A Trifle Dead: Cafe La Femme, Book 1 (10 page)

I tugged at the cream lace hem of my vintage skirt, and checked my rosebud stockings for holes. It’s a rare day when I feel underdressed to walk the streets of Hobart.

‘
W
ere any of them genuine
?’ Ceege asked later.

‘Not one of them had any of the stolen gear,’ I laughed. After my berry run, I had found kCeera hiding out in my kitchen with Stewart—of course he’d taken the opportunity to interview her. ‘There was some sort of altercation over the ownership of a bedazzled Grateful Dead t-shirt, though. So that was fun.’ Thank goodness it hadn’t got bad enough to warrant calling the police—there was a special kind of sarcasm Bishop reserved especially for that sort of situation.

I hadn’t seen Bishop since we were plastered across the Hobart media as the latest supercouple, and I was planning to keep it that way for as long as possible. Bad enough that Mum had already called to demand I buy her a few extra copies of the paper, and to sigh about how dreamy young Leo looked in his uniform. Luckily she lives a couple of hours away, or I might have had to accept the Sunday lunch invitation on his behalf. ‘Back to the important issue. Does peach go with silver?’

Ceege gave me a sidelong look. ‘You can probably get away with it.’

‘I can, can’t I?’ I tilted a hand mirror away from my mouth, and applied an Outback Peach lip crayon. I was going to look excellent tonight, with my new comb-through silver wig, and a go-go dress to die for—assuming I could a) find the dress and b) it still fit me after my recent chocolate biscuit frenzy. It was somewhere in the piles of clothes and dry cleaning bags on the floor of my room, and I was wrapped instead in one of my many quilted dressing gowns.

Ceege stared at his own reflection in the full length mirror that we’d taken out of his wardrobe and leaned against the fridge. ‘Well, you got away with it at the last glam party.’

I stared at him in horror. ‘You are kidding me. Damn.’ I grabbed a handful of wet wipes and scrubbed at my mouth. ‘What about silver and magenta?’

‘Last October.’

‘Damn.’ I threw the little mirror on the table. ‘Do you think it’s time I moved away from the silver thing? Am I getting predictable?’

Ceege shrugged. ‘There’s always silver and silver.’

I forgave him instantly. ‘With sparkles?’

‘Dude, do you have to ask?’

Someone pushed our front door open. ‘Hello?’ Stewart called.

Ceege lifted his eyebrows. ‘Accent.’

‘I
know
,’ I said, giving him a girlie squeal-face. ‘Back here, Stewart.’ I scrabbled through my lipstick shoebox. ‘Cee-ege, I can’t find my tube of sparkles.’

‘The pink sparkles?’

‘No, the sparkle sparkles.’

‘That’s the Italian shoebox,’ he grunted. ‘Try the French.’

I blew him an air kiss. ‘Genius!’

By the time Stewart made it through the mess of our main hall to the kitchen, I was on my tippy toes, trying to lever the French shoebox down from the top of the fridge. Stewart reached over me, lifting it down easily.

‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘This is Ceege, my housemate. He’s an engineering student, but don’t hold that against him.’

‘All right, mate,’ said Ceege. ‘Beer?’

‘Thanks,’ said Stewart. He didn’t seem freaked out that Ceege was wearing a bugled orange mini-dress, a shoulder length wig in the same shade, and make up that could only be described as Drag Queen Chic. So that meant we could keep being friends, good to know. ‘Tabitha, when ye said you wanted to dress me up for this “glam” party…’

I brought the sparkles out of the shoebox in triumph, along with two canisters of spray glitter. ‘Yes?’

‘I have three sisters, and I’ve still never been more worried in me life.’

I gave him my best smile. ‘Don’t worry, it won’t hurt a bit.’

I
’ve always loved dressing
up. I may have a shade too much boob or hip to fit perfectly into half the clothes I fall in love with (my 1920s phase was … unsatisfying) but that just adds to the challenge. Maybe I’m getting too old for fashion play, but … hell, life’s too short to be a grown up.

Dressing up other people is even more fun than dressing myself. Stewart had given me something easy to work with, starting off with white jeans and a close-fitting black t-shirt. He fought me on swapping the t-shirt for a sequined tank top, but allowed me to use my glitter spray on the jeans. I also managed to work some pink enamel and sparkles on his sneakers while he was distracted.

I was allowed free rein over his hair, and happily broke out four kinds of gel for the occasion, giving him sparkly spikes that caught the light when he turned his head.

He let me decorate his face, too. I highlighted the planes and angles with streaks of black and silver. He gave me a suspicious look when I broke out the mascara, but allowed it.

