‘Juan,’ she said, smiling. Then they both stared down at the whiteness of the inside of my arm. ‘Perfect, isn’t it?’ I had no idea what was going on, only that I felt intensely embarrassed. They were examining me like I was a piece of fancy porcelain.
‘Lovely,’ the man said, and then he ran one deep brown finger along it, from the inside of my elbow to my wrist. I pulled away sharply, as if I’d been electrocuted.
‘Jude,’ I hissed, ‘come on. I don’t want to . . .’ I’d had enough. This was getting creepy.
‘It’s okay,’ she said mildly, then looked at the man again. ‘Carmel needs a job, Juan,’ she said firmly. The man shrugged. ‘Okay,’ was all he said and then he smiled at me and shrugged. ‘You’ve got one.’ I just stood there like a prize geek, not understanding anything and looking from one to the other. Jude gave me a nudge.
‘See, you’ve got a job,’ she said with a broad smile.
‘But . . .’ I stammered. ‘I mean . . . what do I do? I mean when do I start?’
‘You can make coffee, sweep the floor . . .’ Juan said, as if what I’d actually do was unimportant, ‘serve the food. When would you like to start?’
‘But I can’t make coffee!’ I wailed, almost in tears. Suddenly a suspicion hit me. Maybe they were both making fun of me. It was hideous, too cruel to contemplate. Jude, my friend, was ridiculing me in front of this stranger! I stood there trying to summon up the courage to run. No one just walked into a cafe and got a job like this! Employers were meant to ask all kinds of questions. Everyone said jobs were incredibly hard to get. I took a panicky glance at Jude’s face. She seemed quite relaxed as she felt around in her bag and pulled out a pen. She had her practical, let’s-get-down-to-business look on. I suddenly remembered that she’d warned me in the bus.
‘Juan is a bit strange, but don’t let him put you off. He’s okay.’
‘How much do I get paid an hour?’ I asked, surprising myself almost as much as both of them. Jude gave me a warm, congratulatory grin. I smiled back tentatively, feeling as if I’d just passed some test. Juan shrugged and looked at Jude.
‘Well, what do you pay him?’ Jude asked impatiently, pointing at a short plump man who was bringing coffees over to a table of men. It was at that point I realised that everyone in the cafe, everyone except Jude and me, was male. I shifted a little uneasily.
‘What kind of, er . . . cafe is this?’ I cut in, trying to keep the suspicion out of my voice. But they’d both seen me staring around apprehensively at all the men and laughed.
‘It’s a sad place, Carmella,’ Juan said, smiling in a slow, wistful way, ‘wouldn’t you say so, Jude?’ Jude nodded.
‘And it’s a happy place, too,’ he added as a kind of afterthought, staring out of the grimy window.
Jeeze. The guy is a nutter! I thought. I gotta get out of here! But I also sensed that he was telling the truth. At least his version of it.
‘Juan, Carmel wants to know what she’ll be paid,’ Jude snapped, ‘its very important!’
‘Twelve . . . fifteen?’ he shrugged, as though that was the last thing he’d give even a moment’s consideration to. Jude looked at me questioningly. As if it were up to me! I opened my mouth, but nothing came out.
‘Let’s say twelve an hour for the first couple of weeks,’ she said. ‘Is that all right by you, Carmel?’ I nodded, thinking that as soon as I got out of this place I’d tell her that there was no way I’d work here.
‘And then when you’ve learnt the ropes,’ she went on blithely, ‘say after a couple of weeks, raise it to fifteen. Does that seem fair?’ She was looking at Juan now. He smiled at her warmly and made a gesture with his hands that said it was all right.
‘Good,’ Jude said, ‘now come over here and I’ll teach you to make coffee.’ I followed her behind the counter and watched her turn on the machine and twist the knobs. A familiar rope of panic began to coil up inside me. There was no way I’d be able to do this. I was sure of it.
‘See, here’s the coffee. You just fill this little thing and screw it in there. Make sure you have two cups beneath. Have a go. That’s right. And this is the milk for the cappuccinos and flat whites. You probably won’t have to make many of them, still you’d better know how.’ She stepped out of the way suddenly. ‘Come on. You do it now from the start.’ I did what I was told and within about ten minutes I’d learnt how to make all the different kinds of coffee. Such a simple thing, and I’d thought it was beyond me.
