The new digital clock was pulsing 0.17 when Eddy Levack took off his reading glasses and placed them on the bedside table. He rolled over, only to discover that his wife’s side of the bed was empty.
‘Mavis?’
‘Yes, dear. Won’t be a minute,’ Mrs Levack called from the lounge room.
Eddy watched several minutes flick by before calling again.
‘Yes, dear,’ Mrs Levack replied.
Eddy was ready to turn off the bedside lamp and go to sleep. But he was a considerate kind of husband and didn’t want his wife stumbling to bed in the dark. ‘Are you all right?’ he called again.
‘I’m doing my Buddhist meditation,’ his wife replied. ‘You go off to sleep.’ As she started chanting Om, Eddy put out the light.
The car had been parked in the back alley for three days. At every available opportunity Mrs Levack had binoculars trained on this very spot and the car had not moved one centimetre. For daytime work, Mrs Levack made do with Eddy’s old racing binoculars which hung from a peg in the lounge room, along with a few other items from yesteryear, but at the moment she was using the special night-vision binoculars that she’d saved up for and bought after seeing Silence of the Lambs on video.
She was sure that the car belonged to Claudia Valentine—a dark green 1958 Daimler. There couldn’t be many of those in Sydney, in the whole of Australia for that matter. And here it was in Bondi, right outside Mrs Levack’s window.
‘What a coincidence,’ she muttered when she’d finished chanting Om. It was in Bondi that Mrs Levack had first met Ms Valentine, who’d one day, out of the blue, knocked on the Levacks’ door, strode into their lounge room and proceeded to question them regarding a murder victim. That encounter had changed Mrs Levack’s life irrevocably, set her on the path to private investigation.
This raft of coincidences was given even further weight by the newspaper report entitled ‘The Case of the Disappearing Detectives’. It said that a growing list of private investigators seemed to be no longer on the case. It named names—including Claudia Valentine. Mrs Levack was a little disappointed that she herself wasn’t mentioned, but then she hadn’t really ever had a client. Most of Mrs Levack’s work was self-generated. She desperately wanted to be recognised as a professional, not a Miss Marple type of busybody. To be up there in the hallowed company of private eyes. In her heart of hearts, she wanted to be famous. Her name in the paper, even on the list of disappeared, would be a start.
The report asked questions but gave no answers. Was it pay-back time? The work of a serial private-eye killer? It seemed mighty peculiar that they were vanishing without a trace and the matter had the police baffled. Not that the police cared much—they had always had an uneasy relationship with private operators, who didn’t play by the rules, moved like shadows in the night.
As a would-be private investigator, Mrs Levack’s ears had poked up when Eddy, as was his wont, read the article out to her. Despite the lack of clients, Mrs Levack took an interest in anything to do with the profession, considering herself an associate member, so to speak. She was naturally concerned for the well-being of her colleagues, but couldn’t suppress the gleeful little imp of a thought that with some of the competition out of the way, someone might finally engage her services.
Claudia Valentine was a different matter. Mrs Levack had a soft spot for the girl. She had phoned Claudia as soon as the article appeared, but all she got was the answering machine. Missing in action; the car abandoned, desolate. Mrs Levack’s binoculars scanned the empty street. No-one came and no-one went. If the car was still there in twenty-four hours she was going to do something about it.
Mrs Levack had already peered into the car during the day but had seen nothing informative—no ID, no letter addressed to Ms Valentine tossed idly on the dashboard or the seat. Not that she expected anything anyway—Claudia Valentine was not the type to leave material of that nature lying around. All Mrs Levack saw was an empty cigarette packet on the floor on the passenger’s side. She didn’t think Ms Valentine smoked. Did the packet belong to someone else? The hitman, perhaps? But Mrs Levack was getting way ahead of herself, jumping to a conclusion that may have had her barking up the wrong tree altogether.
She was keen to examine the glove box. Who knew what treats might be lying in store? She had already sniffed her way around the boot in case it contained a dead body, but she’d smelled nothing unusual. Well, nothing unusual for Bondi. If they’d murdered her they hadn’t left her to rot in her own car. So where was she?
Mrs Levack stood in the quiet street waiting for the right moment. She had given quite a bit of thought to the action she was about to perform. It was a shame doing it to a beautiful old car like this, and if Eddy’d had an inkling, he’d probably have chained her to the bed to prevent her (well, that was his excuse), but it had to be done.
