Tess Evans - Book of Lost Threads

‘No, Mr Ambassador. No. It sounds quite wonderful.’ Ana felt tears pricking her eyes. He had lived so long, seen so much, and still managed to maintain his youthful idealism.

Lusala was speaking again as he offered her tea. He had remembered that she had milk, no sugar. ‘Do you like my tie?’ he asked inconsequentially, indicating its bright orange and yellow silk.

‘Yes, Mr Ambassador. It’s very nice.’ Ana had ceased to be surprised in this office.

‘My father gave me one like this when I first came to the UN. I was a bit embarrassed because I thought it might be too bright. But I always wear bright ties now. They cheer me up. My father was a wise man.’

‘My father died in the Balkan war,’ Ana said, surprising herself. ‘They took him and my oldest brother and all the other men who were unable to hide. Then they shot them.’ Her voice trembled and she fought for control. ‘My mother managed to hide with the rest of us. Many of her friends were raped.’

Ana had never spoken of these events to anyone outside her family. Through her teens, she had suffered terrible nightmares. They occurred less frequently now, but sometimes, without warning, the terror returned in a vision of a blood-spattered wall, of brains and viscera on the footpath, of the stench of urine in dark hiding places, or the sound of screams and pleas for mercy coming through the wall of their shallow refuge. Even in sunny Shepparton or in her cosy little New York apartment, the fear would return unbidden.

Lusala looked at her with a world of sorrow in his quiet eyes. ‘My little friend. What can one say in the face of such pain?’ And it smoothed her ragged thoughts to sit quietly in his presence.

‘Thank you, Mr Ambassador,’ she said after a time. ‘I’m alright now.’

‘Yes, my dear. I pray you’ll find peace one day.’ He stood up and became businesslike again. ‘You’re returning to Australia soon, I think?’ he asked. ‘Perhaps it’s time to speak of the other request I have for you.’

‘Anything at all, Mr Ambassador.’

Lusala smiled. ‘I hope you won’t regret saying that.’

‘Me too,’ said Ana, disarmed.

‘The fact is,’ he began, ‘that I had intended to visit Australia myself some time this year. But my duties are set to become more onerous.’

Ana nodded. She’d heard the rumours. The position of Secretary General would soon be vacant and the ambassador was one of three serious contenders.

‘That being the case, I would be most grateful if you were to seek out Mrs Lily Pargetter and give her a token of my esteem-of the United Nations’ esteem. Do you know this town of Opportunity?’

Ana was eager to help. ‘No, Mr Ambassador. But Victoria is not so large that I couldn’t find her. It would be an honour to act on your behalf.’

‘Very good. Very good.’ Lusala turned to unlock a handsome oak armoire. He took out a parcel sealed with the UN seal. ‘I hope this brings her pleasure. You must tell her it’s from Lusala Ngilu, Quartermaster, on behalf of the Secretary General of the United Nations. And Ana…’ It was the first time he had called her by her given name. ‘I’d like you to call and tell me about her. Our Mrs Pargetter has been my mentor all these years.’

TWO WEEKS AFTER MOSS AND Hamish met with Georgia, she rang Moss with welcome news. ‘Damara can help you, but you’ll need to buy her time,’ she said, and giving Moss the phone number, wished her luck. Moss could hardly wait for Georgia to finish. She hung up and called Damara straightaway.

‘Damara? My name is Miranda Sinclair. Georgia has spoken to you about me?’

The voice on the other end was cautious. ‘Yeah. I might be able to help, but it’ll cost you. I’ll need some money for expenses and loss of earnings.’

‘Georgia told me that. How much for an hour of your time?’

‘A hundred dollars. More if I’ve got the information you want. And you’ll have to throw in a nice lunch.’

Moss asked Hamish to come along, and he was more than happy to desert his studies. ‘Someone has to make sure you don’t do anything rash,’ he added. He wondered briefly how well she had thought through this quest. Nevertheless, he was pleased to see her when he picked her up from the station in his old Commodore.

‘Let’s get moving,’ she said. Hamish drove in his usual careful manner while Moss fretted. ‘You could have made that green light,’ she said impatiently, more than once. ‘You could overtake that truck.’

‘Plenty of time,’ Hamish responded curtly. ‘You can always catch the tram if you don’t like my driving.’

They arrived early at the small Greek restaurant that Damara had named, and looked curiously around at the other diners, in case she had already arrived.

‘I told her I’d be wearing a black jumper with an emerald-green scarf.’ Moss was rather enjoying the cloak-and-dagger aspect of their task. ‘She’ll be wearing a purple top.’

‘And the password is “The bird of night roosts in the banana palm”,’ Hamish muttered from the side of his mouth.

Moss giggled. ‘What an incredibly good guess! I… oh, this must be her.’

Damara sat down in the chair Hamish pulled out, and took off her sunglasses. Her dark brown eyes and olive skin indicated Mediterranean ancestry, and Moss and Hamish looked in awe at her pink mohawk, wondering why on earth she thought she’d needed to mention she’d be wearing a purple top. She met their astonished gaze with an ironic quirk of the eyebrow. She was clearly no fool.

‘I met Brenda just after the accident,’ she said, tucking into her calamari. ‘We both worked for Vince. What a fucking bastard he was. He’d beaten Brenda up real bad and she couldn’t work for weeks. Broke her jaw. I had to take her in. He nicked all her money and the other girl’s too.’

‘Amber-Lee’s?’

‘Yeah. He wanted Brenda to tell him where Amber-Lee hid her stash, but she swore she didn’t know. She wasn’t going to mess about with Vince, so she gave him a box from under the poor bitch’s mattress and he found her money in it. But he just wouldn’t believe there was no stash. So, as I said, he beat her up real bad.’ Damara spoke dispassionately, as though she were describing a business transaction, spearing the calamari rings to make her point.

Hamish watched her with narrowed eyes. She was betrayed only by a slight tremor in the hand holding her glass.

‘Did you keep in touch with Brenda?’ Moss asked without much hope.

‘Yeah, I did for a while. We went to Adelaide and worked together for nearly three years, then she met a bloke and they got married. He knew she was on the game, and he didn’t want her mixing with her old friends, so we sort of lost touch. Last I heard she had a couple of kids.’

‘Did she stay in Adelaide?’ Hamish asked.

‘Far as I know.’

‘Do you have an address?’

‘Nuh. Haven’t seen her for ages.’

‘What was her married name?’ Moss asked.

Damara had already told them more than she’d meant to, and recollected herself in time. ‘That sort of information doesn’t come cheap.’

‘How much?’

Her eyes narrowed. ‘Five hundred.’

Hamish put a warning hand on Moss’s knee. This was where he could be useful. ‘One fifty. That’s more than fair.’

Threads ‘Three hundred.’

‘Two fifty. Final offer,’ said Hamish, preparing to stand up. ‘Take it or leave it.’

Moss held her breath. She would have been happy to pay the five hundred.

‘Okay. Two fifty.’ Damara waited while Moss counted out five fifty-dollar bills. ‘She married a man called Ivan Lefroy- don’t ask me how to spell it.’ Picking up the half-empty bottle of wine, she pushed back her chair, a warning in her dark eyes. ‘I hope you’re not going to give her any grief. We used to look out for each other.’