Sitting here with Jess, Polly felt, as she so often did, the melancholy of time passed and opportunities missed. Her daughter’s childhood features were still visible in the adult face, but only to those who knew where to find them. The wide brows that had made her seem clever, even as an infant; the thoughtful mouth and dimpled chin; the slight tilt of the head when she was concentrating. Polly had spent countless hours memorizing the heart-shaped lines of her daughter’s jaw. A cruel fact of life, that parents and children shared so many fundamental experiences but only one of the pair retained the memories. It was a lonely position to occupy, the sole rememberer.
“What?” Jess had glanced up and caught her staring.
Polly had certainly made some wrong turns—strange how easy the signposts were to see in the rearview mirror—but she had learned long ago that it was pointless to give in to the black temptation of regret. She smiled instead and said only, “Come on, then. Shall we see what’s on the tape?”
32
It was lucky, they were to agree later, that Nora was one of the few people in Sydney to have retained not only her VCR player, but the then-state-of-the-art stereo system she’d purchased in the eighties and had installed, with much fanfare, in the Darling House library. The brushed silver casing contained a cassette deck and two VU meters measuring the output of each massive speaker.
Jess had only been allowed limited access to the special device when she came to live with Nora, and it had therefore retained an air of prestige. Watching the VU needles quiver, backlit in orange, had been a religious experience. Now, she checked which side the tape reel was on and dropped the cassette into the deck. Her finger was trembling slightly as she pressed down the play button.
“Is that thing on?”
Nora’s voice came blaring from the speakers and Jess startled, retracting her finger so quickly that the play button released, and the tape stopped rolling.
Although she’d expected it, hearing Nora speak had been a shock. She sounded so present and yet, at the same time, as if she were a blithe spirit, inhabiting the air of the library after death. It was surreal to realize that the tape had been recorded in this very room.
Where had Nora sat that day? Jess wondered. In her chair by the window? At her desk? And what about Daniel Miller? He’d have had his tape recorder to consider. Had he, perhaps, taken the desk? Or had his aim been to relax his interview subject by removing any impediment, speaking to her in the manner of a confidante?
Polly was waiting patiently for the tape to restart.
With a deep, unsettled breath, Jess pushed play, and as the tape began once more to roll, and a man’s voice said, “It certainly is,” shewent to sit in Nora’s chair and waited to hear what her grandmother would say next.
“Do I need to speak into it?”
“Not at all.” The clarity of Daniel Miller’s warm, American-accented voice suggested that he was closer to the device than Nora. “In fact, it tends to work out best if you forget that I’m recording. Just talk to me and ignore the machine entirely.”
What followed was a pleasant interview, sad at times, between two people whose bond had been forged through having known one another during the progress of a harrowing event. The barrier that might have been expected to exist between journalist and subject was bridged, and although they had not seen one another in twenty-odd years, their conversation flowed, with evidence in the pauses and shorthand, from a place of shared knowledge and experience.
Nora wept when talk turned to the recent discovery of Thea Turner’s remains, and Daniel Miller could be heard consoling her before their discussion continued.
“It’s just been such a long time,” she said at last. “I had come to believe they’d never find her.”
“It must be a relief, of sorts, that she can now be laid to rest?”
“Of sorts,” Nora allowed. “But it does rather bring it all back.”
“Have you been sleeping?” His voice was gentle, concerned.
“Barely.”
“Will she be buried in Tambilla?”
“I don’t—my brother will make those decisions.”
“Have you spoken with him?”
“Briefly.”
“Does Polly know?”
“No. No, I don’t speak to her about such things. What good would it do her to have such horrors in her mind?”
“She knows about Halcyon, though?”
“She knows enough.”
“She must be twenty now.”
