“Oh Lord, I’m sorry.” Rem rubbed at eyes gone gritty. “But I can’t marry her, Bella, you must see that. I don’t care for her in that way, and we’d only end up hating each other.”

  She exhaled a sharp breath. “Seems to me I’ve heard that same sentence before somewhere.” With a sigh, she got up and came to place a hand on his arm. “Sit down, Rem. I’ll tell you a story.”

  A while later she left him alone. He had known she hadn’t married Tiger until after their second child’s birth, but until now hadn’t known the full story of why they hadn’t wed sooner. Now he knew Tiger didn’t wanted to marry his sister when she found out she was carrying Tim. In his arrogance, he forced her to marry her shipboard friend, Dougal. It was a disastrous match from the first, and they grew to hate each other. A hatred that intensified when Dougie, her second baby, died from snakebite on the way over the Blue Mountains. Dougal cast all the blame on Bella, accusing her of caring for Tiger’s child more than his. Bella conceived Annie after Dougal fell off the side of The Big Hill to his death. Bella refused Tiger’s offer of marriage several times, unable to forget how he rejected her at first.

  Rem could see what she meant about history repeating itself, but there had been a genuine and lasting love between Tiger and Bella, a love anyone could see surmounted all obstacles and seemed to grow with each passing day. He didn’t even have more than a liking for Agnes. God! If he married the chit, they would both live to regret it more than Bella had with Dougal. At least Bella and Dougal had once been good friends.

  Besides, he loved Sara; more than loved her, worshipped the ground she trod upon and wanted to marry no one else. What an absolute disaster! Why had he taken what Agnes so willingly offered that night? Simple; he had been too far gone to have any control over his lecherous body, and the silly girl hadn’t the sense in her head to know that.

  * * *

  Agnes stood still as a statue. She dare not move in case the mistress or Remy heard her. Agnes knew almost the entire story of what happened between her mistress and master, but hadn’t known the master refused to marry the mistress when Bella found herself with Tiger’s child.

  There was no way in the world she would force Rem to marry her simply because of the baby she carried. She had seen her chance to have one night of his lovemaking, and had taken it, knowing full well it would likely be the only chance she ever got; knowing full well his feelings for her never matched her own. Never had she dreamed it would end this way, with her pregnant.

  What could she do? If the mistress forced him into marriage, he would surely end up despising her, if he didn’t already. And she would hate herself for forcing his hand. If she ran away, where would she go? No one would take on a maid heavy with child. There weren’t enough settlers this side of the mountains for her to seek employment with them anyway—not that the mistress would see her working for someone else.

  She could likely get a ride back to Sydney with the next party traveling across the mountains. But what sort of life would she have with a child and no income? Perhaps the mistress could secure her a position as a nursemaid where they would accept her baby.

  Stifling a sob of despair, she made her way quietly along the porch and entered the house by the side door. The master was coming from the room he used as his office, behind the kitchen. “Agnes, what are you doing creeping about?” he asked, running fingers through his thick hair of gold. “Where are the children?” Usually at this time of the day, she was preparing them for bed.

  “I...I was...” Unable to think of a sensible retort she hastened away and ran to the nursery.

  Later, after seeing Tim, Annie, Rosie, and the baby, John, safely tucked up in their beds, she crept out of the house and walked in the garden. Pulling her shawl tightly about her to ward off the chill, she wandered aimlessly for a while, not wanting to go too far from the lights spilling from the house so she could keep an eye out for snakes.

  A dark shape loomed before her, and she couldn’t hold back a small shriek.

  “It’s all right, miss, I won’t hurt you.” She breathed easier when she saw it was one of the shepherds, Mole they called him, sitting on a log, puffing on his clay pipe.

  “You frightened me. I thought I was alone,” she said shyly.

  “Not right for a lady to be wandering about after dark by herself,” he said, eyeing her with interest.

  “I’m not a lady.” She looked up to the sullen sky. Not one star peeped through the dark clouds.

