‘That bad?’ Uncle Sal whistled surprised. ‘He didn’t look all that crook.’
‘Painkillers and sheer grit,’ the doctor said. ‘Now, what can I do for you?’
Uncle Sal let Frances remove the bandage.
‘I can’t in all good conscience allow Mr Bernardo to rehearse without your medical opinion,’ she said in her primmest secretary voice.
‘As bad as a jockey, is he?’ The doctor guffawed. Frances thought she detected a hint of alcohol on his breath.
‘Not quite, but we take our responsibilities seriously.’
Dr O’Leary probed Uncle Sal’s ankle. ‘Bend it to the left,’ he said. ‘Excellent. Now to the right, please.’ He patted Uncle Sal on the back. ‘Clean bill of health for you. I’d leave the ankle strapped up, to give it more support, if you can, but you’re good to go.’
A knock on a backdoor Frances hadn’t noticed before interrupted him.
‘Oi, Doctor.’
‘Come in,’ the doctor called out.
A gnarled man sidled in. In his hands he carried a large, brown bag. ‘You forgot your work boots,’ he said in a gruff voice.
The doctor peered at his dress shoes. ‘I did indeed. How’s that possible?’
‘Always in a rush, that’s why. Doesn’t take more than a butcher’s hook to make sure you’ve got everything, but no.’ A pair of sly eyes flickered to Frances. ‘Although the ladies do like a toff.’
‘Off with you.’ The doctor motioned good-naturedly towards the door, and the man shuffled out.
‘My factotum,’ he said. ‘You must excuse his cockney manners.’
A cockney. That meant London, and a Pom. Frances had trouble hiding her excitement.
‘Been in the country long?’ Uncle Sal asked.
‘You mean because he hasn’t succumbed to Aussie slang? Forty years is nothing to a man born within hearing of the Bow Bells.’
‘That’s nice of him, running all the way here to bring you your boots.’
The doctor laughed. ‘He just wanted to save himself the trouble of cleaning my good shoes. And it’s a pleasant walk if you cut across the racecourse. My house backs onto it.’
Uncle Sal slipped into his shoe. ‘Thanks a lot, doctor.’
They shook hands. ‘I hope not to see you again, at least not professionally.’
‘Which reminds me,’ Frances said. ‘You’re of course invited to our charity concert. How many tickets shall I put you down for?’
‘That’s kind of you,’ he said. ‘Just the one will do me.’
‘No worries.’ Frances gave him a courteous smile. One ticket meant he lived alone, and if his house backed onto the racecourse, he or his factotum could easily have gained access to Rob’s chamber.
She remembered the sly glance and easy familiarity of the Cockney, which was pronounced even for Australia.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Arthur Dowling hopped off the train, his swag on his back. The din of Melbourne washed over him. People were bustling every which way on the station, in a constant hurry. He had to step lively, to avoid bumping into a joker who couldn’t be bothered to pay attention to his way.
Arthur heaved a sigh of relief as he made it outside. How people could live like this, was beyond him. They were worse than ants in an anthill. Now, a smallish place like Ballarat, where you could be friendly with folks and still go undisturbed about your business, was more to his taste.
He looked up his piece of paper with an address supplied by Bluey. A boarding house only one stop away from Flinders Street, run by another veteran and his wife.
He found it easy enough. Not a bad place, he decided as he took in the freshly painted porch and the well-kept trim. It did him good to see old soldiers falling on their feet.
A man with a slight limp opened the door as soon as Arthur swung the brass knocker. He gave him an appraising look. ‘You Bluey’s mate?’
‘Aye. The name’s Arthur.’
Arthur followed the man inside, into a scrupulously clean hallway and to a room at the back.
‘Bathroom’s outside,’ the man said. ‘It’s got a tub and everything.’
A woman bustled into the room. ‘Welcome to Melbourne,’ she said. ‘Tea’s ready in the kitchen, if you’d like some refreshment.’
Arthur gratefully accepted a cuppa, and a thick slab of homemade cake. The kitchen was a little too pink and frilly with its dainty curtains and ruffled tablecloth, but it suited Paula Johnson with her bright eyes and rosy cheeks. Her husband Kev relaxed slightly as they sat together.
