Trick or Treat Part 19

'And possibly learn interesting things while we do so?'

He didn't even lower his eyes, much less blush. 'Yeah, maybe,' answered Jason the Shameless. But he was also Mids.h.i.+pman Jason the Efficient. He had entered my employ as a cleaner and he still wielded a mean mop. And it wasn't as though we had anything else to do.

There was a bedroom and a parlour, but apart from a kitchen in which one could not even twirl a highly cooperative kitten and a bathroom suited only to anorexic midgets, that was it for the Cathedral Place apartment. I started collecting bottles. There were a lot of bottles. I was sorry to see that Mr Wyatt had blotted himself out with the cheapest fortified port and the worst Genuine Old Whisky made in Collingwood. He was going to have a hangover to which the term 'exploding cranium' would be appropriate. Jason commented as he handed me another cardboard box: 'I know this stuff. They used to say it had ten thousand dead brain cells in every bottle. Only derros drink it.'

'We're used to a better cla.s.s of drunk in Insula,' I said, thinking of Cherie Holliday's father, Andy, who only drank Absolut or Laphroig and was now confining himself to one bottle every three days, which was an improvement on two a night. And he now drank it mixed with things like water or orange juice instead of straight from the freezer. Jason stuffed an armload of soiled clothes into an empty laundry basket.

207.

'You know, he's pretty organised,' he said. 'I mean, most drunks don't have a laundry hamper, or a desk.'

'He was probably fine until that rye flour arrived on his doorstep,' I said bitterly, straightening out a pile of papers, separating the newspapers and the correspondence and the junk mail. 'Tie this into a bale for the recyclers, will you, Mr Mids.h.i.+pman?'

'I been thinking about that,' said Jason slowly, doing as I had ordered.

'And?' I put a towel and several t-s.h.i.+rts into the laundry basket.

'It can't have been just that rye flour,' he said, 'cos it was going on too long. There was only one sack of dodgy mix, and it would all have gone in one batch. Not like our pure rye, which lasts us a week. That was a mix and that f.u.c.kwit Eddie just emptied it into the mixer.'

'You are right,' I agreed, struck by his excellent logic. 'And the soul cake song...'

'Was going on before the courier gave us the bodgy sack.'

'So it was.'

We had cleared the lounge. The bedroom contained more soiled clothes and more bottles. The kitchen was grimy but not filthy and Jason turned on the hot tap and found the detergent. Bubbles foamed over a collection of dirty dishes.

'So it wasn't us,' he said. I gave him another hug and he still didn't fight me.

'Maybe not,' I agreed. 'Maybe not, indeed.'

No flat was ever cleaned with such diligence by two such superst.i.tious people attempting to buy off Fate. I opened windows to let in the cold breeze. We found a broom and swept the flat clean. We stacked and rattled bottles and papers and Jason slid seven loads of rubbish down the chute. We carried all the recyclables down to the bas.e.m.e.nt, where we found a bank of was.h.i.+ng machines and dryers. It seemed a bit much to do the man's laundry after invading his life so comprehensively.

'He can sit here and recover,' I told Jason. 'Nothing like watching the socks go round to soothe the mind.'

'Really?' asked Jason. 'I always got bored and fell asleep.'

'That, too, might be useful. Here's some money, go and buy him bread and milk and some coffee, he's out of coffee. Eggs, bacon, that sort of thing. We might as well make ourselves some breakfast. And whatever you are having yourself, of course.'

'Sir!' Jason took the purse and ran off towards the all-night supermarket. He ran lightly like the boy he was, heels springing. Suddenly, we were all right. For that I was willing to resurrect any number of drunks, from the dead if necessary. Though for that I was going to need Meroe and I hoped that she was sleeping soundly in her satiny lilac and purple bed with her black cat curled up in the small of her back as usual.

