Coming of Age

However, the security of both Miranda's and Paul's position was kept in check by a thin thread of false allegiance of two Women Wronged By Men. The paranoid scenario Paul was compelled to face was that it really cleared nothing for him. With the existence of the video, he could have any or all of the following persons threatening to ruin him:

i) one of Sydney's top silks; ii) a vexatious and opportunistic housekeeper looking for an early retirement; iii) a manipulative female with no power of resistance against a well-stocked fly; and iv) her husband, at this point a completely unknown factor.

He also began to wonder how Miranda got in front of his car on Rangers Road, why she was wearing a blonde wig, or holding her hands behind her back throughout the whole act in the driveway. He wondered whether it was just a coincidence that the faux bondage scene was caught on film but not her welcoming embrace or her performing fellatio on him.

"Maybe she's framing me," he thought desperately. He reminded himself that the slightest insinuation of male sexual deviance within the education system is guaranteed to bring about the collapse of a teaching career.

Paul took the afternoon off, went straight home, got out the Yellow Pages and looked up Private Investigators. He rang a couple of large firms that took out ¼ page ads and was surprised to find that, like the best GPs in town, there was about a three month waiting list. He saw his case as urgent so he went with a small two person operation in local Artarmon.

"Sexual harassment case, eh," said the male voice of Mathers and Turner Investigations, after Paul discreetly described his situation.

"Our specialist in that area is Ruby Turner," he said.

"Not another woman, please," thought Paul. "Do you have any men that could do the job? It's a sensitive issue," he quietly confided.

"Women get the best results in this area. Only they know how another woman's mind ticks."

"Yes, like a time bomb," thought Paul.

Ruby Turner was a freckly, redheaded woman of average height and build with a slight speech impediment that made her words sound like they were trapped in her larynx. She compensated for this by talking fast and plainly. She didn't mince words or waste time with tactful language and she frequently made bold, sweeping statements that threatened nobody in particular because they were so general. She seemed quite non-judgemental and Paul thought that there was probably nothing he could say that would shock her.

While he felt awkward having to divulge the details of the affair thus far he really had no choice but to explain as neutrally as he could. The fact that Ruby Turner had clearly established a professional distance and that she was a complete stranger made an excruciating experience somewhat less so. Paul noticed that as he was describing the situation, she was drawing a series of boxes with peoples' names in them and arrows connecting them up. He noticed that no-one was placed in the centre of the page.

"You've got yourself caught up in a right hornet's nest," said Ruby firmly when Paul finished describing the affair. He felt mightily embarrassed.

"And now you are just one more hornet in the nest," she said.

"And all because of my horn," muttered Paul inaudibly.

"Your security lies in possessing discrete information on all of the players and communicating to them that you have something on them. My job is to obtain that information - in a more or less legal fashion."

She explained the approximate length of time it would take to get things moving and how much it would cost. Paul thought it was a reasonable price to pay if it was going to save his career. He even wondered whether it was an allowable tax deduction. After he had left the Mathers and Turner office in Artarmon he felt somewhat less anxious. However, he wasn't ready to admit at this point that he actually had confidence in a woman.

He felt growing in him the seed of a general malaise towards women. He tried to reason with it. In the Paul had to concede that Ruby Turner was the type of woman that didn't need his approval. Although he wouldn't admit it to himself he had a sneaking admiration for Ruby Turner.

` ` ` ` `

"Paul Nicholson?" asked a direct female voice.

"Yes, who is this?" asked Paul.

"It's Ruby Turner, from Mathers and Turner. We've got some developments on your case, can you drop by this afternoon?" Paul was surprised at how quickly things had moved and he slipped away from work early.

"Good news," said Ruby laconically. "The housekeeper's visa expired six months ago. She's working illegally. Doesn't pay tax. Probably using a false name. We've got a passport check on her at the moment, it's possibly fake. She seems to be sending money home periodically, and doesn't appear to have any family support system here. Giving her a bit of a gentle reminder re: Australian Immigration and the nice guys at the Australian Tax Office should do the trick." Paul noted she was very matter of fact about the matter of psychological blackmail. He just hoped it wouldn't be him that would have to tell this unfortunate woman of her predicament.

