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my grocery delivery. That darned boy’s late every week.’
    ‘Thought of that.’ He lifted up a paper bag. ‘Got a couple of pies, and a couple of tamarillos for after. I know what you career girls are like. It’s all work, work, work . . . Someone’s got to keep your strength up.’
    I couldn’t help laughing. Nino Gaines had always got me like that, as long ago as the war, when he’d first come and announced his intention to set up here. Then the whole of the bay had been taken over by Australian and American servicemen, and my father had had to make pointed references to his accuracy with a shotgun when the young men whooped and catcalled at me behind the bar. Nino had been more gentlemanly: he had always removed his cap while he waited to be served, and he had never failed to call my mother ‘ma’am’. ‘Still don’t trust him,’ my father had muttered, and, on balance, I thought he had probably been right.
    Out at sea it was bright and calm, a good day for the whale crews, and as we sat down, I watched Moby One and Two heading out for the mouth of the bay. My eyes weren’t as good as they had been, but from here it looked like they had a good number of passengers. Liza had headed out earlier; she was taking a group of pensioners from the Returned and Services League (RSL) club for nothing, as she did every month, even though I told her she was a fool.
    ‘You shutting this place up for the winter?’
    I shook my head, and took a bite of my pie.
    ‘Nope. The Moby s are going to try out a deal with me – bed, board and a whaling trip for a fixed sum, plus admission to the museum. A bit like I do with Liza. They’ve printed some leaflets, and they’re going to put something on a New South Wales tourism website. They say it’s big business that way.’
    I’d thought he would mutter something about technology being beyond him, but he said, ‘Good idea. I sell maybe forty cases a month online now.’
    ‘You’re on the Internet?’ I gazed at him over the top of my glasses.
    He lifted a glass, unable to hide his satisfaction at having surprised me. ‘Plenty you don’t know about me, Miss Kathleen Whittier Mostyn, no matter what you might think. I’ve been out there in cyberspace for a good eighteen months now. Frank set it up for me. Tell you the truth, I quite like having a little surf around. I’ve bought all sorts.’ He gestured at my glass – he wanted me to taste the wine. ‘Bloody useful for seeing what the big growers in the Hunter Valley are offering too.’
    I tried to concentrate on my wine, unable to admit quite how thrown I was by Nino Gaines’s apparent ease with technology. I felt wrongfooted, as I often did when talking to young people, as if some vital new knowledge had been dished out when I’d had my back turned. I sniffed the glass, then sipped, letting the flavour flood my mouth. It was a little green, but none the worse for that. ‘This is very nice, Nino. A hint of raspberry in there.’ At least I still understand wine.
    He nodded, pleased. ‘Thought you’d pick up on that. And you know you get a mention?’
    ‘A mention of what?’
    ‘The Shark Girl. Frank typed you into a search engine and there you are – picture and all. From newspaper archives.’
    ‘There’s a picture of me on the Internet?’
    ‘In your bathing-suit. You always did look fetching in it. There’s a couple of pieces of writing about you too. Some girl at university in Victoria used you in her thesis on the role of women and hunting, or somesuch. Quite an impressive piece of writing – full of symbolism, classical references and goodness knows what else. I asked Frank to print it out – must have forgotten to pick it up. I thought you could put it in the museum.’
    Now I felt very unbalanced indeed. I put my glass down on the table. ‘There’s a picture of me in my bathing-suit on the Internet?’
    Nino Gaines laughed. ‘Calm down, Kate – it’s hardly Playboy magazine. Come over