That afternoon, Charlie lay in bed, trying to clear her mind and relax her body to enter the Dream. Every time she managed to relax one part of her body, though, her mind wandered. Questions were swirling in her head, all leading back to the Grey and to the fear he sparked in her. She was pretty sure it was a “he.” As her thoughts strayed, she always ended up in the same place: I want to talk to Tess.
She sat up in frustration, deciding today wasn’t the day she could find the calm she required to enter the Dream. She grabbed her phone from the bedside table and dialled Tess. The last time she’d had a proper conversation with Tess had been when they were last together, in this house. Since then, life had been so busy on both ends that their conversations had been fleeting. Tess hadn’t had the time to fully invest in Charlie’s odd, crazy life. And Charlie hadn’t had the time to properly console Tess over Leon’s engagement.
Evidently, Tess was already home from work and answered the call quickly. “Bonjour, darling. How are you? Not smited yet?”
The familiar words and warmth flooded Charlie from her heart to all her extremities. She leant back against her pillow, a contented sigh leaving her, along with a lot of her stress “Hello, Tess.” Charlie smiled before they launched into the deepest, warmest conversation they’d had in days. Tess told Charlie all about her fight with Leon after the engagement, her promise to try to reconcile, her realisation that perhaps she was holding on too tightly. Charlie told Tess all about her adventures with Trent, her conversations with Maryanne, and her latest encounter with the Grey.
“It all sounds too fantastic to be real, doesn’t it?” Charlie asked, finally finished recounting everything in more detail than she herself had yet had time to ponder. “The Waiting Place — a purgatory — where souls who aren’t ready to move on can wait, dipping in and out of our reality without being bound by the confines of time.”
“There’s a beauty to it too though, non? And I understand. Death is the biggest change of them all — it’s scary, it’s hard to accept. It’s almost comforting to believe that no matter what the afterlife is, if you’re not ready, there’s a place to wait until you are. To process everything that’s happened to you. Where you can still have some contact with the people — the places — that mattered most to you. And if time doesn’t matter after death, perhaps there is no separation from your loved ones. I’ve always liked to believe that when I die, everyone I’ve ever loved will instantly be with me. Even Leon — even after he lives a full life. Hopefully with some grandchildren who’ll take after me and not her…”
Charlie laughed before sipping the tea she’d made herself partway through the conversation. Her phone was now on charge on loudspeaker too; she was grateful the initial issues with her satellite uplink had finally resolved themselves. “That’s just how Maryanne described it to me. Even she said she doesn’t know what happens after death. That no one can really know until it happens to them. She insinuated that I know — or at least I will know — more than she can. It’s a lot to process, but it’s a lot easier to process with you. Thank you, Tess. Really.”
“Pah.” Tess dismissed Charlie’s affection. “You know it’s not a chore for me, ma chère. Now let’s talk about this grey man. This Grey. Who do you think he is?”
“That’s the question going round and round in my head. I have a strong feeling it’s a man. I don’t know how to explain it, but the last couple of times he’s visited me it’s become clearer. Hang on…” Charlie picked up her cell phone and flicked to the gallery. She selected a few of the photos of the ruins where the eyes were most prominent and messaged them to Tess. “I just sent you some photos. They’re of the stockmen’s quarters. I think the camera mucked up because of the Grey. I believe it’s connected to these ruins somehow. Either a stockman or maybe the overseer himself.”
Tess made the appropriate surprised noises as she scrolled through. “That makes sense,” she said after investigating the photos. “And it’s probably the Grey that keeps opening your front door — or trying to. And that’s where you told it to fuck off, right? I’m proud of you for doing that by the way!”
“I think being a bit drunk helped.” Charlie laughed. “Trent said he’d try to find out more about the ruins, so hopefully that’ll be a good starting point. Whoever it was, they must have died scared or in pain. Or both. It’s Wednesday tomorrow… I’ll pop into the library and talk to him.”
“I can’t believe we’ve been talking for hours,” Tess said. “I should start getting dinner ready. Leon and Ella will be home soon.”
Charlie gasped mockingly. “You named the girlfriend!”
“Yes, well. She’s the fiancée now. And this is me trying.”
“I’m proud of you,” Charlie said. “Okay, I’ll let you go. Thank you for this.”
“And no more ghost hunting today, okay?” Tess said firmly. “Go sew some culottes or something.”
Charlie laughed for what felt like the thousandth time during the call. “I’ll see if my hand is up for it. I love you forever, Thérèse.”
“Je t’aimerai pour toujours, Charlotte.”
Charlie pulled up in front of the library. She hadn’t needed much time at the post office that morning. Sales had dipped a little with her being offline and not adding new stock; she’d made a mental note to try to remedy that. She was now also on a first-name basis with the grocer, Emmett, who’d told her to send him a message when she was on her way from the library. This meant time wasn’t such a limitation today. She felt a thrill of satisfaction with herself for finally starting to integrate into this little town. She almost had a spring in her step as she strode up to the library.
Trent was at his usual spot at the front desk. His eyes lit up when he saw her. The night before, she’d sent him a message to check he’d be at work, so he knew she was coming this time. “Charlie!” he said excitedly. “You’re going to gush when you see what I’ve found. Wanna grab a coffee, honey? We can talk about it over cake.”
A familiar bubble of anxiety and fear popped up in Charlie at the thought of going to a café, especially without her gloves and mask, but the familiarity she was gaining with the town gave her the small confidence boost she needed. “As long as we can sit outside and you word up the owner again, that sounds great.”
