Eden by Dorothy Johnston

chaos in the past tense.
    She sniffed the air, as Fred and I had done, but the vagrant chemical smell I’d picked up was gone, destroyed by my vacuuming and dusting. I couldn’t think what had made it. It could have been a male deodorant, or aftershave, but it had smelt too sharply astringent for that.
    Gail marched around my house, observing neatness and clean surfaces, rattling off the reasons I should not be on my own. Her eyes flicked back and forth, seeking out reminders of my absent family.
    Over iced tea, I asked her if she’d ever seen Ken Dollimore lose his temper.
    Gail rubbed her nose with the back of her hand and said, ‘I was at the Assembly to interview the Chief Minister. It was at the start of those protests over the Gungahlin Drive Extension. I passed Dollimore in the corridor and with no warning at all he grabbed hold of me.’ Gail took hold of imaginary coat lapels and shook them. ‘He called me a parasite and a human mosquito.’
    â€˜Did you bite him?’
    â€˜Yick!’ Gail shook her head. ‘A guy with such a reputation for standing on his dignity. And I’d done sweet nothing. I hadn’t even breathed on his hair.’
    I said I didn’t think a bit of journalistic harassment would do Dollimore any harm. In particular, I thought Gail might pester him about what he’d been doing on the afternoon Carmichael died. I reminded her about contacting Margot Lancaster, and said I had something she might be able to use in return. Carmichael was supposed to have been in Senator Bryant’s office in Parliament House at four o’clock on January 4, not gasping his last in a brothel. The appointment had been made before Christmas, and cancelled at the last minute. I’d confirmed it with one of Bryant’s staffers.
    Gail nodded, then gave me a smile that was like a handshake, confirming a deal.

Six
    It was six o’clock, but already felt like midnight. Because I’d chosen to turn my back on the meat raffle, I found myself sitting with my nose pressed against a penny-farthing bicycle. The raffle that made my stomach turn comprised not one frozen chook, or ten, but floor to ceiling meat—newly dead, red and white and bloody. Close up, it separated into chops, sausages, roasts and steaks in individual packages, gladwrap tight, set artistically like tiles in a wall mosaic.
    I asked Denise Travers if it was a weekly thing. She said it was. I asked her how she thought the winner might store his or her prize. She lit a cigarette, looked bored, and said she didn’t know.
    Denise had long black hair and fingernails to match. Her lips were the colour of an undertaker’s shadow. She was above average height and slim, dressed in dark, well-fitting clothes. At a distance, and apart from the length of her hair, she could have stood in for Margot Lancaster. Close up, she looked half Margot’s age.
    Not wishing to put her off by staring, I turned my gaze back to the largest exhibit in the bicycle museum.
    Denise smiled to let me know she was pleased by my discomfort. She’d chosen our table, in an area of the Tradies that was reserved for smokers. She told me that when her daughter was little, she and her husband used to go to the Tradies every Friday night. She’d have a middy and he’d have two schooners and a plate of chips.
    I raised my glass. ‘To absent husbands.’
    â€˜Yours pissed off as well?’ Denise turned her head to blow smoke away from me.
    â€˜The first one did.’
    â€˜And the second?’
    â€˜In Moscow, visiting his sister. You haven’t given it a second go?’
    â€˜Nah,’ Denise said, with a self-deprecating smile. I’ve had a few nibbles, but.’
    â€˜But?’
    â€˜Something always puts me off. Margot said you’ve got a friend who’s a reporter.’
    â€˜Do you want to talk to her?’
    â€˜Maybe.’
    â€˜What about your daughter?’ There