Arcadia

by Di Morrissey

  ‘She was well prepared,’ Jessica said, thumbing through blank sketchbooks and several notebooks. ‘What’s this? Here’s another one.’

  From the bottom of the pile she pulled out a pad of paper labelled ‘The Artist’s Sketchbook’ and flicked through it.

  ‘Looks like she did rough pencil sketches and took photos as well, and brought them back to her studio,’ said Sally. She paused, seeing Jessica’s expression. ‘What is it?’

  Jessica handed her the open sketchbook. ‘Get a load of this!’

  ‘Ooh, ugh! Horrible!’ exclaimed Sally in shock.

  Jessica leaned over and stared at the rough pencil sketch. ‘It’s Stella, isn’t it?’

  ‘It looks like it . . . But why? What does this mean? She didn’t die like this! Who would draw such a thing?’

  ‘And the owl . . . poor dead thing,’ added Jessica in a small voice. ‘What do you think it means, Sal?’

  ‘I’ve got no idea. It’s sick.’ Sally flipped through the sketchbook. ‘Look at these sketches. Some man with a moustache and a scar on his face, who’s he? Why’d she draw him? It’s not the Greek god.’

  ‘It’s pretty rough, maybe she didn’t draw it,’ suggested Jessica, forcing herself to look at the drawing again.

  ‘Well, that makes no sense.’

  They stared at the face with the straggly moustache, wearing a deerstalker hat over long wispy hair.

  Sally closed the sketchbook. ‘That gives me the creeps. ’Specially the poor owl.’

  ‘Where do you think your grandmother saw this man?’ asked Jessica.

  ‘Do you think she knew him?’

  ‘Who’s to say? From what I’ve heard, your grandmother led a pretty sheltered life, and now we find out all this about her!’

  ‘I suppose so . . . I remember Mum saying she didn’t like the social hoopla in Hobart. My grandfather usually went off to those things on his own. If she went to the city it was for Art Society things, exhibitions and talks.’

  ‘So she probably saw him here . . . maybe he tried to shoot the owl?’ wondered Jessica. ‘And what’s with the flower and the seeds and the other stuff?’

  ‘I have no idea. Come on, it’s late. Let’s pack this all away or start again in the morning,’ Sally said. ‘I promised Katie I’d take her down to the Hendersons’ farm to see their new lambs first thing. This can wait. Katie will not.’

  ‘You take her and after breakfast I’ll tidy up here. Your mum might want to come and go through some of it.’

  ‘Maybe. Mum doesn’t tend to linger over the past even though she’s surrounded by it. And if she wanted to tell me about this, she would have.’ Sally picked up one of the torches and turned towards the attic doorway.

  Jessica straightened up. ‘Sal, we’re going to do it.’

  ‘What’s that? Do what?’

  ‘Take off. A road trip. Chase a mystery to Shelter Bay,’ Jessica said.

  Sally stared at her. ‘I’m not convinced that’s such a good idea.’

  ‘Come on, Sal, we’ve got a whole collection of documents from some strange man in the cave. He had a newspaper clipping about your grandmother’s painting, and a pressing of the flower she painted. And those photos and the farewell letter! They must have been lovers. Plus there’s that creepy drawing in her notebook. What if they’re all connected?’

  ‘We can’t just rock up. Anyway, they’re probably all dead and gone.’

  ‘I don’t know, there might be some descendants of Broadbent’s still living there,’ Jess said. ‘How far away is it?’

  Sally got out her own phone and looked up Shelter Bay on the map. She looked thoughtful. ‘It’s north-west. Remember Chrissie from school? She lives up in the north now with her husband. It might be nice to visit them and then drive on to Shelter Bay, I guess . . .’

  ‘Great. I reckon we should swing through Hobart on the way and go to the Botanical Gardens with the pressed flower and ask someone there to check it out. Then, who knows?’ The excitement in Jessica’s voice was growing. ‘Sal, there’s something strange about all this. We’ve stumbled on it for a reason, I reckon. You know my intuition. There’s more to this. I just know it.’ Jessica spread her arms, suddenly looking elated. ‘Please, Sally. Come with me. See where we end up!’

