by Anna Romer
‘Thank you,’ she whispered, then before I could ask what she’d thanked me for, she had opened the gate and ushered us out onto verge where the Celica glimmered dark red in the sun.
As we drove away, Bronwyn was subdued.
‘Mum,’ she said as we turned the corner and left William Road behind us, ‘Grandy’s very lonely, isn’t she?’
‘I guess so, Bron.’
‘It’s a good thing she’s got us then, isn’t it?’
‘It is good,’ I agreed, keeping my smile bright.
But as we headed back towards Thornwood, a grim mood took hold.
There was a side to Luella that inspired in me a fierce sort of protectiveness, the sort I’d only ever felt for Bronwyn. And yet, she also represented the shadow-side of Tony’s past, a past that Bronwyn and I had – until now – been excluded from. Perhaps my longing for a family and for a normal life for Bronwyn had clouded my judgement, made me leap in too hastily. Or perhaps I was a victim of my own curiosity. Whatever the reason, I felt way out of my depth.
Luella was the shadowy sun around which all the other mysterious planets revolved. Aylish and Samuel; Glenda, Tony, and Cleve. Even Hobe. She was at the heart of a family story that was becoming increasingly horrible . . . and which had started to feel more than I could bear. I’d wanted a safe haven, and believed I’d found it at Thornwood; but it was turning out to be a minefield of tragedy, deception and sorrow . . . and possibly even murder.
I looked at Bronwyn. Her face was glowing from the heat, a happy smile playing on her lips. Fear pricked along my spine. For the first time since we’d arrived, I wondered whether coming here had been such a great idea after all.
17
The following afternoon I arrived at the primary school for my two o’clock appointment with Ross O’Malley. The school was small, so the directions to his office were easy to follow: Through the quadrangle, up the stairs, then into a covered walkway. The receptionist told me I’d find Ross halfway along.
It was a pretty little school – picnic tables tucked under shady trees, areas of trimmed grass, colourful flower beds, quaint old weatherboard classrooms. When the walkway appeared, I ducked into its cool shadows and slowed my pace.
Glenda’s final diary entry was still haunting me. Its conclusion felt all wrong, and no matter which way I looked at it, I couldn’t get the facts to add up. The person who would know for sure, I reasoned, was Ross O’Malley. Had he resolved the issue of the letters, had Glenda felt better about them and decided to return home? Or had some other scenario unfolded that stormy night, a scenario that better explained why an experienced bushwalker like Glenda Jarman had fallen to her death?
‘Hello there.’
A doorway had opened and a man stood there, eyeing me expectantly. He was big and pale, in his late forties with close-cropped hair and watery blue eyes.
‘You must be Bronwyn Kepler’s mum, Audrey isn’t it? So glad you could make it, Ross O’Malley here, Bronwyn’s teacher. Please come inside. You must be eager to know how Bronwyn’s settling in – ?’
A fellow babbler, I realised, and smiled a little with relief as I followed him into his office. While I stood gazing about he continued to talk, explaining that Bronwyn’s class was in the library right now, which appeared to be Bronwyn’s favourite, and how well she was fitting in with the other students, and how pleased he was that I’d agreed to let her attend the school camp at the end of the week . . .
Glad to coast on the backdraught of his chatter, I took quick stock of the decor. A pair of mismatched chairs, a file cabinet and pot plant. A bare desk, just a computer and a jar of pencils, which made me wonder how on earth I managed to get anything done in my chaotic bomb-drop of a studio. I was about to take the chair Ross offered, when a flag of jewel-like colour snagged my eye.
I made a beeline for the far wall.
‘Ah, yes,’ Ross said, abandoning the thread of his monologue and joining me, ‘this is the other reason I was so eager to meet with you. Wonderful, isn’t it?’
It was a small watercolour, simply framed, depicting the delicate cup-like leaf of a pitcher plant. Its proud hood was a mass of translucent washes and crimson veins, convincingly lethal despite its light-handed rendering. It was eerily beautiful, as though the plant’s subtle life-force had been trapped in the multi-hued pigment.
