It’s loud. Poker machines are blaring away with ashen faced zombies plopping coin after coin into the slots. Various TV’s are playing different channels – some with horse races, some with over-tanned women displaying plastic jewellery placed on black velvet pillows. Another has the weekend football round up.
To the left is the stage where a woman who looks about one hundred is pulling ping pong balls out of a metal tumbler. ‘Sixty Six, she paints some sticks’, she croaks over the P.A. A woman near me whispers ‘that doesn’t even make sense’, to her partner who nods seriously. Elderly people do make me chuckle.
‘Bingo!’ Comes a sudden shout from four tables away and Mrs Tremlow jumps up (well, jump may be an exaggeration – it’s more like she gets up slightly quicker that she normally would) to weak applause and some pats on the back by her companions. She crosses to the stage to receive her meat tray, holding it up triumphantly in the air like she just won the Monaco Grand Prix or something. I have this mental image of women in bikini’s coming out and spraying Mrs T with champagne which makes me giggle.
My giggling brings the attention of a wispy haired woman on my right who unfortunately and most suddenly exclaims ‘MY WIG!’ really loudly. All eyes are on me as the woman leaps (again, leap may be an exaggeration because let’s face it, there isn’t a person in this room under eighty!) at me and wrenches her wig off my head. A gasp carries around the hall as every senior citizen in town realises an under age person is in their club!
I run for it. Creaking, wrinkled fingers are grappling at me, trying to prevent my escape. Some one grabs the collar of the big coat and it comes off in their hands. I speed past the pokies and Bert, stares at me open-mouthed with the phone still in his hand.
‘Valoura Karuna you get back here’, follows after me as I fall out the front doors and into the cool evening air.
I whizz around the building to grab Aunt Stacey’s bike and high tail it outta there but as I run to where I was hiding before I see there is no bike, no shadow on the ground where I had left the Speed Master 3000. I let rip a fairly bad swear word and it rebounds around the empty shops and warehouses. What I am going to do? The Evil Witch Queen is going to kill me. No she’s not just going to kill me, she’s going to torture me; rip all my fingernails out one by one, make me watch Widdle and Toot (this lame show for babies) for seventy-two hours straight, make me eat raw zucchini pasta for a week. Then kill me.
As I desperately search around, hoping with a less than faint hope that the bike is simply somewhere else around me, the form of Mrs Tremlow catches my eye as she buzzes down a side street. Now I have a dilemma. Do I keep tailing Mrs Tremlow, fulfilling my mission to make light of her thieving ways or do I keep searching for the bike which has obviously been stolen by some kind of malevolent sneak thief and then slink home to own up to losing Aunt Bossy’s two thousand dollar bicycle? Hmmm. What would you do?
Yep. I take off after Mrs T. My sneakers slap against the cold bitumen and echo in the suddenly breezeless night as I try to catch up. Gee those mobility scooters can really move! Panting and puffing and with a stitch I make it to Eurunderee Street just as my suspect enters her green and yellow weatherboard house. A sudden gust of wind scares me and I jump a whole metre in the air as the wind chimes and whirlygigs in the garden next door send out clatters and rattles. I don’t want to tip Mrs T off, so how can I surveillance her without her cottoning on? And then I remember, there is a laneway that runs at the back of the houses here, if I could somehow get into Mrs Tremlows’ back yard I can hide in the bushes and wait until she does something suss.
By jogging back down the street and cutting across a small park I make it into the laneway and to the back of the house. There is a high fence made of tin and I have no idea how to climb it. Searching desperately for something to use to boost myself over I hear a voice and have to hide behind a four wheel drive car parked nearby.
‘Oh Mr Spencer you are greedy today, yes yes you can have some more grubs’.
‘Squawk’.
‘Oh I know, it’s terrible isn’t it, that poor man’.
‘Squawk!’
‘Really, well that explains it’.
