Morgan's Law (2 page)

‘The pub's your best bet. The rooms are supposed to be okay and the food is pretty good,' said the mechanic. ‘Driven a long way?' he asked.

She nodded. ‘From Sydney.' Then she thought for a moment. ‘I'm wondering if you know a local family out here, the Joneses?'

He looked thoughtful for a moment before shaking his head. ‘Can't say I know of any Joneses.'

‘Seriously? No Joneses?'

‘Nope, not that I know of.'

How could there be no Joneses if her grandmother had wanted her ashes scattered here? Ah well, she'd just have to wait until she got to the pub and could google the White Pages.

As she drove past the front of the pub, she looked up and saw a large canvas banner tied to the verandah rails, high above on the second storey. ‘The Royal' was written in large black letters. ‘Sounds promising,' she murmured with little enthusiasm.

Sarah eased into a dirt car park at the rear of the old pub and lifted her suitcase out of the boot. Then, unclipping the seat belt around the silver urn, she carefully slid it into her oversized handbag and locked the car.

Compared to the rest of the town, the pub was a hive of activity. There was a line of older men perched on stools along the main bar, swapping stories and drinking their beer from tall glasses; a group of younger men were playing pool in an alcove off the main room.

Sarah waited at the end of the bar looking out for a bartender. Instead of the male bartender she'd expected, a young woman rounded the corner, almost spilling the tray of drinks she was carrying as she narrowly avoided colliding with Sarah.

‘Sorry,' said Sarah, her hands automatically reaching out to steady the tray.

‘I'm the one who should be sorry. I didn't see you there. You all right?' the woman asked.

‘I'm fine, I just walked in. Can you tell me how I go about getting a room here?'

‘Just let me deliver this lot and I'll sign you in. Won't be a sec,' said the woman.

While Sarah waited for her to return, she allowed her gaze to roam around the intricate fittings of the old pub, which all seemed to be original and in pretty good nick.

‘Okay, let's get you signed up,' said the young woman, reappearing. ‘How many nights would you like to stay?'

‘Well, I'm not sure yet, maybe just tonight, two at the most.'

The woman pulled out a large ledger and wrote down some details. She looked to be not that much younger than Sarah, with long amber-coloured hair pulled up in a loose bun. After she'd finished writing she slid the pen and ledger towards Sarah. ‘Just fill out your details there, thanks, and I'll take you up and show you your room.'

As Sarah scribbled her signature and jotted down her car rego, she could feel the other woman's curious gaze on her.

‘Great, come on and I'll take you upstairs,' said the woman. ‘I'm Tash by the way.'

Sarah tried to keep up with Tash's chatter as she showed her through the upstairs area of the old pub, but found herself distracted by the sheer atmosphere of the building. You could almost inhale the history of the place.

They came to a stop outside a cream door and Tash slid her key into the lock, pushing the door open and standing back to allow Sarah inside. ‘If you need anything just give me a yell. Bathroom's at the end of the hall, and the dining room is downstairs. Feel free to come down and order dinner whenever you're ready.'

‘Wait,' said Sarah as Tash turned to head back downstairs. ‘The bathroom . . . there's not one inside the room?'

‘No, there's a shared bathroom. Oh, and there's also a community lounge up the other end with a telly, but you can only get one channel, so you're better off coming downstairs to watch the satellite TV.'

‘Really? There's no bathroom in the room?' repeated Sarah, still surprised.

‘No . . . it's a pub,' said Tash lightly, smiling. ‘I have to get back to work, but just yell out if you need anything.'

Sarah braced herself and flicked on the light switch, only to be pleasantly surprised. Instead of the gaudy burnt-orange velour bedspread she'd expected, the bed had a tasteful doona in shades of cream and chocolate, and there were delicate lace curtains draped over timber-shuttered French doors.

Putting her suitcase down, she carefully withdrew the urn from her handbag and sat it on a small antique side table. Crossing the room, she lifted the timber shutters, unlocked the French doors and stepped out onto a wide timber verandah. Stretching, she looked out at the quiet scene below. The few streetlights cast a yellow glow along the dark road. The place probably hadn't changed that much in the last handful of decades, thought Sarah, wondering what connected her gran to this funny little place. It was hard to imagine her out here; her memories of her grandmother were all associated with the city.

Sarah felt a hollowness in her stomach at the thought of her grandmother, who had been the centre of her childhood world, the one steady constant in her young life. Over the past ten years Sarah hadn't spent nearly enough time with her grandmother on her rare trips home to Australia.

Pain and remorse lingered in her heart as she turned away from the railing. Maybe by fulfilling her grandmother's last wish she'd find some healing.

The smell of something mouth-watering drifted up from downstairs and Sarah splashed some water on her face at the small basin in her room before changing into jeans and a T-shirt.

In the dining room there was a surprising number of tables clustered together, almost half of them filled with diners. Feeling a little self-conscious, Sarah followed the lead of the two people in front of her, lining up at a small cash register to order from the blackboard menu.

‘You must be the one staying upstairs,' said the elderly woman manning the cash register. She was eyeing Sarah with open curiosity.

‘I guess that would be me,' Sarah replied, giving the woman what she hoped was a disarming smile.

‘What can I get for ya then?' the woman asked.

Sarah cast a hesitant glance at the blackboard. ‘Is there anything . . . light?'

‘Light?'

‘I'm not a big meat eater usually. Do you have anything without meat?'

‘We've got chips,' said the woman. As if on cue, a plate of fat greasy chips was pushed through the service window and a deep voice yelled, ‘Order ready!'