Friendship eternal, then.

Ceege found my dress—finally—in one of the overstuffed downstairs cupboards, and zipped me into it. ‘Sure you can breathe in this thing, Tabs?’

‘Don’t need to,’ I gasped. ‘Party dress.’

‘You so should have laid off the Tim Tams this week.’ He’s so judgy. We don’t all get our party frocks made to measure.

Stewart shook his head, grinning at us both. ‘I warn ye, Tabitha, if we get to this party and everyone’s wearing ordinary clothes, I’ll be most displeased.’

S
tewart needn’t have worried
. When we fell out of our taxi some time later, the streets of Taroona were filled with gaudy butterfly people, all heading for the same place. It was a big, fancy house—all windows and water view and shiny black furniture. The music poured out of it like the house itself was a huge, pulsing stereo.

‘Wow,’ I said. ‘They must have really bribed their neighbours.’

‘Or drugged them,’ said Ceege.

The second we stepped in the door, we were pounced on by a vampire in gold earrings and a few wisps of satin. ‘Tabby, sweetie,’ she hollered in my ear.

‘Hi, Meryl,’ I shouted back. ‘How’s the band tonight?’

She gave me a funny look. ‘There’s a band?’ Then she saw Ceege. ‘Oh, C.J.
darling
, look at you, all fabulous. Come and have a champagne cocktail with me, they’re to die for.’

Ceege scowled at her under his day-glo makeup. ‘Mez, you couldn’t get one of those ponced-up wank drinks down my throat if I was tied to a bed and unconscious. Where’s the beer?’ He nodded briefly to Stewart and I, then elbowed his way through the crowd in search of drinks, applying a spiked heel to anyone who didn’t move out of his way fast enough.

We weren’t making as good progress through the glam costumes and pressing bodies as Ceege had managed. As we squeezed through the kitchen door I caught a whiff of stale cigarette smoke and saw a familiar figure leaning up against the fridge. ‘Locks?’

The drug dealer waved his fingers at me. The only concession he’d made to the dress code of the party was a sparkly gold daffodil stuck into the buttonhole of his grimy stockman’s coat.

‘I thought you weren’t invited,’ I said from the doorway.

Locks looked smug. ‘I wasn’t, cutes. Ask anybody.’ He grabbed a handful of jaffas from a nearby bowl, and tossed them into his mouth.

The crowd surged. Stewart and I ended up several feet from the kitchen door. He grabbed my arm. ‘Do ye think that Locks fellae is involved in the case?’

At least he hadn’t said ‘murder’ or ‘mystery.’ Though ‘case’ wasn’t much better. I was starting to feel like a character in a Trixie Belden novel.

‘Probably,’ I sighed. ‘Come on, let’s head upstairs. I think the band will be up there.’

I slid and wriggled through the crowd, dragging Stewart after me. I got to the staircase with minimum bruising, but Stewart caught a few stray elbows in my wake.

The upstairs floor was open plan, a huge expanse of floor and glass. It wasn’t quite dark yet, and I could see the sharp grey-blue of the Derwent filling the windows along one whole side of the house.

The music was louder here—I could feel the beat through the soles of my high heels—but I couldn’t see the band.

The room was full of glammed-up dancers. There was glitter and hairspray and leather corsets everywhere—like a David Bowie theme party if Bowie was going through a modern goth phase, and had possibly mated with Austin Powers. ‘How are we going to get to the band?’ I yelled at Stewart.

‘We could dance!’ he yelled back, not sounding overly enthusiastic.

‘I thought you’d never ask!’ I said, and threw myself at him.

Twenty minutes—or three hours or something—later, we clawed our way to one of the ocean windows and leaned against the glass, hot and sweaty and basically stuffed. ‘What were we doing here again?’ I gasped.

Stewart looked as dazed as I felt. ‘I d’know. There was definitely a plan.’

‘I vaguely recall a plan…’ I leaned on his shoulder. ‘I used to have party stamina. I think I’m getting old.’

‘Yeah, it’s all downhill once ye hit yer thirties.’

I gave him a Stare. ‘I’m twenty-six.’

He bumped his head gently against mine. ‘Lightweight. Age is no excuse. Ye aren’t even trying to do this in jeans.’

I spotted something odd out of the corner of my eye. ‘Stewart, did you read that Wearable Art Treasures flyer, where it listed all the missing items?’

‘Sure, I blogged it this afternoon, to go with the pictures I took of all the phoneys that responded. Had to do a round up of all their tweets. This city takes its fashion very seriously.’

‘Do you remember the details about the gold spiked belt?’

