‘It’s never anything special,’ I say to her. ‘Just machinery parts, and small pumps. I’m afraid I can only afford the sweatshop versions.’ There’s a nasty half-joke there, but she does not laugh or express understanding. She steps up close to me, her skin perfect, her teeth white and untampered with. ‘If my parcel turns up, you’ll let me know, won’t you?’ It’s not quite menace, but it’s a very close cousin. Or is that her version of a come-on? Either the money is hers, or she really likes crockery.
I am unreasonably calm.
When her car is gone, I sit with my head in my hands on the front step. If she’s missing a box of crockery, then I’ve really done no wrong. It would have been wrong to involve her in the knowledge of the cash. That would be incrimination. But if the money is hers, I have stolen it from her. Which means she’ll be back, or someone will be back in her stead.
So why was the box addressed to me? A trick to avoid detection, obviously. And why the story about crockery? Because she didn’t want to involve me. That would be incrimination.
But without being bothered by conscience, I have possibly created a problem.
I get the box from the cupboard, take the money out, put it in two green garbage bags, and put the bags in one of the guest bathrooms (I never have guests). Then I go to the garage, and find the last present I bought myself: a four-in-one hammer drill, $120, free delivery. At the time, it turned out to be much smaller than I thought. It was supposed to be a jackhammer. But now I know it will fit, in parts, into the box. I put the parts in the box with the packing material, and masterfully add the instruction booklet, then tape it up. If Elaine or one of her minions turns up again, I will say I found the box after all, someone must have picked it up accidentally, realised their mistake, and then replaced it. This seems extraordinarily brilliant to me. If Elaine does own the money, she might believe that the box had been picked up and swapped with the hammer drill by someone who knew what she was up to. I am just a neighbourly fuck-up. There was no way she would suspect me of being that clever or daring. I will present it to her unopened, saying I hadn’t ordered anything, so the box has to be hers. Perhaps we will open it together, or maybe I will leave her to it and wait for a response.
And then I hear another engine, and a ute rolls into my driveway and parks in the same spot Elaine had. It is a dirty-yellow, battered tray-back that I know belongs to Ben Ruder, who owns a swag of country at the other end of my road. He’s a successful prick, self-serving, hard as nails, and the sort of person never embarrassed into doing anything for his community or his fellow man. Ben has never bothered to hide his feeling that any farmer with my sort of financial troubles is an idiot and a layabout. He makes his way casually to my front door, not limping, but moving with the cautiousness of someone who could. He is in khaki shorts-and-shirt work clothes, a floppy, grease-stained hat, and looks like he might be down to his last dollar. It is a ruse. He is as wealthy as anyone hereabouts.
Ben is the one person I know capable of being involved in illicit deals that might include boxes of large amounts of money. He used to have a piggery on the farm, and everyone knew there was something not quite right about it. He shut it down some years ago. Rumours have it that he owns dodgy real estate ventures, brothels on the coast, and a holiday resort for paedophiles in Asia. Probably not true, but you get the gist of the bloke. No one makes up stories like that about popular, good-natured people.
‘Ben. What can I do for you?’ I’m not wasting pleasantries, and I know he isn’t expecting me to.
But, ‘Hey there, Davey boy. How’ve you been keeping?’ My alarm bells are clanging air-raid warnings. Ben is affable and relaxed. He is visiting an old friend he hasn’t had a chance to catch up with in a long while. I’ve not seen this version before.
‘Okay. You?’ I am suddenly aware that, except for James’s area, the lawn is long, and the garden beds are a mess. There are branches down, and leaves in piles everywhere, backed up against walls and tree trunks. The couch and the kikuyu have taken command of the veggie garden, and the timber fence along the north side is rotted and collapsing. Someone only has to drive into my garden to know what state I am in. It makes me sad to think what my mother would feel when she saw this mess. But why do I suddenly give a toss?
‘Oh, you know, all right. Getting on a bit, slowing down. Everything seems to hurt first thing in the morning when you’re my age.’
