We drive to town, and Mick talks about himself — things he’s heard on the radio, and stories that mates have told him. I am not really listening. My brain is churning with Elaine, Ben, the money, and who else might own it, and what the hell am I doing? I tell myself that if the money was theirs they would have said they were missing a box of money. Stands to reason. Somehow, it’s comforting to have an idiot alongside me. I say, ‘Mick. I’ve got some stuff to tell you.’
‘Yeah?’ I can almost hear the wind whistling through his ears.
‘I sold a few things — a bit of machinery, a few cows — for cash, like real folding stuff. There’s a fair bit of it, and I don’t really want the tax department to know about it.’
‘Yeah, cool.’
‘I’ll be putting a fair bit of money on today. Just so you know.’ It’s a weak premise, but I reckon he’ll go for it.
‘Want me to put some on for you?’
‘That would be great. We’ll have to spread it around the bookies and the TAB.’
‘You must have sold a fucken lot of cows.’
‘I did.’
‘What if we win?’
‘We share the profits from the local races. I keep the rest.’
‘Orright.’ I have just provided Mick with the perfect day out.
My phone rings, and I ignore it. Mick looks at me and my phone, and looks away. ‘You’ll never have any friends if you don’t let them talk to you.’
The caller leaves a voice message. I put the phone to my ear as if I am appeasing my brother-in-law. The voice is Elaine’s, honeyed as well as distinctly vulnerable. ‘Hi, Dave, I just wanted to ring and apologise for yesterday. I was a bit overwrought, and I’m afraid I might have been a bit full-on. My great-aunt was very special to me. So I was wondering if you want to come down for a drink tonight. Just to smooth it over? About six? Let me know. Bye.’
I click off the message, unsure what I have just heard.
‘A woman, eh? Got a few fans, have you?’ Mick knows what he heard.
‘It’s a long story.’
‘I bet it isn’t that long.’ He is guffawing now at his joke or at himself, or possibly the way his shoelaces appear to be frayed baling twine.
I refuse to think about the invitation or its implications. I have enough to deal with.
‘So, are you going?’ Apparently Mick has hearing like a housemistress.
‘Mind your own business.’
‘Listen, mate, for the next two days you are my business. I know how tough things have been, and I’m sorry my sister couldn’t stay, but nothing will be helped by you becoming a hermit.’
‘I’m not a hermit.’ I change gears for the sake of it. ‘I’m going to the races.’
‘You’ll have to yarn to someone other than me and the bookies.’
I decide that’s enough talking. We park near the entrance to the track, and walk. At the gate, I pay Tick Elder, and some other bloke, possibly a Newsome from out on the Barrack Road, the entry fee. Tick asks me how I’m doing, and I tell him, ‘Okay.’ Mick and I continue. There is a reasonable crowd, which surprises me. It’s a long time since I’ve been, but country race meetings can be pretty quiet. The crowd can only be a good thing. More people means I’ll stand out less.
The first race is still half an hour away. We grab a guide each, and examine the form. My strategy is to bet on favourites — the shorter the odds, the better. A small loss each bet would suit me fine. I can hear alongside me that Mick has decided he is an expert.
‘Willy’s Filly has done well at the distance before, but I do like the look of Great Days.’
‘Here’s some money — try not to lose it all.’
I stuff $100 notes into his hand.
‘Fucken hell!’
‘Don’t wave them about.’ I sidle over to the bookies handling the city races. In between pretending to do something else, I bet on every favourite they chalk up, at every venue. My pocket is bulging with betting cards, and it is only the first race. I go and join Mick at the rails. He is very excited.
‘How much did you put on?’ I ask.
‘A grand. You?’ He isn’t looking at me; he is leaning over the rail, trying to see what is happening at the barrier.
‘Two grand,’ I lie.
‘Well, here goes.’
