Claire McNab: Kookaburra Gambit

"Very strict. But thank you so much for asking."

I saw them out, then came back to my office. Ariana was still there. We grinned at each other.

"You missed your chance with Alf," I said severely. "He may not ask you again."

Ariana laughed. "I'll just have to be brave about it."

As soon as Bob came in, shaking his head over freeway traffic- "It's a nightmare, and it's getting worse"-I filled him in on the meeting Ariana and I had had with Alf and Chicka. Unable to resist, I also told him how Alf had asked Ariana out on a date.

Bob's narrow face was split with a wide grin. "And I had to be stuck in traffic. You have all the fun, Kylie."

We discussed Lamb White and the Church of Possibilities, which Bob said was usually shortened to COP. "Calling a church COP doesn't sound very religious," I said.

With a cynical laugh, Bob said, "COP isn't a religion. It's a money-making machine for Brother Owen. And he's a total fake too."

"So why do all these people support him?"

Bob shook his head. "He's one of the great televangelist con men. Wait until you see him in action."

I went off to find Lonnie and give him the Oz Mob staff list for the Burbank offices. Lonnie's room was an indescribable mess, but he always seemed to be able to find what he was searching for in the piles of electronic devices, folders, binders, loose papers, and the like. He was hunched over a monitor, sitting in the only chair in the room that didn't have gear on it. He was operating the keyboard with one hand while stuffing a doughnut into his mouth with the other. Maybe I was influenced by the doughnut, but I thought he looked even plumper than usual this morning.

"You weren't here earlier," I said, "so I couldn't ask before I borrowed a coffee table." I pointed to the crowded corner where I'd found it. "The table looks pretty good in my office, so I was wondering if you wanted it back. I thought I could replace it with a cabinet, or shelving, or something like that. Be more useful, wouldn't it?"

With a practiced move, Lonnie shoved back the lock of brown hair that habitually fell over one eye, giving him a Peter Pan boyish look. "You can have the table, but what did you do with the stuff that was on it?"

"I put everything neatly on the floor." I didn't add it was the only neat area in the whole place.

Lonnie peered in the direction I'd indicated. "Oh, yeah, I see it." He gave me a stern look. "It may seem a trifle disorganized in here, Kylie, but I have a mental grid system and know exactly where everything is. That's why it's important that nobody move anything."

"Does Luis come in here?"

"The cleaner?" Lonnie was obviously horrified. "He's forbidden to enter this room. And don't you ever, out of some psychotic desire for order, encourage him to!"

"No worries. Luis and I aren't what you'd call close."

Lonnie jerked his head at the papers I held in my hand. "Something for me?"

"Background checks. High priority." I couldn't help adding, "My first dinky-di case, actually."

Grinning he said, "A dinky-di case, is it? What's that, some peculiar Aussie sexual practice?" He gave me a pretend leer. "Want to try it on me, little girl?" he asked, twirling an imaginary mustache.

"You're out of luck," I said. "Dinky-di means true, genuine. Like it's my first real case."

He took the Oz Mob staff records and glanced at them. "They've all got social security numbers. Piece of cake."

"That makes it easier?"

"Honey," said Lonnie dramatically, "give me your social security number and I can find out everything, and I mean everything, about you."

"I've got nothing to hide."

"Everyone's got something to hide." He rustled the pages. "What am I looking for here?"

I gave him a quick rundown on the smuggled opal situation, and how the Hartnidges couldn't report the crime because it would derail their movie with Lamb White.

"I ran into Melodie in the kitchen," said Lonnie, "and she couldn't wait to tell me all about her date last night with Chicka Hartnidge."

"More than she told me."

"Ah, but you're management, sweetheart."

I grinned at him, rather pleased. "I suppose I am."

"Chicka took her to a British pub down in Santa Monica. Packed to the rafters with Brits. Melodie said she sang rugby songs, tried a lot of different beers, and played darts."

I found this difficult to visualize, though what did I know of the intimate details of Melodie's social life? It was unlikely, but for all I knew, singing rugby songs, drinking beer, and playing darts was second nature to her.

Lonnie went on, "Melodie says Chicka's promised she can voice one of the characters in the puppet movie he and his brother are making with Lamb White."

I was aghast. "You're kidding me!"

Amused, Lonnie said, "I kid you not."

"But all the characters in the movie are Australian animals. They'll speak with Aussie accents."

"I pointed that out, but Melodie declared if Meryl could do an Aussie accent, so could she." He sent me one of his charming, dimpled smiles. "In fact, I believe Melodie's going to ask you to coach her. After all, you speak Aussie quite fluently, don't you?"

I headed for reception. I was going to front up to Melodie and tell her she had a snowball's chance in hell of having me coach her in Aussie. But she wasn't there. Harriet was sitting behind the desk. This was too much.

"Melodie's off on an audition again?" There was an edge in my voice.

Harriet's expression was grave. "I'd say she wished she was. Ariana's got Melodie in her office, and she's reading her the riot act."

"Oh." Ariana had come in while I was still covering reception this morning, and, although all she'd said to me was "Good morning," her expression had made it clear she wasn't pleased to find Melodie absent and me there.

"Oh, indeed." said Harriet. "You haven't seen Ariana on the warpath, Kylie. I have. Believe me, it's scary."

I reckoned I didn't need to ask what Ariana was on the warpath about, but I did wonder why it had taken her so long to get jack of Melodie's constant absences.

My expression must have given me away. Harriet said, "Why's it taken Ariana so long? You couldn't know, but there's some history between them."

My imagination leapt around wildly. Was Melodie Ariana's love child? She'd have had to be a child herself when she had Melodie if that were the case…

"Ariana knew Melodie's mother," said Harriet, canceling out that particularly alarming scenario. "I'm sure you know that Ariana used to be an LAPD cop. She served with Sharon Schultz at the same station, and they became very close friends."

How close? My imagination got ready to jump again.

Oblivious to this, Harriet went on, "Sharon was a single mother, totally estranged from her ex-husband, and with no family of her own. When she was diagnosed with advanced breast cancer, she begged Ariana to keep an eye on Melodie, should the worst happen."

"And the worst happened?"

"Eventually, after a long, bitter battle against the cancer. Melodie was in her mid teens when her mother died. Fortunately, her father entered the picture again, not that he was much use, but better than nothing. He encouraged Melodie to go for a career in show business, but as you know, that rarely pays the bills, so a couple of years ago Melodie approached Ariana and begged her for a job to tide her over until she made the big time. The agreement was that Melodie could go to auditions, but she had to schedule them at lunchtime or after work."

I had many questions but no chance to ask them, because at that moment Melodie appeared, her face anguished. "My career may be over," she announced. She didn't actually put the back of one hand to her forehead in the proper tragic fashion, but heartbreak was in every drooping line of her body.