After that we decided on the hours I’d work. Juan said he’d like me to start on the early-morning shift until his wife got back. After that I could work in the evenings if I wanted. A lot of his customers were shift workers who came in to get a meal and meet some friends before they went home to sleep. Could I be there at seven? I gulped and nodded. It would mean getting up at six, considering the half-hour bus ride.
‘Sure. Until when?’
‘Say midday or one. Business eases off in the afternoon, then gets strong again in the late afternoon and evening.’
‘Okay. When do I start?’
The same sad smile, the intense eyes.
‘When do you want to start?’
‘A week after Easter. The Monday?’
He took my hand and shook it as if I was really doing him a favour.
‘See you Monday, Señorita.’
‘Yeah, see you then,’ I said uneasily, pulling my hand away.
‘So, what do you reckon?’ Jude was grinning at me like the cat who’d just eaten the cream. ‘It’s great, isn’t it?’ I nodded warily. We’d rushed out of the cafe and were waiting for our bus home.
‘I don’t know, Jude . . .’
‘You’ll be fine.’
‘You think so?’
‘Of course.’
‘He’s a weird man.’
‘I know.’
‘How do you know him so well?’
‘He was a friend of my father’s.’
‘What? Back in Chile?’
‘Yeah. He was with my father in prison.’
‘Oh God, Jude!’ It hit me like a wet sheet in the wind, smacking against my face and blinding me momentarily. And now the bus was coming. I mean, I’d known all along, like everyone else in Manella, that her father was dead. But knowing something and really knowing it were two different things. I hadn’t thought about it at all.
‘Shit, I’m really sorry, Jude,’ I swore easily, for probably the first time in my life.
‘What about? Come on! Here’s the bus.’
We scrambled on, showed our tickets to the surly driver, and found ourselves a seat.
‘Jude, I’m . . . sorry about your father being dead and . . . everything!’ I burst out.
She smiled at me. The bus lurched off. To steady herself she clasped the seat in front with both her small brown hands. I watched them grip hard then ease up as the ride became steadier. ‘I know,’ she said, after a while.
‘What?’
‘I know you’re sorry. About my father being dead.’ I nodded and we were silent. Then she began to speak, very softly and carefully. Each word sort of took me downwards onto a deeper, different plane. It was like music.
‘They tortured that man, same as they did to my father. They strung them both up for six hours at a time, sometimes longer, day after day for weeks. They wanted information, names of people they worked with in the resistance. They hung them from their wrists. Until their sinews broke and their muscles tore . . . sometimes they’d wet them all over and then use electric cattle prods on their sensitive parts . . .’ Her voice choked as she dropped her head between her two outstretched arms. ‘Then they’d beat the soles of their feet,’ she continued, her voice muffled. ‘They couldn’t walk or even stand up because their feet were so swollen and bloody . . . but the next day they would do it again.’
When she stopped talking I looked up and I wondered if I was still breathing.
‘How do you know?’ I whispered.
‘They let my fath
er out after one time. He’d spent six months in one of their gaols. He told my mother everything . . .’
‘Have you talked about it with . . . with that man too?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did he know your father well?’
‘They were friends at university.’
‘Does your mother know about him being here?’
‘No.’
‘Are you . . . are you going to tell her . . . about him?’
‘I don’t know.’
It was after eight by the time we opened the door of our little house. We stood in the hallway and breathed in. The smell of cooking coming from the kitchen was wonderful.
‘Roast pork!’ Jude whispered, crinkling up her nose. ‘What do you reckon?’
‘Nah,’ I said, taking a deep whiff, ‘it’s some kind of chicken or beef.’
‘There’s a big difference between a hen and a cow, you idiot!’ Jude growled. With that we both collapsed against the walls in spasms of nervous giggling.
After we had laughed ourselves out we walked down into the kitchen, grimacing at each other when we saw that the table in the lounge room had already been laid. Not only were we late, we hadn’t fulfilled our part of the deal. Were we going to get into trouble with the headmistress?
