The Girl in the Hard Hat (12 page)

‘Lena has a point.’ Sharon nodded. ‘You’ll be stuck with these guys and all they’re going to do is drink and read dirty magazines.’

Leg sniffed haughtily. ‘You don’t know that.’

Radar snorted.

Wendy shifted uncomfortably in her seat. She didn’t want them to think she was a snob. She had too many other labels already, like: nit-picker, spy, tattle-tale, Bossy Boots Barbie.

She could do without adding Snooty Snob to the list as well.

It wasn’t that they didn’t seem like nice enough people. Under any other circumstances she’d be all for socialising. But at this point she thought keeping to herself was a more preferable option, especially with her search for her father still on the go.

‘Come on, Wendy.’ Lena grabbed her hand. ‘It’ll be fun.’

Wendy was touched by the other woman’s affection. ‘Okay,’ she smiled. ‘I suppose there’s no harm in kicking back a bit.’

Lena whooped. ‘That’s the spirit. And now on to my next question.’ She reddened slightly. ‘Can you drive? We kinda don’t have a car.’

Sharon swatted her. ‘You are shocking, girl!’

‘Oh well, you know . . .’ Lena rushed out quickly, ‘we could ask Carl for a ute if we need to.’

Wendy laughed. ‘No that’s fine. I’ll drive if my battery holds. It needs changing.’ She paused, pushing her fork through her coleslaw with studied casualness. ‘Hey, have you guys ever met a man called Hector Warner on this job?’

They all shook their heads and then Leg added, ‘It’s hard to say though, Sergeant. Almost all the guys around here have nicknames, so your Hector might not be called Hector, if you know what I mean. Look at Radar here. I can’t even remember what his real name is.’

‘It’s –’ Radar began but Leg held up his hand.

‘No, no, don’t tell me, it spoils the romance.’

Radar chuckled and then turned back to Wendy. ‘Why do you ask? Who’s he to you?’

‘Just someone I used to know back in Perth.’ She put a forkful of dinner into her mouth so that she literally could not talk any more.

‘Oh.’

She could tell by the glaze in Radar’s eyes that he’d lost interest. He proved it by turning back to the group at large. ‘Well, you ladies are going to be kicking yourselves that you didn’t stick with us. As it happens we’ve got some super fantastic plans for this Sunday too.’

‘Yeah right.’ Lena pulled a face at him.

He looked down his nose at her and said mysteriously, ‘You just wait and see.’

The next morning, Wendy could have been at work an hour early. She certainly got up in time to make that. The knowledge that Hector Warner’s resume and possible location was sitting on Chub’s computer just waiting for her had her feeling like a kid at Christmas. She could not sit still or, in this case, lie still in bed. In the end, she went for a jog up Water Tank Hill before work. This time nobody followed her, though she could have done with some distraction.

She managed to restrain herself from getting into her car before five-thirty am and arrived at work a mere ten minutes ahead of schedule. Chub was not there so she whiled away the time checking to see if the server was back up.

It was.

Her body tensed with excitement.

Not long now.

‘Hey, little mate.’ Chub arrived, throwing a large backpack down on his desk and then removing from it four lunchboxes that he intended to put in the bar fridge.

‘The server is working,’ she announced as she followed him to their poor excuse for a kitchen. He put his food in the bar fridge and turned around.

‘Is it now? Do you think I have time for a coffee first?’

‘You can’t possibly mean to do that to me.’

‘All right, maybe not.’ He sighed and hunkered back to his desk to sit down. She peered over his thick shoulders as he tried to call up the screen he’d been looking for yesterday. In less than a minute, he had found Hector’s resume and was sending it to the printer.

Her chest swelled as the small bubble-jet creaked noisily to life. ‘Now obviously I can’t let you keep it because it’s a breach of his privacy. But,’ Chub winked at her, ‘I’ll let you look at it for as long as you like.’

‘That’s perfect.’ She nodded breathlessly.

Her hands trembled slightly as he handed her the papers. ‘Now I think I’ll get that coffee.’ He rose with effort. ‘I don’t know why they don’t have donuts in the mess. Such a lack of foresight.’

The comment flew over Wendy’s head as her eyes were already on the page, devouring every word – calculating Hector’s age from his birth date.

Oh wow! He’s sixty-five.

