Jacaranda Blue by Joy Dettman

the need in recent years. Can you perhaps look after that small detail . . .? Yes . . . Yes. Having served my country, I should think so.’ The small page of the notepad was filling with his doodling. He wrote photograph at the bottom of the page, and Chemist beside it. Then a question mark. He darkened the question mark. Turned it into a face, drew stick arms on the question mark’s line, lengthened it, drew feet with large box boots.
    â€˜Of course. Now, just one or two questions, if I may. The tour is fully catered? All meals. Wonderful. Except for one free day in Paris . . . Ah yes.’ And he wrote Paris! ‘Just the one free day . . . I had hoped . . . Yes. I had hoped for more time in France.’ He underlined Paris! , circled it.
    â€˜Right. We will of course have breakfast and the evening meal on that day – . Excellent. Now this business of shared rooms. No. No. No. Allow me to put this to you, if I may. I assume, as I am to be, more or less, filling a vacancy, that there will be a reduction in the overall cost. Yes?’ The pen returned to a box. He drew small dots within it, continued the dots.
    â€˜No? I was led to believe . . . Yes. By Patrick O’Sullivan . . . Yes. That there may be as much as a six hundred dollar discount. Yes. The deposit paid by the deceased was not refunded, according to Patrick – . To be sure. To be sure. I am of course a pensioner, and on a limited income you understand, and as a widower, I have grown accustomed to my privacy . . . Yes. My own room. Yes. Having lost two of your party, I would assume that you now have one room freed. Yes. I certainly would.’ His eyes on the pad, he frowned at it, then removed the page. The pressure of his pen had driven deep into the page beneath it, so he removed it too, then a third page.
    â€˜That sounds fair. Of course I would expect to pay extra for my privacy . . . which will no doubt be covered by the six hundred dollar discount. Yes?
    â€˜Then I look forward to meeting with you also . . . The cheque will be in the mail this evening . . . Passport forms at the post office. A photograph. Yes. And you will send me the itinerary . . . Thank you. And you, sir. Goodbye.’
    He looked at his watch. It had taken almost fifteen minutes on normal daily rates. Still, the church paid his phone bill. He placed the telephone down, and with a weighty skip, walked to the kitchen and tossed his doodling in the waste bin. He picked up his keys from the dresser, flung the flywire door back to slam against the brickwork, and he made his way through the garden to the true love of his life. The flywire door jammed open.

    The Packard had thirty-seven thousand miles on the clock. It had never spent a night out of doors, and it could, with near honesty, claim it had only been driven to church on Sundays – although, not in the past twenty years. It was Martin’s pride and joy. He kept it in immaculate mechanical condition.
    The key in the ignition, he pressed the starter and the motor sprang into life. He backed it out of the shed, then like a large child playing motor cars, he drove it backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards, up and down the long drive until his stomach suggested it was six o’clock.
    Martin normally ate at six, but when he crept to the kitchen window and peered in, he could see no movement in the dark room. He returned to the shed, where, beneath light, he examined the vehicle again. There was some substance on the running board.
    â€˜What is this? Who has been in here?’ He looked closely at the spill, his hands held behind his back, then he shuddered. ‘A quick wash perhaps, just to be on the safe side,’ he said.
    By the time he was done, the sun was low in the sky, and his stomach told him it had definitely missed its dinner. Still no call from the back door, and no light in the kitchen. He entered