'Switch it on, Mike.'
I glanced at the men behind me, trying to smile. I wasn't sure that this was a good idea. It wasn't the image I thought we should portray.
'Just switch it on at the plug, Mike, and I'll do the rest. Come on, Tim, Neville, you can't pretend you don't want to have a go.'
With a low whine, the surfboard jolted slowly into life. Dennis bent his knees and stuck one hand forward, wiggling his fingers. 'What - I - haven't - told - you, gentlemen, is that simulators will also - be - whoops!' He struggled to keep his balance. 'There we go . . . The simulators will be on site for clients to learn on before they go out on the water. It's a complete - package.'
Even those who had never been on the water in their lives, he said, gasping with the effort, would be able to practise in private before exposing themselves to the gaze of their fellow holidaymakers. I don't know if it was the bizarre improbability of this machine forming part of the proposal, or Dennis's evident enjoyment, but within a few minutes even I had to admit that he was winning them over. I watched as Tim and Neville crept closer to the machine, sipping the champagne that Tina had handed to them.
Their finance man, a florid heavyweight called Simons, had already taken off his shoes, to reveal surprisingly threadbare socks, and the two junior members of their team were quoting at each other from the pages of surfing slang that Tina had prepared.
Dennis had imagination, I had to hand it to him.
'What happens if we turn it up, Dennis?' Neville was smiling. I wondered if that was a good sign.
'Tina has given you - a - list,' he said breathlessly. 'I believe - I'll be - whoops! "Catching a pounder."'
Neville had moved closer. He took off his jacket and handed his glass to his secretary. 'What level will you go to, Dennis?'
He was, I had guessed, one of nature's competitors.
But so was Dennis. 'Any you want, Nev. Turn her up,' he cried, his face beaded with sweat. 'We'll see who can catch the biggest wave, eh?'
'Go on, Mike,' Neville urged. I smiled. They were all enjoying themselves. As Dennis had guessed, the simulator had drawn away their attention from the South African rumours.
'I've always fancied a bit of the old surf,' said Tim, removing his jacket too. Before them, the simulator whined and juddered under Dennis's weight. 'What level you on there, old chap?'
'Three,' I said, glancing at the dial. 'I really don't think--'
'Come on, we can do better than that. Turn him up, Mike. Let's see who can stay on longest.'
'Yes, turn him up,' the grey suits of Vallance Equity Financing chanted, the veneer of restraint peeled away by amusement.
I looked at Dennis, who nodded, then motioned towards the dial. 'Come on, Mike old boy, bring on the waves.'
'You're stoked, Dennis!' Tim was checking the surfing terminology. 'The waves are gnarly, but you're stoked!'
Despite his apparent gaiety, Dennis was now sweating profusely. He tried to smile, but I saw a hint of desperation in his eyes as he tried to stay aloft the now rapidly undulating board. 'Want me to take you down a notch, Dennis?' I offered.
'No! No! I'm - stoked! How long have I been at level four, chaps?'
'Take him to five!' yelled Neville, stepping forward and grasping the dial. 'Let's see how he rides the - ah, the crunchers!'
'I'm not--' I began.
Afterwards, no one was sure how it had happened. Dennis was one of the few people in the room who had not drunk any champagne. But somehow the simulator was booted up to its highest level at the moment when Dennis's balance failed him. With a terrible cry he was hurled clear of the surrounding inflatable cushions and across the boardroom, more swiftly than someone his size should have been, to land heavily on his hip.
It broke, of course. Those who hadn't guessed that the impact would do it heard the sickening crunch. I don't think I'll ever forget that sound. It removed, for me, even the slender desire I'd felt to try the machine. As I've mentioned, I'm not one of nature's risk-takers.
There was pandemonium. Everyone crowded round. Over the exclamations of concern and cries of 'Call an ambulance!' the surfboard gyrated and the Beach Boys sang on.
'Australia, eh?' said Neville, as Dennis was stretchered towards the lift. 'Unforgettable presentation. We're definitely interested. When you're out of hospital we'll talk more about the site.'