‘It’s Tony’s,’ I said, not bothering to read the scrawled signature at the base of the drawing. ‘I’ve seen similar ones recently. Other pitcher plants, sundews, a couple of Venus flytraps. I never knew he was so keen on carnivorous plants – ’ I bit my tongue, aware that I’d betrayed the extent of my ignorance about Tony, and in doing so, had perhaps also revealed my failings as a mother.
Ross shuffled nearer the painting and peered at it short-sightedly.
‘I’ve always loved it,’ he said. ‘There was a time when Tony drew these plants obsessively – I found them scrawled in the margins of his textbooks, doodled on his class notes, even on essays he handed in – pencil, ink, watercolour . . . as though they were a mystery he was trying to solve. He knew all about them, too, where they originated from, why they’d adapted to eat insects, as well as how to propagate and care for them. He was a fount of knowledge, a highly intelligent boy – and in many ways a bit of an enigma.’
I looked at him. ‘What do you mean, an enigma?’
Ross shrugged. ‘Unpredictable, I suppose. One day he arrived at school and upended his desk, went through his books. The finches and gumnuts stayed, but every page with so much as a sundew tentacle or pitcher plant hood went into the bin in shreds. It was as though, overnight, his obsession for carnivorous plants had turned sour and he could no longer bear to look at them. This one here,’ Ross gestured at the little watercolour, ‘was one of the last ones he painted. He presented it to me after I’d taken him hunting the previous summer and taught him to shoot.’
‘Hunting?’ I stared at Ross, thinking I’d misheard him. Or that perhaps he’d confused Tony with another boy.
‘I’m sorry,’ Ross said quickly, ‘I’ve rambled on, it’s a loathsome habit of mine I’m afraid. You came here to find out about Bronwyn’s progress, and I’ve bored you by wandering off along memory lane, I do apologise.’
He looked so sheepish, his brow knitted into an expression of worried concern, his beefy shoulders hunched to his ears, that I bit my lips – partly to restrain the new flood of questions that were clamouring to be asked, and partly to prevent a triumphant smile. Ross O’Malley seemed as eager to spill forth the past as I was to hear it. Perhaps, on his part, it was the result of too many years’ silence – or the novelty of having a fresh audience. Either way, I felt a sudden rush of warmth for this awkward man. Ross was something of an enigma himself, a figment of Glenda’s diary come to life. He was an unusual choice of paramour for a schoolgirl, yet I was beginning to see something of that deeply buried charm. He was also a potential wellspring of Jarman family history that I was powerfully keen to tap into.
‘I’m interested in hearing about Tony,’ I admitted. ‘It just surprised me when you said you took him hunting. The Tony I knew hated firearms.’
‘He was always a gentle boy,’ Ross agreed. ‘It must have been a horrible shock for you when he died, I am sorry.’
I nodded, curious about what he’d said before. ‘Why do you think he tore up his pictures?’
‘It was a mystery . . . though I suspect, as I do when a student displays sudden uncharacteristic behaviour, that there were upsets at home.’ He looked at me. ‘Tony had been a favourite of mine, I took him under my wing. I guess I saw something of myself in his studious nature. He was a troubled boy. I suppose he grew into a troubled man.’
‘Troubled?’
‘Oh, you know . . . artistic types always seem to have restless souls. That’s what makes them so fascinating to the rest of us.’
‘Ross, I hate to ask, but could there be any substance to the rumour that he was responsible for his sister’s accident?�
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Ross frowned. ‘No, I’d wager my life on it. I do hope no one’s been gossiping?’
I shook my head. ‘I can’t see him hurting anyone, least of all his own sister. But – and this’ll sound awful – if he was driven to end his life because of guilt, because of remorse over something he did as a boy . . . well, somehow that would be easier for me to bear. If it wasn’t remorse, then I have to wonder if his death was the result of faulty wiring in his brain.’
‘And you’re worried Bronwyn might have inherited similar tendencies?’
I nodded, grateful for his understanding.
Ross sighed. ‘Audrey, we can’t know what other factors were at work in Tony’s life before he died. Depression, drug addiction. Or he may have been terminally ill and not wanted anyone to know. I think genetics are overrated – even if Tony was mentally ill, it doesn’t mean that the illness will pass on to Bronwyn. Your daughter is an exceptionally well-balanced girl, Audrey. And don’t forget, Tony was only one of her parents . . . I’m sure she’s inherited many sound traits from you.’
