re worth.’

Graham bristled. ‘I suppose you do? What about the time you spent with Olive today? I’ll bet that’s not been charged. You might charge Ian for the time you spent sewing him up, but did you charge for the hours you spent in the paddock? I don’t think so. Country doctors don’t make any money, boy. Not if they have hearts.’

That was just the trouble. Nate had a brief flash of what could be-him moving to the city-making megabucks-getting rid of Alan-but that was all it was. A brief flash of hopeless imagining.

He’d come down here six years ago to help Graham out, and his heart had been well and truly caught. Now being a country doctor was who he was. It was his identity. Surgical practice in the city would mean walking away from Graham-and, more, walking away from a community who depended on him. He knew what the odds were of finding someone to take his place.

Doctors didn’t like moving to the country.

He stared bleakly across the table at Graham and thought, I’m as trapped as Gemma.

‘I suppose he really is the boy’s father?’ Graham was still thinking things through.

‘Fiona put him down on the birth certificate. Just like she named me. There’s no possibility that I’m not Mia’s father.’

‘You can’t fight that one. Not with that hair. So…does Cady look like this guy?’

‘I guess.’ He frowned. ‘A bit. But there doesn’t seem to be any doubt. Gemma said they were even living together for a while. What the pair of them wouldn’t do to hurt her…’

‘That’s what I mean.’ Graham shook his head. ‘It’s a long shot-but I guess it’s a stupid suggestion. Whoever the father is, it’s definitely not you. Which is all that matters.’

‘Hell, I wish I was.’

‘Do you really?’ Graham asked curiously. ‘Two weeks ago the thought of marriage was giving you the collywobbles. Now you have a daughter. Do you want a son as well?’

There was no hesitation. ‘Yes. And a wife.’ He groaned and slammed his fist down on the table so hard that it hurt. ‘More than anything else in the world.’

Nate lay awake far into the night, his trapped mind examining every possibility he could think of. Twisting this way and that. Trying to see a way out of this mess.

And at three in the morning he sat up and turned the light on. A conversation was playing over and over in his head.

It was his brief conversation with Jeff, his pathologist friend from Sydney Central, when he’d been checking on Gemma’s credentials. He hadn’t understood the conversation then and he didn’t understand it now.

What had he said?

He got up and made himself a cup of coffee, thinking back to the conversation. He’d thought it odd at the time, which was why he remembered it

Did he have it right?

‘Margot couldn’t stand the sister. Come to think of it, no one could-once you got to see past that beautiful face. She was as mad as a cut snake and what she and that husband of hers did to Gemma…’

And…

‘They fed her a pack of lies. And she believed it. Hell, as far as I know, she still believes it. She won’t talk about Fiona to anyone.’

Hell.

He let his coffee get cold and paced a bit while he thought about it some more.

It was a long shot-a crazy shot.

He’d never get anything out of Jeff.

Would he?

Damn, it was three in the morning.

No matter. He picked up the phone and dialled Sydney Central.

‘Can you put me through to Jeff Sandhurst, please? Yes, I realise he’s not on duty and I know it’s three in the morning. Yes, I realise… But it’s urgent. Tell him it’s Dr Nate Ethan from Terama and I need to speak to him-now.’

NATE rose before dawn. Well, he couldn’t sleep so he decided he might as well work.

First there was a letter to write. A letter that was short and to the point and entirely satisfactory. He hoped.

Then he did some random medico-legal paperwork while he waited for his patients to wake, then spent much longer than usual visiting each of them. He was killing time. He wasn’t facing Gemma with what he’d found out. Or what he planned. Who knew how she’d react? And this was too important for her to have scruples.

This wasn’t pistols at dawn but it was just as unethical.

Nine o’clock seemed a long way off.

His last patient was the farmer they’d pulled from under the plane, and Ian wasn’t impressed by the dark shadows under his eyes.

‘Hell, Doc, you look as bad as me.’ Ian was recovering beautifully. He was tackling his breakfast bacon and eggs with all the trimmings which, considering the condition he’d been in the night before, was little short of a miracle. ‘Did you have trouble during the night?’

‘Um…yes.’ It seemed safer to agree.

‘Not as dramatic as our accident, I hope.’ Ian’s face became closed and he winced as he shifted against the pillows. He wasn’t quite as great as he made out. ‘Of all the stupid accidents. I’ve been thinking and thinking. I should have let him have his four feet of land. It was a strip four feet wide and fifty feet long. That’s the strip we were fighting over. And he died for it.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Maybe we just had to fight.’ Ian shook his head. ‘Maybe we even enjoyed the drama of the thing. Seems we’ve been shouting over the fence at each other since we were lads.’ His weathered face puckered in distress. ‘Hell. The whole thing seems so damned pointless now. How’s Olive?’

‘Terrible.’ There was no point in dissembling.

‘Tell her I’ll milk her cows. I’m mostly running beef cattle now and I’ve only got forty milkers. I can easily run her herd with ours. We’ll split the milk income and it won’t cost her a thing.’

And why couldn’t he have been as accommodating as this before Hector killed himself? Nate wondered. Why on earth did people fight?

Why had Fiona wanted to hurt Gemma so badly?

Maybe she’d sensed that it hadn’t only been in health that Gemma had surpassed her, he thought. She’d been jealous of Gemma long before she’d been diagnosed with diabetes.

Maybe it was because Gemma was just…good.

What would Gemma say if she knew what he was about to do?

He wouldn’t tell her. He’d stay away from her until it was time.