'Mike will send you a copy of the site report. Won't you, Mike?' Dennis spoke through clenched teeth, his face grey with pain.
'Sure.' I tried to look as confident as he had sounded.
As he was loaded into the ambulance, he beckoned me closer. 'I know what you're thinking,' he whispered. 'You'll have to compile one.'
'But the timing - the wedding--'
'I'll square it with Vanessa. Best you're out of the way for most of the planning anyway. Book yourself a flight this afternoon. And for God's sake, Mike, come back with a plan that's going to make this site work.'
'But we haven't even--'
'I'll stall them as long as it takes for you to pull it together. But this is our biggest ever development. I want to know I was right to promote you, that you can bring it in.'
It didn't occur to him that I might refuse. That I might put my personal life before the needs of the company. But, then, he was probably right. I'm a company man. A safe pair of hands. I booked the flight that afternoon. Business class in one of the Asian carriers was cheaper than economy in both my initial choices.
Four
Greg
What's an okay time of day to start on the beer? According to my old man, any time after midday. He used to sink them like my mother sank cups of tea, cracking open a Toohey's every couple of hours or so when he took a break from whatever house he was building.
He was a big bloke, and you'd never have known he was drinking that much. My mum reckons that was cos he was permanently drunk; cheerful in the afternoons, ebullient at tea, a little muzzy in the mornings from the night before. We never had the misfortune to deal with him stone-cold sober.
I believe the right time is around two p.m., unless I'm working, in which case it's whatever time I bring Sweet Suzanne back in. You wouldn't catch me drunk at the helm - whatever my faults, I'd never put my boat or my passengers at risk. But a cold beer at Kathleen's, with the sun high in the sky and a few chips on the table, that'll do me. Can't see how anyone could object to that. Apart from my ex.
According to Suzanne, there's never a good time for me to drink beer. She said I was a mean drunk, an ugly drunk, and drunk too often to make up for it. She said that was why she could no longer stand the sight of me. She said that was why I was losing my looks. She said that was why we'd never had kids - although she'd refused point-blank when I suggested she and I head for the doc to see if he could work it out. And I told her - I might not be an angel and I'm the first to admit I'm not the easiest bloke to be hitched to - there's not a lot of men in Australia would volunteer to have their tackle tampered with, especially by another bloke.
But that was how bad I wanted kids. And that was why, as I left my solicitor's office at eleven twenty-five - amazing how you keep track of time when you're paying by the hour and it's Saturday rates - I decided that, as far as I was concerned, eleven twenty-five a.m. was the perfect time to crack open a cold can of VB, even though it was chilly enough for me to be wearing my sweater, and the wind was too high to sit outside without turning blue.
I guess that beer must have been a two-fingers to her, as much as anything. Her and her bloody fitness-instructor bloke and her half-share of everything and her stupid demands. Because, to be honest, it didn't taste that great. I was going to drink one at the pub but somehow, when I thought about it, sitting in a pub by yourself at eleven twenty-five in the morning seemed a little . . . sad. Even on a Saturday.
So I sat in the front of my truck, drinking my beer with a little less speed than I might have done, waiting for the point when it would stop feeling like an effort, and start easing the hours along from
the inside. I had no customers that day. I'd had to admit my numbers had dropped a lot since I'd graffitied the boat. Liza had helped me paint over it at the weekend, and told me briskly that if I kept my mouth shut everyone would have forgotten about it in a week or two. And I did - I was going to have to work like a bloody dog to pay the kind of settlement that that ex of mine was demanding.
'A clean break', they called it. The same phrase doctors use when they talk about a snapped limb. And that was how it felt, I can tell you. So painful that if I thought about it too hard it made me feel physically sick.
But for now I sat in my cab in the car park thinking of how I had watched the tourists totter down Whale Jetty in their high heels, clutching their video cameras and their whalesong CDs, and eye Suzanne warily, as if she might jump out of the water to reveal some other blasphemy.
If I hadn't had other plans that day, I would have taken her out by myself. Even after a beer. I'd found that sometimes just sitting in the bay watching the bottlenose made me feel better. They stick their heads up with those stupid old smiles as if they're having a joke with you, and sometimes you can't help but laugh, even on days when you want to slit your wrists. I guess we were all a bit like that, the crews. We knew that was the best bit - just you and those creatures, out in the silence of the water.
