‘Yes. It is,’ Harrie said. She dropped the pillowslip and hurried off towards the attic stairs.

  ‘I’ll tell him, then. If you’re sure,’ Nora said to an empty room.

  ‘God, it’s hot this morning.’ Sarah fanned her face with one hand and kept a firm grip on Clifford’s lead with the other. ‘Was it this warm last October?’

  ‘For a few days, it was. Spring’s bloody unpredictable here, isn’t it? I like it, though. Keeps you on your toes.’ In accordance with the warmer weather, Friday was wearing one of her low-cut summer dresses in a startling indigo blue.

  Everywhere on the street women had ventured out with nothing more than lightweight shawls over their gowns, and men’s hair stuck sweatily to their heads beneath their hats. The heat also had the unfortunate effect of increasing the stink from the open drains and piles of ordure in the streets, attracting growing numbers of flies — annoying harbingers of the infestation that would arrive with summer proper.

  ‘Well, if it’s going to be this hot, maybe I won’t buy wool after all,’ Sarah said. ‘Maybe I’ll buy all cotton. What do you think?’

  ‘Don’t ask me. I don’t know the first thing about fabric.’

  ‘No, but you know what colours look nice.’

  ‘Not according to Mrs H, I don’t.’ Friday laughed. ‘She reckons my frocks frighten the horses.’

  Sarah laughed as well because it was true — Friday’s dresses were quite loud, particularly her summer ones. But they suited her character, and the colours did in fact always somehow complement her fair skin. ‘Pity Harrie couldn’t come. How’s she getting on with Leo?’

  ‘He says she’s got a great eye. She has, too. She’s doing a lovely job of my phoenix.’

  Sarah stepped around a boy sitting on the footway selling bunches of parsley. ‘Clifford, stop that! Obviously she’s not tattooing you today.’

  ‘Leo’s invited some uppity Maori chief to teach him and Harrie how to tattoo the way the New Zealanders do it, him and his high and mighty bloody shrew of a wife. I think they’re there this morning.’

  Sarah looked sideways at Friday. Though she’d just made a rude comment, she didn’t sound irritated. In fact she was in an altogether excellent mood. Something was up. She opened her reticule and took out a piece of paper. ‘This is how much fabric Harrie said I should get for each dress.’

  ‘Is she sewing them, or Nora Barrett?’

  ‘Well, I’m paying Nora. I just assumed Harrie doesn’t have the time to sew for us these days, though I bet she would if I asked.’

  ‘Time? It’s her wits I’d be worried about. You might end up with a dress with four sleeves.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘I was watching her the other day. We were listening to that Maori cove talk about tattooing, and Harrie went into this sort of … trance. And it wasn’t even boring, it was more like she couldn’t scrape up the energy to stay in the same realm as the rest of us, so she just let go and slid off into another one.’

  Sarah swallowed. That was the most frightening thing anyone had said yet about the state of Harrie’s mind. ‘Has Leo noticed anything?’

  ‘Hell, yes. He’s really worried.’

  ‘Is it the abortion, do you think?’

  ‘I think it’s everything bad that’s happened since we got here,’ Friday said. ‘I think it’s all piling up in her head. Poor love.’

  Outside the draper’s, Sarah stopped. ‘Should we go and talk to James? I mean, he is a doctor. He should be able to tell us what we can do to help.’

  ‘He’s half the reason Harrie’s unhinged, him and bloody Rowie Harris.’

  ‘But do you really think what Rowie said was true?’ Sarah gave Clifford’s leash a good yank as she lunged at a passing child. ‘Because I’m not so sure it is. I know I didn’t like James to start with, but when he came to stay with me while Adam was away, I changed my mind. He’s a decent man, Friday. I don’t think he did sleep with her.’

  Friday made a vulgar noise, startling Clifford.

  ‘Oh, you think all men are bastards, because of what you do,’ Sarah said.

  ‘They are.’

  ‘They are not.’

  ‘You’re singing a different tune these days.’

  ‘Well, you like Matthew Cutler, don’t you?’

  ‘I suppose,’ Friday admitted.

  ‘And Adam? And Leo? And Jack at the pub?’

  ‘Most of the time.’

  ‘There you go. James loves Harrie, he really does. I know he does. And he’s a good man.’

  Friday stood aside to let a pair of matrons into the shop. ‘So why won’t he help her?’

