Earthly Delights Part 2

CHAPTER THREE.

The day was getting on and the lunchtime rush would be starting soon. I put Heckle back down with a handful of kitty treats to comfort him (and a handful of kitty treats for Jekyll in the interests of justice) and went back to the shop. I booked an order for ten loaves of seven seed bread, a speciality of mine, for the next day, and more rye bread for a German restaurant. Then the health bread freaks demanded more crumbly stuff, and the Greek restaurant asked for extra pasta douro for a banquet. I was going to have a busy morning. I decided to ditch the planned potato bread and make fresh herb rolls instead. Life is too short to peel potatoes, I agree, but bread made from real potatoes does taste better than the stuff baked with commercial potato flour. My customers pay me for the extra taste. I am what is known as a niche marketer. Which generally translates as ignored by all government departments unless they want (1) bread or (2) money.

And, for the shop, olive bread with all those plump, beautiful kalamata olives which Karen the caterer had given me. Turned out that the chairman of the board was allergic to olives

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and she had bought the best. Poor woman was almost in tears. Ours is a disappointing profession sometimes. With a batch of m.u.f.fins that would make up the shop's supply for the day.

Herb rolls meant I had to send Goss to Meroe right away to get a collection of whatever fresh culinary herbs she had left before the witches bought out the shop. Meroe's herbs come from an organic farm (probably by broomstick, I can't imagine how she gets them into the city so fast otherwise) and they taste wonderful. The herbs have to be robust to survive baking.

I gave Goss her orders. 'And make sure you say "kitchen herbs",' I said, forcing her to repeat it. It had never happened, but I didn't want any of the other plants to wend their way into my bread. Entrancing as the idea of turning some customers into toads might be, I couldn't imagine trying to explain it to a sceptical police officer like, for instance, Senior Constable White. L White, her label had said. Lynn? Louisa? Lepidoptera? She looked like a Lepidoptera.

A strangely forthcoming Senior Constable Lepidoptera White. She had told me a lot. Had she been giving me a message? Had she just been up all night? Had her mother taught her that a civil question deserves a civil answer? These were deep questions.

Meanwhile a line was forming of people anxious not to spend their lunch hour trying to buy lunch and I snapped out of my daze and into sell mode. The cash register rang cheerily, Horatio purred, and the money rolled in as the bread rolled out (sorry). I began to wonder whether I was going to have any bread to spare for the Soup Run when the door clicked closed and suddenly the place was empty. Two pm on the dot and only the poor office a.s.sistants and shopkeepers, who had drawn late lunch, were likely to come in now.

Goss returned, having lingered fondly outside Black Flower Boutique, where her next dress lived until she could earn more money. Her Goth friend Carol Holland would make sure no one else bought it. It was a daring dark purple number with a peekaboo front to show her navel. I wondered again, what was this thing about navels? However you look at them, they are not aesthetic. Also, no one with my figure likes present fashions. One does not want one's cardigans skimpy or one's skirts short, and one definitely does not want to show one's navel or any points adjacent. What happened to b.r.e.a.s.t.s? I like b.r.e.a.s.t.s. I'm fond of mine. Goss is as flat chested as a ten year old boy.

Goss thrust a big parcel of herbs into my arms. The scent was heavenly, the essence of green growing things. I identified thyme, parsley, basil, rosemary, coriander, tarragon and a stick of bay leaves with that dark oriental smell.

'Yum,' I remarked.

'That lady cop was at Meroe's,' giggled Goss. 'Going through the herbs. Meroe isn't happy.'

'I bet she isn't,' I agreed.

'Especially since she called Meroe "Sibyl",' said Goss, stroking Horatio.

'Oops.' I was not the only person to be making linguistic mistakes today. Although, I admit, Basil Fawlty's wife was called Sibyl, the original sibyls were powerful witches who spoke oracles. I hoped that Meroe might take it as a compliment but decided that she probably wouldn't. I don't know where Meroe came from, she's never said, but it was a place where they really didn't like the police.

With the world in the state it is that could be just about anywhere ...

'Did Ms White say what she was looking for in the herbs?' I asked.

