She checked her appearance in the looking glass, savouring the heat spreading through her belly, and half-heartedly fluffed out her hair. It’d be Ralph Kidd waiting for her. She didn’t mind Ralph. He’d been a long-time customer and while the sex was as much of a chore as it was with any man, he was physically fit, interesting, generous and, best of all, clean.
As she entered the salon, she offered him her hand and said politely, ‘Good afternoon, Mr Kidd. I apologise for keeping you waiting.’
Ralph Kidd stood and collected his hat. He was over six feet tall, slender and very fair. ‘No matter.’
Friday hooked an arm through his and led him up the stairs. ‘Been away?’ She could dispense with formality now they were alone. ‘Haven’t seen you for a few weeks.’
‘Yes, I’ve been visiting a shipbuilder colleague in Hobart Town. Doing very well, by all accounts.’
‘Very nice. Just you, or did you take the wife and kids?’ Ushering him into a room, Friday closed the door.
‘Just me. Helen doesn’t care for ocean voyages.’
‘How are they, the kids?’
‘Oh, good. Will’s lost both his top front teeth now and Stephanie sits at the dinner table waggling hers constantly. It makes Helen ill.’
Friday laughed.
‘How have you been?’ Ralph asked, draping his coat over a chair and getting to work on his cravat.
‘Same as usual. There is something I have to tell you, but.’
‘Sounds ominous.’
‘I’m not going to be doing this for much longer. Well, only today, actually.’
‘Christ.’ Ralph looked astonished. ‘Don’t tell me someone’s making an honest woman of you?’
‘Doubt it. We’re opening a flogging room. I’ll be working in there from now on.’
‘In what capacity?’
Friday made a flicking gesture.
‘You? I didn’t know you did that.’
‘Well, I do.’
‘So there’ll be no more of this?’
‘’Fraid not. Sorry.’ Though Friday wasn’t, not at all.
Ralph’s shirt landed on the chair. ‘What about privately? I’d be happy to pay you more than Mrs Hislop charges here, and you’d get the lot.’
‘I’ll be too busy for that. I can’t work every hour of the day.’
‘Well, can I whip you? I’ve always fancied that. Does it come with a fuck?’
‘No, it doesn’t, and no, you can’t,’ Friday said. ‘Why don’t you try one of the other girls? Hazel’s lovely, and so’s Connie. Or you could give Lou a go if you fancy a bit of class.’
‘I don’t want class. I want you.’
Thanks, Friday thought.
‘So while I’ve got you I’m going to make the most of it,’ Ralph said, propelling her towards the bed.
Only today, she told herself as she landed face down on the mattress. Just one more day.
‘How did it go yesterday?’ Sarah asked, reaching for a Madeleine biscuit. ‘These look nice, Harrie. Did Daisy make them, or you?’
‘I did,’ Harrie said, her eye on Charlotte galloping around in the ankle-length grass behind the house. From the back verandah, where they sat on a recently purchased matching set of wicker furniture, there was a lovely view of the rear garden, the Domain, glimpses of Government House and the rather castle-ish Government Stables, and Sydney Cove.
‘Where did you buy the dried cherries?’
‘How’s store on Pitt Street. They only came in last week, apparently.’
‘God, listen to you,’ Friday grumbled. ‘You’re like a pair of bloody old grannies. Where’s the Sarah Morgan I used to know? She wouldn’t’ve been caught dead talking about dried cherries.’
Sarah shrugged. ‘Just asking. Adam likes his home baking. Anyway, don’t worry, I’m still here, inside Mrs Green. How did it go yesterday?’
‘Pretty good, actually. I woke up in a really good mood for a change and for a moment I couldn’t remember why and then I realised, thank bloody Christ, no more having to lift my bloody leg!’
‘That must be such a relief,’ Harrie said.
‘I’ll say.’
Sarah nodded. They all knew how much Friday had hated her old job. ‘And the work? Not that I want to know all the gory details, thanks.’
‘Child’s play, compared to what I’ve been doing. Well, nearly child’s play.’ Friday rubbed at her right shoulder. ‘I think I might have done myself a slight injury. I had seven customers one after the other and it was a bit much even though I kept changing hands. We were busier than Mrs H thought we’d be. And my feet hurt from standing for so long in those stupid boots. The heels on them!’
