The Tunnels of Tarcoola Page 7

  The centre of the room was occupied by a long table. There were candles on the table, a few plates, none too clean, and an empty wine bottle.

  David examined the bottle. ‘Hmmm. Nineteen thirty-nine. My dad’d kill for something like this!’

  ‘So would mine,’ said Andrea. She was busy lighting the candles. In their light the room was warm and welcoming.

  David browsed through the bookshelves. As he pulled out each book, a cloud of dust rose and hovered in the air.

  ‘Some of these are in German,’ he said. ‘I know this one – my grandfather has it. When my great-grandmother was still alive they used to read it to each other and cry.’

  ‘Let’s see.’ Andrea peered over his shoulder. ‘Faust. My Dad’s got something like this. In English, though.’

  Everything in the cave was covered with a thick layer of dust. Andrea wandered around, opening cupboards and sneezing. She found several tins of food, some of them unlabelled and dulled with time, but some with modern labels and familiar brand names. There was a large wooden barrel with a tap. Andrea found a cup and poured out a few drops of clear fluid. She dipped a finger into it and tasted.

  ‘Careful!’ said David.

  ‘It’s just water,’ she returned. ‘Doesn’t taste too bad. A bit woody.’

  David took the cup and sniffed. ‘A suggestion of oak on the nose,’ he agreed gravely. He sipped. ‘And definitely too much tannin in the aftertaste.’

  Andrea giggled. ‘Does your dad talk like that?’

  ‘No, Roger Mason, our next-door neighbour. He runs that antique shop in Darling Street. He’s always bringing in bottles of wine for my parents to taste with him. He’s one of those people who know everything about everything.’

  ‘Is he the man who gives those history lectures?’

  ‘Yeah, that’s him. He writes books and sells them in his shop, and takes people for historical walks.’

  ‘Don’t tell him about this place!’ said Andrea.

  ‘Never.’ David resumed his exploration of the room.

  ‘There’s another tunnel over here!’ he called. ‘Oh no, sorry, it’s just a sort of alcove.’ He disappeared with his torch into a narrow cleft. There was a silence. Andrea stood alone in the centre of the cave, in the flickering candlelight. Faint scraping and rustling noises came from the alcove.

  ‘David?’ Andrea’s voice quavered. Suddenly a creature leapt out of the cleft, flailing its arms. It had huge blowfly eyes and a long black snout. Andrea screamed.

  ‘I’m going to get you!’ announced the creature in a hollow voice.

  ‘David, you rat! What is that thing?’

  ‘Don’t you know a gas mask when you see one?’

  ‘Wow! It’s the real deal, isn’t it?’

  She took a quick photograph before he pulled off his disguise.

  ‘There are a few more in there,’ he said. ‘I know what this place is now.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s a bomb shelter.’

  ‘What, nuclear fallout and stuff?’

  ‘Could be, but I’m not sure. Nuclear fallout’s fairly recent, isn’t it? This place seems to be older than that.’

  ‘Wait a minute,’ said Andrea. ‘Bomb shelter? The old lady said something about bombs.’

  ‘What old lady?’

  ‘The one Kitty keeps trying to tell you about. The one who lived in this house. She said there were bombs in the war. I think she might have said something about a shelter.’

  ‘That sort of makes sense. These could be World War Two gas masks.’

  ‘Oh, you’d know, would you?’ scoffed Andrea.

  ‘I’ve seen a few documentaries. TV’s not all game shows, you know.’

  Andrea chose to ignore him. She wandered into the alcove, selected another gas mask and tried it on.

  ‘Yuk,’ she said. ‘It smells horrible.’

  ‘Better than nerve gas,’ said David. He sat down on one of the beds, producing a cloud of dust, and picked up the yellowed newspaper on the low table next to it.

  ‘Hey, guess what. There’s an ad here for the first Harry Potter movie.’

  ‘That’s funny.’ Andrea came over to look. ‘See the date? 2005!’

  ‘I don’t get it,’ said David, looking around. ‘The house is supposed to have been empty since the war. So who’s been down here?’

