“You mean Ruth McQueen?” Sarah asked as gently as she could.
Joe laughed wryly. “Ruth had—still has—a certain technique for mesmerizing people. She mesmerized me from the start. I know it sounds weak, but for years she had an uncanny power over me. I knew she was only using me—Ruth had a very strong sex drive. In fact, to my shame, she threw me over.” He shook his head. “This is old stuff, Sarah. I know you chose not to believe it, but… The point is, I never neglected my patients.”
“I know that, Joe. You’ve made a real difference. The town owes you a great debt.”
Joe shrugged that away. “Caring for people, trying to cure them, is our role, Sarah. What I’m trying to get to is—Forgive my shaky hands. It’s the drugs I’m on. Would you consider for one moment replacing me? I hear all about you from colleagues. You’re a fine doctor and there’s plenty of doctoring to do in this town.”
“I couldn’t, Joe.”
“What’s your biggest obstacle? Unfinished business with Kyall?”
Sarah dropped her eyes. “I was over Kyall McQueen half a lifetime ago.”
“I don’t think so.” Joe reached a hand across the table, his voice so strange Sarah lifted her head to stare at him. “You’ve never told me, but did Ruth threaten you?”
Sarah almost broke down. “Ruth McQueen has been a very threatening presence in a lot of people’s lives.”
“I know she was desperate to break you and Kyall up. I wasn’t happy about that and told her so. She used to talk to me. She doesn’t any longer.”
“Does she really talk to anybody, including Kyall? I hate that woman.”
“Why?”
“Because she ripped me from Kyall’s side. I know it sounds extravagant, but Kyall meant the world to me. He was the sun, the moon, the stars. He was my brother, my soul mate, my very best friend.”
“Forgive me, Sarah. There’s so much I don’t know. Was he your lover?”
“It doesn’t matter now,” she said.
“I’m dying, Sarah, so your secret is safe with me. I’ll file it away and take it to the grave. Somewhere inside me, I feel a terrible guilt, as if I failed you and your mother.”
“No, my dear friend.” Tears sprang to Sarah’s eyes. “Don’t punish yourself, because there’s nothing for you to punish yourself about. Ruth McQueen persuaded me that I had to be brave and give Kyall up.”
“So she made you leave Koomera Crossing. I know you wouldn’t have gone easily.”
“She was afraid we would become lovers.”
“Are you telling me the truth? I won’t let Ruth hurt you.”
Sarah looked at him levelly. “What would you do, Joe? Kill her?”
Joe answered in a shaking voice. “Ruth doesn’t entirely have the whip hand. I’ve long suspected she was somehow involved in Molly Fairweather’s death. I’ve never told anyone. There was nothing substantial to go on. Just a feeling.”
“Good God!” Sarah revealed her shock. “Who’s Molly Fairweather, anyway?”
“Oh, I remember. You wouldn’t have met her. She came to town a year or so after you left. Big woman. Very gruff. People used to think she was crazy. Sure acted like it from time to time. ‘Mad Molly’ the kids called her.”
“Mum never, ever mentioned her.”
“No reason to, I suppose. She kept to herself. Had everything delivered to her door. She bought the Sinclair family home from Ruth, I believe, so I suppose she had private money. She was a trained nurse, but apparently she’d injured her back.”
“What has this got to do with Ruth McQueen?”
“I might go straight to hell for suggesting such a thing, but Mad Molly died of snakebite. Somehow a desert taipan got into her house.”
“How did it get there? They don’t usually choose someone’s doorstep.
Joe shrugged. “It was a bad year for snakes, but no one else in town spotted one in their garden. By the time I got out there—the postie raised the alarm—Molly Fairweather was dead, lying facedown in the hallway with the front door open. Later when I spoke to Ruth about it, I knew in the blink of an eye—or thought I knew—that she’d had something to do with it. Molly Fairweather’s will handed the house back to Ruth, which I thought decidedly odd.”
There was something else, Sarah felt, about that terrible story. In a sudden flashback, she remembered the midwife who’d brought her little Rose into the world. A big woman with an aura of competence, but taciturn with rigid dark eyebrows. A woman who had appeared consumed with the desire to serve Ruth McQueen any way she could. Why am I thinking of her? she wondered in dull surprise. All these years, she’d never been able to rid herself of the sight of Ruth McQueen’s face, yet she’d all but forgotten the midwife. Mad Molly couldn’t be the same woman, could she? Still, Joe’s story was disturbing. She stared at him.
“How could you use a mere feeling against someone like Ruth McQueen? There must’ve been some inquiry.”
“There was an autopsy. I performed it myself. The verdict was bloody bad luck. But the whole business got to Ruth in some way. Don’t forget, I knew her very, very well. Or as well as anyone could know her. For all her fine family name, her power and influence, Ruth McQueen wouldn’t hesitate to walk on the wild side.”
“Kyall and Christine are nothing like her. And they only resemble Enid a little.”
“Enid’s just a shadow of her mother.”
“She certainly knows how to be cruel,” Sarah offered, feeling as though she had a splinter in her throat.
Joe nodded and put a trembling hand to his chest.
“Are you all right, Joe?” Sarah stood up abruptly.
“It comes and goes. Sit down, Sarah.” He spoke like a father. “I’m not quite sure why I feel this way, but I believe you were destined to return to this town. I’ve never given much evidence to dreams, but I’ve been having some odd ones lately. I know—” he held up a hand “—the medication. But the voice in my dreams tells me to beg you to take my place. There are unanswered questions surrounding you, Sarah. I believe the only way you’re going to find the answers is to return to Koomera Crossing. The way has been paved for you. Muriel is at peace. And here I am, dying, ready to hand over the running of the hospital to you. I don’t suppose it was ever what you had in mind. But for a few years? Would you mind so much leaving the city and the medical center you work for?”
“Joe, it’s not possible,” Sarah said. “Ruth McQueen drove me out of town. She’d do it again. Lest we forget, they own the town. They built the hospital. The dedication stone bears Ewan McQueen’s name.”
“Aren’t you forgetting Kyall is a man now? Not a boy. A lot of the power has passed to him. He’s enormously popular, not only in the town but the entire southwest. If you spoke to Kyall about taking over, what are the chances he’d say no? He’d back you to the hilt. I know Ruth’s been trying and trying to marry him off to India Claydon, but with no luck. The girls have always been after Kyall, but for him, it appears, there is only you. Unless there’s someone in your life?”
“No.” Sarah shook her head. “I’ve had a few relationships that didn’t work out. One almost came to something but in the end, I couldn’t commit myself. We’re still friends, though. He’s a fellow doctor.”
“Would you think it over for me, Sarah?” Joe looked at her out of strangely light-filled eyes. “You’d have plenty to do. Probably much more than at your city surgery. Challenges,