"I'll be paying Senora Feliciano a visit. It's all part of the friendly service" said Ruby facetiously, double guessing Paul's anxiety. Paul was beginning to like Ruby Turner. Already she was getting results and she had a gallows humour to boot.

That night Paul Nicholson had another resonating dream. He was the passenger in a flashy car and Miranda was driving, wearing that long haired wig. All the windows were down and her hair was blowing all over her face and into her eyes obscuring her vision. Then the car turned into a surfboard and Paul was surfing down the crest of a wave and as it broke the water turned into sand and he was in sand dunes and his brand new car was full of sand like an empty shell as if it had been bogged and left in a desert storm. When he woke up he realised he had overslept his usual waking time by an hour.

There was text message from Ruby Turner on his mobile that she had sent an hour ago. "Call asap 4 update, rt." Paul felt sluggish and unrefreshed so he made himself a strong coffee before rushing out the door to visit Mathers and Turner in Artarmon.

Ruby Turner was sitting at her desk surrounded by paperwork, and she looked up when she noticed Paul at the door.

"Have a seat," she said. "It appears that the QC walked a tightrope of ethical conduct some years ago before he obtained silk. He was an advocate for a defendant in a criminal case which hinged on the admissibility of some documentary evidence.

"It seems the father of a femme fatale who was tangled up in the case was a retired barrister with an active role in the NSW Law Society. He sought to protect his prestige in this circle from the scandal that would have broken if his daughter was subpoenaed to appear. So he offered a bribe to his former associate, Jim Lyneham, to withhold evidence.

"Lyneham, of course, didn't accept it; he always maintained a meticulous code of conduct that would guarantee him silk in his later years. He did, however, falsely inform his client that a document could not be used because it had been obtained by deception. As it turned out, the defendant was acquitted, but strictly speaking Jim Lyneham walked a razor's edge of professional misconduct because he didn't put his client's needs first. It gets better: further down the track Jim Lyneham was to fall for Madame Metale himself." She got up and turned on the electric jug.

"That's about three nuggets in your pocket right now." Ruby said. Paul thought it was an interesting metaphor.

"Coffee?" she asked.

"No thanks. This Madame Metale: we are not talking about Miranda are we?" asked Paul.

"We are," answered Ruby. . "Right," said Paul nervously. "That makes three: the housekeeper, the QC and Miranda."

"Let's just say we've got an insurance policy to fall back on if the housekeeper loses it and tells Jim Lyneham, or if Miranda gets difficult," Ruby said. "Of course, there's no need to move on this information unless its necessary," she offered up to Paul's confounded silence. "Nothing on the husband as yet, will keep you posted."

Paul left the offices of Mathers and Turner in a state of confusion. What surprised him was that he was jealous, furiously and without reason, about Miranda. When he arrived back at his flat he pulled up and parked in the street.

Paul was muttering to himself. When he felt threatened by something or someone he loomed a thick fabric of internal dialogue that masked him from the outside world. This was how a friend could pass him in the street and Paul not notice him. Or how he could walk up to his first floor flat and not notice Miranda in the stair well.

"Are you going to invite me in, Paul?" she called incredulously.

"What are you doing here?" he answered defensively.

"I have a confession to make. Please don't be mad at me," she said. Paul didn't want to invite her into his flat, but he did want to hear what she had to say. Probably he already knew. There were nosy neighbours so he let her in.

Miranda turned on her vast array of coynesses to soften Paul's exterior but they just served to make him more guarded. She took a long time getting to the so-called confession and Paul was underwhelmed when she finally arrived at it.

"The housekeeper gave me the video and has sworn herself to secrecy about it. Unfortunately, my mistake, I left it in my house and my husband found the tape this morning. I don't know where he is, what he is doing with it or what he plans to do with me," Miranda said with a helpless tone. "He's a former rugby player, he knows a couple of tough guys and he's a bit of a loose canon."

"Great," thought Paul. "That's just what this fiasco needs to intensify it, a bit of homegrown violence."

Paul wasn't about to tell Miranda what he knew about her, or the QC, or even the housekeeper. All he could hope for was that Ruby Turner might turn up something on the husband that would keep him quiet.

"Oh, and I had to call on Bernadette to cover for me," Miranda said, almost apologetically.

