Dead Men Don't Order Flake

by Sue Williams

  Claire and Jess headed out the door and I stood there a moment, feeling awkward. ‘I see you’ve met Jessie, then.’

  ‘Yeah. Been a while since I’ve received such a thorough beating.’ He grinned.

  I ducked in behind the counter, slipped on my floral apron.

  He stood up, sauntered over to the counter. There were Jess-sized chocolate handprints on his knees.

  ‘You OK, Cass? Got your car back all right?’

  ‘Yep. I hope you didn’t drive all the way up here just for that?’

  ‘Oh, it’s not far. And no more trouble from that brown Fairlane?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Good. You’ll call me if you have any more problems, won’t you?’

  Was that a look of pleading in Leo’s blue-green eyes?

  ‘Course.’

  He put his arms on the counter, leaned forward, a movement that made his T-shirt stretch all the tighter across those shoulders.

  ‘Listen, Cass. I know we…err, I stuffed things up. And I know it was all a long time ago.’ He paused. ‘Well, in the Congo, I had a lot of time to think.’

  ‘Right.’ I busied myself polishing the pristine lid of my pickled-onion jar.

  ‘And when I saw that article online that mentioned Piero had died…’ He paused. ‘I’m sure you already know that’s why I’ve come back. To see if you and I could…’

  He reached over the counter and took my hands in his.

  ‘What do you say, Cass? Any chance we could…start again? Properly? Last night I got the impression that you might not be totally against it…’ His voice was husky.

  There are people of my acquaintance who wouldn’t find it easy to stand firm against a bloke like Leo, a bloke with whom they have a touch of unfinished history. Especially when his voice contains that much husk.

  Our heads, faces, lips moved towards each other.

  My shop bell rang.

  I snatched my hands away; spent a busy moment brushing a stubborn speck away from my pile of white paper.

  Leo stepped back towards the drinks fridge as a young woman wandered in waving a map and a phone. I gave her what she was looking for, which was what most strangers that land up here are looking for: directions back to the highway.

  After she left, Leo said, ‘So if you need me to do anything…’

  I smiled.

  ‘Reckon you could do with someone to look out for you, Cass. I don’t like the idea of you in danger. I’d do anything to protect you.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘And I picked up one or two useful tips in the Congo. So just let me know if I can help.’

  I was considering letting him know that there were many, many other things Leo could help me with, but my shop bell rang again and I was hurtled into my evening rush. Leo smiled and left.

  That evening, I did my best to focus on normality: cutting chips, cooking Edna’s order. Breathing.

  ‘Don’t you go burning my fish cakes, Cass.’ Edna waved her walking stick. ‘I won’t have it. People trying to kill me with their stinking carcinogens.’

  15

  I jumped awake to the sound of screaming and sat frozen upright. It wasn’t screaming; just my alarm clock. I grabbed it and switched it off.

  I peered out of my bedroom window. A suspiciously beautiful start to the day. Miles of pale blue sky; the haunting call of a currawong. Golden early-morning light on golden wattle. The kind of start where you know it can only head downhill.

  A cuppa and quick shower later, I was dressed in a navy blue suit, one of my sister Helen’s cast-offs from years ago. Pretty obnoxious as outfits go, and the skirt was tighter than was truly comfortable, but I had a long day of spinning cover stories ahead of me and the suit would probably add more credibility than my shop apron.

  The plan: look through Natalie’s room and then pay a visit to this Morris Temple. Find something concrete so Dean would reopen the investigation into her crash.

  I put Dean’s sausage rolls into my esky, popped a generous pile of Anzac biscuits in a container for Ernie and grabbed my handbag. Drove along Best Street, Rusty Bore’s finest and only street, as Vern always says, although we also have Second Avenue. I passed the row of shining steel silos and turned onto the highway, heading south.

  Frost sparkled on the grass beside the road. I wondered if it was a record for early chill. Those weather people must be getting pretty bored with broken records: bushfires one minute, frost the next. I’d be getting a seminar on all that when Brad got back, delivered in a tone that made it sound like it was all my fault.