A dubious assumption, I thought privately. But in truth I felt reassured, glad to have my mind eased of its fears about Bronwyn. Ross O’Malley’s kindness, and his admission that Tony had once been a favourite, inspired a twinge of trust.
I found myself asking, ‘You were fond of Glenda too, weren’t you?’
Ross looked startled. ‘Did Tony tell you that? Of course he did . . .’ He blinked rapidly and wrung his hands together. ‘Well now, Glenda was . . . she was one of my students, but we – I mean to say, there was never . . .’
He was a blusher, too; the telltale red dashes that crept across his cheeks marked him as a poor liar. He took out a large handkerchief, which I expected him to use to blow his nose. His face looked drawn, his eyes rimmed pink as though the effort of his attempted falsehood had diminished him. Instead, he used the hanky to dust along the top of Tony’s picture frame and over the glass, giving it a shake before returning it to his pocket. Then, as though losing the inner battle with his conscience, he sighed.
‘I was fond of Glenda Jarman. Nothing ever happened between us, you understand. She was just a kid of sixteen, more than a decade younger than I was at the time, but wiser than most people twice her age. My wife was a good, kind woman and I’d never have dreamt of betraying her . . . but Glenda fascinated me. We had so much in common, you see – we loved the same authors, were moved by the same ideas, shared a passion for stories and films and – ’
He cut off, turning his gaze back to Tony’s painting. ‘That sounds awful, doesn’t it? But I suppose I was one of those people who drifted along seeing everything in monochrome. A million grey shades of life, my life. Uniform and predictable. The only true point of departure from the tedium came from movies, or theatre . . . or things I read about in books. Adventures, family dramas. Thrillers, crime, romance. Opening the pages of a novel and vanishing into another world, or marvelling over other people’s expression – Tony’s wonderful paintings, for instance, or Glenda’s short stories – that was when I felt most alive.’
He fell silent. While he studied the luminous little pitcher plant, I studied him – discomfited by his honesty yet recognising myself in his observation. There was a time when I’d existed through my fascination for Tony; lured by his charisma and dragged along at breakneck speed, my own fragile sense of purpose lost in the hectic exuberance of Tony’s ambition. With him I’d felt vital, inspired. Apart from him, I was only half a person . . . or so it seemed to me then. Looking back, I saw I’d lacked the confidence to accept that my version of life – though quieter and far less dramatic than Tony’s – was equally as valid.
Ross shrugged. ‘Glenda was one of those people you occasionally have the good fortune to meet, who brings colour into the greyness of your life. When she died, the light went out of my world.’
‘You spoke to her that night, didn’t you?’
Ross tried not to react, but shock darkened his eyes. ‘You’ve done your homework, haven’t you?’
He must have thought I’d been snooping into police files or newspaper archives or old testimonials – which made me wonder how much of his involvement he’d confessed. Probably all of it, judging by his inability to lie. Rather than alarm him further and lose any trust we might have established, I decided to make a confession of my own.
‘Did you know Glenda kept a diary?’
His face softened as realisation trickled in. His shoulders relaxed and he shut his eyes. ‘Ah. God, I’d forgotten. Did Tony have it? Did he – ’
I shook my head. ‘It was hidden on the property. Bronwyn unearthed it a while back.’
There was such longing in Ross’s eyes that I felt a pang of pity for him. After what he’d told me, he must be dying to delve into Glenda’s private thoughts, especially any that might concern him.
‘Her last entry caught my attention,’ I admitted. ‘She wrote it while waiting at her grandfather’s place. She said she was worried about some letters she’d found, and that she’d spoken to you and you’d agreed to meet her, talk it over.’
Ross nodded. ‘I recall that she did find some letters. They’d upset her and she wanted to talk.’
‘What was in the letters?’
‘She never said. I remember thinking it was all a bit mysterious . . . but she sounded so young on the phone, so vulnerable and afraid. My heart went out to her, I’d have done anything to help her. So I agreed to meet, but . . .’ He looked at Tony’s painting, and his face appeared to slacken into that of a much older man. When he spoke again, his voice was a whisper. ‘But it wasn’t to be.’
