The Wrong Door

by Bunty Avieson

  Clare stared at the white painted wood feeling impotent and angry. She was also starting to feel scared.

  CHAPTER 14

  Clare drove along the Great Western Highway, through Katoomba and Medlow Bath and on to Blackheath. She switched off the talkback and found a radio station that played golden oldies, lots of songs from the seventies, eighties and nineties that she could sing along to. The fears of the previous night vanished in the bright sunshine of the morning. She felt absurdly happy. All was well with the world.

  Naresh Roy. Even the name sounded exotic. They had made no arrangements to see each other again but she knew, with every instinct in her body, that they would.

  The street directory was open on her lap. The school should be on the next corner. And there it was. Blackheath Public School. 1885 proclaimed the sign. It was 11.15 am and the grounds were deserted. She parked the car in a side street and walked through double glass doors. A neat woman with black hair parted in the middle stared at her from behind a counter.

  ‘Can I help you?’

  ‘I am here to see your librarian, Janet Wilson. She is expecting me.’

  Clare followed the woman down the corridor, past the wall lined with cabinets full of sporting trophies and photographs of children with various important people – Paul Keating, Joan Sutherland, Allan Border – up the concrete stairs to the library.

  Janet Wilson turned out to be a bundle of energy with the sort of sing-song voice that children loved. She sat Clare down in Pooh’s story corner and pointed to three boxes of bound ledgers.

  ‘There they are,’ she said. ‘I finally had time to get them out of storage for you this morning. It has been a heck of a week, I can tell you. Everything that could go wrong has. My computer crashed yesterday, I lost all my files. It has put me so far behind. Anyway, here they are. I would say you could take as long as you like but Mrs Marks will be in with the year 4s at midday and they can be a bit noisy.’

  Clare thanked her and pulled the ledgers out of the first box.

  Mrs Wilson watched her curiously.

  ‘You said on the phone you were researching a relative. Are you doing a family tree?’ she asked.

  Clare nodded.

  Satisfied, the librarian left her to it. ‘If you need me I’ll be over in the social sciences section,’ she half-sang over her shoulder.

  The ledgers were heavy and old, with thick marbled paper and a layer of tracing paper between each page. Rows and rows of names had been carefully printed by hand with a black fountain pen. The handwriting changed over the years but they must have used the same pen. Part of the school’s sense of tradition, Clare supposed. Any institution that dated back to 1885 would have to be big on that.

  And thank God they were, she thought. She had had no luck with the high schools or private schools in the area. They either didn’t know where their records were kept or whoever did know didn’t bother to return her call. This was a long shot. She had no way of knowing how long Marla and Peg had lived at the Hat Hill Road address. But this was the closest primary school and it seemed logical Marla would have been a pupil here.

  She flicked through the ledgers to 1975. If she had attended Blackheath Public School Marla would have been in sixth class then. There were seventy pupils entered. Clare ran her eye down the column.

  Daniel Dalgleish

  Sally Daly

  Anna Davison

  Anthony Davison

  Marlene Dayton

  Sandra Deagan

  No Marla Dalton. But there was a Marlene Dayton. Just like in Micky’s letters. A coincidence? Two people making the same mistake, getting Marla’s name wrong? Clare found it hard to imagine any of the people who had written in this ledger ever making a mistake.

  Clare couldn’t believe it … and yet, why not? There was so much mystery and secrecy at home that anything should be considered a possibility. Had Marla been Marlene Dayton then? Why, Clare had no idea, but it was certainly a thought worth pursuing.

  A woman’s head with a pencil behind her ear and a big cheery smile, popped up over a shelf of books. ‘They will be here any tick of the clock,’ sang Mrs Wilson.

  Clare looked at her blankly.

  ‘Mrs Marks’ noisy year 4s. They have story time here at twelve.’

  Clare snapped back to the present. ‘Sorry. I’m done. I was just leaving. Thank you.’

