Simone Kirsch 01 - Peepshow

by Leigh Redhead

  She examined her reflection in the mirror, caught me looking and smiled.

  ‘How was your night, Vivien?’

  ‘OK,’ I shrugged, ‘but I’m having a hard time getting any money out of them. I watched you girls. There’s an art to it, isn’t there?’

  ‘Yeah, but it’s hard to explain.’ She turned and sat on the dressing table. ‘When I first started I hardly made anything. After about a month, something seemed to click in and it became easy to make money. Is that how it happened to you?’ she asked the others.

  ‘Pretty much.’ Betty zipped up an old-fashioned crocodile skin case. All strippers need big bags. Chloe always trundled about with an air hostess suitcase, wheels and a pull-out handle.

  ‘You’ve got to tell them what they want,’ said Anais.

  ‘Don’t wait for them to ask you.’

  Dakota said, ‘I just grab ’em by the hand and tell ’em it’s time for your lap dance now.’

  ‘Isn’t that a bit…’

  ‘Rude?’ said Betty. ‘Don’t you think they’re rude, the way one of them pays and the rest gather round for a free look? They act like you should be doing it for nothing and reckon twenty bucks ought to get them a head job. So fuck them.’

  ‘Hear hear,’ said Anais.

  ‘Point taken.’ I changed into jeans, black boots and my Doug Mansfield and the Dust Devils T-shirt. It was a versatile look that could take me from the boardroom, to dinner, to out on the town.

  The door to the girls’ room burst open and Emma headed for her locker. ‘Thank Christ that’s over. What a bunch of creeps. Where we going, girls? Expansion?

  They’ve got jugs of illusions.’

  ‘I want to go to the Gin Palace,’ said Betty.

  ‘It’s four in the morning, it’ll be closed.’ Aurora hoisted her bag over her shoulder. ‘Coming for a drink, Vivien?’

  ‘Why not,’ I said.

  Expansion nightclub was half a block up King Street.

  Aurora smiled at the doorman and we bypassed the line out front. Who wouldn’t let in a bunch of strippers, cashed up and wearing only marginally more than they did on stage? We dropped our bags at the coat-check and went upstairs to a room with lots of wood panelling and wall fans pushing smoky air around. People writhed to revamped disco hits under a paltry laser light show, and drunk young men packed together at the edge of the dance floor.

  I followed the others to a lounge area at the back of the room where it was quieter and leaned into Aurora:

  ‘Nice place, classy.’

  ‘I thought you’d like it,’ she smirked. ‘Drink?’

  ‘Champagne?’

  ‘Don’t do it. The champers here is so cheap it’s poison. You’ll be sick as a dog for days. Can I get you anything else?’

  ‘Would they have Irish whisky?’

  ‘A girl after my own heart. I like her.’ She clapped me on the back.

  ‘Well buy a fucking bottle, sweetheart.’ Anais opened a Hello Kitty wallet and brandished a crumpled fifty.

  Aurora waved her away.

  ‘Not whisky.’ Betty screwed up her face. ‘I hate that shit.’

  ‘Me too. I’ll get a shaker of illusions, eh?’ Emma bounced off to the bar and I was left sitting with Anais, Betty, Dakota and Carolina. Dakota and Carolina were talking, a coke-fuelled rave with too many words and too little time. They got up to dance. Jesus, who’d have the energy?

  ‘So, Vivien.’ Anais leaned back in her chair. ‘What’s your story?’

  ‘My story?’ I had a moment of panic. Were they on to me?

  ‘How’d you end up at the Red?’

  ‘Well, I’ve done bucks’ parties, pub shows and I used to work at the Shaft . . .’

  ‘Eeew, not the peepshows.’ Betty screwed up her face again.

  ‘Yeah, so?’

  ‘It’s just so . . .’

  ‘It’s so what, Betty?’ Aurora sat next to me on the couch. She had a bottle of Jameson’s and three glasses.

  ‘You know . . .’ she pouted.

  Aurora twisted the cap off the bottle and poured.

  ‘I don’t think someone who works in the sex industry has the right to moralise about anyone else in the business. Strippers, prostitutes, massage girls, porn actors, phone sex operators, we’re all sex workers.’

  ‘Hear hear.’ Anais held up her glass and clinked it with mine and Aurora’s. ‘I don’t mind the peeps.’ She winked at me. ‘I like to pop a coin in myself from time to time. And not just for research purposes.’

