Eternal Journey. Alex Archer
for it, you have, and…”
Annja opened her mouth to reply, but the hiss of the bus drowned her out. It eased to the curb and the doors opened.
“Darlinghurst!” the driver called out.
Annja got up and hurried down the aisle.
“Watch yourself!” Pink Streak called after her. “Keep to Potts Point!”
Potts Point? Annja had no idea what that was, or where. However, within a heartbeat she did know where she stood.
Kings Cross. Annja realized it the moment she stepped onto the sidewalk and looked down the street. She’d grabbed a stack of pamphlets the first morning she ate breakfast in the hotel restaurant—something to look at while she waited for her food. The first pamphlet she’d skimmed was about Kings Cross. She recognized some of the buildings pictured in the advertisement. The waiter told her the Cross was painted by the Australian media as the drug and red light district of the entire continent, but that it had cleaned up its image in the past two decades. The waiter also said it was a must-see spot, one of the most densely populated areas on the continent, and was admittedly a bit of a tourist trap.
It certainly was colorful. Even on this sunny day, neon lights glowed bright and hung from practically every building. Convenience Store, one read, 24 Hours. Annja noted there were a lot of 24 Hours signs. Many of the businesses on both sides of the tree-lined street—and along the street behind her, she noted with a glance over her shoulder—were a mix of adult bookshops, dingy-looking nightclubs, seedy bars, burlesque shows and strip clubs. There were some trendy cafés and respectable-looking shops here and there, but the neon of their bawdy neighbors clashed with their sedate exteriors.
Adult Gifts, one neon sign advertised. Live Nude Dancers, another read.
“Like anyone would want to see dead nude dancers,” Annja muttered.
The ground floor of the buildings mostly looked the same—dark, shadowed by awnings and overhangs, lit at the edges by the neon. The second and third levels were glossy black stone sitting next to bricks painted white and pink that stood out across from fronts festooned in pale yellow, beige, orchid and a surprisingly subdued orange. Apartments, Annja guessed, or maybe offices for the places below. Window boxes were filled with flowers that were holding on in the still reasonable weather. Iron grates covered up some of the widows, looking artful while being protective.
She spied a sign that read Backpackers Welcome, hanging lopsidedly over a weathered wooden door. On a storefront window next to it flyers were taped announcing AIDS testing, health clinics and a place where intravenous drug users could inject themselves under supervision.
The sidewalks were filled with people. Many were tourists; she could tell by their attire and the way they gaped openmouthed at some of the establishments. Some were regulars to the businesses, she noted, because of their obvious familiarity with the neighborhood. A drunk leaned against a sex-toy shop window a few businesses down; he stared at Annja and smiled, showing a smattering of yellowed teeth. At the next shop two heavily made-up girls in skimpy skirts and high boots chatted with a pair of well-dressed businessmen.
She spied a heavily tattooed man. A purple-and-green serpent twisting down his arm and wrapping around his wrist was the mildest of the images. A gaunt-looking fellow in black leather, skin pulled so tight across his face his head looked skeletal, stopped to talk to the tattooed man and passed him a small white envelope.
“Satan made Sydney,” Annja whispered. Mark Twain was sometimes credited with saying that after he took a world tour in 1895 and passed through Australia. Annja had read plenty of Twain and knew the quote was wrongly attributed. “But Satan might have had a hand in crafting Kings Cross,” she said to herself.
Annja shivered. Her feet were sore. She looked down to see that the sidewalk was made of a patchwork of maroon bricks, grime and discarded cigarette butts looking to be the mortar. She wrapped her arms around herself and looked for a pay phone. One more attempt to call Oliver and Doug. Then she’d make a call to the police and come up with a reason why she’d run from the hotel. The police had to know who she was, from the tag on her luggage or from checking with the hotel.
The convenience store first, and then she’d make some calls, she decided, starting across the walk when the signal changed. In the block running east she saw that no cars were allowed on the street, that it was limited to pedestrian and bicycle traffic. A frumpy-looking woman on a ten-speed stopped and stared. Annja would not have been out of place, given the wild assortment of people and their dress in this neighborhood, but the blood spatters and bare feet were raising eyebrows.
No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service, the sign on the convenience store said. Annja ignored it and went inside, tugging down her jeans so they hid the tops of her feet. A banner at the back said Chemist, so she headed for it. She knew it meant the equivalent of a pharmacist, and the things she needed would be there. She spied an aisle with ribbons and hair ties, and went down it, finding a bin with fuzzy socks at the end. She rooted through it and selected a purple pair that looked the least fuzzy, then bought gauze, alcohol, first-aid tape and a pair of scissors.
She ignored the clerk’s concerned expression, took her purchases outside and darted through the doorway of a tiny Japanese restaurant.
The restroom was the dirtiest she’d seen in some time, and Annja couldn’t help but wrinkle her nose at the myriad disagreeable smells. The air was at the same time thick and close, and she sat on the back of the toilet and put her feet on the seat as she cleaned them with the alcohol.
“Wow, that hurts,” she whispered. “What a horrible day this has been.”
Day? She suspected not much more than an hour had passed since she’d found Oliver’s room empty.
She worked quickly, wanting to get out of there and get to the task of solving this wretched mystery. Her feet bandaged, she slipped the socks over them, then went to the sink. The mirror was chipped and filmy, and Annja was thankful for that, as it helped to mask her appearance. She thoroughly cleaned her shoulder where the bullet had grazed it.
“Thank God he wasn’t a better shot.” The wound was superficial, but it had bled enough to make a good bit of her bikini top pink.
After scrubbing the dirt off the little piece of soap she found, she washed the blood off her arm and tried to get some of it out of her top, and then she dried off with some paper towels and smoothed her hair behind her ears. She splashed her face and gingerly touched her scraped cheek. It would be bruising soon.
Annja stared at her hazy reflection. Her eyes, amber-green, showed neither anger nor sadness. But when she blinked and moistened them they showed that she was suddenly deep in thought. A few moments more and she tossed the paper towels onto the top of the overflowing trashcan and left the restroom, pausing at the take-out counter to order a small coffee and swallow it down.
She was so very tired and hoped the caffeine would at least give her a psychological boost.
Out on the street again, she stopped in a boutique that accepted American credit cards and bought the only pair of shoes that fit—baby-blue leather sneakers with silver laces—and a long-sleeved silky beige shirt with an aboriginal design of a kangaroo splayed across the front.
Feeling better than she had since breakfast, she headed toward a pay phone on the far corner of the block. It was near the famous El Alamein Fountain, a huge globelike water display that she would have considered pretty were her circumstances different.
Annja hadn’t taken more than a dozen steps when a man with a hand like a ham grabbed her arm and pulled her into a shadowed doorway.
6
Jon looked as if he wasn’t quite old enough to drive, but he was a second-year graduate student in anthropology with an emphasis in archaeology. His round baby face and mass of curly red hair hid some of his years, as did the fact he’d made no attempt to move out of his parents’ house and didn’t care that all his friends knew it. He sat cross-legged on a small rug he’d brought with him—a futile effort to keep the dirt