  *

  Gwennie stopped the car outside the little stone cottage at the end of Sublime Point Road. Even though she knew it was unlikely, she had hoped Tsering Wangmo would be in the front garden, just as she had been last time. It had filled her with excited anticipation as she drove to the mountains. Seeing the little garden empty and no sign of Tsering Wangmo, she felt a tremor of disappointment. It lasted just a moment, then she was out of the car and through the gate, carrying the box of assorted fancy biscuits she had bought early that morning from David Jones.

  Tashi came to the door and seemed pleased to see her. He was wearing jeans and an orange windcheater emblazoned with a university emblem. ‘Hello,’ he said with a big grin.

  ‘Hi Tashi, how are you?’

  ‘I’m very fine. It’s nice to see you again. How are you?’

  ‘I’m well, thanks.’

  He showed her into the front sitting room and she was surprised to find it different from her last visit. The bed and picture of the king had gone and, except for a carpet on the floor that featured an ornate golden dragon, it looked like any suburban sitting room. In an instant her buoyant mood evaporated and she felt deflated.

  ‘Your grandmother has gone,’ she said in a small voice. She had been so looking forward to being soothed and understood that she had not considered the possibility it might not happen.

  ‘Yes,’ said Tashi. ‘She left a few days ago. She had to get Pema, my cousin, back to our village to meet the man she is to marry.’

  Gwennie stared at him.

  ‘Is it an arranged marriage?’ she asked.

  ‘No, no,’ laughed Tashi. ‘Nothing like that. Grandmother did a mo for her future and saw it. It will be a new moon tomorrow night and that’s when she will meet her future husband. He will be in Bumthang, the valley where our town is, for a festival so Pema must be there too. Grandmother saw that he is the best man for her. Together they will prosper and have a strong family.’

  Gwennie nodded. It sounded bizarre but the confidence with which Tashi spoke made it entirely believable.

  ‘I will make tea,’ he said, gesturing for Gwennie to sit.

  She sat on the same spot on the couch where she had sat on her last visit, looked at the bare wall where the single bed had been and felt miserable. This time she had been ready with her questions for Tsering Wangmo. She had intended to ask all about Clare Dalton and her ‘connection’ with Pete. But, she realised with a disappointing sigh, this was not the place to get her answers.

  Tashi appeared with the small porcelain cups on a little tray and she took one. She remembered the tin of David Jones biscuits and handed them to him.

  ‘Please take them. Your grandmother helped me so much and I am very grateful.’

  Tashi inclined his head in that way she had seen his grandmother do. They sipped their tea.

  ‘You are a student at university here?’ asked Gwennie.

  Tashi nodded. ‘I am studying forestry. I want to learn about conservation and then go home and work to help my country preserve our own forests.’

  ‘Is that important in Bhutan?’

  ‘Very important. Our king decreed that gross national happiness is more important than gross domestic product and we believe that it is essential that any kind of development benefits the economic, social, emotional, spiritual and cultural needs of the people. Everything we do must lead ultimately to happiness, not just more development.

  ‘Our law says that sixty per cent of the land stays as forest cover at all times and as a result, unlike in the rest of the world, forest cover in Bhutan is increasing rather than decreasing.’r />
  Gwennie was impressed by the earnestness of the young man. ‘How long have you been here?’

  ‘Three years. This is my final year.’

  Another young man suddenly appeared in the doorway. He was blond, wearing baggy tracksuit pants and all the signs of a hangover. He stood in the doorway wincing at the bright morning light. ‘Hi,’ he whispered hoarsely.

  ‘This is my housemate, Jim,’ explained Tashi. ‘Excuse how he looks. It was his birthday last night and he only got to bed a few hours ago.’

  Suddenly aware there was someone else in the room, Jim stopped scratching his crutch, and waved. ‘Sorry, I didn’t realise we had company.’

  ‘This is Gwennie.’

  Gwennie waved back. With the pleasantries out of the way Jim turned to Tashi. ‘What time did you leave the pub?’

  Tashi laughed. ‘Same time as you, mate. I brought you home.’

  Jim looked surprised. ‘You did? Then how come you’re looking so fresh and perky?’

  ‘I didn’t stay up with the rest of you finishing off that rum.’

  Jim’s face brightened, as if he was remembering. ‘Oh yeah,’ he said sheepishly. ‘Hope we didn’t keep you awake.’

