‘Not happy about your . . . er . . .’ Katerina twisted around groggily and shot a light grin at Carmel. ‘Er, your . . . love life.’
I glanced over at Carmel. Her face was blank, but a flush was already settling into her neck and cheeks.
‘Is that so?’ Anton’s answer was brief and noncommittal. They both disappeared into the hallway.
‘Yes,’ came her unsteady voice. ‘And to think that I didn’t know you were seeing each other! It’s a bit strange, Anton. After all, I live in the same house as Carmel . . . and no one told me . . .’
‘I met Carmel at your party.’
‘Huh? So I’m to blame, am I?’
‘I think you should be quiet now . . .’ he said. Then there was the creak of the bedroom door opening and closing.
‘I think she should be quiet, too,’ Carmel said vehemently. I laughed delightedly and slapped Carmel’s shoulder.
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Come on, everyone, let’s drink and eat.’
But somehow the buoyancy had gone. It wasn’t just the shock of finding Katerina like that. I think it was her cool beauty as much as anything that must have made our visitors uneasy. The younger ones, Eduardo included, finished their drinks and then made to leave. By this stage Juan and Miguel were deep in conversation near the heater. They just waved casually as the others left. At the front door, Eduardo turned to me as though he was going to say something, but he must have thought better of it. He just said a general goodbye and headed straight for the car. Declan and Annie, my friends from Amnesty, hugged me warmly before jumping into the car beside Eduardo. As they drove off the ambulance arrived. I looked at the time. It had been more than fifteen minutes since it had been called.
‘Too bad if she’d been dying,’ I said drily. Carmel nodded and we showed the two uniformed officers into the house. I knocked on Katerina’s door.
‘The ambulance is here,’ I said, opening the door and ushering the men straight through. I rushed off, catching Carmel’s hand on the way and urging her into the kitchen.
‘Let them deal with her,’ I whispered. ‘If she does need to go to hospital, I don’t want to be around to listen to her complain about it.’
Carmel and I were quiet as we cleaned up the lounge room and brought all the dishes and glasses through to the kitchen. Juan and Miguel’s voices were still droning on in Spanish.
‘All in all it’s been quite a night!’ Carmel said, yawning. ‘I feel like hitting the sack.’
‘You go then,’ I said lightly. ‘I’ll be all right with Katerina, if she wants anything.’
‘You sure?’ Carmel hesitated, then shrugged sourly. ‘I suppose Anton’s with her, too . . .’
‘But you want him tonight, don’t you?’ I replied, grinning.
‘Yeah,’ she sighed, and pulled the plug out of the sink. I put the tea-towel down and grabbed hold of her from behind.
‘How is all that going, Carm?’ I said softly, letting her go.
‘Well . . .’ She smiled.
‘Well what?’
‘Well, it’s getting better, I suppose,’ she said slowly.
‘You mean you’ve . . . done it?’
‘Well, not quite, but . . . we’re getting there.’
‘Will he stay tonight?’
‘I hope so. I mean, that was the plan, but with Katerina getting ill . . . I don’t know.’
‘Have you stayed all night together before?’
‘Not really.’
‘So this might be the big night, eh?’
‘Yes,’ she whispered, blushing.
There were footsteps and then Anton came into the room.
‘She won’t go to hospital. Wants me to take her over to her uncle’s place in Toorak.’ Carmel’s face fell, but she nodded.
‘Okay.’
‘Why?’ I snapped angrily. ‘If she doesn’t want to go to hospital, why doesn’t she stay here?’ Anton shrugged unhappily. ‘Says it’s too noisy or something. Her uncle is a doctor.’
‘Spoilt bitch.’ It was out before I could help myself. I closed my eyes tight.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. When I opened my eyes I saw that Anton was laughing silently.
‘You’re not wrong,’ he said, ‘but I’ll have to do it . . .’ He turned to Carmel. ‘I think I’ll probably have to stay there and make sure she’s all right, or I’ll hear about it from my parents . . .’
‘I guess so.’
‘Any idea what could have happened?’ I asked. He shrugged and shook his head.
‘No idea. Seems to have forgotten everything about what she was doing.’
‘I think she’s on drugs,’ Carmel said simply. Anton and I stared at her.