  “’Course you are. Because you ain’t gentry don’t mean a thing. 'Tis the way you behave that decides whether you’re fit to be called such or not. Now that doxie, Lily, she ain’t fit to be called more’n what she is, a harlot. But I’ve seen you with the little uns, and you’re a lady for sure. And no arguing.” He smiled around his pipe.

  Agnes had seen him about the property. Old as anything, he knew sheep, or so everyone said. In this country, where sheep were looked on with respect, a good shepherd was worth his weight in gold.

  Agnes thought sheep the stupidest creatures God had seen fit to put on this earth. But the master made most of his wealth from them it seemed, or from their fleece, which he sent to the mills in England.

  “So, what’s the problem besetting your young head then?” Mole asked mildly.

  “Problem? What makes you think I have one?” Agnes looked at him sharply.

  “I can tell something’s up with you, lass. You’re shoulders are all slumped, and I haven’t glimpsed a smile on your pretty face in weeks. I been away awhile tending my charges, but you was miserable afore I went a fortnight ago. And you’re ten times worse this night.”

  “I’m not the least bit pretty, and that’s at the root of all my problems.” She gave a shuddering sigh and joined him on the log.

  “Nonsense, it’s all in the eye of the beholder.” He wagged his pipe at her. “Some young blood turned you down, eh?”

  If only it were that simple. “The man I love doesn’t care for me,” she blurted, and then wondered why she had told this to a shepherd—and probably a convict at that.

  “What is he, mad?” He looked truly aghast.

  “No, he’s not mad, nor even simple. He’s in love with somebody else, and I mean nothing to him.” Shoulders sagging, she scuffed one boot toe in the dust.

  “Oh, Lord, now don’t let that upset you, m’dear. Look at my ugly mug.” He pointed to his wrinkled face and grinned, showing many gaps in his discolored teeth. “I’ve probably been turned down by more women than I’ve had 'ot dinners, so I have. And that in the days when I was a lot more presentable than I am now.” He chuckled. “But has old Mole let it get him down? Of course he ain’t. You pick yourself up and go and make a conquest. There must be lots of young men hereabouts only too glad to set up house with a young lass like you.”

  “But, don’t you see, I don’t want them. I want...” Agnes bit her lip. She had said far too much to this old man already.

  “'Tis the young mistress’s brother you want, ain’t it?” he asked solemnly, shaking his felt-capped head.

  “How...how did you know?”

  “Ah, well, ain’t no secret really. You been mooning around after him since I came here last year, probably longer than that.”

  “I don’t moon over him. I love him,” she protested in a small voice.

  “Love, hah!” He sent out a stream of spittle. His dog, which had been lying near his feet, shifted, circled, and then lay down again with a huff. “Strictly for fools, is love.”

  “Then I’m the biggest fool,” she moaned.

  “Forget the boy. He ain’t fit for you, lass.”

  “If only it was so easy.” With a drawn-out sigh, she stood up and prepared to walk away.

  “Anyways, he has big eyes for the Greenwood lass. Ah,” he muttered as it apparently dawned on him this was the whole crux of the problem. “That’s why you’re so down in the dumps. Because he’s mooning over that lass, and you’re mooning over him. He ain’t worth it, girl,” he repeated vehemently.

  “Maybe so. But that’s not all of it.” Agnes sat by his side again, feeling the desperate need to confide in someone. “I’m a fool. I’m carrying his baby, and he didn’t even want to lie with me. I forced myself on him, and now I’m having to pay for my sins.”

  “Hush, girl, what sins? By God, he’s the one who’s sinned. And as for your forcing yourself on him, that’s a load of rubbish, if you’ll pardon my language. No girl of your size could force a man to do anything against his will. I never knew he was that sort. Well, well, we live and learn.” He puffed silently on his pipe for a while. The night creatures shuffled about and a few birds shifted their perches in the trees around them. His dog grunted as it settled itself more comfortably.

  “What did the mistress have to say about it?” he asked at length, when she felt sure the subject was finished with.

