Silk Chaser

by Peter Klein

  Racing has been a part of Peter Klein’s life for over 35 years; as a strapper, trainer and punter. These days he’s involved in the media, managing the racing department for Australian Associated Press. He lives with his wife on Victoria’s west coast and can be found most weekends either at the track, surfing his local break or fishing from his kayak.

  Previous books by Klein include A Strapper’s Tale, Punter’s Luck and Punter’s Turf. Silk Chaser is his third novel.

  Also by Peter Klein

  Punter’s Turf

  SILK

  CHASER

  PETER KLEIN

  First published 2010 in Macmillan by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Limited

  1 Market Street, Sydney

  Copyright © Peter Klein 2010

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

  National Library of Australia

  Cataloguing-in-Publication data:

  Klein, Peter Martin, 1959– .

  Silk chaser / Peter Klein.

  9781405039765 (pbk.)

  A823.4

  Typeset by Midland Typesetters, Australia

  Printed by McPherson’s Printing Group

  Papers used by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd are natural, recyclable products made from wood grown in sustainable forests. The manufacturing processes conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin.

  These electronic editions published in 2010 by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd

  1 Market Street, Sydney 2000

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

  Silk Chaser

  Peter Klein

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  978-1-74262-122-7

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  978-1-74262-123-4

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  For Robin

  1

  She was trouble and everyone seemed to know it but me.

  Kate was the first to warn me off, but what would she know? Ex-girlfriends never want you to find anyone else after they’ve finished with you. Big Oakie White said pretty much the same thing. He’s my main bookmaker and I respect his opinion, but he should stick to the horses, something he knows more about.

  Jim Beering said to ‘watch her’. Can you believe the guy? Beering was a cop for twenty-five years before he lucked into his cushy role as racecourse detective, so it’s his job to be suspicious. But watch her? Made her sound like a suspect, for Christ sake. Even Billy, who manages my restaurant, had a word in my ear. ‘Be careful, Punter, she’s a ball breaker.’

  I mean, what were they getting at? Was she a livewire? Yeah, so what? I wouldn’t want to be with someone who agrees with me all the time. Does she flirt like a movie star? Too right. With her looks, I would too. Does she like a drink? Hell, yeah. I’d be suspicious of her if she didn’t. Was I going to spend my money on her, buy her things? You bet, I wanted to. Maxine’s only ‘crime’, as far as I could tell, was being the socialite daughter of talkback radio star Russell Henshaw. Henshaw was about the biggest name in radio, and the word was he had an ego to match his ratings, but I didn’t much care for Henshaw or his radio show. It was Maxine, his daughter, I was dating.

  I was on the tram on the way to meet her, in fact. I got off in town and for the first time I noticed that the city shop windows were all plastered with Christmas decorations and posters urging shoppers to buy their presents. To be expected, I suppose; it was, after all, the first week in December. Not that I’d done any Christmas shopping yet. I resist the buying of any yuletide gifts for as long as possible. I simply can’t stand the big department stores and all the hype and useless stuff they try and sell you. I’m sure I’d think of something over the next few weeks, probably right on Christmas Eve, which is when I usually did my shopping.

  I walked along to the restaurant, dodging the Friday night shoppers, and worked out how long I’d known Maxine. I met her barely a month ago in the champagne bar at Caulfield races, yet I’d spent almost every night since either staying overnight at her place, or she at mine. I didn’t think that could happen to someone like me. Crazy girl had taken over my life. I hadn’t studied a formguide or watched a race replay all week, and for someone who makes a living out of betting on the horses like I do, well, that’s just insane. Formguides weren’t the only thing I was guilty of forsaking. I hadn’t kept my regular weekly meeting with my manager Billy. He runs my pizza restaurant, Gino’s, and we meet religiously every Monday to go through the books and discuss business. I’d also missed my usual Tuesday night snooker game at the Red Triangle with Tiny and the boys. Don’t think they didn’t know what was going on. And for the first time ever, Big Oakie had to chase me for my betting markets on Thursday night. Why? Because I was with Maxine. She had me hook, line and sinker. They said she was trouble. Well, I’d never been happier.

  Her curious moon eyes peeped at me over the top of the menu, black-studded diamonds that flickered and shone with amusement, and I knew when she lowered the menu she’d be sporting that infectious smile, ready to laugh at anything I said.

  ‘What? What’s so funny?’ I demanded.

  ‘You. How you take so long to order anything.’

  ‘I don’t.’

  ‘You do. You know you do. You’ve been there ten minutes reading the menu and you still haven’t made your mind up, have you?’

  ‘I would have, only the waiter confused me with his specials.’

  ‘Here he comes now. I’m going to order for both of us if you’re not ready. I’m starving.’

  She did, too. Aged Warrnambool sirloin and a glass each of an inky-purple, five-year-old Coriole shiraz. Bit of a blokey meal, not what you’d expect a woman to order. But as I was finding out, Maxine wasn’t exactly a conventional lady.

