The House of One Room

By Mats Halvard

After her father dies suddenly, fourteen year old Anna Nelson escapes to the wilds of Tasmania to be with her godfather, the enigmatic zoologist Peter Bamford.
Pete has a secret project in the forest beyond his lonely cabin, but he won’t tell her what it is. Only when he too disappears, leaving Anna alone, does she realise just how important and fragile her godfather’s work really is.
With the competing forces of tourism, logging and international smuggling closing in, she must find a way to save the forest before it’s too late.
There’s only one chance, but to take it will risk everything...
Set in the beautiful and austere landscape of western Tasmania, Mats Halvard’s debut novel is a moving and magical story of courage and love, of loss and life regained, and of how one person really can make a difference.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Eyelevel Books
• Release date: Mar 1, 2016
• ISBN: 9781311390226

Mats Halvard

Mats Halvard was born in Norway in 1969. After working briefly in the nuclear industry, he retreated into the wilds and has spent much of the last twenty years living off the land in numerous countries in the sub-artic regions, including northern Canada, Siberia and Greenland. A passionate conservationist, he has studied the survival methods of indigenous peoples and their unique relationship with their environment and wildlife. He still lives entirely off the grid, having no computer or mobile phone, and is often out of touch with the outside world for months at a time. 'The House of One Room' is his first novel.

Book preview

Chapter One

A light drizzle smeared the window, trickling like yellow tears where street lights caught in the aimless lines of water. He stood in the doorway for a moment, watching her sleep.

Beside her the clock read 2.32.

The floorboards creaked as he crossed to the bed but she did not stir. He gently stroked the hair from her face and kissed her good night. Tonight was for her as much as for anyone else… to make her world a better place.

He crept back across the room and away.

For the next hour he would be the Ghost again, the inside man, chosen because he knew people, knew his way around. Theirs was a tight-knit cell, part of an organisation that dealt with an old-fashioned kind of morality, the kind that fought hard and dirty for those who had no voice of their own.

No one listened when the monkeys screamed in the labs or the lambs were led to slaughter, so he made them listen.

He retrieved the small rucksack from its hiding place in the laundry and stepped out into the night.

The road down to the university was quiet except for the creak of the rucksack and the drip-drip of drizzle from the hedges and street signs. He breathed in the cold April air, glad that even in a city this size there were still times when the night fell silent, returned for a while to the owls and urban foxes.

Senate House loomed dark and brooding in the distance. Beyond it, strung out along Medway Avenue, lay the Medical Faculty, the Vet School and the blank, anonymous-looking building that housed the vivisection labs. The Medical Faculty was to have been his destination, but it was too risky. For years the university had been expecting something along Medway Avenue, and the place was crawling with guards. So they had switched their attention to the admin building, Senate House.

Wiping rain from his face, he hitched the rucksack higher. The sharp outline of the bomb nestled between his shoulder blades.

* * *

Wolf was waiting in the smoking shelter beside Senate House when he arrived.

‘Got it?’ Wolf said.

The Ghost nodded at the red pack on his shoulder.

‘Then let’s do it.’ He flicked the browning stub of his roll-up into the flower bed and cracked his knuckles.

The two men slipped on their monkey masks – a joke for the police when they examined the CCTV tapes later in the day – and made their way to the back of the building. With a final look along the road, the Ghost tapped on the glass door.

A security guard appeared in the shadows along the corridor and gave a hesitant thumbs-up. His involvement was strictly behind the scenes, nothing hands-on. His job was to arrange a small electrical incident in the basement so that the alarms would be temporarily disabled. He and his two fellow guards would have an excuse to be out of the way – sorting the problem out – for the next half hour.

The guard melted back into the gloom.

Just as planned.

Wolf dug the tip of the crowbar into the edge of the door and jemmied it open. The two men entered the building. In near total darkness they slipped along the corridor to the back stairs. On the turn of the stair-well, a tiny red light blinked at them. Beneath it, a camera swiveled silently, tracking them as they made their way towards their target.

On the top floor Wolf smashed the window and turned the lock admitting them to the Medical Faculty admin room. Here in admin no one would be hurt; their point could be made without casualties.

That detail had always been most important: no one gets hurt, no collateral damage. Once people started dying, the cause was lost. The Ghost had been schooled in old-style protest where the greatest weapon was public opinion. Shoot up a concert hall or bomb a nightclub and the world cares about the victims, not the message.