'At least you didn't have kids,' the solicitor had remarked, checking out the joint account. She'd no idea what she'd said.
I'd finished the second beer when I saw him. I'd crumpled the tin in my fist and was about to chuck it into the passenger footwell when I clocked him. You couldn't miss him. He stood there in his dark blue pen-pusher's suit, flanked by two oversized matching suitcases, gazing back towards the main street. I stared at him until he clocked me back, then stuck my head out of the window. 'You all right, mate?'
He hesitated, then picked up his cases and stepped forward. His black lace-up shoes had been polished to within an inch of their lives. Not the kind of bloke I'd normally have got chatting to, but he looked dead beat, and I guess I felt sorry for him. One deadbeat to another, like.
When he reached my window, he dropped the cases and fished a piece of paper out of his pocket. 'I think my taxi's dropped me at the wrong place. Can you tell me if there's a hotel near here?'
A Pom. I might have guessed. I squinted at him. 'There's a few, mate. Which end of Silver Bay you after?'
He glanced at his piece of paper again. 'It just says the . . . ah . . . Silver Bay Hotel.'
'Kathleen's place? It's not a hotel as such. Not any more.'
'Is it much of a walk?'
I guess curiosity got the better of me. You don't often see men dressed up like a dog's dinner in this neck of the woods. 'She's a way up the road. Hop in. Got a bit of business over there myself. You can sling your bags in the back.'
I saw doubt pass over his face, as if an offer of a lift was to be mistrusted. Or perhaps he didn't want his smart luggage touching my seaweedy gear in the back. This bugged me a little, and I nearly changed my mind. But he dragged his cases round to the tailgate and I watched him haul them over the side. Then he opened the door and climbed in, struggling as his feet made contact with the pile of empties.
'Mind your shoes on those tinnies,' I said, as I pulled off. 'The beer should be long gone, but I can't promise.'
As a name 'Silver Bay' is a little misleading. It's not really one bay at all but two, separated by Whale Jetty, which sticks out on the piece of land that cuts through them. From above, I used to say, the sea looks like a giant blue backside. (Suzanne would raise her eyebrows at that but, then, she raised her eyebrows at almost everything I said.)
Kathleen's place sat on one of the bays, the furthest, right at the end, near the point that took you out to the open sea. All that remained on her side, really, was the old Bullen house, the museum and the sand dunes. The other side of Whale Jetty was MacIver's Seafood Bar and Grill, the fish market, and then, as you moved further from Kathleen's, the growing spread of the town.
He told me his name was Mike, and I forget his surname. He didn't say much else. I asked him if he was here on business, and he said, 'Pleasure, mainly.' I remember thinking, What the hell kind of bloke dresses like that on his holidays? He said he'd just got off the plane that morning and he should have had a hire car but the company had screwed up and said they'd deliver one to him up here from Newcastle tomorrow.
'Long flight, but,' I said.
He nodded.
'Been here before?'
'Sydney. Once. I wasn't there very long.'
I figured he was in his mid-thirties. He looked at his watch a lot, for someone who wasn't working. I asked him how he came to be booked in to Kathleen's. 'It's not the busiest,' I said, glancing pointedly at his expensive suit. 'I thought someone like you'd want to be somewhere . . . you know . . . smarter.'
He looked straight ahead, as if he was working out his answer. 'I heard the area was nice,' he said. 'It was the only hotel I could find listed.'
'You really want to be over at the Blue Shoals up the coast there,' I said. 'Pretty nice place, that. En-suites, Olympic-sized pool, all that jazz. Monday to Thursday they do a pretty good all-you-can-eat buffet too. Fifteen dollars a head, I think it is. Fridays the price goes up a bit.' I swerved to avoid a dog that loped across the road. 'And there's the Admiral, in Nelson Bay. Satellite telly in every room, the decent channels, not the crap. You'd get a good deal this time of year - I happen to know there's hardly anyone in there.'
