# The Strange Experiences of Tina Malone/Chapter 15

CHAPTER XV.
WALLERAWANG.
It was Monday afternoon. It had been raining all day. I had tried to get away on Friday but I had not been able to get my washing done so I put off going till Monday.
Somehow the voices were bothering me so much all that day that I felt tired and unable to get my things together. I had written to my brother to expect me any time after Friday, so knew that if I should not be able to leave that night for the country it would not matter. There was Smut to be carried up to Bessie's and my things to collect and pack and the thought of it all worried me.
But at three o'clock, after all the nuisance of these incessant voices giving advice and making comments on my appearance, etc., I spoke angrily and rudely to one of these unseen.
"You wait," came in return. "You are going to be practiced on by Dr. Weston's psycho-analysis class. Your name has been given by Miss Dutton."
I put down the bundle of clothes I had in my hand.
I had seemed to be on view for so long and had held up blouses, skirts, etc., to see if they were clean or untorn, so often, at the same time hearing "Look at her! What's she doing with that blouse? Oh, isn't she vain? Why don't you put the other ribbon on? Oh, fancy dressing up like that—the old hen—Now your boots," etc., all comments on every movement I made—everything I did, in such a way, that it ragged my nerves till they were all on edge.
And now when the taunting remark was flung on me, I stood still for a moment—very still, to show I was listening.
"Very well, then," I said, "I shall write and ask him—and I know Miss Dutton. I shall write and ask her."
There was quiet after that, and a subdued flurry as if someone were saying, "Why did you say such a thing?" "Eileen, you little fool! Why did you?" There was a confused murmur as of voices talking at once in subdued tones, and as if someone were saying to me that it was not true, while another said, "That woman has had enough to bear. It's a shame," etc. and the sound was suddenly shut off. But the voices came again with:
"Look, she's going to do it—Now, you've done it." "She doesn't—she only pretends—she's always doing that kind of thing," etc.
But I wrote the letter to Dr. Weston, went into the shop next door to get his address and posted it.
They seemed to follow me down to the pillar-box. I popped the letter in and came back.
There were no more voices that afternoon. I hurried ​my things together. I was feeling terribly nerve-fagged and ill but I took Smut away, and got away that night, feeling that I was accompanied to the station by Patrick, almost felt as if he were carrying my things for me.
I hoped to lose myself when I once got away into the country. I felt as if Sybil were somehow trying to build a wall between me and my enemies and, by so doing, feeling all the brunt of it herself, for I heard the same distressed protests from her as I had many times used myself to the indecent language and threats behind.
It was a joy to find myself in my brother's home, with its pretty brown dining-room and yellow chrysanthemums in the vases, a bright fire in the fire-place, and the comfort of my sister-in-law’s warm personality. And when the children came home from school and tumbled all over me with affectionate welcome, I forgot all about the voices.
Their first glance at me was anxious. They, too, had heard of the "voices" and had put the same construction on them as my sisters. But I kept my voice even and my conversation sensible, determined to live down the awful impression.
But that afternoon as I left the house and walked along the queer little country street on the way to the post-office, I saw two men in new-looking clothes, standing at a window near at hand, looking in as if interested.
The town was such a small one that at that hour they were the only people in sight. Something about them made me shiver. They appeared not to see me as I passed and I walked past them determined to appear unconscious.
But something in me said, "detectives" and as I walked on I knew they were following.
As my family always called me "imaginative" I determined to try to think of them as ordinary strangers spending the day in town. But while I stood at the post-office counter writing a letter-card to Jessie, I was conscious of one writing a telegram at my shoulder, while the other stood outside.
I would have thought nothing of that but when I had finished my letter-card and closed it he was ready to go and as I took up another to write to someone else he said:
"Oh, I must write this again," to the clerk, and stayed till I had finished.
With my heart beating fast I tried to look unconscious and walked home the other side of the street, taking interest in the shop windows.
The two men walked on the other side of the road and by degrees I found shelter again in my brother's house.
I said nothing to him. How could I? No one believed anything.
Perhaps they lost me—the voices—I hoped so but again, next day, they came, commenting on all I did, gently this ​time, very faintly, but as if watching with interest everything I did.
Would they never leave me in peace?