‘Bluey said you’re staying as long as you need to.’ Kev waited for an answer.
‘I hope that’s alright with you.’
‘Sure.’ Paula laughed. ‘Any customer’s welcome if they behave themselves, but friends of friends are always special.What can we do to help?’
Arthur hesitated, but Bluey wouldn’t have sent him here if the Johnsons weren’t trustworthy.
‘I’m looking for a man who worked at a fancy foreign restaurant about thirty years ago.’
‘That’s a tall order.’ Kev pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘Shouldn’t be too hard to find the restaurant. There’s still not too much foreign chow around. But a bloke who used to give them a hand back then? Good luck with that, mate.’
‘He was Italian,’ Arthur said. ‘That might be something people remember. They would in Ballarat. And he married an Australian girl by the name of Cowper.’
Paula pushed her lips in and out, as she pondered this. ‘Didn’t you come home on the ship with an Italian soldier, Kev? The one who wouldn’t shut up about proper coffee making?’
Her husband broke into a lopsided grin. ‘Good old Gio,’ he said. ‘He’s still around, and you know how people are. Sticking together with their own folks.’
‘Can you point me in his direction?’ If Arthur was lucky, he could be done in a day or two. Not that he minded staying with the Johnsons, but Bluey had said his task was urgent.
‘If you can stick around for a few hours, I’ll take you to the hotel where the old soldiers usually hang out.’ Kev noticed his wife’s sudden frown. ‘I’m not drinking, love, you know that. But you can’t blame a man for having a pint or two.’
‘That would be swell,’ Arthur said. ‘Where shall we meet?’
They arranged a time, and Arthur excused himself. The bathroom was tacked on to the back of the house, with a separate entrance. A rustling noise from inside the drain suggested that a critter or two had found a home there, but everything else was as sweet as could be, with a tub, a sink and mirror, and a toilet.
His own lodgings in Ballarat didn’t stretch that far, although a dunny and zinc bath served him and his fellow lodgers well enough. The Johnsons seemed to do well enough for themselves.
Arthur stepped out onto the streets in his best suit. The jacket hung a little loose on his frame, and the pants were starting to fray. Yet he’d still count as well-dressed, considering the sorry state most folks were in. From what he could see, you were either a flash cove in Melbourne or reduced to wearing rags. There were not many people in between.
He held his hat in his hands as he entered the office of “The Argus” on La Trobe Street.
The smart receptionist gave him a perfunctory smile as he asked to see the archives.He breathed a little easier when she told him to follow her, without asking any more questions. All he had to do was sign in, and off they went. Her heels clacked on the floor as she led him to a large room and handed him over to a dried-out old man. The walls were lined with shelves holding large, bound volumes.
The old man coughed, the kind of polite cough not caused by a sore throat but by a desire for the other party to state their business.
‘I’m looking for a marriage notice,’ Arthur said.
‘Yes?’
‘But I only know the approximate date.’
‘Indeed.’
Arthur grew hot, despite the coolness of the room. He moistened his parched lips.
‘And the groom was Italian.’
The old man tut-tutted. ‘That’s all?’
Arthur shuffled his feet. ‘It would have been around the late 1890s.’
‘You can have a look, although with this little information, there’s not much hope.’
The old man hefted two large volumes with an ease that astounded Arthur and placed them carefully on a table. Two chairs sat ready for visitors. ‘Let me know when you’re through.’
Arthur’s eyes smarted from scanning page after page. Luckily, “The Argus” kept family notices and obituaries in the same spot every day. He took great care to turn the pages without tearing or creasing them. The old man watched him like a wedge-tailed eagle.
Arthur’s neck developed a crick as he sat, searching through year after year. The tiny print hurt his eyes. He glanced at his watch, to make sure he didn’t miss his appointment with Kev as something caught his eyes. A wedding announcement, for Easter 1896, between a Miss Susan Cowper of Hobart, Tasmania and a Mr Giuseppe Rossi, formerly of Tuscany, Italy, and now Melbourne.