  Sally looked at Jessica standing there with arms outstretched, ready for anything. ‘Oh, Jess. You’re nuts.’

  ‘So? We’re going. From the mountains to the sea . . . Just you and me . . .’ she sang.

  ‘Well,’ said Sally, giving in with a laugh. ‘I suppose I can’t let you go alone.’

  4

  Arcadia, 2018

  Where the dusty attic had seemed mysterious, secret and alluring the previous night, in the bold morning light it looked forlorn, a place of forgotten lives and abandoned dreams.

  Jessica tidied the boxes and carefully placed Stella’s art back in the trunk with the letters and other items. But on an impulse she put the sketchbook with the drawings of Stella and the man in the hat to one side. She wondered if Mollie knew about it and if Stella had ever hinted about a rendezvous or a ‘friend’, or if indeed Mollie knew of the cave’s existence.

  Mollie was brewing coffee and she turned to Jessica with a smile as she came into the kitchen.

  ‘Just in time. Would you like a cup?’ she asked, then her eyes fell on the items Jessica was carrying. ‘What have you got there? Sal said you two found a few intriguing things last night. No one has ever been interested in all that old stuff, and I’ve run out of room in my little cottage to fit in anything more.’

  ‘You might want to build another room, maybe a gallery and tearoom, to display it all,’ Jessica said, sitting at the kitchen table. ‘Did you know there’s a collection of your mother’s art in a trunk? Truly stunning work. It should be on show. Sally suggested maybe publishing it in a book.’

  ‘Yes, Mother did some pretty flower paintings. I thought they were all given to the Art Society. We kept the ones she hung in her studio – they seemed to mean a lot to her.’

  ‘Yes, the one with the blue flower and fungi and the painting of the owl. What was with the owl? It’s a theme in several of the paintings we found.’

  ‘Mother loved that owl. It was wild and lived down in the woods. She used to say it was her special friend. Not exactly a pet, though I believe it sometimes flew into the garden. I was afraid of it when I was very young, but when I grew older I would look forward to seeing it.’

  ‘Did anything . . . bad ever happen to it?’ asked Jessica cautiously.

  ‘Not that I know of. There were a few years when I wasn’t living here, before I moved back with Graham, but, my mother would have said something if it had; she’d have been heartbroken.’

  While Mollie poured the coffee, Jessica put the sketchbook and the tin box from the cave on the table and took a deep breath. ‘Sally suggested I show you these while she’s out with Katie.’ She’d managed to convince Sally to let her ask Mollie some questions without giving too much away.

  Mollie glanced at Jessica’s serious expression and sat down opposite her. ‘Goodness, what dark secrets have you girls found in the attic?’

  ‘Actually, we found this cashbox on the edge of your property, in the bush. It has some man’s personal papers stashed inside, as well as a newspaper cutting that mentions Stella winning first prize for the owl painting. When we saw that, Sally thought we should see what Stella had packed away that you mightn’t have gone through, and that’s when we found this sketchbook in the attic.’

  ‘I can’t say that I’ve ever looked through every little thing up there. My mother had rolls and rolls of pictures, some unfinished, and a lot of paperwork. It’s a project waiting to be taken on and I confess I had quite forgotten about it.’ She looked at Jessica. ‘So what have you found?’

  ‘There’s a drawing in the sketchbook
that’s rather shocking.’

  ‘Shocking as in lewd for its time, or . . . what?’

  ‘Well, it’s horrific, actually.’ Jess turned to the page and put it in front of Mollie, who gagged on her coffee, spilling some as she put the cup down in the saucer.

  ‘Good lord, that’s my mother! Hanging! Oh, sweet mercy, the owl . . . who drew this? Not her . . .’

  ‘It’s not very good art but there’s no mistaking who it is,’ said Jessica quietly. ‘We wondered if you’d ever heard about this . . .’

  ‘God! No! Close it up, I can’t bear to look at it. My poor mother, why would she keep such a terrible thing?’

  ‘Well, there are also sketches of a man . . .’ Jess flipped through to the drawings of the man in the deerstalker hat. ‘Do you recognise him?’

