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  'I have a much better idea,' she said, taking him by the hand.

  She led him into the bathroom where the big old enamel tub was full and brimming with soap bubbles. 'Take your clothes off,' she said, and he did. Then she untied the knot of her wrap-around. It dropped to the floor and she stood there, naked and glorious. Spud had never seen anything like it.

  'I'll wash you myself,' Ruby said. For ten pounds the boy deserved the full service.

  Spud had never had a bubble bath before. At first he tried to grope Ruby's breasts and touch the mat of black hair between her thighs – apart from the men's magazines that were passed around at school, he'd never seen a woman's pubic hair before. Well, he'd caught a glimpse of his sister Maeve's gingery bush one night when he'd been perving through the window of the bedroom she shared with Caitlin. Maeve had screamed the house down and he'd been well and truly ticked off by his mum, but if the truth were known he hadn't really found Maeve's gingery offering all that fascinating. Probably because she was his sister, which was just as well. But Ruby's bush was a real turn-on, he thought, making another grab for it.

  'Later,' she said, smacking his hand away as she had each time he'd tried to grope her. 'Time for that later.' So Spud relaxed, as Ruby had planned he should.

  Ruby's determination to give Spud his money's worth was a matter of honour and personal pride. She'd been good at her job for eighteen years and now, at thirty-five, she managed the brothel as madam and kept her few regular clients, servicing their friends if they wished her to, but she'd given up the nightly trade. Her feelings about virgins, however, remained the same.

  Working girls always welcomed virgins. In and out, a speedy job, no complications. You didn't have to work virgins up like you did the old guys. It was all too easy – bring them on quick and get ready for the next trick. Ruby didn't see it that way, she never had. A young man's first time should be an experience, she thought, something to remember.

  Spud had hit it lucky, and this Saturday afternoon would stay locked in his memory for as long as he lived.

  She dried him down and took him into the bedroom where she allowed him to explore her body. 'Gently, slowly,' she kept saying, 'you'll last longer that way.' And Spud curbed the urge to thrust himself into her; he wanted to learn everything Ruby had to teach him.

  She caressed him with her hands and her tongue, careful not to bring him to the brink, pausing now and then, telling him to breathe deeply. Finally, she allowed him to enter her. And when he did, she told him not to move. They stayed like that for a full minute, Spud lost in heaven, and then she undulated her muscles and he moved in perfect unison – only for twenty seconds or so; by that time he'd lasted as long as he could.

  She left him when it was finished, and as Spud lay on his back in the little bedroom in the little weatherboard house in Subiaco he thought of Mikey McAllister. Mikey had said it was fan-bloody-tastic, he remembered. Well, Mikey McAllister didn't know the half of it, Spud'd bet his last bob on that!

  Ruby offered him a cup of tea before he went. She was in her cords and jumper again and as they sat in the kitchen she looked out at the backyard.

  'You did a good job of the lawn.'

  'If I come back and mow it again,' he said, 'will you give me a discount?'

  Ruby roared with laughter. 'No way,' she said.

  'The mystique of the Orient, Mikey – there's nothin' like it!'

  Spud couldn't wait to boast of his conquest, but just as Mike had done, he refused to name names, except to say that she was Chinese. Mike was fascinated, but made no further queries, respecting Spud's protection of the girl's identity. In actuality, Spud was protecting himself. If he told Mikey he'd been with a hooker, he thought, Mikey'd wonder where he got the money – prostitutes weren't cheap. But he gave his mate a full account of what had gone on and basked in Mikey's open-mouthed envy. Shit, it felt good, he thought. Mikey McAllister, envious of him! It was a first.

  For the following month Spud went on a spree. He branched out from hub caps to car radios, and the house in Waratah Avenue was his first port of call. All four hub caps and the radio from Anthony Wilson's Mercedes went missing.

  Four weeks to the day, he was back at Ruby's.

  'I've come to mow your lawn,' he said very loudly for the benefit of the neighbours, and when she led him down the side path to the backyard, he handed her five quid.

  'I reckon I shouldn't cop double rates if I do your lawn, eh?' he asked hopefully.

  Ruby nodded and accepted the five quid. It was only fair, she thought. Besides, the kid was gutsy and she liked him for it.

  Over the ensuing monthly visits they came to an understanding. Spud mowed the lawn and paid the going rate whenever he could – he had a business on the side now, running a book on all the school's sports events and keeping a 10 per cent cut for his troubles. But when he was a quid or so short, Ruby lined up odd jobs for him to do about the house – he was a proficient handyman – and they called it quits.

  As the months stretched into a year and Spud turned sixteen, there was even the odd occasion when she gave him a freebie. Ruby had grown really fond of the kid by then.