‘Hello, you two,’ Katerina called, welcoming us with one of her wide, gushing smiles.
We walked into the kitchen to find her hauling a couple of roast birds out of the oven. Plates were already laid out on the kitchen table. Katerina had a little frilly apron on over a stunning black beaded dress that was split up the back, sheer black stockings, and high heels.
‘I’d like you to meet Glen Simons,’ she said with a proud smile. We both turned in surprise to see the man sitting down at the end of the table. He looked up, olive-skinned, good-looking, clutching a glass in one hand and a bowl of cherries in the other, and at least fifty years old.
‘Glen, these are my housemates. Jude and Carmel.’
He waved the hand that was holding the wine by way of greeting, but didn’t smile. He was incredibly good-looking, probably the most handsome old man I’d ever seen – on screen or off. But he’s old enough to be her father. Easily. Grandfather? There was silver in his hair and deep wrinkles around his glass-cold blue eyes.
‘Hello, Glen!’ we chorused.
‘Hello, girls,’ he said in a deeply bored voice, as if he thought we were mildly amusing, ‘nice to meet you.’ But his eyes were already on something else by the time he’d finished the sentence. I took one glance at Jude and I could see that she had been similarly stunned. The silver-streaked hair, the ice-blue eyes, and the slight sagginess around the fashionable stubble on his chin. He wore a cream silk shirt and navy linen pants with slip-on leather shoes. His skin was tanned and . . . Wow! It flashed through my mind that if those two ever got together they would make a pretty amazing kid.
‘So, what is it you’re cooking?’ I asked, for something to say. ‘Duck with orange,’ Katerina smiled, ‘but there’s home-made pâté and iced Mexican soup first, so why don’t you both just go in and sit down?’
‘Are you sure we can’t help?’ we protested. She waved us away.
‘No, everything is under control. Take Glen into the lounge room and seat yourselves at the table.’ We both edged towards the door, thinking that he’d get up and follow. But he didn’t look as if he planned to go anywhere. After the diversion of being introduced to us, his eyes had moved back to Katerina. Jude and I stood by the doorway and watched him ogling her as she moved around the kitchen. But she gave no indication that she was aware of it.
‘I got a job,’ I said lamely. ‘In a cafe.’ Katerina looked up from where she was dishing up the soup.
‘That’s great, Carmel,’ she said in a kind of uninterested voice. Glen gave no indication that he’d heard. He was still staring at her, eating her up with his eyes. Katerina turned her back on him and lifted both her arms up to get a bowl from the top shelf. The movement made her dress rise up her legs. I watched him watching that.
‘So, Glen,’ Jude said sharply, ‘what do you do?’
‘I’m in business,’ he said dismissively. The lustful look in his eyes was fascinating. He’d hardly taken them off Katerina to answer. The guy was almost licking his lips!
‘Oh yeah?’ Jude said. ‘What kind of business?’
‘The rag trade,’ he replied, without enthusiasm. ‘I have a company in South Melbourne. We supply a lot a piece work for the fashion labels.’ He was still watching Katerina.
‘We . . . ?’
He turned then and smiled condescendingly at Jude.
‘Well, I don’t do it myself,’ he said. ‘I employ a lot of people to do the work.’
‘Women?’ Jude said. Glen frowned.
‘Yes, mainly women,’ he said. Jude nodded thoughtfully.
‘You got a problem with that?’ he asked sarcastically.
‘Migrant women?’ she said, ignoring his tone, running her fingernail along the table and making a horrible scaping sound. ‘Yes. Migrant women.’
‘Migrant women who can’t speak English, eh?’
‘They’re glad of the work,’ he replied shortly and stood up. ‘Bathroom in here?’ pushing on the door.
‘Yes,’ Jude answered coolly. He walked through and shut the door. End of conversation. Jude was still frowning. I gave her a nudge and we went through to the lounge room and sat down at the table.
‘He’s a creep,’ she said. We were sitting opposite each other and the door to the kitchen was open.
‘Ssssh,’ I said urgently, ‘he’ll hear!’
‘I don’t care,’ she shrugged, picking up a piece of crusty bread from the plate and smothering it with butter, ‘hope he does.’