  Mollie studied the pencil portrait and shook her head slowly. ‘I don’t think so. I doubt Mother would have known strange men outside the Holland circle of friends.’ She took a moment, sipping her coffee, then turned to the cashbox. ‘What’s in the tin?’

  Jessica opened it and showed Mollie some of the contents, carefully avoiding the violet letter. ‘Personal documents belonging to some bloke who might have been a bit of a loner, considering where we found it. Perhaps your father knew him, treated him, maybe?’

  ‘It would be very hard to know,’ said Mollie, shaking her head slowly. ‘Could have been from the Depression years when a lot of people were homeless or roughing it. Just someone passing through,’ she added. ‘My father never talked about his work, whereas my mother used to let me draw beside her when she was painting. When I was older I preferred to curl up and read. She was a great reader, too. Looking back I’ve come to realise that my mother was a very talented person.’

  Jessica nodded and put the sketchbook to one side. Obviously Stella had never mentioned anything to her daughter and, apart from her shock at seeing the drawing, Mollie didn’t seem particularly interested in the papers.

  ‘Sally said she wishes she’d known her. I think it might be a good idea for her to do something with Stella’s paintings, even just to protect them from ageing and fading,’ said Jessica. ‘We also found some pressed flowers and seeds in an old diary. We thought we might take them to the Botanical Gardens in Hobart to see if they can be identified.’

  ‘Good idea, if you’re really that interested! Goodness, I can’t get over that dreadful drawing in Mother’s sketchbook. It’s like a threat or a premonition of some kind. But she lived a long and happy life, and so, I presume, did Nyx.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The owl. In Greek mythology Nyx was night. She lived in a cave somewhere at the edge of the cosmos. My mother read a lot of Homer and Hesiod.’

  ‘Oh, I see. Well if she befriended the owl, someone must have known it meant a lot to her. Surely your mother didn’t have any enemies who would wish her such a terrible fate?’

  Mollie refilled their cups. ‘I can’t imagine. She was a sweet and gentle person. Dreamy, like artists tend to be. Not that she was an artist as we know them today. It was her private passion. Though you just never know what goes on inside someone’s head, do you,’ said Mollie with a shrug. ‘In a small village you think you know people pretty well, then it turns out the kind old lady down the road killed her husband and buried him under the cowshed.’

  ‘Hit him over the head with a leg of lamb and cooked and served the lamb to the detectives looking for her missing husband,’ Jessica said, and laughed.

  ‘So they never found the murder weapon,’ added Mollie with a smile. ‘I read those old British crime novels too!’

  ‘Maybe he was a wife basher and deserved it. Though Miss Marple would never say so!’ said Jessica.

  ‘Anyway, I do know that my mother was highly intelligent, artistic, and rather adventurous. She was also a devoted birder. Birdwatcher,’ she added when she saw Jessica’s puzzled expression.

  ‘I wish I’d known her. There’s something mysteri­ous about her,’ said Jessica.

  ‘Why are you girls so absorbed with my mother’s art?’

  ‘It’s so under-appreciated publicly, under-acknowledged,’ said Jessica. ‘So, Sally and I thought we’d do a bit of research, and have a kind of break at the same time, seeing as you and Toby offered. I want to reconnect with my home island again.’

  ‘Oh, of course, of course, Sal mentioned it this morning. I think it’s a great idea that the two of you head off on a bit of an adventure for a few days. Be good for Sal to get away. Have you worked out an itinerary? There’s bad mobile reception in the most remote places, and sometimes none at all. Just where are you headed?’ Mollie walked over to the sink and rinsed out her cup.

  ‘A place called Seawinds, Shelter Bay. It was mentioned in one of the documents we found. We looked it up, it’s in the middle of nowhere on the north-west coast.’

  ‘Why on earth do you want to go there? Who lives there? That area is very rugged and remote.’

  ‘Hopefully someone who knew the person who owned all this stuff lives there. I’m really curious to find out more.’

