25

I ASSESSED each shop for hiding potential: immigration agent, no; gold and jade merchant, no; mobile phones and sim cards, no. Indian grocery shop, yes.

Inside, the air was cool and heavy with fragrance. Rows of lentils, bags of spices, bottles of rose water and soap and henna, and packets of incense. I walked straight to the back of the shop and, obscured by a pile of atta-flour bags, I dabbed my injury with a tissue. It wasn’t bad; the bleeding had stopped. I rolled up my t-shirt in the front and tied a knot, exposing some skin but concealing the bloody stain. Then, to avoid attracting attention, I occupied myself reading the contents of the fridge. Time passed. I moved past a display of five-litre ghee tins, and casually peered over a pile of forty-kilo sacks of basmati. The streets were delinquent-free, as far as I could tell. Had they followed me, they’d have come in and clobbered me by now. I relaxed a little, though I waited a bit longer to be sure. I walked along the aisles, past shelves of neatly arranged kilo bags of whole spices. Who, I wondered, used that many cloves?

A man wearing a shirt that reached down to his knees, and baggy long pants, came down the aisle carrying some boxes from the back of the shop. He ripped the tape from a box. It would seem suspicious if I simply stood here, so I moved down to the next shelf and picked up a bag of cardamom pods.

The man smiled at me. ‘Not that one.’

‘Pardon?’

‘The black, not the green. The green are not as good. Madagascan is the best, but here we have only black and green. Take the black.’ He looked on the shelves and found a packet of black cardamom and offered it to me. A one-kilo bag. ‘What are you making?’

‘Oh, a delicious … food thing … that you eat.’

‘Cookies? Iraqi cookies with almonds and cardamom, they are very nice. Or maybe you put it in coffee? That is good also.’

‘Yes, cookies … and coffee. Coffee-flavoured cookies.’

I took my cardamom to the counter.

He ran the scanner over the bag. ‘Fifty dollars, please.’

A pineapple? A whole pineapple for a spice I didn’t want or need? If I cooked at home for the rest of my life, I’d never use a kilo of cardamom. ‘Do you have a smaller bag?’

The man went to the back of the shop. I glanced out the front, crowds bustled to and from the station, people with trollies doing last-minute food shopping, families out to dinner. A bone-thin man with a maniac stare tried to run through the crowd, he turned to yell at the woman following behind him. Her expression was grim and hostile. He stuck out a hand, she grabbed it and they ran on together. Romance was not dead for some.

On the counter was a stack of brochures for a brand of lentil, the world’s best lentil, it said. On the back was a recipe. Curiously, the recipe did not include lentils. But I liked the sound of it, kaddu bharta, and it had palm sugar in it. That had to be a good thing.

A plan was forming. A romantic dinner for two, at the triumphant close of Brophy’s exhibition. Reading the ingredients: cardamom seeds, crushed, was taken care of; pumpkin, easy. Unsalted butter, fennel seeds, green chillies, palm sugar, chopped toasted hazelnuts, and lime juice. The salt, I had already.

All this spice was going to my head. I imagined myself pounding them with a mortar and pestle, guiding these flavours into a seductive unity. I’d create my own garam masala, a secret blend with potent seduction properties.

The man put a smaller packet of cardamom on the counter. ‘Anything else?’

I rattled off the list on the recipe card.

‘Ah, kaddu bharta. Very good.’ He pointed to a stack of plastic hand baskets. ‘You will find all of those items here.’ He smiled.

I went hunting around the shop. On a high shelf, I spotted a box of Turkish delight from Iran, for which I had a sudden hankering. I was counting out the green chillies when my phone rang. It was Afshan. ‘Hello, Stella!’

I could hear a rumble in the background and then a crashing sound. ‘Where are you?’

‘Funky Town.’

‘Are you kidding?’

‘No. Shahid wanted to try bowling. Like The Dude.’

‘The Dude abides, man,’ I said solemnly.

‘Stella, join us, come to bowling with Shahid and me. If you’re free?’ He was shouting over the noise.

It was a lovely offer. Trouble was, I now categorically hated bowling. ‘Another time.’

‘What?’

‘No thanks,’ I yelled. I put my phone away and took my basket to the counter. The butter and the pumpkin, I would get at the supermarket.

