The Memory Tree

by Jennifer Scoullar

  ‘I don’t understand. Why would you give away your companies?’

  Fraser sighed with the sadness of the ages. ‘To atone for a misspent life,’ he said. ‘A life lived with a kind of moral blindness.’

  Penny stared, open-mouthed.

  ‘I’m facing my own personal extinction, Penelope. I may not have a year.’ His voice was grave, but free from self pity.

  Penny shook her head, in shock. Oh no, poor Fraser. She tried to say she was sorry, but he frowned and held up his hand. ‘I won’t have platitudes. After all, nobody gets out of here alive. But I will have my son back. And thanks to you, darling girl, I will have my grandchild as well.’

  Penny hugged her knees, mind folding around what she’d learned. How had her world become so false, so riddled with secrets? She tried to summon indignation about Matt keeping Fraser’s offer from her, but the hypocrisy was too much. Her hand strayed to her plump stomach. She was beginning to show. Sins of omission. Had she and Matt convinced themselves they were less destructive than outright lies?

  ‘Help me, Penelope.’ Fraser looked hopeful now, even happy. ‘I’m not the man I used to be.’

  Penny studied his eager face, and her heart went out to him. ‘Prove it, then,’ she said. ‘Prove you’ve changed. Save Pallawarra for a start.’ Fraser looked blank. ‘Don’t you know anything about what’s been going on in the forest?’

  ‘I don’t micromanage.’ His brow furrowed. ‘But I know the gist. There’s a formal halt on logging in Tuggerah Valley until after the election. Then state cabinet will meet to reverse the ban.’

  ‘What? As cut and dried as that? Already decided?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. Kate wants to avoid a fuss on the eve of the poll. Afterwards, she’ll pass a Peaceful Assembly Act to criminalise forest protests and shut them down for good.’

  ‘How can you possibly know that?’

  Fraser sighed. ‘Because it was my idea.’

  Penny felt suddenly sick, dizzy, as though the ground was shifting beneath her. Was it the pregnancy – feeling things she’d never felt before? Or was it Fraser, what he’d done? Matt was right, the man was a monster. ‘What about our right to freedom of assembly?’

  ‘We are not America, Penelope. There are no such entitlements in our constitution. Our rights in this regard amount to whatever the law states, so they amount to nothing.’ He blew a smoke ring. ‘Kate’s legislation will not be popular, hence her decision to wait.’

  ‘But that’s outrageous. She’s lying to the electorate. Doesn’t the truth matter?’

  ‘My dear child, someone famously said that a lie told a hundred times becomes the truth.’

  ‘No, it doesn’t.’ Penny’s voice grew shrill. ‘No it doesn’t!’ She rose to leave.

  He stood and blocked her way. Staying upright was costing him a noticeable effort, and his expression was one of uncharacteristic desperation. ‘Please Penelope?’ The plea sounded strange coming from Fraser – a man normally in total control.

  Penny took in the lines on his face, the sag of his cheeks, the hope in his eyes. She drew a deep breath. ‘Will you do whatever I ask of you?’

  Fraser’s hand found his heart.

  Chapter 26

  The sun was setting in a nest of purple clouds when Matt pulled up at the bed and breakfast attached to Mrs Murphy’s tearooms. Sarah was waiting out the front, clad in a tight black dress with a chain around her hips, holding a document wallet. Matt pulled over, disconcerted by how glamorous she looked. He was dressed in his ranger’s uniform. She was dressed for a date.

  ‘Hop in.’

  ‘Whatever have you done to your face?’ she asked.

  ‘I told you I was accident-prone.’ He drove past the local hotel and took the road to Nandena. There might be a band playing there tonight. Ha, who was he kidding? He didn’t want to be seen with Sarah in town, not looking the way she did.

  The road ran between plantations of pine, which clung to the slopes and valleys like a dark fog. Ahead, a wombat lay slumped on the verge. Matt pulled over, checked its pouch and dragged the dead marsupial into the scrub. ‘You have to get them off the roads,’ he said. ‘They attract devils.’ A few minutes later it was a possum. Next was a young pademelon, with a flattened black corpse beside it. Matt swore, bagged the remains of the devil, and hurled the wallaby into the bushes. ‘See what I mean?’