A bin rattles and a door slams shut. I shake my head; I knew that old woman was totes batty. I spy a wheelie bin nearby and roll it over to the fence, it’s the right height, the problem is it’s on wheels so every time I go to lift myself onto it, it rolls about. It’s like trying to get on a drunken horse. Someone has put some pieces of wood out for council cleanup so I think that if I make a square of wood around the bin, it will stop it moving. No, the bin just pushes the wood about. ARGH! I am getting a titch frustrated now. If I don’t get over the fence soon Mrs Tremlow will be in bed! Everyone knows old people go to bed before the sun even goes down.
I push all the wood and the bin aside angrily and curse some more when my head hits a tree. Well not a tree but a branch hanging over the fence from Mrs Tremlow’s yard. I can just grab it with one hand… kicking about a bit helps me to clutch it with my other hand and I heave both my feet into the air and wrap them around the branch. It’s bending ominously (a fine but scary word) so I shift my body up over the branch quickly and now I am lying face down with my feet pointing towards the trunk of the tree. As I try to push myself onto all fours and inch backwards, a dog races up from out of nowhere and wees on the fence. She spots me and starts barking her head off, slobber dripping from her mouth and a demented look in her eyes.
I whisper shout at her, ‘shove off you stupid dog’, but it makes no difference, she keeps spinning about in circles yelping and leaping up at me. The branch is really bending and swaying now and the barking is doing my head in and I am determined to get up the tree and over the fence. I am so determined I do something pretty stupid. Really stupid. I try to backflip into Tremlows’ garden.
‘ARGH! OW OW OW OW’. The pain! It so intense I think my head will explode. Somewhere in my foggy brain I realise that I’ve just fallen out of a tree and into some lavender bushes. As I start to pass out I have this ridiculous thought that at least Aunt Stacey can’t kill me if I’m already dead.
Chapter 9
Noises are filtering into a soupy darkness. The scream of a woman repeating over and over ‘peeping tom call the police!’. A siren. A man’s voice saying calm things. Beeping. A feeling like wee running down my leg. My brother talking about sticking grapes up my nose. This last one some how causes the blackness to turn into blurry shapes and colours and I blurt out, ‘I don’t wanna die’.
‘You’re not going to die sweetie, you’re in the hospital, you’ve just hit your head’.
‘You are so in for it Valoura, you are going to jail!’
‘Shut up Bastian. Seriously though, mum can I visit her on the inside?’
‘You two, be quiet, your sister is in dire circumstances’.
‘You can say that again’, huffs a bossy voice.
I can open my eyes, but I’m not sure I want to. All the kerfuffles of stealing a bike, trailing an old lady, going undercover in bingo, the stolen bike being stolen again, barking dogs and awkward backflips are coming back in a rush. And I can’t face it. Luckily I fall asleep.
Who knows how much time has passed. Sunlight is falling in the window onto the bed and I feel like I’ve been hit in the head with a stegosaurus. Muffled hospital sounds are coming from an open doorway and my mum walks through it with a man in blue.
‘You’re awake my darling! What a scare you gave us, not to mention Maggie, what were you thinking Valoura?’
‘I dunno’ I mumble. Mostly because I am embarrassed, but also because Constable Carey is present and he may use what I say as evidence when I go to trial. ‘Who’s Maggie?’
Mum pats my knee and looks forlornly at the policeman.
‘Well, you’ve really outdone yourself this time Karuna, trespass, destruction of property – you’ll be lucky if Maggie, I mean Mrs Tremlow, doesn’t press charges.’ He looks at me with a mixture of pity and wrat
h, it really just makes him look like he needs to pee. He pushes on. ‘Why were you on Mrs Tremlow’s property Valoura?’
I look at mum who looks exhausted and scared and then at my fingers. I feel so stupid. As I spill the beans to the constable and my mum about suspecting Mrs Tremlow of stealing the cake stall money, overhearing her conversation, following her to and from the bowling club (I leave out the bit about the bike – that can wait forever as far as I’m concerned) and trying to get into her yard to watch her, I realise that I’m feeling better, like I’ve been in an oxygen-less environment and suddenly it’s been terraformed or something. I can breathe.
‘Wow Valoura, even for you that’s a bit extreme’, is all my mother can say. Now her fear is turning to annoyance and I think my get out of jail free card has expired.