  ‘You know why. She won’t let him.’

  There didn’t seem to be anything to add to that, so Sarah tied Clifford to a post and they went inside. The shop was long, its dim interior lit with wall lamps illuminating an extensive range — for Sydney — of fabrics stacked on shelves along one wall. There was bolt after bolt of crepe, camlet, calico, gingham, linen, lawn, chintz, muslin, striped cotton, velvet, silk (plain and figured), satin, taffeta, damask, superfine, bombasine, merinoe, kerseymere, flannel, stuff, drab, diaper, blue jean, moleskin, canvas, fustian, duck, drill, and great rolls of silk mosquito gauze (plain and coloured). On the opposite wall deep shelves displayed crepe and silk waistcoats, Norwich and Thibet shawls, straw and fabric bonnets, men’s beaver hats and dress shirts, pelerines, stays, house caps (plain and lace), parasols, work trousers and jackets, and a range of readymade children’s and infants’ wear.

  A deep counter ran across the back of the shop for cutting and measuring, and in the centre were arranged tall glass cabinets containing sewing tools, and tables displaying box after box of sewing cottons and silks, edgings, ribbons, lace, tassels and other notions, silk and cloth handkerchiefs, kid and silk gloves, lace and men’s collars, buttons, steel and whalebone busks, sheet willow and bonnet wire, split straw, silk flowers, hatpins, men’s and women’s hosiery, and scarves and veils. Milling around the tables were at least a dozen women, clucking among themselves and picking over the goods like chickens in a yard.

  ‘God, where do I start?’ Sarah said.

  She wandered towards the more lightweight fabrics — the muslins, cottons, ginghams, calicoes and chintzes — and ran her hand over various bolts.

  ‘Do you want plain or patterned?’ Friday asked.

  ‘Oh, plain, probably.’

  ‘Don’t be so boring.’ Friday indicated a Turkey red floral calico. ‘What about this?’

  ‘It’s a bit bright.’

  ‘It is not. This, then. The China blue looks really good against your skin. And so does that red. Don’t be such a lily liver. Honestly, one day you’ll disappear comp—’

  Sarah glanced over her shoulder to see what had caused Friday to stop talking — a very rare occurrence. Approaching was an extremely beautiful, big, brown-skinned girl wearing a smart black and silver-striped dress. Her chin was tattooed and she wore a comb of some sort in her hair.

  The girl touched Friday’s hand. Sarah thought Friday looked like she might faint.

  ‘Mother is up at the counter,’ the girl said in a rush. ‘Tomorrow morning at your room. I will try to be there by ten.’ Then she turned on her heel and hurried back towards the rear of the shop, leaving Friday staring after her.

  ‘We have to go,’ Friday blurted, a spot of red blooming on each cheek. ‘But we can come back. Is that all right?’

  ‘Why?’ Sarah asked. ‘Who was that?’

  ‘Um.’ Friday panicked. What was she going to tell Sarah? ‘Come outside, just for ten minutes? Please?’

  ‘Only if you tell me what’s going on,’ Sarah grumbled, following Friday out onto George Street.

  They collected Clifford and walked fifty yards up the road to lean against the Barracks wall, keeping an eye on the draper’s shop so Friday could see when Aria and Mahuika came out.

  ‘Well?’ Sarah prompted.

  Friday sighed. Her palms were sweaty, and not just because it was hot. ‘Her name’s Aria. I met her the other day. Her father’s the one visiting Leo.’

  Sarah said, ‘She’s very beautiful.’

  Clifford growled at a woman walking past. Friday said nothing.

  ‘You fancy her, don’t you?’ Sarah asked.

  ‘No!’ Friday’s face heated up again and her skin prickled uncomfortably.

  ‘It’s a waste of time lying,’ Sarah said. ‘I pretty well worked it out a while ago.’

  Friday opened her mouth to protest further, but why bother? Sarah knew — she could see it in her eyes. ‘God. How did you know?’

  Sarah shrugged. ‘I’m not entirely sure. I don’t know the first thing about, well, girls who like girls. It’s just that you’ve never had anyone special. Anyone at all. But you’ve got a big heart, so I assumed it was because you couldn’t, not because you didn’t want someone. You could have had plenty of men as proper lovers, but you never have, so I suppose I eventually decided you must prefer women. And I did get the impression that you fancied Serafina.’

