Beyond the Tree House

by Gudrun Frerichs

  “We wondered whether you could help us. My aunt had an extension built in the late 1970s or early 1980s and we wonder whether Mark Brewer Building did the building work. Would it be possible to talk to Mr. Brewer?”

  With a friendly smile, she invited us inside. What a difference to the previous builder who wanted to set his dogs on us.

  “My father’s in the office. He might be able to help you.”

  The builder is a wiry, tall man in his late sixties. I’m afraid to ask direct questions but I shouldn’t be. He appears excited about meeting Mandy Wright’s niece.

  “Mandy Wright, yes I did the extension. You wouldn’t believe how lovely it was to work with Mandy. She always had a decent mug of coffee ready for us. It took us all of what … probably a week to do the work. Is anything wrong with it?”

  “No, no, nothing is wrong with it, we just wondered if you held on to notes or plans. The fire of 1992 destroyed the plans at the council. We are planning an extension and getting plans for the current house makes it so much easier.”

  He rubs his chin. “I should have. Let me think. Where would they be …? Claudia, please look in the attic for the document boxes with plans and correspondence from 1978.” He turns to me. “That’s when we did the work. Mandy had just taken over the house from her father who’d passed away that winter.”

  He seems to know a lot about my auntie. I’m excited and can hardly wait to ask him more questions. But we’ve surprised him with our visit and I feel I need to offer a way out.

  “We can come back another time if it’s inconvenient at the moment.”

  He dismisses my suggestion with a wave of his hand.

  “Don’t worry. We have time. It won’t take long to find the documents. I have them all ordered by year. Take a seat.”

  We sit around a large table. Scott leans over to me and whispers, “See, told you so.”

  I’m overwhelmed by Mr. Brewer’s kindness.

  “I don’t know much about my aunt. You knew her quite well?”

  He grabs with both hands the opportunity to talk about the past.

  “I knew her very well. People in the district liked her, despite her strange father.”

  “Do you know when they settled here?”

  “As far as I remember, Eduard Wright, your grandfather, built the house in 1945 for his family. He built it himself, something that most people in the area both admired and frowned upon. Right after the war, to survive, you bartered your skills. For example, you employ a builder for any building work you need and in return, you plow their fields or shear their sheep, depending on your skills. That way people kept their dignity, and it showed mutual respect.”

  “That’s a great system.”

  “Yes, and it worked at a time when nobody had money. With Eduard it was different. Nobody knew where he and his family came from. They showed up one day and he started building the homestead.”

  “In my old family bible, it says the family arrived by ship from Europe in 1874. They settled somewhere else before they came down here.”

  “Ah, that makes sense. When he finished the house his wife and two daughters arrived. Everyone wondered why he had chosen to live so far away from Port Somers. People had lots of compassion for his wife. She had one miscarriage after the other. If you go to the old cemetery in Old Quarry Valley, you’ll find at least six graves if not more of his children who were either stillborn or died soon after birth.”

  “I’ve been there. I was looking for Auntie Amanda’s grave and saw all the little stone markers.”

  “After a while, your grandmother was only a shadow of herself. There was lots of talk about them in the community. People were afraid of him. Your grandmother died soon after she gave birth to your mother. People said she simply lost the will to live and gave up.”

  “I wasn’t aware my grandparents built the house. Thank you for telling me all that. It’s special to meet someone who knows so much about my family. I hardly remember my parents and have only faint memories of my aunt.”

  He pats my hands. “When your grandmother died, people came out to the homestead and wanted to help him. They felt sorry for him having to care for his two daughters. Sarah was not even one year old and Amanda must have been about five. But he didn’t appreciate people just dropping in. If I remember right, he once set the dogs on people who showed up at the house.”

  “Oh my, the poor man.” Scott shuddered. “Just thinking about taking care of a baby and a toddler by oneself. What an achievement.”