‘You didn’t see her at Thornwood?’
He shook his head. ‘After I spoke to Glenda on the phone, my wife started complaining about stomach pains. She was a few months pregnant, so I rushed her up to Brisbane. Sadly, she miscarried that night. It was awful, and I forgot all about Glenda until later.’
‘Did you ever doubt that Glenda’s death was accidental?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘She knew the gully well, didn’t she? Knew which areas were safe and which parts were treacherous, which parts to avoid. It strikes me as odd that she’d have made such a fatal mistake.’
‘That’s why you asked about Tony, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
Ross’s gaze slid away, then came back. ‘If anyone was to blame, Audrey, then it was me. Glenda was distressed on the phone. Then when I failed to show, she must’ve been even more angry and hurt. I imagine she rushed off home, in a mood, not taking notice where she walked.’ Pulling out his hanky again, he blew his nose. ‘No, Audrey, all the evidence points to an accident. The heavy rain, the cave-in on the edge of the gully, the gaping chunk of earth where she went over. The mess of rubble where they found her. There was never any speculation that her death was anything other than accidental.’
He sighed, then pulled up his wrist and grimaced at his watch. ‘I’m sorry, Audrey, I’ve got to rush off, I’m going to be late for class.’
We said goodbye, and I lingered in the coolness watching him hurry along the walkway and vanish around the corner. Then I made my slow way back to the Celica, my thoughts weighing heavy on the diary stashed in the bottom drawer of my bedside table. Buried in darkness, just as it had been for the past twenty years. None of Glenda’s entries was conclusive; none would stand up in a court of law as evidence to support my belief that she’d been the victim of something other than a fatal fall.
But it didn’t matter what she’d written, did it?
The facts told a different story. Along with her haversack and hairbrush and a change of clothes, her diary had lain hidden in the hollow tree at the top of my garden for two decades, a good forty-minute walk from where – that rain-swept night – her falling body had supposedly caused a rockslide.
At the end of the week, I pulled up outside the school gates and cut the motor. We were an hour earlier than usual. Beside me in the passenger seat B
ronwyn was jiggling in obvious excitement. She was wearing jeans, her new hiking boots, and her old terry sunhat jammed on her head. Her face glowed with zinc cream.
I reached over to straighten her collar. ‘Remember what I told you?’
‘Stay near the teachers at all times,’ she recited, pulling free of me and searching the mob of kids swarming at the gates. ‘Don’t wander off alone, watch for snakes, and always wear sunscreen.’
‘I’ll miss you, you know,’ I said. ‘We haven’t been apart before.’
‘Yeah, Mum.’ She was distracted, fiddling with her bag, itching to get going.
I sighed, trying to calm the butterflies dancing whirligigs in my stomach. ‘Are you sure you’ve got everything?’
‘Mum, don’t worry! Me and Jade’ll look after each other . . . Oh, there she is! See you in a week!’
With a kiss to my flushed cheek, she grabbed her backpack and sprang out of the car, then hailed Jade, who was bearing down through the hordes towards us.
They greeted each other with their customary exuberance, then shouldered their packs and trundled off towards the waiting coach. The teachers, Ross O’Malley among them, began to drove the kids into ragged lines. I kept waiting for Bronwyn to turn and wave, but she was too immersed in excited conversation with Jade and a skinny fair-haired boy. Five minutes later she was climbing into the coach, vanishing from view as the ragtag procession of kids swarmed in after her.
A dull ache pulsed in my chest. She was slipping away. Only eleven, but already drifting out of my protective orbit, into a wider and – for her, at least – more interesting world.
Sitting there in the sun-warmed car, searching the crowded coach for a glimpse of her, I couldn’t help remembering how I’d been at her age. Plaits and long socks, hand-me-down school tunics that Aunt Morag had happened across in op shops. Geeky and quiet, a bookworm, painfully shy. For a long time I worried that Bronwyn would be equally afflicted with shyness, but she couldn’t have been more different. Despite the absence of a dependable father figure and the presence of a reclusive workaholic mother, Bronwyn had turned out, as Ross O’Malley said, to be an exceptionally well-balanced girl.