  During their final year at Mod, sex continued to dominate the lives of Mike McAllister and Spud Farrell, with rugby coming a close second and study a poor third. At seven-teen, Mike had finally stopped growing and Spud had finally started. He would never be a tall man, but he'd certainly filled out. He was chunky and muscular and girls now found him attractive – in a cute kind of way.

  As the leaving exams loomed, Mike realised that he'd have to pay a bit more attention to his studies. He'd need a good matriculation result to get into the sciences at UWA, and if he bombed out his father would be deeply disappointed. In his day, Jim McAllister had been one of Perth Uni's finest students, academically and athletically, and Mike was aware that he expected no less of his son. Besides, Mike wanted to go to uni – his desire to emulate his father had not waned over the years. So he took his mind off girls, as much as was humanly possible, and applied himself to his work.

  Spud didn't. Uni held no attraction for him, and he studied only those courses which he found interesting and felt would be useful. Particularly maths – Spud liked playing with numbers.

  Mike's matriculation placed him amongst the top ten students that year. Spud, after cruising through his exams with no expectations, was surprised to discover that he'd passed all seven subjects, with distinctions in maths A and B and physics. He'd received only a conceded pass in English, however, which was essential to matriculation, so he wasn't eligible for university. Who the hell cared, Spud thought.

  That summer, the river seemed to play a more important part than ever in their lives. They swam and fished and prawned and crabbed with carefree abandon. Even girls seemed to take a back seat for a while. Perhaps they sensed this was the end of their boyhood.

  'Look!' Mike pointed at the bird feeding frenzy out in the bay. 'Grab the outboard and tackle.'

  The sun was setting, painting the sky with orange, and he and Spud had just hauled the Vee Jay into the boatshed following an afternoon sail.

  While Spud grabbed the outboard and fishing tackle, Mike dragged the little dinghy down to the beach. They both knew what the birds signalled. The tailor were running.

  Ten minutes later they were out in the bay, surrounded by gulls swooping and diving, the water all around them swirling and writhing with the tailor that were feeding in their own frenzy on the same school of whitebait.

  With a spinner each trailing behind the dinghy, Mike and Spud were pulling in tailor hand over fist. They blooded each fish as soon as they got it aboard, and the moment their line was out they were hauling in another. Half an hour later, when the bucket was full, they decided to call it a day. They'd be cleaning and filleting fish all night otherwise. But they were exhilarated. Hauling in tailor like that was always a buzz.

  It was dusk when they dragged the dinghy into the boat-house. They took the bucket of fish up to the
laundry where Mike turned on the outside light and grabbed the cutting boards and knives that were stored there. Then he spread newspaper over the wrought-iron table and they sat side by side and started cleaning the fish.

  'You could have taken me with you!' a voice behind them said accusingly. It was Jools, hands on hips.

  Mike turned to her. 'There wasn't time,' he said.

  'Yes, there was. I was watching from the balcony. The birds are still feeding. And it's my boat!'

  She had a point. The dinghy belonged to Jools. It wasn't really a dinghy at all, it was a Pelican, or Junior Trainer, a little sailing boat with a detachable mast. Jim had built it for her the previous year as a thirteenth birthday present. But it had also replaced the old dinghy and now served as a tender for Alana, so came in for general use. Still, Mike thought, with a touch of guilt, he should have asked her permission.

  'Sorry, Jools,' he said. 'You want to lend a hand?' He gestured at the mess of scales and guts.

  She nodded, mollified by the apology and keen to accept the invitation. For some inexplicable reason, Jools loved cleaning fish.

  'Grab us a cold beer then.'

  Although Mike was underage, it was understood that a cold beer went with cleaning fish, which was fine by Jim and Maggie McAllister. As for Spud, well, he'd been known to get legless with his dad on a lost Sunday afternoon.

  'Rightio.'

  Jools belted eagerly up the back stairs. Just turned fourteen, she was a late developer. Still very much a tomboy, she couldn't understand some of her girlfriends who talked about nothing but boys or the fact they'd just got their first bra. She'd much rather be cleaning fish.

  Spud started filleting the several fish they'd already scaled and gutted. He enjoyed filleting. With the supersharp, scalpel-like knife reserved for the purpose, he felt for the backbone of the fish with all the delicacy of a surgeon.

  Mike watched him for a moment; he was doing an excellent job. It had been Mike who'd taught Spud how to fillet fish, just as his own dad had taught him. 'Filleting fish is an art,' Jim McAllister had said, holding up a back-bone with the remaining flesh so transparent you could see right through it. Mike had worked hard at perfecting the art, and had passed his expertise on to Spud. They'd shared so much, he thought, watching Spud's deep concentration.

  'What're you going to do, Spud?' he asked.

  'Eh?' Spud looked up. The question had come out of nowhere.