  ‘Ew,’ said Sarah. There was now a ripe odour in the jeep.

  ‘You’re lucky I don’t take them all back to put in Binburra’s freezer. That’s what I usually do.’

  Sarah screwed up her nose. Opening her document wallet as he drove, she pulled out some papers. ‘Matt, this really can’t wait,’ she said. ‘I’ve identified a genetically different population of devils, and – guess where? In the Tuggerah Valley.’

  ‘Different how?’

  ‘Different in the best possible way. In their major histocompatibility complex genes – their MHC genes.’

  Did she expect him to know what that meant?

  ‘MHC genes help the immune system to recognise and attack foreign cells. They’re what causes a patient’s body to reject a donor liver, for example. Most devils have MHC genes so similar to the cancer, that they can’t identify or fight their tumours. But I’ve found a population whose MHC genes are very different to DFTD cells.’

  ‘But you said local devils were close to immunological clones,’ said Matt.

  ‘I was wrong,’ said Sarah. ‘Thanks to Penny’s roadkill count project, I’m getting a lot more samples, widening my data base.’

  A rabbit dashed across the road and Matt braked to avoid it. Sarah’s voice grew high with excitement. ‘I re-ran my tests. Devils with this different MHC genotype, I’ve named it MHC2, should be able to recognise the cancer and mount a defence against it.’

  The significance of her words sank in. Sarah’s research might not only save the devils, but the Tuggerah as well. A critically endangered population of tumour-resistant devils could permanently halt all logging.

  Matt pulled the jeep off the road, grabbed Sarah and kissed her. It was meant to be a congratulatory kiss on the cheek, but she turned her head and their lips met. ‘You’re a genius,’ he said, and he meant it. This was by far the biggest breakthrough they’d had. If Binburra could breed up these special devils? If their MHC2 genes were dominant and prevailed in their offspring? The possibilities were too marvellous to think about.

  Sarah was still talking, but Matt was no longer listening. He was imagining the joy on Penny’s face when he told her the news. He should have asked her to come along tonight, but he’d been mad at her – again. A sudden flash of insight told him he was blaming the wrong person. His father was the culprit. Fraser had lured Penny into visiting him at Canterbury Downs. He’d encouraged her to bring him specimens from Binburra, behind Matt’s back. He’d told Penny about the way down to the valley, when, as lifelong protector of Binburra, that information belonged to Matt by right. Fraser was deliberately causing trouble. Well, no more. Matt would put his marriage back together, and Sarah’s breakthrough could be the catalyst for doing it.

  ‘I need to do more testing, that’s the main thing,’ Sarah was saying. ‘Almost twenty-five percent of Tuggerah devils tested so far have the MHC2 genotype. Penny’s frozen samples are next. I can’t wait to get started.’

  ‘Of course, of course. Whatever you want.’ Matt hugged her, laughing, overcome with excitement. For one glorious moment his worries evaporated. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘We’re celebrating.’

  * * *

  The Top Pub at Nandena was a historic two-storey Georgian building with a graceful twin-gabled roof line.

  ‘How gorgeous,’ said Sarah, admiring the hotel’s sandstone Regency façade.

  Matt hopped out and opened Sarah’s door for her. ‘This place was built by convicts in 1840,’ he said. ‘Martin Cash, Tasmania’s own Robin Hood, among them.’

  They took seats at the bar, Sarah still clutching her document wallet
. She unzipped it, zipped it back up again and put it down. ‘Tell me about Martin Cash,’ she said, pouring them both a glass of water.

  Matt stretched his arms over his head, feeling happier and more relaxed than he could remember. ‘Cash was an Irish hothead. Women loved him, but they were his downfall, all of his life.’

  ‘Ooh,’ said Sarah. ‘Do tell.’

  Matt rearranged his long legs. ‘Cash was only eighteen years old when he looked through a Dublin hotel window and saw someone hitting on his girlfriend. The two men got into a fight. Cash shot the other bloke and was sentenced to seven years’ transportation here to Van Diemen’s Land. But no jail could hold him. Cash even broke out of Port Arthur, and that was some achievement. Completely escape-proof, they reckoned, like Alcatraz. Armed sentries everywhere. Only connected to the mainland by a narrow strip of land – Eaglehawk Neck – and a line of savage, starving dogs chained across it. Convicts believed the water both sides was infested with sharks.’ Matt sipped his beer. ‘Cash didn’t care. He tied his clothes round his neck in a bundle and swam for it. Got clean away, first man ever. Lost his clothes though. Did his first hold-up starkers.’