  Her eyes burning, Friday struggled to swallow around the lump in her throat. ‘And you’re not … angry?’ From the corner of her eye she noted Mahuika and Aria emerge from the draper’s and walk off in the opposite direction.

  ‘Angry? Why would I be angry?’

  ‘Because I’m not normal,’ Friday said. ‘Because it’s wrong. Because I’m a tribade.’ Oh, her throat ached now.

  Sarah took her hand. ‘You can call yourself what you like, but to me you’re just Friday. I don’t care who you fancy.’

  As Friday wiped tears off her cheeks with the back of her hand, Sarah gave her a hug. Jealous, Clifford squeezed between them and sat on Sarah’s feet.

  Friday shoved her off. ‘Does Harrie know?’

  ‘She’s never mentioned it, but I doubt it. You know how naive she is.’

  ‘She’ll be so shocked. Or disgusted.’ Friday could just imagine Harrie’s face when she found out.

  ‘Oh, she will not,’ Sarah said. ‘She loves you.’

  Friday thought about that for a moment. It was nice knowing you were loved. ‘She does, doesn’t she? She loves you, too.’

  ‘Yes, I know. She was much nicer to me when we first met in Newgate than you were.’

  ‘Well, you were pretty awful.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Sarah agreed.

  ‘She’s held us together, hasn’t she? All of us, especially poor Rachel.’

  ‘Do you think that’s why she believes Rachel’s still here? Because she loved her so much and can’t bear to let her go?’

  ‘Christ knows,’ Friday said.

  ‘Because I loved Rachel, too,’ Sarah said, ‘and I’ve never seen her.’

  So did I, Friday thought, and I can’t make up my mind whether she’s here or not. ‘God, poor Harrie. What’s she going to be like when she hears about what else Serafina saw?’

  ‘If it’s actually happened. It was only a prediction,’ Sarah reminded her.

  ‘You just don’t want it to be true,’ Friday said.

  ‘Of course I bloody well don’t. Do you?’

  ‘Hell, no.’

  They stood there for several moments in unhappy contemplation.

  At last Sarah asked, ‘So why did we have to rush out of the draper’s?’

  ‘Because Aria’s mother was in there. She’s taken against me. If she sees me, Aria won’t have a hope in hell of sneaking away and coming to visit me tomorrow. But I saw them come out a few minutes ago.’

  ‘Well, you be careful. Those people eat their enemies, you know.’

  ‘Do they?’ Friday’s stomach clenched slightly. ‘Jesus.’

  ‘That’s what I’ve heard.’

  ‘I wouldn’t put it past that bloody mother.’

  ‘Do you think we can go back in now? I might get the Turkey red after all,’ Sarah said, flinching as Clifford lifted her leg on the hem of Friday’s skirt.

  ‘And the China blue,’ Friday said. ‘What’s the matter? Ah, you little shite!’

  With a deep, shuddering groan, Adam gave one final thrust then slowly subsided onto Sarah’s slender white back. He moved his hands from her rounded hips and, the muscles of his arms quivering, settled them on either side of her on the mattress to avoid squashing her, and rubbed his face against her tousled sable hair.

  ‘My thighs are going to give way,’ she murmured.

  ‘So are mine. They feel like jelly.’

  Sarah giggled as he rolled over, taking her with him to fit neatly against his sweat-dampened chest and belly.

  ‘As always, that was exceptional,’ he said. ‘You’re enough to give a man a heart attack, Mrs Green.’

  ‘Oh, don’t be stupid, you’re as healthy as a horse,’ Sarah said.

  And he was — healthy, fit, handsome, decent, prosperous (these days), and devoted to her. Sometimes — frequently, in fact — she was awed by her good fortune. True, she was still a prisoner of His Majesty and serving a seven-year sentence, but what did that matter? She’d married her master, and what a master he’d turned out to be.

  ‘Yes, well, right now this horse wouldn’t be out of place at the knackers’. It’s too hot for sexual acrobatics.’

  Smiling, Sarah turned over to face him. ‘We didn’t have to do it twice.’

  ‘I felt we did, actually.’

  Sarah laughed and poked him in the chest. ‘That’ll teach you.’ She snuggled into him, sniffing the faint scent of the sandalwood and lime cologne he always wore. ‘Friday told me something this morning. It’s a secret. At least, I think it is, though she didn’t actually tell me not to tell anyone else. But I’m not sure you count anyway.’