‘Rice?’ The man asked. ‘I’d serve kaddu bharta with rice or chapati.’

‘Rice,’ I agreed. ‘But your smallest bag is five kilos. I’ll never manage it on the tram.’

His response was a subtle tilting motion of the head. At once enigmatic and full of meaning. A gesture that I understood to mean: we are all one, creation exists in the mind, beyond all thought is the ultimate bliss of consciousness. But he may also have meant: that is the amount of rice we have; the decision is up to you.

I bought the rice. Outside, seeing no one with green hair, I slipped into the shadows and moseyed down the street to a waiting tram. I hauled my rice aboard and sat near a window, where I had a view of anyone coming from Hopkins Street. My fellow passengers seemed harmless, no orange-topped heavies, and no scary teenage combatants.

On the way home, I sifted through the mail I’d lifted from the letterbox at the squat. Some catalogues from a local supermarket, a generic message from the local member of state parliament, and two window envelopes, each addressed to a different Richard. Richard Peck had a summons for an altercation with a driver in a car park in Norlane. The incident happened in June, the letter was dated three weeks ago.

And a Richard Turner had an itemised account from Rising Star Glamour Photography. They were based in Werribee. Company slogan: We put you in the picture. Listed on the bill were forty high-definition colour photographs, files supplied.

It was after nine on a Friday night. Some places worked late on Fridays though. I glanced up; a handful of passengers were mostly at the front of the tram, out of earshot. I searched on my phone and hit the number.

‘Rising Star Glamour, this is Travis.’

‘Travis, I’m Emily Turner, sister of Richard Turner and executor of his will. Richard passed away and I’m paying his accounts. I’m ringing about some shots you did for him?’

‘Honey, you have my condolences, but that job was a nightmare from start to finish and I still haven’t been paid. Would you mind telling me when I’m going to get my money? What’s the hold-up?’

Jeez, what an arsehole. ‘Just a small issue. I need to know the purpose of the photos, if they were personal or —’

‘Business. Nasty business.’

‘Why nasty?’

‘One of those fucking kids had head lice. I had to fumigate the studio after that.’

‘Sorry, would you mind giving me more detail?’

‘First, the assistant came in, she gets some sexy portraits — impress the boyfriend. Tasteful lingerie, you know? Beautiful. She took the full package. Then she asks about shooting kids, says she’s asking on behalf of her boss, this guy who runs a kids’ charity. He wants glamour shots. Hair, make-up, the whole shebang. He wants passport head shots and these ghastly full-body poses. Says he’ll pay extra, for discretion.’

‘Full-body? Like frontals? As in … nude?’

‘Clothed. This is a legit business, lovey. Full, as in you can see the feet. Afterwards, I see all these fucking bugs in the basin and I rang her, I said head lice is going to cost you extra, sweetie, and no more kiddie shots. Nada, zero, zip, that’s it for me.’

I thanked him, said I’d send a cheque, and ended the call.

What drug-dealing thug wanted to take disadvantaged children to get glamour portraits? I recalled Josie in Macca’s, talking to Alma about hair appointments for the kids, and something about a test. According to Raewyn Ross, some kids had called Ricky Peck a paedophile. Maybe he was. But he was working with Enright. Was she a sex offender, too? Or was she genuinely volunteering to save street kids from her fate?

At my stop, a kind soul helped me off the tram with my bags. I struggled up the hill, glancing behind me to see if I was being followed. There was no one around, but instead of entering my building, I crossed to the street and slumped down in a dark position between street lights and waited. It felt like an age since I’d last been home, in my sanctuary from life’s knockage, and I was dying to get inside, pour a glass of wine, and watch a movie, preferably a soothing old favourite. The minutes passed. I put on my cardigan.

The street was quiet, and apart from the occasional car going by, no one stirred.

This was silly, I told myself, no goons were coming for me. Least of all Mortimer, who was supposedly in hiding. I started to cross the street.

A light-coloured SUV turned the corner and crawled down Roxburgh Street, and paused outside my building.

Panic froze me to the spot. A startled rabbit had more self-control. Think, I thought. Run? They’d follow me. Weapons — what did I have? A five-kilo bag of rice. Not very helpful. There was nothing for it, death had arrived at last. Sorry, Hardy, you’ve had a few lucky escapes in your time, but your hour has come. I crossed the road, went to the car, and looked in at the driver. A woman in her late thirties, blonde, similar facial structure to mine, only a lot more attractive. ‘Kylie?’