  Without waiting for an answer he turned and walked back down the hallway.

  ‘There’s fresh hot tea if you want it,’ called Tashi.

  ‘How much sugar did you put in it this time?’ Jim called back.

  ‘Just the right amount for a hangover. Have some. It’s good for you.’

  Tashi laughed again. ‘He hates the way I make tea.’

  Gwennie looked at Tashi curiously. She had never met anyone quite like him. On the one hand, he was like any other young student on a weekday morning in his logo windcheater and jeans with a mobile telephone tucked into the pocket. That image was at odds with the man she had met the previous week, sitting at the feet of his grandmother, explaining her visions. Then he had given her a glimpse into another world, a supernatural realm.

  Gwennie felt that in death Pete was on the other side of a heavy, impenetrable black curtain. She could feel him around her, sometimes so acutely it was as if she would turn and see him there. But of course he wasn’t. It felt, in some strange way that she didn’t understand, that for a few fleeting minutes with Tsering Wangmo and her grandson, the tiniest corner of the curtain had lifted and she had been given a hint that Pete was there, just beyond. It was ethereal and vague, more of a feeling than anything tangible. It had frightened and fascinated her. She could not reconcile that experience with the Tashi now before her who seemed very much a part of the real world.

  ‘Your grandmother is a remarkable woman,’ she said.

  ‘Yes, she is. She has been like it since she was a young girl. Where I come from she is a legend. People come from miles around to see her.’

  ‘I feel very privileged,’ said Gwennie.

  ‘Oh no. Grandmother said you were meant to come. She said she felt a connection with you that goes back many lifetimes.’

  He said it so matter-of-factly Gwennie found herself nodding. He was so unlike anyone she had ever met. ‘When she was doing what she did …’

  ‘The mo,’ said Tashi.

  ‘The mo,’ repeated Gwennie, ‘I didn’t understand a lot of it. The woman in red. I wish I knew more about her. Did your grandmother say anything else, anything about the connection she had with my husband?’

  Tashi looked at the wall above Gwennie’s right shoulder as he tried to recall everything that his grandmother had said. He frowned and squinted with the effort to get it exactly right. ‘She said this woman was from his past but still she had a connection with him. Grandmother said she helped him and she could help you. She described her as having a particular type of energy. I have heard her talk of people this way before. She says I am yellow,’ Tashi chuckled.

  Gwennie looked at the smiling, round face before her. Tashi seemed to have a sunny nature. Having met him just twice, if she had to pick a colour, she supposed yellow did describe him.

  ‘Grandmother said you had a deep well of blackness. She said you were in danger of going into it, letting it take you over. She was very concerned for you. She kept repeating that you must not act out of anger, out of the blackness, or you would harm yourself.’

  Gwennie was conscious of the heaviness in the lower half of her chest that had been her constant companion since Pete died. It was solid, impervious and black. Tsering Wangmo had seen it. Gwennie found some comfort in that.

  There seemed nothing more to say so Gwennie stood up to leave. Tashi opened the front door and walked with her to the gate. His next-door neighbour was mowing his lawn. When he saw Tashi, he turned off the engine and came to the fence, eyeing Gwennie curiously. She could see he was wondering about her, who this woman was leaving Tashi’s home. Tashi seemed to know him well and they exchanged greetings.

  ‘Bloody dead birds,’ announced the neighbour. He sounded more puzzled than angry. As he spoke he looked at Gwennie. ‘That’s the third one I’ve found,’ he continued. He held a dead parrot by its feet. It was stiff and hard, its eyes glassy and open.

  Gwennie shivered. Death was all around her it seemed.

  ‘We’ve had a few too,’ Tashi told his neighbour. ‘Not for a few weeks though. It’s the bushfires last month bringing them here. There isn’t enough food for them up higher where the fires were at their worst. So they have been coming down here, some too sick to survive.’

  ‘That’s not the story I hear,’ said the neighbour. ‘I hear dead birds are a calling card of the devil and that he is alive and well on Hoary Hill.’

  Gwennie thought of the madman of Leura and shivered, despite the warm day.