'Mj,' said Goss, going off into a fit of the giggles. Marijuana? In the Sibyl's Cave? It was funny. Meroe is sternly against all drugs. Except, I suppose, flying ointment and essence of nightshade. She has been known to threaten smokers with eternal karmic backlash and doesn't even approve of my gin and tonic when I finish work for the day. It dulls the chakras, apparently. I told her that I liked them dull. Senior Constable Lepidoptera White was doomed to disappointment, and probably a lecture on chakras as well.

'Time to close up,' I said, fastening the door and pulling the shutter across. Goss loaded the remaining bread into my sack while I put out the stuff I could resell at half price into its rack. That left me with a good load. I paid Goss and let her out the back way and sat down to total my cash register receipts, count and bundle the money, and make out the deposit slip for the bank. Then I put the cash float in the drawer, allowed Horatio to precede me into the bakery, and sighed. Another day past and I was p.o.o.ped.

I walked down to the bank on the corner and deposited the takings, then I re-donned my trackies and began to clean the bakery. This involves a lot of scrubbing and I find it soothing. Big bakeries employ scullions, but I did it myself. Horatio always removes himself to the parlour when water sloshes across the floor, my last task. There. I wrung out a track suit leg and straightened my back. I had cleaned and dried all my cutlery and pots and mixers; I had tidied my own kitchen and washed my own dishes; the cat dishes were scrubbed, the cat litter was changed and the floor was scrubbed and it was me for a bath. I flung the tracksuit into the washer and set it going.

I love baths. I ran one and sprinkled in Body Shop bath milk with a liberal hand. No, with a generous hand. The original meaning of that word has been lost. By the time I finished my eleven hour day I was always filthy. I lay there feeling like the Queen of Sheba. Dark blue dolphins danced along my frieze. Horatio sat on the edge. He balances beautifully. Vaughan Williams' 'The Lark Ascending' was playing. Bliss.

The CD finished and I finally arose from the foam, dried myself and put on my favourite garment. It is a floor length house gown of heavy dark purple silk figured with chrysanthemums, the only present I ever liked or kept among those my ex-husband James brought back from his travels. Though I sort of regret throwing out those toys from the s.e.x museum in Amsterdam. Who knows what that strange object did when filled with warm milk as the directions suggested? Probably nothing good. I loved this part of the day. With my Esky in one hand and my cat in the other, I ascended to the roof garden like a G.o.ddess.

The roof garden design has remained unaltered from the original, partly because when the building was unfashionable, someone had chained the entrance and the vandals didn't know it was there. It has gazebos. It has pergolas. It has bowers. Horatio led the way to the rose bower, his favourite. I sat down on the wicker love-seat, concocted a gin and tonic from my Esky, added ice, and leaned back contentedly.

No one here, except Mrs Pemberthy and her little doggie, Traddles. I don't like dogs very much. They have no self control. But Horatio had obligingly taught Mrs Pemberthy's yappy little mop-dog a measure of healthy fear and he usually never came near us. Mr Pemberthy was talking to Trudi near the lilac trees. A light shower of rose petals fell down on my dress as a starling landed on the bower. Horatio watched interestedly. The starling eyed Horatio. I drank my gin and tonic.

The city was full of people who were working hard, and I wasn't one of them. It is a lovely feeling. I closed my eyes for a moment. Horatio climbed onto my knee and curled up into a loaf shape, paws folded under. We drifted off into a light doze.

When we woke someone was kneeling in front of us. I jumped and spilled the drink and Horatio, in keeping his balance, stuck a few claws into me. Every cat owner knows that this is not malicious. Which doesn't mean that it doesn't hurt.

'Sorry,' apologised the kneeling person. I blinked myself awake. Trout pool eyes looked into mine.

'Daniel? How did you get in?'

'I met one of your girls, the one with green hair, in the street. She let me in and said you were up here. What a lovely place,' he said.

'Isn't it? Would you like a drink? I've only got one gla.s.s,' I said.

'We can drink it sip for sip. You look very different in that gown,' said Daniel, sitting down beside me and holding the gla.s.s while I poured the gin.

