Chapter 17

Late Saturday morning we walked along King Street. We went into Red Chili, but nothing seemed appealing. At The Urban Store there were just the sort of tee shirts I'd wanted: crimson, emerald, peacock blue, forsythia.

"Can I get more than one?" I asked Rachel.

"Why not? You'll still have something when you spill sauce on the one you're wearing Sunday!"

"Nasty girl! I should beat you for that!"

"Oh, please, sir!" We both laughed at that.

I bought an emerald and a blue. They were quite dear. I also found a pair of green silk hose. I used VISA.

"That should hold them tomorrow!"

"Hungry?" I asked.

"No, but we should walk over and do some food marketing."

We walked back to a bit past the bend in King and purchased some leaf lettuce, tomatoes, a cucumber, and a sack of potatoes. Then bread, milk, butter, black olives and some cheese.

"This will hold us for a few days, but we need to do some major marketing," Rachel said.

"Yes, dear," I sighed. "Can we go to a cheese shop? I'd like some real cheese."

"What's wrong with the Deli on King?"

"It's just not broad enough."

"Okay then, you find one."

"I'll ask tomorrow."

We had salad for lunch. "Want to go for a walk?"

"Where?"

"Just up King and City Road to Victoria Park. We could take something to sit on and some books. It looks dry enough."

"Fine. We can get drinks from one of the vendors."

And so we did that. I reread Upfield's An Author Bites the Dust, as murder in a fictitious Melbourne suburb was the closest I could get to Sydney (actually, the one about the Kelly Gang would be nearer in distance, but further in reality). Rachel took her book on the folktales of Indians in the American north-west. We had a fine time: together, comfortable, peaceful. After a few hours we walked home, stopping to get some take-out from Thai Times. After dinner, we went to bed for peaceful togetherness.

We cleaned house and lazed about Sunday. Then we got dressed and I drove downtown to Cowper Wharf. After a brief hunt, I located a space that appeared to be legal on Sunday.

"Do I look okay?" Rachel asked when we were in the lift.

"Ravishing," I responded.

Winnie's door was open and noise filled the vestibule. We just walked in. There must have been two dozen people there. We were most likely the youngest by a decade. We were spotted almost instantly.

"Oh, there you are! Come in! There are so many folks for you to meet." Winnie was hostess and mistress of ceremonies. She introduced us to a couple near the entry and then towed Rachel off, saying "You must meet the Gallery chair!"

"Oh, well," I said to the couple. "This way I know who counts."

"I know the feeling, sweet," the woman said. "He [head gesture] goes off to talk business or golf and I get abandoned."

"A man would be a fool to abandon you, ma'am," I said.

"Aren't you cheeky!" she responded. "Can I fix you a drink?"

She moved towads a table where a white-jacketed man was serving.

"Sir?" I cast an eye over the bottles. "I'll have a glass of the Viognier, please."

"Are you a connoiseur?" my new companion asked.

"Hardly, but I'm quite familiar with this one. My uncle owns the terroir."

"The vineyard?"

"Not quite. The group of vineyards. A terroir consists of the site- or region-specific characteristics of a wine. I recognized the label as from a hillside near St. George."

"Oh! You're a Queenslander! I'm afraid I didn't catch your name."

"Patrick Hollister. My pleasure. And you?"

"Mireille Colbert." She put out a long white hand with dark red nails. It was faintly moist when I took it.

"Well, Mrs. Colbert..."

"Mirry."

"Mirry. I'm not from Queensland. My father was born there, but I'm from Perth."

"Oh. Do you know Winnie well?"

"She's been a friend of the family for ... uh ... decades."

"Very tactful, Patrick." Mirry was maneuvering me about, like an angler with a prize fish. And it was clear what she was planning. But I spotted something on a wall.

"Pardon me, but might we look at that painting?"

"That one?" she pointed. "The one with that curve of dots?"

"Yes. It's a Fred Williams. Quite striking."

"You don't look like a painter."

"Oh, I'm not. The south-eastern Australian painter can be recognized by his poor manners and paint-spattered extremities. Large solitary, they band together briefly at gallery openings to criticize the exhibitor."

Mirry gave a shriek. "Oh, my! You hit it! You must be a performer. A stand-up comedian?"

"Wrong again. But I do want to look at the Williams." I moved towards it, sipping my wine. In the meantime a soft-looking woman in a too-brief orange dress had made her way over, attracted by Mirry's shriek of laughter.

"Laura, this is my new friend Patrick! He's the very funniest! Patrick, tell Laura what you said."

"Hello, Laura. I'm afraid I can't recall what it was that set Mirry off. It was just a spur-of-the-moment remark." Laura was wearing a shopful of scent. The Williams was really fine. It was a decade or so after ours, a vertical canvas with a shallow arc of dabs running vertically.