A passerby would never have suspected that her shopping bag contained a brick wrapped in an old cardigan. Mrs Levack had bought the cardigan specially, at the op shop, and had never worn it, so that a forensic test, should it come to that, would reveal no trace of Mrs Levack’s DNA. She wondered whose DNA was on that old cardigan. Had the person simply got sick of the colour, a rather bright shade of green, or had they died in it? How many items that ended up in op shops had once belonged to the dead? The Nikes Mrs Levack wore had been purchased at the op shop. Was she walking round in a dead woman’s shoes? A shiver went down her spine. Better to turn her mind to other things. She was beginning to spook herself.
Although Mrs Levack was pretty sure there was no car alarm, the possibility didn’t faze her. With those Nikes, dead woman’s or no, she could be up the stairs and back in bed before the cops could say ‘Hello, hello, hello’. However, she thought it prudent to wait for a bit of noise to muffle the sound of the already muffled brick. Anything would do—a police siren along Campbell Parade, a party of uncouth youths laughing loudly at a joke, a blast of heavy metal music from a passing car. The back alley wasn’t far from the main drag, anything was possible.
What finally provided her with cover was a couple of copulating cats. As if that wanton screeching alone wasn’t enough, when they’d finished, they noisily knocked over a wheelie bin, quite a feat for two smallish cats.
Mrs Levack was already inside the car, lying low, trying not to do herself a mischief with the fragments of broken glass, when she heard a window open and looked up to see an irate young woman firing a large water pistol in the direction of the disappearing cats.
The car was pretty clean as far as clues went, and nothing seemed to be missing. It probably wasn’t a stolen car because no damage had been done to the interior and the radio-cassette player was still in place. Mrs Levack pressed the eject button and a cassette slowly slid out. Mrs Levack shone her torch on it. The soundtrack to Doctor Zhivago. Almost automatically Mrs Levack found herself humming ‘Lara’s Theme’. It didn’t really seem to be the kind of music she imagined Claudia Valentine playing. Perhaps it was the hit person—did the deed, lit a cigarette, lay back and thought of the Russian steppes. Mrs Levack resisted the urge to do the same. She wasn’t here to enjoy herself.
In the glove box she found a street guide to Sydney, an invaluable aid to a private detective. As she thumbed through it, it disgorged a scrap of paper with what appeared to be a phone number scrawled on it. Very, very interesting.
Mrs Levack dumped the brick and the cardigan in the same bin that the cats had upset and closed the lid. Then she went to the nearest telephone booth and tried the number. It was 3.25 am. She didn’t want to talk to the person, merely find out who it was. Just as she was hoping, she got an answering machine. ‘Cliff Hardy, private enquiry agent,’ she heard a deep, world-weary voice announce. ‘Office hours are nine to five.’
Cliff Hardy! Though she had never met the man, Mrs Levack knew who Cliff Hardy was—arguably the best private investigator in town, in all of Australia. Certainly the most prolific. He had solved more cases than Mrs Levack had had hot dinners. But why did Claudia Valentine have his number? Were they having an affair? Or did she need help with something she couldn’t handle on her own? Did she suspect the serial private-eye killer was on her trail and wanted Hardy on the case? So many questions, so few answers.
Mrs Levack walked back to the flat, the shopping bag over her shoulder, her hands as deep into the pockets of her trenchcoat as her mind was deep in thought. She walked past a drunk sleeping in a doorway, past a couple of girls with pasty faces and black lipstick who could have been vampires. These were the mean streets of the soul, yet Mrs Levack glided through them effortlessly. Finally, she had a lead. She felt an incredible lightness of being. It was probably getting rid of that brick. An abandoned car like that, the window was bound to get smashed sooner or later.
‘Going jogging, dear?’ she heard Eddy say.
‘What?’ she replied in a sleep-encrusted voice.
‘You’ve got your tracksuit on and your runners. In bed.’
Mrs Levack’s eyes flew open as she abruptly came back to the land of the living. She had hung up the trenchcoat but apart from that was still wearing the clothes from the night before. ‘Oh. Yes. Thought I’d make an early start.’
‘It’s not that early any more—nine o’clock. I’m off to the library. Can I get you anything?’