  ‘Yes, well there’s a lot of superstitious people around here,’ said Tashi lightly.

  Gwennie looked at him to see if he was joking. His face was quite composed and serious. He didn’t seem to find anything incongruous in his neighbour’s remark. It appeared he didn’t consider himself superstitious, despite having a shaman for a grandmother who made predictions from dice. Outside, in the bright sunlight, wearing his windcheater, chatting to his neighbour, he looked ordinary again. The man who spoke to her of previous lives and the colours of energy was nowhere to be seen. She found herself wondering if she had imagined their conversation.

  The neighbour grunted and tossed the parrot’s body onto a pile of dead leaves and twigs that looked to be the beginnings of a bonfire. He gave her one last look, waved to Tashi and went back to his lawnmower.

  Gwennie said goodbye, wished Tashi well with his studies and sent her regards to his grandmother. Tashi responded that any time she was visiting she was welcome to drop in. Gwennie nodded though she knew she never would.

  As she turned to walk across the road, Tashi called after her. ‘In my country we have a saying. Whatever joy you seek, it can be achieved by yourself. Whatever misery you seek, it can be found by yourself.’ His words echoed inside Gwennie’s head as she drove off. It sounded like a conundrum, the sort of wordplay her father liked to engage in on a Sunday morning.

  She couldn’t imagine joy, she could feel only misery. Was he telling her that it was her fabrication? The idea made Gwennie angry. Anger welled up from inside her, suddenly, instantly. She didn’t choose to be miserable – she’d just lost her husband for God’s sake. Twice. First in death and then to this Clare Dalton. Where was she supposed to find joy in that? She fought the tears, the all-encompassing misery that hovered just behind her eyelids and in her throat, making it ache. The ever-present blackness in her chest threatened to rise up and engulf her. She smothered it under the weight of her anger.

  *

  Clare’s next stop was the office of The Blue Moun tains Gazette in Katoomba. She pressed the bell on the counter and a young man appeared.

  ‘Are you Darren?’ she asked.

  ‘You must be Clare, the student who called.’

  ‘Yes, that’s me. As I explained, I am doing a thesis on regional politics of the ear
ly eighties.’

  Darren waved his hand. ‘Sure. Just take a seat. I’ll be with you in a minute.’ He disappeared into a back room. Clare leafed through a copy of the current newspaper, skimming the headlines. Doctor shortage in Blue Mountains. New winery opens. Clash over hazard reduction after fires. One story caught her eye: Mayor says no to witches.

  The lord mayor, Peter Granger, yesterday denied that a coven of witches was operating in the Blue Mountains, saying the sudden appearance of hundreds of dead parrots was ‘unfortunate but not supernatural’.

  He blamed the deaths on recent bushfires in the area, which had wiped out thousands of hectares of the birds’ natural habitat.

  According to Mr Granger, rumours of sorcery and witchcraft rituals being performed at Mount Boyce Lookout, using native birds as sacrifices, were just ‘the fanciful imaginings of idle minds’.

  Clare felt a chill along her arms and looked up. Darren was watching her.

  ‘Usually back copies of the newspaper are kept at our head office in Springwood but it is being renovated so everything is here at the moment. It’s a bit of a squeeze I’m afraid but come through.’ He led the way past half-a-dozen people, all going about their business, to a desk at the back corner of the room. No-one paid any attention as he explained the system. ‘All our back issues are stored on computer. You can search by date, by story, using any key word, or by typing in the name of the journalist who wrote it.’

  Clare nodded. ‘It’s like our computer at the university. I’ll be fine.’

  ‘If you need anything, just holler. I’ll be up the front.’

  Clare looked through the issues published in June 1979, not sure what she was looking for. She stopped at stories that interested her and skimmed others. It was all small-town news – a fire station being rebuilt, a letter-writing campaign by schoolchildren about the dangerous roads in the area and lots to do with local politics. Still, Clare found herself caught up, reading some stories right through, even though it was obvious they had nothing to do with Marla. It gave her a peek into another world. There was a strong sense of community here that she wasn’t used to, living in the city. Apart from Mr Sanjay, Clare didn’t know anyone in her neighbourhood.