Nefertite In NSW

7

Nefertite In NSW

    Nefertite looked anxiously at the airline’s message board but there was nothing under either “Corrant” or “Walsingham.” Was that good or bad? She hadn’t spoken to her brother or her sister-in-law for some time, but, though David was almost completely hopeless, Dot was utterly reliable and she’d promised they’d meet her. At least… It had been a bad line from Greece, or perhaps it had been the connection from their place, way up beyond Sydney in the hills of New South Wales, and what with that and Dot’s Australian accent, that she still wasn’t quite used to over the phone, she hadn’t caught exactly what she’d said. Well, she had explained that David couldn’t make it to old Great-Aunty Persephone’s funeral because of his commitment to Springer House B&B but frankly, having known her only brother for forty-odd years, Nefertite had been only too glad to hear that David was taking his responsibilities seriously. True, he had improved a tremendous lot since marrying dearest Dot, but there had most certainly been a lot of room for improvement. Had Dot actually said that they would meet her or just that she’d make sure someone would? And if it wasn’t them, who would it be, and would she recognise them? Oh, dear, she should have had her contact lenses replaced but frankly, what with the concert commitments she’d stupidly made and then all the fuss over Great-Aunty Persephone…

    Wobbling slightly in a pair of delightful high-heeled shoes she’d been unable to resist at Les Galeries Lafayette during the concert series in Paris—they hadn’t been dear at all, not compared to a hand-sewn pair, so even darling Dot couldn’t say she’d been too extravagant—Nefertite tottered on towards the concourse in a dreadful state of nerves, never mind that for the greater part of her forty-seven years she’d been accustomed to travel all around the world in the course of her very successful career as an operatic contralto. All those trips of course had been managed for her, and the charming, sophisticated woman known professionally as Antigone Walsingham Corrant was the first to admit that she was hopeless—hopeless!—at anything practical. Well, take that awful time after she’d sold the London flat because she never used it and then let that Athens travel agency con her into booking a cheap return flight— Well, put it like this, dearest Dot had been so right when she’d said: “You’ll know next time, dogs’ legs to Morocco aren’t cost-effective if you don’t make your connection!”

    … Oh, dear, was it even the right flight? Um, well, she must have got on the right plane or they wouldn’t have let her on—though there had been that time when she and Daffy Owens had been singing in Greenland—but this was a big international flight. And this was definitely Sydney. Not that anything looked familiar—well, generic large airport—but the pilot had definitely said Sydney and told them what the time was, so she’d reset her watch. No, but had she told darling Dot the right flight number? Had she even said it wasn’t British Airways? That was the trouble, it was Singapore Airlines. Oh, dear: perhaps they’d be expecting her to arrive in a different terminal building—and come to think of it, she was absolutely sure David had once said Australians always expected you to fly, um, well, whatever their national airline was. Their planes had kangaroos on their tails. Only perhaps that had only been David being David…

    Their little Baby Rose was only one: they wouldn’t want to come all the way to the airport with a little kiddie, and David hated driving… Perhaps Dot would drive. Oh, dear, why had she gone and accepted that last set of engagements instead of joining them out in Australia like she’d promised? Well, the Conservatorium hadn’t been able to take her on as soon as she’d hoped, though they’d got her to take a set of Master Classes, and whatever David and Dot might say she had no intention of battening off them, and the exchequer had been a bit low, what with one thing and another… She should never have bought that stupid villa: in all the years she’d owned it she’d managed to spend precisely four weeks there. One of them with Tony Gilliard, oh, dear. Well, he was simply lovely, of course, and how many straight singers did one meet, after all, but half her age, thank God David and Dot didn’t know about it. Not that they were stuffy, in fact David’d probably laugh and say good for her, but Dot’s dear little round face would get that sad look that it did when someone she was fond of—me, usually, thought Nefertite glumly—had let her down…

    Why had she stayed away so long, she’d missed nearly all of Baby Rose’s first year! What an idiot! After all those years thinking David was never going to find the right woman—and then when they’d first met dear little Dot she’d been much, much too young for him—attracted, of course, but too young to admit it to herself, dear little soul, and it had been plain as the nose on your face that David had fallen dreadfully hard and wasn’t going to admit it— And then it had turned out all right in the end! Father didn’t approve, of course, but then it was over twenty years since he’d approved of anything David had done—and he’d never approved, really, of anything she’d done, though he’d wanted her to have a musical career, but she was too like Mother’s side… But Aunty Susan had been all for the marriage, and you couldn’t get anyone more sensible than Aunty Susan! And then they’d had darling Baby Rose and she’d missed most of her, what a fool… Of course they sent snaps but it wasn’t the same, and Dot sent emails with whatchamacallums attached, only that horrible new laptop didn’t seem to do email, so she’d missed a whole lot before she’d plucked up the courage to write and say could they just post the photos… Dot had written her a great long letter explaining how to make the laptop do email but honestly! It was completely beyond her! Worse than that awful new video-, um, no, the other things, yes, DVD-player that she’d had to take back because she couldn’t make it go. The man in Harrods had been so nice and they’d sent someone round to do it for her. Only then Aunty Susan had found out and said she was an illiterate idiot, um, no, computer-idiot, was it? No, well, something like that, and why hadn’t she asked her? Of course she hadn’t asked her because she was the sort of horribly competent person that could do things and cope with plumbers and electricity and stuff. Train timetables, that sort of stuff. And that sort of person usually was utterly incapable of grasping that if one couldn’t, one just couldn’t, and it wasn’t a case of trying harder… Even darling Dot, who did understand that if you couldn’t you couldn’t, often assumed that she could: the email was certainly a case in point—

    Nefertite stopped stock-still with a gasp.

    After at least five cross, hurrying people had bumped into her and glared and had to be apologised to she gathered herself together and tottered over to the side of the passage, where she just leaned weakly against the wall. She’d been concentrating so hard on not forgetting her good new coat and her vanity case and her handbag with all her travel documents in it—she’d had to have a special visa for Australia, wouldn’t you think with her brother actually being a resident—and after all, she was a citizen of the British Commonwealth! But no, the Conservatorium had had to swear she had a position with them and she’d had to fill in unending forms—well, Aunty Susan had done most of them for her, thank goodness: she was a solicitor, so she was very good at forms…

    “Is anything wrong, Ms Corrant?” cooed a sickening female voice. “Are you feeling ill?”