'Thank you,' he said eventually. 'If I decide to move, that may come in useful.'
After that there wasn't much we said to each other. I drove, feeling a bit irritated that the guy hadn't made more of an effort. I'd picked him up, driven him all the way - a cab ride would have cost him a good ten bucks - given him the low-down on the area, and he made barely any effort to talk to me.
I was half thinking of saying something - I guess the beer had warmed me up a little - but then I realised he'd fallen asleep. Out cold. Not even a sharp-suited businessman looks like a winner when he's drooling on his shoulder. For some reason this made me feel better and I found myself whistling all the way along the coast road to Silver Bay.
Kathleen had done up the table something beautiful. I saw the cloth and the balloons long before I saw anything else, the white damask billowing in the brisk winds, the balloons bobbing in a bid to break free for the heavens.
The home-made bunting read 'Happy Birthday, Hannah', and below it, the birthday girl and a gang of her mates were squealing at some bloke with a snake wrapped round his arm.
For a minute I forgot about the visitor in my cab. I climbed out and walked along the driveway, remembering with a jolt that the party had started an hour earlier.
'Greg.' Kathleen had a way of looking you up and down that told you she knew exactly where you were coming from. 'Nice of you to make it.'
'Who's that?' I nodded towards the bloke with the snake.
'The Creature Teacher, I believe he calls himself. Every creepy-crawly you can imagine. Giant cockroaches, snakes, tarantulas . . . He lets the kids hold them, stroke them, that kind of thing. It was what Hannah asked for.' She shuddered. 'Can't think of anything more disgusting.'
'In my day you'd stamp on 'em,' I agreed, 'with your Blundstones on.'
There were eight kids, and a few adults, mainly other crew. That didn't surprise me. Hannah was a funny kid, old before her time, and we were all used to her hanging around with us. She had done since she was small.
It was good to see her with some kids her own age. Apart from that girl Lara, I hardly ever saw her with one. You'd forget how young she was, half the time. Liza said she was like that, a bit solitary. I sometimes wondered whether she was talking about Hannah or herself.
Kathleen handed me a cup of tea, and I took it, hoping she couldn't smell the beer on my breath. It didn't seem right, somehow, at a child's party. And I was very fond of that kid.
'Your boat's a bit prettier now.' Kathleen grinned.
'I suppose you know Liza helped me repaint her name.'
'That temper of yours'll get you into trouble.' She tutted. 'Old enough to know better, I'd say.'
'Is this you telling me off, Kathleen?'
'You're not that drunk, then.'
'One,' I protested. 'Just one. Okay, maybe two.'
She glanced at her watch. 'And it's just after midday. Well, good for you.'
You've got to hand it to the Shark Lady. She tells it as she sees it. Always has, always will. Not like Liza. She looks at you as if there's a whole other conversation going on in her head, and when you ask her what she's thinking (like a woman! That's what she reduces you to!) she'll shrug as if nothing's going on at all.
'Hi, Greg.' Hannah ran past, beaming. I remember that feeling - when you're a kid and it's your birthday and for one day everyone makes you feel like the most special person in the world. She paused just long enough to clock the little parcel under my arm. She's an angel, that girl, but she's not stupid.
'Oh, this is for your aunt Kathleen,' I said.
She stopped right in front of me, mischief in her eyes. 'How come it's got kids' wrapping paper?' she said.
'It has?'
'It's for me,' she ventured.
'Are you saying your aunt Kathleen's too old for this paper?' I put on my best innocent face.
It had never worked with Suzanne either. She stared at it, trying to work out what it might be. She's not the kind of kid to snatch. She's cautious - thinks before she acts. I couldn't bear making her wait any longer, so I handed it over. I have to admit, I was quite excited myself.
She ripped it open, flanked by her friends. They were all growing up, I noticed, losing the skinny little legs and the chubby cheeks. In a couple you could already see the women they would become. I had to fight my sadness at the thought that some would end up like Suzanne. Dissatisfied, nagging . . . faithless.
'It's a key,' she said, puzzled, as she held it aloft. 'I don't get it.'
'A key?' I said, making myself look confused. 'Are you sure?'