The little flat looked and smelled much better as I came in again. Vin Wyatt was asleep rather than pa.s.sed out. I filled a clean mineral water bottle with tap water to supply his dehydrated body as soon as he woke and set it next to his bed. The furnis.h.i.+ngs had come with the flat, that was clear. They were easy minimalism, IKEA chic. Which made them easy to clean as well. Though h.e.l.l to a.s.semble. The lounge room carpet, now visible, was going to need a vacuum cleaner and there was nothing to do immediately but fill the kettle and find the cafetiere and some clean cups, so I did that, and then sat down to thoroughly invade Mr Wyatt's business privacy.

Best Fresh was a franchise, which meant that he had to pay franchise fees, as well as all his operating expenses and rent. He 209.

had put up an initial fifty thousand dollars, which was now almost gone, and he was making a small profit, just enough to service his debt. He employed two part time workers at dirt poor rates, Janelle Richards and Eddie Ramsgate. Not surprising that the gum-chewing girl showed little enthusiasm for her tasks and that Eddie had spotted Jason ten dollars for not telling on him about the flour.

Mr Wyatt needed to transform his business into a success, and having dedicated workers, and paying for them, was the key. He should get up and do his own baking and employ someone during the day who liked bread. Then he could double the a.s.sistant's wage and get someone with more presence than poor Janelle. Also, getting up and doing his own baking might keep him off the booze. Of course, maybe he had just taken to it lately. Which might explain his choice of poisons.

I scanned the list of permitted breads which Best Fresh supplied to its franchisees. Not a lot of room to improvise. None, in fact. The essential thing about a franchise is that wherever you buy, it will taste exactly the same, whether it's Kentucky Fried Chicken with its identical mix of the Colonel's secret herbs and spices, or Coca-Cola, which sold the essential cordial to be diluted with local water. This reliability promotes brand loyalty and explains the state of perpetual war between, as it might be, c.o.ke and Pepsi. However, it means that a franchisee can't go off on his own and start inventing new chicken dishes or innovative hamburgers. It's not wrong or right, it's just the way that these things work. What had persuaded Mr Wyatt, who seemed to be a good baker from what he had told me when we had met before his plunge into the bottle, to accept restrictions like these? The idea of an inspector coming into my bakery and telling me that my cream buns had too much cream in them and therefore must be altered would have made my blood boil. Or at least simmer.

His personal finances were sound enough, though stretched. He had a nice little share portfolio, though lately he had plunged on Navarino Gold, the company about which Mr Benson, the m.u.f.fin-appreciating wunderkind, had had doubts. Still, it wasn't expensive, and he didn't have a large number of shares. The others were sound enough. He owned a small house in Templestowe. His divorce had just been finalised. His driving licence was going to expire in a week. His insurance premiums were due. He had a couple of photographs of a dark-haired woman with a small child at the beach under his blotter. And if he didn't get a wriggle on with his BAS, he was going to be fined.

I didn't discover anything more enlightening in the papers and I was slotting them into their folder when Jason came in with bulging bags.

'I went a bit OTT,' he confessed, piling them on the little kitchen bench. 'But I'm-'

'Starving?' I guessed.

The glaze of pink donut icing on his chin was a bit of a dead giveaway. He nodded. We set out Jason's food on the coffee table and the couch-more donuts, cheese rolls, those sad, limp microwave hot dogs, several packets of biscuits and a huge bottle of vanilla c.o.ke. I made coffee and toast, found a frying pan and cooked myself some eggs and bacon.

The scent of coffee woke Mr Wyatt, who drank his bottle of water and a double fizzy Berocca with puzzled docility and went obediently back to sleep. He did not seem surprised that his flat had been augmented by me and Jason. His eyes shut as he hit the pillow.

'Eggs?' asked Jason hungrily, having polished off more 211.

junk food than a science fiction convention in a little under twenty minutes.

'And bacon.' I yielded him the kitchen and took his place on the couch.

I felt so much better. Yes, that might have been a contaminated sack of flour and it might have been the cause of one freak-out, but not all of them. The freak-outs both preceded and followed the sack of contaminated flour, so where, I wondered, were the soul cakes coming from? Who was making them? The police report said that the victims all had the remains of cakes in their stomachs. It was reasonable to a.s.sume that the soul cakes were indeed cakes. They hadn't come from my bakery, of that I was positive. Where, then, was the devil's baker who was making pain maudit on my territory?

