The Wrong Door

by Bunty Avieson

  An alcove built into one wall held a small gold statue of a rotund man with an enormous belly and an elephant head. In front of him was a cone of incense, sending a wisp of smoke up the wall and filling the room with a pungent, musky aroma. An enormous wall unit ran the length of the room and contained a large TV, video and stereo player, rows and rows of books and a couple of photographs in silver frames.

  Clare walked over to the pictures, hoping to find among them Mr Sanjay’s cheeky chuckling face. One was obviously of Shree’s graduation and showed him wearing a cloak and mortarboard, holding a scroll, beside Mr Sanjay. They both looked serious and proper standing in front of a vast four-storey building that Clare guessed was an Indian university. Other students and their families milled around in the background. Mr Sanjay looked proud and happy, his posture just a fraction more erect than usual. Clare smiled for him.

  Beside it was a photo of Shree, an elegant young Indian woman, Mr Sanjay, Mrs Sanjay and an elderly Indian couple. The men wore neat grey suits with nehru collars while the women wore beautiful saris. The young woman beside Shree was elaborately dressed in a bright red sari with gold flecks. She wore enormous gold earrings that hung almost to her shoulders and at her neck and forehead were gold chains. Delicate filigree patterns covered the skin of her hands and feet. Clare leaned forward to inspect them more closely.

  ‘That’s at my wedding,’ said Shree, handing her a glass of wine.

  Clare wondered where his wife was but didn’t like to ask. Mr Sanjay’s wife, it seemed, had managed to avoid Clare for nine years, staying indoors, so maybe Shree’s wife wouldn’t appear at all while Clare was there or maybe she would pop in later. Clare was ignorant of Indian customs. She wondered how she could have known Mr Sanjay for so long and yet have learned so little about his culture, or his family. But the apartment felt quiet and empty, as if she and Shree were alone.

  ‘My wife has returned to India,’ said Shree. ‘She didn’t like Sydney.’ He sounded so matter of fact that he could have been talking about the weather.

  ‘Oh?’ said Clare.

  ‘Swati had never been outside Bengal before. She came to Sydney and I’m afraid she hated it. I blame myself. I was working long hours at the hospital and she was left on her own a lot in this foreign country. After my parents died we took their ashes home, to sprinkle them on the holy Narmada River, as is our tradition. During our visit Swati visited her family. Once she saw them again she decided she didn’t want to return to Sydney, or to me.’ Shree shrugged. ‘When she left Bengal she was a very traditional Indian girl. Coming to Sydney made her more modern. It taught her she could leave her husband and his modern life to go back to her traditional life. It is what you would call an irony, no?’

  Clare agreed. She tried to look solemn, aware that somewhere inside she was grinning. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

  ‘It was an arranged marriage. We only met a week before the wedding.’ Shree raised his palms to the sky in a gesture of resignation. ‘I’m sure it sounds very quaint to you that we have arranged marriages.’

  Clare smiled. ‘We-ell … it does sound a little strange. I can’t imagine marrying someone my mother might choose. Actually, if I left it up to her I don’t think it would ever happen. She doesn’t think I should have anything to do with men.’

  ‘Aaah,’ said Shree. ‘Sounds like mothers all over the world.’

  Clare felt herself start to relax. Shree’s way of speaking and his formal manners reminded her of Mr Sanjay. All his attention was directed to making her comfortable. When she sat down he moved a larger cushion behind her back. When she put her wine glass down on the coffee table, he slid a coaster underneath for her, but not in an obsequious way. Then he would spring back, careful not to get too close, not to infringe on her personal space. He seemed gentle and kind, just like Mr Sanjay. And like his father he had deep brown eyes, brimming with good humour.

  ‘I remember Mr Sanjay telling me he had two sons here in Australia and a daughter in America,’ said Clare.

  Shree frowned and Clare wondered what she had said.

  ‘Yes, that is right but there is something I am afraid you have wrong and I must correct you. I don’t want to embarrass you but …’ He spread his hands in a helpless gesture.

  Clare felt her heart sink. She wondered what faux pas she had committed.

  ‘My father’s first name was Sanjay. That was his Christian name.’

  Clare looked at him blankly.