    Nefertite blinked and came to. Not that she was “Ms” Corrant or had ever been; and she wasn’t even Lady Corrant any more: the Unlamented Corrant was now very much in the past and she’d gone back to her maiden name, it was Walsingham on her passport—that had been loads more forms, but Aunty Susan had been only too glad to help, she’d loathed the Unlamented—

    “No, I’m quite all right, thank you,” she said to the over-dressed, middle-aged Australian woman who’d been sitting across the aisle from her on the plane. Australians seldom recognised her but unfortunately in Business Class there was more chance of meeting the sort who patronised the Sydney Opera House. But for such a long flight she really hadn’t been able to face Tourist Class—and what if she got that leg vein thing and made herself a burden to David and Dot? “It’s just that I’ve left my laptop on the plane. Um, do you think it’d be all right to go back for it?”

    “I’m afraid not, not in these days of terror alerts!” she cooed. “Just ask at the airline desk, I’m sure they’ll be able to find it for you.”

    “Yes,” said Nefertite limply, very sure they wouldn’t. It’d be like that time she left the entire score of Samson and Delilah on a plane between London and New York. Even though you couldn’t conceive of anyone wanting it, it had vanished without a trace. “Thank you. It won’t do email, anyway.”

    “Isn’t technology terrible?” she cooed with a very silly laugh. “I always leave all that to Stan, I’m afraid! Now, are you sure you’re all right?”

    “Yes, perfectly, thank you, Mrs, er—”

    “Inglis,” said the woman briskly. “Barbara Inglis.”

    Nefertite had always rather liked the name “Barbara,” in fact at one stage she’d been quite keen on it for Pandora, but her father wouldn’t hear of it. The “Pandora” hadn’t worked, though: after the christening, which had been frightful, C of E in the Abbey, if you please, with Father there with bells on, the old hypocrite, she’d overheard her mother-in-law saying to a crony with a sniff: “Greek, of course, my dear.” Well, possibly it was Greek, but it hadn’t even been her choice! And she and David had grown up in England and gone to English schools.

    “Yes: Barbara,” she said weakly. “I’m Nefertite.”

    She hadn’t intended it, but this took the woman aback. “Oh! But surely— Stan and I went to your last concert in Sydney at the Opera House: wasn’t the name Antigone?”

    “Yes, that’s my stage name,” said Nefertite heavily, not trying to explain that it was her real name and she’d always loathed it and then she’d got heavily into the rôle of Nefertite for that new opera the year that David had met little Dot and decided to stick with it.

    “I see! But Nefertite’s very pretty, too, if I may say so!” she cooed.

    “Thank you,” said Nefertite flatly. Sometimes that shut them up but not in this instance, and Barbara proceeded to stick closer than glue.

    Aeons later Nefertite and her scoured luggage tottered out onto the concourse. The Customs men had taken one look at the dread word “Athens” on her ticket and gone for it. Possibly one had technically been an agricultural quarantine man: David had a horror story of inadvertently bringing a half-eaten English apple into Australia in his jacket pocket. This crime would immediately have flooded the country with foot-and-mouth, mad cow and rabies, the way he told it. Being David, he’d offered to eat the apple and spare them the trouble, which had got a very frosty reception indeed. Nefertite had received, in addition to the scouring, an interminable pompous and polysyllabic lecture, a fine, even though the cheese had been bought at Harrods and was all sealed up—their reason seemed to be that this wasn’t her first visit to Australia, though she wouldn’t have sworn to it—and the confiscation of not only the cheese, but also the high-heeled sandals she’d worn at the Greek aunties’ country house, the baklava she’d brought for David—there was nothing wrong with it, it was securely packed and she’d bought it at the little place in Athens where Aunty Ariadne shopped, you couldn’t get more hygienic than that!—and the lovely Swiss chocolates for Dot. She was absolutely sure that this last was sheer spite and the two men—and the woman who’d emerged from the back regions to join in the polysyllabic lecture—were going to eat them themselves! She’d been reduced to tears but far from swaying them this had only produced more polysyllables.

    She looked round, blinking. There was an enormous crowd, help! …No David or Dot. Well, Dot was very short, bless her, but David was medium height and she couldn’t see him… Ooh, did that sign say— No, “Walshe” not “Walsingham.” In any case the man holding it was a chauffeur and even if David had been mad enough to want to send a car for her, Dot was too sensible to let him. Maybe Dot’s sister, Deanna, and Bob, her husband, had come instead? …No. Or their friends Ann and Bernie? …No. Did that sign— No, “Lewisham.” Oh, dear, they must’ve gone to the wrong terminal building—or perhaps they’d had an accident driving on the terrible Australian roads: every time she’d been out to see David the news had always been full of horror stories about giant trucks crushing whole families. Ooh, hang on, was that— No.

    The streams of people pushing past her with their trolleys of luggage were beginning to thin out and still there was no sign of them! This was terrible: she didn’t have any Australian money and would a taxi accept a foreign credit card and even if it did would she be able to get into a hotel? Her agent had once said that Australian hotel accommodation was shockingly inadequate and one had to make quite sure one made the booking well in advance. People were going away in groups—Nefertite looked wistfully at one group composed of a young couple, the older man they’d been meeting, and a dear little boy, aged perhaps four or five—and there was definitely no sign of David or Dot, oh, dear, this was terrible!

    “Yoo-hoo!” cooed a sickeningly coy voice.

    Jumping, she gasped: “Hullo, Mrs—Barbara!”

    “We meet again!” Barbara Inglis cooed. “Aren’t those Customs people the limit? My dear, I swear they went through every stitch in my bags! One creature even looked at my dirty laundry, I ask you!”

    “They took the Swiss chocolates I’d brought for my sister-in-law,” revealed Nefertite glumly.

    “Typical! Of course they eat the stuff themselves, my dear: ask anybody. Why, Helen Davies brought in a tin—a sealed tin—of pâté de foie gras, and the woman at the counter—the women are just as bad as the men, don’t let anyone tell you different—she maintained that as it had the word lait in the list of contents it must be a milk product and would contaminate our livestock with foot-and-mouth disease! Can you credit it? The only mouth that was concerned was hers, and what was going to go straight into it was Helen’s best pâté de foie gras!”

    “Yes. They took the Stilton I got for David, too, and that was Harrods, I don’t see how it could possibly be impure.”

    Mrs Inglis drew a shuddering breath. “No, quite! They eat better than the Governor-General himself, my dear Nefertite! –Oh, look: that’s you!” she trilled.