Library day. Perfect. And it was nine o’clock. Cliffy Hardy was open for business and she could make the call without Eddy interfering. He certainly wouldn’t approve of the manner in which she’d obtained Mr Hardy’s phone number. But you can’t make an omelette without breaking a few windows.
Mrs Levack got out of bed, did her Salute to the Sun yoga routine, then changed into something smarter. You couldn’t wear a tracksuit while you were making a business call.
‘Hardy speaking.’
Mrs Levack couldn’t believe her luck, she’d got through to him straightaway. Didn’t he have a secretary?
‘It’s Mavis Levack.’ she said. Silence at the other end. He was waiting for her to go on. ‘I’m calling in relation to Claudia Valentine.’
‘Yes,’ he said warily.
Mrs Levack could tell that he was a man who gave very little away. How could she probe any further without hitting sensitive tissue? If he was having an affair with Claudia Valentine, he probably wouldn’t want to discuss it, and if she had engaged his professional rather than personal services, there was the matter of client confidentiality. ‘I was trying to get in touch with her.’
‘Try the phone book,’ he said, rather unhelpfully.
‘I’ve called but only got her answering machine.’
‘That’s what they’re for.’
‘I thought perhaps you might have a more direct connection.’
‘I don’t know what you’re insinuating, but I’ve got to go,’ he said brusquely. ‘There’s a queue of clients waiting and my secretary called in sick.’
Though it was only a small slight, Mrs Levack started to feel upset, the way she used to when she was going through the menopause. ‘I’m afraid she’s gone missing,’ she blurted out.
‘Ah,’ he said soothingly, ‘you want me to find her. Would you like to make an appointment?’
No, she would not like to make an appointment. If anyone was going to find the missing private eye, it was Mrs Levack. ‘No, it’s not that. Her address has gone missing. Yes, that’s it, I’ve misplaced her address. I helped her with one of her cases. Mavis Levack,’ she repeated her name loudly and clearly.
‘I’ve never met the woman, though of course I’ve heard of her. I believe she lives above a pub in Balmain. It’s a small town and this is a small business. Can’t say I’ve heard of you though.’
‘Well, I like to keep a low profile,’ Mrs Levack lied.
‘Same here,’ said Cliff. ‘Bye.’ He hung up.
Mrs Levack had no idea there were so many pubs in Balmain. It was quite an adventure coming over to this side of the city, crossing that elegant new Glebe Island bridge. She had a splendid view of everything from the bus. And goodness, hadn’t Balmain changed since Eddy worked on the trams here when they were first married? Much more upmarket now. All those new shops to look at. Mrs Levack reminded herself that she was on a mission. She wasn’t here for the shopping.
Before crossing over to this side of the city Mrs Levack had tried Claudia Valentine’s phone one more time. Still the answering machine. She’d come prepared for a full day of it—Nikes on her feet, a bottle of water in the backpack. She was going to systematically work her way through the pubs in Balmain till she found the right one.
At some pubs they said they’d never heard of her, at others they said they didn’t do accommodation, and at one the barman said, ‘Who wants to know?’ She thought she might have been onto something, it sounded like he had at least heard of her, and the tone was suspicious, but further questioning got her nowhere. She was on her way out of this particular pub, in fact standing in the doorway wondering which pub to try next, when someone whispered moistly in her ear, ‘Looking for Claudia Valentine?’
She turned to see a rugged, unkempt kind of chap. ‘Yes, as a matter of fact.’ Where had he come from? She hadn’t noticed him in the pub. It was practically empty. Perhaps he had emerged from the shadowy corners.
‘It’ll cost ya,’ he leered at her. Did he wink, or was it a nervous twitch? He kept doing it.
‘What’s the price?’ she asked, trying to ignore the eye movements.
‘Sex,’ he said. ‘That’d probably loosen my tongue.’
Such crassness, thought Mrs Levack. There was surely no need to mention tongues. She looked him up and down, wondering whether the ultimate sacrifice was a price worth paying. He was not a bad-looking chap. If he shaved off the grey beard, had a decent haircut, or at least put a comb through it, he’d spruce up quite well. But all that would take time and Claudia Valentine was in mortal danger. Perhaps if she simply closed her eyes and imagined him shaved and combed? A woman’s gotta do what a woman’s gotta do. ‘Well,’ she heard herself saying, ‘your place or mine?’
