Outback Fire. Margaret Way

a surprise visit. Noni will let us know when dinner is ready.”

      “Will do, Major,” Noni gave a comic little salute and made off for the kitchen, thanking God Luke was around to ease the Major’s pain and loneliness.

      Above the fireplace in the Major’s book-and-trophy-lined study hung a painting of Storm. It had been commissioned on the eve of her twenty-first birthday. He found himself looking up at it with a brooding silence. No lavish ball gown for Storm. No deep décolletage that would have shown off her beautiful shoulders and breasts. But the painting, like Storm, compelled attention. She was wearing riding clothes, white silk shirt and close-fitting beige mole-skins, a fancy belt with a heavy silver-and-opal studded buckle she had designed herself around her narrow waist. Her long black hair was blowing free, her head slightly profiled, skin luminous, her almond-shaped eyes the same rich emerald-green as the bandanna that was knotted carelessly around her throat. One beautiful long-fingered hand was on her hip, and the other clasped a white akubra with a wide snakeskin band. How many times had he seen her stand like that? Maybe a thousand. As a background the artist had used the wonderful colourations of the desert; the cloudless cobalt-blue sky, the purple hills, the gleaming gold of the spinifex dotting the red ochre plains. The setting lent the painting a kind of monumentality. The young woman up there looked so vivid, so real he had the sense she could very easily step from the frame.

      Into his arms?

      And then?

      He never saw it without getting an erotic charge. He was under no illusion Storm couldn’t move him powerfully. Nothing easy or relaxed about it. Blinding pleasure and sometimes more than its fair share of sexual hostility.

      The Major, observing Luke quietly but intently, took his usual seat waiting for the young man to join him. “Could I ask you something very personal, Luke,” Athol McFarlane queried, meeting that direct sapphire gaze.

      “Sure, Major, as long as you leave Storm out of it,” Luke returned deadpan.

      McFarlane laughed. “What impresses me most about you two is neither of you can find anyone else while the other’s around.”

      Luke, taken by surprise, didn’t answer immediately. “You’re suggesting a love-hate?”

      “More often than not it’s Storm waging the war,” McFarlane answered ruefully. “I would have thought she’d be long over it by now.”

      “She’ll never be over it,” Luke answered, a mite tightly.

      “I can’t accept that,” the Major growled. “I want to see her, Luke.” It came out far more plaintively than he ever intended.

      Luke stared across the table, perturbed by the Major’s tone. “What’s up? What’s the matter? I wish you’d confide in me.”

      “Nothing to confide,” McFarlane lied. He wanted desperately to tell Luke he was dying but he couldn’t. He wouldn’t even tell Storm. “I’m just feeling tired and old and lonely except for you,” he evaded. “You’re my adopted son, Luke. You know that.”

      “If there was anything badly wrong you’d tell me?” There was a serious almost stern expression in Luke’s face.

      “Sure I would.” McFarlane tried to lighten that gaze.

      “Why don’t I believe that? I’m here to help you, Major.”

      The Major responded by grasping Luke’s forearm. “Don’t you think I know that, son? But it’s four months at least since Storm was here.”

      Four months, one week and three days. “She leads a full life,” Luke pointed out. “Even I’ve picked up the magazines Noni leaves lying around the place. She’s beautiful, gifted, she has a fine family name. It’s only to be expected she’d get invited everywhere. And she has her work. Her commissions.”

      “She could do them here.” The Major’s heavy eyebrows drew together. “I’ve offered many times to convert a couple of rooms into a studio, workshop, whatever she wants. God knows there are enough rooms empty.”

      “Have you told her how you feel?” Luke asked.

      McFarlane sighed. “Yes.” It wasn’t strictly true. He always played hardy when she rang.

      “And she still won’t come?” It was hard to keep the censure out of his voice. Storm had plenty of time for parties and all the social functions.

      “Maybe I haven’t asked the right way.” McFarlane dropped his gaze evasively, sighing heavily.

      “You must know it’s on account of me.”

      “I don’t accept that, Luke.” McFarlane shook his head.

      “I think you might have to, Major,” Luke countered knowing the Major had been living with the fiction one day he and Storm would get together. God, could you believe it? “Storm has always seen me as the usurper,” he added with quiet force, opening up his own wounds.

      “Rubbish! That’s irrational.” The Major’s protest was overloud.

      “Aren’t human beings irrational when their deepest emotions are involved?” Luke held the Major’s gaze until he blinked.

      “You’re a man of integrity, Luke,” McFarlane said. “Storm knows that in her deepest being.”

      Luke’s expression became sombre as he studied the other man’s gaunt face, thin body and arms. “Would you like me to go to Sydney and fetch her?”

      McFarlane looked up quickly. “You’re far too busy to do that,” he protested but his face brightened and he squared his shoulders.

      “Everything is in hand,” Luke pointed out. “I’ve got Sandy well trained. He can stand in for me for a day of two. Of course if you want me to check out Kingston?” Luke referred to a Winding River’s outstation.

      “It can wait,” McFarlane said without a second thought.

      “Actually it can. I’ve got the situation sorted out. Webb was the troublemaker.”

      McFarlane scarcely heard, his voice picking up strength. “When will you go?” Luke studied him. It sounded as if time was of the essence.

      “When would you want me to go?” Luke watched him carefully, evaluating the change.

      “What about Friday?”

      The day after tomorrow. Luke’s mind worked overtime. The Major hid his desperation well but Luke sensed, no knew, there was something terribly wrong. He wished he could talk to Tom Skinner, the Major’s doctor. Get things straight, but the Major would never forgive him for going behind his back. He had tried to get something out of Tom, to little avail. Whatever the true state of McFarlane’s health the file was confidential. But there was the evidence of his own eyes. The Major was a sick man. He knew it. Storm knew it. Where the hell was she? Surely her concern for her father would outweigh every other consideration? Her long-running cold war with him?

      “So?” McFarlane asked as the young man opposite him fell silent.

      “No problem!” Luke flashed his white smile. The smile everyone waited for. “I won’t let Storm know I’m coming in case she jumps town, though I will check to see she’s in residence.”

      “What about young Carla?” the Major suddenly sidetracked.

      “You could give me a clue?” Luke drawled, not wanting to discuss Carla.

      “Dammit, Luke, you know what I mean. You and Carla used to be close. Is it still on?”

      Luke picked up a paperweight and palmed it. “On and off. Carla and I are friends.” He set the crystal paperweight down.

      ‘You’re a darn sight more to her than that, my boy,” the Major scoffed. “I’ve got eyes. The girl is head over heels in love with you. Her dad would be thrilled to have you for a son-in-law. Like me he only has a daughter to inherit.”

      Luke,