The Australian Heiress (24 page)

The silence was profound. Camille could hardly breathe. “So it’s come to that, has it?” she asked finally. “Your sanity has completely crumbled. You’ll never get away with it.”

“That’s no comfort to you, dearie.” Clare’s blue-gray eyes were white-rimmed.

“You
must
let Melissa go,” Camille said vigorously. “She’s an innocent child. I’ll put her in the Jeep. Then we can talk.”

“Stay there,” Clare ordered, getting a firmer grip on the whip.

“Camille, I’m afraid,” Melissa said, her voice trembling.

“I won’t let anyone hurt you, sweetheart,” Camille said softly but firmly. “Daddy will come. We’ll hang on.”

“What are you whispering about?” Clare’s voice spiraled up, so strident Camille flinched.

“I’m begging you, Mrs. Tennant, stop. How can you hurt a child?”

“No, I won’t stop,” the woman said in a harsh gritty voice. “I can’t do much about it. There’s a voice talking in my head. A voice I can’t control.”

“You can get help.” Camille was beginning to shake in helpless fear and anger.

“Help?” Clare shouted, freshly enraged. “You think I want to live with that? Live like my poor mother all locked up? I’d rather die.”

“There’s a child here who has a right to live!” Camille cried, impassioned.

“It’s a wonder her mother didn’t do something terrible to her,” Clare hissed. “Like my mother used to do to me.”

The shocking statement brought Camille up short.

The woman smiled. “I’ve gone through hell in my time, not like you, you sheltered little bitch. Carole looked on me as a friend. Why not? I supplied her with everything she needed. No call to deal with the
scum on the street. I even handed her the keys to drive herself home that night.”

Camille blanched. So Clare
had
been instrumental in Carole’s death.

“Yes,” she went on, “home to the only man I’ve ever wanted. The only man stronger than I am who could take care of me. He was grateful for my help.”

“He’ll be grateful if you let us go,” Camille said earnestly.

“Ayaa!” It was that eerie tortured wail again.
“You
put an end to that, didn’t you? You with that red hair and the emerald eyes. You mesmerized him from that very first night. I saw it happening. I can see ahead in time, you know. How I’ve hated you. It’s been like a cancer growing inside me.
A
horrible great cancer sending tentacles to every part of my body. In the beginning I only wanted to frighten you. Any other woman would have packed her bags and fled. Not you.”

“But you must have had an accomplice.” Camille tried to piece things together.

“Just someone who does what you want—for a price.”

“I should have known,” Camille said. “I
did
know, but I didn’t want to face it. For someone to hate me so much! I’ve never done anything to you, Mrs. Tennant. Melissa is only a child. If you love Nicholas as much as you say you do, you must let her go.” Camille stopped breathing, waiting for the woman’s answer.

“If you two had an accident, he could turn to me again,” Clare said astonishingly.

Dear Lord, what’s happening?
Camille thought.
She willed herself to remain under control. “You couldn’t possibly pull it off. You know that.”

“I could try.” Laughter again. Chilling laughter.

Keep her talking,
Camille told herself, trying desperately to think of a way out. “You’ve been making Jack sick, as well?” Speaking conversationally, she inched forward. She would have to time the moment. It was terrifying and dangerous, but she had to act.

“Nothing serious.” Clare smirked. “Just a little something I put in the mixture to make his stomach act up. Jack’s not a bad guy. He’s even tried to help me. But marry him? No. I’m not that far gone. I just used Jack as a means to get here. I’ve always been one step ahead. Sometimes the voices work for me. Sometimes they don’t.”

“You can be helped, Mrs. Tennant.” The space between them was closing. “Don’t wreck what’s left of your life.”

Fast and fluid, the whip whistled, cutting along Camille’s thigh and making her cry out in pain. “I’m prepared to
die!”
Clare shouted hysterically. “I was prepared from the moment I came out here.”

There was a stir in the air and, arrested, she threw up her head. “What’s that bloody eagle doing? Is it coming back to its nest?”

The eagle circled, its attitude such that the hair rose on the back of Camille’s neck.

“That’s Wirra Wirra!” Melissa’s voice was a mix of relief and excitement, the blood flowing back into her pale cheeks. “You’ve heard of him, haven’t you? Look, look—he’s watching you from above.”

“You don’t suppose for a minute I believe that rubbish,”
Clare snarled, then retreated frantically. “Good God, it’s not going to dive-bomb, is it?”

“It’s coming for
you!”
Melissa shouted with fierce joy.

“And you think
I’m
crazy?” Clare let out a mad cackle of laughter. “It has a nest here. We’re threatening it. There are always eagles in the outback. I’m more used to them than you are.”

“Not Wirra Wirra!” Melissa cried. “He’s our guardian spirit.”

Clare’s eyes were glazed. One look into them and Camille went cold. The moment of crisis had arrived.

Now was the time, the
only
time, to make the break. She had to do it even if she was cut to ribbons. “When I tell you to run,
run,”
she muttered to the child. “Run like the wind.
Hide.
Daddy will come.
Now.”
Camille gave the child a push, and Melissa took to her heels with the knowledge that her life depended on it.

“Come back here, you little bitch.” Clumsy in her haste, Clare began to unfurl the whip. “Come back!”

It was the chance to rush her, but the eagle chose that moment to fly low over the escarpment There was a loud vibration, then a rush of wind.

What Camille saw nearly stopped her heart

Equally thunderstruck, Clare Tennant thrashed out with her whip as the great wedge-tailed eagle swooped on her, its glossy dark wings glinting in the sun, golden fire blazing from its fierce eyes. Its huge wings tipped as its shadow fell over the flailing woman.

“Get away from me,” she screamed.

The great bird was shrieking, an almost human sound. Its terrible talons were in the woman’s hair, shredding it like silk.

“No!” Clare’s scream was full of disbelief and terror. Face bleached of all color, features contorted with shock, she tried to fight the bird off. The great bird wasn’t just protecting its nest, it was trying to drive Clare to her death. Impossible to make sense of it.

She took a few staggering steps backward—and then she was treading on air. Limitless open space.

Camille raced to Melissa. She grasped the child, turning her head protectively into her body. This wasn’t for a child to see.

For a moment Clare seemed to hang there, her arms windmilling crazily, a terrible look of inevitability on her face. Then she was gone, facing her darkest unknown.

As the eagle soared straight upward into the sun, the woman dropped like a stone to the valley floor.

Camille thought she would hear that high-pitched scream for the rest of her life. She bowed her head protectively over the sobbing child. She tried to pray, but found she could not.

Someone would come. What could she tell them? That the legendary Wirra Wirra had saved their lives? Who would believe her? Yet she’d seen it with her own eyes. When she finally lifted her head, the eagle had disappeared. Had it been there at all?

Camille and Melissa remained there like that, arms around each other, until Nicholas arrived. Much later he told Camille that a great wedge-tailed eagle had landed on the front lawn of the homestead and stayed without moving. It was an event so singular it had caused him to break up his meeting and go in search of them.

eISBN 978-14592-7074-9

THE AUSTRALIAN HEIRESS

Copyright © 1997 by Margaret Way Pty. Ltd.

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