Sucked In

by Shane Maloney

  I’d been drinking her in with rapt attention. ‘No, no.’ I shook my head furiously. ‘It’s my fault. My son’s a half-wit. Chip off the old block. He only gave me your message this morning. I’d’ve called earlier but I didn’t have your number. I haven’t, um…’ I glanced at her casual outfit. ‘We could, er, go somewhere else instead, if you like.’

  Not really. Not tonight, anyway. I couldn’t jeopardise my chance for a discreet tête-à-tête with Barry Quinlan during the post-banquet mix-n-mingle.

  ‘And miss the fun and games?’ said Lanie brightly. ‘No way.’ She hoisted her gym bag. ‘Do you know the Duxton Hotel?’

  ‘Used to be the Commercial Travellers’?’

  The Duxton’s place in Melbourne hostelry history wasn’t the point. She reached over and firmed the knot of my tie, an eighty-dollar silk Armani I’d bought myself for Christmas.

  ‘328 Flinders Street. Meet me in the lobby in half an hour.’ She spun on her heels and took off at a rapid clip.

  Her bum wasn’t big at all, not really.

  I re-inflated my male ego, edged through the Understanding Modern Art crowd milling at the classroom door and went down to street level. The Duxton was less than two blocks away. I sauntered towards it, rehearsing some studly moves in the shop windows and whistling under my breath.

  People were coming from all directions, heading towards the river. Some carried rolled-up banners, protesters bound for the anti-casino rally. Others were evidently angling for good vantage points to watch the fireworks or do some star-spotting. Kylie and Kerry would be representing the A-list and a who’s-that cast of B and C celebrities would soon be debouching from hired limos for exclusive private dinners, before the doors were flung open to the punting public.

  The Duxton was one of Melbourne’s first skyscrapers. A fine example of Belle Époque Moderne, its twelve storeys had spent most of the twentieth century descending into shabby gentility as a home away from home for suitcase-and-sample men. Recently, it had been refurbished for the Asian package-tour trade. I found the lobby full of heaped suitcases and gregarious gents in comfortable trousers with faces like Genghis Khan. Not the trousers, the Chinamen.

  I bought a Jamesons and water at the bar, sat in a new-smelling club armchair and re-read my entrée card to the blackjack dealers’ beanfeast. Ribbon cutting and banquet, Crown Towers, eight for eight-thirty. Hotel entrance.

  The evening was still mild but there was a promise of drizzle in the air. With luck, it would hold off until we’d walked across the Queen Street bridge to the designated entry-point.

  At ten past eight, Lanie descended the wide staircase from the first floor, displaying herself for my appraisal.

  Her chestnut hair was twisted up, a few strands left artfully free to draw the eye to the sculptural curve of her neck. Her torso was tightly wrapped in a bolt-width of titianred brocade that accentuated her full figure and left her shoulders bare except for a rain-fleck of freckles. The skirt was black and multi-layered and flared out slightly as it dropped over her hips, falling just past her knees. She was wearing Medea mascara and loose-fitting silver bangles, giving her the sultry look of a wilful slave-girl. Her shoes, thank you Jesus, were flat.

  She was like a store of plundered treasure. Truly here was a woman who made you want to rush out and steal a horse, lead a raid, sack a city. It was all I could do not to jump up on my chair and let out a howl to rouse the Duxton’s venerable Mongol horde.

  For the moment, however, I’d be satisfied just to take her to the fun-fair. We’d share a sarsaparilla and I’d win her a kewpie-doll. On the way home, we’d sneak a quick pash in the back of the cab and I’d find out what sort of a kisser she was. Important, that. The sine qua non of all that might follow.

  ‘Ready?’ she said.

  I presented the crook of my arm and strolled her towards the door, the man who broke the bank at Monte Carlo. As we passed reception, she took a key from her small black clutch and handed it to the girl behind the desk.

  ‘Thanks, Amie.’

  The girl beamed helpfully and returned the key to its slot. ‘Anytime, Miss Lane.’

  ‘Amie’s one of my ex-students,’ Lanie explained. ‘She’s just got her diploma in Hospitality Studies at Maribyrnong University.’