  ‘He wasn’t Mr Sanjay. He was Mr Sanjay Roy.’

  It took a moment for his meaning to sink in. ‘You mean for nine years I’ve been calling him the wrong name?’

  Shree smiled gently. ‘Not exactly. You were partly right. Don’t be too hard on yourself.’

  ‘He never corrected me. In all that time.’ Clare was incredulous. ‘Never once did he tell me I should drop the mister.’

  ‘No, I can well believe that of my father.’

  ‘Oh Shree, I feel so silly.’

  Shree looked embarrassed again. He cleared his throat and looked at his feet. ‘That’s another thing. My name is Naresh. Shree is an honorific title, like Mr or Sir. I assume you heard my young cousin call me that when we met at my father’s house.’ He waited for her reaction.

  Clare put her hand to her mouth. ‘You mean … I … oh dear.’

  They sat in silence for a moment. Clare remembered greeting him at the funeral service. What had she said? Shree, I’m so sorry about your father. Mr San jay was a great man. No wonder he had looked nonplussed. Oh God. What would Mr Sanjay have made of that? It was the biggest gotcha of them all. For nine years he had let her call him Mr Sanjay. It was like an old black and white film she had seen where all the white-gloved Indian manservants had addressed their British bosses as Mr Peter and Miss Kitty. Only this time the roles were reversed. Ha ha. He would have enjoyed that. She started to laugh.

  ‘That’s pretty funny,’ she said, then worried how that might sound. ‘Oh, I’m so sorry. I hope you aren’t insulted. It’s just … I don’t know … I find that rather humorous. What an idiot I have been. Your father has been playing with me all along.’

  Naresh grinned. ‘Oh don’t apologise. I’m glad you find it humorous. I do too. And I’m sure my father would have enjoyed it. He loved to laugh. You could not have offended him.’

  Clare knew that to be true. He was not likely to be offended by anything. He would have been mightily amused.

  They smiled at each other and there was an easing of tension, a lightening. The anxiety in the pit of Clare’s stomach loosened, just a bit. It wasn’t the wine. And, she noticed, Naresh’s frown had disappeared. He seemed to relax too. An understanding that didn’t require words passed between them. Clare felt it and she knew Naresh did too.

  She settled herself deeper into the couch, feeling comfortable and happy to be there. Another thought occurred to her. ‘So the letter I sent to you at the hospital … I addressed it to Dr Shree Sanjay. How did you get it?’

  ‘Well, as it happens, I’m the only Indian doctor at the hospital. They showed it to me in case I knew this Dr Sanjay and when I saw the address on the back I figured it must be from that lovely girl next door whom my father spoke about and who came to the funeral.’

  Clare groaned inwardly. ‘Now I really do feel foolish.’

  ‘Please don’t. My father spoke of you with great affection. He respected you greatly. He said you were nothing like a Brahmin bull.’

  Clare smiled and raised an eyebrow. ‘And that would be a compliment?’

  ‘Yes, Clare, that would be a compliment. A Brahmin bull is stubborn, the most stubborn of all animals. His nature is born out of ignorance and inflexibility. Above all else my father valued flexibility. To have a flexible mind, he said, was to be open to life and what he was saying is that you were open to life.’

  Clare felt the tears well behind her eyes. ‘I have so much to be grateful to him for,’ she said.

  They sat together in silence. It felt c
omforting and inclusive.

  ‘I am pleased to finally meet this Clare Dalton from over the fence,’ said Naresh at last. ‘And she is not at all what I expected.’

  ‘Oh?’ said Clare.

  ‘I thought she would be very highbrow. Papa-ji said he argued with her about philosophy so I assumed she would be very intellectual and earnest. I didn’t expect her to have a sense of humour as well.’

  Clare felt herself starting to blush. She sat very still hoping it wasn’t noticeable and would soon go away.

  Naresh stood up and went to the sideboard. He returned with a bundle wrapped in deep blue silk with gold embroidery. He handed it to Clare. ‘This is for you, from my father.’

