“Like what?”
“We’ll see,” she said, leaving it at that.
She bade her assistant adieu and strode into her office, making her way to her modest corner balcony, where she opened the doors, a fresh breeze blowing in with the sounds of the city below. She stepped out and leaned against one of the two Roman-style pillars, gazing out over the top floor of nearby Station House, which wasconnected to Daking House by a small safety bridge, and the bustling Rawson Place and George Street below. It was humble as balconies went, with barely enough room to turn around, but it was one of only three balconies on the sixth floor, and only half a dozen in the whole building, the rest being on the first floor. It had been a favorite contemplation spot of her father’s. Naturally she’d saved this spot for herself when necessity meant subletting the other offices.
Seconds later, Sam appeared among the foot traffic below, strolling along the footpath in his trench coat, soon blending into the moving crowd. In a few minutes she’d take the lift down herself and walk to Brown & Co. Fine Furs shop to see what else her clients could tell her. In the meantime, she continued to watch the moving streetscape, her mind on Shyla’s unexpected request, and on the thin doorman and his expression when he’d realized he’d been seen talking with her. It bothered her, that expression. There was something there, she thought. Something.
Far below on George Street, eyes watched her—eyes that did not approve of the woman in her high tower.
Brown & Co. Fine Furs was located in the grand Strand Arcade building on George Street. The last of the great shopping arcades built in Victorian-era Sydney, it still held appeal after the ravages of the wars it had survived, if the crowds Billie saw milling around were anything to go by.
As Billie stepped inside the arcade, the hustle of the main street fell away and she saw that little had changed since she’d last ventured inside. As always, it was cooler within the arcade than on the street. Patrons strolled slowly on the patterned tile floor, looking inthe timber-fronted shop windows at jewelers working with fine tools, at cobblers repairing shoes, at racks of fine clothes, and at milliners arranging tilt hats of the latest style. She picked up the scent of a florist before turning to see a beautiful display of dahlias, gardenias, roses, and little plain daisies in pleasing arrangements. Leaning her head back and holding her brimmed hat, Billie looked up at the vaulted ceiling of tinted glass panes that hung high above the two farther levels of shopping, each level lined with cast-iron balustrades, the shops announced with oval, hand-painted signs propped up on curved Victorian iron posts.
Billie pulled off her round smoked sunglasses and contemplated her surroundings with shrewd eyes. This was a strangely tranquil place. Busy but never bustling. Something about the design, she supposed, or the businesses that set up shop here. The Brown & Co. Fine Furs shop was down a large staircase just in front of her, announced by a tasteful painted timber sign propped up on a stand of swirling ironwork. Yet amid the tranquility she felt eyes drilling into her back—a feeling she was rarely wrong about. She turned the sunglasses in her hands, pretending to clean them with the edge of a scarf in her handbag, and the reflection showed a man who had entered the arcade, his hat pulled low, watching her. She tucked the glasses into her handbag and looked around in one simultaneous movement, but by then he had his back to her, his attention apparently drawn elsewhere. Nonetheless, out of habit she memorized the texture and color of his well-tailored gray suit, his slightly crumpled fedora, his height against the shop-front windows, the black hair above his collar, shot with strands of gray. He was heavyset and moved away before she caught a glimpse of his profile, his face. Then he was gone, just another stranger back on the street outside.
Billie walked down the steps toward Brown & Co. Fine Furs, detecting the distinctive smell of a furrier—that variety of animal odors and tanned skins particular to the trade. Alone, a fur coat did not usually have much of a smell unless it had been cooped up and become musty or rancid. But when several furs were crowded into a shop, there was an undeniable mix of scents, though here, as with other fine fur shops, it was not unpleasant. A vase of deeply scented wild roses added another, sweeter odor to the mix. A bell tinkled to alert the shopkeepers to the presence of a new visitor.
“Mrs. Brown?”
Billie’s client was busying herself with a display, and she snapped her head up, as if jolted; her startled doe eyes fixed on Billie. Today the woman wore the same suit, the same fine mink stole, the hairs brushed down and gleaming, but her hair was tucked under a turban of brown and emerald green, knotted at the front and secured with a circular brooch encrusted with diamantes. It suited Mrs. Brown. But despite her show of style, the past day had not been good to her, it seemed. Dark circles were forming under those uncertain brown eyes, and the lines of worry on her face seemed yet deeper.