‘Yes, well’, says Carey as he hitches up his belt with all it’s doodads and the gun on it, ‘I will talk to Mrs Tremlow and see what she wants to do, if she wants to press charges we will have to proceed according to the law in relation to a minor, this means that you could be fined, or worse Valoura, (serious voice) sent to juvenile detention’.
My mum gasps as her hand flies to her mouth. The oxygen has been sucked out of the room as if by a giant vacuum cleaner and I vomit all over the bed.
****
After mum and the constable leave doctors and nurses keep coming in and out looking me over, prodding me and talking about me as if I wasn’t there. They give me some painkillers and jelly and turn the TV on. Great, it’s Widdle and Toot and they’ve left me without a remote.
After two hours of pre-school television I am miserable. Thoughts of how I’ll survive in prison and plans of escaping to Mexico flitter in and out of my mind and things get even worse when I get a visit from Aunt Bossy and Celia. Celia is rabbiting on about me going to ‘juvey’ like in the movies and mostly Stacey switches from glaring at me to huffing and staring out the window with her arms crossed, then back again. Finally she opens her mouth to start her tirade. Well, I think she’s going to but all she says is: ‘Don’t worry about the bike Valoura, I didn’t like it anyway’.
Huh? I stare at my aunt in disbelief. Did she just let me off the hook? She still has her arms crossed but her face is softened somehow. Her eyes seem to be telling me that she gets that I’m already in deep doo doo and maybe the sight of me in a hospital bed has finally awakened some niceness in her. I don’t expect it to last too long.
I get released from the hospital the next day, and instead of heading to the safety of my lovely home like I expect, we are heading to the police station. Mum won’t look at me as we pull up and I’m so scared I think I’m going to vomit again. When we get inside I see that Mrs Tremlow is sitting in the waiting room. She’s giving me filthy looks but I am pretending that something on my shoe is the most interesting thing I’ve ever seen. Constable Carey shows us all into a little room which must have been a cheerful shade of sunny yellow once, but now is more like a kind of puke brown. I am made to sit in a chair opposite Mrs Tremlow who is still glaring daggers at me.
‘Valoura, do you understand why we are here today?’ The constable looks at me with a mixture of authority and excitement – I have the feeling he doesn’t get too do much being the only cop in a country town.
‘No’, I mumble into the table.
‘Well!’ exclaims the old woman, she is so shocked she looks like a poodle on a rollercoaster. The policeman holds up a hand to silence Mrs Tremlow and with her tirade quashed (best word ever!) she sinks back into her chair.
‘Valoura Karuna, in an attempt to ascertain an understanding of who stole monies raised by your mother did you knowingly follow Mrs Margaret Tremlow to and from the bowling club two nights ago?’
‘Yep’ I squeak, feeling like I’d like to dissolve into the atmosphere.
‘And upon Mrs Tremlow’s arrival at her home, did you attempt to gain access to her premises in order to, in your own words, (Carey takes out his notebook), “find out what the old bat did with our money”?’
Mrs Tremlow goes to say something but the constable just looks at her and she thinks twice.
‘Yes, I believed that she was the one what stole our cake stall money and I wanted to prove it’.
‘Well I never!’ manages to escape the old lady’s mouth before the policeman can get his hand up.
I add in a rush, ‘but I had a good reason to suspect her you know, because everyone knows she hates our family and…well, she was at the cake stall! And I heard her say to Mrs V, I mean Mrs Vanmanthy, at the mall that she has like HEAPS of money now, so (I add a little quieter) I thought it could have been her.’
‘Well excuse me young lady, I happen to have some money at the moment because my husbands life insurance has finally been paid, not that it’s any of your business’. She glares at me and crosses her arms tighter. Then she adds through thin lips, ‘and for the record, I do NOT hate your family, I don’t agree with how your mother conducts her life (my mum shifts uneasily in her seat, but I’m not worried, my mum is pretty tough and doesn’t take too much, um, stuff from old biddy’s like Tremlow), but it’s not my business, just like my shopping habits are not yours missy’.
I look at Constable Carey uneasily now. I don’t know what to say and to be honest, I don’t know why I am here. So the old lady knows why I fell into her garden, so what? No one seems to care that I nearly brained myself. And so what if she didn’t take the money, I have every right to find out who took it.