  ‘Whoever it was,’ said Andrea cheerfully, ‘they haven’t been here for a while. Look at all the dust. And they left in a hurry,’ she added. ‘They didn’t even wash up!’ She picked up one of the plates from the table. It had faint smears of an unrecognisable substance.

  ‘Yeah.’ David looked uncomfortable. ‘Did you say something yesterday about men in the house?’

  ‘I reckon they were security guards, doing their rounds. One came down to the cellar with a torch and nearly caught me. And when I got out there was another one upstairs, looking out the window.’

  ‘And you think they saw you?’

  ‘When I was in the cellar the torch went right over my face. I don’t know what he saw. Then when I got outside I just ran. It was pretty dark.’

  ‘We’d better be careful.’

  ‘We’ll just stay away from the front door.’ Andrea wandered around the room. The house and the figure with the torch didn’t seem so scary now that she had company.

  ‘Maybe we’ll keep using the window in the cellar. It’s more out of the way.’ David moved towards the entrance.

  ‘You don’t want to go already, do you?’ asked Andrea, dismayed.

  ‘Well, I’ve got a lot of homework. You can stay if you like.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Andrea. ‘I will.’ She sat down at the table.

  David turned on his torch.

  ‘Don’t use your candles in that shaft, though,’ he said. ‘If you catch fire I won’t be here to save you.’

  ‘Oh. Right.’ Andrea sat doggedly at the table. ‘Bye.’

  ‘Bye.’ David walked past her to the entrance. She sat calmly with her back to him. ‘See you, then.’

  ‘See you.’ She didn’t turn her head. She sat very still for a while, staring into space.

  When she was quite sure David had gone she leaned over and blew out the candles on the table. In the faint light of her own candle, she went as far as she dared back towards the shaft.

  ‘He could have waited,’ she muttered crossly to herself. But at the same time she was glad David had assumed she wasn’t scared of staying underground by herself. At least that showed some sort of respect. Maybe.

  The smell grew stronger as she got closer to the shaft. Her candle flared up, and a shadow loomed menacingly on the wall in front of her. Andrea gasped and shrank back. The shadow shrank too.

  Andrea looked around carefully, then blew out her candle. It was quite dark now, and her heart was pounding. She moved slowly, groping her way out. David had left the trapdoor open, so there was some illumination as she climbed the ladder. Trembling with relief, she scrambled up towards fresh air and freedom.

  MARTIN spotted Andrea eating lunch with Tammy and Michelle. They were sitting on a patch of grass, skirts pushed up to get the maximum amount of sun on their winter-white legs. Shouts and the thump of a ball could be heard from the nearby basketball courts, and the warm breeze brought a whiff of cigarette smoke from a little hollow behind them.

  Andrea’s friends started whispering behind their hands as Martin approached.

  ‘My sister wants you to meet her at the Balmain library,’ he said gruffly.

  ‘Oh, yeah?’ said Michelle, raising an eyebrow.

  ‘If you want to see Andrea, just say so,’ advised Tammy. ‘She won’t bite you.’ Both girls giggled.

  Martin scowled and walked away. Andrea picked up her things and followed him down the steps towards the playing fields.

  ‘I don’t know why I hang out with them,’ Andrea muttered.

  Martin said nothing. It was a mystery to him too. Andrea had told Kitty that she hated Tammy and Michelle, but s
he spent a lot of time laughing and giggling in the school grounds with them, acting as if they were her best friends.

  ‘What’s this about the library?’ asked Andrea.

  She brushed some leaves off a bench and sat down. Martin sat next to her, not too close, and took his lunch out of his bag. A few seniors were kicking a ball around on the grassy oval. Beyond them the Harbour sparkled in the sunlight.

  ‘Kitty wants you to meet her there after school. She thinks they might have old newspapers that’ll tell you when some guy killed himself. I don’t know what that’s got to do with anything. She said it was because of bombs in the war, but that wouldn’t have happened here, in Australia, would it? And why would it make someone kill himself?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Andrea. ‘This old lady of Kitty’s, Miss Gordon, is pretty rambly, but she said there were bombs, and yesterday David and I found this amazing bomb shelter under the house. It’s got food, and blankets, lots of really old stuff, and gas masks!’

  ‘Wow! Any weapons?’

  ‘No, Martin.’