  We crossed the road to Banana Alley, pulled along by the throng. When we reached the Queen Street bridge, we were confronted by a scene part Dante, part Cecil B. DeMille, part situationalist manifestation.

  On the southern bank of the Yarra squatted the long, low lump of the casino. Here was the Temple of Mammon, intermittently lit by huge balls of flame belching from square, chimney-like pillars on the riverside promenade.

  Facing it across the shimmering ribbon of water was the Multitude of the Righteous. This polyglot host of protesters had assembled in a featureless strip of urban park to display their opposition to the plutocratic–autocratic conspiracy behind the sucker-fleecing works on the opposite bank.

  On the next bridge, King Street, the suckers were queued, bumper-to-bumper, scarcely able to contain their impatience to be fleeced. And on our bridge, Queen Street, milled those who had come for the show. Or, in our case, a free feed and party favours.

  We stepped up our pace, mindful of the time and the density of the crowd. Every few metres, flyers were thrust at us by baby-faced Trotskyists, Gamblers’ Helpline volunteers and touts for the Santa Fe titty bar.

  ‘When do the fireworks start?’ said Lanie, rubbing her bare arms against the faint chill rising from the river.

  ‘They seem to have started already.’

  I pointed from the bridge railing to the speaker’s platform at the centre of the protest crowd. The clergyman at the microphone had just been upstaged by an actress who was baring her breasts in a statement of objection to media superficiality. That’ll show ’em, I thought. The poor pastor didn’t know whether to cheer, go blind or head for the Santa Fe.

  As we reached the far side of the bridge, we hit a thick cluster of gawkers who were backed up behind a low wall of crash barriers. Across the street, cars were pulling up at a red carpet, disembarking their cargo of league footballers, former lead singers of former one-hit bands and various other VIPs. I spotted Vic Valentine’s speed-pushing informant Jason as he stepped from a stretch limo with a soap opera starlet. Or was she a current affairs host? Hard to tell.

  ‘That’s where we need to get,’ I told Lanie.

  Putting my arm around her, I steered her through the fringes of the crowd. This gave me a pretext to press my face against her hair and inhale her slightly-musky, slightly-spicy fragrance. I was strongly tempted to nibble her neck, but decided that munching her jugular at this formative juncture in our relationship might send the wrong message.

  We got to where the crowd petered out to a thin line with a lousy view. I let go of Lanie and squeezed through a narrow gap in the crash barriers. A constable detached himself from a strung-out line of bored cops. He advanced, arm extended, palm vertical, in a creditable impersonation of a real security guard.

  Socialise the costs, I thought, privatise the profits.

  ‘Sir,’ he said. Sir as in get your arse back behind the barrier pronto, pal, Hugo Boss or no Hugo Boss.

  I held up my entrée card. ‘Sorry officer, I’m afraid I’ve come the wrong way.’ Silly-billy me. ‘My companion and I are invited guests.’ I twisted my head back helplessly towards the well-dressed woman I’d left stranded behind me. ‘I’m a member of parliament.’

  The cop gave me a look of censure just short of outright contempt, inspected my ticket and beckoned Lanie through the gap. He pointed across the road. ‘That way, sir.’

  I took Lanie’s hand and we walked towards the kerb where the red carpet started.

  ‘Pity the Rolls is being washed tonight,’ I said. ‘Still, it’s nice to see how the little people live.’

  Lanie was lapping it up, already having fun. A cheeky minx, laughing at it all with her eyes. A white Fairlane with Commonwealth p
lates drew up at the roll-out Axminster and a compact, dapper, mid-sixtyish man in a dinner suit stepped from the back seat. The senator extended his hand and drew a woman of the same vintage from the interior, dark-haired in a tight perm and ankle-length evening gown.

  ‘Do you know who that is?’ I asked Lanie.

  She shook her head. ‘He looks vaguely familiar. Have I seen him on TV?’

  ‘He’s one of the world’s greatest living actors,’ I said.

  ‘Two days ago he gave me a private performance that would’ve made Al Pacino weep tears of envy.’

  I was half-turning to half-explain my little joke when a shout came from behind us. At the section of the crowd with the best view, a figure in a raincoat had climbed over the barrier. He was heading towards the red carpet.