Arthur grinned to himself. He took out an old envelope and a pencil and carefully copied the words.
‘Thank you,’ he said to the old man. ‘You’ve been most helpful.’
The man surprised him with a smile. ‘Anything else, you’ll find me here.’
Arthur bounced onto the street, only now allowing himself to be intimidated by the Argus building. He’d never been anywhere that elegant or huge before, and the idea that eight floors could just be there for one newspaper was unfathomable. And yet the staff hadn’t been snobby at all about an ill-educated man like him, who had come close to licking his pencil before he wrote. Even better, he’d actually done it. He had a name for Bluey and Captain Jack.
Kev waited outside a shabby hotel. Paint peeled off its weatherboard and the patch of garden had more bare patches than grass. Despite these signs of neglect, the windows shone.
Inside, a group of men aged beyond their years sat around a table at the back. They all looked as if they could do with a square meal. Arthur felt a stab of remorse for all the hours he’d spent pitying himself. Why, with people like Captain Jack and Bluey to fall back on, and hardly any hungry days, he should count himself lucky.
Kev knocked on the table. ‘Fellas,’ he said. ‘Mind if we sit down?’ The men willingly made space for them. Arthur slipped Kev a pound note. He didn’t want to make it too obvious he was here to buy information.
‘Beer alright with you?’ Kev asked around. Seven heads nodded.
‘Make it Victoria Bitter,’ one man who had two fingers missing on left hand said.
Kev strolled to the bar.
‘You’re new,’ the man with the missing fingers said to Arthur.
‘I’m just passing through,’ Arthur said.
‘Looking for work? You won’t find any.’
Arthur thanked Bluey for giving him a cover story. Otherwise he’d have been in a spot. ‘I’m here to do a mate a favour,’ he said. ‘He’s in a bad way and you know how it is. A cove gets to thinking about his family, and the people he should have been in touch with. It’s what I did when that German bullet hit me.’
One of the men shuddered. ‘I still hear the mortars whistle.’
The man next to Arthur whispered, ‘He was a sapper. Got buried for two days and nights when the tunnel caved in.’
Kev came back, carrying a tray full of pints.
‘So, how can we help?’ the man next to Arthur asked.
‘My mate is a bit hazy, but he thinks as he might have an aunt and uncle here in Melbourne. An Italian. Used to drive horse-drawn carriages.’
Arthur took a long pull from his bitter.
The other men looked at a man with gleaming black hair and dark eyes. ‘You know anything, Gio?’
‘Did he have himself a local wife?’ Gio asked.
‘Too right he did.’ Arthur leant forward.
Gio pulled a face. ‘Could have been old man Rossi.’
Arthur’s heart beat faster.
‘Do you have any idea where I can find him?’
‘Melbourne General cemetery,’ Gio said. ‘He’s been there since 1918. The Spanish flu got him. Sorry, mate.’
‘At least I can tell my friend that much.’ Arthur took another swig. ‘Did they have any children?’
‘One son, I think. They didn’t mingle too much.’
‘Ah well. Family can be tricky. Next round’s on me.’
Chapter Twenty-Four
Bluey hung up the phone and grinned at Marie, Jack, Frances and Uncle Sal. ‘Spit it out before you burst,’ Marie said.
‘We’ve got the good oil from Melbourne,’ Bluey said. ‘Old Arthur has come up with the Italian.’
Jack clapped him on the shoulder. ‘About time. Is it Lucca?’
Bluey’s chipper mood deflated. ‘Name’s Rossi. But Arthur said as he was originally from some place called Tus, Tus-something-or-other. What Uncle Sal mentioned.’
‘Tuscany?’
‘That’s the one.’
Frances looked at Uncle Sal. ‘You said the officials bungled up foreign names.’
‘Or the son changed it himself, to hide something.’ Jack smiled at Frances in a way that made her heart skip a beat.
‘We’ve got Mr Lucca, then,’ she said. ‘Ad we might even have his helper. I can’t really see Mr Lucca bash in a head with a horseshoe.’
‘And his accomplice would be?’