I had written to the other doctor—a great hypnotist whom Tony had advised me to consult some time before. I had also written to the girl who had been supposed to have given my name to him to be practised on. I had asked this last to come to see me as soon as I returned home.
Dr. Weston wrote to say that he was travelling to the mountains but would be returning in a week and would see me then.
Why I thought it I don't know, but I felt as if I knew someone was looking for me. Somewhere in the underground—searching—searching—And then, one day, while I was sitting trying to read, I felt that he had found me.
But the voices had never really ceased and there was now this new consciousness of a successful search on someone's part.
I had some sense of peace, for it was a very quiet little voice I heard at this time, insistently telling me to "Remember Wallerawang."
Why it should be so anxious for me to remember Wallerawang I don't know, but I did remember.
Then I went home.
Wallerawang was not far from my brother's town and somehow I felt as if I were to be picked up at Wallerawang by those taunting voices and somehow the old dread I had been given lately that I was to be gagged and carried off to some secret place came to torture me. The fear was there before I left but I did not dare to voice it to my brother and I wanted to spare him.
I welcomed the fact that there were others in the carriage besides myself and waited for Wallerawang hardly daring to look out of the window. But look I did and shivered as I saw a policeman and wondered if a policeman always came to meet the trains.
But the train hurried on and all fear left me. Nothing had happened although I had "remembered Wallerawang."
And so I went home.
But the everlasting voices were still there and, I suppose, returned in full force when they found me back again.
Enid Dutton came as I arranged and said she was sorry I heard "voices," and denied having ever had anything to do with my being practised on.
And then I went to Dr. Weston.
I had always had a fear of being hypnotised and having to submit my will to another's. But Tony told me this was my best chance. The voices were still going, and I was having a conversation with one all the way in. I was saying to myself:
​"I'm not going to be hypnotised, you know. He's a man before he's a hypnotist—I'm not afraid, do you think I am?"
I had written out all I wanted to say, for at that time, I could not trust my memory and had to write in those intervals of rest allowed me by the voices.
I sat there in the room and waited, chatting with a small boy who was waiting for his father.
"I don't want you to hypnotise me," I said quickly as the doctor motioned me to a seat.
I noticed that as I read my paper to him he kept trying to keep his eyes from meeting mine.
Here was a difference to my other doctor. There he sat and, having asked him if he could make me unclairaudient, I proceeded to read him all the many reasons I had for wishing to be made deaf.
He said:
"There are voices and voices you know. You must learn to differentiate."
"Yes," I said, and went on reading.
"There now," he got up when I was half through, "you've had your half-hour."
"Oh no," I said, "I must read to the end."
I was determined that this time I should be heard and appreciated.
With a half-amused look in his eyes he patiently took his seat again, picking up a second paper I had let fall and handing it to me.
And presently I left him.
"Leave it to me," he said.
And I left it to him.
As I walked down the street I felt suddenly a great feeling of fatigue come over me and as if my inside were being torn out.
I had told him I knew something about mind-reading, and felt that I had had my mind snatched from me as I lay in bed at night.
He smiled kindly and said:
"Oh no, it can't be done."
"Oh yes it can," I said. "I know it has been done."
I had dangled the little Rosary before his eyes but he did not seem interested as I thought he would be. I had felt so much lately that anything might have brought the influence, that I felt I must give the rosary back as a possible cause.
And so that feeling as if my inside was being torn out of me.
Then the voice which was always with me said:
"Was it really Dr. Weston? What about the Man in the Next Room? He does all the work."
​But from that minute I felt as if all the tangles in my mind were being combed out—as if he had the skeins and was setting my mind in order.
And gradually all my fears went. No longer did I feel that I must not say this and I must not say that. He had explained to me that a psycho-analysis was a long and expensive thing and that he had not a class, so that the scandal was all a lie.
It was not long after this when I heard a name that had been given me long ago, "Bunty Blue," come popping in among the voices. He had caught up this name out of my past and it made me smile. How had he known? For it had been given to me by a teasing cousin who had long since vanished.
The wonder of it! How could he read my past like that?
And little by little my mind straightened out and the voices seemed to taunt less and to my great joy one day I found I was able to read again.
The voices never left me, but the fears had gone.