    “Um, that sign over there?” replied Nefertite doubtfully, peering. “Doesn’t it say ‘Meredith’? Or, um, ‘Nettles’?”

    “No, ‘Nefertite’,” she said limply.

    “Oh, dear, I should have gone to Aunty Ariadne’s optician while I was in Athens… That doesn’t look like David,” she said dubiously.

    “I expect he’s sent a driver for you!” replied Barbara Inglis brightly.

    From here the man looked as if he was wearing jeans. Though since this was Australia a driver in jeans wasn’t impossible.

    “Come along, my dear: we’ll just make sure he is waiting for you, shall we?” she said brightly, taking her elbow.

    Limply Nefertite let Mrs Inglis steer her and her trolley—as well, of course, as her own trolley—over towards the tall man with the sign that did say, she realized as they got nearer, not “Meredith” or “Nettles”, but “Nefertite”.

    “I see that sign says ‘Nefertite’,” said the helpful Barbara before Nefertite could utter.

    “That’s right, lady. That you, is it?” the man replied stolidly.

    “No, not me, but may I just ask who sent you?”

    “If you’re not her then never mind.”

    “It’s me,” said Nefertite quickly.

    “Well, ya do look a bit more like what ’e said, yeah,” he owned.

    “My dear, if you’ve never seen the man before we must make quite sure. You’re not nobody, after all!” cooed Barbara Inglis. “Come along: who sent you?”

    “Her brother,” he replied stolidly.

    “Um, yes; it’s all right, Barbara,” said Nefertite in agony.

    “Nonsense, my dear Nefertite: the man’s being deliberately obstructive! I’ll see some ID, thank you, or you can speak to my husband!” she said sharply.

    “Well, the ID won’t help, lady, I’m not an Aussie,” he replied equably. “It’ll tell you me name’s Jack Jackson, if that means anything to ya.”

    “Does it?” she said sharply to Nefertite.

    “Well, no, but I’m sure—”

    “Hush, my dear, one never knows these days. –Come along, some ID, please!”

    Looking bored, the tall man fished in his hip pocket and produced a battered wallet. “There ya go.”

    After a moment she said sharply: “This is a New Zealand driving licence!”

    “It would be, yeah.”

    “Does it say Jack Jackson?” asked Nefertite faintly.

    “Well, yes, but he could still be anyone.”

    “Yeah: Jack Jackson, occupation kidnapper,” he drawled. “David Walsingham asked me to collect ya, that satisfy ya?”

    “Mm,” agreed Nefertite, very red. “That is my brother, Barbara. Thank you so much for your help.”

    “If you’re quite sure, Nefertite, my dear? –There’s Stan: yoo-hoo, Sta-an! –I told him not to get here too early: he’d only have to wait around in this frightful scrum. Well, goodbye, my dear: wonderful to have met you in person, and I promise you that Stan and I will be the first to buy tickets for your next wonderful concert! –STA-AN!” And with this she mercifully sailed off.

    Then there was a short silence, during which Jack Jackson just looked wry and Nefertite just looked desperate.

    “Stan doesn’t get to meet you, eh?” he concluded.

    “I think she’s annoyed with him because he obeyed her orders and didn’t get here early. But disobeying would’ve been wrong, too,” she ventured.

    “Too right!” he said with a laugh. “Didn’t have her next to you all the way, didja?”

    “No, thank goodness: she was across the aisle and she kept nodding and smiling and trying to catch my eye, but I’m afraid I pretended not to see her.”

    “Good on ya,” he approved.

    Then there was another silence.

    “I’m so sorry!” blurted Nefertite, very red.

    “Nah, these Aussie airports are swarming with Nefertite-kidnappers, Nefertite. That all the luggage you’ve got?”

    “Yes. I sent the rest of my clothes by freight. And I sold the villa fully furnished, it would have cost more than the stuff was worth to bring it out here. I did have my little escritoire valued but the man said it wasn’t Second Empire after all, it was a 1930s copy. Quite a good copy but not worth anything.”

    “Didn’t offer to take it off your hands for a song, did ’e?”

    “No, he was from Sotheby’s,” replied Nefertite seriously.

    Jack Jackson didn’t get the precise reference, but he got the picture: he nodded, eyeing her thoughtfully. “Right. Now, before we set off, Nefertite, I gotta say it: you okay? ’Cos ya look to me like ya might’ve been bawling.”

    At this Nefertite tried valiantly to smile and burst into snorting sobs.

    “Shit,” said Jack under his breath. “Yeah, thought so,” he said more loudly. “Come on, buck up, ya got here, and I’ll drive ya straight up to David and Dot’s place.”

    “Took—everything!” she sobbed.

    He watched limply as she snapped open her fancy purse and produced a minute lace-edged square. She looked a lot more Greek than her brother: she was tall and dark with huge black eyes, a mop of black curls, and a rather hooked nose. Not an ugly nose by any means: not too big. Made her real striking-looking. The tiny wee hanky, however, was quite inadequate for the nose, especially since it already looked damp. He hauled out a flaglike and not particularly clean one from his jeans pocket and shoved it into her hand.

    “Thank you,” she said soggily.

    Very cautiously Jack put a hand on her shoulder. “Ya better come and sit down and tell me all about it.”

    Nefertite blew her nose loudly on his handkerchief. “I’m sorry. I’m okay. It’s stupid, I should have found out what the regulations were, but everything was sealed up and I thought it’d be like going to Greece. I mean, I always take Mother and the aunties and great-aunties something from Harrods and I’ve never had it taken away!”

    “Oh,” said Jack in great enlightenment: “flaming Customs, eh? Took the lot, did they? The buggers had a huge great tub of food when I came through: fancy cheese and packets of nuts and stuff galore. Tinned stuff, too. Never seen anything like it! Well, one woman tried to bring some flowers in, that was bloody dumb, even I know ya don’t take flowers into an agricultural country. But another poor dame had brought over some Milkie Bars for her grandkids, and they got the chop! Boy, those buggers were gonna have a party and a half!”

    “Yes, that’s what Barbara thought, too,” she said, sniffing hard. “I mean, Swiss chocolates are the purest of the pure: you can’t get more hygienic than the Swiss, the whole country’s like a—a bandbox! And they were for darling Dot!”

    “Yeah. Now, don’t bawl again,” he said, patting the shoulder gingerly. “Dot won’t mind: not into fancy stuff.”