In the dancing beams of torches he opened the bag and gently pulled out the six pound bomb.

With the pencil torch between his teeth he fitted the detonator and set the timer. Two and a half minutes would be plenty. Any more and the alarm fault might be picked up by Central Control. Any less and they risked not being far enough away to avoid the blast or the mayhem that followed.

He slipped the bomb under the desk. The timer was already ticking down. For a moment he watched it, the whole world poised on the edge of something new, something that would wake them all up.

‘What?’ Wolf whispered. ‘You waitin’ to see if it’ll work?’

‘It’ll work,’ he replied.

‘Then let’s get the hell out of here!’

And that was that. Months of planning, weeks of building and testing, and their moment had come. Every detail had played out exactly as planned.

Every detail but one.

As they reached the ground floor, the scream of police sirens split the night. Tyres screeched along Tynwall Avenue, heading straight for them.

‘It’s the pigs!’ shouted Wolf. ‘Move!’

‘We’ve got to abort. No one gets hurt, remember?’

‘Then they shouldn’t be here, should they? Should have kept their snouts out of it! Come on!’

Wolf wrenched the door open and ran out into the night. The Ghost glanced at his watch… seventy seconds. There was time. The police were no part of this.

Ripping off the monkey mask, he sprinted back up the stairs. From a window at the top of the stairs he glanced down at the car park. The police were already running out cordons around the building, and at least five officers were strapping on kevlar vests and helmets.

He ran.

He slammed the light switch as he passed and the office was flooded with blinding light. He winced, tripped over the outstretched legs of a chair and stumbled, cracking his head against the corner of a filing cabinet. He lay dazed for a moment, then dragged himself forwards. Below him feet pounded along the corridors.

Blinking blood from his left eye he crawled to the bomb and carefully pulled it out from beneath the desk. Twenty-four seconds. Heavy boots mounted the stairs.

He pulled at the wire connecting the timer to the detonator. There was time yet to be careful. The door behind him slammed open against the wall.

‘Freeze! Police!’

‘Get out!’ he shouted without looking back. ‘There’s a bomb. Get out of here.’

Again he pulled at the wire but it would not give. He had to get it free. Removing the detonator from the bomb was not enough – it alone had enough power to take his arm off if it was not disabled. He had to stop the timer.

‘Put your hands where I can see them!’

Fifteen seconds.

‘Go!’ he screamed. ‘Get out, now!’

Several sets of feet began to retreat, but he felt a presence closing in on him.

‘Hey, I know you...’ a voice said.

His heart skipped a beat. Something in that voice, something familiar…

Ten.

For an instant, he could not pin down the memory, then it hit him. He did know the man who was standing behind him… a man just like himself, with a family asleep at home, waiting… He had a daughter, maybe an older son? In blind panic now, only the face of his own daughter came and he knew the price was too high. If he could not disable the bomb now…

Six…

‘Get out!’ He flailed at the unseen figure, trying to push him back.

Four…

Yes. He knew the man he was about to kill.

Three…

One chance, or everything changes….

Two…

He gripped the wire and yanked with all his strength.

* * *

Wolf stopped as the percussive wave shattered the night. He watched the top floor of Senate House erupt into a ball of fire, spewing glass and concrete into the night. He would later hear that the object he saw ejected from the far window was the body of a policeman who had been to slow or too stupid to heed the warnings and retreat.

Not what they had planned, but it was only a pig after all.

Flames licked up the sides of the building and alarms pierced the peaceful slumber of the university precincts.

Their point had been made.

* * *

A mile away Anna woke suddenly. There had been a noise, a loud low rumble. There were sirens now, and the gentle patter of rain on the window. But there had been something else too… before.

She gripped the edge of the bed and turned towards the window and the dull orange glow in the distance. She almost called out to her father, but the images from the dream continued to play in her mind.

A shape in the night, hovering above her. The hunter had been here again, circling, closer.

She’d tried to hide,

– stay still –

but it had found her. (Just before that noise.)

It knew where she was. Now it knew where she was.

Icy fear stabbed through her and this time she did call out.

‘Dad!’ she screamed, but the word was swallowed by the night. The house was silent. Dad had always been there before. He’d chased the monsters away, but this time there was no reply.

There would never be a reply.

It was April the twelfth. Everything had changed.

Chapter Two

‘Will you come and do this washing up?’

‘In a minute!’

‘Now, Anna! Sophie wants to make up the bottles….’