“Oh, Miss Walker,” she said, and scurried over. “Is there any news of our boy?” Her tone was heart-wrenchingly hopeful.
“Nothing yet,” Billie replied gently. “We hope today may be fruitful. Perhaps I might speak with you and your husband for a short time?”
“Of course,” she said, though with a hint of uncertainty.
Looking around, Billie noticed how widely the garments were spaced on the racks. The Browns were putting up a good front, but it wouldn’t surprise her if they didn’t have a lot of stock. They certainly wouldn’t be alone if that was the case. The importation ofluxury goods like fur pelts had been banned in New South Wales in 1942, as was the manufacture of new luxury garments, though Billie believed the ban on general fur manufacture had been relaxed to account for utility items and a shortage of warm clothing. Having previously focused on importing luxury pelts, Sydney’s furriers had become creative about using rabbits, goats, sheep, and even water rats, said to loosely resemble mink, to make garments. She recalled her mother commenting on all the curious “new” animals used by the trade, and it was through those eyes that she surveyed the coats on display.
Mrs. Brown seemed to catch her thoughts. “We get new stock in next month in time for Christmas. We’re organizing a display with Father Christmas and the reindeer.”
“How charming,” Billie said.
A man of perhaps fifty emerged through a door at the back of the shop. “This is my husband, Mikhall,” Mrs. Brown announced. He walked over and shook hands with Billie. Mr. Brown was perhaps five foot eight, and slim, but with a rounded belly. His hair was curly, what remained of it. His shoulders sloped and he appeared to be shy, his eyes meeting Billie’s for just a moment. Next to him, his reserved wife seemed a bold and forthright person.
“I’m sorry, I don’t have much English,” Mr. Brown said in a heavy accent, perhaps a touch ashamed of the fact. “I try, but it’s not so good.” His accent was certainly much more pronounced than his wife’s, who had clearly worked hard to dampen it. It was a German accent, Billie noted.
As Billie sat with the pair of them in the administration office, it soon became clear why Mrs. Brown had been the one to come to Billie. Her husband was not at all confident conversing in English,even with his wife there to help him along. Mikhall managed to speak of coming to Australia in late 1936, and how grateful they were to escape Europe and what was happening there. He backed up his wife about their only child, saying what a “good boy” Adin was, and how pleased they’d been to get him to safer shores in Australia.
On their shared desk was an array of family photographs, many showing several generations. A faded black-and-white image of a cherubic, curly-haired baby, surrounded by adults, took pride of place in a large frame. “This is Adin?” Billie inquired.
“Yes.” Mrs. Brown did not elaborate, though it looked perhaps as if she wanted to. Her eyes welled up as her attention was drawn to the photo, and she turned away, holding back her emotions. “Happier days,” she said simply.
“Where was it taken?”
“Europe,” Mrs. Brown answered cautiously. She dabbed her eyes.
“And what about this photograph?” One of the small silver frames on the desk was empty, Billie noticed. She picked it up. “Where did this one go?”
The Browns seemed genuinely surprised by this. “I don’t know where it went,” Mrs. Brown exclaimed. “I hadn’t noticed anything missing. Mikhall?”
Her husband shook his head and said something to her in German in a low voice.
“It could have been like that for a time, he says,” Mrs. Brown explained.
“Where ismein Junge?” Billie thought she heard Mikhall mutter. He was clenching his fists now, evidently overwrought. When he looked up she caught the glittering tears in the corners of his eyes.Ashamed, he wiped them and looked down again, body hunched and tense.
Billie calmly put the empty silver frame back on the desk. “In peacetime, in places like Australia, most missing persons do turn up,” she began. “Most young people run away to a relative, a friend, or, if they’re Adin’s age, a lover.” Adamant headshaking from her clients followed this comment. “I do not judge,” Billie stressed. “It’s not my job to judge a client, be it someone seeking a divorce or parents looking for their child. Anything you can tell me about Adin—his personality, his interests, anything unusual you might have noticed recently—could help to track him down and return him to you. Was he acting strangely in the past week or so? Did anything seem different? His mood? His routines?”
