Comeback

waiting for: her brown skin seemed to glow in the early sunlight and her dark hair had the sort of sheen you see in television commercials. She wore a short, leopard-print jacket and loose black trousers, high heels. She walked with a dancer’s grace and the only men who didn’t stare at her were those looking the other way. She strode off towards the main drag, smoking, with a bag matching her jacket slung over her shoulder. I followed her.

The morning was mild with a light wind and the tang of the sea in the air. The early rush had subsided and there weren’t many people about-a few joggers, a few pram pushers, a few oldsters sitting under cover in the park. Isabella was at an outside cafe table. She butted the cigarette she was smoking and immediately lit another. She gave her order and sat back looking at the water. She was the only person in the cafe’s outside area. She took a mobile phone from her bag and made a call. She laughed, showing gleaming white teeth. I moved up quietly and sat across the table from her. I put the photograph on the table beside her bag.

‘Don’t be alarmed. I don’t mean you any harm. I have to talk to you. It’s about your friend Miranda, and this woman.’

She was older than she’d looked at a distance and from the way she moved. She was handsome rather than beautiful, but striking. She looked at the photo and blew some smoke, unperturbed at being accosted.

‘Simisola,’ she said in a New Zealand accent. ‘I suppose you’re a cop.’

‘No.’ I gave her my card. She glanced at it.

‘Even worse. What do you want?’

Her coffee arrived. Black. She tore the top off three packets of Equal and poured them into the cup. Her long nails were painted silver.

‘You haven’t heard the news this morning, have you? Or seen the paper?’

‘Baby, I don’t watch the news or read the paper. It’s all bad stuff.’

‘Simisola’s dead.’

She stirred her coffee. ‘Silly bitch. I suppose one of her crazy brothers got her.’

‘I don’t know. She rang me yesterday. She said she had information for sale. But you’re right, she mentioned honour killing.’

She drank some coffee and finished her cigarette in two long draws. She snuffed it out and gave me a full candlepower smile. ‘I have three to start the day and that’s it. What information?’

‘Something about Miranda.’

‘What were you looking for-a three-way plus one? No, you’re on about something serious. Bound to be pain.’

I gave her a severely edited version of my interest in Miranda. She drank her coffee and listened without expression.

‘They’re both silly bitches, Miranda and Simisola. Miranda’s always looking for something extra, like an angle, a big score. Simisola was on a real good thing with that Muslim bit.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘She used to wear the head rag for the punters.’

‘Muslim men?’

‘And others. You’d be surprised at what turns blokes on.’ She gave me the smile again. ‘Or maybe you wouldn’t. So she didn’t sell you the information?’

‘No.’

‘What was it?’

‘I don’t know. I hoped it was how to find Miranda.’

She felt in her bag for her cigarettes.

‘I thought you said you only had three,’ I said.

‘I need to think. Order some more coffee.’

A few other people had taken their places at the tables and the waitress was in and out of the cafe. I ordered two more long blacks. Isabella lit up and waited for the coffee. It came and she did the thing with the sweetener.

‘How much trouble is Miranda in?’

Much the same question Ruby asked. Solidarity. I shrugged. ‘Nothing at all from me, a bit from the police, some from people she’s got involved with. All I want is answers to a few questions.’

‘And you’ll pay for the answers?’ She glanced at the card. ‘Cliff?’

I drank some coffee but I’d let it cool too much. I pushed the cup away. ‘Yes.’

‘Will you pay me to tell you where Miranda is, or where she might be?’

I nodded.

‘How much?’

‘Five hundred.’

‘A grand.’

‘Split the difference-seven fifty.’

‘I can get that for one trick.’

I looked closely at her. There was a suggestion of a double chin and the lines around her eyes were spreading. ‘Not anymore,’ I said.

She dropped her butt in the dregs of the coffee. ‘You’re right, but you’re a shit to say so. Okay, seven fifty. Let’s see it first.’

I took the notes from my wallet. Seven hundreds, one fifty. She hesitated.

‘Her name’s not really Miranda.’

‘I know, it’s Mary Oberon.’

‘Fuck, I was hoping for the other two fifty. In fact it’s Oberoi. She figured Oberon was classier. She’s got a brother named Ramesh. He runs a restaurant up on the central coast. She used to talk about working there. How she liked it. I mean working in the restaurant.’

‘Indian restaurant?’

‘What do you reckon?’

‘Where on the central coast?’

‘Fucking stupid name for a place-Woy Woy.’

I handed her the money.

‘Say hello for me,’ she said.

There were several Indian restaurants in Woy Woy and one of them was named Ramesh’s. At one time I had a girlfriend who lived near Newcastle and I spent a bit of time up there with her. But I wouldn’t have detoured to visit the central coast for many years. I surfed up there when I was younger. In those days we used to drive up in old cars with our boards on the roof and an esky full of beer. This time I decided to take the train. Get around by taxi. Hope Isabella’s tip was right. Stay overnight.

I packed a bag and caught a train to Wyong from Central Station. I settled down with C.J. Sansom’s Heartstone . I’d been working my way through his Tudor series. Good reads, although this one was a bit slow-padded, as a lot of novels are now. I don’t know why. I looked out the window from time to time but basically let the kilometres take care of themselves. No food or drink on City Rail trains. I had a flask of scotch in my bag in case of delays and emergencies.

The train was held up for almost an hour just out of Berowra. Signals malfunction they called it, which is not what you want to hear. It was late afternoon by the time the train got to Woy Woy. A taxi took me to a motel in the centre of town. I’d printed out a town map from the web. Ramesh’s North Indian restaurant was only a block away. I consulted the phone directory but there was no Oberoi listed residentially, so it had to be the restaurant. Well, nothing wrong with a good rogan josh after a train trip. I rang the restaurant and booked for one at seven thirty.

I took a walk around the town centre to get the stiffness out of my legs and back. Woy Woy is a sort of generic Australian coastal town; could be Nowra, could be Ulladulla, could be Coffs Harbour. There was the usual run of shops with a Coles and a Woolworths and the inevitable McDonald’s and KFC. All I knew about the town was that it had once been a fishing village and Spike Milligan’s parents had lived there and Spike spent a bit of time there himself. There were worse places to be and I was willing to bet that anything with a view of the water would