‘What?’ I said. But I sensed that Carmel was probably right. I was the medical student, and I hadn’t even thought about that. We’d learnt a bit about the signs of drug overdose. At least some of them were there. The slurred voice, the dilated pupils.
‘But . . . Katerina?’ I said incredulously. ‘I mean . . . I can’t imagine . . .’
‘I can’t either,’ Anton said shortly, looking away. ‘Katerina is too sensible for that . . .’
‘Just a thought . . .’ Carmel said, and shrugged.
Anton put both arms around Carmel’s waist, and drew her to him, smiling.
‘You gotta watch that imagination of yours, girl,’ he teased. Carmel laughed.
‘How did the protest go?’ Anton asked her.
‘Oh, terrific,’ Carmel said, enthused. ‘So many people. And we sang and yelled out for hours, didn’t we, Jude?’
‘It was great,’ I replied.
‘So, you’re both fully paid-up members of rent-a-crowd now, are you?’ he continued, in the same lighthearted tone. I shook my head. A second take. What the shit was he getting at?
‘What do you mean?’ I heard Carmel say. I’d turned my back on them so they wouldn’t see my reaction.
‘Nothing, nothing!’ he joked. I turned around and saw that Carmel wasn’t laughing.
‘What? Are you saying I shouldn’t have gone?’ she asked evenly. ‘Not at all,’ Anton replied. ‘It’s a free country. Anyone can do anything they like in this country. Even stop the traffic in the middle of the city on a Friday night.’
‘What are you trying to say, Anton?’ Carmel asked. She sounded calm, but I could tell she was getting upset.
Anton moved to the door. He didn’t look angry or even particularly interested in the conversation.
‘I’ll have to go and take Katerina. Look . . .’ He glanced over at me with an apologetic smile. ‘Can we have this conversation tomorrow? I’ll come over around four. Okay?’
‘What did you mean?’ Carmel repeated.
‘Well,’ he sighed impatiently. ‘I really don’t see why you would go to something like that, Carmel.’ He looked at me. ‘I mean both of you. What did you think you were going to achieve? That man is the president of a foreign country, whether you like it or not! We have trade agreements with Chile. What kind of impression will a whole lot of . . . singing protesters give him of this country?’ I was staring at him very hard. He must have sensed it because he suddenly turned to me, both hands spread out in a friendly, I-don’t-want-to-fight gesture. So bloody attractive, with his wide shoulders and interesting crooked nose! ‘Perhaps, Jude, your situation is a bit different,’ he conceded. ‘Your father and . . . er, everything.’
Oh, thank you very much, you ruling-class fucker . . . !
‘And why not Carmel?’ I asked. ‘Why shouldn’t she have been there?’
‘Well . . . what has it got to do with Carmel? I mean, really!’ He was almost laughing, imploring me to understand. ‘Chile?’ he said, with one of his charming wry shrugs. He leant forward and put a hand on Carmel’s shoulder. ‘She’s never even been there . . .’
‘So?’ I snapped. ‘The world shouldn’t have protested when the Chinese authorities shot down all those students in Tiananmen Square, because most of us have never been to China? Is that what you’re
saying?’
‘That’s different,’ he said shortly, the smile disappearing. ‘I mean that was so blatant . . .’
‘It was pretty blatant in Chile, too,’ Carmel cut in angrily. ‘Ten thousand people died and many more disappeared! A lot of people!’
‘Oh sure . . . sure . . . I mean.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well . . . if those figures are . . . er, correct.’ He looked at us both. ‘There is some question about that figure, you realise. I mean some pretty eminent people refute it . . .’
‘There are also eminent people who say that six million people were not exterminated in Hitler’s death camps,’ I said quietly. ‘All those Jews and gypsies and communists . . . it’s really important for some people not to believe that was true . . . But it was true. It happened.’
‘Oh sure, sure. I take your point,’ he said uncomfortably. ‘I’m not saying I refute it, but . . .’
‘But?’
‘Well, I guess I don’t see what it’s got to do with . . . today. I mean here in Australia. The military coup happened over twenty years ago. All very sad and everything, but . . . well, a lot of people think that the takeover was for the best . . . T hat Pinochet and his military rule are the best things that ever happened to Chile . . .I mean, the economy there is really looking up . . .’