    “But I can’t arrive with nothing! And David adores Stilton— I know!” she gasped, clutching at his sleeve. “Can we pop into Harrods on the way, Jack?”

    Jack looked limply down into the huge dark eyes with the mascara smudges under them. “Uh, well, pop anywhere ya fancy, Nefertite, but I’m not a local, ya know: not sure what this Harrods is.”

    “Uh—oh, how silly of me, I don’t think they’ve got one,” she said weakly. “A big shop. A big department store, Jack: very nice.”

    He looked wryly at the fancy hairdo, the pretty wee earrings of pearls and, he’d take his dying oath, real little diamonds, the string of pea-sized pearls round the neck, and the fancy purple frock that had got a bit crumpled on the journey. Yep, it’d be very nice, all right. David had said that his sister would be done up like a dog’s dinner and Dot had immediately squashed him, but admitted that she probably would be wearing something fashionable. Well, he didn’t know about fashionable: she was a tall, big-bosomed woman, not that he objected to that, on the contrary, but it wasn’t the sort of figure that could get away with the flimsy little bits of stuff the model girls pranced around in. But the get-up sure did scream “expensive” and “nice shop.”

    “Yeah, well, me spies tell me ya wanna go to David Jones if ya want a nice shop, Nefertite.”

    “That’s it, yes! There was one in Adelaide: David got some lovely bottled fruit there for Dot’s aunt!”

    “Right, well, there’s definitely one in Sydney. But David and Dot won’t want you to chuck your money away on crap for them, ya know. Bring anything for wee Rose, didja?”

    She brightened. “Yes, in my case. They didn’t even ask about them! Just some pretty little frocks: hand-embroidered, one can buy some really lovely children’s clothes in Greece!”

    “Good, that’ll do them, then,” said Jack firmly. “Come on, better get going, it’s a fair drive up to Potters Inlet, ya know. –Aw, hang on, need to go to the Ladies’?”

    “Yes, as a matter of fact,” said Nefertite gratefully.

    “Come on then, over here,” he said, as she peered.

    “Thank you,” she said with a sigh, following him over there. “Aunty Susan was on at me to get new contacts last time I was in London but I just didn’t get round to it.”

    “Right, well, Australia’s not the end of the world, dare say they got opticians here, too. In ya go: I’ll be right here when ya come out, ya can’t miss me.”

    Replying with a wry smile that made her suddenly look very like her sardonic brother: “I think you mean, even I can’t miss you!” Nefertite vanished into the airport Ladies’.

    Jack Jackson scratched his chin very slowly. “Ye-eah…” he said thoughtfully to himself. “Well, could be worse, eh?”

    Nefertite had slept for about fourteen hours, woken up around ten-thirty in the morning and consumed a huge meal provided by her talented brother. It was now around midday and she’d gone off to shower and dress. Since Springer House restaurant had no clients today—it was their off-season—David went into the kitchen to make a light lunch for himself, Dot and little Rose.

    After a little his wife came in and stood silently by his elbow.

    “Mm?” he murmured.

    “Um, I think,” said Dot, swallowing hard, “we should of built on a proper room for her, David.”

    “Changing the design of the house would have almost doubled the cost of the kitset, darling,” he reminded her. “She’s okay in the study for the time being.”

    “It’s Rose’s room, really. The book says—”

    “Fuck the book,” replied David cheerfully.

    Dot swallowed. “Yeah, I know your Greek ancestors all raised their fifteen kids in one-roomed cottages, but Rose will need a room of her own before long. I mean, when she’s old enough to, um, take notice of what we’re doing—”

    “Oh!” he said with a laugh. “That! Well, that won’t be for a while yet, darling. Let’s see if Nefertite can hack it here before we start making changes, mm?”

    “Ye-es… So do ya think she isn’t serious about settling here after all?”

    David pulled his ear, looking dry. “I think she’s as serious as she ever is about anything. Not a planner. Well, always wanted to sing, but she let bloody Father manage the whole of the early part of her career, you know, and then when he washed his hands of her when she’d married the Unlamented Corrant, she let her agent take over from him.”

    “You said he was a very nice man.”

    “Eh?”

    “The agent, silly!”

    “Oh! Francis Cooper! Yes, very nice fellow, but that was just luck, Dot, nothing deliberate on Nefertite’s part.”

    “Mm.”

    “Uh—there is the point that we were expecting her quite some time back,” he murmured.

    “Yes, but I think she needed the money for those concerts, David,” she said in a low voice.

    He sighed. “Yeah.”

    “Um, do you think she could maybe afford to build a house for herself?”

    “I think she could afford to buy a kitset house like ours from Bob’s mate, yes, but she’s forty-seven and comes from a very long-lived family—Great-Aunty Persephone lived to be ninety-nine, remember—and the cash she’s got in the bank is all she has, darling. No lovely pension plans for self-employed singers, you know.”

    “You mean she’s got no super?” croaked Dot.

    “Precisely. And I don’t know how much she chucked away on the Terrible Infant’s bloody twenty-first but I do known that Aunty Susan wrote me a steaming letter reporting that fucking Corrant would only cough up for half of it.”

    “Oh, no!”

    “Yeah.”

    “Um, could she put some of her money into a super fund now, do you think?”

    “Uh—dunno. Well, it is earned dough, don’t see why not. Er, they don’t pay much interest and some of them take off whacking great fees, I think.”

    “Don’t worry, it’ll be an industry super fund, they’re run for the benefit of the members,” said his little wife on a grim note.

    “Yes. Well, good idea, even if she doesn’t make anything much out of it, it’ll stop her spending it,”

    “Yes, exactly,” said Dot with a sigh. “Um, David, will she be eligible for an Australian old age pension?”

    David made a face. “This may surprise you, but I did look into that when I decided to settle here. Think the story is, if you’re a foreigner you have to have been here ten years before you’re eligible. It’s sixty-five for men but I have an idea it’s younger for woman.”

    “Yes, it’s a sliding scale, we went into that when I worked for Uncle Jerry. It’ll be sixty-five for women of her generation. Um, that’s ten years at a stretch, is it, David?”

    “Ten years solid up to the date of applying, I think.”

    “Mm. I’ll check it out. And if she’s working for the Conservatorium they’ll have to pay super contributions for her. I think that’ll be the uni super fund, Peta from work had money in that and she said it was a rort because it’s not pre-taxed, they take tax off it when you try to get your money out. We got it rolled over into an industry super fund for her. I’ll make sure Nefertite’s is rolled over.”