Anna didn’t reply. Her brother could come and drag her downstairs if he felt that strongly about it.

‘You come first,’ she said, lifting the guinea pig out of his run and putting him on the bed. Dante looked bemused for a moment, then began to wander aimlessly around the duvet.

Anna rolled up the newspaper and hay and swept the last of the stray bits onto the floor. Dom had no say in the state of her bedroom and she was going to make the most of it, even if it did mean getting guinea pig pooh stuck to her socks now and then. Her brother had contrived to control every other aspect of her life, but within these walls Anna was queen.

Queen of a bit of a sty, but queen none the less.

From the stack of old papers in the corner Anna retrieved a fresh floor for Dante’s run. Even without seeing it she felt the presence of one particular newspaper, now three months old and beginning to yellow at the bottom of the pile. It sat like a talisman, a focus for her simmering rage and unhappiness. She would never use it in the cage, or throw it away, but she certainly never read it these days. There had been enough of that when it was still fresh and white.

Uninvited, the words on the front page came calling as she made the run ready for Dante. ‘Special constable killed in bomb blast’, the headline ran. Beneath it was an image of the burned out shell of Senate House’s top floor, windows hollow and blackened like dead eyes. Inset was a picture of the victim, and another of the University Vice-Chancellor looking defiant and angry.

As she worked, other words tumbled around like guilty whispers, making sure she could never forget what had brought her to this point in her life. Two killed, five wounded, a million pounds worth of damage. One bomb, no change in university policy, research had to continue. Life went on.

Life for most people. Anna looked sadly at the guinea pig.

‘It must be nice being you,’ she said, the words coming somewhere between a whisper and a choked cry. Dante peered over the edge of the bed, unconvinced. He withdrew rapidly as a voice called from below.

‘Anna, what are you doing up there?’

‘I’m coming, all right?’ she shouted. ‘Keep your hair on.’

For several minutes she sat on the edge of the bed. The run was freshly filled with paper and hay but she needed this time alone with Dante. He didn’t ask questions, or tell her how she should feel or what she should be doing. He didn’t have to start his GCSEs in September or decide what he was going ‘to do with his life’. He was a guinea pig, and he was still smarter than any of them.

Dad had bought her Dante a year ago, back when it was still the three of them: Dad, Dominic and Anna, a neat family unit managing perfectly well since Mum had gone hippy and gone off to live in Goa. Then Dad had gone too.

Things might have been all right if Dom had inherited her on his own, but it hadn’t worked out like that. Sophie’s baby was already on the way by then, and as the dust from the bomb settled and people carried on with their lives, Sophie and the baby moved in. The police and reporters, solicitors and social workers went and this broken family were left to make the best of things in a house they could scarcely afford and seemingly without a friend in the world.

But as the summer heat began to build, Anna began to plan.

She reached under the bed for the bag of guinea pig pellets. She trickled a handful into Dante’s food bowl.

‘Anna!’

‘I’m coming!’

It was now or never. She put Dante back in his run and went downstairs.

* * *

Anna had thought the hardest part would be persuading Dom to let her go. For weeks she’d planned and schemed, kept hope alive with thoughts of an escape, always aware that Dom stood in her way. Big Brother, always looking out for her, pushing her to grow up but always holding the power of ‘no’. But she needed this escape. She needed to be somewhere where life was simple again and death was just a word.

Tonight was the night. She’d rehearsed every line, weighed up the exact emphasis of every word, twisted and turned the sentences. It’s only for three weeks; I’ll be back well in time for the new term; it’ll be a chance to spend some time away from the memories; let you and Sophie have some space with the mewling bundle of puke and nappy smells.

It would be a chance to be the centre of attention for a while.

She ran water into the sink and prepared for battle.

With her arms in the soapy water she assessed the enemy. Dom was in the perfect position for an ambush, attending to the bills. He scowled at the gas bill and put it back in the envelope. Anna gripped the handleless mug tight, drew a deep breath and spoke.

‘I want to go away for a while,’ she said.

‘Right…’ Dom said drawing the word out and pausing with his hand poised over the Council Tax envelope.

‘To see Pete,’ she said.

‘In Tasmania?’

‘Yes. I’ve written to him and he thinks it’d be a good idea. Anyway, I’ve got some cash saved and I can afford the flights and a bit for Pete. I’ll be back before term starts and….’

‘Yeah, yeah, fine. Sounds like a great idea.’ He shuffled the papers together and stood up. With a final slurp of tea, he dropped his mug into the sink where it immediately vanished into the soapy depths.