  Soon I was into red sand hills and abandoned farms. I passed a derelict homestead, a mass of broken timber, red-brick chimney standing all alone. I sailed on through Hustle, past their public toilets which I refuse to use on principle, no matter how badly I need to go. The bastards nicked the design from Rusty Bore.

  At least I hadn’t had to leave the shop in Claire’s hands today. I don’t mean that in a negative way: Claire’s OK, mostly. And I’ve been grateful for her assistance on more than one occasion: it’s not easy combining the unceasing work of the comfort specialist with the running of a top-notch takeaway.

  But Claire’s help wasn’t exactly my idea—it had taken Sophia about five seconds to sense my weakness.

  ‘High time you get assistant,’ she’d said, tottering into my shop in those high heels. Sophia might be in her nineties but she never leaves the house without her heels on.

  ‘With Bradley away now at his uni, you need someone. A nice young girl, Cassie, one you can mould. You listen to me now, bambina.’

  I’m not Sophia’s bambina but she’s Piero’s mother and even with him dead, she’ll always be my mother-in-law—there’s no way Sophia would ever give up on that. My own mum died when I was fifteen.

  ‘And best if it someone in the family. Someone who likes to cook.’ She looked around, pretending to give deep thought to selecting that someone. ‘Ah, cara. You like this plan.’ A special-effects pause. ‘Claire.’

  Claire had been staying with Sophia since Claire’s mum went into a cult.

  ‘Yes, this way you kill two bird with one stone, now you are nonna again.’

  I don’t know why people have to keep mentioning the nanna thing.

  ‘Babies and hot oil aren’t a good combination,’ I said. ‘It’s not safe for Jess in the shop.’

  ‘Nonsense. You and Claire grown women. You both keep eye on Jessie. And you raised your two boys in shop and they’re OK. No burns. Lovely boys. Although Dean sometimes…but anyway. And nothing like a baby for attracting customers. Even those CWA women, maybe some of them like to tut over the idea of takeaway, but you see, even they will come, like before when Brad is little. Yes, that’s settled.’ She clapped her hands. ‘I go home and tell Claire she start with you tomorrow.’

  Resistance is futile, once you’ve been assimilated into Sophia’s family. And it’s true enough Claire likes to cook. I found that out on her first day.

  ‘Have you ever considered adopting the concept of slow food, Cass?’

  She wrinkled her nose and peered into the deep fat fryers. Jessie was busy tearing sheets of my white paper into pieces and throwing the bits all over the floor, something Claire seemed able not to notice.

  ‘Hmm.’ Claire had a thoughtful expression on her face as she looked around the shop. ‘You might want to consider making some changes around here.’

  So much for the someone I could mould. Still, Claire made rapid progress. In her first week she managed to ascertain that it’s not possible to cook a slow roasted shoulder of lamb in a deep fryer, doesn’t matter how much rosemary you rub into it. I had to admit it smelled pretty amazing when Claire cooked it in the oven that night though.

  I passed a chicken farm. A flock of cockatoos flew overhead. I wondered for a moment if chooks ever look up at passing flocks like that and wish.

  It’s two hundred k’s to Muddy Soak, a good long stretch of yellow wheat stubble and blue sky. A drive th
at provides a person with an opportunity to think, maybe listen to her favourite music, or even brush up on a foreign language. I sighed, remembering the CD player in my car was out of action. Still there’s always the radio, I told myself. Although you can have enough of listening to dead rock stars. I switched it on, anyway.

  Meatloaf was busily singing ‘Two Out of Three Ain’t Bad’ through the static. Must’ve died and no one had told me. Bloody shame. Although his stuff’s a bit sad and desperate for my liking.

  I spent a moment considering what I’d choose as my soundtrack, if I had one. Vern plays the blues every night: depressing songs involving a bloke moaning on about a woman who’s wronged him. I’m probably more of a soul person. Soul’s generally about a woman who’s been messed around by a no-good bloke—a whole lot more convincing, if you think about it. I considered my soundtrack options, while the wheat paddocks flashed by. The Sapphires, perhaps. Aretha Franklin. Maybe Renee Geyer, if she was available.

  Yellow wheat stubble thickened to shimmering green as I got closer to Muddy Soak. I passed a fancy farm stay, excessively surrounded with lacy ironwork verandahs. The rounded Dooboobetic Hills were hazy in the distance.

  I drove along Muddy Soak’s main street, keeping a good eye out for Dean and his speed gun. No sign of him. Maybe his new boss would redeploy him. Hopefully to something more useful than booking his relatives.

  The morning sun lit up the long avenue of autumn trees, their leaves every shade of red and gold. A thousand coloured pansies dotted the beds around the war monument, its white granite highlighted by the golden early light. A long line of kids in bottle-green school uniforms walked purposefully along the street. Purple banners hanging from every street pole proclaimed the Turning Leaf Spectacular.

  I pulled over and dredged out the scrap of paper from my handbag; checked Gary’s address: 72 Catton Street.

  16

  Gary’s house was a huge Edwardian place surrounded by acres of lush green gardens. White picket fence, four chimneys, six leadlight windows and miles of wraparound verandah. Painting that verandah would be one of those soul-destroying activities, like painting the Sydney Harbour Bridge—as soon as you’d finished, it’d be time to start again.

  Gary answered the door, his salt and pepper hair spiky and wet. Not too many alcohol fumes: maybe he hadn’t started yet.

  ‘He certainly made a mess of your eye,’ he said.

  A small white dog was busy yapping behind him.

  ‘Settle, Preston.’

  Gary held a piece of toast in his hand. That and the smell of frying bacon drifting through the doorway reminded me of the unwelcome fact I hadn’t eaten anything yet this morning, except for a couple of Panadol with a cuppa so rushed it burned my tongue.

  He led me down a black and white chequered-tile hallway, the smell of bacon growing stronger. We sailed past a lounge room decked out in a sickening brownish swirl—vintage 1970s, the era that really knew how to celebrate the glorious shades of poo and wee. Preston rounded me up, barking and sneezing manically around my feet.

  A phone started ringing.

  ‘Sorry, need to get that,’ Gary marched down the hall, Preston following, keeping up the bark-sneezes.

  I waited in the hallway, filling in the moment by looking at the pictures on the wall. Lots of browns and blues. A muddy painting of what might be a waterfall.

  Well, there was no harm in taking a little look around while I waited. I slipped into the lounge for a brief inspection. The brown swirling carpet was offset by long green velvet curtains. One chaise longue strewn with yellow silk cushions, a glassed-in bookcase, a statue of a young woman, one hand held casually behind her head; all the better to reveal her graceful un-nanna-flapped arms.

  I wandered over to the bookcase. Earnest, serious books—political biographies, Australian history, explorers and military history. No fiction. A whole shelf devoted to astronomy. I headed back into the hallway.

  Gary returned, toast no longer visible.

  ‘Organising a speaker for the festival. Bloody subcommittees. Unbelievable how long it takes to actually do anything,’ he paused. ‘You had breakfast?’

  ‘Yep.’ But like always my stomach growled as I spoke. Traitor.

  ‘Come on.’

  He smiled and led me down the hallway into the kitchen.

  A surprisingly modern kitchen—no hint of any 1970s, although there was a poster circa-1950s of a matador. More black and white tiles. In fact, the whole kitchen featured black, white and stainless steel. The steel wasn’t quite as stainless as you might hope for. I wondered when Gary had last cleaned. An overfull frypan of bacon sizzled on the stove.

  On the wall opposite there was a row of three photos in wooden frames. The first photo featured a small girl, aged five or so. Red hair in plaits. Blue hair ties wound around the plaits. She was licking a spoon, a bowl of ice-cream in front of her. A younger version of Gary, wearing a red shirt, was beside her, watching her as if no one else existed. He was sitting sideways as if to protect her from the world. Photo two featured the same little girl, this time drinking from a coffee cup, and Gary, smiling, eating some ice-cream from her bowl. He had dimples. I glanced at him. These days the dimples were deep grooves. In photo three they were hugging. He had ice-cream on his cheek.

  ‘Take a seat.’ Gary pointed at the stools along the black granite benchtop.

  I sat on the one stool that wasn’t overflowing with piles of papers.

  The dog kept up the yapping around my feet.