‘The park,’ he said. ‘It’s a nice day.’
The park. In broad daylight. ‘But there will be other people.’
‘Not many. They’re all at their smart office jobs in the city.’
‘I’m sorry . . . what did you say your name was?’ Here she was, on the brink of intimacy with the fellow and she didn’t even know his name. She hoped Claudia Valentine would appreciate the lengths Mrs Levack was prepared to go on her behalf.
‘I didn’t say. It’s Frank. You know, as in frank and earnest.’
‘I’m sorry, Frank, I don’t think I can do it in the park.’
‘It’s not illegal. But suit yourself. If you don’t want the information, forget about it. There are others who’ll be happy to oblige.’
Well, didn’t he have tickets on himself, thought Mrs Levack. Still, she was going to lose him if she prevaricated any further. ‘Are there, you know, bushes?’
‘Bushes, trees, flowers, a rotunda. We could even have a go on the swings if that took your fancy.’
The very idea of doing it on the swings! ‘The rotunda sounds nice,’ she said.
‘Well, let’s go then. You don’t mind if I take your arm, do you? Got a bit of a limp.’
They headed towards the park, past well-groomed people walking well-groomed dogs. One woman even had hair the same as the Great Dane straining at the end of the red leather leash. They were just about to enter the park when Frank said, ‘Hang on, what about the beers?’
That was a bit much, expecting her to throw in beers as well. ‘You said sex,’ she pointed out.
‘That’s right, a sex-pack.’
Then it dawned on Mrs Levack. He was a New Zealander. He’d meant six beers. Now that she had primed herself up for sex she was almost disappointed.
Why hadn’t the silly man let her know before? They could have got the beers at the pub.
‘I thought you must have known somewhere closer to the park,’ he retorted. ‘Don’t want you carrying it any further than necessary.’
‘Me carrying it?’ said Mrs Levack. ‘That’s not very gentlemanly.’
‘I’m not a gentleman. Besides, you’ve got a backpack. Look,’ he said, ‘this is all getting very long-winded. Either cut to the chase or forget about it. I’m losing interest.’
They soon found themselves outside a bottle shop. Mrs Levack had to go in alone to buy the beer because, as Frank had sheepishly explained, they wouldn’t serve him in there. OK, so what if he’d made a fuss one time and knocked over their display of organic wines? The prices they charged were outrageous.
Mavis and Frank sat in the park drinking. She’d bought two six-packs, in fact. He’d insisted on one all to himself and Mrs Levack decided that after all this walking around, she had a hankering for a cleansing ale herself. She kept the unopened beers in her backpack, didn’t want him running off without divulging whatever it was he knew about the missing private investigator. Not that he could run far with that limp.
‘Ah, that’s the shot,’ he said, after the first mouthful. ‘Now, what was the question?’
Mrs Levack took a sip from her stubbie. Toohey’s Ice. It wasn’t a bad drop.
‘Claudia Valentine.’
‘Ah, yes. The delectable Ms Valentine. What do you want to know?’
Frank mused for a moment, toying with Mrs Levack. ‘Ms Valentine’s whereabouts. Now that’s a mystery.’
Mrs Levack grabbed the beer off Frank, splashing a little of it on her shoes. ‘I’m not paying for you to tell me what I already know.’ She stood up, as if she was about to leave.
‘Not so hasty,’ said Frank. ‘I know where she lives.’
Mrs Levack sat down again, gave him back his beer. ‘You know her house?’
It was a trick question and he responded admirably. ‘She lives above a pub.’ Exactly what Mr Hardy had told her.
‘Which one?’ she asked.
‘We’ll get to that,’ he said, waving his hand. ‘But first, the mystery.’ He embarked: ‘Ms Valentine, as you probably know, likes a drink. Though she lives above a pub, she doesn’t necessarily do her drinking on home turf. No shitting in your own nest and all that. But at the Footballer’s Leg, where you were earlier, she used to pop in fairly regularly. But lately, we don’t see her.’
Frank took another swig of beer, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. ‘She doesn’t seem to be drinking anywhere else around here either.’
All this was fairly revelatory about Claudia Valentine, but Mrs Levack was anxious to get to the point. ‘Perhaps she’s doing her drinking at home,’ suggested Mrs Levack. The way Frank was keeping tabs on her habits, Mrs Levack would have been doing her drinking behind closed doors if she’d been in Claudia’s shoes. She looked at the Nikes. Could they be? No, she dismissed the thought.