    “Good. Well, that should ensure she has something for the future,” he said comfortingly.

    “Yes,” said Dot on a grim note. “And she’s always got us.”

    David put an arm round her and hugged her into his side. “Yeah.”

    “Um, I don’t think she’s got any suitable clothes,” she ventured after a few moments.

    “I’m sure she hasn’t!” he choked.

    “Don’t laugh, it’s more expense.”

    “Take her into town, Dot: go to Kmart or Target.”

    “They’re not that cheap, these days, either.”

    “No, but I sincerely doubt you’ll get her into an op shop.”

    “No. Besides, she’s a big size, the op shops are usually full of stupid size eights,” said Dot sourly.

    David’s lips twitched. Dot was short, but her bust would never have got into a size eight! “Mm. Well, try the cheaper shops, darling. Um, didn’t you mention you had a database design to finish for a client today?”

    “Yeah, I’ll do it this arvo. Why?”

    “There’s a party of foodies that’ve booked out the restaurant for this evening, I’ll have to get over to the B&B after lunch.”

    “That’s okay, Ann’ll babysit Rose. Or Nefertite could take her for a walk, if she likes.”

    “Mm… Well, yes. Well, can’t be helped.”

    “She’ll understand,” said Dot in some surprise.

    “Yes, but… I don’t think any of us really thought this through,” said David lamely. “It's not just this afternoon. What’s she going to do with herself when we’re busy, sweetheart?”

    “Um, whatever she did when she stayed with you in Adelaide, I s’pose.”

    David bit his lip. “Dot, cast your mind back. What she largely did in Adelaide was lurk in her room in the air conditioning your Uncle Jim put in for her, huddled in a woollie!”

    Dot stared at him, frowning. “Uh—blow, better rescue her,” she said as there came loud wails from up the passage.

    “Mm, go on, quick.”

    Dot shot out. David made a ferocious face at the lunch. “Better rescue both of ’em, Dot,” he muttered.

    The walk with Baby Rose in her pushchair wasn’t an entire success. Certainly the little girl seemed happy, and the November weather was warm but not yet too hot, so with a little sunscreen on her face and limbs and her sunbonnet on she was fine, but the steep driveway up to David’s and Dot’s house and the adjacent Springer House Art & Crafts Centre was horribly rough, and Nefertite didn’t manage too well in her high-heeled sandals.

    “Ya should’ve worn sneakers or thongs, Nefertite,” said the forthright Ann as she fetched up at her back door.

    “Thongs?” she quavered.

    “Yeah. Aw, right: Bernie calls them something else,” she remembered. “He reckons ‘thongs’ only means those rude panties, back in Britain. Um… well, rubber thongs,” she said feebly. “Um, ya might wear them to the beach?”

    “Oh! Flip-flops! I’ve never owned a pair. I did have another pair of sandals,” she said wanly, “but the horrid Customs men took them. Anyway, they were high-heeled, too.”

    Ann could have guessed that, actually. The rest of the get-up consisted of a bright lime silk shirt over what you could have called a tee if it didn’t look as if it had cost the average weekly wage: beautifully printed in a floral pattern in about fifteen different colours and looking as it if might have been worn once before at the most, a completely unnecessary necklace, those chunks in between the real gold links not only looked like real rose quartz and real amethyst, she’d have taken her dying oath they were, and a horrendously well-cut pair of pale lime slacks that frankly she, Ann Anderson, would have given her eye teeth to possess. “Yeah, well, come in and have a cuppa,” she said comfortably.

    Gratefully Nefertite came into Ann’s delightfully colourful kitchen-living room and sat down for a cuppa, some biscuits, a lovely play with Baby Rose and a good deal of gossip. The supermarket biscuits apart—Aunty Ariadne, to name only one, would have had a fit at the mere sight of them—it was just like being back in Greece with the aunties, really! Even to the pots of geraniums on the windowsill!

    Unfortunately the cosy afternoon was interrupted by a loud bell, so Ann had to get up and attend the art and crafts centre’s shop: Bernie usually looked after it but he was out sketching this afternoon.

    “Oh, dear,” said Nefertite under her breath to the happily oblivious Rose. “They’re all busy, of course… I should have thought.”

    “See, I’ve got an appointment to demonstrate this database design to the client,” explained Dot as the sisters-in-law got into the four-wheel-drive very early the next morning. “I’ve emailed the structures but half the time the nongs haven’t got the nous to install them, so I might have to do that, too. Anyway, it’ll take an hour or so.”

    “I see,” she said foggily. “I could just wait at Harrods, Dot. Um, no—I forget what Jack said yours was called.”

    “Jack?” croaked Dot. “Jack Jackson?”

    “Yes, he was very kind… I feel dreadful, going to sleep like that during the drive out here,” she murmured.

    “Heck, Jack wouldn’t of cared! And everyone’s jet-lagged after an international flight, Nefertite!” said Dot sturdily.

    “Mm… Well, anyway, I mentioned Harrods, and he explained that your nice shop is called something different. Oh, yes: I think there was a branch in Adelaide!”

    “Yeah,” said Dot resignedly. “You would of gone there that Chrissie I was over there staying with Aunty Kate and Uncle Jim, ’cos ya got him a lovely scarf.”

    “Of course! He put that wonderful air conditioner in for me!” she beamed. “Yes, that was a nice shop. Oh yes: David got some brandied fruit there for Kate, of course! Just like those lovely ones we got at Harrods, remember, Dot?”

    Dot sighed. “I’m not taking you there, Nefertite, ya gotta pull your horns in, okay?”

    “Yes, of course. I thought I could just window-shop,” she said wistfully.

    Dot winced. “No. Let’s face it, ya dunno what it is.”

    “Very well, Dot, darling, no!” agreed Nefertite with a guilty laugh.

    If she’d just been an ordinary visitor Dot could’ve dropped her off at the Opera House, it was one of the biggest tourist attractions, but of course Nefertite knew the dump like the back of her hand, she’d sung there innumerable times. Sydney did have a couple of parks, but in those high-heeled jobs? No way. Suede, yet. Um, well, there were stacks of coffee bars and some of them would be open by the time they got into town but crikey: sitting in a coffee bar that did short blacks that you couldn’t guarantee the quality of and that in any case were never as good as the coffee in Greece, and with their pavement tables right up against the curb where you got all the stinky fumes of the traffic, instead of set back against the shop itself like they did in Europe—? No. She couldn’t take her to Mum and Dad’s place, they’d be at work. Um, one of the museums or galleries? But there were the high heels, again, and they’d have to be on their feet shopping. Although she’d had a lovely time in London, usually Dot didn’t regret having come home to Australia at all, but at this moment she was conscious of a strong wish to be there, within reach of lovely old Melina and Ari and their Greek restaurant, and all the other people and places Nefertite knew and would be safe with. Blow!