In no time at all, Charlie and Trent were sitting at a small table out front, a soup-mug-size coffee in front of each of them. The café was named a very unimaginative ‘Greenfields Café’. Though Trent had informed her all the locals simply called it “Dot’s” anyway, after the owner. Unfortunately there was no guarantee the selection of cakes didn’t have trace nuts, so Trent had abstained in sympathy. “You can get cake if you want to,” Charlie tried again. “As long as you don’t spit it in my mouth, we’ll be okay!”
“Trust me, this is a good thing. Brent will thank you. He’s been complaining I’m getting pudgy.” He pulled his satchel onto his lap and removed a small sheaf of papers. “Get ready to gush! I found the records for your property all the way back to 1880! That’s when the stockmen’s quarters and overseer’s cottage were first built.” He extracted photocopies of handwritten notes that she couldn’t decipher. Handwriting had certainly changed a lot in the last hundred or so years.
“That’s amazing!” Charlie patted his shoulder affectionately as she looked over the papers. “But you’ll have to decipher all this for me, I have no idea what I’m looking at.”
“Henry James Thomson,” Trent said, tapping the piece of paper. “He acquired the property in 1880 and constructed the overseer’s cottage, kitchen, outhouse, stockmen’s quarters, and wool shed. There should also be stables somewhere on the property. At the time, the overseer’s cottage was his cottage. He had three full-time stockmen living at the station and working for him, including two First Nations people. Someone whose name is recorded as Jacob Smith — though I wonder if that was his real name — and someone called —”
“Kapiri,” Charlie whispered, only the hint of a question in her tone.
Trent looked at her with surprise and question. “Ye-yeah…” he said slowly. “How did you know?”
“Spooky stuff.” Charlie dismissed the question with a wave of her hand. “His wife was Alice, right?”
“That I can’t say,” Trent answered. “I only found the names of the men who worked the station, though they often had their wives and children living with them, and the cottages certainly would’ve been big enough for small families. Seriously, though, how did you know about Kapiri?”
“Promise you won’t refer me to any more psychologists?” Charlie joked, but it obviously cut deep, as Trent grimaced and slumped his shoulders. “Sorry, I didn’t mean anything by it. I was teasing… Well, it’ll sound a bit weird, but I’ve been having dreams about the cottage and about the people who used to live there. Kapiri was in one of the dreams.”
Trent’s mouth dropped open. “Now that is spooky. If I hadn’t experienced what I did at your place, I wouldn’t have believed it. Surreal.”
“Who was the third stockman?” Charlie asked, tapping the papers and bringing Trent’s attention back.
“John Garrett,” Trent said after a moment.
“I think the grey man is someone who lived at the stockmen’s quarters,” Charlie said. “Maybe even died there. Not of natural causes too, probably a nasty death. Which is why he turns up when there’s fear or pain.”
“Are you saying I was scared at your place?” Trent mocked.
“Yep!” Charlie laughed, then took a slurp of coffee. At that moment, the café’s owner, Dorothy — Dot for short — bustled out with a small stack of pancakes. She wore a well-made brightly coloured dress, garishly paired with a multi-patterned apron.
“I’m going to get some nut-free options here soon, darl.” She smiled as she plopped the pancakes down. “In the meantime, enjoy these, on the house. I was so sorry to hear about your hospital stay recently.” The whole town seemed to have heard about it. “I do hope you’ve fully recovered.” Dot was about a decade older than Charlie, greying at the temples, and nicely rotund around the middle.
“That’s so sweet of you!” Charlie said, feeling the homeliness click even more. “You didn’t have to, but I really appreciate it. Thank you.”
“Just don’t let him eat all of it,” Dot said, motioning at Trent with her thumb.
He threw his hands up in faux defence as Dot walked away. “Want me to cut that up for you?” Trent asked, motioning to Charlie’s hand.
“Nah, I got this today.” She halved the pancakes and made a start on them. Dot really was a fantastic cook.
“Do you know if any of these guys died at the property?” Charlie asked around a mouthful.
Trent shook his head. “Not yet. But I can find out. I can tell you who didn’t die at the property, though.” Charlie raised her eyebrows. “Henry Thomson. He died in 1901 during the Second Boer War, in South Africa. He went off to serve his country and never came home. I don’t know how he enlisted – he would have been 37 years old when the war started. Anyway, that’s when the property became vacant and presumably went up for sale. The Evans Family bought it in 1922 and the cottage was constructed by the mid-twenties, as you already know. It must have stood empty all those years in-between. I can’t find any record of what happened between Henry’s death in 1901 and the Evans Family purchasing it in 1922.”
“We know Kapiri stuck around…” Charlie mused, finishing off her coffee.
“Maybe he even kept the place going when Henry was away and before the Evans family bought the place,” Trent thought aloud.
“What about the others? What were their names again?”
“Jacob and John. Jacob most certainly did stay on — but not John. Looks like Billy Evans had a few stockmen come and go over the years. He never had more than four at a time, though.”
Charlie thought back to the Dream — there had been at least six men. “That’s not right… There were more than that in my dream.”
“Probably swagmen or temporary labourers.” Trent shrugged. Having already finished his half of the pancakes, he leant back in his chair contentedly. “It wasn’t uncommon for extra hands to come on board when it was shearing time. And swagmen would have been pretty common during the thirties. Even if it was just menial labour in return for meals.”
Charlie sighed. “This is feeling more and more like a needle-in-a-haystack situation!”
“Don’t worry.” Trent patted her hand. “I’m on the case. I’ll see what I can dig up.”