  ‘Anyway,’ said Martin. ‘Doesn’t it show that she and this “What’s the time, Mr Wolf” were both crazy right from the start? They’d have to be, like, paranoid to want a bomb shelter, wouldn’t they?’

  ‘It is weird. I mean, Australia’s never been invaded.’

  ‘Why don’t we ask Miss Tenniel?’ suggested Martin.

  ‘Oh, sure.’

  ‘Yeah, go and ask her. It’s for your assignment, isn’t it?’

  ‘Enough already!’ shouted Andrea. ‘Why is everyone on my back about that stupid assignment?’

  ‘Okay, okay!’ Martin put up his arms as if to fend her off.

  ‘I just want to find out more about the house,’ said Andrea emphatically. ‘The house, right?’

  ‘All right, all right.’

  There was a silence for a while.

  ‘We could still ask Miss Tenniel,’ said Martin hopefully.

  ‘I’m not going to the staffroom. Someone might see me!’ Andrea took a banana out of her bag and started to peel it. ‘You ask Miss Tenniel.’

  ‘Hey, it’s not my assignment!’ said Martin cheekily. Andrea beat him about the head and shoulders with her banana until he pleaded for mercy.

  ‘Now look what you’ve done to my banana!’ she cried.

  ‘I’ll have it. I like them mushy.’

  ‘Oh yuk, Marty!’ She watched him eat it. ‘Anyway, what did you do your assignment on?’

  ‘My great-grandpa. He used to have a farm up past Bathurst, but there was the Depression and a big drought, and he had to go on the wallaby.’

  ‘On the what?’

  ‘You know, being a swagman. I wrote five pages, with footnotes.’

  ‘You don’t have to do that much!’

  ‘My parents get all keen, and they hang around and say “Put this in” and “Put that in”. You don’t know how lucky you are. If I missed doing an assignment I’d be grounded for the rest of my life.’

  ‘Poor you.’ Andrea scuffled her feet on the ground. ‘So when are you going to see Miss Tenniel?’

  ‘What’s it worth?’ grinned Martin.

  ‘I’ve got a bag full of mushy bananas at home.’

  They went to the staffroom together. Andrea stepped back out of sight as Mr Blythe, the head of History, opened the door.

  ‘It’s a boy,’ he said in his lugubrious voice. ‘Go away, Boy.’ He began to close the door.

  Martin could see Miss Tenniel at her desk in a corner. He waved frantically. After a moment she came out, smiling.

  ‘What can I do for you, Martin?’

  ‘I just wanted to ask you something, Miss. About history.’

  ‘Is it more medieval stuff? Knights and castles?’

  ‘Not this time. It’s about – um – World War Two.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Well – our side won, didn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, of course. If you can say anyone ever wins a war.’

  ‘So have we ever been bombed?’

  ‘Oh, no. Well, I mean yes. Darwin was bombed. And Broome.’

  ‘But what about here? Has Sydney ever been bombed?’

  ‘Well – there were some submarines. I think they blew up a ship in the Harbour.’

  ‘They did?’ Martin’s eyes lit up. ‘When was that, Miss?’

  ‘I couldn’t tell you for sure. Let’s see . . . ’ Miss Tenniel’s eyes took on a faraway look. ‘It must have been fairly early. Late forty-one maybe? No, it was after Darwin.’ She put her head back inside the staffroom door and called above the hubbub inside. ‘When were those Japanese mini-subs in the Harbour?’

  Mr Blythe’s voice boomed out: ‘May thirty-first, nineteen forty-two. Send that boy away, Miss Tenniel. Mr King has made some magnificent coffee and I propose that we enjoy it.’

  KITTY marched into the Balmain library and looked around. There were a few pensioners dozing over magazines in the lounge chairs and some older kids clustered around the computers. Kitty checked her watch. She wandered around the shelves for a few minutes, then went outside again and looked up and down the street. Finally she spotted Andrea lurking in the bushes.

  ‘What are you doing there?’ Kitty hissed. ‘Come on, I haven’t got much time.’

  ‘I can’t go in,’ Andrea said sullenly. ‘I’ve lost my card. Anyway, I got some books out once and never brought them back.’

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ said Kitty. ‘You don’t have to borrow. We’re just looking for information.’