    In the end she pulled into the side and rang Aunty May on her mobile. Okay, good. Love to have her, blah, blah, blah, meet her at the station or drive the station-waggon into town, it’d be no trouble— No—way. Driving with Aunty May was like driving with Ray Charles.

    “No, I’ll drop her off, the client’s on that side of the city anyway. See ya, Aunty May. And thanks!” she said hastily, ringing off. “You’ll be okay with Aunty May,” she said cheerfully to Nefertite. “Better than hanging around in a coffee bar or something: it won’t matter if the meeting drags on a bit.”

    Nefertite had been going to suggest she could buy a couple of nice magazines, a French Vogue, perhaps, to while away the time in the coffee bar. “Buh-but I don’t think I know her, Dot,” she quavered, trying to smile.

    “Eh? Ya do! She was at the wedding!”

    A lot of Dot’s relations had been at the wedding. In fact it had mostly been Dot’s relations: the Walsinghams didn’t have any relations out here and David wasn’t the sort of person who made friends easily.

    “Plump, blonde, around sixty,” said Dot firmly.

    Nefertite swallowed. That was precisely how she’d have described not only most of Dot’s aunties, but her mother as well! “Dot—”

    “No, sorry!” said Dot with a sudden loud laugh. “Uh—well, I’d say really mad hat, but—”

    Nefertite collapsed in helpless giggles. “Oh, dear! Yes!” she gasped. “Well, weddings are always like that, aren’t they?”

    “Yep: brings them out, worse than the Cup!” Dot agreed cheerfully.

    It was a horse race: she had heard the phrase before, so she nodded obediently.

    “Uh… Well, as I recall, Aunty Allyson had gone batty—battier—in apricot. And Mum looked like a birch broom in a fit in that blue thing.”

    “Mm. I do know your mother, Dot,” she murmured.

    “Yeah, ’course ya do! Well, um, think it might of been pink. Well, pink or turquoise. I mean, they are her favourite colours, but she doesn’t confine her hats to— Yeah,” she said with a silly grin as Nefertite collapsed again. “Sorry! Well, anyway, she’s Rosie’s mum. You’ll remember her when ya see her!”

    “Yes. Thank you, Dot,” she said weakly.

    Of course she didn’t remember May Marshall at all, but as she looked very like Sally, Dot’s mother, she was able to give her what she hoped was a convincing smile as she thanked her very much for having her.

    “That’s all right, dear!” beamed plump, cosy May. “What a lovely hat, Nefertite! Did you get it in London?”

    Dot waved and drove off, looking wry, to the sounds of Nefertite telling Aunty May that she’d bought the hat in Athens at a little boutique her mother had recommended. In that case it would of been the most expensive hat in Athens, Greece, the world, the universe, because David’s and Nefertite’s bloody mother was the most extravagant cow that ever walked, not to say completely selfish and irresponsible. She’d walked out on her marriage and two kids when David was eleven and Nefertite thirteen. Admittedly she’d been a trophy wife: Sir John Walsingham was a total prick and had married the woman because she was completely gorgeous, a dead ringer for the young Irene Papas; but that was no excuse for pretty much ignoring the fact that you’d ever had two kids! She’d never fought him for custody, but as the great Sir John was too busy with his flaming orchestra conducting to be bothered with them, they’d been able to go to their Greek grandmother and aunties for their school holidays. Which was about as much of a family life as they’d ever had.

    Some two and a half hours later Nefertite looked numbly at the little shop full of granny-type garments and croaked: “May, I don’t think these are really me.”

    “They have more variety than you’d think, dear, and of course they do cater for the larger sizes!” replied May brightly.—Dot, firm-minded as she was, had been completely unable to stop Aunty May from accompanying them on the shopping expedition. First stop, Aunty May’s mall. Okay, it did have a Kmart, but that wasn’t where they’d ended up.—“Now, they may not have all their casual wear on show, but of course they can get anything for you, and we’ll make sure the nice lady puts you on their catalogue list, shall we? And of course if you want to you can buy their things on your computer—Dot will be able to help you with that!” Happily she led the way.

    “Duh-does she mean mail-order, Dot?” faltered the hapless Nefertite, hanging back.

    “Nah, online shopping. I can show you, if you really want me to.”

    Nefertite looked limply at the window display of greyish-lilac cotton-knit tops and  greyish-lilac or pinky-grey, elastic-waisted trousers. “Not really, I don’t think, Dot.”

    “No. Never mind, go in: I’ll stop her from making you buy anything ya don’t want!”

    Trying to smile, Nefertite went into the shop.

    … “The thing is, you see, she’s got quite a small waist,” May explained brightly to the obliging shop assistant. “We thought these jeans: they’re a nice easy cut and they fit well over the hips; but they’re far too loose in the waist!”

    “Aunty May, we can get her some jeans at Kmart.”

    You’d have thought she hadn’t spoken. The assistant, who was about May’s age, immediately plunged into a long confab over the jeans with her, the conclusion being that the little shop further down the mall that did alterations would be able to take the jeans in at the waist for her—no, it wasn’t just hems, by any means! Yes, very obliging, Norah Sanderson—oh, had Mrs Marshall met her? Yes, wasn’t she? And blah, blah, blah…

    “Now these tops are very nice, Nefertite, but these soft pinks and lilacs aren’t your colours, dear, are they?” decided May briskly. “Dot, dear, just ask the saleswoman if they have this style in a nice bright colour, would you?”

    “I’ll ask,” muttered Dot, “but they won’t, this is planet Granny Gear.” She asked. They didn’t. Black or navy. She returned to the changing booth. “Black or nav—”

    “Here we are!” cooed the saleswoman from two inches behind her.

    “I do wear a lot of black,” said Nefertite faintly.

    “Yeah, black slacks or black evening gowns with sparkly things on them, ya don’t wear black tee-shirts!” said Dot loudly.

    “These aren’t tee-shirts, Dot, dear,” her aunt reproved her tolerantly. “They all have to be, to her generation, don’t they?” she said cosily to the other two.