‘Stella, at bloody last,’ she said, getting out. Two boys of about ten jumped from the car and immediately started to rumble on the nature strip.

I wrapped my cardigan around me to conceal the blood stain on my t-shirt. ‘This is a surprise,’ I said.

‘Where’ve you been? We’ve been waiting for ages.’

My sister still lived in the same town we grew up in, and assumed a city of five million functioned much the same as Woolburn, a town of two hundred and seventy people. In Woolburn, you could rock up unannounced to your sister’s house, and if she wasn’t home, let yourself in. In Woolburn, you could ask a neighbour where your sister was and they’d know. In Woolburn, you could expect someone to be home on a Friday night. She’d driven for four hours on the off-chance I’d be here, ready to receive visitors. ‘Why didn’t you ring me first?’

‘I left about five messages,’ she said. ‘You never return my calls.’

‘Aunty Stella, we’re starving!’ one of her boys moaned. Chad? Blair? I could never tell them apart.

‘You’ve just had cheeseburgers,’ Kylie said, and then to me, ‘We were driving around for something to do. I let them have McDonald’s, Stella. That’s how drained I was.’

The only diet-conscious parent in the Mallee.

‘But we’re starving!’

She seemed on the verge of tears.

‘Come on, everyone upstairs,’ I said. ‘How’s Vegemite on toast?’

The flat was hot and stuffy. I opened a window, whacked the kettle on and threw some bread in the toaster. Kylie’s judging eye roved, appraising every detail. ‘Nice place.’

Nothing about my lifestyle fitted her idea of ‘nice’. ‘Thanks. What brings you here?’

She pulled out a chair and gave it a quick brush, and sat. ‘We need to halt the sale.’

Our mother’s farm, she meant. My mother, Delia, and her partner, Ted, made plans to move to a unit in Ouyen. The Hardy matriarch was as tough as granite, and a farmer in her own right, but getting on in years. Semi-retired, they’d sold off stock, and half the land in acreage lots. The sale of the rest of the land with the family home, had stalled for some reason. I suspected the delay was emotional rather than a simple matter of red tape. My father had worked the place for twenty years, sheep and wheat. In the late eighties, when he was crop-dusting, his light plane had crashed. Thirty years had passed, yet I suspected my mother still quietly grieved for him, and was still attached to the house they had made into a home together.

To make matters even more complicated, Shane Farquhar, the Woolburn farmer who wanted to buy the land, was my former high-school tormenter. He’d bullied me, spread rumours about me, and generally made my life hell. His place bordered the Hardy farm. When he first tried to contact my mother to discuss the purchase, he couldn’t get her on the phone. This was sufficient grounds to accuse me — me — of blocking his progress as payback for high school. The truth was, my mother had not sought my opinion on the matter, let alone my counsel. He was just paranoid and feeling guilty.

Since then, both parties had come to the table and seemed on the verge of reaching an agreement. I was pretty sure there’d been a handshake. ‘It’s a done deal, isn’t it?’

‘It’s not done until the paperwork is signed.’

‘I see. And you want to halt the sale because?’

‘We’ve been talking it over.’

‘We?’

‘Mum and I.’

The kettle boiled. I made two mugs of tea, and passed one to Kylie.

‘We think it should stay in the family.’

Our family was Kylie — who’d never shown any interest in the farm, ditto me — and our brother, Ben. ‘If you mean Ben, forget it. He’s about to do another stretch.’

Kylie nodded. ‘Going equipped to steal is a level-seven offence; based on his previous record, he’ll get the full two years. With parole, eighteen months.’

I raised my eyebrows. Ordinarily, she took no interest in the details of Ben’s legal circumstances. In fact, she would rarely admit she had a brother. A duck quacked; she ripped her phone from her pocket, frowned at the screen, and commenced thumbing.

The toast popped, and I slapped on the butter. ‘Then I hope you don’t mean me. I’d rather stick a knife in this toaster than return to Woolburn, that lifeless dustbowl.’ I looked up. ‘No offence.’

