Paradise Lost

Marv Kelly was in the Southwest National Park on the island of Tasmania searching for a ghost. The scientific community thought he was a dreamer, wandering after something that had gone extinct nearly one-hundred years ago. The view of his peers did not deter Marv, he was sure the beast still roamed the island.

Two years ago, Marv heard a bark in the park. It was a piercing sound making the hairs on his head and neck stand on end. It was a call from a beast who was no more, the bark came from a thylacine.

Marv went to the park religiously, checking trail cams and looking for footprints and other evidence that would point to the existence of a modern Tasmanian Tiger. Apart from cast prints and grainy pictures, Marv did not have undeniable proof.

‘Someday, you’ll find it,’ Marv’s wife Martha would tell him. ‘You’ve invested too much not to.’

Martha complained about him spending too much on memory cards and batteries, but his trail cams needed them, and she knew Marv needed the trail cams. Marv hated to discuss how much money he had spent over the years of searching and tracking. But he reasoned with Martha that a man with a hobby always overdid it.

But the eerie bark kept Marv coming back, day after day, in hopes of catching a glimpse of the animal hunted to extinction by the ignorance of man. A creature, that besides old black and white film and still pictures, Marv had never seen alive in his life.

Marv was retired now, so he focused his time on wildlife conservation and working on a book about the national parks of Tasmania.

Marv thought back to his college days while he walked the park trails, but more often his thoughts would wonder back to the day he had heard the bark, it was the reason he put himself in the forest when he could be doing any number of other things.

The straps on Marv’s rucksack began to dig into his shoulders. The sun had traveled across the sky before Marv made it back to the trail. He looked down at his wristwatch. Tomorrow, he would be in Melbourne with Martha, attending an exhibition that would change everything.

The University of Melbourne sent out invitations. They were invitations to witness, for the first time in a century, the phantom that Marv and others like him had searched for for years. Marv and Martha, along with a crowd of scientists and environmentalists, would see the elusive creature for the first time.

He walked back to the trailhead and got into his old Land Rover. He drove back to his home in Hobert, the radio playing a cricket game at full volume to combat the wind rushing in the open windows.

Back home, Marv grabbed his rucksack from the back of the Land Rover. He slipped into the house through the kitchen door, hoping to go unnoticed.

“Where have you been?” Martha said, standing with her arms crossed. She was waiting for him. “In the bush, I see. You need to pack, or have you forgotten about tomorrow?”

“Trust me,” Marv said, dropping his rucksack on the floor by the counter. “I haven’t stopped thinking about it since we got the invite.”

“And you haven’t packed so much as a pair of socks, wild man. Go pack so we’re not late for the airport tomorrow.”

“Alright, won’t take me but a minute,” Marv said leaving the kitchen, “I pack light.” Marv headed out of the kitchen.

“Marv.” Martha yelled. “Don’t leave that filthy rucksack there on the floor.”

With one strap slug over a shoulder, Marv retreated to his office, like a kid home from school going up to their room.

The circus wallpaper inside Marv’s office was a reminder it had once been his son’s bedroom. Now, Marv’s son had children of his own. A fair trade, he reckoned, but he wished they could see the grandkids more. He dropped the rucksack in a chair that stood by his desk.

Papers and folders covered Marv’s desk. Somehow, he authored his books and checked the hundreds of pictures behind it. He had books on native wildlife stacked to the ceiling. Imprison specimens floated in jars of formaldehyde and frames held flowers and insects pinned in hopes of capturing beauty, but Marv had seen all those things while he was in the forests and knew they did not compare to the beauty they expressed in life.

Marv grabbed a book sitting on his desk. He opened the cover and read: ‘Crikey! Marv, love your book! It’s a relief to know there’s blokes out there like us. Cheers, Steve Irwin.’ Marv had lost count the times he had read that page.

Marv grinned, staring down at his dirty boots, wondering how he had made it through the kitchen with them on.

The next morning, they took an Uber to the airport.

“Please, try to enjoy this Marv,” Martha said, as they boarded their plane. “This will be good.”

Marv did not say much during the flight. When the flight attendant came by, he asked for a beer, the benefit of flying business class.

“Nervous?” Martha asked. She placed her hand on his sun worn arm. Marv looked down at it and smiled at her.

“Today will be the end to my search, Martha.” Marv sighed.

“Would that be the worse thing in the world?”

“If we can bring something back from extinction, what will stop us from bringing any animal to extinction. Nothing will be beyond the power and will of a geneticist.”

“Your work will stand as a testament to the importance of keeping nature natural.” Martha looked out the window. Her hand was still on Marv’s arm.

“We should fly to Sydney and drop in on Charlie.” Marv said.

“What, and miss the event?”

“No, after Melbourne. We haven’t seen the grandkids since forever.” Marv and Martha looked out the window, soon Melbourne would be under their feet.

                                                 ***

“Marv, get your rear in gear,” Martha called through the closed bathroom door of their hotel room.

“Just a moment,” Marv said. “Be right out.” He was still struggling with which cufflinks he would wear from his choice of two pairs.

Marv stood in front of the bathroom sink. A mirror reflected a weathered face that had spent hours out in the bush, lines formed by smiles and wonder. Thankfully, Martha had trimmed his bread, so he looked less like a boy lost in wanderlust, but his eyes still gave him away.

Suddenly there was a knock on the bathroom door, a bit of urgency behind it. “We must go, Marv.”

Marv clipped his last cufflink in place and opened the bathroom door. Martha stood waiting; she had on a light emerald colored evening gown. Marv’s mismatched cufflinks went unnoticed.

Again, they took an Uber to the event which took place at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Hall. When they arrived, a man showed them to their seats. A waiter came by with drinks and served them glasses of red wine.

“I just spotted Leonardo DiCaprio,” Marv said, tugging on Marth’s sleeve. He took a drink from his glass, winced with one eye, and swallowed.

“Would you stop that,” Martha said, pulling her shoulder away. “If you haven’t noticed by now, the place is crawling with celebs.”  

The evening had started with soft acoustic music. But the lights soon dimmed, and a women came out on stage. “Thank you all for coming this evening,” she said. “Tonight, we all come together to witness the resurrection of a creature we deliberately destroyed. Tonight, we shall see an extinct species rise from the ashes of a fire we created.”

A backlight powered on to reveal a cage with a red drop cloth over it. There was silence in the crowd, they all knew what they had come to see, the thylacine in all its glory. “Without further waiting,” she said, “we give to you all the Tasmanian Tiger.”

A cord hanging overhead pulled the drop cloth to reveal the cage underneath. The cage had transparent glass sides with round holes for ventilation. The crown awed; Marv was the only one to let out a laugh.

Behind the glass was a Tasmanian Tiger crafted by scientists and millions of dollars. Fully grown, the lab made creature was no bigger than a rat, twenty of which could have hidden in the shadow of the true thylacine.

As the crowd looked on with their mouths agape and patting each other on the back, Marv and Martha left to catch their economy flight to Sydney.