  “Yes, the locals found some compassion for him but he never returned it. He seemed to have connections to the Gateway people and spend a lot of time with them after his younger daughter Sarah married Eugene Seagar. I don’t recall how that marriage came about. She already had a six-year-old son. There was talk that the baby was Eduard’s. It surprised people in Port Somers when she married Eugene.”

  “Eduard lies in the old cemetery as well. Soon after his death, Amanda started being more social in the community; she helped in the kindergarten and school. I tell you she was a lovely woman and many of the lads made googly eyes when she walked past them. She must have had lots of proposals. Your aunt was a beautiful, caring woman.”

  “So, when you got the job to do her extension, you did so gladly?”

  “Yes, very gladly, but don’t tell my wife. Even though I met her much later, she is bound to be jealous.” He chuckled. “Women, you know? Maybe you don’t know, being one yourself.”

  At that moment the door opens and his daughter returns with a brown cardboard box.

  “Sorry, it took so long. The box was in the furthest corner of the attic.”

  Our host grabs the box. “Let me see.” He digs through a large pile of folders, pulls one out, and puts it on the table. “These are the sketches of the work I did for you aunt.”

  Scott leans over the table and studies the drawings. “What’s this?” He points to a square next to the shed.

  “Hmm, It’s a trap door to a ground cellar.”

  “A cellar? Under the house? That’s new to me.”

  “No, my dear, it’s not under the house, it’s only under the shed. It has always been there. I only replaced the lid for your aunt.”

  “If it’s alright with you, I would like to make a copy of the plans and permits.”

  “You are welcome to all of my documents. Take them and bring them back when you’ve made copies.”

  I can’t believe how helpful Mr. Brewer is. “Thank you for taking the time to tell me about my family. It means a lot.” I get up to leave and Mr. Brewer puts the drawings back into the folder and hands them to Scott.

  “It was my pleasure to help Amanda’s niece. Don’t be a stranger. I have more stories I’m happy to share with you both.”

  Back in the car, I hug Scott. “Thank you for making me continue our search.”

  He just smiles and kisses me.

  “Am I forgiven then?”

  “Perhaps.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Elise: 18 March 2017, Afternoon, Wright’s Homestead

  The drive home is quiet. Only the car engine purrs like a satisfied kitten along state highway six. My thoughts are swirling through my head, some louder, others just a whisper, breaking up and bumping into each other.

  “You’re quiet.” Scott breaks the silence.

  “I have to when the voices in my head work overtime. Mark told me so much about my family. I knew nothing about our history. It took one conversation and my life had become three-dimensional. I’m not just this abused person with multiple personalities, but I’m part of a family with a long, sad history. I remember Miss Marple asking after my family. Back then I found that strange. As far as I was concerned, I didn’t belong to a family.”

  “So, meeting Mark was good then?”

  He doesn’t understand what the meeting meant for me. He always accepted his family. We never considered family as something that existed outside of our Tribe. We rejected the notion we belo
nged to the people who were our birth parents. They abused us. It was pure self-preservation.

  For years I didn’t even think of the Tribe as my family. I was this small rowing boat in the middle of a hostile ocean, torn away from my anchor and without a harbor. Lost, forgotten, half the time imprisoned in a drug-stupor, with no purpose or value. I didn’t even know that any other form of existence was possible.

  Was meeting Mark a good thing? It was like a tectonic shift that reshaped the landscape of my mind. How can I explain that to Scott?

  “It blew my mind. I always thought of auntie as this old woman, and to a young child, she probably was. She was only thirty-eight when she died, younger than I am now. My mother died at the age of thirty-one, that’s an odd notion. So young.”

  “Does that change how you feel about your mother?”

  “I’m not sure yet. It’s shaken up how I always thought and felt about my family. Their lives didn’t start with me. A lot happened that shaped them long before I was born.”

  “Would you like to talk about it?”

  “Perhaps later, it has to settle in my mind first.”