'My ex brought it back from China. It's my favourite dress.'

'I can understand that.' Had he stiffened a little when I said 'ex' ? I poured tonic and offered him first sip. He accepted. He sipped very neatly. His chin and jowl were darkened. I wondered how often he shaved.

'I didn't realise you had such unusual eyes,' he said. 'That's the trouble with dawn, there are no colours. They're grey, really grey. Sea-grey eyes,' he said, handing me the gla.s.s. Our fingers met. I couldn't think of anything to say. His fingertips were calloused, as though he worked at a manual trade. I didn't know anything about him. But who cared? He began, 'Would you-' and just at that moment the starling dropped down to the gra.s.s, Horatio leapt off my knee and swiped at it and Mrs Pemberthy's b.l.o.o.d.y dog decided to join our little conversatione. The world was suddenly full of yapping (the dog), squawking (the starling), hissing (Horatio, who had quite lost his composure) and yelling (me and Mrs Pemberthy). It took some time to sort out the melee and after that the moment, if it was a moment, had pa.s.sed. We sat down again. Horatio washed. I refilled the gla.s.s. 'What brings you to Australia?' I asked lamely enough.

'I was born here,' he said, taking a healthy swig of the drink. 'I went back to Israel with my parents and joined the army, and then I came back here. I work on the Soup Run for fun. I've always been nocturnal.'

'Like Horatio,' I said, pointing out my fearless hunter, who was sitting with his back to us, washing in a very thorough fashion. One got the impression that Horatio would have blushed, if he hadn't been a cat.

'Cats and lovers love the dark,' he said, which sounded like a proverb. 'What about you? You didn't start off as a baker, I can tell.'

'How can you tell?'

'Trade secret,' he grinned. He had very white teeth. I still didn't know anything about him.

'What trade?'

'That would be telling,' said Daniel. 'There, we've finished our drink. I'd better collect the bread and get going.'

'Start by collecting the cat,' I said, feeling frumpish and cross. Daniel went over to Horatio and said something, and Horatio climbed onto his shoulder and draped himself across the leather-clad neck. He looked like a very elaborate fur collar.

My apartment is called 'Hebe'. It shows a rather curvy girl in a slipping tunic pouring out nectar for a series of reclining G.o.ds. The builder decided that the shop apartments should be dedicated to the attendant G.o.ds. Thus we have the Pandamus family, who run the Cafe Delicious, living in Hestia, G.o.ddess of the hearth. The software company Nerds Inc live in Hephaestus, smith of the G.o.ds. And Meroe lives in-I swear- Leucothea, the white G.o.ddess, who is also called Hecate, Queen of Witches. She says it was Meant. With a capital letter. And it probably was.

I let Daniel in and went to my kitchen to fetch him the bag of bread. This was not how I had foreseen our next meeting. Also, I had stinging puncture wounds across my thighs from Horatio's abrupt take-off. That cat can accelerate upwards like a Harrier jump-jet. I sat down heavily. I folded back the silk to inspect my wounds and Daniel came in, soft footed, and caught me.

He contemplated my half-naked state, drew in a breath, and went into the bathroom. When he returned he sat down on his heels and smoothed anti-sting into each little puncture. It was one of the s.e.xiest things I had ever felt and I shivered.

'You're beautiful,' he said. Then he stood up. 'I must go,' he said. 'Can I come back tomorrow?'

'For more bread?' I asked. I let the dress fall and stood up before him. He was tall. My nose collided with his second shirt b.u.t.ton. I smelt that elusive spice scent again. My body seemed to be magnetically attracted to him.

'That too,' he said cryptically, took the bread, and went.

'Someone thinks I am beautiful,' I told Horatio. He gave me a measuring look, went to his dish, and suggested dinner. That was another problem. I had to go to bed at eight or before. Did I have enough energy to get dressed and go down to Cafe Delicious for an early dinner of luncheon leftovers or was I going to settle for free range boiled eggs and toast soldiers? No contest.