  ‘What makes you think you’ll find someone still in the area who knew that fellow? That place doesn’t ring a bell with me. It’s not somewhere we’ve ever had any connection with.’

  ‘Where’s your sense of adventure, Mollie?’ Jess teased. ‘Actually, it’s kinda near where Chrissie and her husband are farming now. Remember Chrissie? I’d love to see their place.’

  ‘Chrissie and Paul! Of course, I remember her well from when you were all at school. Don’t they have something to do with TV? I saw an ad for a new cooking show and Sally said it was being filmed there,’ Mollie said. ‘Look, as far as I’m concerned, if you girls want to take off on some wild-goose chase, go ahead. It will give you both a chance to have a little time out together.’ She smiled. ‘Been a long while since it was just the two of you. Sally would never go away on her own, but she deserves a break. I’m glad you’ve convinced her to go.’

  ‘Sal did say she wanted to see what Chrissie and Paul were doing. Game birds and things?’

  Mollie sighed. ‘Truffles I can live with, but spare me screechy birds. We had peacocks and guinea hens here, briefly – never again.’

  ‘And geese! I remember my dad had geese when we lived here. They were scary. Good watchdogs, though.’ Jessica laughed. ‘Anyway, we’ll go and check out the pheasants, do a bit of a loop up north then west and back here. Go where the mood takes us.’

  ‘Good idea.’ Mollie cocked her head as a car door slammed outside. ‘Ah, that must be Sal and Katie coming back.’

  Jessica packed away the papers and Stella’s sketchbook as Katie came hurtling towards the kitchen squealing, ‘Granny! Granny . . . I fed the lambs with a bottle!’

  Arcadia, 1939

  Stella sat in her studio in the fading light, staring into the twilight roses but seeing another scene entirely. She couldn’t help but linger over the details of the unexpected encounter that morning.

  Once the James family had settled back at Arcadia with their youngest son, Terry, who was still receiving treatment but was recovering from his exposure to polio, life had fallen into a routine. Winsome was retained part-time to help Mrs James, and Stella resumed her birdwatching and painting. She returned to her habit of wandering along the riverfront, which was coming back to life after stagnating during the Depression and the years that followed it. Sometimes she took photographs, idly considering painting a river scene, but as always, she was drawn to the strange and compelling beauty of nature around her home, so little observed by the outside world.

  Even though it had happened years ago now, thinking about her run-in with the strange man in the Far Forest still rattled her, especially as she was so sure she’d seen two men the first time.

  Now, however, she felt emboldened whenever she was in the forest because of the presence of Nyx, the masked owl, wh
o felt like a protector, a guardian who mysteriously appeared when she wanted or needed him. Stella was glad that the James children had kept his existence to themselves, and she thought the novelty of their day in the woods had been forgotten probably in the daily kaleidoscope of their lives.

  Dr Holland had repeated his request that she not wander alone in the forest, providing no specific reason and assuming that his mere command was enough. So Stella had not challenged him even in the mildest manner. She had learned that the less said the better; a small smile and the matter was closed.

  Or so Stephen may have believed.

  Stella had adopted a compliant manner, and, while she wasn’t meek, she certainly didn’t challenge her husband. Mrs James once mentioned to her that she saw an occasional spark in Stella’s eyes, a certain set of her mouth as she turned away following a flat edict from the doctor. Both Stella and Mrs James clearly understood that the doctor assumed his words were never disobeyed, and that suited everyone.

  On her walk that morning, Stella had paused near the jetty with the shed that the James children had explored when they were in her care. She had often thought about coming here to see for herself what the children had been talking about but had never found the time, until now. She noticed a boat, some stacked boxes, and a man standing in the entryway to the shed.

  He was slim and fair, fit looking, dressed in hiking clothes and with a faint air of the mountaineer about him. Unlike most men he wasn’t wearing a cap or hat, instead his thick fair hair flopped over his forehead. Stella thought he seemed familiar, but she couldn’t seem to place him.

  He smiled at her. ‘G’day, miss. Lovely afternoon. Take care on the path there.’ He pointed at the protruding roots from a nearby tree and a small pothole. He was well spoken, his voice roundly modulated.