  ‘Research?’

  ‘Anais is working on her Honours thesis,’ Aurora explained. ‘The Vagina as a Social Space.’ Betty had marched off to the ladies.

  ‘Don’t worry about her,’ Aurora said. ‘She can get a little narky after too much nose candy.’

  ‘Or too little,’ said Anais. Emma came back with two jugs of illusions. I didn’t know what was in them—something green. Betty returned from the toilets sniffing and in a much better mood.

  ‘Do you like the Dust Devils?’ She pointed at my T-shirt.

  ‘Yeah, you know them?’ I was surprised—they weren’t exactly hit parade stuff.

  ‘Saw them at the Greyhound once.’ She sniffed again,

  ‘If you like them you should come see my boyfriend’s band at the Espy Tuesday night.’

  ‘What are they called?’

  ‘Las Vegas Grind.’ She pulled a flyer out of her bowling bag. The name was spelled out in red and yellow flames and there was a picture of a hot rod, a pair of dice and a busty burlesque showgirl. ‘They’re kind of like a mix of rockabilly, swamp-country and western swing.

  Aurora’s coming.’

  ‘Yeah, you should come, Vivien,’ Aurora said.

  ‘Where do you live?’

  ‘Elwood.’

  ‘No excuses then, it’s just up the road.’

  Dakota came back from the dance floor and flopped herself onto Anais’s lap. ‘Illusions!’ She had a shot.

  Anais bounced her up and down. ‘Still seeing that cop, babe?’

  ‘Nah.’ Dakota shook her head from side to side, sending her wavy blond hair flying. ‘His wife found out and cracked the shits.’

  ‘You were going out with a cop?’ I asked.

  ‘From the murder investigation.’ She seemed proud of the fact.

  ‘We all got interviewed,’ Anais said.

  ‘It wasn’t Detective Duval, was it?’ I took a big slug of whisky and it seared a path down my throat.

  ‘How do you know Duval?’ Aurora asked.

  ‘Read about him in the paper.’

  ‘It wasn’t Duval,’ said Dakota. ‘He’s, like, a hundred years old.’

  ‘Come on,’ said Aurora. ‘He’s no more than fifty.

  He’s got really amazing eyes. I’d root him.’

  The girls screamed with laughter.

  ‘I’d root Talbot,’ said Anais, ‘but she’d have to be wearing a motorbike cop outfit, full leathers with handcuffs and a . . . baton . . .’ She wiggled her eyebrows.

  Emma stood up and did an impression of Harvey Keitel in Bad Lieutenant.

  ‘Show me your ass.’ She pulled at an imaginary dick.

  ‘Is that what Detective Perlman used to say? Show me your ass . . .’

  ‘No!’ squealed Dakota.

  I had tears in my eyes and even Betty was laughing.

  Guys looked over. They wanted to approach but seven cackling females were just too frightening.

  ‘Fucking hell.’ I wiped my eyes. ‘Must have been full on, middle of a murder investigation.’

  ‘Tell me about it,’ Dakota said. ‘They closed the club for a couple of days and when we opened there was so much heat around you couldn’t get a line to save your life.’

  Aurora said, ‘Had to keep shutting early. No one could stay awake.’

  ‘Those undercover cops were so obvious,’ said Betty.

  ‘Pathetic.’

  I had another sip of whisky. The more I drank the easier it went do
wn. ‘You reckon it was a Mafia thing, like they’re saying in the papers?’

  Anais snorted.

  ‘Those newspapers don’t know shit,’ Dakota slurred.

  She was getting messy.

  ‘I’ve got my suspects,’ said Emma

  ‘Who?’ asked Aurora. ‘Come on, Miss Marple.’

  ‘Well . . .’ Emma leaned forward and almost fell out of her top. ‘You know that copper who used to get free drinks and dances, what’s his name? Dick something.’

  ‘Dick Farquhar,’ Aurora said. ‘Dick by name, dick by nature.’

  ‘Well, the night Frank . . . was killed . . . I got a call to bring them scotch in the office. Before I knocked on the door I heard arguing. They stopped when I went in, and started up again when I left.’

  ‘Did you tell the cops?’ I asked.

  ‘No way,’ said Emma. ‘That D, he’s fucking bent, right? And he’s a nasty piece of work. I always got a real bad feeling about him. I’m here on a working holiday, you know, have a few laughs, don’t want to be the next backpacker murder or nothing. I’m like one of them monkeys that don’t see, hear or smell evil.’