I can’t think of anything to say except, ‘Tell someone who cares.’ I refrain from comment.
‘But, like they say, it’s better than the alternative.’
‘What alternative?’
‘Being six foot under. Being dead, mate. Being dead.’ I think it’s meant to be a joke.
‘Yeah.’ We look at each other for a few seconds, and I guess he decides his approach is a waste of time. He’s never actually done anything wrong by me except treat me like someone of no account. Maybe that’s enough reason to hate him. And he is basically a shit human being who gets to feel like he is a part of a good community, has people who talk to him and humour him because they believe that is their duty in a small community. If he lived anywhere else, the only reason anyone would have anything to do with him would be money. At least that’s what I think.
‘I’m missing a box. That internet tracking thing says it was supposed to come in the mail today, but it didn’t. It’s got precious stuff in it. Precious to me, anyway.’
‘So how can I help you?’ Or perhaps you could bugger off.
‘The mailman said he dropped a box off here, so I was wondering if there was a mistake, and you had my box.’
‘I don’t think so.’ I respond too quickly, and he reads me easily. He squints, and points past me through a gap between me and the doorway, to the box recently taped up, sitting on the kitchen island. ‘I see a box on the bench in there.’
‘That’s right. It is addressed to me. Nothing to do with you.’ His eyes are faintly bloodshot, and I’m thinking he’s a man who is used to drinking heavily on his own.
‘It looks like it could be mine. Can I have a look?’
I know how this will go. I will deny him entry, he will insult me, accuse me of being a thief, threaten legal action, and say he will get me one way or another. He’s that sort of guy. I don’t need drama like this when I have quarter of a mill in crisp notes in my bathroom.
‘How can it look like it’s yours?’
‘It just does.’
I take my time examining his face — the thickening weathered skin, the multiple folds around the eyes — knowing I could take all my feelings of rage against the world, the piercing fury of injustice, out on Ben Ruder, and not feel any remorse. I could hit him over the head with a baseball bat, watch him slump, and know that the better people of the world might not be cheering me on, but they would understand. But instead of belting him, I say, ‘Have you got a knife?’ Cool as.
His hand goes to a pouch on his belt.
‘It’s not been opened. You’re welcome to have a look.’ I extend an arm to show him the way. I’m getting good at this. If he’s looking for the money, I’m willing to bet he won’t want to open the boxes in front of me. But if he declines, how would he ever know, short of having someone steal them from my house?
He removes his hat, takes a pocket knife from his pouch, and steps forward. ‘I’d appreciate that.’
We stand on either side of the island, and look at the box. The phone starts to ring, and I let it. Ben is focused on the box. He checks the address panel, and runs his hands expertly over the cardboard and tape surface. Then he stabs the knife into the seam in the top, and cuts backwards the distance of half a hand. He peers into the box, and then pushes a hand in the gap. I can’t see what he is finding. He pulls his hand back out, and says, resigned, ‘It’s not mine. Some sort of hand tool. Did you order one?’
A man’s voice on my answering machine says something about
boxes.
To block it out, I say loudly, ‘I don’t think it’s any of your business.’
He gives a half nod, and a shrug as if to say If that’s the way it’s going to be, and turns and walks towards the front door. It lights a little fire of rage inside me.
‘What precious thing are you expecting in the mail? A gimp suit?’
‘Fuck off, you loser.’ He says it over his shoulder, my insults nothing to him.
‘The souls of abused Asian boys?’ I am yelling it from the doorway as he gets into his ute and puts the finger up at me.
I walk across the lawn following him, bad-mouthing him all the way out of the garden and down the road.
Then I stride back up to the garden shed, and drag the mower out, fill it, check the oil, and proceed to mow the perimeter of James’s area.
After the mowing, I play the message on the answering machine. It says nothing about boxes. It is a man from the Department of Agriculture doing a survey on whether I am baiting foxes.