  A cop was moving to intercept him, and he increased his pace to a jog, then began to sprint. It was Sid Gilpin. He was heading straight for Barry Quinlan, pulling something from beneath the flaps of his coat. Christ, a machete. The blade was wide and dark and its edge was honed to a silver strip.

  Security toughs in bomber jackets appeared out of nowhere. Cops were shouting and uniforms were converging on Gilpin. They were closing fast, but not fast enough.

  Quinlan, oblivious to the ruckus, was advancing up the carpet, Mrs Quinlan beside him. Gilpin was ten paces away, fifteen, ten. For a sick man, he was moving astonishingly fast. I let go of Lanie’s hand and raced forward.

  I got to Quinlan a step ahead of Gilpin, slamming into his back with my lowered shoulder. Definitely a reportable offence. Quinlan bounced off me and flew forward. I hit the ground, maximum impact, just as the fireworks went off. They were really good. Worth every cent of the five million.

  I could see them even with my eyes closed.

  ‘Dad?’

  Red’s voice pulsated out of the void.

  ‘How are you feeling?’

  How did the damn fool boy think I felt? And why wasn’t he doing something about the crazed monkey that was trying to break my head open with a sledgehammer?

  ‘Dad?

  He was close, a moving shape on the other side of my eyelids. If I tried, maybe I could see him. I commanded my eyelids to open. No, they said. Yes, I insisted. Red’s worried face filled my vision, then drew back. I was lying in a bed. A green curtain surrounded us. We were in a hospital.

  ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Feel okay.’

  ‘That’s good.’ He still looked worried.

  I leaned forward and he propped me up with a pillow. The throbbing rushed back, then subsided. My mind was clearing, remembering what had happened.

  First came the jarring impact, then the sensation of flying as my limp body was grabbed and rushed inside the building by a thicket of security men. In a vertiginous rush, they propelled me though a series of doors, my head reeling. I must have gone nighty-nights for a moment. Next thing I knew, I was lying in a moving ambulance. And then on a gurney in a corridor with somebody shining a light in my eye and asking me if I could remember my name. I must have got the answer wrong because the next time I surfaced I was being fed into a giant white plastic doughnut.

  ‘You sure you’re okay?’ said Red.

  A motherly, vaguely familiar woman in scrubs came through the curtain. ‘Feeling better, Mr Whelan?’ she said. ‘How’s the head?’

  ‘Not too bad.’ Apart from the white-hot harpoons that shot through my brain whenever I spoke.

  ‘Doctor will be round to see you soon.’ She checked my vitals, gave Red a reassuring smile and floated away.

  Soon, in hospital parlance, meant three hours. Not that I could do much but wait anyway. Whenever I tried to get vertical, it was spin-out city.

  Red told me that a woman called Andrea Lake had rung the house to say that I’d been clobbered by a protestor at the casino and been taken to Prince Henry’s. He’d come straight over in a taxi. She was outside in the waiting area, dressed up like a bon-bon. There were a couple of guys, too, but he didn’t know who they were.

  I had a pretty fair idea.

  Not being in any position to entertain a lady, I sent the lad out to tell Lanie that I was all right, and please not to wait. I’d call her as soon as I could. I was feeling a bit groggy, so I closed my eyes and wondered where my clothes had gone. Next thing I knew, the registrar was waking me. I was suffering from concussion, he told me, but the scan indicated no serious damage. To be on the safe side, they were keeping me overnight. By then it was two o’clock and I didn’t see any point in objecting.

  Red spent the night in the chair beside my bed, bless his sweaty socks.

  Just after six, I went to the loo. Borneo dayaks had done something to my head, but my legs were back on duty and the giddiness was gone. Red found my suit in a plastic box under the bed. While I was putting it on, he went to find whoever needed telling that I was ready to go home. The bankbook had vanished.

  Red came back with two men, plain-clothes cops from headquarters in St Kilda Road. They were there to drive me home, they said. And if I felt up to it, perhaps I might answer some questions.

  Fine by me, I had a few of my own.

  We drove through the empty streets with Red in the front seat while I talked to the more senior officer in the back. By the time we got to Clifton Hill, Red’s ears were as pointy as Spock’s and I had a reasonably clear picture of the situation. Twinkle-toes Quinlan had taken it on the fly. He was a bit scuffed around the edges, but he’d responded well to a touch of five-star valet service and a steadying drink in the Bugsy Siegel Suite. The casino appreciated my self-sacrifice and trusted that I was prepared to overlook the rougher-than-usual handling meted out by its security staff in the confusion of the moment. Their representative would speak with me personally in the very near future.