‘What does the room look like?’ Harrie asked. ‘Are the drapes nice? I’m thinking about new drapes for here, but velvet seems a bit extravagant.’
Friday lit her pipe. ‘Not really what you’d expect.’
‘Some of us have no idea what to expect,’ Harrie said prissily. ‘Charlotte, no! That’s a snail. We don’t eat snails.’
‘Oh, leave her, it won’t hurt her,’ Friday said. ‘A lot of flogging rooms tend to look a bit gaudy but ours doesn’t. Jack gave all the trims and the ceiling boards a fresh coat of white paint, repolished the floor, and hung this pale grey Chinese silk with white flowers and birds on the walls. Pheasants, I think. Then Mrs H added the dark grey velvet drapes, a big blue and grey carpet and a white cabinet for the whips and stuff. And there’s good bleached linen sheets on the bed, because she says we’re not having common old oilcloth in our flogging room, and it’s all come together really nicely. It’s quite . . . well, elegant.’
Harrie made a face. ‘Don’t the sheets get, er, mucky?’
‘No muckier than the sheets in the other rooms. Which is why we’ve got two coppers in the hotel laundry.’
‘How much do you charge?’ Sarah asked, pouring herself more tea. ‘Anyone else want another cup?’
‘Seven pounds an hour.’
‘Bloody hell! That’s as much as some folk get paid a year!’
‘Well, not quite. And I bloody well work hard for my sixty per cent, I can assure you.’
‘So it’s just for wealthy men, really, isn’t it?’ Harrie made another face. ‘I have to say, I can’t really see the appeal of it.’
‘Not just men,’ Friday said. ‘Mistress Ruby at Mrs Thompson’s reckons she gets women now and then as well. Only rich ones, though.’
An escalating wail reached them: Charlotte had fallen flat on her face. Harrie crossed the lawn and picked her up, brushing damp leaves off the little girl’s pinafore and the knees of her pantaloons.
Sitting down again with Charlotte on her lap, she said, ‘I’ve done a new series of flash for Leo. Do you want to see them?’
‘Yes, please,’ Friday said quickly.
She’d always loved Harrie’s tattoo designs, and wore one herself. She already had a peacock, roses and the name of her deceased daughter tattooed on her left arm, a Chinese dragon on her right, a bat with outstretched wings on her right calf (that one was Harrie’s), and an enormous phoenix on her back, but felt it was time to get something else.
Blushing, Harrie rang a small silver bell on the tea tray. ‘Look at me,’ she said. ‘What a lazy cow I’m turning into.’
When Daisy appeared, Harrie asked her to fetch her book of drawings from the parlour. Daisy trotted off, returning almost immediately.
Harrie moved the tea tray and opened the book on the table. ‘I’ve been getting interested in birds lately. The garden’s full of them. I think it’s all the berries. So I thought I might as well do a series. What do you think?’
‘Mama’s pitchers,’ Charlotte said, planting a grubby finger on the corner of one.
The stylised drawings depicted common local birds such as the crow, pigeon, petrel, sandpiper, cockatoo, gull, parrot, raven and magpie, but Harrie had, as usual, added her own stunningly decorative elements, as well as her little signature bat.
Friday let o
ut a gasp. ‘Ooh, Harrie, they’re lovely.’
‘They are,’ Sarah agreed.
‘I like how they’re a bit fierce, even the pigeon and the cockatoo, but beautiful at the same time,’ Friday said. ‘Nowhere near as ghoulish as the ones you were doing a year ago, though I have to say they were bloody spectacular. I really fancy this crow. I might get that on my left calf.’
Sarah said, ‘Haven’t you got enough tattoos?’
‘No, and nothing at all on my left leg. When were you thinking of giving them to Leo?’
‘This week,’ Harrie said. ‘Tuesday morning, probably.’
‘Good. I’ll pop down there and see him on Wednesday. You know, you really are very clever, Harrie.’
Harrie went pink again. Charlotte grizzled to be put down, and ran off into the house.
‘Adam’d like these,’ Sarah said. ‘He’s keen on birds. Would you be interested in doing a couple of bigger ones I could frame? I’d pay you, of course.’
‘Don’t be silly, I’m not a proper artist.’
‘’Course you are. Look at these.’ Sarah waved a hand at the flash. ‘Think about it. It’d be your first commission.’