  Agnes bit her lip. “She’s after him marrying me. But he’ll not have that. And neither will I.”

  “Hmm, 'tis a tricky situation 'an that’s a fact. Hard to know what to do. No sense in getting wed to someone you’ll hold responsible for trapping you.”

  “I know that.” Agnes rubbed at her temple, which ached with all the worry. “That’s why I wouldn’t wed Remy now if he pleaded with me.”

  “There’s another answer. Marry someone else who’ll look after you and the babe.”

  “That would be even worse. I couldn’t bear to have another man touch me as a man expects to touch his wife,’ she confided. “I’d sooner stay as I am.”

  “Hmm, you could marry someone old enough to be your grandfather.” With a soft chuckle, he paused before adding, “That way the child will have a father, you’ll have a husband with all the respectability that goes with it. And the man’d have a good young wife to cook his meals and keep his cabin clean.”

  Agnes shrugged and turned to stare at him. “I could never get wed for the sake of it, to someone I didn’t care for.”

  “What’s the alternative, I ask you?”

  Agnes toyed with her shawl fringe. She had no answer.

  “I’ve got it.” His elbow nudged her gently in the side. “I’ll marry you. Now what about that idea, eh?”

  How could she marry a wizened old man with not many teeth, wrinkled skin, and the smell of sheep constantly about him? To tell him so would be unkind and rude, so she smiled and said, “Thank you for the offer, but I’ll find another solution.”

  “Think on it, lass,” he said softly as she got up and began to walk slowly back to the house.

  Darkness enveloped it except for one shaft of light flowing from the sitting room window. How she loved this place and the mistress who had taken her from the orphanage where she had lived since she was a four-year-old. Her mother, caught stealing a yard of ribbon from a stallholder at the market, died on the transport ship. The mistress was the closest to a mother she ever had since. And now Agnes had disgraced herself and likely turned her mistress against her brother for what she would see as his lechery.

  Lord above knows what the master would say about it when he heard of her condition.

  Chapter Seven

  “With child?” the master bellowed.

  Agnes shrank back against the wall near the window to the sitting room.

  “Aye, Tiger, she’s three months gone. Poor child.” The sadness in the mistress’s voice brought tears to Agnes’s eyes. With a fist over her mouth, she held back a sob.

  “Poor child, is it? She’s eighteen, Bella, love. Hardly a child, I’d say. So, who’s the father?” He paused, and Agnes pressed herself harder on the wall. “If it’s one of my men, I’ll have him whipped and slung in chains!”

  “Tiger, don’t be so harsh,” the mistress chided softly, her skirts rustling as she crossed the room. “It’s not one of the laborers or shepherds…it’s...” She stopped talking, and Agnes could sense she fought with her conscience.

  “Then who the bloody hell is it? The girl spends all her time with the children and you, and barely spares a glance for any of the men. Except…Jesus! Don’t tell me it’s your brother.” Agnes cringed at the string of muttered oaths he emitted.

  “Tiger, don’t be angry.” The mistress’s soft rebuke was filled with gentleness.

  “I’m not angry,” he shouted, proving he was angrier than Agnes had heard in a long time. “I’m disgusted. I’ll kill him.”

  “You have a short memory, love.” Agnes heard the sigh in her tone, and then the master’s soft snort.

  “It was different with you and me.”

  Agnes knew it hadn’t been much different at all. The master refused to wed the mistress at first, forcing her into a loveless marriage with her first husband.

  “Was it? Agnes loves Rem, fool that she is, even though I hate to admit it. My brother pines for Sara Greenwood, and Agnes moons over him. It happened while he was well into his cups. Agnes could no more stop herself from succumbing to him than I could to you all those years ago. What will we do, Tiger?” she wailed in a distraught voice. Agnes shuddered. “Rem doesn’t want to get wed any more than you wanted to way back then. We can’t force him to marry her. I wouldn’t want to see them endure the unhappiness Dougal and I shared.”

  The master must have put his arms about the mistress for his voice was muffled, probably because his mouth was pressed to her shoulder. “I wish I knew, love.”