  ‘I want mine rare,’ she told the waiter. She had her chin on a fist, fingers showing off her rings and other assorted jewellery dangling from her wrist. Her other hand played with shiny strands of shoulder-length black hair.

  ‘That’s not medium or well done, but rare, okay?’

  The waiter promised ‘absolutely’ it would be rare. He made a special note with a flourish in his notebook. Probably wrote down Beware of table six. When we’d got our drinks, Maxine swirled hers around expertly in the big Riedel’s Vinum glass and took a deep sniff.

  ‘God, that’s good,’ she said. ‘And you were, too, last night. I can hardly walk.’

  I grinned sheepishly at her across the table. There was a guy and a woman sitting next to us and another table of four on the opposite side. The guy must have heard; he turned his head none too subtly to catch our conversation. His partner would have heard too, but she was pretending not to notice.

  ‘Are you always like that?
’ she persisted. She had a voice that carried, a radio announcer’s voice just like her father’s. One that demanded to be heard above a crowd. I leant forward, spoke in a whisper.

  ‘Can we, er, keep it down a bit?’

  Maxine laughed at me again. Don’t know what she found so amusing. She took one of my hands in hers, spoke a little more softly – but not much – and said, ‘I’m sorry, Punter. I didn’t mean anyone else to hear.’

  I was beginning to blush. Felt a red rash flooding my face like a tide that everyone in the restaurant must surely see. Those moon eyes were fighting back laughter again. Playing with me.

  ‘But you were good,’ she said. She’d taken her shoe off and I felt her foot explore my calf. Outrageous.

  ‘And what you’re doing is against regulations.’

  ‘What regulations?’

  ‘Government thingummy regulations. Applies to all restaurants. No funny stuff by patrons before dessert.’

  She giggled again. Hadn’t actually removed her foot. Mind you, I hadn’t shifted my leg either.

  ‘Would you . . . like to go outside for ten minutes?’

  I nearly had a coughing fit. God, didn’t she ever play by the rules?

  She leant forward slowly across the table so that my eyes zeroed in helplessly on her cleavage like she knew they would. And there was a generous portion of that thrusting out of the little black dress she was wearing. Her smile left her mouth slightly ajar, a delicious little trapdoor revealing her tongue caressing the back of her teeth.

  ‘There’s a ladies’ powder room out the back,’ she whispered huskily.

  I must have looked like a shocked prude. It set her off on another giggling fit. This time I could feel every eye in the room on us when she spoke. I leant forward and whispered desperately through clenched teeth, ‘Will you cut it out!’

  ‘Don’t worry, Punter, I’m not going drag to you off and have you in the powder room before my steak arrives.’

  ‘That’s good to know,’ I said meekly.

  She turned and faced the couple staring at us goggle-eyed from the table opposite. They’d abandoned their own conversation. Why wouldn’t they; ours was much more interesting.

  ‘I’ll wait till after dessert.’

  ‘You’re trouble,’ I said with a grin.

  I tiptoed gingerly out of her apartment at six the next morning and went home to try and get some form study done for that afternoon’s races. Who was the one who could hardly walk? This was getting ridiculous. Che, my sixteen-month-old black Burmese cat told me as much as I let myself guiltily into my apartment. He let out a high-pitched yowl designed to let me know that I’d been neglecting him. I fixed him up some dried food, put on the kettle and jumped into the bathroom for a quick shower.

  When I came back out into the kitchen, Che had already finished his breakfast but he gave it a try; pulled a face as though I’d only doled out half rations.

  ‘I don’t think so, buster, you’ve had enough,’ I said, picking him up and opening the back door. Outside, Mrs Givan, my downstairs neighbour, was already putting out her first load of washing. A day like today, with a hot northerly and the forecast for thirty-two degrees, she’d be good for at least three more loads. It had me beat how much washing an old widow could possibly find to do.

  ‘Here,’ I said to Che, setting him down, ‘Go out and play with Mrs Givan. Do you good to get an airing.’

  Over freshly ground coffee, I did some form and marked out betting prices for the races I wanted to play. After an hour or so I was done. I suppose I’m what you call a lazy sort of punter. For a person who makes his living from the track, I don’t usually dedicate myself to hours of form study like some of the pros do. There’s a woman punter I know, they call her the Professor, because she’s always studying the horses. She spends up to ten hours a day doing the form; I mean, can you believe it? If the winners don’t jump out at me inside of ten minutes, I move on to the next race. I’ve got better things to do than read the Winning Post cover to cover.

  My mobile rang; it was Billy.

  ‘Punter, you still catching up with me for breakfast at eight?’

  ‘What’s on the menu?’

  ‘Poached eggs and mushrooms on rye and fresh juice and coffee.’

  ‘I’ve already left,’ I said, hanging up.