The economy there is really looking up . . .
I stared into those sparkling, brilliant blue eyes, and felt a deep coldness wash over me.
My mother had told me that ordinary city life had gone on during the terrible purges after the coup. Thousands of people were being detained, taken at night by armed men, sometimes even whole families disappeared. Husbands and wives, friends and relations were sometimes tortured in front of each other so that they’d speak and give more names to the insatiable military machine. But on the surface, people simply went on with their business, pretending that nothing was happening. Many of them were pleased. The military coup had put more goods in the shops, and public transport was running again. Who cared that a democratically elected leader had been brought down by the systematic destabilisation of the military? They went out and bought ice-cream and re-employed their housemaids at half the price. They continued to meet for lunch on Saturdays, as they’d always done.
‘Don’t talk to me! I don’t know anything,’ a close neighbour had hissed through the crack in her door when my frantic mother had come home to find my father missing and their flat ransacked. Had she seen anything that afternoon? my mother wanted to know. ‘Go away! I know nothing.’ As long as it wasn’t her brother, husband, daughter or teacher, it was easier to pretend that the atrocities weren’t happening.
‘Well, sure,’ I cut in calmly, ‘because they benefited! You see, Anton,’ I went on reasonably, ‘they owned all the land and the industry before. I’m talking about one or two per cent of the population owning ninety per cent of the country’s wealth. The military coup meant that situation could return! Millions of peasants on that land, Anton, worked all their lives for virtually nothing. Generation after generation. Lucky if they had enough to eat!’ I stopped, aware that I was raving. I actually wanted to walk over to him, grab him by the scruff of the neck and push him hard up against the wall – rub his nose in the truth.
‘Well, we have to get on with things here, don’t we?’ he said. ‘I mean, we don’t live there.’
I sighed. He obviously wanted to get away, and I was suddenly exhausted. At that moment just getting horizontal seemed to be the one thing worth doing. I looked at Carmel, but she was frowning and staring at her feet.
‘I mean, realistically, Carmel,’ Anton said quietly. ‘You wouldn’t have got involved with this if you hadn’t been friends with Jude, would you?’
‘So?’ she shrugged. ‘What’s that got to do with anything? Don’t you get influenced by other people?’
She was about to say something else. Her mouth was open, her eyes wide and troubled, and one hand was in mid-air about to make a point. But Anton suddenly strode over to her and picked her up off the ground in a bear hug.
‘Shut up!’ he said. ‘Shut up. Shut up, shut up! I’ve got to go!’ It was like I wasn’t in the room. Carmel’s flushed face broke open into a surprised laugh. I smiled too, because, although I hated him for doing it, I had to admit it was kind of cute. A really sexy thing to do. He dropped her back to floor level and began kissing her. I watched her white hands tentatively making their way around his broad back. Love was weakening her resolve, I thought darkly. Women are always being shut up with kisses. Perhaps I was jealous. I didn’t have anyone to kiss like that. And a deep longing to kiss someone overwhelmed me.
Anton left with Katerina, and Carmel had gone to bed when I walked outside with Juan and Miguel. They were still discussing Chilean politics, but I was only half listening. I had begun thinking about Eduardo again, wondering how I might contact him privately, without it looking like I was doing it. The factory he worked in was way down in South Melbourne, so that would be out of the question. Maybe I should wait around longer after our meals in the cafe, try ‘bumping’ into him on his way home.
‘Well, what purpose would it serve to tell her?’ Juan hissed in Spanish. I’d fallen behind the two men to examine all the junk in our letter-box.
I knew he meant me. Tell her what?
They were both looking at me.
‘Bye then, Señorita!’ Miguel called in a slightly forced jovial voice.
‘See you soon,’ Juan waved, avoiding my eyes.
‘Tell me what?’ I demanded, coming nearer. I saw their faces in the street light. Old, both of them. Old and serious, not knowing if they should speak.
‘Come on, Juan,’ I said. ‘I’m a big girl. Tell me . . .’
Juan shrugged unhappily and looked at Miguel.
‘Ah, no,’ he said in Spanish. ‘I don’t think . . .’
My curiosity had really flared up now. I moved closer to Juan and put my arm through his.