  ‘They might recognise me.’

  ‘Course they won’t. You were probably about six the last time you came here.’

  The librarian was deep in conversation with some middle-aged ladies. Kitty waited patiently to be noticed while Andrea pretended to browse at a nearby shelf.

  ‘I was wondering if you keep old newspapers,’ said Kitty.

  ‘How old?’

  ‘I was looking for the local paper, from World War Two?’

  ‘I’m not sure if there was one that long ago.’ She tapped on the computer in front of her for a while. ‘No. There’ve been a few different local papers over the years, but there wasn’t one for this specific area during the war.’

  ‘Oh. Where can we find out about local history, then? Stuff about local families, and . . . and things that might have happened to them?’

  ‘We don’t keep any real source material here. You’d have to go to the main library, at Leichhardt. They might be able to help you.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Kitty was crestfallen. She moved away from the desk.

  ‘See?’ said Andrea. ‘It’s just too complicated.’

  ‘Right, you win. I give up,’ snapped Kitty.

  She walked out of the library and down the street, tears prickling her eyelids. She imagined Andrea stalking off in the opposite direction, but a moment later she felt a hand on her arm.

  ‘Sorry,’ muttered Andrea.

  ‘It’s okay.’

  ‘So,’ said Andrea. ‘We’ll just have to go to Leichhardt, right?’

  ‘It’s not that easy. Mum would never let me.’ She cheered up all the same. Her brain was already at work, weighing up her chances.

  She approached it casually while helping to make dinner.

  ‘Mum, did you know all the local history stuff is in the Leichhardt library now?’

  ‘Well, I suppose that makes sense. It’s kind of central.’ Her mother handed her some tomatoes to cut up.

  ‘There’s some information there I need. You know, for my project.’

  ‘Oh Kitty, I wouldn’t have time to take you to Leichhardt this week. Maybe on Saturday . . . ’

  ‘Mum, I could just get the bus after school. Straight there and straight back.’

  ‘On your own? I don’t think so.’

  ‘If I get into a selective school next year I’ll have to go on the bus.’

  ‘We’ll worry about that when it happens.’

  Kitty slid the tomato pieces i
nto the salad bowl, considering her options. Well, nothing to lose, she thought.

  ‘What if I go with someone else?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Well . . . Andrea?’

  ‘Andrea?’ Her mother nearly dropped the pot she was carrying. ‘Are you still hanging around with her?’

  ‘Mum, you like Andrea, remember?’

  ‘Yes, but Kitty. As she gets older, you know . . . she . . . ’

  Kitty was prepared for this. ‘Mum, she’s not a bad influence on me,’ she said firmly. ‘I’m a good influence on her.’

  ‘All right,’ said her mother, recognising a match point when she saw it. ‘But all the same, you’re not going to Leichhardt on the bus with Andrea or anyone else except me or some other parent, and that is final.’

  KITTY sat at the dining-room table, working on her project. It was just amazing how much information had come out of one little interview. Now that David and Andrea had found the shelter, and Martin had discovered that there really were bombs, she was determined to follow up every single thing Miss Gordon had said. Andrea had better not have given up on the idea of going to Leichhardt. Martin was printing all her photos right now, two copies, and Kitty would have to pay by doing his share of the washing-up for three days.

  She thought of Miss Gordon sitting in her chair at the nursing home, gazing, gazing out over the trees. Did the trees remind her of the view she once had from her own window at Tarcoola?

  Kitty pictured the lovely young woman in the photograph Andrea had found. The mysterious Mr Wolf must have been very much in love with her. And yet he betrayed her: first by marrying her when he already had a wife, then by committing suicide. That was a cruel thing to do. But even when it all came out, after he was dead, Miss Gordon still insisted that she was his wife. Why did she believe in him? He had ruined her whole life.

  Kitty leaned on her elbows and closed her eyes, pressing her fingers to the lids until she could see dancing green spots in the blackness. When someone died, they left a will, and in their will they could give their money to anyone they liked, couldn’t they? It didn’t have to be their family – she knew that much. So even if Mr Wolf had another wife, he could still have made a will leaving everything to Miss Gordon. Why didn’t he?