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my delivery to unseen hands through the mail slot in the door, then leap gratefully back down the steps, all three in one go.
    I have no idea who I’ve just delivered Gail’s expensive products to, and I don’t care. Beyond the knowledge that I’m in fertility doctor territory, my mind is an information blank, and what’s done behind these doors for the city’s desperate inhabitants is nothing I ever want to know. Genderbent and happy, that’s me. And now my duty has been done, my rent will be paid.
    The subtle warmth beginning to leach from limbs to fingers is mainly my parasympathetics kicking in, but there’s something else there too. It’s the satisfaction of having played my small part in a greater insurgency; just one of the termite team munching into the behemoth structures of a regime that would have us all thinking the damaged fertility of a nation is punishment for our sins, and that praying for forgiveness — and preying on transgressors — will bring about our only reprieve.
    I ride out of Cutters Lane feeling more relaxed despite the cold. Time to report to the termite queen.

    I wish I could say I’m comfortable visiting my suave and sophisticated boss at her home; but I’m not. South Yarra and Toorak are still where most of the old wealth sits — the land alone worth a mint, not to mention the heritage mansions. Gail has always blended in well with the hoity-toity.
    The route along the south edge of the Yarra beside the Botanic Gardens is one of my favourites, but this time of night the view across the water to the CBD is eerie. The power-saving measures put in place to force frugality means the city blocks are subject to rolling blackouts, the streets only minimally lit. I bump along a weed-infested cycle path that reflects the general downturn to Melbourne life, as if the whole city is suffering from the sort of depression that makes it hard to get out of bed each morning.
    Toorak was divided into ‘estates’ and gated several years ago, the residents not trusting in simpler measures to keep the riffraff out. ‘Checkpoint Charlie’ is a guard box in the centre of the road. It has a window, an intercom and a bored and burly member of SOS — Service One Security — inside.
    Straddling my bike, I punch in some numbers on the keypad then stare into the identity-check lens. The LED goes green and the gate slides open.
    Beyond it, the street curves gently, my cycle lights picking out low stone walls and high hedges looming black in a grey-toned darkness. By day, grand houses can be glimpsed set well back in manicured grounds. But even old money can’t bring the rain. The gardens are sad reminders of their former glory, many of the original lush-leavedplants replaced by hardier specimens, and the lawns a dull, parched version of green. At least here they haven’t yet resorted to the solutions of the more downmarket suburbs: faux grass — the bright emerald kind — or concrete.
    I enter Salmon Close and catch the scent of jasmine still in bloom. To my right, pencil pines spear uniformly to the sky. Left, a thicket of hardenbergia hides a garden gate, and a tall brush fence makes an impenetrable barrier. I make for the end of the close, where an electric three-wheeler sits by the kerb. Built for inner-city use, these vehicles are really motorised tricycles with rain bonnets, and so gutless that a scooter rider can easily drag them off at the traffic lights.
    I repeat the number on the keypad outside Number 5, and the metal gates swing slowly open.
    Gail’s residence smacks of old colonial behind its square-trimmed photinia hedge and imposing entrance. The house is two-storey villa style, a driveway leading to grand, curving steps and the modern addition of a glass portico. The French windows set along the front open onto gently sloping lawn — real grass, thanks to the majestic oaks each side of the drive that