  ‘Thank you very much. Anyway, I bet I do.’

  ‘Oh, you won’t tell anyone. She’s finally met someone.’

  ‘Well, it’s about time. Anyone I know?’

  ‘I wouldn’t think so.’ Sarah paused. ‘Her name’s Aria.’ Beside her she felt Adam twitch in surprise.

  ‘Her name?’

  ‘Er, yes.’

  ‘A girl?’

  ‘Well, obviously.’

  ‘That’s interesting.’

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘Well, now that I think about it,’ Adam said, ‘I’m possibly not as surprised as I should be.’

  ‘Aren’t you?’

  ‘She’s never had a man friend, has she? Well, not that I’m aware of. Are you surprised?’

  Sarah said, ‘I did rather think she might be that way inclined. But, you know, it just never really seemed to matter, one way or the other.’

  Adam ran his thumb across the curved, silver scar on Sarah’s cheek, then stroked and smoothed her hair as though she were a cat. ‘I don’t suppose it does, as long as she doesn’t advertise the fact. I do wonder, though, how she manages to do her job. I mean, all those men.’

  ‘She hates it, you know,’ Sarah said. ‘Well, when I say she hates it, I know she doesn’t get any pleasure from it, and some of her customers she can’t stand. You should hear what she says about them. A few she tolerates, though, a couple of her regulars.’

  ‘Then why does she do it?’

  ‘Money. She makes more in a week than we do some months in the shop.’

  ‘Not when we’re on the flash, though, I bet.’

  ‘No, maybe not then.’

  But they’d been keeping very much on the right side of the law since Adam returned from Port Macquarie. Sarah, however, missed the jewellery rackets, and the thrill of living so dangerously, and she certainly missed the challenge of breaking into houses.

  ‘So what’s this girl like, do you know?’

  ‘She’s a New Zealander. A native girl. I saw her this morning. She’s very beautiful, quite exotic, and even taller than Friday. You should have seen them, Adam: together they look like a pair of Amazons. And Friday’s face when Aria was talking to her — she looks like she’s bewitched already.’

  ‘And she lives here in Sydney?’

  ‘No, she doesn’t.’ Sarah was quiet for several seconds. ‘And I think that’s going to be a problem.’

  Chapter Nine

  Grateful that she didn’t have to start work until one o’clock, Friday rose uncharacteristically early on Saturday morning, thanks to a clear head from limiting her drinks the previous evening, and got stuck into cleaning up her piggy room. She collected all the dirty shifts, stockings and towels from the floor and sent them down to the laundry, put away everything else vaguely cleanish, returned her hats to their boxes, changed the bed linen, tidied all the cosmetics scattered across the dressing table and wiped the powdery surface. She also returned half a dozen dirty tea cups and a reeking bowl filled with pipe ash to the kitchen, cleared out a sackful of empty gin bottles from under the bed (and the top of the clothes press, the windowsill and behind the chest of drawers), opened the window, and made a quick trip down to the flowerseller on George Street for bunches of violets and sweetpeas to sweeten the air.

  At a quarter to nine Jack brought up the tin bath, followed by Ivy from the laundry, labouring under the weight of the first of a dozen buckets of steaming hot water. When the bath was six inches deep, Friday stripped off, stepped in and sat down, sighing as the luxuriously hot water rose to her waist. Normally when she had her weekly bath she lounged around in it, drinking gin and smoking her pipe until the temperature of the water became unpleasant and she was forced to get out, but today she lathered herself with a bar of Mrs H’s fancy soap immediately. She washed everywhere but her hair, which wouldn’t dry in time and wasn’t particularly dirty anyway. Once out and wrapped in a towel, she yanked on the bell-pull to summon Ivy to empty the bath, and sat down at her dressing table.

  Staring at herself in the mirror she felt jittery with nerves. Should she put on powder and kohl and lip rouge? Or, being a New Zealander, would Aria not find that sort of thing pretty?

  Shite! Food! After Mahuika’s snide comments the other day, she didn’t want to risk insulting Aria by not offering her anything to eat or drink.

  Friday ran out of her room into the corridor, her towel flapping, straight into a startled Ivy. ‘Quick, go down to the kitchen and ask Jenny to bring up some food on a tray. At exactly a quarter past ten. And a pot of tea. For my visitor.’