  Clare sat with it on her lap for a moment feeling a mixture of emotions – sadness, gratitude, yearning and pain. She wanted to open it but not as much as she wanted to hold onto the wonder of it. She doubted a gift had ever meant as much to her. She felt Naresh’s gaze upon her and gently unwrapped the fabric, smoothing out the folds. The tears she had held onto poured down her cheeks and she made no attempt to wipe them away. They coursed silently down her face and off her chin, darkening the silk where they landed.

  ‘They are his shoes,’ she said, her voice catching with a sob.

  He nodded. ‘I don’t know why, but he left specific instructions that you were to be given his burgundy brogues. I assume they mean something to you.’

  Clare was too moved to speak. Naresh went into the kitchen and returned with the wine bottle. He refilled their glasses.

  ‘Here’s to my father,’ he said.

  Clare held her glass aloft. ‘Here’s to your father, my Mister Sanjay.’

  *

  The telephones in the sitting room, the hall and the study rang in unison, the noise bouncing off the walls and around the house. Gwennie sat slumped over Pete’s desk, ignoring them all.

  Finally the answering machine in the hallway clicked into life. ‘Hi, we aren’t home but if you would like to leave a message, please speak after the tone. If you need to contact Pete Darvill urgently he can be reached on his mobile phone. Have a nice day.’

  The voice of Gwennie’s sister sounded tinny coming out of the little speaker on the answering machine. ‘Hi, Gwennie. I think it’s time you changed that message. It’s Beth here. I haven’t heard from you and I am wondering if you are away. No-one in the family has heard from you and we are getting worried. Please ring as soon as you get this message just to let us know you are okay.

  ‘I’m still trying to get leave from work to come and visit. It looks like I could come for a week in May. Won’t that be fun? I am so looking forward to it. Perhaps we could go to a beach for a week. Or to the outback. I’ve been to the travel agent and there seem to be some wonderful places over there for a holiday. God knows I need a holiday. Anyway, sending much love and hope to hear from you soon.’

  There was a click as the line went dead and then a whirr as the outgoing message tape rewound itself. Gwennie stayed with her head on her arms on the desk. After several minutes she rose and walked to the machine. She pressed the erase button for a few seconds. When the red light stopped flashing, she released it.

  She opened the back door and stepped into the garden. She and Pete had gone there most evenings. Gwennie knew all their plans by heart. A stone-paved path would lead from double French doors to a grassy area, on through to a fernery and finally to the open-sided Balinese pagoda, shielded by tall palm trees. She retraced the route they used to take and stopped at the back fence.

  Gwennie picked up a lump of soil and threw it with all her strength at the wood palings. It broke up on impact, spraying small clumps of dirt in all directions. It reminded her of a lunch at her parents’ place in Surrey. She and Pete had thrown rocks against the back wall of the country pub, teasing each other and competing – who could create the biggest explosion?

  She savoured the memory, wallowing in its poignancy and melancholy. It had been such a lovely day. It was the first time Pete had met her parents. And her sister Beth. And Beth’s new girlfriend Sally. And Aunt Venetia, her mother’s mad sister. And Venetia’s latest stray, Matt. Pete had been confronted with the whole catastrophe all in one go. And he had charmed them all. Her mother Rhonda thought he was very handsome and her father Bill was impressed that he was an architect. He had tried to engage him in a discussion about the Roman period and Corinthian columns, which had amused her mother.

  ‘He knows nothing about any of that,’ Rhonda whispered to Gwennie in the kitchen. ‘Everything he is saying he learned from that package tour we did to Yugoslavia back when it was Yugoslavia and he has been an expert on Corinthian columns ever since.’

  Pete had thought her parents were delightful. Or that was what he had said. Gwennie felt as if she had stood outside herself and for the first time viewed them with detachment. Seen that way they were rather oddball characters. Her mother had wanted to be a doctor, but instead became a nurse and now worked happily alongside her husband in their pub, The Foresters’ Arms. She would diagnose and treat every drinker who came in whether they wanted help or not. Most of her cures involved getting more sleep and outdoor exercise, neither of which encouraged more business, as Bill would remind her. But Rhonda was resolute. She was a natural healer, she would say, and that’s what they needed. Bill would sigh, roll his eyes and leave his wife to her ‘ministrations’. Bill inherited The Foresters’ Arms from his father and felt compelled to make it a success even though his real interests lay in breeding racing pigeons.

