Devil's Food (23 page)
‘I reached the same conclusion, but continue reading,’ he said equably. I did so.
‘Right, here’s the dangerous ones. Monk’s hood. That was the murder means in a Brother Cadfael story — it’s wolfsbane. And datura, that’s the thorn apple of Kipling’s
Jungle Book
story about the King’s Ankus. Castor oil beans — source of ricin, which killed that poor Bulgarian in the umbrella murder in London. All of which would grow in Australia, I assume,’ I said, scanning the rest of the list. ‘Here’s some old-fashioned laxatives, and — dandelion leaves? Did I mention mental derangement as an explanation of this mystery?’
‘Yes, and I have to agree,’ said Daniel. ‘Still, we ought to be able to clear it up once we ask this young man what he thinks he is doing.’
‘What are you going to do to him, Jon?’ asked Kepler.
‘We’ll have to sack him,’ said Jon. ‘I know that it’s just such a relief that they aren’t smuggling anything awful that I feel like letting him off, but he’s a major breach of security.’
‘I suppose so,’ said Kepler.
Jon took his hand. I leaned back in the seat. Timbo was very skilled and the car was warm. I closed my eyes. Just for a moment.
And when I opened them again we were in a nice quiet backwater of West Footscray, stopping in front of an oval on which a lot of young men were playing an informal game of something with a round ball, possibly soccer.
‘I’ll just wander along to the end of the ground,’ said Daniel, getting out and slouching casually away. For a tall man in a leather coat, he can almost vanish, making himself into something which no one needs to notice. It’s a remarkable skill. The soccer ground was suitable for trapping our rabbit. It had a high cyclone wire fence around it. There were two gates, one at each end of the ellipse. The other one looked to be locked. I could see a chain and padlock.
‘Where’s your man?’ I asked Jon.
‘There,’ he said. ‘Red baseball cap. I’ll call him. He’ll know the jig is up when he sees me.’
‘Right,’ I said. Jon is noticeable. He walked to the gate and called ‘Chris! Hey, Chris!’
The red baseball cap’s bill slid around to point at us, then briefly spun as the boy hauled it off his head. He looked around wildly for a place of safety, failed to find one, glanced at the back gate and saw Daniel there, looked at Jon, looked at me, looked at his puzzled fellow soccer players, took a breath, and gave up. He hauled off his cap, stuck it in his back pocket, flipped the ball to a friend, and plodded out to the gate.
‘Chris,’ said Jon as he approached, ‘what have you done?’
‘Nuthin’,’ said Chris, but his heart wasn’t in it.
‘You want us to take the security video over to your mum?’ asked Jon.
Chris acknowledged defeat. ‘Nah,’ he said.
‘You’ve got two choices,’ Jon told him. ‘You can come and tell us all about it, and though we do have to fire you we’ll find you another job, or you can just resign and we call the cops.’
‘Not the cops,’ gasped Chris. He was a weedy, undersized creature with a fine natural crop of acne. Not an attractive prospect for an employer.
‘Have you got more of the weeds at home?’ asked Jon severely.
‘Yair,’ said Chris. I could tell he was going to be difficult to interview, even when he was cooperating. He didn’t seem to own many words.
‘Then let’s go to your home,’ said Jon.
‘All right,’ said Chris. ‘Mum’s at work.’
He led the way across the road to a well-preserved white weatherboard cottage. Someone had planted roses and geraniums and lovingly watered the hanging baskets of fuschias every morning. There were other plants, but those are the only ones I know, as well as daisies. If the plant isn’t one of them, then it’s just a leafy botanic thing.
Chris let us into a sparely furnished clean hallway and parlour.
‘I live in the bungalow,’ he told Jon. ‘Jon?’
‘Yes?’
‘It wasn’t drugs, was it? Only he swore it wasn’t drugs.’
‘No, it wasn’t drugs,’ said Jon, looking down at the frantic hand clutching his sleeve. ‘Who got you to do this, Chris?’
‘Just this dude,’ he muttered. ‘Offered me a hundred. Need the money.’
‘Why?’
