The Ambulance Chaser

by Richard Beasley

  ‘Who else?’

  ‘I thought you might have meant Laura.’

  ‘Was she a friend?’

  ‘We adored her,’ I said after a pause. ‘We played in her garden a lot for a couple of summers. And I was in love with her daughter.’

  ‘Heather?’

  ‘You know her?’

  ‘Of course. She’s back from Hong Kong soon – did you know?’ I shook my head. She sipped on her champagne, then asked, ‘What was it you were saying before, about flying chickens?’

  I told Helena about that night, about other moments we had witnessed. Mrs Green’s tears, some smashed paintings out by the garbage bin. And I told her about Bill Doyle’s fantastic right hook. And some of what Heather had told me.

  ‘I’ve heard similar things,’ Helena said after I finished. ‘Only recently from her.’ She paused and sipped champagne. Then, flouting the law, she lit up a fag and sucked deeply. ‘I always knew he was a complete prick,’ she said. ‘Plays golf with my husband, of course. As thick as thieves. They both make me sick.’

  That was the second candid admission for the evening. I let that one pass without comment, not knowing what to say, anyway. ‘You didn’t tell me what you liked about Edward’s work,’ she reminded me, changing the subject.

  ‘There’s a force to them. A boldness.’ I waited to hear if she agreed.

  She paused before turning towards me. ‘I think if I were being critical, I might say that because he’s deaf his paintings are a bit . . . loud. He’s shouting at us so we can hear him. Most of us can hear with a little less.’

  I felt myself tighten up. ‘And if you weren’t being critical?’ I asked.

  Helena laughed. ‘I’d say he captured emotions very well. Uncontrolled anger, for example. He knows all the shades. Fear and despair as well. He’s very talented.’

  ‘So, you don’t think he’s subtle enough?’

  Helena shook her head. ‘It’s not so much subtlety, although that’s part of it,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t have to give a speech with every painting, though.’

  ‘Guernica’s a speech, isn’t it?’ I said, knowing I was about to tread into unknown territory. ‘Or a symbol . . . I mean, surely art is about communicating?’

  ‘That’s a bit limiting as a concept for art, isn’t it, Chris?’

  Well, Helena, I specialise in limited concepts.

  ‘What do you like about Laura’s paintings?’ she then asked.

  When I was a boy, it was simply that she could do it. It was like magic, the way she could make pictures with her paints and her brushes. ‘I understand the stories, I think,’ I finally said. ‘A lot of art that I look at I don’t get. You know, drips and drops and splashes everywhere. Then that grid stuff, or just a few straight lines – what the hell is that, you know what I mean?’ I mentally kicked myself under the table. Too hard, and it hurt.

  ‘You’re not looking or thinking or feeling for long enough,’ she said. ‘People rush through famous galleries, look at hundreds – thousands – of paintings. It’s like reading twenty novels at once. More time on less will help.’

  ‘It’s hardly practical to go to the Louvre to look at just one painting.’

  ‘People do. All the time. The Mona Lisa?’

  I thought about it. Three trips to the Louvre. What do I remember? The Mona Lisa. Behind some glass. Anything else? Nup.

  I was going to be a renaissance man. I decided on this when I turned thirty. I was going to read every literary masterpiece, and the works of all the great left-wing thinkers, from Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, to, later, Sean Penn and the Dixie Chicks. I would champion the underdog, and organise rallies protesting the tyrannical incompetence of government. I’d be a Barossa Valley Shiraz socialist but retain credibility. A wiser, modern-day John Reed without the typhoid. I would brush up on my French, and speak conversational Italian. History, art – hell, I’d be like one of those people from Such and Such University who get interviewed on the History Channel, and who speak like they knew intimately every member of the Emperor Vespasian’s extended family and most of his favourite restaurants.

  I hadn’t got there, though. I went backwards instead. I still couldn’t even communicate in English. Not according to Sam. As for art, well, I did at least know where the Mona Lisa was. Just don’t ask me what she’s smiling about.

  ‘So,’ Helena said, turning towards me again, ‘are we going to sell you one?’

  ‘How much?’

  ‘Mr and Mrs Green?’

  ‘As an example.’