That made him a very plausible candidate indeed.

He was married. His address was in . . .
Wickham
! She scanned down the list of his credentials and began to feel rather light-headed.

There it was. He’d started as a welder. He was a site supervisor now but he definitely fit the bill. A shame there was no photo. If Chub hadn’t been in the room, she probably would have jumped up and down, laughing and screaming. Instead, she put the resume down on his desk, giving it a swift pat. ‘I don’t know how I’m going to get through today, but I’m just going to have to.’

‘Why, what’s on tonight?’ Chub asked as he returned to his desk.

‘Something big, I hope.’ She pulled open her drawer and drew forth a brown paper bag. With great delight she tipped the contents of it onto Chub’s desk. A large selection of chocolate bars she had purchased from a machine outside the camp reception spilled forth in all their glossy glory.

‘I know it’s not much,’ she smiled, ‘but I wanted to give you a little gift for helping me out.’

Nobody does anything for nothing.

So now her debt was paid.

‘Geez, Wendy,’ Chub’s eyes widened, ‘you didn’t have to buy me chocolate. You’ll ruin my figure.’

‘Do you want me to take it back?’

Chub’s expression was pained. ‘Well, I wouldn’t want to be rude.’

She laughed. ‘Then don’t be.’

She sat down to focus on getting through the day again. This included enduring an absolutely dreadful meeting with TCN. The attendees were herself, Carl, Dan and Frank, the safety manager for TCN.

As usual it was a short trip to the client’s office and a long sojourn in the waiting room. To Carl’s entertainment, the woman Wendy could only assume was Annabel George arrived shortly after them. She was dressed in a figure-hugging short green dress accessorised by a giant gemstone-studded handbag hanging from one shoulder.

The receptionist seemed to regard her with almost as much disdain as she regarded Barnes Inc staff, because she waved the brunette to a chair without so much as a greeting.

‘No problem. I’m happy to wait.’ Annabel George sat down next to Wendy, beaming. ‘Are you here to see Daniel too?’

‘We have a meeting.’ Wendy inclined her head.

‘Do you know him well?’ Annabel put a hand over her heart. ‘He’s such a sweet man, isn’t he? Did you know when he was in high school he used to play guitar? He wrote me a song once. I still have it on cassette tape.’

Carl’s eyebrows practically hit his hairline. ‘Ffffuuuuck.’

‘Yes, well,’ Annabel smiled modestly, ‘I was thinking about that keepsake the other day and I thought, you know, he should really have one from me too. So . . .’ She paused for effect. ‘I made him a photo book.’

‘A photo book?’ Wendy repeated faintly.

‘Fried fuck and onions,’ said Carl.

‘Oh yes, I’d love your opinion.’ Annabel withdrew a professionally bound hardcover book from some digital photo studio and reverently opened it.

The first page featured a large picture of Annabel blowing a kiss at the camera dressed in a purple bikini that left little to the imagination. The picture itself was surrounded by sprigs of lavender. Annabel leaned over the book and whispered excitedly, ‘Did you know lavender is for Yearning?’

‘Get fucked.’ Carl baulked.

‘I didn’t know,’ Wendy responded, searching the woman’s eyes for dilated pupils.

A shadow crossed their chairs and all three occupants looked up to find Dan standing over them, frowning.

‘Sorry I’m late.’

Carl stood up but not in greeting. He simply placed a firm and sympathetic hand briefly on one of the client’s broad shoulders before turning away and entering the meeting room behind him.

Dan turned to his admirer first. ‘Annie, why are you here again?’

‘Sorry, Daniel.’ Annabel also rose from her chair. ‘I know you said not to come but I just wanted to drop this off. I’ll be out of your hair in two blinks of an eye.’

She presented him with the album before patting his other shoulder. ‘See you soon, sweetheart.’ She blew him a kiss.

As the front door shut behind her, Dan’s eyes flicked back to Wendy, who refused to mask her amusement.

Dan Hullog was normally the embodiment of extreme professionalism, mixed with a hawklike intelligence that favoured perfection and the achievement of tough deadlines. He was a man’s man whose rough edges hadn’t quite been polished smooth. It was clear that he had absolutely no idea how to deal with Annabel George. He couldn’t fire her because she didn’t work for him. But he wasn’t mean enough to tell her to get lost either.