  Mike was a little surprised himself. He hadn't really intended to talk about their futures, but he couldn't envisage going to uni without Spud.

  'If you sat for your leaving English next year and got a good pass you'd get your matric.'

  'What do you mean? Go to uni?'

  Mike nodded encouragingly. Hell, Spud was one of the cleverest blokes he knew. Spud could do anything he set his mind to; he'd be mad if he didn't give uni a go.

  'Nah,' Spud said. 'Don't want to, don't need to and couldn't afford to anyway. It's all right for you, mate, your folks have got money.'

  Though he'd often thought it, it was the first time Spud had said the words out loud, and he said them without rancour. But Mike felt the need to correct him.

  'No, they haven't,' he said. 'We're not rich.'

  'Oh, aren't you.' Spud laughed. 'Well, it's one helluva life.'

  This time there was a touch of rancour, but Mike failed to notice.

  'Yep,' he grinned. 'We're paupers who live like kings, Dad says.'

  It was one of Jim McAllister's favourite sayings – he believed in drilling home to his children the fact that they should never take their privileges for granted.

  'Paupers who live like kings!' Spud let out a guffaw. Jesus, Mikey was naïve, he thought. But he loved him for it. 'I'll swap you, mate,' he said, just as Jools arrived with the beers.

  Over the wrought-iron table and the bloodied newspaper and fish guts, they toasted each other.

  'Mates forever,' they said.

  CHAPTER THREE

  'You're Mike McAllister, aren't you? I'm Ian Pemberton.' Ian proffered his hand as he joined Mike in the queue at the canteen. He'd made a point of seeking him out. It was time they got to know each other, he thought, they had a lot in common. To Ian, they were plainly the brightest in their first-year science course, and Mike came with an excellent pedigree, given his father's university sporting record.

  'G'day, Ian.' Mike shook his hand. He'd seen Ian at the lectures – they were doing the same subjects: geology, zoology, maths and chemistry – but it was less than a fortnight into the term and they'd not as yet actually introduced themselves. 'How're you enjoying it all?' he asked. 'Bit different from school, isn't it?'

  Ian was surprised at the ingenuousness of the remark. He – and all the other freshmen, as far as he could tell – was doing his very best to embrace the student ethos and appear blasé. Apart from sifting out which college a fellow student had graduated from, one didn't refer to 'school' in such a manner. At least, Ian certainly didn't. But far from seeming gauche, Mike's lack of inhibition lent him a confidence the others seemed to lack.

  'Yes, I suppose it is,' Ian agreed.

  They shuffled up in the queue, reaching the counter where conversation halted as they made their selections.

  'Why don't we grab that table by the window?' Ian said when they stood with trays in hand.

  Mike had been about to join his mates from Mod, who were sitting up the far end of the canteen, but he could see there was only space at the table for one more, and as Ian seemed to have latched on to him, he decided it'd be rude to give the bloke the flick.

  'Right you are,' he said, and they crossed to the table Ian had indicated.

  'Your dad's Jim McAllister, isn't he?' Ian asked once they were settled.

  'Yeah, that's right,' Mike said, before taking a mouthful of his ham and salad roll.

  'Awarded more full Blues than any other student in the sporting history of UWA.' Ian made the announcement sound as impressive as it was.

  Mike was surprised. 'How'd you know that?'

  'With a record like his, who wouldn't?'

  'Just about every other first-year student around, particularly when they've been here less than a fortnight.'

  Ian decided to cough up to the truth, rather than sound as sycophantic as he obviously had. 'My mother told me actually. She went to uni with your dad.'

  His mother hadn't told him about Jim McAllister's sports record at all; Ian had checked it out for himself just the previous day. But Cynthia Pemberton had certainly boasted about having been to uni with Mike's dad.

  'That'll be Jim McAllister's son,' she'd said when she'd asked Ian for the names of his fellow students – at least, those who'd made an impression upon him and whose names he'd remembered. 'Jim was a wonderful sports-man,' she'd said, hinting at a familiarity which hadn't existed. 'He held all sorts of records,' she added vaguely.

  Cynthia hadn't really known Jim McAllister, he'd been two years ahead of her, but like every other female student on campus at the time, she'd fancied him. She liked to dine out on her university years whenever she could though – it gave her a background of her own and an academic edge over most of her friends. The fact that she'd completed only eighteen months of an arts course before marrying Gordon Pemberton was something she didn't mention, instead hinting that she'd given up a promising academic career – in exactly what area was always hazy – to devote herself to her husband.

  'Really?' Mike asked. 'What's your mum's name?'

  'Cynthia. It would have been Randall then. Cynthia Randall.' Ian was glad to have garnered Mike's interest.

  'I'll remember her to Dad.'