Table of Contents

  Mysteries

  Books by this Author

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1 – Jim – Discoveries

  Chapter 2 – Jim – Remembrance

  Chapter 3 – Mick – Long Time Past

  Chapter 4 – Jim – Ghosts of the Past

  Chapter 5 – Mick– My House

  Chapter 6 – Jim – Meeting Cindy

  Chapter 7 – Jim – Looking, Looking

  Chapter 8 – Jim – Far Away

  Chapter 9 – Jim – New Life in the West

  Chapter 10 – Jim – New Passion

  Chapter 11 – Jim – Iron Mountains

  Chapter 12 – Jim – The Rock Fall

  Chapter 13 – Jim – Return

  Chapter 14 – Kate – New Family

  Chapter 15 – Mick – Back from the Future

  Chapter 16 – Kate – My Long Lost Mother

  Chapter 17 – Mick – Way Back When

  Chapter 18 – Kate – Marks in the Stone

  Chapter 19 – Jim – The Cellar

  Chapter 20 – Kate- Meeting Lulu

  Chapter 21 – Jim- What Lies Buried

  Chapter 22 – Kate – Finding Jo

  Chapter 23 – Jim – Jo’s Story

  Chapter 24 – Jim – Elusive Cindy

  Chapter 25 – Jo – Requiem Cindy

  Chapter 26 – Kate – Losing and Searching

  Chapter 27 – Jim – A Starting Place

  Chapter 28 – Jim – Place of my Birth

  Chapter 29 – Kate – Uncovering Treasures

  Chapter 30 – Marti – Story of a Basement

  Chapter 31 – Mick – The Returning-1832

  Chapter 32 – Kate – Michael O’Flaherty?

  Chapter 33 – Jo – Irish Connection

  Chapter 34 – Jo- Michael’s Story

  Chapter 35 – Jo – American Connection

  Chapter 36 – Jim – The Finding of Nothing

  Chapter 37 – Marti – To Buy a House

  Chapter 38 – Josephine – Alaska

  Chapter 39 – Kate – My Home

  Chapter 40 – Jim - A Buried Story

  Chapter 41 – Jim - Story of My Mother

  Chapter 42 – Kate – Filling the Gaps

  About the Author

  MYSTERIES

  Graham Wilson

  Copyright

  Mysteries

  Graham Wilson

  Copyright Graham Wilson 2020

  ISBN 9780648311225

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without prior approval of the author.

  For permission to use contact Graham Wilson by email at grahambbbooks@gmail.com

  Books by this Author

  Arnhem’s Kaleidoscope Children – A Memoir

  Risk Free – A Novel

  Mysteries – A Novel

  Old Balmain House Series

  Little Lost Girl – Book 1

  Lizzie’s Tale – Book 2

  Devil’s Choice – Book 3

  Crocodile Dreaming Series

  Main Series

  An English Visitor – Book 1

  Crocodile Man – Book 2

  Girl in an Empty Cage – Book 3

  Lost Girl Diary – Book 4

  Dance of Shadows – Book 5

  Prequel

  Part 1: Return of the Breaker– Book 6

  Part 2: Whirlwind – Book 7

  Acknowledgements

  Thank you to Nada Backovic for cover design.

  This book began as a short story of the same name that I published through a writing group within the Sydney School of Arts and Humanities. In writing this story I envisaged a much larger story behind it waiting to be told. Thank you to other members of this group for their advice on both that short story and on my early versions of this larger story.

  Also thank you to many readers who have given input on earlier drafts.

  A print version will be published in in 2021 following further reader input and revision. If you have suggestions for refinement to this story please contact me by email at grahambbbooks@gmail.com

  Chapter 1 – Jim – Discoveries

  I live in an old house – well at least it’s old for Australia. I think it was built in the early 1800s, at a time when those who came on the first fleet were not yet old. Perhaps it should be listed on the national estate, but it’s not grand or in any way remarkable. So it seems to have been forgotten about by time.

  It sits in an obscure Sydney suburb, not one of the well to do early locations like Balmain, Glebe, Paddington or the Rocks. It occupies a gap between two old railway lines running west of the city, all alone in a no-man’s land between Newtown and Redfern. It looks like the railway builders knocked down all the other houses around it when they built these lines. Somehow this one was forgotten. Perhaps a railwayman lived here once to work the signals, if so nobody remembers his story now.

  I have searched local libraries, old railway records and many other places, wherever I can think of. But I’ve found nothing. Nobody seems to have bothered to tell its story.

  I know it’s old because it’s built of sandstone blocks, one’s that look as if they were convict hand-cut, chisel marks still sharp, held together with sea-shell mortar. The roof is slate, except for a front porch with timber shingles, ones which leak when it rains.

  It’s a house of only two rooms, a main room with a front and back door and a small room alongside it, entered from the main room. I use the small room for my bedroom. The main room serves as office, living and dining room. An outbuilding provides my toilet, bathroom and laundry. It has an old copper boiling tub and a cast iron bath. I think this part was built at a later time.