Frances grinned. Despite everything, this was her moment, and she intended to enjoy it. ‘Old Pom. I think he works for Dr O’Leary, which gives him access to the racecourse buildings, he knows his way around, and he should have enough knowledge of medicine.’
Uncle Sal chuckled. ‘He’s definitely a proper Cockney, and his age is right too.’
Marie gave her husband a loud kiss on the cheek. ‘What are we waiting for? Let’s get the police to take over.’
‘We still have no proof,’ Jack said.
‘What could there be to find?’
‘Papers,’ Jack said. ‘Even a crooked businessman will keep track of his pennies. We only have one set of accounts, because we’re honest, but I bet you anything, there is a complete paper trail.’
‘The safe,’ Frances said. ‘There’s a safe in the office. I could open it.’
‘No.’ Uncle Sal and Jack spoke in unison.
‘If anyone does it, it will be me.’ Uncle Sal’s face took on its stubborn look. ‘If we get caught, I’m an old man. I’ve got nothing much to lose.’
‘Nobody will get caught,’ Jack said. ‘You know why? Because nobody will touch that safe until we’ve come up with a cracking plan. Pun intended.’ He touched Frances’s hand.
‘But you too believe there’s something in there?’
‘If it’s at the racecourse, yes. And I can’t imagine a fraudster and possible murderer would carry around incriminating material any further than he needs.’
Frances rose. ‘Then all we need is a plan, and we’re all set.’ A hopeful smile played on her lips.
Jack nodded. ‘The sooner we have an inspiration, the better.’
Frances helped Uncle Sal to his feet. ‘We should go home. Unless we’re needed here?’
‘You should go, too, Marie,’ Jack said. ‘If you make sure your troops are in place when we need them for the show, you and your aunt have done more than enough.’
‘I’ll drive them,’ Bluey said.
‘Thanks.’
Marie had a smug little smile on her face as she declined the passenger seat and squeezed herself in with Uncle Sal and Frances at the back.
‘Captain Jack is getting overly cautious,’ she said in a low voice.
Bluey heard her, nevertheless. ‘That’s how he’s kept us all alive during the war. You listen to him.’
‘We do,’ Frances said. ‘As if we’d ever ignore his advice.’ A tiny voice inside her head whispered that listening wasn’t the same as obeying. She understood why Jack tr
ied to steer her away from any danger, but if it helped Rob, she wouldn’t allow herself to be stopped by anyone. Not even Jack.
Marie winked at her. Frances settled into her seat. Together they could not fail.
Frances handed Uncle Sal a mug of hot tea. She’d scrub the kitchen after they they’d had a chat. The whole house wasn’t up to her mother’s standards lately, but Frances didn’t care. She’d blithely ignore the state of the kitchen too, with its food stains on stove and floor and a light grease film everywhere if she could trust Uncle Sal not to don an apron and clean every nook and cranny on his knees.
They settled into their usual spots on the sofa.
Uncle Sal slurped the hot tea, startling Frances. His manners normally tended to be impeccable.
He twinkled as he caught her look. ‘Just getting into character, love. In case good ol’ Bernard is needed again to chat up the bookies.’
Frances lifted her pinkie as she sipped her tea in her most refined manner. ‘Is this right for Signorina Francesca?’
He kissed his fingertips. ‘Perfect. Now, tell me about that safe.’
Frances thought back. ‘It’s a bit under hip-high and this wide.’ She spread her arms slightly to indicate the size.
‘What kind of lock?’
She didn’t understand.
‘One with a key, or a combination lock with rings and numbers?’
‘A key.’
He blew out his breath, much relieved. ‘Do you remember what it looked like?’
She closed her eyes and tried to picture it. ‘Yes.’
Uncle Sal hurried away, to return with the locks she’d practiced on what seemed like ages ago.
She lifted them each carefully. Only two resembled the lock they were after, both almost ten inches in diameter and with a heavy pin tumbler mechanism.
Uncle Sal grimaced. ‘Yale locks. They take a little longer to crack, with their pin tumblers. I should be able to do it in under two minutes though. We just need enough of a distraction.’
Murder at the Races Page 15