‘Now that’s the strangest thing of all,’ Frank wagged his finger at her. ‘Something very peculiar’s going on, or rather, not going on down there.’ Frank finished off his stubbie. Mrs Levack watched his Adam’s apple bob up and down under his beard as he imbibed the liquid amber. ‘Very strange indeed,’ he repeated. ‘You see, I have a mate down there at Jack’s pub where Ms Valentine lives. George—he’s practically a permanent fixture. Never leaves, has his own stool and gets very upset if anyone else tries to sit on it. A cranky old bastard, but I don’t mind him.’
Mrs Levack handed him another stubbie out of the six-pack, twisting the top off for him. He gave a sigh of satisfaction. ‘Nothing like the first mouthful out of the bottle. It’s like cream on the top of a bottle of milk.’ Mrs Levack wondered where he’d been for the last twenty years. Milk didn’t come in bottles any more and it was homogenised.
‘I’m mainly stationed at the Footballer’s Leg,’ Frank went on. ‘Got a trendy new name, but I still call it the Footballer’s Leg. Occasionally I stroll down to see how my mate George is getting on.’
Mrs Levack was onto her third beer and, unaccustomed to drinking this early in the day, was starting to feel . . . different. Alert, all her senses heightened. She noticed the blackheads at the sides of Frank’s nose. Should she recommend a cleanser?
‘The darnedest thing,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t get in.’
‘Why not?’
He shook his head from side to side. ‘Can’t explain it. They were all in there—Jack, George propped up on his stool, those blokes in suits that go there. And the ones in singlets and shorts. I gave George a wave but he didn’t respond. It was like a bloody wax museum. All very lifelike but not an iota of movement. I couldn’t even get to the door, as if an impenetrable force-field surrounded the place.’
Mrs Levack could feel the hairs on the back of her neck starting to stand on end. She took another swig of beer. ‘Did you see Claudia?’ Mrs Levack asked.
‘No,’ he said. ‘But she could have been upstairs. That’s my theory—she’s trapped in there and can’t get out.’ He leant intimately into Mrs Levack’s personal space. ‘Trapped in the Twilight Zone, like all of them.’
Shivers ran up and down Mrs Levack’s spine. Her nerve ends were positively shimmering. She took another swig of beer.
Frank didn’t seem any the worse for wear, looked like he could manage another six-pack without even pausing for breath, but Mrs Levack doubted that she could keep up with him. Besides, it was time to take the next step. The Twilight Zone. A frisson of fear and excitement snaked its way through her body. What strange places investigating led you to. She took another gulp of beer. For courage.
‘Where is this place of which you speak?’ she asked with a great deal of gravitas.
‘Come,’ he said, getting up off the park bench. ‘I will show the way.’
As they began their journey out of the park, it seemed that Frank’s limp had been miraculously cured and it was Mrs Levack who was having trouble walking straight.
They crossed the road and Frank led Mrs Levack down Darling Street. They passed lots of nice clothes shops, some with sales, but she held herself back. Everything seemed so ordinary, the people in the streets going about their business, going into Woolies to do their shopping, to the deli or the fruit shop. All blissfully unaware that the Twilight Zone was just around the corner. They seemed to take no notice of Frank and Mrs Levack, as if they were invisible.
‘We take a turn here,’ Frank indicated when they came to a quiet side street. Down they went, past cars parked bumper to bumper. ‘And again here,’ said Frank as he directed her into another street. On they went, taking one street then another, twisting and turning so much that Mrs Levack had no idea where she was. She was glad she had her Nikes on. So much walking!
‘There,’ he said finally. Mrs Levack’s eyes followed his pointing finger to a pub at the end of the street. It was like looking down the barrel of a gun. Mrs Levack blinked, and wished she’d remembered to drink water between the beers but it was too late for that.
‘I have led you to the place and now I must go,’ he said solemnly. ‘You must enter on your own. Thanks for the beers.’ And he dissolved into thin air.
Curiouser and curiouser.