A muscle spasmed below his chiselled cheekbones as a dark cloud descended upon his brow.

‘I’m big in trouble, aren’t I?’ he demanded.

‘You bet.’

She would have taken pity on him then. Perhaps offered him some advice. But the moment was lost when his safety manager, Frank, came stumbling out of the main office area burdened with a stack of foolscap files.

‘All set, Dan,’ he was saying. ‘Shall I put these in the meeting room?’

‘Yes,’ Dan nodded and then swept a hand before himself, indicating for Wendy to proceed.

Wendy found herself once more confronted by the white trestle table and eight uncomfortable chairs, one of which was already occupied by Carl. She had never liked this room, both for its ambience and the conversations that had taken place in it. The room, in turn, didn’t redeem itself when, after initial pleasantries and updates, the discussion proceeded to deteriorate.

‘I’m sorry to have to inform you,’ Dan began, ‘that we are still receiving complaints from the wharf owners.’ He laced his fingers on the tabletop. ‘I know you have terminated Neil Cooper and stepped up preparation for cyclone season but TCN and, indeed, the wharf owners are still concerned about your day-to-day operations.’

Carl and Wendy squirmed in their uncomfortable seats. It wasn’t that she didn’t know they had a long way to go. It was just getting those improvements implemented at an acceptable rate was really, really hard. The men were getting better but they were still pretty unreceptive. Only one in four orders she issued got listened to. What else could she do?

Perhaps she didn’t have all the information she needed.

‘What are their complaints?’

It was a mistake to have asked for specifics because it was not Dan who responded to her question but Frank. He happened to be one of those annoying people who given a very small amount of power had allowed it to go to his head. He opened the large file in front of him and began reading from a list with smug superiority.

‘They smoke anywhere they like. The toilet dongas are a breeding ground for disease. They litter. They forget to wear their PPE, or the PPE they do have is damaged or inadequate. They drive their utes too fast. There is a speed limit, you know. They break things. Last week someone backed his ute into the conveyor and bent one of the struts! Luckily, no serious damage. They don’t wait thirty minutes after hot work before clearing the site. They don’t tag damaged equipment, they just chuck it in a container so some other person can re-discover it and not tag it all over again. They don’t read safety memos! They are constantly –’

‘Okay, you can stop now, Frank.’ Dan held up his hand. ‘I think they get the message.’

‘We’re doing our fuckin’ best,’ Carl protested. ‘But you can’t expect this sort of shit to improve overnight. Wendy needs a chance to fuckin’ find her feet.’

‘Then I hope she finds it by next month because the wharf owners have instructed us to do a safety audit of your team then.’

‘What?’ It was Carl who gasped the word out loud but Wendy felt the blow equally. She was finding it difficult to breathe, as if a sack of potatoes had been dropped on her chest.

Dan sighed, rubbing his temples in an obvious attempt at restraint. ‘Carl, it may come as a shock to you but I am as reluctant to shut Barnes Inc down as you are. That is why, even though I’m not supposed to, I am giving you fair warning. TCN
will
be auditing you next month. Clean your men up.’

Static buzzed in Wendy’s ears. How on earth was she supposed to fix everything in less than a month? There was just too much to do. She hadn’t counted on this job being so stressful, in addition to the other emotional baggage she was carrying around. The plan was to be functional at work so that she could be a basket case in her free time. Bad enough she was already very nervous about tonight. She didn’t need this on her shoulders as well.

Thinking about her father and what she would say to him when she met him always put her on edge.

Not that she had any expectations. If he hadn’t concerned himself about her in all these years, chances are he probably wouldn’t be moved to become part of her life now.

No. All she wanted was a little information.
Do I have any brothers or sisters? Who are they? And where do they live?

She relived that day on the phone with that awful government clerk over and over in her nightmares.

The hurt.

The betrayal.

The uncertainty.

If she were honest, she didn’t want to know why her father had abandoned her. That might be too painful. It was more about needing to know what he had left her with. Knowing that she had this whole other identity out there – that could be sprung on her at any time – was enough to give her a panic attack. And, back when she first found out about her father, often did.

She didn’t want any more shocks.

Wendy was a planner. Ever since her parents had shipped her off to boarding school, getting control of her life back had been a goal. As an adult she’d prided herself on her independence and being in charge of her own destiny.