  “As you wish. We found nothing that links to the burglaries, though.” Scott gazes at me and then chuckles.

  “No goldmine, no smugglers; just an eccentric ancestor and a potato cellar under the shed. Not very interesting or romantic, I’d say.”

  “I agree and yet I feel so much richer. We should ask Mark to build the extension for us once we get the permit.” I slow down the car and turn into Flatbush Creek Road.

  Scott laughs out loud. “You only want more stories, admit it.”

  “Yes, that too, but my aunt trusted him. That’s a good enough recommendation for me.”

  I turn quiet. Every time I drive down Flatbush Creek Road now, I’m reminded of the day when Scott’s cabin burned down. It always gives me the shivers.

  “Do you think your burglars were looking for the cellar?”

  “In my bookcase? I don’t think so. And they are not my burglars.”

  “No, that was a silly thing to say.” He shakes his head and we laugh until we stop at the homestead.

  Inside, Scott goes straight to the range and lights the fire for hot water. We both need a strong cup of coffee after this afternoon.

  “I can’t wait for us to have electricity. Who still lives like this?”

  “We do.”

  I don’t have much compassion for his complaints. I like the smell of the wood and the time it takes to cook a meal or make a coffee. It slows life right down to a pace I love. I’m getting the mugs and the milk out and put them on the table next to Mark Brewer’s plans.

  “I remember how I only had to flick a switch to heat a kettle or make some toast. I don’t miss it.”

  While Scott stokes the fire and shakes his head about my old-fashioned ideas, I’m heading out the back to hunt for the ominous cellar. We’ve lived here over a year and never came across something looking even remotely like the entrance to a cellar. It’s probably collapsed or my auntie filled it in.

  I direct my focus inside, hoping to connect with Mikey, the go-to Tribe member when it comes to all things hidden. Nothing. The lack of response is hard to take and a stab of loss and grief pierces my heart. I never expected to miss the others. I used to call them time-thieves. But now I would give everything to have them back the way we were when we arrived here. Sometimes I still sense I’m not alone but not very often.

  Where is the cellar?

  Mark Brewer said under the shed and the square on the plan was about where the shed’s window is. An image floats through my mind like a GIF of a woman and a young child disappearing down a ladder into the ground. It’s as if I’m pulled to the side of the shed. I swear I feel Maddie; I swear I hear her giggle; I swear I can feel her little hand in mine, fleeting as the touch of a butterfly’s wing, but as quickly as it came, it went again. A rush of joy washes through me. I’m not alone.

  The dirt under the window is compacted more than the rest of the garden. I kick some away with my foot. A hollow sound makes me stop.

  “Scott, I think I found it.”

  He looks around the corner. “Found what?”

  “The cellar entrance. Quick, bring a shovel. Forgotten is the coffee.”

  He’s just as curious as I am and comes with a shovel and a torch. He scoops away the soil until a one by one yard wooden lid with a metal hook on one side becomes visible. He pulls on the ring, but nothing happens. Reluctant to give away its secrets after thirty years of peaceful slumber, the lid is not budging.

  I fetch a rope from the shed and feed it through the ring. We pull hard together and almost fall to the ground when the lid opens with a groan and a screech. Exited and a little nervous I peek into the hole. It’s a pitch-black, a musty smelling hole in the ground. No ghosts are jumping out, not even rats are scuttling away. I’m disappointed. Such an anticlimax. A rickety old ladder leads down into the dark hole.

  “I’m sure they kept potatoes, carrots, and pumpkin in it over winter.”

  Scott holds me back. “Not for a long time. Wait here for me, I’ll check how brittle the ladder is. These old things can be dangerous.”

  A chord of love chimes through my heart. My knight in shining amour. We’ve met eighteen months ago and I’m still amazed someone shows care for me. His love wraps around me like a protective shield.

  He climbs down step by step, testing each rung.

  “It seems safe, but be careful it’s dirty and there are lots of cobwebs.”