It’s as if Carey is reading my mind because he says, ‘Valoura, when you fell into Mrs Tremlow’s garden you frightened her, when an older person lives on their own they often feel very vulnerable. Now, Mrs Tremlow has kindly (I snort a bit here, and it doesn’t go down well because Carey straightens up and raises his voice a little), ‘yes Valoura, Mrs Tremlow has been VERY kind to suggest this meeting so you could both come to an understanding about events and you could offer an apology in lieu of Mrs Tremlow pressing charges. Do you want to do this the easy way or the hard way kid?’ He smoothes out his shirt and looks at me in what he thinks is a tough way.
Mrs Tremlow looks really confused, I think because on the one hand she wants to smoosh me into little pieces, and has wanted to for a while now – and now she has her chance. But on the other hand I think she is just a tired old lady who wants some peace and quiet and right now, I can understand that.
‘I am sorry Mrs Tremlow, for scaring you and landing in your garden in the middle of the night. I regret that I have caused you some bother.’
The old woman opens and closes her mouth, a bit shocked at my change of attitude. I am a bit shocked at my change of attitude. Actually, everyone in this room is! My mum’s shock turns into a small smile and Mrs T. stammers out a thank you. I am glad that we are now getting up to go and that this is all over, I just want to snuggle Gilbert and watch Nasty Past. I need a laugh. Just as we are leaving the police station, Mrs Tremlow turns to me and says, ‘Takes a brave person to admit defeat Valoura, I see you are living up to that name of yours’, and she winks at me. I think she thinks we are now friends. I think she may be pushing it.
*****
As Mum turns into our driveway, I glare at her. She has had this little smirk on her face the whole way home. Finally I can’t take it anymore.
‘What? What is it, why are you smirking?’ I turn and she is rolling her eyes.
‘Oh nothing Loo, just thinking about that look on your face when Mrs Tremlow winked at you, it was well funny.’
‘Oh was it? Was it mother, what was SO funny?’
‘You looked like you half winked back, thought twice and went for a little bow!’ Mum’s chuckling now.
‘I did not bow! I did not BOW at her!’ I shout back, giving her a playful shove.
‘Oh sorry, my mistake’.
She’s still cackling to herself we when get inside. Bastian rushes up, jumping up and down like a loony. ‘Is she going to jail? Huh? Can I have her room? What about her laptop? Muuuuuuum??
??
‘Valoura is not going to jail Bastian, and you should be happy for your sister that this is all over, it is all over isn’t it hun?’ She turns and looks at me imploringly with her chocolate coloured eyes.
‘Yes mother, it’s over, I just want to go to bed.’
About an hour later I squidge into bed with Gilbert and my laptop, Celia brings me some cherry macaroons and a lemonade.
‘So, you got out of it again huh, you’ve got a knack for weaselling your way out of trouble, I’ll give you that’. Celia smiles a little over her shoulder and on her way out of the room says ‘you’d give up trying to find that money if you knew what was good for you!’
‘As if!’
Chapter 10
So, it wasn’t Tremlow. Well, how was I to know! At least that’s one person crossed off my list of suspects. My nanna calls to ask how I am but I fob her off on to Bastian coz I am not up to talking to anyone much. I need to think.
While Bastian is rabbiting on at nanna about the zombie apocalypse I get a piece of paper and write out a mind map.
The Suspects is written in the middle with little branches to the names: Emmerllee, Carter, university students, and other people.
Then by each name I write why I think they might have done it. The Grater has the longest list with things like: is poor, wants stuff, has stolen before, hates my sister, is evil. Carter has the next longest with: is poor, wants to give my sister stuff (why, I don’t know), is sick of potatoes. After that I list a few things for the uni students and other people I can kind of remember, although, I don’t think Mr Congreve would nick anything as it’s a bit hard to get away fast on a prosthetic leg.
It’s clear who I need to examine next. I gaze out the bay window in the lounge room at mum doing her Tai Chi and I realize I am a bit sick in my guts. I mean, I know why I am reluctant to look into Emmerllee Lamb’s affairs - she is even scarier to me than Aunt Stacey and Mrs Tremlow combined.