Nothing sprang to mind. I was tired. I closed my eyes. Jason woke me after he had demolished the remaining toast and bacon and eggs and done the was.h.i.+ng-up.

'I reckon we'd be better leaving the old bloke to sleep it off,' he told me.

'And we'd better get back to Insula before everyone misses us.' I sat up. 'What's the time?'

'Gone seven thirty,' he said. I wrote a note, leaving my phone number. Jason put the Berocca on the clean kitchen bench with a gla.s.s next to it and we took our leave of our slumbering colleague.

Daniel was waiting at the front door of Hebe when I came up in the lift.

'Ah, Corinna,' he said airily, concealing what I thought might have been a sigh of relief. 'There you are.'

'Here I am,' I said. 'I went out on an errand of mercy to rescue a fellow baker from delirium tremens,' I explained.

'I thought it might be something like that,' said Daniel. 'I a.s.sumed that Jason was with you.'

'He was, and he ate a breakfast which would have stunned a Gorgon. Sorry, I should have left you a note. Have you eaten?'

'Yes, and I have to go and see to a few errands myself. A box was delivered, I left it on the coffee table. Back for lunch,' he said, kissed me, and went.

The box contained a gorgeous florist's arrangement of flaming parrot tulips. The note said 'Sweet Corinna, let's go a-Maying'. More cavalier poets. Darling Daniel. He must have put in a weekly order and not wanted to stop it even though we were reconciled. I placed the tulips on the coffee table and they glowed in the early sun, slashed with scarlet and white like medieval doublets.

I was feeling so relieved that I didn't even jump when Senior Constable Bray and her offsider Constable Vickery rang the bell and demanded entry. Helen Vickery was instantly mobbed by the Mouse Police, who had fond memories of her ear-scratching ability. She dropped to her heels and began to demonstrate it to ma.s.sed purring.

'Sit down, have some coffee, maybe a piece of apple pie?' I asked.

'Nice,' said Ms Bray approvingly. 'Do you want the good news or the bad news?'

'Both,' I said. 'Tell me the bad news first.'

'Traces of ergot detected in spilt flour on a bakery floor,' she said crisply, accepting a cup of coffee and a fork. I put two plates of pie and the pot of cream on the coffee table. Constable Vickery helped herself, and allowed Heckle and then Jekyll to lick a glob of cream off the end of her forefinger.

'And the good news?'

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'It's in Best Fresh. Nothing in yours at all. Earthly Delights came out as clean as a whistle, except for some cat fur. About which you might get a stiff note.'

'Oof.' I let out a breath abruptly.

'As you say,' agreed Senior Constable Bray. 'This is good pie. Your apprentice?'

'He's a good boy,' I said proudly.

'But he used to be a bad boy,' said Ms Bray.

'I know. He was a junkie.'

'And a thief,' she said keenly.

'As you say.'

'This doesn't worry you?'

'No,' I said with perfect truth. I got up and fetched myself some pie and a new cup of coffee. 'If he steals from me I'll sack him and bang goes his career. He goes to a drug counsellor every Sat.u.r.day.'

'Yes, I know.'

Horatio had awoken and was requesting a dab of cream. Ms Bray looked at him coolly. He looked back. I wondered who would win. There was a pause. Then she dipped a finger into the cream on her plate and offered it to him. In a formal, marked manner, Horatio condescended to lick it. Honour was satisfied. Ms Bray and Horatio then withdrew their mutual regard. Horatio sat down for a wash. Ms Bray returned to her subject. 'I suppose if he hasn't got back on the gear with all this upset, he's not going to. Where's Daniel?'

'He went out to do some errands. He said he'd be back for lunch.'

'Patrol said you were carrying Best Fresh's Vincent Wyatt back to his flat this morning. How is he?'

'About now, he is waking to the hangover of the century,' I replied.

'What did you learn about him? You were in his flat for hours and Jason went out to buy food.'