Exhausted from the mowing and the stress of the day, I decide I will have a drink. I’m not an alcoholic, so it’s not like I can never drink. It’s just that I choose not to. But when I choose to, it is a serious decision. So instead of dinner I have a beer, and then another one, and another few. I open a bottle of red and drink it, and then manage a couple of scotches, because there is some in the cupboard. I pass out on the couch in my clothes.
2
I’m woken by a rapping on the back door that my half-asleep brain tells me is the rattle of a Thompson gun held by Ben in a three-piece suit backed up by Elaine in full gangster-moll attire, blonde bob included. But then somebody yells, ‘Dave!’ and I wake properly, and know it is the voice of my brother-in-law Mick, and I think perhaps this really is Armageddon. I open the door for him and manage a ‘Hey’ before I go to the sink for water.
‘Mate, you look rough,’ he says, delighted at my poor state and his relative exuberance. ‘I thought you might have been dead.’
‘I’m not. Just a bit of flu.’
‘Flu be buggered. You’re hungover. I can smell it.’
‘What are you doing here?’ The water is cool and clean, and I wish for a bathfull of it.
‘I’m here for you.’
Mick is short, fit, and useless. I don’t need two useless people in the house.
‘Oh good.’
‘Seriously. I know how tough things have been for you, so I thought I’d better come and keep you company.’
‘Sarah sent you?’ Mick is the last person in the universe I want for company. He is the kind of ignorant, self-confident bastard who can’t stick at anything, can’t finish anything, and yet talks like he is the only competent tool in the shed. And, worse, he never has any money. By comparison, I am a workaholic with a slush fund.
‘No.’
‘She okay?’
‘Within reason. Probably better than you. You’re a bit of a mess.’ He looks around as if he is thinking of buying my house. ‘This place is a bit of a mess.’
‘Thanks. I’m loving your company so far.’
He drags a large, soft overnight bag in through the doorway, and drops it on the floor.
‘I guess we’ll be doing some cleaning up together.’ I know Mick has never done any cleaning up in his life.
The box is still open on the kitchen island. Marooned again, in point of fact. He walks over to it, pries it open, and says, ‘God, you still buying that shit, are you?’
I put my glass down on the sideboard and look at him square on. ‘Mick, I don’t want company at the moment. I appreciate you coming, but it’s important I’m left on my own.’
‘Fine. I get it. I’ll stay a couple of nights, and get out of your hair.’ He pulls the parts out of the box. ‘Whoa. A jackhammer. What would you want with one of these things?’ He jiggles it at me.
I don’t want Mick around for even a day, but I guess he has driven up from the city, which is over four hours away. He’ll have to stay at least one night. And then my mushy brain remembers the money in the guest bathroom. Bloody hell. What made me put it there? I groan like I’m going to be sick, and make quickly for the bathroom — confident, but not certain, that he won’t follow me.
I take the garbage bags, jam them in the linen cupboard, go back to the bathroom, and flush the toilet, twice for authenticity.
When I return, Mick has taken a seat, his feet up, and says, ‘I thought you’d given up the piss?’
‘I have. Just fell off the wagon for one night.’
‘Yeah, right.’ He looks around the room again. ‘So, what’s on? What are we up to?’
‘If it’s Saturday, I’m going to the races.’ I knew the races were on in town, but I hadn’t known, until I said it, that I was going. Somewhere in my boozy sleep I had decided that I was going to launder the money like every good crook does: on the horses. It needed laundering because TV-crime knowledge tells me the serial numbers would be marked by the banks and the police. And an innate and unpleasant sense of cunning suggested Mick could be very useful in that laundering.
Mick leaps to his feet, and rubs his hands together.
‘Bewdy. I love the races.’
