An Iron Rose

interested.’

‘Bit too independent these days,’ I said. ‘But that might change. I’ll show you what’s left of the walled garden on the way back.’

The architect was waiting at the house, a thin middle-aged man, wispy chicken-feather beard, dressed for an Atlantic crossing in an open boat. With him was a clone, cloned smaller, presumably the assistant architect. In my days among the rich, I’d observed that nothing they paid for came in ones: not lawyers, not gardeners, not architects, not whores. Even their women came with a mother or a sister or a friend, usually fat, often ugly, always resentful.

I excused myself to rejoin the labourers, to go back to my place. Leon shook my hand. Anne said, ‘I’d like to see the mill some time if that can be arranged.’

‘Any time you want to see it, it’s down there,’ I said. ‘It’s your mill.’

‘Mac,’ Leon said, ‘I’ll tell Francis to build in the time for showing Anne the mill. Keep her away from the dangerous places. These old buildings, everything’s rotten.’

‘Any time,’ I said.

I found Flannery and Lew on their hands and knees looking for a path. ‘Glad to see you’re safe,’ Flannery said. ‘Thought you’d slipped over onto the managerial side. Notice that woman’s mouth? Very powerful. Suck the grips off your handlebars. She give you an indication of anything?’

‘Said she found the bloke with the pie gravy running down his chin irresistible. Turned her on.’

‘I’ve heard it can do that,’ Flannery said. ‘Chittick’s pie.’

At the end of the day, we had a few beers at the Heart of Oak and then I went home, dog-tired, still hurting from Saturday’s football, sick at heart about Ned.

It was Lew’s turn to make the meal. I poured a big glass of red wine and went out to the office to finish making out Allie’s invoices. There was a note from her on the desk:

You are my № 1 football hero. Can I wash your jumper, anything that has been close to you? On second thoughts, perhaps not anything. To business. You’ll see I’m booked up tomorrow but can give you a hand with the, um, gateposts on Wednesday. See you tomorrow evening. Your devoted fan, Allie.

Something was nagging at me as I worked. November 1985. Ned and Dr Barbie. The depressed Dr Barbie. Barbie the skier.

Skiing.

I stopped writing mid-invoice and looked up Irene Barbie’s number. She answered on the second ring.

‘Irene, Mac Faraday. Sorry to bother you at night.’

‘That’s all right. I’ve been thinking about our conversation.’

‘I want to ask you about Ian and skiing.’

‘Yes.’ Puzzled.

‘When did he give it up?’

‘When? Oh, I’ll have to think-um, it would have been around 1986 or ’87.’

‘You said he went to Europe or Canada every year. What time of the year?’

‘Usually from mid-November. He’d get back in time for the start of the school holidays.’

‘You wouldn’t be able to say whether he went in November 1985, would you?’

‘I’m sure he did. I can find my diary if you want to hold on.’

‘Take as long as you like.’

I drank some wine and waited, feeling the tension in my neck and shoulders.

Irene Barbie was back within three minutes.

‘Mac? Still there?’

‘Yes.’

‘One second while I…’

I held my breath.

‘Left for Canada on November 13, came back December 5.’

I breathed out. ‘You’re sure that’s 1985?’

‘Oh yes. This is from my diary. Can you tell me why you want to know this?’

‘I’d like to talk to you again,’ I said. ‘If that’s possible. And I’ll tell you then.’

‘Ring me,’ she said.

I set off to get another glass of red. The pain had left my body. I felt a sense of relief and elation.

Marcia Carrier was lying about Ned and Ian Barbie.

Berglin traced Melanie Loreen Pavitt to an address in Shepparton, out where the neat town begins to fray. You drive past the restumped houses, disciplined yards, steam-cleaned driveways, tools hung on pegboard in swept garages, retired men in caps, full of empty purpose. Then the brick veneers, low, brown, ugly, lawns shaved, big windows blinded. At the end of the concrete drive, fixed to the two-car garage, a hoop. It waits for the sad boy to come home and throw the meaningless ball, pass the time until summoned to eat the processed food, watch the manufactured world, sleep.

Further out, on bigger blocks, windswept, treeless, beyond mowing, stand exhausted weatherboards, at the end of their histories, all hope gone, boards sprung, stumps rotten, roofs rusted.

Melanie Pavitt’s weatherboard house stood in a sea of long yellow grass, leaning with the prevailing wind, bright junk mail blowing around. The brick chimney on the right was bulging at the bottom and swaying inwards at the top. The windows’ sashcords had disintegrated and pieces of weatherboard fallen off the side of the house held up the top panes. I felt the verandah boards, grey, eroded like Ethiopian hillsides, sag under my weight. Next door was a work in progress, a long brick-veneer train carriage of a house with two window openings blocked with plywood and the end wall half-built. Silver insulation foil caught the light. Behind the house was a huge shed, more factory than garage. A newish red Nissan, dusty, stood at the end of a paved section of driveway facing the shed across a riverbed of bluestone dust.

There was no response to my knocks. Inside a radio was on at full volume. Country and western. I thought of going around the back, then a vertical blind in the unfinished house moved. I went over and knocked on the unpainted front door. It opened instantly, on a chain. A woman in her forties, pretty face, plump, long dyed auburn hair, sleep in her eyes, lipstick a little smudged, said, ‘Yes.’

‘Sorry to bother you,’ I said. ‘I’m looking for Melanie Pavitt. Does she still live next door?’

There was a wary silence. Finally, she said, ‘Police?’

‘No. I’m not selling and I’m not collecting either. It’s a personal matter.’

She put a finger to the corner of her right eye, pulled the skin back. ‘Yeah, she’s next door.’

‘She doesn’t seem to be home. Any idea when she might be back?’

The woman closed the door briefly to take off the chain. She was wearing a purple dressing gown. ‘Didn’t hear her go,’ she said. ‘The car makes a helluva noise, exhaust shot. She might be in the back. Let me put something on, I’ll come with you.’

I waited on the verandah. It was quiet here, just a faraway hum of traffic. The woman came out wearing tight jeans, a fluffy blue mohair-like top with three-quarter sleeves and black pumps. She had repaired her make-up. She walked ahead of me, buttocks jiggling.

‘Doesn’t go out much, Mel,’ she said. ‘Not since the boyfriend moved in. Nice bloke. Used to be in and out of my place. Not anymore.’

We tried knocking again. Nothing. Just the music.

‘Try the back,’ said the woman. ‘By the way, my name’s Lee-Anne, two words with a hyphen.’

‘John,’ I said. We walked down the car tracks beside the house. The kitchen was a lean-to at the back, younger than the main house.

Lee-Anne knocked on the back door. The music was louder here. ‘Stand by Your Man’.

‘Won’t hear anything over that racket,’ Lee-Anne said. She tried the doorknob. The door opened. She took a step inside.

‘Mel? You there? Someone for you.’

Nothing. Just the music.

Lee-Anne took another step in. I followed. The kitchen was neat, a smell in the air of something burnt. ‘Mel!’ Lee-Anne shouted. ‘Barry!’