‘What?’ I said sternly. They were both silent.
‘Tell her, Juan,’ the older man said bluntly. ‘It’s not as if she can do anything . . .’ Juan sighed again.
‘But it’s upsetting, Miguel . . .’
‘What?’ I said more loudly. Juan took both my hands in his own and caressed them lightly.
‘You remember that wedding I went to last week,’ he said.
‘Yeah,’ I said. He had joked that the families were from the more well-to-do groups from the other side of town; the ones who gave the balls and the dinner dances and never wanted to hear anything unpleasant about Chile. Juan had not been looking forward to the event at all.
‘Well, I met someone there,’ Juan continued. ‘A man we . . . er, a man we knew back in Chile.’
‘Who was he?’
Juan shrugged again. He looked away, his face suddenly anguished.
‘He was in the . . . er, military. A commander . . . in the DINA.’ ‘What?’
I stepped away. The DINA, the brutal wing of the police force in Chile. They were responsible for most of the arbitrary detentions. It was they who had organised the mass killings and the torture sessions in secret gaols all around the city. They were above the law, or apart from it. The government knew what they were doing, but turned a blind eye. When someone was in the hands of the DINA all their rights stopped. They didn’t charge or sentence. They were a law unto themselves.
‘In gaol?’ I said. ‘You knew him in gaol?’
‘Yes,’ Juan went on quietly. ‘He was the one your father and I faced when we first arrived. He was one of the top brass . . .’ Juan’s voice faded away. The reality of what he was telling me made my vision go haywire. The peaceful Melbourne street in front of me, bathed in the golden light from the old-fashioned lamps, started to swim around and around. For the first time in my life I thought I would faint.
‘And you met him at a wedding?’ I whispered incredulously. ‘Here? In Melbourne?’
‘Yes.’
‘What did he . . . look like?’ I asked.
‘Oh, the same,’ Juan said. ‘Just older. Heavier. He was . . . he is, a very handsome man, not much older than me.’
‘Did he recognise you?’
‘I don’t know. We locked eyes a couple of times. And I think . . .I think I saw him ask who I was, but I couldn’t be sure. I tell you chiquilla, after I’d recognised him, I was feeling so strange that I might have imagined anything!’
‘Was he the head of it all?’ I asked. ‘I mean of the gaol?’
‘Yes. Well, I think so,’ Juan replied. ‘Of course he would have had superiors elsewhere. When I was first interrogated he was firing the questions. There were two other men sitting there, too, although neither of them was present for any of our . . . sessions. Remember how I told you that they got me mixed up with someone else?’ I nodded. There was a small, strange buzzing sound near us. For a few moments I thought it was happening in my head. But suddenly one of the streetlights popped. We looked up in surprise, the gloom now making it almost impossible to see each other’s faces.
The ‘sessions’ Juan was referring to had involved him being tied naked onto an iron bed, with electrodes attached to his temples, to his nipples, and inserted up his anus. A heavy gag was placed over his mouth. He was given a small hand device, which he was instructed to press when he was prepared to ‘talk’, and the torture would stop. The gag would be removed, and if what he had to say was not what the men in the room wanted to hear, it would all start again. Juan had merely been a left-sympathiser, not a member of any party, but they’d made the mistake of thinking he was a member of the ultra-left-wing MIR organisation, and wanted him to spill the beans on other party members. Juan had genuinely not known any of the names they threw at him, but his protestations were only met with harsher treatment. When he had realised after a few days that the torture sessions would go on and on, he tried to commit suicide by tying a smuggled leather strap around his neck and attempting to hang himself from the bars on the cell window. It was only pure luck that my father, his fellow prisoner, had found him and saved him. On that same day, a petty army official arrived at the gaol and informed the DINA of Juan’s true identity as a benign. Not a member of MIR at all. He was freed that day and never saw my father alive again. ‘He was the one who let me go eventually, too,’ Juan went on. ‘He smiled at me as I walked out of the gate, before I got into the truck, apologising for the inconvenience.’ Juan gave a shrill laugh that broke through the cold night like a steel spike. ‘And he was probably the one who interrogated your father, too. He would have been the one who ordered his death after . . . after they’d got everything they could from him.’
Queen Kat, Carmel and St Jude Get a Life Page 23