I fed Horatio and the Mouse Police and ate my soldiers and eggs. They were very good. I read the Wiccan Times absently as I wondered about Daniel. He was gorgeous, yes. I was not, that also was true. But he had said that I was beautiful. He wouldn't be saying that just because of the bread. I moved my thighs. I could still feel those warm, sure fingers shifting over my flesh. Flesh that was awake and alert and suggesting that there were lots of things we could do with Daniel that did not involve bread. I knew that. I told my flesh to pipe down until I could get Daniel into a s.p.a.ce which did not contain anything other than human mammals, excluding all cats, birds and dogs, and read on.

This really was an odd newspaper. It had an article on Wiccan men which made them sound extremely desirable. There was the sacrificial consort, who seemed to be the summer king from Arthurian legend. One elected a monarch in spring and when the year began to fail, one killed him and got another next spring. I suppose it saved feeding him over the winter. Which made for a short reign but an extremely merry one, as the summer king would probably pollinate himself to a state of collapse if he was to die in autumn. Lot to be said for a willing sacrifice. I had already heard the definition of an ideal lover: one who turns into a pizza at three am. That sounded sacrificial to me.

There was Poseidon, G.o.d of the sea-we had an apartment called Neptune, the Roman form of Poseidon. Occupied by Jon, a travelling exec who only stayed a week or so, distributed strange sweets and trinkets marked, ie Made in Cambodia, and went off again. He worked for some aid agency and could tell riveting stories if you caught him between a.s.signments. Kylie thought he was wonderful and had hopes of an affair, but whenever she steeled herself to seduce him, he wasn't there. This rather put a damper on the whole thing, but the article said that Neptune was cyclical and would be back with the tide. Then there was Pan, the old G.o.d, master of woods and darkness, father of goats. He sounded agreeably rustic and rather dangerous. But you always knew where to find him. Just follow the goats.

I finished my supper, cleared the table and read the last of the article with my nightcap, a cup of Ovaltine, the sleep drink of my childhood. Osiris, lord of the dead, father of occult wisdom, dark and mysterious, who came by night.

I closed the Wiccan Times and took myself off to bed. Horatio was already reposing next to my pillow. I have a bed big enough to sprawl in and I sprawled, stroking Horatio and thinking, as I fell asleep, that Osiris and Daniel might have had a lot to say to each other ...

I didn't wake until the alarm clock exploded at four am and the fans came on. In my sleep I had crooked an arm around Horatio and was holding him close. He was bearing this like a good cat but the moment I woke he removed himself and jumped down. My arm was stiff. I must have been hugging poor Horatio all night.

I got up and did my exercises. I do these when I wake up feeling stiff. I managed to get my elbow uncreased and restore the blood supply to the fingers which held the coffee cup. Then I put on my trackie and went down to start breakfast and the usual routine of the day. I had forgotten to keep any bread for myself so I ate biscuits and marmalade with my coffee and turned on the TV for company.

Not a good idea. All the international news was as bad as expected and I am, personally, sick of being stuck with a government which gives not one flying ... er ... fur for the opinions of the people. It's not as if I voted for Mr Goodcardigan (Leunig's description) and his band of merry warriors. But he ignores me just as if I did.

Nothing like a healthy dose of mistrust to start the day off with a bang. I went downstairs moodily. I gathered the ingredients for my olive bread and set the mixer going. Heckle and Jeckyl arrived at their usual pace, shoulder to shoulder like players in that strange sort of American football where they wear armour. Gridiron, that was it. I checked the night's harvest. Four mice and three rats; we might be getting the rat problem under control at last. I checked the cats over for rat bites, rewarded them, disposed of the corpses, washed my hands, and began making seed bread.

This is my secret recipe. You need seven kinds of seeds; I use kibbled wheat, oats, poppy seed, dill, fennel, caraway and coriander. It's a basic rye bread dough and the extra seeds are poured in while it is mixing, so that they are evenly distributed. The final result is a dense, chewy bread studded with seeds and terribly good for you. Or so I am told. What I find attractive about it is the taste, which is divine, especially with blue cheese. But the proportions have to be exact. I measured and poured carefully. By the time the olive bread was coming out of the oven, the seed bread was ready to go in and I heaved a sigh of relief. The rest of it was easy. I did the usual pasta douro for the Greek restaurant, made double for the shop, and was peacefully mixing Health Loaf by six am. Then it was just the rye bread,which I can make in my sleep (and often have) and the m.u.f.fins.