‘Go on, they’d be lovely,’ Friday said, sliding her flask out of her reticule and removing the cork with a squeak.
Harrie said, ‘It wouldn’t be, not really. Leo’s always paid me to draw them. That’s a commission, isn’t it? And I wouldn’t make you pay, anyway. That’s not what friends do.’ She glanced at Friday. ‘I thought you were supposed to be making an effort to cut down? You told us Mrs Hislop said you had to.’
‘Did I?’ Friday wiped her mouth. ‘I don’t remember that.’
Sarah rolled her eyes. ‘You told us a couple of weeks ago that Mrs H said she’d fire you if you didn’t. No drinking during the day or at work, you said.’
‘I’m not at work. It’s my day off, today and tomorrow.’
‘I don’t think that’s quite what she meant, do you?’ Harrie asked.
‘How do you know what she meant? You weren’t there.’ Friday felt her temper beginning to unravel. ‘Anyway, what’s it got to do with her?’
‘She’s your mistress, remember?’ Sarah pointed out.
‘So? That doesn’t give her the right to tell me what I can and can’t drink. It’s none of her business. It’s none of yours, either.’
‘It is her business if you behave like an arsehole at work.’
‘Who says I do?’
‘Why wouldn’t you?’ Sarah said. ‘You behave like an arsehole with us when you’re drunk, staggering round with your hair all over the place, pissed and swearing like a great stinking foul-mouthed . . . carrot.’
Friday thought that was incredibly rude. ‘Don’t you call me a carrot.’
Harrie laughed, but, alarmed that the bickering would get out of hand, said, ‘Stop it, you two. We’re just worried about you, Friday.’
‘Well, don’t be. I can look after myself.’
‘Like the time you got arrested and ended up in before the magistrate?’ Sarah said. ‘Look, why won’t you stop drinking?’
‘I have. I’ve cut down a lot,’ Friday lied.
‘Or can’t you?’ Sarah accused. ‘You can’t, can you?’
‘Of course I bloody well can.’
‘Then why don’t you?’ Harrie asked. ‘You’d feel a lot better. And there’s your new job. You don’t want to lose that, do you?’
‘I won’t lose it.’
‘Well, we’ll see,’ Sarah said.
Friday eyed her resentfully. Ever since she had failed Harrie six months previously, Sarah had been prickly towards her, especially about the drinking, and it was wearing very thin. Harrie said it was because Sarah loved and cared about her, but Friday wasn’t so sure of that any more. Sometimes it felt like Sarah was putting the boot in just for the hell of it, and that hurt.
Daisy brought Charlotte out then for a kiss before her afternoon nap.
‘Bye bye, I not seeping,’ Charlotte said as she planted a sloppy kiss on Friday’s cheek.
‘Good for you,’ Friday said.
They all waved as Charlotte was carted off.
‘I’m off myself,’ Friday said, standing. ‘Things to do.’
‘Such as?’ Sarah demanded.
‘Just things.’ Like finishing my gin in peace. ‘Thanks for the tea and biscuits, Harrie. Sorry I missed James. Where is he?’
‘He and Matthew have gone to see a man about buying a carriage.’
‘Whatever next?’ Sarah said, but there was no spite to the comment.
‘It wouldn’t really be for us, it’d be for when he gets called out after hours.’
‘What’s wrong with a horse?’ Friday asked.
‘Where would he put the person who comes to fetch him? Behind him, holding on round his waist?’
‘That’s true,’ Friday said. Her face lit up. ‘We could borrow it and go on jaunts. There’re some . . .’ About to say ‘great pubs I know out on the Parramatta Road’, she shut up, having caught Sarah’s disapproving eye.
‘I thought you were leaving.’
‘I am.’
Harrie waggled her fingers in farewell.
Friday wandered down Hunter Street taking surreptitious slurps from her flask, then, surprised to find it empty by the time she reached Essex Street, detoured slightly and stopped in at the Bird-in-Hand. Feeling sufficiently fortified, she headed home just after sunset. Countless bats passed silently overhead, bound for the fig trees on Bunkers Hill, Windmill Street, and Dawes Point, flying so low she could smell their faintly musky, fermented-fruit odour. She gazed up at them for a while, making herself dizzy.