It is a small field: six horses. They stay bunched together for most of the race, but towards the end, one chestnut breaks from the pack. Mick is jumping in the air, banging his program against his hip. ‘Go, you good thing!’ His horse, apparently the chestnut, wins. He leaps about, saying yahoo. When he has stopped, he says to me, ‘What percentage are we working on?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You said we’d share the winnings. So who gets what?’
‘The profit is yours,’ I say, and he starts to leap around again, and then ricochets off to collect his winnings.
I feel a hand squeezing me lightly on the upper arm. A woman, my age, short, dark-haired, robust, with large features, says, ‘Fancy seeing you at the races.’
It is Helen, the wife of Marko, who’s one of my best mates. She has tried very hard to be a good friend. As he has. But I know they don’t know what to do or what to say to me. I can’t stand hearing their conversations about their kids and their kids’ friends. It’s like they don’t talk about anything else.
‘My brother-in-law is visiting. He loves a punt.’
‘Well, he’s very clever if he can get you out. You never come to anything we invite you to.’ She puts an arm around me and gives me a little hug — playful, but pointed.
I don’t bother with an excuse. I tell her I promised to put money on in the next, and she takes the hint. ‘Come for a drink later on, will you? Please? We’re just on the grass in the carpark. There’s food, friends.’
‘Thanks, I will.’ Not a chance. She walks away, and I head back to the bookies.
None of the horses I bet on gets a place. I try again.
Mick bets, and wins. I bet, and lose. I am beginning to feel that betting is not much better than sticking the box back in the mailbox. My small pile of notes is diminishing. I go back to the ute to grab a stash more.
Mick, on the other hand, might need a small bag to carry his winnings. The problem is that the amounts he’s winning aren’t enough to carry my losses, and they’re never going to launder $250,000, even if I were foolish enough to give him that chance. The whole thing is a dumb idea, except it is making Mick happy. If he’s got cash, he’ll probably go home earlier. So that’s a good result.
I think about Elaine’s invitation, and whether it’s a date or a way to finagle the money out of me. I’m finding it almost impossible to make sense of anything.
On the other side of the betting ring, two swarthy young dudes appear to be watching me: a tall wide one and small wide one. They look, look away, and look back. One holds my gaze, and slaps a form guide hard into an open palm. It’s time to get out. I tell Mick this is the last, and put all the money I have on the next race. I feel the swarthy men watching me the whole time. But this time I choose the longest odds I can find. My horse, it turns out, at 20–1, is called Kinky. It seems somehow appropriate. I give each of the four bookies $2,000.
I look across at the swarthy guys, who are still checking me out. And then, without premeditation, I lift my chin at them, and give a lazy eye-roll. I’m thinking I should be saying, ‘What?’ or ‘What’s up?’ or ‘You looking at me?’, but I say nothing. The larger of the two lifts his chin at me, dead-eyed, in response. I walk over to them. Nothing in my head makes any sense except a recurring refrain of ‘How bad can it be?’ I can assure you this is not me. I am not soft, but I am not someone to pick a fight or seek out trouble. I know what tough is, and it isn’t me. Suddenly I’m a badarse. I am almost welcoming the pain of a good belting.
I say to the
m, ‘Is there a problem?’
The tall one says, ‘Hey,’ waves a thumb in the direction of his chest, and offers, ‘Sergei.’ I know I’m meant to believe he is the coolest guy on the ground. But I think he might have been watching too many gangster videos.
The smaller one says, ‘You’ve got a lot of cash, brother. Everyone round here says you’re broke. What are you up to?’
I say, ‘I roughed someone up for it. Have you got an issue with that?’
They make little amused sounds to each other, and then the big one says, ‘You?’
‘Yeah. Me.’
Here’s the thing. I’m not doing any thinking at this point, I’m just doing. I don’t know where it comes from. I take my right hand and cross my body, and pat underneath my left arm at that gun holster. Somehow it has just the right amount of bulk. Suddenly they lose some of their cool, and have to stop themselves taking a reflexive step back. I get the rush of someone who has just had his ridiculous shtick believed. These guys aren’t hard men; they’re dopes from the city who thought they could play tough with a bunch of yokels in the bush. I have their mark, and it feels like cocaine is supposed to.