Mrs Levack took a deep breath and gingerly began the last leg of her journey, treading carefully to avoid the dog doings. She saw no actual dogs and, oddly, no people. Apart from a fat furry cat sleeping on a front door mat there was no sign of life at all. She felt as if she had been walking for ages. She looked at her watch—11.45. She was sure it had been 11.45 when she’d met Frank. Maybe she’d made a mistake, maybe it had only been 10.45 when she’d looked the first time—it had been just a passing glance. She stood in the middle of the footpath counting to sixty, but the hands of her watch didn’t move. Maybe the batteries had worn down. Yes, that was it, she decided. She wondered if she should ring Eddy. Perhaps not.
It was hard going, like walking through invisible mud, but eventually she found herself across the road from the pub. There were people inside, she could see that much, but no-one moved. Figures were set in various poses—a man in a suit with his glass of wine half-raised; a leery gent feeling a young woman’s bottom, her hand raised to slap his face; a group of chaps nursing schooners at the bar, their faces in rictus, the aftermath of a joke. The air in there looked very smoky.
Mrs Levack wanted to have a closer look, to see if she could spot Claudia, but the minute she made a step towards the pub she encountered the force-field of which Frank had spoken. She tried again, taking a run at it, but butted up against some invisible airbag.
Mrs Levack looked at her watch again. Still 11.45, though she had no idea what it was in real time. She was sure Eddy would be back from the library and wondering where she was. There was definitely something very strange happening and Mrs Levack was about to find out what it was. She’d had enough mucking around, enough of being thwarted by something she couldn’t see. It was time to take action.
Just as well she had a couple of beers left in her shopping bag. Not quite as good as a brick, but they’d provide enough weight. She swung the bag around a couple of times, took aim, then let go. Mrs Levack heard the pleasing tinkle of smashing glass. Unlike smashing the window on the Daimler, she didn’t care who heard this one, in fact she’d be quite pleased for someone to come along. Anyone. But no-one did. She heard a whoosh as a brown cloud of miasmic air escaped from the hole in the window.
She had released the pressure, the spell, and was able to cross the road and enter the pub with no resistance. ‘Hello?’ she called to no avail.
She pushed her way towards the bar, past immobile figures. ‘A schooner of new,’ she requested. The barman had a dishcloth under his hand, as if to wipe up a puddle of beer. He didn’t move. ‘A schooner of new,’ she shouted over the bar.
‘Don’t mind if I do,’ came a voice.
Mrs Levack turned round. In a dark corner, almost part of the furniture, sat a gent who looked not unlike Frank, except that he was older and greyer. She marched over to him. He reeked of beer, it was practically oozing out of his pores. ‘What’s going on here?’ she asked.
‘Is something going on?’ he slurred.
‘Are you blind? It’s like Madame Tussaud’s in here.’
He didn’t look around to see what she was referring to, just stared into his memories, his past, to whatever it was that had brought him to this corner in the first place and to which he was fixed. ‘Some days are quieter than others,’ he commented.
‘How come you’re not in the same state as everyone else?’
‘I am different to everyone else,’ he said profoundly. ‘These eyes have seen things others have not,’ he said, still staring straight ahead. ‘We are all islands in a sea of nothingness.’
Mrs Levack rolled her eyes. Spare me the philosophy. ‘Have those eyes seen Claudia Valentine?’
‘Who?’
Oh no, thought Mrs Levack. It was the wrong pub. Frank had given her a bum steer. ‘Claudia Valentine, private investigator. Tall girl, red hair. Apparently she lives here.’
‘Ah yes. These eyes have seen the private eye. Nice girl, she buys me beers. You wouldn’t feel inclined to do the same, would you?’
Mrs Levack looked around, taking in the scene, including the barman who was still standing there with the dishcloth. ‘Help yourself,’ she said. ‘I don’t think anyone is going to object. Do you know where the private eye is?’
‘A shot of whisky would probably jolt my memory,’ he suggested.
The second time today. What was it with men nowadays, thought Mrs Levack. Did they all expect women to get the drinks? Nevertheless she weaved her way over to the bar, squeezed behind the barman and poured a whisky. On second thoughts, she made that two.
‘Ah,’ said the chap when she returned with them. ‘Nothing like the first drink of the day.’
Mrs Levack threw back her shot, smacking her lips afterwards. It wasn’t her first drink of the day and she doubted it was his. It was still 11.45 by her watch. She wondered what time it was in the world outside the pub—3 pm? Was it still Wednesday? Was it next year already? She tried not to think about such things, it was enough to shortcircuit the brain. Something strange was definitely going on, Mrs Levack didn’t feel herself. Shortcircuit the brain was not a term she would normally use.