At the Siren’s Arms Jimmy was shovelling horse shit off the stable-yard cobbles — a lot of it — so there must be quite a few guests in the hotel tonight. Why horses had to wait to shit in the stable yard when there was plenty of street outside, she didn’t know. She waved and went inside.
She was a bit mashed, her shoulder hurt, and, even though she was relieved beyond measure to not have to sleep with her customers any more, she felt deflated. Honestly, what was wrong with her?
And the door to her room was ajar. Shite. She must have forgotten to lock it on her way out.
She opened it . . . and shrieked.
Chapter Four
Aria was sitting on the end of the bed.
She smiled. ‘Good evening, Friday.’
‘Aria?’ Friday rushed towards her, her heart pounding madly, then stopped, wondering if she’d had more to drink than she’d realised (quite possible) and was a bit delirious.
‘Yes, I am really here,’ Aria said, grinning now.
‘Oh,’ Friday said, utterly bereft of words. She put her hands on her cheeks and said ‘Oh’ again.
Her stupefied daze was broken by the sound of feet pounding along the corridor outside, then Ivy, the hotel housegirl, burst into the room. ‘Miss Friday, are you all right?’
‘What? Yes, I’m fine. I . . . got a shock, that’s all.’
Ivy’s hands clutched at her apron. ‘I thought it’d be all right to let her come in and wait. I mean, she is your friend, isn’t she?’
Friday looked at Aria and smiled. ‘Yes, she’s definitely my friend. Sorry you got a fright, Ivy.’
Ivy nodded uncertainly. Friday closed the door after her and sat on the bed. She and Aria gazed at each other.
‘You smell of gin,’ Aria said.
‘Sorry. God. I’ve looked forward to this for such a long time.’
‘So have I.’
‘Are you here with your family?’
‘No. I have run away.’
Friday’s heart gave an almighty lurch. ‘From New Zealand?’
‘Yes, from Aotearoa, from my family, and from my betrothed, Te Paenga. I was to marry him this month, but I cannot. I cannot marry a man with ugly feet. I cannot marry a man at all.’ Aria took Friday’s hand. ‘I wish to be with you, Friday.’
Friday gave a strangled sob of shock and
elation that came out sounding like ‘A-hump!’ and felt silly. She cleared her throat. ‘You ran away to be with me?’
‘Yes. I could not be without you any longer.’
Friday raised Aria’s fingers to her lips and kissed them. ‘But you didn’t write to me. You didn’t answer any of my letters.’
‘You did not send me any.’
‘I did so! I sent dozens.’
Aria’s face creased in a frown, momentarily lending her beautiful features a faintly malevolent air. She gently detached her hand from Friday’s. ‘I did not receive them. Also, I sent many to you. I gave them to my servant to deliver to Paihia to ships sailing for Sydney.’
‘Well, I never got them. Your mother, do you think?’
Aria nodded. ‘She has always interfered. Did you receive my gift at Christmas?’
‘I did and it was lovely! That and the letter are all I’ve had to keep me going. Otherwise I would have thought . . .’ Friday knew that without those, her belief in Aria’s love for her would have faltered months ago. Aria though had had nothing, but had still forsaken everything to come to Sydney to be with her. ‘Do you have somewhere to stay? Because you could live here, with me.’
‘Here, in your room?’
Friday nodded.
‘What might people say?’
‘Who cares what they say? Mrs H knows about us, and it’s her hotel, and everyone else can go to hell. They probably won’t even notice.’
Aria’s eyebrows went up. ‘I thought you Pakeha do not approve of those who love their own kind?’
‘We don’t, if it’s men. They get sent to gaol and sometimes even the gallows if they’re caught. But women going with women isn’t against the law. We just become lovers or live together. Well, that’s what happens with girls like me. I don’t know what ladies do. The same, I expect.’
Aria glanced around the room. ‘I would love to live here with you, Friday, though I think we will need a bigger bed.’
Utterly delighted, Friday said, ‘We’ll buy one tomorrow.’
‘But I will not work here. I am not a prostitute.’
‘Oh, no, that’s not what I meant!’ Friday was shocked that Aria would even think she’d have to work for her keep. ‘I’ve got enough money for both of us. Anyway I’m not doing that any more. I’ve got a new job. I’m a dominatrix now.’
A Tattooed Heart Page 6