  The attempted assailant was a man named Gilpin. He was currently in custody. He claimed that Senator Quinlan had been persecuting him. Could I shed any light on the subject?

  My lights, I reminded the officers, had recently been punched out. When I’d had a chance to recover, I’d be happy to provide a full statement and answer any further questions. In the meantime, I’d had a bitch of a night and thanks for the lift.

  The honcho cop, a likeable fellow, escorted us to the door. ‘A man in your position,’ he said. ‘I don’t need to remind you that since charges have been laid this matter is now sub judice.’

  ‘Ah jeez,’ said Red. ‘That means I can’t tell anyone.’

  As the cops drove away, young Tyson from the newsagent’s rode past and threw the papers over the fence. The Age described the casino event as ‘a hoop-la the likes of which Melbourne had never seen’. The knock-’em-downs didn’t get a mention. The Herald Sun was similarly mum, and so was radio news.

  The lid was on and that’s where I hoped it stayed. Reports of a machete-wielding maniac taking swipes at its patrons were not something the casino was likely to welcome, and I had some valid reasons of my own for concurring.

  Red begged off school and retired to catch a kip. I changed out of my silly galoot into trackie daks and a sloppy joe. Under the circumstances, seven-fifteen didn’t seem too early to ring Lanie. I tried to sound hale. ‘Great first date, eh?’

  ‘You’ve got some interesting moves, I’ll say that for you.’

  She wanted to come straight over, but I fended her off. Domestic squalor and a walking-wounded shuffle were not the ideal follow up to my display of heroics. What I wanted most of all was a cup of tea and a good cry.

  I’d barely got those out of the way before the phone started ringing and the rest of the day kicked in. It didn’t take Nostradamus to predict it was going to be busy.

  Mike Kyriakis called first.

  ‘We’re fucked, mate,’ he said. Overnight, inter alia, the wheels had started to fall off our Coolaroo strategy. The last-minute surprise candidate wasn’t to be Len Whitmore of the concrete gang. That was a furphy. The contender now being touted was Andrew McIntyre, Vice President of the ACTU. And with McIntyre’s name on
the ballot, it was arrivederci Canberra.

  ‘You sure?’ I said.

  Mike was pretty sure. If the unions were looking for a way to take Quinlan down a peg, McIntyre was custom made. On the other hand, there were a lot of rumours flying around. We decided to keep a weather eye on developments and get together around lunchtime.

  I went out onto the deck. The sky was overcast and the weather was still trying to make up its mind which way to jump. I downed a couple of Panadol and answered the phone.

  ‘You sound ratshit, Murray.’ It was Ayisha. ‘Hit the turps at the big event, did you?’

  ‘Hit something else,’ I said. ‘I’ll tell you about it later. But I’m not feeling too sprightly, so I’ll be working from home today.’

  ‘Nominations close at four,’ she said. ‘I’ll lodge the form at quarter to, okay?’

  Hiding my hand until the death knell was integral to the plan. The way things were turning out, it might just save me falling flat on my face. I told her about the McIntyre rumour and lined her up for the confab with Mike. Then Peter Thorsen rang.

  ‘Didn’t spot you at the opening last night,’ he said. ‘I heard you were attacked by one of the anti-casino lot.’

  ‘It was a non-violent protest,’ I said. ‘You can’t believe everything you hear. Or can you?’

  ‘McIntyre?’ he said. ‘Looks like it. But your mate Kyriakis will still get the first-round votes I promised. Just wanted you to know.’

  ‘If McIntyre runs, Mike will probably withdraw,’ I said. ‘And that nice letter you wrote me, I’ve already shredded it.’

  ‘You’re a gent, Murray. If I can ever do anything for you…’

  ‘Don’t make promises you might regret,’ I said. ‘And I know whereof I speak.’

  The next caller was offering free quotations on cladding. I told her we were happy with our current clad, but thanks for ringing. I finished the papers and emptied the dishwasher, then Helen Wright rang.