They are curiously easy to make and have largely replaced most other cakes in general consumption. Fashion is a strange thing. I used to have to throw my carrot cake into the pig bin, because although it was succulent and moist and had a very tasty yogurt icing, no one would buy it. Make the same mixture into a m.u.f.fin and the shelf would be bare by ten am. Odd. 'No accounting for tastes, the old woman said when she kissed the cow' as my grandmother used to say. Come to think of it, that was an odd thing for her to say ...

Nearly done. I opened the door into Calico Alley very carefully, in case there was another junkie on my grate, but there was no one there. Heckle and Jekyll strolled out to sniff the air and perhaps walk along to the j.a.panese food bar, which often had sc.r.a.ps of fish left. Which they would donate to a poor hard-working feline if he sat there looking winsome enough. It is hard for Heckle to appear winsome, what with his street-fighter 'I could beat you with a steam iron tied to my tail' air, but for raw tuna, I have seen him manage it. I stood at the door, inhaling the dawn. Bakers see a lot of dawn. I was glad that I had changed my profession. I like sunrise.

The j.a.panese cafe rises early to get to the fish market. Kiko waved at me from there, putting out a plate of sc.r.a.p fish on which Heckle and Jekyll dived as if they hadn't been fed for a week. I don't feed them fish more than twice a week, it isn't good for them, but a treat is good for everyone. 'A bit of what you fancy does you good.' I was quoting Grandmother Chapman a lot this morning.

I was grateful to her because she had taken me in when my parents had finally taken leave of their senses. She had just come and collected me one night when I was five and they hadn't tried to stop her. 'You're not fit to have a child!' she had said. She was right. They had no idea how to look after a child. Grandma had to teach me how to use a knife and fork, how to wear shoes, how to switch on an electric light. My parents had believed in going back to the land, and that meant candles. And an earth-closet. Oh, that pit toilet, how it stank. And no shoes, even in winter. When I thought of them I only remembered being cold, always cold. They were still in Nimbin and I devoutly hoped they stayed there. I was a great disappointment to them, which was fair enough, because they were a great disappointment to me.

Gloomy thoughts for a shining morning. I went back in to remove my health loaves to their cooling rack and put in the rye bread. I then stripped and chopped all the herbs except the bay leaves. My chopped herbs went into a Swiss-roll style casing of pasta douro. The scent made me more cheerful as I rolled and sliced and slid them into the oven.

My m.u.f.fins this morning were raspberry. They object to a lot of mixing, m.u.f.fins. They come out tough if one mixes them too much. Fine with me. I put them in the oven too and went back into the street. Heckle and Jekyll were ambling home, licking fish off their whiskers. I heard a whistle. Seven am and here came my newspaper. I was making such good time that I could have another cup of coffee and some seed bread and cheese while reading about the latest doom and mayhem. The paper boy, who was known for his reckless use of plastic-wrapped papers as missiles, flung it to me as he pa.s.sed. I fielded it. Heckle and Jekyll split to either side of Calico Alley as the bike pa.s.sed. They were used to the paper boy. They came back to flank the bakery door like small stone statues, noses lifted to the morning smells.

I left them there as I shut the door and locked it. They could get in through the cat door, carefully placed so that not even a really adroit thief could use it to reach a lock. I wandered up to the bedroom to get dressed and then down to the kitchen for more life-giving caffeine. I shed the tracksuit, noticed that last night's cat-claw wounds had almost vanished, put on my shop clothes and sat down with another cuppa and the first loaf of seed bread. It tasted just as I remembered. Really, really good. Sliced beautifully. Dense and rich.