"What? How?" Paul jerked back.

"It's a long story, but she owes me one. As we speak she's in my car outside my house dressed in my outfit, and my wig, and my stilettos, waiting for my husband to come home. She's going to try and pass herself off as the woman on the video being taken by you on the bonnet of your car." Miranda said. Paul choked audibly. He was furious.

"But why did you get her involved?" he blurted.

"Look, she already knew about that night in your car," said Miranda, irritated. "The video vision is blurry and it's far away. She could easily pass herself off as me," said Miranda carelessly.

"Bernadette? No." Paul noted quietly.

And a luminous jade crepuscule fell upon Paul Nicholson's coming of age.

7.

Bernadette parked the coupe across the driveway of the house Miranda lived in with her husband. She felt fairly disabled as she climbed out of Miranda's low slung seat in a outfit of clothing half a size too small and a pair of shoes more at home on a catwalk. She felt like she was playing out a scene from the The Story of 'O'. She knocked on the door and heard the heavy footfalls of Steve down the hall.

"Hi, Steve," said Bernadette. "I've parked you in but I've just dropped in for a moment," she said without hesitation. She knew Steve only briefly and she hadn't seen him for about two years.

"Sorry, who?" he asked.

"It's Bernadette, Miranda's colleague," she quickly answered.

"Bernadette!. I didn't recognise you. Where's Miranda? Hey, that's her car, what's going on?"

"She lent it to me for the afternoon," said Bernadette, smiling and tousling her long blonde wig with an upbeat manner. Steve blatantly sized her up and a wry smile appeared on his lips.

"Well, you've certainly changed. You're about half the size you used to be, and you're blonde," Steve added.

"Yes, there's been a lot of changes of late. Can I have a word with you?" she asked.

Steve opened the door and stood back to allow Bernadette through. She entered the hall with a haughty air and was conscious of every dainty step as she walked down the passage. Steve followed her, watching her hips move. Bernadette could feel his eyes on her as she moved slowly. It all seemed ironic.

"Coffee?" Steve asked as she took a seat in the living area.

"Would you have anything stronger? A red wine, perhaps," she asked. He poured himself one as well and sat on the sofa closest to her.

"So tell me about these changes," Steve ventured.

"Well, you know, I was a single woman and now, I ... circulate," said Bernadette coquettishly. She noticed Steve was looking at her closely, his pupils were dilated, and he had a bemused expression, and she guessed she was probably on the right track with where she wanted this visit to go.

Bernadette possessed significant sexual power but had no idea how to use it. She had spent so much time and effort in working over the years that the art of personal relationships and reading non-verbal messages had been overlooked. She was improvising in the dark on the theme of psychological manipulation through sexuality. This was Miranda's song. But there was a lot at stake to follow through on this pretence. The truth was, despite his absence in her life, she was in love with Paul Nicholson .

"I'll come straight to the point, Steve. You have a video which shows a woman having sex on the bonnet of a car in a driveway," Bernadette waited for a response.

"Go on," said Steve with a poker face.

"That woman is me and that was one of my lovers. It was taken at his mother's house. He doesn't want anyone to know about us." Bernadette felt disempowered and her voice sounded feeble, almost childlike.

"And why's that, do you think?" Steve asked mercilessly. Bernadette figured that he was enjoying making her feel small and the thought passed through her mind quickly that this was the pathway she could take.

"Perhaps he thinks his friends and family will think I'm not good enough and that he's using me for sex. Something like that ... I don't know." As Bernadette trawled through her own degradations she ran her hands over her stockings and crossed and uncrossed her legs. Steve watched her closely.

"Do you like sex?" he asked. Bernadette smiled with a faux coyness and let a moment pass.

"Of course," she said quietly, with her eyes lowered.

"How do I know that it is you on that video and not my whore of a wife?" Steve said suddenly and viciously. "It's her car parked in that driveway."

Bernadette was taken aback at Steve's hardball manner but she had rehearsed a response to this question.

"My car's been off the road for two weeks and Miranda has been lending me hers when I've needed it to out-of-the-way places."