  ‘Naked?’

  ‘As the day he was born.’ Matt was enjoying himself. ‘Nicknamed Cash and Co, him and a couple of mates had short but spectacular careers as bushrangers.’ Matt leaned forward in his chair. ‘Dodged five hundred constables and soldiers sent to bring them in. Survived six shoot-outs, escaped dozens of traps, outwitted everybody. They only robbed the rich – squatters, hotels, mail coaches – and they left the poor alone, didn’t rape or shoot people. The gentleman bushranger, that’s what they called Cash. Quite the gallant.’

  ‘Did they ever catch him?’

  ‘Betrayed by the woman he loved, so the story goes.’ Matt picked up the menu. ‘Do you want to order yet?’

  Sarah slapped his arm playfully. ‘Finish the story.’

  ‘In 1843 word reached Cash that his girlfriend, Bessie Clifford, was having an affair with a man called Joe Pratt in Hobart. Cash was on his way into town to kill Joe, when Bessie found out and tipped off the police. There was a shoot-out. Cash fatally wounded a young constable before he was captured. But – get this – he’s such a legend, the press mounted a campaign to pardon him. Loads of Cash’s victims interceded on his behalf. The court sentenced him to death anyway.’

  Sarah was sitting forward too. She licked a drop of water from her lip. ‘Did he die bravely?’

  Matt grinned. ‘The slippery bastard won a reprieve an hour before he was due to hang. They transported him to Norfolk Island where he became a model prisoner, won a pardon and headed straight back to Tasmania. Cash married, bought a farm and died in bed.’

  She laughed. ‘Are you sure it happened like that?’

  ‘As God is my witness.’

  While they waited for their meals, Matt led Sarah out the back to see the hotel’s historic stone wishing well. ‘It’s over a hundred and fifty years old.’

  Sarah looked unimpressed. ‘Yours is such a young country. You don’t have anything really old here. Well, you don’t,’ she said, at Matt’s amused smile. ‘You can’t. You haven’t been here long enough.’

  Matt tossed a coin into the well and wished that his falcons, Sooty and Sweep, had found their way in the wild.

  ‘Go on then, name something,’ she said. ‘Name something really old.’

  ‘The forest,’ he said, without turning around. ‘The rivers. That rock art I showed you. Our Indigenous culture.’ Matt thought of the carved stone steps at Tiger Pass. How old were they?

  Sarah blushed through her tan. ‘Sorry, I was thinking small.’

  ‘Most people are.’ Matt tossed in another coin. ‘What do you know about wishing wells?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Copper or silver coins stopped the water going sour ‒ that’s the practical explanation. But the idea that wishes would be granted came from believing that tiny gods lived down wells. It’s a form of ancient pagan sacrifice.’

  Sarah leaned against the well close beside him, and tossed in a coin. ‘I wish …’

  ‘Shh … it won’t come true if you tell.’

  A sudden screech from a nearby tree sent Sarah rocketing into his arms. For a moment he held her, smelled her sweet perfume, felt the warmth of her body and her willingness for something more.

  ‘Just a masked owl.’ He stepped back and glanced inside. ‘Our meals are ready.’

  They were both quiet during dinner. It wasn’t until the tiramisu that Sarah said, ‘I heard that Penny moved out.’

  Matt twisted a paper serviette. He toyed with his beer and watched the band set up on stage. He wasn’t enjoying himself anymore. The pub was filling up, and the blonde girl on stage with her back to him looked familiar. Of course, it was Lisa.

  ‘G’day Matthew … Doctor.’ Drake peered over Sarah’s shoulder. Just what Matt didn’t need. The evening was bound to get back to Penny now. ‘Mind if I join you?’

  Matt sighed. ‘Suit yourself.’ He felt a sudden urge to get away.

  Drake slid his chair in beside Sarah and began a low conversation, too low for Matt to hear, now that the band was tuning up. Sarah laughed and nodded, eyes smiling at some joke. Tawny eyes, with a hint of green, like ripe hazelnuts.

  Lisa and the band launched into their first number.