I struggled with the plastic-wrapped newspaper until I managed to peel it. I have taken hours to do this on bad days. Well, it would have been hours if I hadn't lost patience and taken to the sandwich wrap with a breadknife, a girl's best friend. Mine has been sharpened so often that it has a rather elegant sickle moon curve in it. Druids could use it to gather mistletoe. Horatio floated to the table and sat down on the paper for a leisurely wash. I read around him.

'Another heroin death,' said the headline. 'Is there a serial killer in the city?'

Now there was a question to which I didn't want to know the answer. I read all of the story which wasn't covered by tabby fur. It was so interesting that I actually slid Horatio sideways onto the sports section. (Four heroin addicts had OD'd in the city within three days. Three had recovered, one had died.) Name and story followed. But every one had been a regular visitor to the soup van, which was actually mentioned. Senior Constable L White was quoted as saying that inquiries were continuing and that the respectable portion of the city had no need to worry. Well, that made me feel a lot better. I did not like junkies, no one did, they were a major pest, but where did Lepidoptera get off implying that they were expendable?

I scanned the rest of the news, which was all bad as usual, folded the paper and tried the crossword. No luck. Time to go to work. I could hear the girls opening the outer shutters of the shop. The city was on the move. More cars, the clang of trams, the scurrying of feet. Lights came on in the gla.s.s towers. Melbourne was facing another day.

CHAPTER FOUR.

I had an ordinary morning, sending off the bread orders, arguing with the carrier, checking the carrier's account, showing where he had made a mistake in his arithmetic and watching him trundle off, wondering if he was going to drop the bread in the gutter out of spite. I was a victim of my own success. I used to just trundle the bread along on a hand cart, and I never had this sort of ha.s.sle. I resolved to get another contractor as soon as I could spare a moment to find one. I was just folding the account and stuffing it crossly into the drawer when someone who compelled attention marched into the shop.

She was six feet tall in her stilettos. She was wearing a red leather corset and fishnets. She had a head of straight dark hair which fell to her waist and a spiked collar around her shapely neck. This matched the spiked armlets around her shapely wrists. The only thing missing was the whip. She was, of course, Mistress Dread from the leather shop and she was furious.

'Have you seen what they've painted on my wall?' she screamed in a full throated alto which made me wonder if she had ever studied for opera.

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The customers had forgotten all about bread and that, for me, is a bad thing. Various mouths, both male and female, had dropped open. I nodded to Kylie to take over and got out from behind my counter. Horatio raised an eyebrow. This was not the behaviour he expected in a respectable lady. But I needed to get Mistress Dread out of the shop.

'Show me,' I said.

Without a word, she turned and strode out. I had to run to keep up with her. She took me into Flinders Lane and stopped me with a hand on the shoulder. She was strong. It takes a lot to stop me in my tracks like that.

'There!' she declaimed.

It was noticeable, all right. Someone with a can of red paint and a sense that the end justified the means had sprayed 'Wh.o.r.e OF BABYLON' in letters a metre high across the whole frontage of the leather shop. I couldn't think of a thing to say but, 'Oh s.h.i.t,' which was, I admit, weak.

'Is that all you can say, Corinna? What I want to know is, did you see who did this?'

'No,' I said. Her red-lipsticked mouth was only centimetres from my neck and I was fairly sure that she would bite. I pitied the poor idiot graffitist if she laid her hands on him. 'I came out as usual at six and I looked down the alley and I didn't see anyone. You might ask Kiko. She gave my cats some fish, she might have noticed,' I added. This was unkind. Kiko was a friend. I shouldn't sic this virago on her.

'And have you had the letter?' demanded Mistress Dread.

'What letter?'

'This one, the scarlet woman one,' she yelled, thrusting a piece of paper at me. I recognised it.

'Oh yes, the wages of sin is death. Yes, I got it yesterday.

There may be no connection,' I said. 'There must be more than one lunatic in the city.'

'There may be hundreds,' snarled Mistress Dread. 'But I'm putting that cop onto this.'

Good idea, I thought. Mistress Dread might prove an education for Lepidoptera White. Though, on second thought, if she'd been in the police force for long, Mistress Dread wouldn't be in the top one hundred weird things she had seen.