‘You want to play?’ I give the impression of moving in on their territory.
Now they back away.
‘No, man, we’re cool.’
‘We’ll see you around.’
I am about to celebrate, except I feel Mick panting at my elbow. Back to Augie Doggie and Doggie Daddy.
‘What are you up to? Trying to get yourself killed?’
‘Your race is about to start.’
‘I know. I just thought I’d check you weren’t getting your head bashed in.’
‘Thank you.’
I let Mick cheer his horse at the rail while I watch the TV sets. Kinky, with a jockey in purple polka-dot colours, is a stumbler and a bumbler. He could easily be my mount. He’s not cut out for racing. That is, until the 1,500-metre mark, when one of the other horses or jockeys must have sledged him, and he decides that this running thing can’t be that hard. He takes the pack on the outside. Mick appears at my side, disappointed at his narrow loss in the last. He’s had a good day, though — or so he says — and watches the TV with me. Kinky has the look of an animal that has been pumped with rocket fuel as he sprints round the mob and draws level with the leader. There is an excited noise from the small crowd. Kinky, oblivious to the romance, pushes out in front, and wins by maybe two lengths. I’m guessing the fix was in, but it doesn’t matter. I have the betting tickets, and the big winnings are mine. The bookies frown at me when I come to collect and they have to send runners off to pick up more cash. One of them asks me if he can get the money to me next week. Seems I’m not the only one who had money on Kinky. I tell him it’s fine, but that I know where he lives. It’s a joke, but he looks at me with a confused look, knowing anyone who throws cash around like I do might well know how to call in a debt. Miraculously, he finds the money he owes me.
Mick and I walk briskly to the ute, avoiding the area where Helen and Marko are drinking with friends — my friends. I am carrying supermarket bags of cash, and I can feel Mick looking at me, wanting to ask me, but not knowing how or what. To allay him, I say, ‘It went well, so you can keep your winnings and the money I gave you.’
‘What the fuck just happened?’
‘For the first time in a decade, I was a winner. Don’t ask me about it.’
‘Right you are.’ He pulls cash out of his pocket and counts it, hissing, and bobbing his head with pleasure.
Then Ben Ruder comes striding across towards us, and in the mood I’m in I’m almost glad to see him. He is dressed up for the races, complete with a thick wool tie from a different lifetime and a clean town hat. He stops in front of us, ignoring Mick, and looks me up and down, taking in the bags of money. ‘Where did a loser like you get money like that?’ He is hoping for derision, but I can see in his black reptile eyes that he really wants to know.
‘I won it. Which makes me a winner.’
Mick is staying close, looking like he might bite Ben.
‘You can’t win like that with ten bucks, can you?’
I give him a stupid ‘Maybe’ look, and notice his feet are very big for a small man.
He points a gnarled finger at me, and says, ‘You’re doing something dodgy, aren’t you? And someone’s paying you for it. Big time.’
‘That’s right. I’ve got a brothel on the coast. It’s the best way to survive on the land these days. And then I just suck the life out of everything around me.’
He is so angry, the spittle is beginning to froth in the corner of his mouth.
‘You won’t be laughing when the cops are at your door.’ He pushes past, and strides off.
Mick takes on a surprisingly good David Attenborough voice, and says, ‘Everyone is so friendly in the country, aren’t they? The sense of community, the whole looking-out-for-your-neighbour thing, it’s just bloody marvellous.’
I actually laugh.
I drive us home, checking the rear-view mirror for anyone who might be following. There is no one, and in my current state of delirium I am almost disappointed. I feel like I could smack anyone.
‘I’m going for a drink at Elaine’s tonight. Will you be all right on your own?’