  I have lived here now for thirty years. The house’s title was of dubious provenance, so I bought it for a low price. The real estate agent told me it was a leftover of long deceased estate. It gathered little interest due to its poor location wedged between the railway lines, decrepit and unused. To this day not even lost druggies come here, only mice, weeds and windblown bags find it a worthwhile stopping place.

  When I bought it I had just returned from five hard years of working in outback mines. I carried a pocket full of cash which the tax office had no business knowing about. I was tired of being homeless so I decided I needed a place of my own, somewhere to call home.

  The real estate man had this freehold title, unencumbered, for an ancient tiny house on a wedge shaped block. The land was six metres wide at front, twelve metres deep, the backyard wedged between two diverging railway tracks, both lines long unused and kept apart by two rusty high wire fences. I did not want to share my house title with any bank and this was all I could afford.

  So I paid cash and the man handed the title over to me.

  I have lived here since. The title dates from 1933, depression era, though the house is clearly much older. A friend, knowledgeable in old houses, told me its construction features suggest a build date around 1820, but who is to really know without some actual history.

  The house was not flash when I bought it. Thirty years of neglect have not improved it. But it was all I needed then and it still suits my purpose. At odd times, since, I thought it deserved a facelift. But I never had any spare cash. We both seemed happy to let our lives drift along the way they’d always been.

  Then a great aunt up and died, older sister to my mother. I’d never met her but, when I was about eight, she’d sent my mother a letter. In return my mother sent her a photo of us together. Somehow this aunt remembered me in her will from all those decades past and a cheque for fifty three thousand dollars drifted into my bank account.

  I decided that using it to do work on the house was a good option.

  I knew it would not go far paying builders, but I’m still handy, if getting long in the tooth. So I will use it to pay for good quality materials and do the building work myself. Its not that I plan on pulling off the roof or other big dramatic fix ups like that. Rather I will strip out the old fittings and put in modern replacements.

  Perhaps I will also create a private back yard within a walled off garden – I like the idea of growing flowers. It’s something my mother did, a distant image of faded fond remembrance. I have a need to put some fresh daily beauty into my life. It’s become a sterile place with only the shells of empty memories in residence.

  It’s not as if I have neighbours who care if my house changes, the nearest are on the other side of abandoned railway sheds that line the road in to my house. It’s a dead end road that almost nobody ever comes along.

  Who am I?

  I guess you’ve gathered I am a pretty antisocial.

  You may well be right.

  As the years have passed I’ve grown mostly comfortable in my own skin. I work odd jobs; just a day here and there, enough to live on and pay the bills. I mostly read old books, a mix of history and mystery. These transport my mind to other places. I have a few mates who I share a drink with from time to time. We meet at a pub, our private lives are left at the door. It’s not a bad life though it seems to have become bleak with the passing years.

  Until just after I turned sixteen, I lived in a little town out in the back of beyond, a place in the far north-west of the state. Then my mother got sick and died. My father was long gone and there was no one else.

  So I came to Sydney to seek fame and fortune, both proving elusive.

  Instead I met a girl, Cindy, out on her own like me, another teenager.

  For a year we lived together
in a one room squat in Woolloomooloo. Along the way we had a baby, a tiny thing who we called Emily.

  To help us get ahead I took a job over the mountains for a month. I left Cindy with all the money I had, two hundred and twenty dollars. It was just enough to pay the thirty dollar weekly rent for the room and leave a bit for food. Cindy assured me she would be fine. I left with all her loving kisses and a pocketful of dreams. I came back with a thousand dollars in my pocket.

  But of my girlfriend or baby there was no sign, our squat vacated.

  A few of Cindy’s things were thrown in the street, mouldering in a pile. Another man and woman, unknown, were now living in our place. They knew nothing; the other few people I knew from around there also knew nothing. All the landlord could say was that, a week after I left town, Cindy and Emily had gone too. When the rent fell due it was not paid. So he gave our place to another, they were always plenty in need of such spaces.

  I searched for a long month, going all over this part of the city, looking in all the places I could think of. But there was nothing to give a clue. Then my money was gone and I had to leave and find more work.

  So I went west to the mines where I made plenty of money. I had hoped to come back and look some more for Cindy and Emily. But there was really no point, gone is gone, and five years is a lifetime of empty absence.

  There was another special woman for a while who came to stay, but one day she went away too and never came again. She told me she’d grown tired of a candle of loss for another burning in my heart and that I needed to move on. She was the one who told me how old this house is.

  Now, at odd times, I pay for a woman of the night to relieve that part of my needs. I visit them at their own places rather than invite them here. For the rest of the time it’s just me, in my home, alone. I’ve grown well used to it. I feel I have moved past the ability or need to change.

  Anyway it’s time to get to work. My furniture is minimal, so I move it to the back yard and cover it with a canvas tarp to protect it from the weather.

  I will live in the outhouse, with my kettle, microwave and bedroll on the floor, along with my chair and book for company, until the work is finished.