'Ms Bray, do you know everything about me?' I demanded, trying to be offended and not really succeeding.

'Most things,' she chuckled. 'But not all. Bit vague on your shoe size. And the situation still has enough puzzles to stop us getting bored. For instance, I don't know what connection this soul cake thing has with this magic convention which hit town at the same time as the cakes did, which may be a coincidence or may not.'

'So they are definitely cakes?' I said. This information exchange was going to work both ways if I had anything to do with it.

'Yes, every person examined had cake in their insides, and the path lab managed to find the ergot actually in some of it. Ma.s.sive doses, ma.s.sive.'

'What else was in the mix?'

She stared at me. Horatio nudged her very gently and she began to stroke him, almost without noticing. He has the best subliminal moves of any cat I have ever met.

'What do you mean?'

'I mean, was there fruit, cinnamon, was it yeast dough or made with baking powder?'

'I don't know. Why would it help to know?'

'Well, the traditional soul cake which the witches require is made of bread dough with extra sugar and dried fruit and spices. Jason made some up from an old recipe written in Middle English. It would be interesting to know whether whoever made the lethal ones was using that recipe and might be a witch, or was just making poisonous rock cakes.'

'I see. We can ask. Make a note, Helen.'

215.

Ms Vickery found her notebook, which was under Heckle, and made a note. Then she spoke for the first time.

'You were asking about Mr Wyatt,' she reminded Ms Bray.

'So I was. Helen is my memory. What did you find out about him?'

'Not a lot.' I detailed what I had discovered. Ms Bray smiled. She had a hidden dimple, which flashed when she was pleased. She was very attractive when she smiled.

'That's a bundle,' she said admiringly.

'And what do you know about him?'

There was a pause, in which Ms Bray realised that she was stroking a cat, stopped, and continued to stroke. 'It was an amicable divorce, as divorces go,' she told me. 'Wife happy with new bloke and not asking for too much in settlement. Little daughter, Tamsin, aged seven. He has access every weekend and half the school holidays. They stay in the Templestowe house. No criminal record. Six driving offences in twenty years, all speeding. Did a bread-making course at RMIT, pa.s.sed top of the cla.s.s. Ordinary sort of bloke, really.'

'What about his employees?' I pressed my luck. Ms Bray put down her empty plate and sipped her coffee, looking at her own notebook.

'Edward Ramsgate. Aged nineteen. Born in Kent, England. Parents came here when he was a baby. Father went off ten years ago. Didn't finish Year Eleven. Dim lad, works the night s.h.i.+ft. Not a mental case, just not too bright. Couple of children's court offences, no ticket on a train, drunk in a public place and minor with.'

I looked at her. Jargon was jargon the world over. She dimpled again and explained.

'Sorry, minor in possession of intoxicating liquor. Got a bond. They all do in the children's court for anything short of arson or murder. No further offending. Lives with his mum in Abbotsford. She's on the pension. Two sisters, both younger, still at school, nothing on LEAP. This is his first job.'

'Nothing there connected to witches or drugs?'

'No,' she said sadly. 'Janelle Richards, aged eighteen. Eldest daughter in a family of five. Child of complete losers. Mother an alcoholic. Every child has a different father and only one of them pays any child support. They manage in transitional housing on benefits. Every now and again Mum goes on the booze and the children get sent to foster homes. Janelle's supposed to be the most stable of all of them according to her social worker. Mum's a shrew, suspected of beating the kids, always gets into violent relations.h.i.+ps and has to keep running away from awful partners.'

'Thus the transitional housing,' I commented.

'Yeah, they've worn out several social service agencies. The only one which keeps on trying is the Salvos and they're supported by G.o.d.'

'Poor Janelle,' I said.

'Yeah, life's tough sometimes,' said Ms Bray without noticeable sympathy. 'Some religious sect is looking after them at the moment. The whole family's moved out to Bendigo, staying on some sort of communal farm. Lots of prayer and good country food. They're safe for the time. Until Mum f.u.c.ks up again and they get thrown out for moral turpitude.'

'So is Janelle travelling from Bendigo every day? Surely not.'