On Friday Daniel Nurse told his wife: Why dont you listen? Its staff only. No family.
His crocodile-skin suitcase was spread open on the bed and he was folding a change of underwear into it. Joyce watched him sourly. He took a couple of white shirts down from their hangers in the wardrobe and tried to figure out how to fold them. Joyce might have helped but she was going to be stuck here at home with their fourteen-year-old daughter all weekend while he went off gallivanting, so he had to do his own bloody packing.
I wouldnt be in the way, she said. I could read, walk on the beach.
Nurse turned away so that she wouldnt see his fear and strain. He also felt close to the edge of smacking her sulky mouth for her, and hed never done that before. He caught his reflection in the window and didnt like it. Short, round, pink and more or less hairless. The view beyond the glass was better. Their house was a 1920s Queenslander on stilts set into a slope of East Brisbane opposite the Norman Creek. There was a private school below the house, tiled rooftops among big old trees. Mignon Nurse would be going there in the next year or so, when hed scraped the money together for her fees. Better than the high school sprawled out on the opposite bank. The trees on that side were home to a colony of flying foxes. They stank, they were noisy, they reminded Nurse of vampires. Here, in East Brisbane, life was cleaner, more orderly.
He turned away from the window. Its a training session, for Christs sake. Im expected to share a room, some assistant manager from the Mackay branch. Ill be at lectures tonight, all day tomorrow, and tomorrow night. Were more or less shut away the whole time. Full on.
Joyce persisted. Theres no reason why we cant get a room together. You go off to your lectures, Ill lay around on the beach. If you got the urge to gamble, Id be there for a change to stop you losing the lot.
Jesus Christ, he didnt want her anywhere near the place. He should have said TrustBank was holding the workshop in Mt Isa this year. Mention the Gold Coast and it was like a red rag to a bull. Look, sweetheart, the head office boys will be there. It wouldnt look good. Theyre trying to build up a team spirit and Id be on the outer if you were there.
Joyce folded her arms. A lot of men and no wives? God, you must think Im naive.
Well be flat-out the whole time. Too buggered to muck around even if we wanted to. Plus which, they dont like it if we booze at these things.
At least, thats how it had been at the one and only TrustBank training retreat hed attended, two years ago. He tucked a pair of carpet slippers into the case. That was the right touch, for the sour look left his wifes face. Lets have a weekend down there soon, she said. Just the two of us.
Its a deal, Nurse said.
When she was gone he took his dinner suit from a forgotten corner of the wardrobe, folded it, closed the suitcase lid. He had a shitty couple of days coming upno reason why it had to be a total write-off.
He looked at his watch. Seven-thirty am, time to move. On the way out the door he kissed Joyce and Mignon, told them hed be back Sunday afternoon, and tossed the suitcase into the Volvo. The next part he loathed. Eight years ago hed been assistant manager at the East Brisbane branch of TrustBank. Ten minutes walk, there and back. Twelve months ago theyd appointed him manager of the main Logan City branch. A nice salary hike, nice car, but Logan City was thirty minutes away and it was the arse-end of the world. No way did he and Joyce want to live there, so he was trying to learn to put up with the long drive, and the barren place, with its jobless kids and mothers pushing prams around the shopping centres.
At eight-fifteen he slotted the Volvo into his own space, the only one in the tiny paved courtyard at the rear of the bank, and selected the key to the back door of the bank. The all-night security man was dozing in a vinyl armchair in the waiting room outside Nurses office. The man yawned, looked at his watch, walked away to the tearoom.
Other staff members began to arrive. Unlike Nurse, they had to wait while the security guard opened the double doors at the front of the building. Nurse greeted them, smiled at Angie, the teller with the boobs, and went into his office. It was going to be a hellish morningthe in-tray was full and he had an 11 am appointment with a man he didnt want to see.
To distract himself,. Nurse phoned through for coffee and biscuits and drafted a number of letters and memos. One matter took some thought. At the end of next week, from Friday afternoon until the following Monday morning, his bank was going to be holding deposits on behalf of the two smaller Logan City branches. They were having state of the art safes, cameras and alarms installed and Head Office thought it would save time and trouble to move their holdings to his vaults rather than to haul them up to town. Close to two million dollars, mostly fifty- and one-hundred dollar bills. Extra effort for Nurse and his staff, of course, a fact that his letter to the other managers made clear.
He wrote: I shall expect delivery to this branch at 4 pm precisely, so kindly ensure that the notes are correctly stacked, bound and secured in strongboxes of the appropriate dimensions, ready for collection by Mayne Nickless. I would count it as a favour if you would impress upon the workmen in your respective branches that they have been contracted to complete the refit before Monday lunchtime. I need not remind you that every hour the money is on the road or at this branch is an insecure hour. He underlined insecure.
At ten-thirty Nurse had a second round of biscuits and coffee. That was a mistake: fifteen minutes later, he went to the mens, his stomach churning. At ten-fifty-nine Angie showed the man who had inspired it into his office.
Danny boy.
Nurse stood shakily. The mans name was Ian Lovell and he had a long, raw-boned look, his hair fine and sun-bleached, his body hard and sinewy. His vigour and humour were plain, characteristics that earned him covetous looks from Angie. Lovell folded himself into an armchair, stretched out his legs, and directed a grin lurking with menace at Nurse. There was a briefcase next to his R M Williams boots. