Death in Brunswick Page 2

  But where was he?

  ‘Anybody round?’ Carl shouted through the service door.

  ‘Yeah!’

  Carl saw an enormous figure floating towards him through the gloom. A cigarette glowed nearly seven feet from the ground.

  ‘Ah, Laurie,’ Carl said nervously. ‘What are youse doing in so early?’

  Carl deliberately roughened his accent, Laurie being a bouncer and liable to be displeased at any sort of ‘poofter’ voice.

  The huge lout straddled the counter with a vast creaking of black leather pants; gold sparkled on his chest and his blow-waved hair was tipped with silver.

  ‘So early?’ said Laurie, ‘It’s nearly quarter to six. You better get fuckin’ moving, Cookie, Yanni’s not too happy with you already. He reckons he’s going to replace you with a pie machine.’

  ‘Yeah, well, where’s Mustafa for Christ’s sake? How can I work with no kitchen man?’

  ‘Ah, well,’ said Laurie grinning. ‘Sorry, pal, we had to biff the little wog last night.’

  ‘Jesus! What the hell for?’

  ‘He reckoned we all owe him, you included, Cookie, and he really started stacking it on an’ we just gave him the big fuckin’ push, you know? So. You’ll just have to do without him—and hurry up! Yanni’ll be in soon and he’s got the fuckin’ rags on.’

  ‘Why do I work in this shithouse?’ said Carl hopelessly.

  ‘Same as why I do; lurks and perks,’ said Laurie, slouching off into the darkness.

  Well, fucking great! No kitchen hand, no pills, bugger all food and seventy meals to cook! Crushing his rising panic he shrugged his shoulders, muttering ‘Se debrouiller’—‘I will get through!’

  Beef Curry—right! He went to the coolroom and fetched the beef and, looking at it with distaste, laid it on a chopping board. He unwrapped his favourite knife, a Portuguese fish filleter, and trimmed most of the fat from the noisome mass. Boy, it’s really high! Still, curry…

  He cubed it, washed it with vinegar and fried it quickly, pouring away the resulting grease.

  His knife flickering, he sliced half a kilo of onions and fried half slowly with as much curry powder as he dared. In went powdered beef stock, a packet of coconut and a jar of peanut butter—Malaysian Beef Curry! He set this fraudulent stew at a low simmer.

  OK! I’ll add some spuds later, that’ll bulk it out. Right; what’s next? Vegetable lasagne—fucking no way. It was out of the question; he had no vegetables except tomatoes…but wait! Tomatoes, onions and ham. Ham…Spaghetti Milanese! There was always plenty of spag.

  As always, like a soldier going into battle, Carl’s panic disappeared as the action commenced. Soon the sauce was simmering on the stove with the curry and Carl was slicing salad vegetables with fair contentment.

  He was shaking salad cream into a bowl of boiled potatoes, and as it landed in the bowl with an unpleasant plop the door flew open and Carl’s employer waddled into the kitchen. This was Yanni, a gross youth whose pub-owning parents had bought him the club as a sort of apprenticeship to the real world of booze selling. Carl thought he looked like the picture of the young Brendan Behan on the back of Borstal Boy. He had the same look of cherubic dissipation, but added to this was a kind of stupid cunning. He wore a tracksuit and fur-trimmed moccasins.

  ‘Hey, Cookie,’ he cried with jovial menace. ‘What’s on tonight?’ He stuck his fat fingers into the curry and licked them.

  ‘Jeez, that’s a bit strong!’

  ‘Well, I had to cover up the taste of that rotten meat you bought. What are you trying to do, poison everyone? And shit, Yanni, there wasn’t enough food there to feed the staff, let alone the poor bloody customers.’

  ‘Stiff fuckin’ shit, Cookie, we only serve munga here to keep the licencing boys happy—you know that.’

  Carl did know it and it made his position weaker than a cook’s usually is. Normally the management defers to the chef in some degree, cooks being notoriously temperamental and liable to storm out halfway through garnishing the Julienne of Yabby with Tamarillo Sauce.

  So Carl had to whine instead of bluster: ‘What about Mustafa? I got to have a kitchen man at least—who’s going to be the slushy?’

  ‘Don’t worry about it, Cookie, one of the girls’ll do it—and as for that Turkish sheep-fucker Mustafa! Well, you know what he was doin’? Selling drugs!’ Yanni looked virtuously shocked.

  ‘And yeah, I forgot,’ said Yanni with a snigger. ‘We told him you dobbed him in.’ He turned heavily towards the door and by the time Carl had worked this out the fat Hellene had gone, leaving Carl to stew with the Malaysian Beef Curry.

  *

  By seven-thirty the temperature in the kitchen was in the high thirties and Carl could hear rumbles of thunder above the exhaust fans. The first whine of electric guitars told him that it was time to set up the servery. He went out and switched on the lights. On one side was a glass-topped salad table, on the other a bain-marie. The salad table was supposed to be refrigerated but Carl had never known it to work. Dusty plastic vine leaves half hid the rusty pipes. He filled the gaps with mushy watermelon halves, scattered some roughly sliced oranges, and added bowls of potato salad and sliced ham, garnishing the whole with aged parsley. About this moribund smorgasbord hovered the tiny insects which Carl had never seen anywhere else but around rotting fruit. He stepped back and looked at it all. Jesus! But what can I do?

  It hurt him though.

  Resentfully he switched on the bain-marie and filled the trays with curry and spaghetti sauce; this was Mustafa’s job and Carl splashed his shirt doing it.

  ‘Shit!’

  He threw the pots into the sink and grabbed a dish cloth.

  As he was rubbing the marks on his shirt, a short buxom young woman appeared through the gloom. She was carrying a large glass.

  ‘Here you go, Cookie,’ she said, handing him the drink. ‘The boss says I’m helping you tonight.’

  ‘Ah, Sophie—you little ripper, you! You’ve saved my life!’

  He tasted tequila and ginger ale and poured a long column of coolness straight into his stomach. In a second he felt better and realized that he had been trembling slightly for hours.

  ‘What do I have to do, Cookie?’

  He looked at her with more attention. She wore a very short black gym slip and fishnet tights, a white shirt and a school tie.

  ‘Jesus, Sophie, what are you got up as? You’re too big a girl to get round like that, ’specially in this joint!’

  ‘Yeah, well, Yanni, he turns round last night and he goes: “All you barmaids’ve got to wear your old school uniforms.” It’s ’cause of the Divinyls playing tomorrow night.’

  ‘The what? The Vinyls? What’s that? This is all getting a bit kinky.’

  ‘No, Cookie, the Divinyls—you know, Chrissie Amphlett.’

  ‘Oh, right,’ Carl muttered.

  He paid no attention to rock’n’roll bands these days, dividing them into the strutters and the jumpers.

  He looked at Sophie again. My God! He heard not so much the bat squeak of sexuality as a low cockatoo’s shriek. She looked so young and healthy. Maybe I…

  ‘Listen, Sophie, just wash those couple of pots and I’ll put the rice and pasta on—back in a minute!’

  He hurried to the washroom and peered anxiously into the spotted mirror; his hair was holding up well, he thought.

  That hair gel did the trick. Pity I can’t see the back—I’ll make sure I don’t turn round. In the half light he didn’t look more than—what? Twenty-eight? God, maybe I could…He felt his spirits lift higher. Tonight might be all right after all; the food wasn’t too bad considering. And he did owe Mustafa money, so if the Turk was gone maybe that was it, and he must be able to score some pills somewhere—and then there was Sophie!

  A certain lack of the self-consciousness usually found in young Greek women, coupled with heavy hints dropped by the bouncers, made her definitely available and to Carl, shy with women, availability was the sce
nt of a bitch in season.

  But I must have another drink. Now if I can get her to pinch me another, strictly against house rules, it’ll mean she fancies me—or will it? He hurried back to the kitchen.

  She had finished the pots and was leaning against the sink; she wore his short apron. He saw her in profile, a very Greek profile, he thought; her round, soft face was dominated by a strong hooked nose. Jesus, what a conk! It was a bit intimidating really. But what about that pouter-pigeon chest—that big shapely bum—the uniform—even the apron—God, she looks like something out of one of those magazines!

  He felt predatory—like that well-known molester of young Greek girls, Lord Byron. However, not having the social advantages of that aristocratic harasser, he put a note of appeal into his voice:

  ‘Sophie, listen, go and get us another drink, will you? A double, ay?’

  She smiled. God, look at those teeth. He thought of his own: twenty-eight left and sore gums.

  ‘Yeah, OK, Cookie,’ she said good-naturedly.

  ‘Don’t get caught now,’ he said as she swung out of the kitchen like the head girl at St Hilda’s.

  Excitedly he planned his next move. What time is it? Seven-ten—not much time—first, pasta and rice. He put two big pots of water on the stove, dropping a handful of salt into each. The heat near the stoves was terrific and the roar and boom of the exhaust fans made his head ache, so he retreated to the serving area. He could hear the steady electric grunt of an electric bass from overhead; a cymbal clashed—bands rehearsing. He remembered his dead father saying puzzledly:

  ‘But they all sound the same.’

  Carl would try to explain but his father would just say in his polite way:

  ‘A bit quieter, please, boy, that’s all.’

  And Carl would turn up his record player.

  But they do all sound the same. The guitar whine was knifing into his middle ear. I’m sorry for torturing you with them, poor old chap—now I’m being punished.

  Sophie appeared from the gloom carrying another glass.

  Sex, drugs and rock’n’roll! But what about drugs? What about Mustafa? Where was he going to get some stoppers?

  He took the drink, and after taking a big slug:

  ‘Everything OK? Listen, thanks a lot, Sophie.’

  ‘No sweat, Cookie, Yanni’s in his office with Laurie and the bouncers.’

  ‘Jesus, they’ll be down for their tea soon. Um, listen Sophie, can you give me a hand with something? I have to bring in a bag of rice from the passage.’

  ‘Yeah, OK,’ she said absently. ‘Jeez, they’re shit-house, them Abos.’

  ‘What Abos?’ said Carl, taken aback.

  ‘That band upstairs,’ said Sophie impatiently. ‘It’s an Abo reggae band from Northcote.’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ Carl muttered.

  Vinyl, Aboriginal reggae—how long ago did I stop noticing these things?

  She went through the kitchen. He followed, admiring her thick hair, gleaming blue-black under the harsh fluorescent light.

  She went through the passage door and he realized with some trepidation that this was the perfect place for what? A declaration? Maybe even some foreplay! Not romantic to be sure, filled as it was with bags of rice and rusty iron compressed-air cylinders.

  Quickly, before he lost his nerve, he slipped his arm around her waist and pressed himself to her sturdy body.

  Quick! What can I say?

  ‘Hey, Sophie, you’re a real spunk!’

  God! It sounds terrible. But she turned towards him easily; her breath was in his ear. She was laughing; he could feel the giggles shaking her.

  ‘Jeez, Cookie, I didn’t know you were like this.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘We all thought you was a poof.’

  ‘Eh?’ he shrieked in a high whisper. ‘Well, I’m not!’

  ‘That’s all right then,’ she said cheerfully, and robustly returned his embrace. He kissed her, enjoying the taste of chewing gum.

  He slipped his hand up the back of her thighs and pressed her buttocks.

  ‘I can feel you’re not a poof.’ She was laughing again. ‘Come on, Cookie, better stop now, someone might come.’

  ‘No, they won’t,’ Carl groaned. ‘Please, Sophie.’ He nuzzled her smooth neck. What’s the sexual etiquette here? Where do I go from here? More kissing? To the breasts or straight to the crotch? Oh, don’t let me bugger this up!

  ‘Sophie, I really like you. I’ve been thinking about you since I started here.’

  ‘Yeah?’ she said doubtfully. But she made no move to break away.

  ‘I never thought you was a poof. Really, Cookie, just you talk a bit funny, you know.’

  There was a pause. In desperation he quickly moved his hand between the front of her thighs and let it rest in her crotch. He rubbed her gently through her tights. She sighed resignedly and moved her hips. His erection felt explosive, packed with potential like a torpedo. He guided her hand towards it—a little hesitation—maybe Greek girls don’t…then she unbuttoned his Levis and started to wank him with purpose. His hand felt dampness. Jesus—she does like me. Maybe…

  He slipped his other hand down the back of her tights and touched her warm buttocks.

  ‘Hey, Cookie, cold hands!’

  She staggered slightly and her elbow caught one of the air cylinders behind her. It rebounded against its fellows and suddenly the passage was full of noise as of iron gongs.

  ‘Hey! That you, Cookie?’ A voice came from the kitchen. ‘Phone call from your Mum!’

  ‘Oh God. Oh Jesus!’

  ‘Off you go, Cookie,’ Sophie said, smiling at him kindly in the gloom. She moved past him, hauling up her tights in a businesslike way. He followed her hopelessly, buttoning his fly. In the kitchen he found Laurie regarding him impatiently.

  ‘Your mum’s on the phone, Cookie, she sounds a bit upset.’

  There was a phone near the servery and he lifted the receiver with sudden fury.

  ‘Yes, Mother, what the hell is it? I am working, you know.’

  ‘Carl, you are not to worry, dear, but I do feel a little strange and I wonder could you…’ Her voice trailed off.

  ‘Jesus! Mother! Look, I’ll be there in a minute.’

  God! My bloody sister will never forgive me. He turned to find Yanni standing by impatiently.

  ‘What’s up, Cookie? Tea ready yet?’

  ‘Listen, Yanni, I have to go! No wait, I really do, my mum’s really sick.’

  ‘You comin’ back?’ Yanni said, frowning. ‘Don’t forget fuckin’ Mustafa’s not here.’

  ‘Look, Yanni, Sophie can serve it out, it’s all ready—Jesus.’

  He hated to plead with the fat oaf, but waves of guilt impelled him on.

  ‘Yeah, well, OK Cookie, if it’s your mum…Off you go.’

  Carl turned impatiently away and ran into the kitchen.

  ‘Sophie! My mum’s sick and I got to go home, can you look after things? It’ll be quiet tonight, just give them plenty of rice and pasta, OK?’

  ‘Yeah, sure, Cookie. Gee—I hope she’s OK.’

  He kissed her quickly—that’s one good thing anyway—and ran outside into the warm, smelly Brunswick night.

  *

  He seized his bike and wheeled it swiftly into Sydney Road. There was no hope of riding it in the heavy traffic; cars were banked up at the lights, trams clattered by one after the other. It was very humid, and thunder rumbled in the distance.

  He forced his way against the crowds on the footpath to a pedestrian crossing and stood waiting for the signal to change, hopping from one foot to the other.

  What will I do if she…I haven’t got a car—I suppose you ring the hospital. What about—what is it? Heart massage. How do you…

  The lights changed and he ran across, the bike rattling beside him. Once off Sydney Road he was able to ride. Pumping his legs he forced the old bike up the narrow streets. They were nearly empty. Sometimes he saw a family sitting
outside, talking quietly in the sticky heat. His heart raced and pounded. At last he turned into his street, wheels bouncing in the potholes, and flung the bike down outside his house. He stood for a moment gasping.

  The front door was open and a shaft of light from the hall glinted on an unfamiliar car—a Mercedes. What?

  He ran inside to meet a neat Chinese coming from his mother’s bedroom. He carried an expensive leather bag and wore a beautifully cut double-breasted suit.

  ‘Doctor Lee! How is she? Have you got an ambulance coming? Can I go in?’

  The doctor with a smooth, dismissive gesture:

  ‘Nothing to worry about, she just had a little turn—slight arhythmia. I changed her pills a little.’

  His voice was Chinese-American. Carl reluctantly admired his well-dressed cool. A kind of mod inscrutability.

  ‘You mean there’s nothing wrong with her? Jesus!’

  ‘Now, now, Mr Fitzgerald, heart attack scared her; better to be safe. I see her in two weeks. Make sure she doesn’t smoke, you know? Goodnight.’

  And he passed by and out the door. Carl heard the solid clunk of an expensive car door and the Mercedes purred off.

  He stood for a while in the passage damping down his relief and anger and then, gently opening the door, he walked into her room.

  It was the first time he had been in here since his mother had come and he looked around curiously. She had draped a square of silk over the bedside lamp and the light was pink and subdued. A crucifix hung on the wall beside her bed. There was a large plastic framed picture of the Virgin on her bedside table, and next to it a clutter of pill bottles. A fluffy rug covered the worn lino and a vase of everlasting daisies stood on his old chest of drawers. The door of the hulking ugly wardrobe stood open. It was lined with the flouncy girlish dresses she had always favoured.

  He looked at her. Even in the dim light he could see how frightened she had been; her face was grey and loose and her grey-blonde hair lay flat. Seeing how thin it had become, he thought with digust of his own baldness. Her nightie was cut rather low, the skin between her breasts dry and crinkled.