  Agnes turned and ran. She didn’t stop until she reached her room. Sitting on the edge of her bed, she let the tears fall unheeded. What a mess. Did she really expect Remy to fall in love with her because she offered herself to him?

  One of the children began to whimper, and she quietly went to the room next to hers. It was the baby. Picking him up she rocked him as she paced the room, crooning. “Hush John, my babe,” she whispered. When he quietened, she placed him back in his crib, staring at his cherubic face for ages, while her mind went over and over what the master and mistress had said.

  Even if they forced Rem to marry her, she wouldn’t. Not now. Not if he went into it unwillingly. She loved him too much to make his life a misery. How she hated to be a disappointment to her mistress, the most beautiful person she had ever known. She knew what it was like to love and not have that love returned. But then, everything worked out right for her in the end.

  Try as she might, Agnes could never see things working out right between her and Rem. He wouldn’t have taken her unless drunk and she had thrown herself on him. She hadn’t a lot of pride where he was concerned, but Lord, it would be purgatory to be wed to a man who hated her.

  * * *

  “Where’s Aggie?” Bella turned to Rem. He concentrated on the food on his plate and shrugged. His sister then turned her attention on Gracie, who was placing a platter of roast lamb on the table in front of Tiger for him to carve.

  “Said she’s not feeling well, wants to lie down, she does,” Gracie said, her eyes as solemn as Bella’s as the two women appraised each other silently.

  Why did women always seem to know what the other was thinking, Rem wondered. If only he knew what went on in their heads. Always a look passed between them and although no questions were asked, they seemed somehow to know what the other referred to.

  “I guess we might as well bring this out into the open, seeing as the chit isn’t here,” Tiger said as he began to slice the meat. “What are your intentions where she’s concerned?” His eyes turned to study Rem as the carving knife stopped in mid-air.

  Rem ducked his head, groaning inwardly. Jesus, what to say? “Intentions?” he asked, knowing he was being cowardly.

  Tiger sighed, returning to the carving. “Don’t beat about the bush, man. She’s with child. Your child. And I asked a straightforward question. Are you going to meet your obligations? Please tell us while she isn’t here to feel insulted further by your refusal to make an honest woman of her.”

  “I can’t wed her, Tiger. Don’t you see?” Panic made him dizzy, and he swallowed. “She deserves better.”

  “Pity you didn’t think more on this before you violated her innocence.” Tiger waved the knife, and Rem eyed it. Both Gracie and Bella were still as statues while they listened.

  “Violated? That’s rubbish, Tiger.” Rem glanced at his sister, now shaking her head, whether in sorrow or disgust he wasn’t sure.

  Tiger’s laugh was scornful. “Spare me the stories. All right, I can understand fully why you wouldn’t want to wed her when there’s no feelings whatsoever for her. I wouldn’t force you down that path.” He glanced to Bella and a meaningful look passed between them. “So, what’s to be done, love?”

  Rem stifled a retort. They were discussing this as if he had no say whatsoever in the outcome. No say in how the rest of his life shaped.

  Bella sighed sadly. “I’m sure I don’t know. I guess things go on as before. Another baby in the house won’t make a lot of difference. We already have four, and that’ll grow to five before the year is out. I’ll tell her later when I go in to see how she is.”

  The food was passed around the table. They ate in silence.

  Rem had lost his appetite. “I’m sorry, Bella,” he said, rising suddenly. “I know as well as you that I’m being a selfish brute.”

  He left them, knowing he sank in his sister’s estimation. He detested having her feel that way. Ye Gods, if only he had insisted the silly chit go when he told her to. Had she actually thought she could force his hand, force him to care for her? What a mess.

  He wandered outside, walking in the softness of the late winter evening. A small sliver of light showed beneath the blind in Aggie’s room and for a moment, he considered going to her, pleading for sense in this matter. She could still bear the child and be welcomed under Bella and Tiger’s roof. There was no need to complicate matters by going through a wedding that would be a farce.