  Betty lit a Lucky Strike. ‘I think Jim had the most to gain. He wanted Frank’s job, which he got, and, I don’t know, was secretly in love with Flame and had to kill Frank so they could be together.’

  ‘That’s sooo romantic,’ said Anais.

  ‘Did Frank and Flame used to be an item?’ I asked innocently.

  ‘Yeah,’ Aurora said, ‘but that didn’t stop him from rooting around, only Flame couldn’t fuck anyone else.’

  ‘Unless it was another chick and he watched,’ said Anais.

  Dakota, who was passing out on Anais’s lap, suddenly came to. ‘He had his dick cut off.’

  ‘What?’ I said. Everybody stopped talking and looked at her.

  ‘That wasn’t in the news,’ said Aurora.

  ‘Whoops, that’s supposed to be a secret.’ Dakota covered her mouth with her hands like a little kid.

  ‘Fucking hell,’ said Anais. ‘Maybe it was Shane then.’

  ‘Who’s Shane?’ I asked. This drinking session was a goldmine.

  ‘Honey’s boyfriend,’ Anais said.

  ‘Who’s Honey?’

  ‘Honey’s a bit of a ditz. Starts rooting Frank and Shane finds out. Get this, he works in an abattoir and one night comes for Frank with one of the knives they use to slaughter the animals.’

  ‘No way,’ I said. ‘What happened?’

  ‘Brad, Vince and Frank beat the shit out of him. Left him in hospital.’

  ‘Do the cops know?’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ said Emma. ‘Told ’em about that one.’

  ‘Maybe it was Ebony,’ said Dakota. ‘This black chick into voodoo.’

  ‘Now you’re thinking of Angel Heart,’ Aurora said, ‘with Mickey Rourke and Lisa Bonet? There was voodoo and penis severing in that.’

  ‘Can we stop talking about Frank?’ said Betty. ‘The guy was a prick, someone killed him, world’s a better place, end of story.’

  I went to the toilet and grabbed a coaster on the way.

  I must have been drunk because walking a straight line was beyond me. After I’d pissed I took a lipliner out of my back pocket and wrote on the coaster. Shane, Honey, abattoir, Jim, Ebony and Dick Farquhar. I circled his name—where had I heard it before? As I washed my hands I saw myself in the mirror. Not good. Mascara had migrated downward creating a fetching panda effect, and my foundation had soaked so far into my skin I could feel it enter my bloodstream. Go home, girl.

  Back at the couches Dakota had passed out on Anais’s lap. I said goodbye and walked down the stairs, gripping the handrail all the way. Outside the air was cool and the sky was getting light. I slumped into the back seat of a cab and watched telegraph poles slide by. I saw the top of Crown Casino, a concrete overpass and even a tree. I thought of Chloe and felt useless and stupid.

  My eyes pricked with tears. Drunk and maudlin. I didn’t remember getting into bed.

  Chapter Nine

  I woke up one o’clock Sunday afternoon feeling slightly hazy but not totally hungover. It was a miracle. I got up and drank a plunger full of strong coffee and headed to the gym before the buzz wore off.

  The gym was up Glenhuntly Road, across the Nepean Highway where Elwood turned into Elsternwick. It was nothing fancy, a huge space with peeling lemon yellow paint and shabby grey carpet divided into two barn-like rooms, one with weights and cardio equipment and the other aerobics.

  I went into the weights room and jumped on the treadmill. There’s nothing like working naked with a bunch of skinny chicks for motivation, and I ran for twenty minutes, visualising the fat just melting off my stomach. The gym was empty except for a nuggety guy with black hair and an overweight woman in leggings and a floppy T-shirt. None of those no-pore rich bitches here.

  My legs still ached from dancing so I worked my upper body and abs. I grabbed a bench in front of the mirror and did free-weights—shoulder press, side lifts, biceps, triceps—then lay down and did chest presses and flies. I got on the floor and managed fifteen push-ups, real ones not the girly ones, then found a fit ball to do crunches. I did four lots of fifty and my abs screamed in pain. Somewhere under this layer of fat there’s a killer six-pack.

  I was red faced, sweating and pumped up on exercise-induced endorphins. Doing weights always made me feel powerful and strong, ready to take on the world. I left the gym and popped into the solarium. It was Chloe who told me brown fat looks less fat than white fat.