  ‘Fifteen.’

  ‘Hundred?’

  ‘Thousand. And it’s far from her best work.’

  ‘Shit.’

  ‘And rising in the market every day. She’s now becoming recognised for the wonderful artist she is.’

  ‘Maybe I’ll talk to my trustee. Perhaps he can make an investment.’

  ‘Your trustee?’

  ‘Don’t ask. It’s a long story.’

  ‘We all live in debt, Chris,’ she said.

  ‘I wrote a book with that title.’

  Fifteen thousand dollars seemed like a lot. Then again, was it? How much had Helena Abbott paid for her ‘sculpting’? Five thousand a breast? It immediately occurred to me how incongruous it was that Helena Abbott’s breasts were worth approximately two-thirds of a Laura Green painting. What kind of world is this? As I contemplated this, Helena moved on. She’d call me, she said, and offer me the best deal I’d ever get for a Laura Green.

  It’s funny what you think about at three in the morning. I found myself back in my flat that night thinking about Sam’s face. Sam the Spinner. I couldn’t see her smile, though, not even like Mona Lisa. I just saw the pained expression that was becoming more frequent as her friends married, had children. I thought about those awkward lunches at some of their houses where women she didn’t even know would talk about what a big eater their little boy was, or how many haircuts he had already had, or how many pairs of boots they’d already had to buy, and how sick they had felt during the first trimester. I would see Sam fighting that frozen look on her face, and I would shift uncomfortably in my seat and wish I was somewhere else. And Sam was wishing too. Wishing just as hard that I was someone else.

  I had started on that road to be a renaissance man when I met Sam. Mrs Green’s Alto Road. I played the part pretty well, even if I do say so myself, and she found me entirely convincing at first. I’d tricked her, though. I was a fraud. And for this sin her face hangs before me at three in the morning, as white and as sad as the moon.

  Fourteen

  ‘At South Pacific, we take a different approach,’ Barry Hardcastle told me. ‘When you have to make a claim, we know that something serious has gone wrong. So, we don’t spend our time thinking about how we can make things worse. We think only one thing. How can we help?’ Barry Hardcastle beamed at me.

  Then there we all are on the screen. The friendly South Pacific insurance people. Handing over cheques to the injured. Comforting those who have been robbed. Repairing homes, rebuilding businesses. Cut to Barry. ‘What’s our motto? Simple. We’re a friend first, an insurance company second.’ Cue Barry’s smile.

  Barry looks like he’s going to eat the camera. He’s going to eat his way out of your television set. He’s going to eat you.

  The message that I saw on my small TV screen on Monday morning was simple, as Sam the Spinner could have explained. The message in the newspaper advertisements, complete with a signed ‘guarantee’ from CEO Barry Hardcastle, was the same. South Pacific wasn’t an insurance company. Oh no. There were a lot of those. It was in the hero business. It was your saviour, your friend. A friend who made you safe. Who was the guarantor of your entire life.

  ‘Have you seen the new ads?’ I asked Clare over our now customary Monday morning coffee at Zanetta’s. I had already mentioned my ‘dates’ on Thursday and Friday with Gabby. Clare was sympathetic in an amused way when I explained I had been slowly but surely making my move
on Sydney community legal centres’ numero uno lesbian. She then made the mistake of mentioning that she had read an article about the phenomenon of hasbians – women who were gay but now dated men. She soon saw the look of hope on my face, and quickly suggested that it might only be a temporary phenomenon.

  Hasbians. Jesus Christ. My life is tough enough.

  Sam the Spinner used to call me a metrosexual. Every time I watched Jamie Oliver cooking on TV. Every time I dabbed on a touch of her moisturiser simply because my skin was dry. Every time I used her shampoo and conditioner. I didn’t have a clue what she was talking about until she told me who else was metrosexual. A whole bunch of blokes sitting with their legs crossed in the front row of fashion parades.

  ‘Is that what you want?’ I had asked Sam. ‘Is that what you want me to be? I thought you wanted a SNAG?’

  ‘I want you to get in touch with your sensitive side, your feminine side, if that’s what you mean,’ she had said, ‘but I don’t want you like those poncy chefs on TV that you watch. And you can drop Dusty. That’s not metro. That’s homo.’