  Half an hour later, I drove past Gino’s looking for a park. You’d think early on a Saturday morning I’d get a space right outside. Not so. The twenty-four/seven supermarket opposite always had people taking the car parks on the road, so I ended up having to find a spot a couple of hundred metres past the railway boom gates. I hardly ever came over this side of the railway tracks, but when I did I was always surprised by how much it had changed since I was a kid. The shops were all different back then. There was a milk bar where my brother and I used to ogle Mrs Vladimoss’s daughter, Angie. In the summer when Angie wore those low-cut tank tops, we’d be in there four times a day. I wonder if she realised we didn’t just come in solely for her strawberry malted milkshakes. The milk bar was long gone, as were Mrs Vladimoss and her daughter. So too were the haberdashery and the fish and chip shop. In fact, as I thought about it, most of the new shops that had sprung up replacing them were restaurants and cafés, catering for the younger crowd which had shifted in and always seemed too busy to cook for themselves. There was another pizza shop which had recently opened; competition for Gino’s, but it was all good for business and kept Billy on his toes. There was also a Vietnamese restaurant and a Chinese noodle shop, plus a Japanese sushi place which only opened at lunchtimes. It looked like this end of the street was starting to prosper.

  Most of these shops seemed to have suddenly sprouted Christmas decorations. Ribbons and streamers and fat red Santa Clauses riding sleighs pulled by reindeer had appeared like mushrooms after a shower of rain. It was like an outbreak, a splash of colour that had swept through the street. I was thinking that perhaps I’d better have a word to Billy about us doing something for Gino’s or we’d look the odd one out. As I walked past the Vietnamese restaurant, I noticed a panel of tin sheeting covering a broken front window. Perhaps a kid had left a bike leaning against the glass pane and it had fallen through. Either that or some drunken hoon had kicked it in. A few minutes later I walked under the sign that proudly announced Gino’s Pizza. In smaller letters underneath it said: Licensee, Billy McCarroll. I’d cut Billy in on a third of the place, with the only stipulation that my name was kept out of the books. A while ago, I’d come into a windfall. I decided a run-down pizza joint might make a good place to park the money, especially during the winter months when the tracks were too wet to bet on and I couldn’t get a reliable earn from the horses. Billy knows how to keep his mouth shut and to this day, the only person who knows it’s my business is Billy himself.

  I’d owned Gino’s for a couple of years now and unlike the early days, it was actually starting to pay me a wage, rather than drain my pockets of cash. I’d finished renovating and transformed it from the dark and dingy place it used to be. I’d put in French doors which opened outwards into the street. I’d replaced all the scungy furniture with colourful, funky tables and chairs from Ikea. When we’d got a liquor licence, I put in a new bar at considerable expense. In fact, about the only thing the place had in common with old man Gino who used to own it, was that his name was still on the sign above the door.

  Billy let me in when he heard the bell and then closed the door behind us. He led me out to the kitchen, chattering cheerfully away as he always did, asking me questions then answering them himself before I could even open my mouth.

  ‘How’s it going, Punter? Found me a winner for today? Course you ’ave. Probably been up half the night doin’ form, haven’t you.’

  I’d been up half the night, that much was true. It must have shown in my eyes and my manner; I was still dead tired.

  ‘Ah,’ said Billy, latching on. He didn’t miss much. ‘Don’t tell me, another late one with Miss Troubles, was it?
’

  I ignored the reference to Maxine. ‘This meeting is strictly about business,’ I said, reaching for the cup of coffee he’d put down in front of me.

  ‘Oh right, of course. And she’s none of my business,’ he said, busying himself about the stove.

  ‘Damn right she’s not. Hey,’ I said, ‘did you know the Vietnamese restaurant down the road got its window broken?’

  ‘Tan Tat’s?’

  ‘Yeah. Looked recent, maybe last night. Did you hear anything?’

  Billy shook his head. ‘Not a thing. Musta been some smart-arse kid walking by. Little bastards got nothing better to do. They should make ’em all go on compulsory national service.’

  If Billy had his way, the entire youth of Australia would be packed off to boot camp and made to serve out two years of military service. Not that Billy had actually done any time in the army, but he thought it such a good idea that it was obviously the cure for all of our delinquent teenagers’ behaviour.

  ‘You wouldn’t see a kid in Israel kickin’ in a shop window, would you?’ he said defiantly.

  ‘I’ve never been to Israel, Billy.’

  ‘Either have I, but I bet you wouldn’t see any kids kickin’ in shop windows there. They’ve all learnt a bit of respect, serving time in the army.’

  ‘It might have been an accident, perhaps a kid leaning his bike against the window and it fell through.’

  Billy scoffed. ‘Two years in the Nasho,’ he said solemnly, ‘it’s the only way to learn those little bastards.’

  He must have been reading my mind, because he changed the topic and asked if we should start putting up some Christmas decorations like the other shops in the strip.

  ‘You know, I was just thinking that,’ I said. ‘Perhaps we should get into the Christmas spirit.’

  ‘You want me to get a quote for some Christmassy stuff? You know, Santas, angels, the sort of shit everyone puts up?’