‘Is it jolted yet?’
‘What?’
‘Where is Claudia Valentine—the private eye? You said a whisky would jolt your memory.’
‘Haven’t seen her for a while,’ he said. ‘My guess is that she is away on a case or she’s upstairs.’
‘How do I get upstairs?’
‘There’s a separate entrance. Next door.’
Mrs Levack gave him a quick thankyou, then found the door. As luck would have it, she had no trouble opening it and finding her way up a well-worn spiral staircase. At the top, a strip of blue and gold carpet ran the length of the corridor, off which were guest rooms. Mrs Levack trawled along the corridor, knocking on a couple of doors, trying unsuccessfully to peer through the keyhole of others.
At the end of the corridor she came across a door marked private. Private. Private eye. Mrs Levack had a hunch this was it. She knocked, gingerly at first, then more loudly. No-one came. But that didn’t necessarily mean there was no-one home. If Claudia Valentine was in the same comatose state as the crowd downstairs, she probably couldn’t make it to the door. Breaking and entering had paid off twice for Mrs Levack. It would work the third time as well.
She kicked at the door but it wouldn’t budge. Blast those solidly built cedar doors. Eddy was always going on about how shoddy workmanship was nowadays, but Mrs Levack would have appreciated some of it right at this moment. She looked around for a suitable tool. An old hatstand stood silently in a dusty corner, shrouded in cobwebs. At least a hatstand was what Mrs Levack took it to be, though it bore a remarkable resemblance to a large crucifix. It had a round base so Mrs Levack was able to roll it over, the cobwebs wisping into space, floating on the air like ghostly tendrils.
She had a few practice shots then, using it like a lance, charged at the door. It opened effortlessly. Mrs Levack wasn’t sure whether it was the hatstand or a mysterious force that had caused it to open. There was a small whoosh as another cloud of miasma escaped.
Mrs Levack stood on the threshold, staring at the figure in bed, white sheet up to her neck, red hair spread out upon the pillow like a sleeping storm, the whole reminding Mrs Levack of dead Ophelia in the river. But Mrs Levack could see the gentle rise and fall of the sheet. The woman in bed was at least breathing.
‘Claudia Valentine?’ Mrs Levack asked carefully. No answer. She took a step into the room and called again, a bit louder this time.
‘Who wants to know?’ A voice came sliding out from the direction of the bed. Mrs Levack didn’t even see the lips move.
‘It’s Mavis Levack.’ Mrs Levack thought she saw a small frown appear but no sign of recognition. ‘I was of assistance on one of your investigations,’ Mrs Levack prompted. She flicked through the scrapbook of her mind till she came across the newspaper clipping: ‘The life and times of Harry Lavender.’
‘Crimes.’
‘Pardon?’
‘It’s “crimes”, not “times”. Come in. Close the door behind you.’
Mrs Levack did what was requested of her. ‘Shall I pull back the curtains, dear? It’s very dark and pokey in here.’
‘No,’ said Claudia Valentine, for it was indeed she who was lying in the bed.
Closed doors, drawn curtains in the middle of the day, everyone in a comatose state. Mrs Levack wondered whether Claudia and the crowd downstairs were all vampires. She checked to see that the crucifix-hatstand was nearby, should she need any protection. She peered at Claudia, looking for specially pointed teeth, but the mouth remained as closed as the eyes.
‘Forgive me for not getting up,’ said Claudia. This time Mrs Levack saw the lips move, barely discernible, like a ventriloquist’s mouth. ‘I don’t get out of bed for anything less than 200 pages.’
Pages? What was she talking about? ‘Are you all right?’ asked Mrs Levack.
‘Perfectly.’
Now it was Mrs Levack’s turn to frown. It was a most unsatisfying answer.
‘It’s just that . . .’ she started, ‘I’d heard that you’d gone missing. I came looking for you.’ And now that she had found what she was looking for, there were more questions than ever. ‘Can I make you a cup of tea or something?’ Mrs Levack offered.
‘No, thank you.’
Under the bed Mrs Levack spied a bottle. ‘A shot of whisky perhaps?’
‘No, thank you.’