  I like Dusty Springfield. Especially Dusty in Memphis. As for metrosexuals, well, I guess I’d rather base myself on a metrosexual than, say, a Taliban warlord, but as politically incorrect as he might be, I’d frankly rather use Norman Mailer than a metro as a role model. Ditto Frank Sinatra, George Clooney and Sean Penn. The same goes for Cary Grant, whom I refuse to believe was the first metrosexual. And give me Humphrey Bogart any day. Shit, no offence to a number of sporting icons who have an interest in haute couture, but I’d rather base myself on Gore Vidal than a metrosexual. Although I wouldn’t take it too far.

  I want to be in touch with my sensitive, feminine side. I’m all for bringing women to the table and smashing glass ceilings. Hell, I reached the conclusion long ago that most men are emotionally and morally unfit to be politicians, judges, priests or military leaders. I’m all for women taking over for a while, see how things pan out for the planet. Provided they’re not right-wing arsehole women. I just don’t see why I should wear make-up, or get my knickers in a knot about what hair product I may or may not be using. I really don’t.

  ‘I can’t believe you didn’t know she was gay,’ Clare said as I pondered the damage patriarchy had done to the world and the fact that metrosexuality wasn’t the answer.

  ‘It isn’t obvious,’ I said, ‘and she didn’t tell me, and I didn’t ask. It’s never been my first question.’

  ‘Perhaps she’s a LUG?’

  ‘And what would that be?’

  ‘Lesbian at university, hetero afterwards. Lesbian Until Graduation.’

  ‘You’re torturing me.’

  ‘Maybe she’s post-gay?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘She doesn’t advertise it. She doesn’t define herself purely through her sexual preference.’

  Hasbians. LUGs. SNAGs. Post-gay. Metrosexuals. I hope you can hear me screaming.

  Clare told me she hadn’t seen the commercials yet. ‘Apparently, we’re now everyone’s friend,’ I said.

  ‘Barry starring again?’

  ‘Bigger and uglier than ever. How many tonnes does the camera add again?’

  ‘What’s the theme this time?’

  ‘We’re pitched as a cross between Amnesty International and St Vincent de Paul’s. Barry plays the role of the first CEO likely to be beatified. There’s a huge ad in the paper as well. Barry giving a signed corporate guarantee to all policy-holding citizens of his undying love.’

  ‘Can I see it?’ Clare pointed to the morning papers piled on a table behind me at the front of the café. I grabbed one and opened it at the page that featured a beaming Barry Hardcastle. ‘The same message as last time, really,’ she said, folding the paper back up after scanning the ad. ‘No one can afford to live without us.’

  I put down my coffee cup and looked at Clare. ‘Funny you should say that,’ I said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Where do we keep closed files?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I just need to look at a couple.’

  I knew this wouldn’t be good enough. Clare glared at me over the rim of her cappuccino cup. ‘What are you up to, Chris?’

  ‘I need to look at some files that have been taken off the computer system. There’s an expert report I want to check.’

  ‘Bullshit.’

  I paused. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Look, I’m only asking where the files are stored. There’s no big secret about that, is there?’

  ‘And,’ Clare said, placing her cup down and leaning forward, ‘all I’m asking is what you’re up to. There’s no big secret about that, is there?’

  ‘Clare,’ I said. ‘Do you know or not?’

  She leant back in her chair and crossed her arms. ‘Penrith,’ she said.

  ‘Penrith!’ Penrith was the last stop west before the Blue Mountains, about fifty kilometres from the CBD. Without a driver’s licence I’d need to train it, or find a lift somehow. ‘How do you get access?’

  ‘You ask for a file and they retrieve it for you.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The company that stores the files for us, I imagine.’

  ‘South Pacific doesn’t own the site?’

  ‘I don’t know, Chris.’

  ‘What if you wanted access yourself? You know, to look through a number of files.’

  Clare half smiled, then glared at me again, her arms still crossed. ‘Will you just tell me what you’re up to, please?’

  ‘I will,’ I said, ‘but not today. I know I sound like a wanker saying that, but . . . I will. Later in the week.’