  Beth, an Oxford law graduate, had a pierced nose and belly button and was training to be a plumber. Her latest girlfriend, Sally, was a banker in London. Then there was Aunt Venetia. Talking to Auntie Vee usually left Gwennie feeling bewildered, as if she had come into the conversation in the middle, never quite knowing where it had started. Her aunt was always saving someone. That day it had been Matt, a boy of indeterminate age with hard eyes and a scar on one cheek. She had found him asleep on her doorstep in London and taken him in. Vee was teaching him piano and he was teaching her how to pick a lock. Gwennie adored Auntie Vee but in front of her new fiancé her eccentric ways suddenly seemed odd and potentially embarrassing.

  She needn’t have worried. Pete thought they all were great fun. Her mother had asked Pete about his own upbringing and Gwennie remembered how he dealt with it. Indeed, they had joked about it later that day and often since. Every time anyone at lunch asked anything personal of Pete he managed to direct the conversation back to her father and Corinthian columns. Only Gwennie had noticed. But now, as she recalled it, his behaviour seemed furtive.

  She sat down on the spot where the Balinese pagoda was to have been built. The more she thought about it the more she realised how little she actually knew of her husband’s background. He had been a reserved man, painstakingly courteous and solicitous of her. He would always want to know about her day before he spoke of his. He always engaged people in talking about themselves. She had admired it in him, thinking how it showed a selfless side to his nature. She wondered now if it masked something more sinister.

  As she searched her memory there was very little of his past or his childhood he had revealed. She knew he had lived in the country – in Tibooburra – at some stage, though he had grown up in Sydney. He had taken her past one home, on the edge of a golf course on the northern beaches. He had lived there with three other students when he was at university. They had driven past the house one day and stopped. Apart from that, Gwennie knew nothing of the details of his earlier life. Who was this man she had married?

  She looked at her watch. It was a few minutes to midnight, time she faced that empty bed. She didn’t bother taking off her clothes, she just lay on her back, eyes wide open, staring into the darkness. Her body ached with fatigue. It felt heavy and dense, permeating the marrow of her bones. But her mind was active. The name Clare Dalton revolved like an out of control merry-go-round in her head. Gwennie lifted her thumb and forefinger into the air, point
ed at the ceiling and, as if at a fairground, took aim and whispered bang. Then she recocked her imaginary gun, took aim and fired again and again, until she fell asleep.

  *

  Clare lay listening to the sounds of the night. Something had woken her but she wasn’t sure what. Everything in the house appeared quiet. She looked at the clock beside her bed. It was just after midnight. She pulled back the doona and looked out the window to Mr Sanjay’s old place. It was all dark. The new neighbours would be enjoying themselves in their new home.

  Clare padded softly to the bathroom. At the door she stopped. She could hear quiet sobbing corning from Marla’s room. She tiptoed up the corridor and put her ear against the door. Marla was crying and she could hear Peg’s voice soothing her.

  ‘It’s okay. You’re safe. He won’t be coming here. It’s all right.’

  Clare opened the door. ‘What’s happened?’

  Both Marla and Peg were caught by surprise, their faces stricken in the low light cast by the bedside lamp. Marla immediately stopped crying and Peg withdrew her arm from around her shoulders.

  ‘It’s all right love, your sister just had a bad dream.’

  Clare stood in the doorway staring at them. ‘Who isn’t coming here. Who?’

  Peg looked sternly at Clare, indicating she didn’t like her daughter’s tone. But Clare would not be quieted. She raised her voice. ‘I heard you. You said “he” isn’t coming. Who is “he”?’ It was on the tip of her tongue to say ‘Is it Micky? Is that who Marla is scared of? I know all about him now.’ But the words died on her lips. She didn’t want to admit she had been prying. She sensed also that she would be blundering into something very delicate. She didn’t have enough information to know how to proceed and looking at her sister’s distraught face, she knew she should be careful.

  ‘The boogieman,’ said Peg coldly. ‘Now I told you your sister had a nightmare. It has nothing to do with you. Please return to your bed and let her go back to sleep.’ Peg got up and gently pushed Clare out of the room, closing the door in her face.