Kylie put her phone down, turned her head. ‘Pardon?’

I spread a thin layer of Vegemite over the toast. ‘Who is going to be the farmer in the family?’

‘Tyler.’

‘Your husband, Tyler?’ The man couldn’t grow a beard. He called horses ‘ponies’. Chickens scared him.

‘He did a course. Correspondence. We’re going to breed Dexters. They’re small cattle, very cute actually. From Ireland.’

‘Hmm. Miniature Irish cows. How do they get on in the desert?’

‘Woolburn isn’t the desert, it’s semi-arid. There’s a big difference.’

‘What about capital?’

‘We’ll borrow, like everyone else does. He’ll make it work.’

I formed a noncommittal smile. He’d make it work like the Betamax tape recorder. I called the boys, who ran in from my room, where they’d been suspiciously quiet. While they scoffed the toast, Kylie pursed her lips to sip her tea.

‘Did you want to stay here tonight?’ I asked.

She seemed amused by the question. ‘No. We’re staying with friends.’

Another long pause.

‘Is there something you want me to do?’ I asked.

‘Talk to Mum. Get her to wait until Tyler can put together a proper offer.’

‘You said she’d already changed her mind.’

Kylie went coy. ‘She’s wavering. I need you to clinch the deal. Can you do that much for me?’ She patted one of the boys on the head. He flinched and pulled away. ‘For the sake of their future.’

‘And what about Shane Farquhar? He’s been in negotiations with Mum for months.’

I couldn’t believe I was sticking up for that man. Especially after he’d falsely accused me of having stymied the deal. Now, by some weird twist of fate, here I was being asked to meddle for real.

‘He’s not family. Don’t you want to keep it in the family?’ Kylie asked.

‘I don’t care who owns it.’

She acted wounded. It was a good performance.

‘But I like the sound of those Dexters. Fine. I’ll speak to Delia.’

When they left, I went to the bathroom and lifted my t-shirt. A short, shallow cut throbbed faintly on my side. I dabbed at it with a tissue. Brook had pressed the blade into my skin enough to draw blood, but it wasn’t deep.

I showered and applied a Band-Aid. Then I put on a pair of shorts and an old t-shirt and stretched out on the couch. I turned on my old TV, and flicked around. There was going to be a Paul Newman movie marathon on over the weekend, starting tonight. That would be worth staying in for. I made my usual eat-in meal of cheese and crackers, washed it down with the last glass of white I could squeeze from the cask.

First up, Sweet Bird of Youth. It was good, but my eyes drooped. I closed them for a minute. Keng something. Kengtung, was that the word? Angie had said it was part of the lure Alma had dangled at them. Kengtung, drugs, and lots of money. Who was Kengtung? Or maybe Kengtung was a company?

Angie and green-toenails Brook, living in a squat once used by Ricky Peck. Brook was handy with a blade. Angie loved Cory, and kept his discarded passport photo in her wallet. They were all in the orbit of the Corpse Flowers, locked in their evil tractor beam.

Nothing you can do, miss. Why did someone push Cory Fontaine in front of a truck?

Isaac Mortimer had warned the kids to avoid them. Presumably, he meant Josie and her bikie boyfriend, Ox Gorman. Maybe the Turk, too. Even Alma. Brook said the Turk was with ‘them’ and was looking for Mortimer. If Gorman found out Mortimer was tipping off the street kids that he planned to enlist, that was reason enough for Mortimer to skip town.

Mortimer’s testimony was crucial to Copeland, to saving his reputation, his job. I’d promised Phuong I would help find him, for her. Because, for whatever silly reason, Copeland mattered to her. I liked to think that if something silly mattered to me, she would support me. I hoped so, because I’d arrived at mission creep. The state of affairs was in flux, and disturbing information had broadened the focus beyond Mortimer. The Corpse Flowers’s gambit appeared to involve a program to groom children, in the literal sense. That was suspect in the extreme. And, in my view, a much bigger problem.

I fired up my laptop and opened a browser.

Burma. Kengtung, it turned out, was a town on the Chinese border. What kind of money, I wondered, was to be made in Burma? Something legal and completely above board?

My dark thoughts were interrupted by a Shih tzu yapping inside Brown Cardigan’s adjoining flat. And a moment later, insistent pounding on my front door.