  The house floor is covered in flagstones, old rectangular slabs of sandstone, worn smooth over time. Between them is a mix of sand and dirt with odd remnants of mortar, they are cold and damp underfoot in winter. I decide they must come up to put a dry layer beneath. I photograph them in position then number each stone so that I can recreate the sequence when it’s time to put them back.

  I begin in the living room corner furthest from the back door, carefully lifting each flagstone free and stacking them outside. It’s slow heavy work and takes two long days until all are lifted and removed. What lies below is interesting but unremarkable, the odd English coin or scrap of another distant past hidden amongst the rubble, but there’s nothing buried here to fire my imagination.

  I move into the bedroom and continue the removal. At first it goes the same, but half way done I find another block of stone sitting below the block I have lifted. This block is different. It’s square cut and smooth, about two feet each way. I scratch my head and push on. Now I find this is a new pattern, the old flagstones sit on top of a second layer of stones; these are all cut regular and square to the same size. I don’t know what it is but I’m intrigued.

  I remove the rest of the flagstones, brush away the loose dirt and look closely. These stones cover one half of the bedroom floor. They are all the same, looking fresh cut, untarnished by use.

  I try to lift one free. It’s jammed tight, as if somebody has mortared it in place.

  I take a picture on my phone, thinking, This is my house’s own mystery. Perhaps someone else will know what it means.

  It’s getting late and it’s Sunday night. Tomorrow I’m working in the local lumber yard. I go to the pub to drink a few knots out of my muscles.

  I tell my mates of my discovery. They look closely at my phone pictures.

  One of them, an old house buff, says, “You need to let the State Heritage mob know about this. It could be an old grave or buried treasure. They will fine you millions if you dig it up without permission.”

  I’m not a lover of government telling me what to do. But he has a point. I don’t want to lift these stones only to find a mob of buried bones. Of course treasure’s another matter, but that’s the stuff of fairy stories, the kind which only happen to somebody else first sprinkled in magic dust.

  So, next day, I ring up the Heritage Office and tell them a bit about my discovery. The person on the phone seems only half interested, as if to say, who is interested in a bloody pile of old rocks. She says something about needing an archaeological investigation. I can see all my money fast running down the plughole as a rich dirt digger, one with some fancy degree, gets even richer.

  I say to her, “Well, I might as well get to work myself and dig it up, see what I find, perhaps pirate treasure or a body is buried underneath.”

  This gets her interest and she says, “Wait a minute, I will put you through to a Heritage Officer.”

  A friendly female voice comes on the line. “Kate here, how can I help?”

  I give her the potted version.

  I can tell from her voice she’s intrigued. “How old did you say the house is?”

  “The title deeds are from 1933 but a friend in the know says much older, maybe 1820. Despite my best endeavours to find out it seems nobody knows.”

  She replies, “I would love to have a look. Is it possible to arrange a visit?”

  I can feel this getting out of hand and want to run a mile. She has no details to let her find me if I hang up now. But there’s a sibilance to her voice that will not let me go, it’s a sound from another time and place, it holds a long distant familiarity.

  So, despite my better judgement, I give Kate a time and place, two days hence, at the nearest pub on the corner in Newtown. She asks for the house’s address.

  I tell her, “The streets don’t make much sense, it’s hard to find, it will be easiest if I bring you and show you.”

  I think I can back out if needs must.

  In turn I hear reticence in her voice, “What you propose is outside of normal procedure,” she says.

  But she agrees, despite whatever her reservations.

  I like that part of her.

  A magnet pulls me towards her. Perhaps she feels it too.

  I don’t know what to expect when I meet her. When I see her from behind I instantly know it’s her.

  She has brown hair and a trim figure, a woman in her thirties. She pushes hair back from her ear, a mannerism redolent with old familiarity, as if I’ve seen it before. But the face that greets me is unknown. It’s not one I remember from another place or time, though I like her smile.

  She’s sitting on a bar stool in the pub. I propose we have a drink while she tells me about her heritage role and, in return, I’ll tell her about the house, before I take her and show her what I have found.

  She acquiesces though I can tell she is impatient to see it, not talk. I drink a schooner of beer while she sips her lemon lime and bitters. I begin by telling her about my purchase of the house and its dubious title, then of my inheritance of enough money to do a limited fix up. I say how I recorded the flagstones in their pattern before I begun to dig up the floor.

  She nods, “It is good you have done that, having a record of the past is always important.”

  I ask her about the rules before I go further, but she fobs me off saying, “Let’s have a look first.”

  So, to pass the time until I finish my drink, I ask her about herself and what led her to do this work.

  I expect some meaningless answer, but she turns to me and says, “I think it is about trying to find the past I am missing. I was adopted and my parents are wonderful. But part of me wants to discover the past I never knew. The nearest I can get to this is to study old things from the early history of this town, old houses, old stories, things that happened before I was born. I know it is not my past but it’s a way of me being connected to what came before, to build a story of a past that I can put myself inside.

  I nod, unsure how to respond. So I finish my drink.

  I suggest she follows me in her car, to see what I have found. In five minutes we’re there.