Tess Evans - Book of Lost Threads

As none of them actually fell in love with him (or he with them), it seemed only fair to share him around. Most of his women eventually went on to marry lesser but more accessible men. Of the remainder, two never married: one entered a convent, and the other disappeared into the black hole of the Murdoch newspaper empire from whence she later emerged as a waspish commentator on other people’s sex lives.

The problem with all this female attention was a lack of ready cash to fund his exploits. Michael had a bursary that paid for his books, his scientific calculator and some of his rent, and to supplement this, four nights a week he stacked supermarket shelves for twelve dollars an hour, earning just enough cash to cover the rest of his living expenses. As a consequence, he often had to leave his paramours alone in their beds as he dived into his clothes and hurried to rendezvous with laundry detergent, baked beans, tomato sauce, Tim Tam biscuits and bonus-sized bottles of Coke. There was no doubt that money was short, but somehow he always found a way.

‘Hey, Phil, can you lend us a couple of dollars?’ he asked his housemate one day.

Phil looked up from his newspaper. ‘Pushing your luck, mate. I only have six dollars fifty till I’m paid and you still owe me twenty bucks from last week.’

‘Is that a yes or a no?’ Michael had a happy knack of ignoring what he didn’t want to hear. Getting no reply, he began to compile a shortlist of those he hadn’t borrowed from recently. The list was very short indeed. He was close to despair when Phil came over with his newspaper. It was the official student publication, Vox Discipuli .

‘Get a look at this, Mike. A job made just for you. Listen: Part-time position . Earn up to $10,000 . Applications are invited from males between the ages of twenty-two and thirty. They must be tall and fair, in good health and with an exceptionally high IQ. Special skill in science or maths preferred. Please send CV, academic transcript and two recent photographs (full-length and head shot) to PO Box OIV, GPO, Melbourne. Applications close 24 June. There! What do you reckon? Up to ten thousand dollars, it says. Ten thousand dollars , mate.’

Michael looked at the advertisement. ‘What do you reckon you’d have to do? It doesn’t say here.’

‘Model?’

‘Why would they need an academic transcript?’

‘Call boy? For super-intelligent females?’

‘I could be their man.’

‘It might be ASIO, wanting you to seduce enemy scientists.’

‘Dangerous blonde Russian babes. Just my type.’

‘Go for it, brother.’

So it was that a few days later, Michael found himself knocking on the door of a very nice house in a very nice suburb. He had received a letter inviting him for an interview and he presented himself punctually.

The door was answered by a serious-looking young woman in jeans and a neat T-shirt. She was petite, but her voice was that of a much bigger woman: the sort of voice that usually issues from a broad chest; the sort of voice that suggests confidence and authority. He was startled to hear it coming from such a small frame.

‘Michael Clancy? I’m Linsey Brookes. Come in.’

Linsey led him into a small sitting room and he lowered himself gingerly into one of the elegant little chairs as she dashed away down the hall, telling him she wouldn’t be long. He tried to lean back in the chair, but it was impossible to sit any way but straight. He looked around, trying to ignore the gilt curlicues abrading his spine. What struck him most about the room was its order-its uncompromising symmetry, its matching fabrics, its clear preference for right angles. It was a room that strove to keep you in your place and it rigidly resisted Michael’s sudden desire to move the coffee table to a forty-five-degree angle-or, better still, seventeen degrees. Squirming like a schoolboy in the frost of its disapproval, he wished he had worn a subversive red shirt just for the joy of alarming its smug colour scheme and prim furniture. By the time Linsey returned, he was feeling resentful and sullen.

‘Follow me,’ she said, and led him to a dining room where another woman sat with her head bent over some papers she was reading. Linsey indicated a chair, and Michael found himself sitting opposite the two women. It didn’t quite feel like a job interview-but then he didn’t have much experience to go by.

Linsey introduced the other woman as Amy Sinclair. He realised now she was somewhat older than him- Around thirty , he estimated. But what an incredible…

Amy stood to greet him, taking his hand in cool fingers. Like Michael, she was tall and blonde with blue eyes fringed by impossibly dark lashes. Her face was heart-shaped and her mouth generous. He stole a glance at her breasts. Two perfect curves rose from her soft V-necked sweater. Things are looking up , Michael reflected, reluctantly adjusting his gaze to the table and what he realised was his résumé.

‘I see you’re an Aquarian,’ Amy noted, glancing at the résumé. ‘That’s a good start.’

Linsey frowned. ‘But hardly a clincher, Amy.’ She turned to Michael. ‘You seem to meet most of our requirements, but can you be discreet?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘And reliable? Are you reliable?’

‘Discreet and reliable. That’s me. Anyone will tell you.’

‘Unfortunately, we don’t have the luxury of being able to ask anyone. Your academic and work records seem to speak for your reliability, and you were on time today. Discretion, now. That’s another thing altogether.’ Her dark brows, winged at the outer tips, swooped together. ‘Can you give us an example of your ability to be discreet?’

Michael was unsettled by Linsey’s keen stare. He gained some time by moving his chair closer to the table and folding his arms thoughtfully. Then he brightened. ‘I never discuss the girls I sleep with.’ This was true. He felt a strange delicacy about discussing his conquests, a courtesy not returned to him by the conquests themselves, who never tired of discussing him.

Linsey smiled grimly. ‘Unusually discreet, for a man,’ she said. ‘Tell me, are your parents and grandparents still alive?’

‘My parents are, but I only have one grandparent.’

‘And how did the others, er, die?’

‘You want to know how my grandparents died? What sort of job is this?’

Book of Lost Threads Linsey looked severely over her pointed little nose. ‘You can leave now if you wish. When we have satisfied ourselves as to your suitability, we’ll explain further.’

Amy said nothing, but managed to look both charming and concerned.

What did I have to lose? Michael asked Phil later. Nothing at all, mate , said Phil.

Michael explained that his maternal grandparents had been killed in a train crash in India. ‘They liked to travel,’ he said, noting the approving nods. His father’s father had died recently, at the age of seventy-five. ‘Lung cancer. He was a smoker.’

‘You don’t smoke, do you? We don’t want a smoker.’

Michael told his first lie. ‘No. Never seen the sense in it,’ he replied, shaking his head. ‘What with Grandad and all.’

‘Do your parents keep good health? No chronic illnesses or allergies?’

The second lie was easy. Phil had coached him on this point. With job interviews, you tell ’em what they want to hear. ‘Nope. Both disgustingly healthy.’ His mother’s asthma was hardly worth mentioning, so he didn’t.

‘Thank you, Mr Clancy. We’ll be in touch in the next few days.’

That night, Michael and Phil speculated over a bottle of rough red. Two bottles, in fact. The best theory they could come up with was that he was to be part of some sort of scientific experiment.