The races in Waterglen are an odd affair. There are bookmakers, punters, and usually horses, but most of the action happens elsewhere: on the big-city courses watched on TV screens. The Waterglen racetrack is a pleasant enough place: a well-maintained little grandstand, a bar, plenty of white railings, and a marshalling yard that has green grass, some roses, and other areas of lawn. I guess going to the races, whether you’re betting on the local chaff-burners or some bolter on the other side of the country, can be a good day out. The idea is making me sick-nervous because I have no idea what I’m going to do. My barely-thought-through plan is to give money to the bookies in small amounts, and hopefully I’ll win some back. I know I’ll be worrying that everyone is watching me and that maybe the owner of the cash is in the crowd stalking me.
While Mick is getting himself organised, I take a brick of notes out of a bag in the linen cupboard, remove a fistful of hundreds, shove them in my pocket, and put the rest of the brick in the toolbox in the back of my ute. In the fog of my hangover, I know things are happening too quickly. I’m allowing myself to jump ahead on slim assumptions that will almost certainly lead to trouble. I should have either put the money back in the mailbox or told both Elaine and Ben that it had arrived and that I didn’t want it. Take it, and leave me alone. Instead I am creating the fabled web of intrigue, and somehow that’s what I want, I need. In my next stroke of madness, I go to the old dress-up box at the end of the house, rummage through, and find a holster and the large toy pistol that goes with it. I strap it beneath my shirt, under my arm. The motivation for doing this is unclear.
Mick comes out of the house, smiling and bouncing as if life simply couldn’t be better. Maybe I should think more kindly of him. Perhaps he really is here to look out for me. Others would think I’m in need of it. He is in jeans and joggers, and a shirt without a collar. He obviously doesn’t think we’re going to Ascot. And we’re not. There will be men there in ties, and some even in coats, alongside dudes in shorts and thongs.
My father was a punter, in a very coat-and-tie way. In fact, he did everything in a sports-coat-and-wool-tie manner. My family has always had horses: stock horses, polo ponies, and even a couple of draught horses. It was an accepted matter of status that the Martin family always had several top-quality racehorses. The ‘old’ families always did. My grandfather had paddocks of them, and employed a man whose only job was looking after them.
For Dad, the best thing you could possibly do was to go to the races at one of the big-name city tracks and watch your own horses run. In my memory, Mum never went with him. She told me she used to go when they were young, but after a while she got bored by it. My father never did. He liked to play polo,
but he loved everything about the races: the horseflesh, the bloodlines, the people, the punting, the drinks. It was the time when he was the most relaxed and happy. At the races he was always that man on our verandah: the man he wanted to be.
I never liked him. Not for any particular reason. I just didn’t. He wasn’t a hard man, not for his time anyway, but he wasn’t a man to share what he felt. He believed in enduring. Expressing emotion except through laughter was for the weak and the feminine. If you fell or failed or fucked up, you laughed it off. I cannot remember a time when he put his arms around me, but he must have when I was little. I don’t suppose any country men hugged their sons in those days. I wouldn’t have known what to do if he had.
A few times, Dad took me with him. I would go to the races, and then, at the end of the day, he would drop me at my aunt Alice’s so he could go out all night, and pick me up the next afternoon. I enjoyed it as a kid. It was an adventure, and my father was always so excited. It felt like anything was possible. On the drive down to the city, when it was just him and me, I would ask for things that I would never dare to ask for in any other place: could he, Mum, and I go for a beach holiday, or would he buy me a bike, or could we go to a cricket Test one day? He always said yes to my requests, breezily, without thought, but he never delivered on them. I realised that what I thought was the two of us having special fun together, father and son, was nothing of the sort. I could have been anyone he was giving a lift to the city to. I was with him for adult reasons that were beyond my understanding. So after a while I rejected his offers to go. He almost looked relieved.
As I got older, I began to sense there was something a bit off about his visits to the races: indulgent, I guess. I don’t know why I felt that. Teenager’s intuition, maybe. I didn’t know that drought and low stock-prices were making things tough for us, and that his wife, sister, and brother thought he was wasting money on horses and a lifestyle he couldn’t afford but believed he was entitled to. It is some quirk of karma that the first time I have spare money to flutter, I am going to the races.
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