Sarah could barely recall the last time she'd eaten carbs. ‘Actually, the roast of the day sounds fine,' she said, anxious not to get the woman offside.

The woman's expression eased slightly as she ripped off a ticket with a bright red number on it and handed it to Sarah.

After paying, Sarah went in search of a table, choosing one off to the side of the dining area and trying to project a carefree air, even though she could feel the curious gazes from all around the room.

She was deep in thought when a voice bellowed, ‘Number 34!' causing her to jump up and hurry towards the cash register to claim her meal. Sending an uncertain smile of thanks to the woman she'd ordered her dinner from, she picked up her plate, which had an enormous amount of thickly sliced beef piled onto it.

When she took her first bite she felt her palate explode as the rich gravy and flavoursome beef awoke her slumbering tastebuds. She found herself blinking back tears as she remembered the roast dinners her gran used to cook.

Gran, the one constant in her somewhat turbulent life, had been her anchor. Sarah could still picture her gran humming softly as she pottered around her kitchen providing much more than mere sustenance to a young girl who always felt as though she were an inconvenience in her mother's life.

It wasn't a coincidence that most of Sarah's younger memories centred around her gran. Long before it became the norm for grandparents to babysit their children's offspring, Gran had been the one raising Sarah—maternal instincts had somehow skipped her mother. It wasn't until she was much older that she realised just how lonely her childhood would have been were it not for that gentle woman who stepped in and made her feel so special. How many hours were spent in that little kitchen in her grandmother's house?

Sarah continued to enjoy her meal, savouring the robust flavours she'd denied herself for so long, and before she knew it she'd consumed the entire meal. It had been one of the single most enjoyable dinners she'd had in the last ten years.

Thinking back, Sarah couldn't recall the exact date she'd given up red meat, or carbs for that matter. She'd always loved her food. But, once she moved to London, it was a whole new world. Sarah took notice of the women she worked with: they were elegant and well groomed and the unspoken expectation of the industry she worked in was that you dressed for success. No one was going to swallow the advertising campaign of a frumpy woman who showed no respect for her body or grooming . . . Everything was about the package and, like it or not, if you didn't conform, you didn't belong. It also helped that her job was incredibly stressful; more often than not, she was simply too busy to stop and eat, and too exhausted once she went home to do more than swill a glass of wine and go to bed.

Pushing away her empty plate, Sarah wished for nothing more than to go to bed and sleep for a week. After contracting a serious bout of flu on her return from Gran's funeral, it had taken Sarah longer than normal to bounce back. The virus had completely wiped her out and she was still suffering its effects, sapping her energy and leaving her tired. Today's driving had been a marathon effort, and fatigue had finally caught up with her. With a weary sigh she forced herself to her feet and headed up the staircase to her room.

She was sure she wasn't imagining the lull in conversation as people stopped to watch her leave the room. Was it really so unusual for a stranger to be in town? Even though she was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt somehow she still managed to stand out like a sore thumb. With an unsettling memory of the film
Deliverance
running through her head, she forced herself not to run the rest of the way up the stairs.

Sarah listened to the gentle patter of rain on the tin roof of the verandah outside her room. For all its bluster and noise earlier in the afternoon, the brewing storm had gone around the town, leaving only a light rainfall in its wake.

She loved storms—always had.

As she glanced over at the urn, a smile touched her lips as memories of hot summer afternoons listening to the rumble of thunder on Gran's back verandah flooded her mind.

Sitting cross-legged on the bed, her back propped up against pillows, Sarah carefully unfolded her grandmother's letter and map from her bag. She knew the letter off by heart—she'd been reading and rereading it for the last six months, ever since she'd received it from her grandmother'slawyer following the funeral service and cremation.

I, Eliza Jones, request that upon my death my
beloved granddaughter, Sarah Murphy, take my ashes
to Negallan, a place dear to my heart, and scatter
them beneath the wishing tree on the banks of the
Negallan River. Included are the directions to my
final resting place.

On the roughly drawn map, the river and main road were instantly recognisable but the rest was divided up into different properties and landmarks, their names worn away over time and now illegible.

Tomorrow she would begin searching for the answers she needed. Someone here was bound to know where the wishing tree was located, and maybe after she had fulfilled her grandmother's final request her heavy heart would feel a little lighter.

Two

Sarah awoke to the sound of banging, shouting, honking and a dog barking incessantly.
Doesn't anyone sleep around
here?
she wondered irritably, throwing off her bedcovers and stomping over to the window to see what on earth was going on.

As she pulled the cord to lift the timber louvres, she caught sight of a very large hairy man outside her window. She screamed in surprise and let go of the cord, the crashing back into place. Once her heart had stopped thudding, Sarah reminded herself she must be sharing this pub with a number of people, and clearly the verandah outside her room, like the bathroom, was a communal area.

She had to admit her first experience with the whole shared-bathroom thing last night hadn't been as bad as she'd anticipated. Although old, the shower stalls and separate toilets were spotlessly clean.

Now, pulling on her jeans and T-shirt, she gathered her toiletries and towel and made the trek down the hall again. Halfway to the showers a door opened on her left and Sarah gasped, hugging her towel and makeup bag to her chest protectively, as the big man she'd seen outside her room walked out of the men's toilet, almost colliding with her.

‘Jeez, sorry love. I didn't see you there,' he said.

‘That's okay,' she said, trying not to stare at the tattoos running down his arms. ‘No harm done.'