‘Just do.’ Chris squirmed. Jon flicked up the boy’s sleeve to expose his elbow and he indignantly pulled it down again.
‘No! I’m not on the gear!’ he cried.
‘Then what did you need the money for?’ Jon has a sort of gentle patience which will sooner or later wear down any malefactor. He isn’t angry or shrill, there’s no escalation, he never gets louder, but he never gives up.
‘I’ll give you the rest of the stuff.’ Chris opened the back door of the house, dived out, and emerged from his bungalow with a large plastic bag full of miscellaneous veg. ‘This is all of it.’
‘When is more coming in?’ asked Jon.
‘Next month. On the first.’
‘All right. Now we are going to sit down at the kitchen table and you are going to tell me everything you know, Chris. And then we shall see.’
Something slightly indulgent in Jon’s tone made Chris prick up his unwashed ears. And gradually, picking up broken threads of narrative and knotting them together, Jon extracted the whole story.
Some seven months earlier a dude had leaned on the fence and watched the soccer match until he could speak to Chris. He had then asked him if he needed to earn some extra money, and Chris had said yes because he needed the money. Because, all right, his dad was gambling and his mum couldn’t earn enough to pay the mortgage. And he had two little sisters still at school. So Chris and the dude agreed on a hundred every delivery. All Chris had to do was remove the monster pots to the car park. There he would take out the herbs and stash them in the bushes for the dude to pick up. Except that he hadn’t picked up the last lot so Chris had brought them home in case someone found them. And his hundred would be posted in his letterbox. Except that it hadn’t been.
‘Who was the dude? Didn’t he give you a name at all?’ asked Jon.
‘Mollari,’ said Chris, concentrating hard. ‘Londo Mollari.’
I looked at Daniel. Daniel looked at me. Londo Mollari was the Centauri ambassador on
Babylon 5
. I decided not to say anything. The name didn’t mean a thing to Chris, obviously. Or to Kepler or Jon.
‘What about a phone number, any way to contact him?’
Chris shook his head.
‘What did he look like?’ Jon persisted.
‘Short hair. Sort of brown. Bit bigger than me. Ordinary.’
Not one of nature’s great observers, this boy. We got up to go. Jon put his hand on the boy’s shoulder and shook him slightly.
‘I’m not going to sack you yet,’ he told him. ‘You stay where you are and tell me the moment this Londo calls you. He’ll want his herbs back, I expect. And see me tomorrow for some leaflets on Gamblers Anon. Your dad needs counselling.’
‘What do I do now?’ asked Chris, seemingly astonished.
‘Go back and finish the game,’ Jon suggested, and smiled.
We watched him run across the road to the game as we got back into the car. Timbo set it in motion and we slid away.
‘I do love you,’ said Kepler to Jon.
The murderer had decided his deed but not his place and time. When could he best strike down his tormentor? Not when he was praying, for then he would go to heaven. The murderer knew that his victim deserved to go to hell, and meant to send him there.
After we had dropped Jon and Kepler at Insula, Daniel went to a meeting on another matter and I took Timbo and the car to the headquarters of the Discarnate Brotherhood. As we swept down towards Studley Park I reflected that it was no wonder Megan, my courier, had charged me extra for delivering their pitiful excuse for bread. This was a long pull for her little pedal-assisted putt-putt. I tidied my hair and examined myself in the mirror. I looked very respectable, as befitted a woman visiting missions. I was conscious of a squirming feeling somewhere just above my waistline, as though I was about to give birth to a gerbil. It was probably the carob.
Timbo stopped the car and said, ‘Jeez!’
It was a fair comment. The home of the Fleshless Friars was a folly. A very big and elaborate folly. In about 1890, to judge by the meticulous brickwork, some citizen of Melbourne, as richly endowed with gold as he was poverty-stricken in taste, had decreed that an Englishman’s castle was his home and had actually caused one to be built. I couldn’t imagine how I had missed seeing it before. It was not precisely concealed behind a screen of genuine yew trees and a high box hedge of immemorial density, because you can’t conceal a castle like that, but somehow I must have repeatedly, as a student, walked right past it and never blinked. Which was like walking past an elephant in your third floor bathroom and not noticing. A purple elephant, complete with howdah and tiger.