Mrs Levack was getting nowhere fast, and running out of time, even though it was 11.45 by her watch, so in fact time was standing still. She was beginning to lose patience.
‘Is there any particular reason why you can’t look at me while I’m talking to you? Can’t we go and sit in the park? It’s a very nice day outside and it’s not healthy for a young woman like yourself to be cooped up in here.’
‘I’m on hold. Like I said, I don’t get out of bed for anything under 200 pages.’
‘I didn’t understand the first time and I still don’t get it. What’s page length got to do with anything?’
‘This is a short story, right?’
‘What are you talking about, for heaven’s sake?’
‘This. Everything that’s happened. The newspaper report, the carefully planted clue in the Daimler, you coming to Balmain, your escapade in the park with Frank.’
Claudia knew everything. ‘Sorry about the Daimler,’ Mrs Levack said in a small voice. ‘I can pay to have it fixed.’
‘Don’t worry, it’s not a real car. Which is just as well. Otherwise it’d cost an arm and a leg. Stupid car for a private investigator to have in the first place. It was never my idea.’
‘Not your idea?’
‘No, it was the author’s.’
‘The author’s?’
‘Our author’s, actually. The only reason we are in the same room, having this conversation, is that we have the same author.’
‘Same author?’
A sigh escaped from Claudia’s lips. ‘Mrs Levack, it’s not your fault. I know you’re doing your best,’ she whispered sympathetically, ‘but the only way we can get a decent dialogue going beyond you merely repeating everything I say, is to spell things out for you.’ She paused before announcing: ‘You and I, Mrs Levack, are fictional.’
‘Fictional?’ The explanation obviously hadn’t taken, because Mrs Levack was still echoing.
‘We’re not real.’
‘Of course we’re real. We’re talking, I can see you breathing.’
‘Lifelike, but not real. It’s not that bad, there are pluses to being fictional. We don’t age as fast as real people. Only about two years a decade.’
At Mrs Levack’s age, that indeed was a plus. ‘What else?’ she asked eagerly.
‘We can have exciting adventures, as long as they are plausible.’
Mrs Levack had to admit that some of her adventures were quite exciting even though this current one was nudging the envelope as far as plausibility was concerned. Which brought her to the reason she’d come to Balmain in the first place. ‘Why did you and the others go missing?’
‘The authors had other things to do. Sometimes,’ Claudia added darkly, ‘authors get sick of their characters and kill them off.’ Heaven forbid, thought Mrs Levack. ‘Sherlock Holmes’s author killed him off then found himself in the embarrassing situation of having to bring him to life again. Reader pressure.’
‘Reader pressure?’ Mrs Levack had started doing it again.
‘I can feel myself fading, Mrs Levack,’ said Claudia, her voice indeed dwindling. ‘One last plus—there’s always the chance of immortality. Look at James Bond. It’s time for me to go back to sleep. Ah, perchance to dream.’
Mrs Levack certainly had a lot to think about on the bus back to Bondi.
‘Eddy,’ she said that night after dinner, in as brave a voice as she could muster. ‘There’s something I want to tell you.’
‘What is it, dear?’
‘We’re fictional.’
Eddy, who was doing the washing up, stopped midstream, pondering.
‘Never,’ he said finally.
‘We are. I have it on good authority.’ She gave him an edited version of the day’s events.
‘But what about our forty years of marriage, what about Freda and Bill, the bowls club?’
‘Fictional, fictional, fictional.’
Eddy took off the apron and sat down. ‘You mean, like replicants, in Blade Runner? All those memories, all our friends, they’re implants?’
‘Apparently.’
Eddy spent a moment lost in thought. ‘Actually, Mavis,’ he cleared his throat. ‘That accounts for this funny feeling I get sometimes, especially when you are off somewhere. I can’t really explain it except to say I feel rather thin. I don’t mean thin in the body.’ He patted his ample stomach and chuckled before returning to a more serious note: ‘It’s more a feeling of being two-dimensional.’
Though Mrs Levack never felt like that herself, she consoled him by saying, ‘I bet even real people feel two-dimensional at times. And they don’t have authors or editors who can fix things up. Look on the bright side,’ she said, and went through the pluses.
‘What about a cup of tea?’ she said when she’d finished. ‘You’ll feel as good as new.’
‘Real tea?’
‘No, dear, we’ve run out. It’ll have to be teabags.’