  As soon as I got home I cooked scrambled eggs and wrote down a plan. I was going about this thing all wrong.

  Torcasio had told us in class that the most important thing in a murder or missing person investigation is the victim. I had to find out about Frank. And maybe Sal while I was at it. Then I had to systematical y go through the list of suspects. I took out my coaster from the night before. Jim, Shane and Honey, Ebony, Dick Farquhar.

  Farquhar. Suddenly it hit me, Jim talking about Alex:

  ‘What’s Farquhar doing sending one of his boys around here?’ Did Alex work with Farquhar? Did I still have his card? I raced into the bedroom, grabbed my black boots, held them upside down and shook. Two cards fluttered out. One said Tim Purcell, Junior Accounts Manager, and the other had the name Alexander Christakos and a mobile phone number. Bingo. Before I called him I rang Tony Torcasio. He was at his daughter’s under-eight netball game.

  ‘Sorry to bother you,’ I said, ‘but I need information on a cop named Dick Farquhar.’

  There was silence on the line and I heard cheering in the background.

  ‘Detective Senior Sergeant Richard Farquhar of the southwest CIB?’

  ‘I guess so.’

  ‘Why do you need to know about him?’

  ‘It’s kind of a long story.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re up to, Simone, but we need to have a little talk. Can you meet me at my office tomorrow?’ Tony sounded serious. He gave me an address in North Melbourne and we arranged to meet at midday.

  ‘Farquhar is not someone you mess around with.

  He’s corrupt and he’s dangerous. It’s people like him made me leave the force.’

  ‘Got anything on a cop who works with Farquhar named Alexander Christakos?’ I asked.

  ‘Never heard of him, but I can find out. In the meantime don’t do anything stupid, OK?’

  ‘I won’t,’ I said, and dialled Alex’s number.

  He answered after three rings. ‘Alex Christakos.’

  ‘Hi, it’s Vivien. We met at the Red Friday night?’

  I was walking around in nervous little circles with the portable phone.

  ‘Vivien,’ he sounded surprised and pleased. ‘I didn’t think you’d call.’

  ‘Neither did I. How’s Grant?’

  He groaned. ‘I have to apologise for that whole scene. What a fuck-up. Anyway, what are you up to tonight?’

  ‘Nothing much.’ I sat on the
couch.

  ‘How about dinner?’

  I imagined sitting in a restaurant, all civilised.

  Hmmm. I flipped through the Impress on the coffee table to check out band listings. Doug Mansfield was playing at the Greyhound at four o’clock.

  ‘How about a band?’

  ‘A country and western band?’ The corners of Alex’s mouth turned down in distaste. We sat a couple of tables back from the stage. Actually I was sitting; he perched on the edge of the chair like he might get something nasty on his trousers.

  ‘Not western, just country,’ I said. ‘There is a difference, you know.’

  The public bar was half full. Old rock dinosaurs in flannelette shirts propped up the bar and over at a window table a group of rough-looking guys shared a jug of beer with a loud drag queen and a smacked-out hooker. A couple of diehard country fans sat up front near the band, a man and woman in their sixties, dressed in checked shirts and cowboy boots. The man wore a string tie. At the table behind them a group of backpackers drank beer, talked loudly and occasionally shouted yee-ha. Two large Islander guys had staked claim on the pool table and the barmaid looked tired. It was the Greyhound all right.

  I had gotten to the pub early and was working on champagne number three. Alex nursed a scotch. He wore an olive green shirt that looked expensive for a cop who wasn’t on the take and his hair was slicked back and slightly damp. I’d decided on a white sundress. I thought a virginal look might confuse him after the red latex the other night.

  There was an uncomfortable silence.

  ‘Well,’ I ventured.

  ‘So,’ said Alex. We laughed. I looked him in the eye and he returned the gaze. It was a stare-off.

  ‘You have beautiful eyes,’ he said. ‘Are they real?’

  I almost choked on my drink. ‘What do you mean, are they real?’

  ‘They’re not coloured contacts?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘It’s just that they’re such a bright blue. You don’t notice it so much at night but in the light they’re amazing.’

  I squinted and leaned across the table. ‘You’re a Libra, right?’

  ‘How did—’

  I shrugged. ‘You dress well, smell nice and you’re not short on charm.’

  ‘I don’t believe in star signs,’ he said. ‘Can I get you a drink?’