"This is way out there, all right. So you like a bit of humiliation?" said Steve. "Stand up", he ordered with a bullying tone. Bernadette could see where this was going. She had led it down this route and was now looking down the barrel of a twisted variation on a date rape scenario. She stood up and made an effort towards a submissive, girlish laugh. It seemed to humour Steve a little and his tone softened as he asked her to turn around.

"Pull up your skirt." Bernadette hoisted the tight fabric up over her hips by moving from side to side. The skirt caught one of the outer thigh suspenders and unfastened it. She stopped, twisted around and refastened it. She caught Steve's eye and kept up a girlish persona to assuage him. She continued to hitch her tight skirt up to her waist and revealed a black garter, black stockings and nought else.

"Mmm, very nice," he growled softly from the sofa. "Now bend over."

Bernadette felt utterly defiled as she leant over and rested her elbows on the back of the chair she had been sitting on. She heard Steve come behind her and in a moment he had his large hands on her buttocks and he began to rub them. She felt like a pony being stroked on its rump. She pretended to like it.

Then she let him nuzzle the hardness in his corduroy trousers into her bare ass. He reached around and pulled her arms behind her back and shackled them in his large grip. He repeatedly rammed his trousered groin into her behind with some force. Bernadette lowered her head and privately bit her lip. Suddenly there was a knock at the front door. It startled Steve. Bernadette sighed with relief on the inside.

"There's no question that it is me on that video, Steve. I want the tape back, please," said Bernadette with all the charm she could muster, twisting around and pulling her skirt down in one movement

"It will cost you," said Steve loosely, as he went to open the door.

"It has already cost me," she answered in a deeper, more strident, tone. She could hear that Miranda had returned. She wondered how she'd got home and hoped Paul wasn't with her. There was a palpable acrimony between husband and wife when they both walked into the living room. Bernadette greeted Miranda briefly, thanked her for the use of the car, returned her the keys and then made moves to leave.

"Just before you go, take this." Steve ejected the video tape from the VCR and handed her the tape, adding, "Your boyfriend is waiting outside."

"Boyfriend?" said Miranda cattily, "that's pushing it a bit, and look out kitten, he's ropable." Bernadette knew to let these swipes pass unchallenged. They rarely made contact, let alone drew blood.

"I can let myself out," said Bernadette. She picked her way down the front stairs carefully. This attire didn't allow for rushing. The world would have to wait for Madame Metale.

Paul was waiting in his car and saw Bernadette dressed as the woman he had had sex with on the bonnet of his car a week ago. He was upset by her involvement in this affair, not to mention his own humiliation, but to see her strong and able body now so contorted in its movements by this tight, restrictive clothing and seeing her restless, boundless energy slowed down to a snail's pace by this ridiculous footwear almost made him want to weep.

He wondered why she was doing this, what was owed to Miranda? Paul noticed Bernadette's face was highly flushed and she seemed embarrassed to the point where she was going to walk right by his car and completely avoid his gaze. He got out and approached her.

"Bernadette, let me drive you," he said.

"Hello, Paul, not right now, it's okay, I have to go," said Bernadette, who was not coping with meeting him like this, who was fiercely protecting herself after being traumatised by the humiliation.

"Please," he said simply. Bernadette turned around and got into his car. He drove off immediately and they shared an interminably uncomfortable silence together in heavy Sydney traffic. Eventually, Bernadette broke it.

"How the hell did that video get into his hands in the first place?" she asked him, fiercely tearing off the blonde wig.

"Well, it explains a lot", said Paul unhelpfully.

"Not to me it doesn't," said Bernadette, looking blurrily through the front windscreen.

"I'm taking you to my place where you can get changed," said Paul as he drove past the turnoff to Bernadette's suburb.

"I've left my clothes in Miranda's car," she said.

"I have some you can wear," Paul offered, and thought he had better offer an explanation.

"That will be interesting," said Miranda flatly. Paul thought she looked despondent and sounded dogged.

"We should have dinner and talk things over," he offered instead.

Paul got out of the car at his place and came around to the passenger side to help Bernadette get out of his sports car wearing the bondage outfit. Paul noticed how quiet and withdrawn she was and it drew out a protective instinct in him. He offered his arm and she took it. He felt like he was bringing a patient home from hospital who was rehabilitating after an operation. She was something delicate.