‘Really? You don’t mind?’ Anna said. This could be a trap. Or maybe he hadn’t really understood what she was asking. ‘What’s the catch?’

‘No catch. I’d get away for a bit if I could…’ He took the ironing board from the gap between the wall and the fridge and looked resentfully at the pile of baby clothes on the table. ‘Pete was always good for a laugh when we were kids: it’d do you good.’

‘I know it’s not great timing,’ Anna said.

He studied her for a moment as the iron began to click in the hot thick air of the kitchen.

‘Seems like a perfect time to me – if Pete doesn’t mind putting up with you.’

This was not how it was supposed to go at all. Dom had done everything he could to keep her in sight and in check since Dad had gone, and now he was just letting go. Or was he just giving up?

‘But you said I shouldn’t run away from what’s happened,’ she said.

‘No, I said you shouldn’t bury it. Going to Tasmania isn’t running away if it gives you some time to get this sorted out.’

‘So… you’re not going to change your mind tomorrow?’

‘This is really what you want?’ he said.

‘It’s what I need. I can’t explain it. It’s like I have to go there.’

Dom spread the fluffy baby-grow out and began to press the iron over it half-heartedly. ‘I know it’s been tough for you. You and Dad were close, and I guess suddenly having a new family in the house... well, the timing could’ve been better. So yes: get away, get things straight. We can try and find a way of keeping a roof over our heads for when you come back.’

His permission was too easy, too tinged with relief that someone else would be looking out for his little sister for a few weeks. He was too happy, as Anna now realised, that he’d be free to spend the whole summer playing New Dad with Sophie and the baby, without an extra adult-but-not-quite cluttering up the house.

For a moment Anna missed the argument, the push for a little more than Dom was willing to give, the struggle for a bit more independence. She felt empty. Now she was going to have to do it... fly half way round the world to a remote spot to stay with the godfather she hardly knew. Suddenly her dream of escape was chillingly real.

‘So what’s the plan?’ he asked, folding the first baby-grow so that creases did not show and taking another from the pile.

‘I can fly out the week after next, I checked on the internet. Pete says I can help him with his vet’s stuff, or just spend some time out in the forests. And Emma’s going to have Dante – her parents don’t mind.’

‘You’ve got it all figured out,’ Dom laughed. ‘How long have you been plotting this one?’

‘A while. I just didn’t think you’d let me.’

‘Let you what?’ Sophie said shuffling in with Jamie in her arms. ‘Anything I should know about?’

‘No,’ Anna said and glared at Dom. Sophie pulled one of the dining chairs out and sat bouncing Jamie on her knee.

‘Anna’s going to see Pete in Tasmania. You know, Godfather Pete,’ Dom said, working the iron with a little more diligence now.

‘Pete… Have I ever met him?’

‘No,’ Anna said. ‘He doesn’t travel much now, he’s got too much to do.’

‘Oh, I know – he’s the animal man, isn’t he?’ Sophie burbled something incoherent at the baby then looked back at Anna. ‘Something to do with kangaroos?’

‘He’s a zoologist,’ Anna said coldly.

‘Well, whatever he is I really don’t think this is a good time for a holiday, is it? Your brother’s got enough on his plate already without worrying about what trouble you’re getting into.’ Sophie laid Jamie on his back and made cow-eyes at him. Anna wondered what kind of witch-craft she used to enable her to be such an indescribable bitch to her but still moon and coo at that baby.

‘It’s OK,’ Dom said. ‘I think Anna could do with a break.’

‘Oh, do you?’ Sophie said, her whole posture stiffening. ‘And what about us? We’re just going to be left dealing with all this on our own, are we?’

‘We’re dealing with it anyway, Soph. Dad wanted me to look after Anna, and yes, I think a holiday would do her good. And I think Pete’s just the person right now, out where the wild things are. You never know, we might have a vet in the house by the end of summer!’

‘Oh well, that’s settled then. Don’t know why you bothered to ask me!’ Sophie said. ‘A nice holiday. And God knows, you do love your animals, Anna. We can smell that rat of yours all over the house.’

‘Dante’s not a rat, for your information. And he smells better than...’

‘Just leave it,’ Dom said, seeing Anna was about to take the bait again. Sophie cast him a withering glance. Jamie looked startled then drew in a huge lungful of air. After the briefest of pauses – as if for dramatic