‘Handmade by a local artist, gold leaf embedded in the handwoven fabric, gold leather spikes at a forty-five degree angle,’ he said as if he had the flyer right in front of his eyes.

‘That’s the one,’ I said. ‘One of a kind. And it’s over there, moshing.’ I pointed, and the belt in question swung in and out of view, surrounded by corseted women.

‘Hey,’ said Stewart. ‘The same fellae’s wearing those steel-capped boots with Elizabethan spurs, too. Or something tha’ looks exactly like them…’

‘Get him,’ I said, and lunged forward into the crowd. Stewart came after me, but I was faster because of being shorter, and having the ability to crawl between people’s legs. I latched on to the knee of the Wearable Art Treasure Thief, and climbed up.

‘Hello, Owen,’ I said, as Stewart caught up to us.

The Crash Velvet guitarist stared at me. ‘Café Babe! Love the magic blue muffins. I’m like, addicted now!’

‘So, ye found yer Wearable Art Treasures then,’ Stewart shouted at Owen’s ear.

The guitarist looked alarmed. ‘Well, you know, turns out they weren’t stolen,’ he said. ‘They were … lost, right?’

‘I expect the drummer had them in the back of his ute, and forgot about it,’ I yelled above the music.

Owen brightened noticeably. ‘That’s, yeah! Exactly what happened. Or something. No, wait, that wasn’t the story. They were returned. In a parcel, right? All good.’

‘Uh-huh. Can you spell “insurance fraud”?’ Though that didn’t make much sense. Unless it was an incredibly stupid attempt at insurance fraud.

‘Dudes,’ Owen said, shrugging. ‘I’ve gotta get back to the band. We’re about to start the second set.’ He smooched a couple of the nearest corset girls, and sidled off into the crowd.

I sagged against Stewart.

‘Can ye spell “red herring”?’ he asked against my hair.

‘I’m so depressed,’ I moaned. ‘No wonder Bishop is pissed off all the time if he has to deal with this sort of thing every day.’ I gave Stewart a meaningful look. ‘No more girl detective. I’m through. The police can solve all the mysterious deaths they want. I want to go home and make apple strudel and forget all about postmen and Trappers and Wearable Art Treasures.’

Stewart laughed, hugging me. Which I didn’t mind, actually. ‘Ye can forget about all that and still enjoy the party. Come now, we got all dressed up. D’ye really no’ want tae dance any more?’

‘Did the glitter go to your brain?’ I teased. ‘I think you’re enjoying yourself.’

‘Is that a crime? Less whining, more shaking yer thing. If yer thing wants to be shaken. It’s an entirely voluntary exercise.’

Well, when he put in like that…

‘Drinks first,’ I said firmly. ‘Sissy girlie drinks with bubbles. Then the shaking of things.’

Some time later, we finally moved close enough to get a good look at the band—not that I was feeling all that friendly towards them now. They were bloody good, I had to admit. Of course, I was plastered by that point, having downed several of what Ceege would refer to as ponced-up wank drinks mainly consisting of lemonade, vodka and pretty swirly colours.

The boys of the band were all in formal suits, and kCeera wore an ankle-length black satin gown. Their outfits were modified with the usual spiked, glittering and antique augmentations, wrapped around them like jewellery. Owen and one of the not-Owens played guitar, and the second not-Owen (the one usually asleep when I visited their rooms) was covering electronics, keyboards and drum tracks.

kCeera sang in a clear, smooth scream that dominated the whole sound:

Do you want to wear me in your skin, open up your mouth and let me in…

‘Hey, Stewart,’ I said, grinding against him as we danced. ‘Is that a camera in your pocket, or —’

‘It’s a camera,’ he said, his eyes on the band.

I looked at him. ‘You’re not just here to party, are you? That’s why you wanted to stay.’

I’m the source for all your pleasure, I’m a wearable art treasure…

One woman with bright platinum blonde hair stood right up against the makeshift stage, her whole body swaying in a tiny black leather dress which showed off long legs. I glanced back at Stewart and realised he’d been watching her for a while, keeping her in line of sight, even as he danced with me.

I leaned up, and grabbed his chin to make him look at me. ‘What the hell is going on?’

Kiss me quick and kiss me slow, stab me in the back and go…

A jolting sound came through the speakers as the band stopped playing. Someone screamed, but that was nothing new at this particular party. I swung around.

The platinum blonde was on the stage, brandishing a huge kitchen knife. The band members fell back in a tangled heap together, dragging their instruments with them. The automatic rhythms from the keyboard were still pulsing out through the speakers.