  I don’t mind dirt, but cobwebs are a different story. Eek. I’m almost at the end of the ladder when his torch dies and everything turns dark except for the bit of light coming from up the ladder.

  I shriek and cling to him. Thank heavens he’s at my side. The dark belly of the earth reaches for me … I struggle to keep panic at bay. Scott uses his lighter and swings it around. The room is not large, roughly two yards by three. Along the sides are stacks of crates that once might have held vegetables.

  Then I see something white peeking out from behind the crates to my right and all of a sudden a ghastly sound of horror fill the space. It takes a moment until I realize it comes from me. My feet want to run but won’t.

  Scott drops his arm with the lighter when he sees the skeleton lying behind the crates. Pieces of faded fabric still cling to some of the bones.

  He puts his arm around me and presses my head to his chest. “Don’t look.”

  I bury my face into his shirt but I know I have to take another peek.

  “Oh my god, it’s Auntie Mandy.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Shaken I nod. “It must be her going by the shreds of material. That’s the dress she wore in the photo we found of her in the notebook.”

  “Come on, let’s go. We have to call the police.” He leads me to the ladder and helps me up. My knees are shaking and my mind struggles to comprehend what I saw. Only when we reach the kitchen and sit down with a cup of coffee does my heart stop racing.

  “Gosh, you are as white as a bedsheet. Have a coffee and I’ll grab two of your lamps and take another look at the cellar.”

  “I’m okay, you don’t need to protect me. I’m a big girl. It’s no news that auntie is dead. And now we know why there is no grave.” I’m still shaking and my voice is not even half as calm as I’d like to sound.

  “You may be okay but there are lots of little people inside who were attached to your aunt. Give me a few minutes. I’m back in no time.”

  I sit at the table and stare ahead. One of these days I’ll tell him that I’m it, that the tribe is—with a few exceptions—not much more than an echo in the back of my mind. I have an idea and I’m sure it comes from Mikey. We should have another look at the cellar. Auntie always hid things as if she knew she was in danger.

  But how did she end up in the cellar? Maybe she fell in and broke her neck? But that’s impossible. The cellar didn’t look like anything you’d use daily. And to be clear, de
ad people don’t close trap doors after them and cover it over with dirt.

  In my mind’s eye, I see the bones in the corner behind the crates. It didn’t look like someone accidentally fell into a hole and died. The bones would have been more spread out. It wasn’t an accident. She must have died kneeling or sitting in the corner. My mind is reeling with possible scenarios.

  How come everyone thought she died in an accident somewhere in the bush? It must mean she was killed. Dead people don’t drive their car thirty miles into a deserted bush and leave it there. This smells foul from every angle.

  About ten minutes later Scott comes back, limping with a pained face.

  “Did you hurt yourself? Let me see.”

  “It’s nothing. I misstepped and rolled my ankle.”

  He put an envelope on the table and beamed at me.

  “Did you find this in the cellar?” I pull the envelope toward me.

  “I did. This was hidden underneath the bones. It poked out.”

  “I want to read it but shouldn’t we leave it for the police?”

  “Leaving it is teasing. One thing is clear, she didn’t die in a car accident. She died right there in the cellar. Bloodstains showed on the leftover bits from her clothes and someone smashed the back of her skull with something like the sharp end of the shovel.”

  Listening to him, my whole body comes alive, as if an army of fire ants is crawling over me. I wince and shake. Who’s so depraved as to harm a woman who never hurt a single fly?

  Scott puts an arm around me and pulls me to his chest. “Shh, it will be all right. You’re not alone.”

  My head is buzzing like a beehive while he’s on the phone talking to the police. Adrenaline is racing through my blood as my mind trying to make sense out of the way auntie died. Although what had happened, happened many years ago, I can’t stop thinking I lived here for over a year with the remains of a body hidden underneath the house. I thought last year’s ordeal was bad, but this is worse. My thoughts are all over the place.