“If you didn’t come in response to my ad for a nanny, why did you come up the lane?”
“Well, I—” She broke off again.
Maxie was now running back and forth between the car and the cottage, whimpering and whining. She finally stopped in front of the wooden door, ears back.
“Oh!” Melissa exclaimed.
“Maxie, get away from there!” Gregory called. “Maxie!”
“The animal must be in there, Daddy. Should we look? Maybe it’s not a possum. Maybe it’s a bear.” Alice Ann bounced up and down in her squeaky gum boots, her eyes shining. “A polar bear with fluffy white fur and a blue satin collar.”
“There are no polar bears in Australia, with or without satin collars,” Gregory told her. “But maybe we should have a look for signs of possum.”
He walked over to the cottage, reached for the handle and nudged the dog gently aside with his foot. “Get away, Maxie, so I can open the door.”
“Excuse me!” Melissa slipped between him and the cottage more quickly than he would have thought possible. Her deep blue eyes met his at close range and the faint, fresh scent of wildflowers drifted up to him. “I came up the lane to…to buy free-range eggs. There’s no one home next door, and I wondered if you might have some for sale.”
“As it happens, I do,” Gregory stated, taking a step backward. “My neighbor forgot to take down her sign before she left on holiday. But I’m looking after her chooks. I have eggs up at the house for her regular customers.”
“Constance left you the eggs?” Melissa asked. “Constance Derwent?”
Gregory nodded, wondering at the peculiar emphasis she placed on the name. Maxie whined and scratched at the door.
“Do you think you could get me some? Now, I mean,” their visitor said urgently. “I’m late for an appointment.”
“Of course. Come up to the house.” Gregory dragged Maxie away from the cottage door by her collar. Alice Ann ran over to get her bike, and rode, weaving, across the hard-packed dirt yard.
“I’m one of Constance’s most regular customers,” Melissa assured him as they started for the house. “Two, three dozen eggs a week. I eat nothing else.”
Gregory stopped short. “You eat nothing but eggs?”
“Goodness, no. I mean, when I eat eggs I insist on free-range. Constance’s eggs are the best.” Nervously, she glanced around to see where the dog was.
“You don’t need to be afraid of my dog,” he said. “Behind that big bark she’s a complete softy.”
Melissa gave him a quick smile as she twisted her silver bangles. “Tell that to the polar bears.”
“See, Daddy?” Alice Ann said as she nearly crashed into him on her bike. “Melissa thinks there are polar bears in there, too.”
Gregory chuckled and shook his head. “You’ll see there aren’t any bears when I clean out that cottage this week for your new nanny.”
Beside him, Melissa breathed in sharply. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her stumble on the uneven ground in her high-heeled sandals. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, fine.” She smiled brightly. “What kind of pigs are these?”
“Wessex Saddlebacks,” Gregory said with quiet pride. “A rare breed originally from England. I’ve got five sows and a boar. This paddock holds the weaners—five months old. The smaller group in the next paddock are growers, about three months old.”
“My aunt and uncle kept pigs, the pink kind,” Melissa replied. “I used to spend a week at their farm every summer when I was a child.”
“Ah, so you have an appreciation for the animal,” Gregory said. “They’re smarter than some dogs and have loads of personality.”
Alice Ann brought her bike to a wobbly halt at the fence and dismounted. “Benny!”
At the sound of her voice, a young pig trotted over, grunting and squealing. Unlike the others, his pink saddle stopped short on one shoulder. His moist pink nose wiggled about, sniffing the air as he lifted his head to peer at the girl from under his floppy ears.
Melissa went to join the child. “Is Benny your pet?”
“Yes,” she said happily, and to Gregory’s exasperation, fed him a marshmallow from her pocket.
“Pigs aren’t pets.” He had tried to instill this concept into Alice Ann since Benny was born, five months ago. To no avail. No matter what he said to discourage her, she persisted in treating the runt like a puppy, and consequently he followed her around like one. Worse still, she took advantage of the fact that pigs had a sweet tooth to lure Benny, using all manner of sugary treats.
Alice Ann took no notice of him. Instead, she handed Melissa a marshmallow. “Do you want to feed him?”
“Are you sure this is okay for him to eat?” Melissa asked, glancing doubtfully at the sweet.
“He loves them,” the four-year-old replied. “Go on.”
Melissa stuck her hand through the wire and laid the marshmallow on the ground. Benny gobbled it up and grunted for more. Alice Ann produced a cookie and fed it to him.
Gregory shook his head as his daughter fussed over the pig. Heaven help her—and him—when the weaners were taken to the abattoir in a few days. Gregory had to tell her soon, but he could never seem to find the right moment.
“When’s Ruthie going to have her babies?” Alice Ann demanded, running back to her bike. “Will she have to go to the hogspital?”
“Pigs don’t go into hospital,” he replied, suppressing a smile. The heavily pregnant sow was lumbering up the hill with long tufts of grass hanging out of her mouth, on her way to the corner of the paddock where she was making a nest. “She’ll give birth right here on the farm.”
“Ruthie looks as though she’s ready to pop any minute,” Melissa said. “When is she due?”
“Early next week,” Gregory told her.
“I can’t wait to see the babies!” Alice Ann hopped on her bike and wobbled off toward the house. “They’ll go wee, wee, wee, all the way home.”
Gregory and Melissa followed. He stepped onto the back veranda and held open the screen door to the kitchen. “Excuse the mess.”
Newspapers and magazines he never got time to read were stacked on the antique sideboard; bills and work papers were scattered over the red-gum table. The breakfast dishes were still in the sink, the tiled floor needed sweeping and the granite counters needed wiping. Alice Ann’s last wardrobe change—a blue T-shirt and yellow cotton skirt—lay on the floor where she’d dropped them. He kept vowing he’d make time to clean up, but there was only him to take care of Alice Ann and the animals, while holding down a full-time job.
“Don’t
