Page 96

The business would be a good distraction now. ‘Any funeral calls?’ Fleur asked, pausing at the bottom of the stairs.

‘No calls. Just a visitor. Mr Wren.’

Fleur frowned, the name escaping her momentarily. ‘And?’

‘Their baby’s dead,’ Irma said, flat and heartless.

Fleur felt as though she’d taken a blow. How did Irma do that? How could she be so callous, to say that aloud and not show any care?

‘I told him it wasn’t convenient—’

‘You what?’

‘You heard. I let him know my husband had died and we were unable to help.’

‘How long ago was this?’

‘Barely five minutes before you walked in.’

‘Did you get the address?’

‘Yes, he’d written it down, but I’ve thrown it in the wastepaper basket.’

‘This is why my father needed a secretary, not a new wife! We have a rule, Irma. Dad and I never turn away a grieving family.’ And then it hit her. Wren! ‘Wait, was his name James Wren?’

‘So what if it was?’

Fleur closed her eyes momentarily in sorrow. The inevitable must have occurred; that poor child, and that poor family.

Irma went on speaking, ignoring her. ‘And fret not. I will be taking calls and making sure you know about them. We don’t want the business failing, do we? Or we’ll both lose out.’

‘After today, I’ll be giving you my key to the mortuary.’

‘What do I want that for?’ Irma asked, looking disgusted. ‘I’ve got no reason to poke around in there.’

‘You’ll need it if you take a call for undertaking.’

‘And how do I reach you?’

‘Irma, if you think I’m going to protect the business for you, then you have me wrong. After I handle the Wrens’ needs, I shall step away. Apparently it’s all yours now, anyway. You can find a new mortician from tomorrow, and good luck.’

‘You can’t do that!’

‘I just did.’

‘Watch your father’s business go to hell?’

‘No, I’ll watch your business do that. I can always build another, because, Irma, you can’t take away my skills or my reputation. In time, no one is going to come to you for a funeral . . . You might be able to convince a few with your clever acting for a while – relying on the name Appleby – but it won’t last. In this I’m confident. You’re a trickster and a con, and you’ll be found out.’

Irma barely blinked. ‘I’ll just sell it, then.’

‘Do what you like. All you have is the name. And that will only go so far once you’ve sold it on to the dodgy people you plan to.’

Fleur turned away to find the Wrens’ address in North Adelaide and quickly changed into her special undertaking gown. She was out of the house in moments to find one of the lads washing the car. ‘Quick, we have a call-out, Robbie,’ she said. ‘North Adelaide.’

As miserable as she felt for the Wrens, she was inwardly relieved to have important work to attend to. It would occupy her for the rest of the day at least and set the pain of Tom’s departure aside, giving her a bit more time to confront that pain, which felt unbearable on top of the pain of losing her father.

She wound down the window and inhaled the fresh sea air, tasting the salt on the breeze. She needed it to cleanse her mind of visions of her father on a slab in the Royal Adelaide Hospital’s mortuary, with a pathologist preparing to cut him open from clavicle to navel. She knew how the coroner’s studies went, with nothing left to chance. All major organs were removed, weighed, scrutinised – even the tongue. She thought of all the fond words her father had spoken to Mae and herself and she began to cry again at the thought of her father being muted. She leaned back; she needed the wind to dry her cheeks before they arrived.