‘Great. I’ll be fine. Got any food in your fridge?’
‘Frozen meals in the freezer.’
‘Sounds good to me.’
I shower again, and think about money. I now have enough money in the house to completely refurbish Mick’s life. I don’t feel it’s a good idea to tempt him with that. He slumps in front of the TV, so I take the garbage bags from the linen cupboard and the supermarket bags with my most recent winnings, and put them in the ute.
I say, ‘I’ll see you later,’ and he waves me off.
I’m not sure why I’m going to Elaine’s. Intrigue. I suppose. Why is she asking me, and what is her involvement with the box? I haven’t accepted an invitation from anyone to anything for months. The arrival of one box has pushed me out into the world. And sitting with Mick, watching TV and not drinking beer, does not sound like a good alternative.
3
I was an only child, but I don’t remember ever being lonely. Not lonely like I am now. Except I’m not lonely, because I don’t really like to see anyone. But when I was a kid there were always things I wanted to do, and usually someone who would come over and do those things with me. In the holidays, there were people around, and work to do. But when I was with my friends, we didn’t work, even if we said we did — we just rode horses and bikes, swam in the dam, caught craybobs in the creek, and had wars at the hiding tree. Later on, I had my own bush-basher car, and we used to fang around in that. My parents expected me to entertain myself, with or without friends. They never thought it was their job to find ways to keep me amused. They both taught me things, and I would never have dared to tell them I was bored or that I wanted a new toy of some sort. If I couldn’t amuse myself amongst nature on the farm, or the animals, or the machinery, then I was beneath contempt. It was never a contempt I needed to worry about. It’s odd to think that I am the only one on my farm now. But I really don’t think about it. Actually, now I feel the place is populated by ghosts, so I’m not really alone.
Elaine’s house appears to have every light on. I wonder if she has decided to have a gathering. I sit in the ute tossing up possibilities. The house is very large, as if she and Tito renovated it expecting to have many children or endless visitors. The times I took Tito out to meet people, we met up at his mailbox, so I never got to see the house — or Elaine, for that matter. It’s only one storey, but the roof and the ceilings, I can see, are high. Even in the dark, I can pick up the lushness of the lawn and the scope of the garden. It isn’t in bad taste, but maybe a bit too keen to let you know how much money is lying about. I don’t see any other guests�
� cars, but I don’t want to have to go home to whatever Mick might be doing, so I get out of my vehicle and find my way through a wrought-iron gate in the centre of a hedge, across that lawn, and up the steps to the verandah and the glass front door.
No one is about. No one comes to greet me. I clear my throat as loudly as I can, and then give a half-hearted ‘Hello’ not in any way reminiscent of Elaine’s version at my place. Nothing. I wait for a minute, and then turn to go. I don’t really want to be here anyway. I can sit in the car and listen to music if the thought of Mick is too much. And then I hear a faint, single sound. It could be an animal in the paddocks: a cow coughing; a hoot from an owl. I spin around, hoping that facing the paddocks will help me pick it up a bit better. I hear it again, but not from the dark — it is coming from inside. I move quickly, reefing the door open and stepping into a house that is a puzzle to me. The room is as big as a machinery shed: there are couches in a semicircle down one end, and a kitchen bench down the other. There is some sort of indoor fish tank with … I don’t know … sharks or something in it probably.
‘Elaine?’
A sob in response. Maybe from the next room. I run through a massive archway into an even larger room with more couches and chairs, separate in their own nooks, but dominated by a huge fireplace. Sitting on one of the couches is Elaine. Her clothes looked ripped, and she is hunched over with her face in her hands. Every now and then, she lets out a sob that shakes even my soiled heart.
‘Elaine?’
She looks up. Tears have smudged her make-up, and wet her cheeks. There is blood mingling with the moisture seeping down her face.
‘Are you okay?’ I ask, because I am an idiot.
Boxed Page 3
