CHAPTER 1
This story is set in Sydney, Australia
* * *
It was stormy when late morning the young boarding school history teacher, Sophie Cuthbert, hurried under the lashing of wind and rain, shedding her hat and coat before entering the head mistress's office where she was given the expected news.
Thirty minutes earlier the school board decided to fire Sophie following her admission she'd supervised an interschool hockey after-match party knowing that party drugs were being used and she did nothing to stop that prohibited practice. She also had been verbally obstructive when school authorities called in the police to close down the end-of-season party, an action widely publicised in the media that allegedly had brought the school into disrepute.
"I'm so terribly sorry Sophie. You have been a fine teacher, an inspiration particularly to our slower learners and your bubbling personality has been admired by all of us. But I must say when you were called before the school board and asked to explain yourself, saying 'Go to Hell' did nothing for you, that being the total sum of your defence."
"Well haven't those sanctimonious assholes sitting on the board got anything better to do than criticise?"
"Thank you Sophie. Please leave these grounds within the next thirty minutes and make no effort to speak to anyone. Mr Hodge the gardener will now escort you to your room where you shall pack and then drive you to the airport."
"Everything is already packed."
"Oh Sophie, you are the brightest teacher ever to come my way."
"Thank you. Oh my next class is in twenty minutes. Could you...?"
"It's all taken care of dear. Just modify your behaviour a little and you'll find your special niche in society."
* * *
David Cuthbert, principal of Clew and Associates, Barristers and Solicitors, and wife Rebecca, met Sophie at the airport.
"Sophie, we are so sorry."
"Thank you Uncle David."
"My dear let me hug you. It came as such a shock."
"Indeed and thank you Aunt Rebecca for your sympathy."
"My concern was for your mother's and my old school darling but your attitude ever since in your early teens was to rebel and take no prisoners and that really made you unfit for military service or to enter law unless of course you specialised in criminal law."
"Very droll dear," laughed her husband. "Why have you chosen to stay with us Soppy? Your parents know about your disgrace."
"Well Dingo, you are my father's younger brother and he's always put you down and Auntie Wreck always has been softer and more sympathetic than her best friend, my mother."
"Oh darling, what a wonderful thing to say about me. Me sympathetic? God I must be getting soft."
The legal mind of David clicked three notches. "In effect darling Soppy did not paint you as being sympathetic. All she said was you always have been softer and more sympathetic than her mother. I'm sorry to be pedantic, but there we are."
"Is that what you meant Sophie?"
"I really don't know what Dingo is talking about, do you?"
"No, not really. I believe I'm not as tough as your mother."
David said he'd do his best to find Sophie a teaching position in a boarding school located somewhere in rural Australia where survival meant more than good manners and where fighting, rebelliousness and breaking rules were considered to be character building.
"Does such a school exist?"
"I would think we have more than them than one would suspect Rebecca."
"No thanks. I have high ideals and want to make women a real force in this country, unshackling the yokes lingering from Colonialism. The closest I've ever got to bright kids was taking the ski team to Queenstown, New Zealand, and coaching hockey that attracted the elite girls. In the classroom I was always landed the dummies."
"Darling I do think it's not PC to call students with learning disadvantages that name."
"Fuck fancy names."
"Sophie!" her aunt and uncle yelled.
David asked diplomatically how did Sophie intend filling in her days.
"Finding a job at Icon Boat Fittings Corporation."
"The chairman, your father, will resist that. He runs a multi-million-dollar company listed on the stock exchange that sells its boat fittings in twelve countries..."
Sophie said, "Fourteen countries."
"Er, fourteen countries with earnings of $270 million..."
"Actual gross earnings last financial year were $265.3 million."
David stopped in surprise. "Then you know something about the business?"
"Yes you dingo. Don't you recall I worked in the office every long vacation from the time I was fifteen and when I went to university between semesters I held down jobs in stores and in packaging and dispatch. Although I have worked in Victoria for the past three years I have maintained an interest in what my family is doing."
"But you'd need long business experience before you could hold down an executive position in a company as big as Icon Corporation."
"Dad always skites that like his father he started at the bottom and worked up so that's what I plan to do. My two brothers weren't required to do that, going straight into legal services and financial admin because of their degrees and I know dad wishes they had started at the bottom."
"Darling, I can't imagine you sweeping floors and cleaning toilets," Rebecca sniffed.
"That work is done by outside contractors. I meant starting at the bottom of the payroll."
David said confidentially, "There's no way you'll get on the payroll. Your father still personally approves all mainstream appointments."
"Will you give me a thousand bucks if I succeed, by fair means or foul?"
"No."
"He means yes darling, this sounds like fun."
In the car Rebecca said, "I'm glad you're coming home to stay with us. I've always wanted a girl in the house. Promise me no drugs or scandalous goings on within our property because it could adversely affect on Dingo's reputation... er David's reputation."
"I promise. I guess it's okay if I bring guys home, only one at the time though, to fuck?"
Rebecca groaned and David almost drove into the car stopped for a red light.
"You know guys each of us needs a mission in life and on the tedious train journey to Sydney I decided on my mission."
"To stay out of jail?" David half whispered.
"To marry a fine bloke and have a lovely boy and girl?"
Sophie snorted, "You're not even warm."
"Oh, you don't mean to seduce every male in Sydney?"
"No Aunt Rebecca."
"What about every attractive woman in Australia?"
Rebecca choked and Sophie giggled, "Good one Dingo. Old age is loosening you up a bit."
"David, that was disgusting."
"Oh come on Rebecca, you heard what the girl said. Loosen up a bit."
"Well here it is folk. Generations of Cuthbert's have made our family name famous sailing on Sydney Harbour and I aim to ultimately persuade dad to commission a keelboat and name it Cuthbert and continue my family's tradition. I always have been the best sailer in the family as I sail by instinct and almost made it to the Olympics in small yacht sailing. Every free weekend I have gone from college into Melbourne and crewed on a 40ft keeler and we'd go out sailing for fun when racing was cancelled because of storms. Give me a crack boat and I show you my stern."
"I have noticed it. It has widened and rounded fulsomely just like your boobs. You have grown up deliciously Soppy."
"David!"
The censoring yell from his wife made David drive straight across the intersection when he should have turned left. Fortunately the traffic light was green.