  ‘Don’t worry about Preston,’ said Gary, turning over the bacon. ‘Don’t try to pat him though.’

  I maintained a good eye on Preston. Don’t get me wrong, I like dogs. But only dogs that like me back.

  I kept my feet up as high as possible. The old dog-bite scar on my leg throbbed. Preston kept up the manic bark-sneezing and then threw himself and his little jaws at the leg of my stool. I lifted my legs higher. I was starting to lose interest in breakfast, to be honest.

  Gary put a bowl of dog food near the kitchen door and Preston scampered over to it, snarling as he ate.

  ‘He was Natalie’s.’

  He put a plate heaped with bacon and toast in front of me. Another one for himself. Gary was a bloke who ate with some concentration.

  I’ll admit the food was welcome.

  ‘This pepper spray Natalie had in her bag—was someone hassling her? An ex-boyfriend, maybe?’

  ‘She didn’t have a boyfriend.’

  ‘You sure about that?’

  ‘I’m sick of people insinuating things about Natalie. OK?’ A vein bulged in his neck.

  ‘What kind of things do they insinuate?’

  ‘Nothing!’ He thumped the table with his fist.

  An awkward pause. Preston did his best to fill it with a new round of bark-sneezes.

  ‘Listen, Gary, I’m not asking to be nosy. I’m trying to find out who killed Natalie. So if there’s something I need to know, don’t you think you’d better tell me?’

  ‘Sorry,’ Gary said. ‘I know I’ve got a…short fuse.’

  I guess if I had a daughter who’d been killed, I’d be a touch unstable too.

  ‘This town is full of people who love nothing more than to destroy other people’s reputations.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Andy Fitzgerald’s, for example.’

  I once knew Andy Fitzgerald as a red-faced pimply creep with a bum-fluffed attempt at a moustache on his upper lip. Since then he’d lost the pimples and gained a sense of self-importance. Probably related to him being state minister for innovation, major projects and energy.

  ‘Their latest pigswill is that Natalie and Fitzgerald spent a lot of time together.’

  As in an affair? ‘And the, err, police took this into consideration?’

  He shrugged. ‘Your son decided early on that Natalie was just a driver who’d taken Jensen Corner too fast. He wasn’t particularly interested in any detail.’

  ‘And he knew she had
a history of speeding. Any reason you didn’t tell me about her fines?’ I said.

  He looked at me blankly. ‘Natalie was always a careful driver.’

  I kept my voice gentle. ‘Dean said she’d been booked twice for speeding.’

  ‘Yeah, but you know what he’s like.’

  ‘What does that mean?’ I didn’t bother keeping my voice gentle this time.

  ‘Well…’ He shrugged. ‘Frankly, I think you’ve got more chance of finding out what happened than he has. He’s too busy with his clipboard.’

  ‘He’s just doing his job, Gary.’ To the best of his ability. Which, of course, is the problem. I didn’t say that. If you don’t have family loyalty, what do you have?

  I forked in a mouthful of bacon, chewed and swallowed.

  ‘What about Natalie’s friends? Might be useful if I talk to them.’

  ‘I have no idea who her friends were. There were so many strange faces at her funeral.’

  Right. The bloke was totally out of touch with his daughter’s life.

  ‘Sometimes I worry that…’ he paused.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well, what if Natalie drove off the road deliberately?

  ‘Why would she do that?’

  ‘Natalie was always so…intense. She had to excel at everything. Won every damn award going at school. If she couldn’t be the best, it just wasn’t worth doing, in her view. Leaving the job like that, well, she’d have been very upset. She had this whole career path mapped out for herself: she wanted to work for the Guardian. Anyway…’ he stood and gathered up our empty plates; stacked them with the piles of others beside the sink. ‘Let me show you her room.’

  He shut Preston in the kitchen, then led me up the red carpeted stairs, past another muddy painting—possibly a lake?

  Natalie’s room was behind the second door on the right. It was a room that made a big and confusing impression. The floor was strewn with an array of items: ropes, a helmet, coloured slings, metal things that I guessed might be used for rock-climbing, a pair of walking boots and a rucksack. The bed was unmade and had piles of clothing lying on it. A row of framed photos on the wall. A desk in the corner of the room.