  When Drake left to order drinks, Matt put his hand on Sarah’s arm. ‘Sorry to be a party pooper, but I’m off,’ he said. ‘Drake will give you a lift back.’

  ‘But why? The music’s just started.’

  ‘I might not have shut the laundry door at home. I’d hate Hedwig to get in with the baby bandicoots.’

  Sarah thought for a moment, then picked up her bag. ‘I’ll come with you. There are some research notes I want to pick up from Binburra anyway.’

  * * *

  ‘I’d love a drink,’ said Sarah, as they walked inside. ‘And can we put on some music? I haven’t finished celebrating.’

  ‘My iPod doesn’t work.’

  ‘Don’t you have Spotify? Never mind. Let’s be old-fashioned.’ Sarah began rifling through a shelf of dusty CDs. Soon Sade’s smooth sound filled the house.

  Matt cracked a bottle of champagne he found in the fridge. When he read the label, he put it back with a stopper. Non-alcoholic. Where had that come from? He opened a bottle of red wine instead and poured them both a glass. ‘I’d better look in on the babies.’ Sarah trailed after him, sipping her drink. He moved about, checking on the wallaby joeys and the bats and the bandicoots. A family of half-grown quolls, who regarded night-time as playtime, escaped from their pen in the corner and darted about the laundry.

  ‘That’s the second time they’ve done that,’ he said. ‘There must be something wrong with the latch.’

  ‘How adorable,’ said Sarah, as Matt retrieved a wayward youngster from his head. She lifted the lid of a freezer. ‘Are there devils in here?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Matt snatched a quoll from the curtain. ‘See for yourself if you want.’

  Sarah put down her glass and started sorting through the carcasses. A wide variety of plastic-wrapped, frozen Tasmanian wildlife soon littered the floor, from giant freshwater crayfish to hairless wombat joeys.

  ‘I can’t find the devils.’

  Matt put away the last quoll and frowned. What a mess. Did she have to be so careless with Penny’s animals? ‘Come on. I’ll help you pack this up.’ There was an edge to his voice. He was tired, that was all, and his arm throbbed where he’d twisted it in the descent. It wasn’t fair to take it out on Sarah.

  Some fresh air would help. He took the bottle of wine and some cheese out to the verandah, poured their drinks and watched a bushfire moon break free of the distant mountain. Stars pricked through the roof of the sky.

  ‘What an enchanting evening.’ Sarah’s face was in shadow, but he could feel her eyes upon him. ‘Isn’t starlight romantic?’ Her voice was low and silky.

  Was she
coming onto him? Matt was clueless about women other than Penny. And given the state of their marriage, it turned out he was pretty clueless about her too. He moved his chair to better see Sarah’s eyes. Maybe he shouldn’t have brought her back to Binburra.

  But his disquiet evaporated when Sarah began talking about her work. She positively shone with passion for it. ‘Genetic tagging is the key to protecting endangered species,’ she said. ‘Imagine tracking your devils by their DNA signatures instead of by ear tags and microchips and electronic collars. You’d hugely reduce your own workload. Reduce the stress caused to the animals from handling them. All you’d need is a sample of hair, scat or saliva.’

  ‘Have there been field trials?’

  ‘Absolutely, from humpback whales to grizzly bears. It’s early days, of course, but genetic tagging is the future of conservation.’

  Matt was riveted. With Sarah’s help, Binburra would stand on the cutting edge of devil research. They opened another bottle of red and moved onto theories of wildlife management. Sarah held a pragmatic view, believing that animals should be intensely managed, and individuals sacrificed to science if needed for the good of the population as a whole.

  ‘You do whatever you must to protect a species, right?’

  Matt remembered Winston, Penny’s resistant devil that had been injected with different strains of cancer cells until he finally succumbed; remembered his suffering. ‘A species is more than a biological construct,’ said Matt. ‘It’s a collection of feeling individuals, who are entitled to enjoy their one and only life on this earth without human interference. I say leave them alone.’

  ‘But your job involves actively managing this park.’

  ‘Does it?’

  ‘So, that’s why you didn’t make a report about the rare orchid.’

  He grinned. Sarah rolled her eyes and the debate continued.

  * * *

  It was after midnight when Sarah yawned. Matt yawned too. ‘Time I took you home.’