  Clare shook her head. ‘I sense that there’s something spectacularly foolish behind this.’

  Spectacularly foolish? Me? A disbarred lawyer? An unknowing former metrosexual with a liking for Dusty Springfield who’s in love with a socialist–feminist–lesbian and whose greatest hope in life is that she’s a LUG–Hasbian? The nerve of this woman.

  To authorise a closed-file retrieval, I needed to fill out a request form and have it signed by a team leader. To actually go out on site, though, the storage manager told me when I called, I would need a letter signed by the Head of Claims, Mr De Luca, and one of four authorised signatories in senior management.

  De Luca would be easy. I had numerous memos from him, all signed in his childlike hand. Easily copied. Senior management would be harder. Then I remembered the ad in the paper. Time for another coffee.

  ‘Can I tear this out, Mrs Z?’

  ‘Certainly, my beautiful man. You take what you want, my darling.’

  I ripped out the South Pacific advertisement from the Telegraph. The personal guarantee to customers signed by CEO Barry Hardcastle.

  ‘He your big boss, darling?’ Mrs Z said as I started to walk out.

  ‘Very big,’ I said.

  ‘You like him? He’s a nice man?’

  ‘The best.’

  I faxed my authority form during the lunch break. I had traced over Hardcastle’s signature on the advertisement and written over the indentation in ink. It was almost a perfect replica. I could have done the same with De Luca using some internal memos I had that he’d signed, but his scrawl was easy enough to copy even for an amateur forger like me.

  The fax told the storage people to expect me at 9 am on Friday. I was planning to ring in sick and spend the whole day out there. The manager of the storage facility told me when I called that they held all the closed liability and professional negligence files from all over Australia, so I could expect a mountain of material. It might take me weeks to see if there were any stories similar to Simon Broun’s and Terry Fadwell’s. I would need help.

  I rang Gabby right on five, before she was likely to have left but after the clients had gone. She had offered to help, after all. ‘It’s not a drink this time. It’s professional.’

  ‘Your due diligence?’

  ‘Right on the money.’

  ‘Will I get arrested?’

  �
��Not a chance,’ I said. ‘I’ve organised the whole thing. Perfectly legal. You’ll just have to look at some files. Permission’s been granted.’

  ‘This is crazy.’

  ‘You said you’d indulge me.’

  ‘I didn’t use those words.’

  ‘Just a couple of hours? I don’t have a car. No licence, either.’

  There was silence down the line for a few seconds. ‘Where?’ she finally said.

  ‘Um . . . just out at Penrith.’

  ‘Penrith! It’ll take a couple of hours to get there.’

  ‘You’ll be back at your desk by lunchtime. I’ll be there all weekend if you don’t help.’ Silence down the end of the line again. This time I broke it. ‘You have a car, don’t you?’

  She said I was mad, which I was, but she agreed to come. Her anti-corporate belief system got the better of her. She’d pick me up at seven thirty Friday morning.

  As soon as I put the phone down, it rang. The liquid crystal told me it was De Luca. He didn’t usually want to talk to me after five. ‘Chris,’ he said brightly after I picked up the phone. ‘Angelo here. How are things?’

  I knew immediately something was not right with the world. Angelo De Luca exchanging pleasantries with me at five ten on a Monday afternoon set my skin crawling. ‘Fine,’ I said.

  ‘Look, I’ve just had a chat with Barry Hardcastle – about you, in fact.’ What the fuck . . . I waited for more. ‘He wants to meet you tomorrow. First thing, 6.15 am at his house, outside the gates. If you’ve got a pen I’ll give you the address.’

  That prick at the storage company must have fucked me over. He’d rung up and checked if my fax was legit, if De Luca and Hardcastle had actually signed it. These people had killed Simon Broun, and Fadwell, and the Dobsons, and others. Greg Stewart had probably gone out to Penrith . . . just to investigate, on a hunch like me. A deadly hunch, as it turned out. Everything I imagined was true. And they knew I knew. Now I was going to be sent to big bad Barry’s house where I’d . . .

  ‘And you have to bring your jogging shoes and your running gear.’

  . . . exercise?

  ‘What?’