I had to agree with Timbo. ‘Indeed,’ I said. We looked at it for a while.
The brickwork was red, with sooty overtones. There were crenellations. There were battlements. There was a great door and a gothic porch. Horace Walpole would have clasped his hands with glee. No flowers or even grass in any of the beds, I noticed, just a writhing of dark green ivy, hauling itself bodily up into ilex trees with iron thorns and leaves of the darkest green any plant can have before it gives up on photosynthesis altogether. A few irregular lumps, heaved up under the vines, marked where statues or gravestones — or possibly unfortunate canvassers — lay fallen.
There would have been a carriage drive in a real castle, but in this case there was just a gravelled road which was broad enough, at the end, for a car to turn around. Several cars were parked behind the corner of the stone wall. Some of the brothers were allowed modern methods of transport, then. I got out. Timbo emerged and leaned on the door.
‘You want me to come with you?’ he asked.
‘No, thanks anyway,’ I told him.
The big soft face looked worried. His curls sagged. ‘Only Daniel told me to take care of you or he’ll —’
‘You stay here and mind the car,’ I said. He took out a packet of cigarettes, hesitated, and put them back again, still looking at me. The castle had really spooked Timbo, who had been unaffected in that dreadful Braybrook slum which reeked of evil. Thus architecture can make cowards of us all.
‘Won’t be long,’ I assured him. ‘If I’m not back in an hour, you come in and rescue me.’
‘Okay,’ he said. This time he took out the smoke and lit it — a watchdog with his proper orders.
I turned and went up the great steps under the gothic porch. The stones were slightly hollowed under my tread, like the steps of every authentically ancient building I could recall. Had they been specially carved that way? The person who had ordered that this place be built probably had that sort of lunatic thoroughness. The door was a dread portal, studded with nails. A stretched eagle was more or less outlined in metal studs. I could not see the piece of Viking skin which I had expected under the hinges but doubtless it was just a matter of time. The latch was appropriately overwrought in iron.
I looked around for a method of attracting attention, as a serviceable battleaxe would not have made much impression on that door. Fortunately there was a long chain, which I pulled, and an unusually dismal bell gave one solid clunk.
Inside the great door a wicket gate opened and a hooded figure looked out.
‘We are sequestered,’ it whispered. ‘Nothing disturbs the fast of the sabbath.’
‘I need to speak to the proprietor,’ I said.
The hood tilted a little and I caught a glimpse of horrified, disgusted eyes. ‘He won’t see you today,’ said the voice. ‘He won’t see anyone today. Or you at all. Go shed some of your flesh,’ it said, dripping with loathing. ‘Food belongs to the devil! Come back in penance and he may see you!’
I was taken aback by the force of this hatred. What had I done to this little brother? Nothing, except be fat and exist. I stepped away a little and the door started to close.
That wouldn’t do. I grabbed for the figure’s arm and with no exertion dragged it practically into my arms. It fought frantically. It was like trying to hold on to a spider, all legs and venom.
‘Let go!’ it panted.
‘I got this leaflet,’ I said patiently. ‘It says, come here to lose weight. I’m here.’
‘Tomorrow night,’ said the figure — I still hadn’t seen its face. My grasp had weakened. It dived back into the castle and a skinny hand extended and thrust another leaflet at me. I took it.
Then a sweet voice said, ‘What is the trouble, brother?’
‘I’ve given her the leaflet,’ whined the little voice. ‘But I can’t help it, brother, they’re so disgusting, like pigs, all sweaty and gross and …’ The door closed on the sound of retching and sobbing.
I stared at the eagle rivets for a while, shaken to the spine. I could not recall being so shocked. I was not used to being hated. Well, since school, and that was school. That child had not just disliked me, I had made it sick.
I gathered myself together and went back to the car. Timbo had been inspecting the cars. He, too, was deeply disturbed.
‘You all right, Corinna?’ He took my arm and helped me into the car next to him, a great honour. ‘They tell you to bugger off?’
