Lessons In Loving Read Online Free Page B

question.’ He sipped his beer. ‘Long story.’ He looked away, drew an uneasy breath. Why had this smiling, agreeable man suddenly become ill at ease? He sighed again, gazed towards the hills. His shy, perhaps bashful, look told Kate that in the next moments he’d reveal something unexpected. He fiddled with his glass, looked down. Then he spoke.
    â€˜Kenilworth, it’s been in the family for three generations.’ He waved a hand towards the hills. ‘My father inherited it. Then, when he reached the age of sixteen, he left. Caught the city bug. Reckoned he would never be a farmer. He worked in banks and such, travelled the country. He was never at home. Then, on a long business journey to England, he met my mother. She was the youngest daughter of one of them … whaddaya call ’em? “Establishment” families. The eldest son has a title. All that stuff. They lived on this ancestral estate in country Hampshire. If her photograph is anything to go by, my mother was a real English rose when they met.’
    â€˜You mean a gentlewoman?’ Kate offered.
    â€˜If you say so, teacher.’
    She stole another sideways look at the man. Beneath the country lad exterior he wore like a heavy overcoat, his nervousness had now become too obvious. He sat hesitant on the edge of his chair. ‘My father had been raised with the family legend as the blood in his veins,’ he continued. ‘Kenilworth must always stay in Fortescue hands. Be a solid part of what they calls “the bunyip aristocracy” round these parts.’
    Kate had heard that term before, applied with due disparagement to English migrants of gentry stock who had attempted to transplant the British class structure onto Australian soil. She bit away her smile, watched his eyes drift towards the hills again.
    â€˜It all began when a fellow called Horatio Fortescue, my grandfather, first took up this land back in the 1830s. They say he was the youngest son of an earl or a baron or a duke, or whatever they call ’em. It seems youngest sons don’t inherit the title. Sometimes, not even a little smidgeon of the family wealth. It was about the time the English gentry came to see The Great South Land as a place where any ambitious man could get rich.
    â€˜So Horatio came to Australia. And he did pretty well.’ Tom waved towards the hills yet again.
    â€˜Then, my parents. Seems my father had always wanted to marry a high-born English lady. As his father had. And his grandfather too, come to that. He wanted to carry on the Fortescue tradition that would have been fed to him with his mother’s milk. And from what she told me, I reckon my mother’s family had always wanted her to marry money. The minute my parents met, the two of them knew they were made for each other. They married at the family seat in Hampshire. Then my father brought his bride back here to Kenilworth. She’d never seen Australia before. Never travelled. Reckon her eyes would’ve popped when she climbed down from the coach over there.’ He pointed to the flight of elegant steps leading to the mansion’s ornate front door. He paused, drew a long breath.
    â€˜Hampshire’s about as different from this place as a blowfly is from a butterfly. Tidy little green hills, sprinkled with them old castles. Tiny villages, straight out of a fairy story. See what I mean?’
    â€˜Yes. I’ve come to love England from the travel books I’ve read, the Jane Austen novels,’ Kate replied. She waved an arm towards the hills now silhouetted by the setting sun. ‘After Hampshire, New England must have come as rather a shock to your mother.’
    â€˜Yeah, I reckon she tried hard to like Kenilworth,’ Tom continued. ‘Often, I’d watch her sitting here of an evening, taking in the view. She seemed to love the hills. She’d sit me on her knee sometimes, perhaps round sunset. Tell me how