    Limply Nefertite got into the black short-sleeved top. It was a soft knit fabric, reasonably light-weight, and would have been ideal for an English summer, but in New South Wales? And although it was quite a good fit, it was rather long.

    “They make them like that, quite flattering if one’s a bit hippy, dear,” said May kindly as she smoothed it over the bulky jeans.

    Dot felt the fabric dubiously. “Ya won’t get enough wear out of it, it’s too heavy for summer, and if a black tee-shirt’s your bag, we can grab one for half the price.”

    “It is a nice top… I was thinking of something brighter,” she said sadly.

    “Yeah, she likes bright colours,” said Dot grimly to her aunt.

    May looked wistfully at the pinky-grey version. “I might just try this on…”

    It’d go good in that fully ducted air-con of hers that she kept at around 21 Celsius in summer, that was for sure, and Uncle Jerry had pots, he’d never miss it, so Dot let her.

    They emerged from that shop with the jeans, the black knit top, and a nice pair of polyester elastic-waisted slacks for Nefertite in a harsh deep turquoise, plus the white, bright blue and lighter turquoise blouse that the shop had had on display with the same, but without the mix-and-match deep turquoise top that featured a huge machine-embroidered spray of something indefinable on one shoulder, because according to May the shade would have been too harsh close to the face, and with the pinky-grey, short-sleeved top plus a nice pair of pinky-grey polyester elastic-waisted slacks for May.

    “Now,” explained May as they left it in their wake, “down here there’s a very nice shop, most of the larger sizes, but very smart styles, that specialises more in summer clothes. It does call itself a club but ignore that, dear; and in any case I’ve got my card!”

    “Does it have the computer shopping too?” asked Nefertite limply.

    Dot snorted. “It’s got what calls itself a website, but they’re not wised up to themselves yet! I looked it up for Mum. Dunno whether they condescend to let you buy if you’ve got a club member number, but I couldn’t even see how to join up, let alone any way to browse the goods!”

    “They want you to come into their shops, dear,” explained May kindly.

    “Then they’re living in the Dark Ages,” replied her niece flatly. “Now hear this. You’ve got her some jeans and a pair of slacks and a couple of tops, so unless they’ve got something really lightweight and useful—and cheap—we’re not buying anything else, geddit?”

    “Don’t be silly, Dot,” she replied in a vague voice, looking avidly into the place’s window. “Ooh, I haven’t seen that before!” With that she was in there.

    Nefertite looked limply at the awful floral patterns on the things in the window.

    “Fancier than the other mob, eh?” discerned her sister-in-law.

    “Yes,” she said faintly. “Dot, I really can’t… And they’re nearly all those horrid pinky mauves again!”

    “Yep, horrid pinky mauves and yucky dark turquoise, must be what the grannies are being suckered into buying this year. All right, leave it to me.”

    They emerged from that shop with a long-sleeved cotton blouse patterned in sickly blue daisies, off-bright yellow buttercups and pale lime leaves on pale cream for Nefertite, and one pair of elastic-waisted white cargo pants, also for Nefertite, that Dot had given in and let her have because at least they looked washable and were reasonably priced; and with two shopping carriers full of toning floral outfits in light turquoise, sicky pinky-grey and sicky greyish lilac for May.

    After that Dot felt so drained that she just let her drag them into Georgia’s and feed them on limp quiche and limper salad because it just had nice ordinary food and you didn’t want anything too heavy for lunch, unquote. Well, it was better than being dragged home to her place to her curried chicken topped with mashed potato, shepherd’s pie-style, that was for sure. Georgia’s cappuccino was quite possibly the worst in the country but Nefertite lapped it up like a lamb.

    Having got their second winds, and Mrs Sanderson having promised the altered jeans without fail for three o’clock—too bad if they weren’t ready, determined Dot silently, ’cos it’d take them till six to get home, they weren’t gonna wait any later than that—they tried Kmart. Ignoring her aunt completely, Dot managed to buy a couple of cheap men’s shirts, the largest size, in checked cotton that wouldn’t shrink, and, since the shirts were on sale, another couple in David’s size. She let Nefertite buy a couple of cheap scarves, why not? Probably not silk, but they were nice and bright. And a couple of nice bright straw sunhats. And then steered her firmly in the direction of the footwear.

    “Yes, she does need some sneakers, Aunty May, it’s very rough round our place. –Not those, they’re runners. –Not those, see those stupid bits on the sides? They cut into ya toe joints: guaranteed to give ya blisters, closely followed by bunions. –Yeah, that’s right: nice and plain like tennis shoes used to be, good on ya, Aunty May!”

    “She’s such a practical little shopper,” explained May as they queued at the check-out.

    “Yes,” agreed Nefertite limply. May herself had bought a huge pile of sheets and pillowcases that were on sale: not for her, for her daughter-in-law. Would the poor girl want them? They were printed in horrid bright lilac flowers and little bright lilac dots on a white background. She’d bought her a video, too.

    “It’s all right,” said Dot in her ear in a low voice as, having been forced to go through first, they waited for May’s linen, the video and the unnecessary chocolates she’d also bought to be rung up.—Belgian seashells, Kmart seemed to have a glut of them this year.—“She’s the type that likes lilac.”

    “Your cousin’s wife? I see,” said Nefertite limply. “So will she like that video, too?”

    “That Doris Day thing? Bound to! Well, she won’t know who she is, but she’ll like it, too right!”

    Alas, the overwrought Nefertite at this collapsed in helpless hysterics.

    It felt like half-past forty-two of the day after next but was actually only two-twenty, so they just popped into the car and popped down to Dot’s Aunty Allyson’s mall, because there was just the off-chance—

    Sure enough, it yielded some really, really cheap tracksuit pants of the fleecy-lined variety, just Nefertite’s size, and she could put them away for winter, dear!

    After that they popped back and collected the altered jeans and after a comfort stop and just a very quick coffee at May’s, finally got going only half an hour later than Dot had intended. Quite a record, for a day spent at the mercy of Aunty May.

    “She means well,” said Dot, after they’d been driving for some time and had cleared the worst of the Sydney traffic.

    “Don’t,” said Nefertite unsteadily.

    “Uncle Jerry’s got pots, he doesn’t care how much she spends, ya know.”

    “Mm,” she agreed in a strangled voice.

    “And if ya don’t like any of that stuff she chose for ya, don’t wear it: she’ll never know.”