The dinner progressed woodenly. I tried to open up the conversation a couple of times, but no one followed through. Katerina and I did most of the talking, and it was stiff and constrained with the other two just sitting there, more or less silent, as they listened to us blabber on about nothing.
‘So, a job, Carmel? When do you start?’
‘Monday week, at seven o’clock.’
‘You’ll be tired when you get home with such an early start.’ ‘I guess so.’
Glen made it obvious that he wasn’t in the least interested in either Jude or me, or in anything that was being said. Even at the table, while we were eating, his eyes hardly left Katerina. When she reached out for a piece of bread he stopped her hand with his own and sort of stroked it, making her meet his eye over their touching hands. And when she handed him his plate of duck and fancy sauce he let her put it down in front of him and then grabbed her waist from behind and tried to make her sit on his knee! Yuck! I looked down at my plate not daring to catch Jude’s eye. It was nauseating, just watching him waiting to pounce at the first opportunity. Jude sat glowering down at her end of the table for most of the meal. Her abrupt answers to any questions that were put to her were verging on rude. After a while I couldn’t understand anything that was going on. All I did know was that I felt uncomfortable and bored. Katerina had gone to so much trouble. And I was baffled. Why had she wanted us there? I’d never even had a halfway decent conversation with her since moving into the house. But I couldn’t help feeling sorry for her. No one could possibly call this dinner pleasant, in spite of the fancy food.
By the end of the first course I saw that Katerina was starting to look strained and decided I’d had enough. I was about to hop up and collect the plates and then excuse myself by doing the dishes. But it was exactly at that moment that Jude spoke. ‘So, how many women have you got working for you, Glen?’ she asked in this amazingly loud, aggressive voice. My mouth fell open and I began to squirm in my chair. I saw that he had also been taken by surprise.
‘Depends on what’s on,’ he shrugged. ‘Sometimes two hundred. Sometimes three.’
‘Where is the factory?’ Jude asked, her voice saturated with a meaning that I didn’t get. I looked over at Katerina, wh
o was looking at Jude with hurt surprise. Glen leant over and took Katerina’s hand, as if he was protecting her from the crass, loud-mouthed Jude.
‘Well, my office, as I think I said before, is in South Melbourne,’ he said coldly, ‘but most of the work is done out.’ He turned to Katerina with a small, tense smile.
‘You mean piece work?’ Jude said.
‘Yes. That’s right.’
‘So you don’t pay for any of the overheads, right? Electricity. Not to mention sick leave or holidays? What’s the name of your company?’
‘Clothes-that-go.’
Katerina was beginning to look uncomfortable. The frown on her face was becoming more strained by the second. Jude suddenly got up and stormed out into the kitchen. I looked at the other two, but they were obviously determined to let pass whatever Jude was on about.
Glen picked up the bottle of wine and poured some into my glass.
‘What are you studying, er . . . my dear?’ he said in his patronising way. Hell. I saw red. I was livid. This creep was just playing games. I hadn’t been good enough to talk to before, but now, for some reason, probably to do with Jude’s questions, he’d decided he’d better at least be civil to one of us.
‘I don’t study at all,’ I said sharply. Katerina gave a little jump as though I’d bitten her.
‘What do you mean, Carmel?’ she said. ‘You’re doing a teaching course at Melbourne, aren’t you?’
‘No,’ I said bluntly. ‘I’ve finished with that.’
‘Since when?’
‘Since about three weeks into term.’
‘So, what are you going to do?’ she asked with a forced smile. ‘I just told you,’ I answered coldly. ‘I told you both out there that I’ve got a job in a cafe!’
‘Oh!’ she said. ‘I thought you meant that you’d be doing it in between lectures or after them or . . . whatever . . .’ As far as I was concerned all that showed was that she was basically uninterested in anything to do with my life. I got up, picked up a couple of plates from the table, and went out to the kitchen. I wanted to get away from both of them. I wished with all my heart that it was just Jude and me in the house. We would have got along together just fine. This creepy old bore and Katerina were making me feel sick. I realised that I would never want to be Katerina if it meant having to mince around for someone like him!
Queen Kat, Carmel and St Jude Get a Life Page 12