    Alas, Nefertite at this gave way completely and collapsed in helpless hysterical laughter.

    “I see,” said Dot feebly as she searched in the handbag that was so terrifically up-market that Aunty May had pointed it out admiringly to her with the intel that even David Jones hardly ever had those, dear.

    Nefertite blew her nose hard. “It was just like shopping with Aunty Antigone or Aunty Aphrodite,” she said unsteadily. “Not in specifics, of course, but generically. Oh, dear!”

    “Right,” said Dot on a weak note, sagging slightly, indomitable though she was. “So ya not gonna turn tail and go back to ruddy Europe on the strength of it, eh?”

    “Of course not, Dot!” she said in that warm, deep voice that was like listening to deepest blue velvet.

    “No,” said Dot limply. “Good on ya, Nefertite.”

    David collapsed in helpless hysterics.

    “Stop LAUGHING, ya wanker!” shouted his wife, turning puce.

    After quite some time he was able to stop laughing, blow his nose and apologise to his sister. “Not laughing at you,” he ended feebly, blowing the nose again.

    “Not much!” said Dot angrily.

    “I really don’t think he was, for once,” admitted Nefertite.

    “No,” he agreed feebly. “It’s the way she’s combined that stuff you and May bought for her yesterday, Dot.”

    “She looks good!” retorted Dot fiercely.

    “Exactly,” he agreed feebly, his shoulders starting to shake again. “Given the—er—ingredients, one wouldn’t have thought it possible.”

    Dot gave him a good glare. “She’s good with clothes.”

    “Don’t set me off again!” he begged.

    The large shirts Dot had bought at Kmart were of the checked variety, two colours on white, the white threads interwoven with the coloured ones so that although the basic shades were quite bright the overall effect was toned down. Nefertite had cut the collar off the blue, red and white offering—the collars were far too stiff for leisure wear, as David silently acknowledged: the shirt had doubtless been made in China by sweated labour who had no idea of what the Australian public considered a casual shirt. She was wearing it over the black knit top, the latter tucked into the jeans. She’d folded the two headscarves from Kmart into triangles, and then knotted them together to form a wide, soft belt, tied jauntily in front. The riot of brown, gold, red and orange on the one thus intermingled with the riot of black, gold, emerald, blue and turquoise on the other. The effect was considerably enhanced by the riot of gold, blue and orange dangling from the ears. Some sort of enamelled things—she owned truckloads of jewellery.

    “It is a good effect—well, done, Nefertite,” her brother conceded. “Now show us what you can do with those deep turquoise slacks that set the teeth on edge.”

    Looking pleased, Nefertite exited to her room.

    “That’ll startle the natives,” David drawled.

    “Shut up! And if you laugh again I’ll kill you!”

    They waited, Dot glaring and David trying, though not terribly hard, not to grin.

    Nefertite came back in the harsh deep turquoise polyester slacks. With them she was wearing the white, bright blue and lighter turquoise blouse intended to be so worn, but the nice middle-aged lady look had vanished: it was knotted tightly above the waist. This might have allowed a considerable strip of skin to show except that she was again wearing the two knotted headscarves as a belt. This time the earrings were a beautiful pair that she’d had for years—she’d got them in North Africa but whether they were actually a native design, as was claimed, was open to doubt. Large triangles of turquoise set in long-stemmed, heavy gold.

    Dot clapped her hands, beaming.

    “Yes,” conceded David feebly. “Jolly good. All that one could do, really. Okay, let’s admit that if you can make that yellow and green checked shirt she chose look good, I’ll give you a medal. Or at least make that couscous dish you like.”

    His sister went out, beaming, and they waited…

    David choked. Dot gulped but rallied to say: “That’s really ace!”

    The green, yellow and white shirt had suffered an even more drastic fate than the other: it had had both its sleeves removed as well as its collar. This allowed the sickly blue daisies, off-bright yellow buttercups and pale lime leaves on pale cream of the long-sleeved shirt from the second granny shop to show—or most of them, she’d rolled them up loosely to just below the elbow. The two garments had green and yellow in common, this was true. The blouse had been fairly loose-skirted but now appeared quite tight. It was certainly tucked tightly into the white cargo pants.

    Dot peered. “I see, you’ve sort of, um, folded the fronts over.”

    “Yes. I thought I might wear these tops with the jeans, as well.”

    “Yes, that’d look good, too,” agreed Dot happily.

    “Nefertite,” said David faintly, “just tell me one thing before they put the straight-jacket on me. Why have you favoured that particular combination with that giant purple belt?”

    “She likes purple!” snapped Dot, glaring.

    This was true, but was it germane? The purple belt was one of the huge, squashy sort intended to appear creased. Just as well, with Nefertite’s tummy below it, reflected her brother drily.

    “Well, I had this lime and purple stuff, you see,” she said, holding up a wrist.

    Er—yeah. Huge rings of pale lime and pale purple. They looked like plastic but knowing her, wouldn’t be. That square chunk of green stuff at the neck definitely wasn’t plastic: the Unlamented Corrant had given it to her in his besotted phase.

    “Is that pendant chalcedony?” he croaked.

    “Chrysoprase, strictly speaking,” said Nefertite calmly. “Green.”

    Right. That’d startle the natives, all right.

    “So will you?” she asked hopefully.

    “Huh?”

    “Make the couscous dish.”

    “Oh! Of course! Well, er, dunno that it’ll run to sweet potatoes in the stew, but I’ll manage something!”

    “Lovely!” she beamed. “It has fruit in it as well, Dot,” she explained: “often dates or prunes, but it is nice with sweet potatoes as well.”

    “Mm. Might do that North African salad with it,” he said thoughtfully.

    “That’d be nice!” agreed his sister. “For tomorrow?”

    “Uh—don’t think I’ll have time, Friday evening’s usual pretty busy. The weekend customers arrive: that way they can gorge themselves on three dinners before they have to go home. Can you wait until Monday? The restaurant’ll be closed.”

    “Of course!” she beamed.

    “We’ll just have cheese on toast for tea tomorrow, eh?” said Dot comfortably.

    David opened his mouth to object feebly that that was ridiculous, he’d send over a decent meal from the restaurant, but the two of them were beaming and nodding at each other, so he just kept stumm and sent up a prayer of thanks to Whoever might be up there above assorted rusting Yank and Russian hardware that Dot and Nefertite had hit it off from the word “go.”

Next chapter:

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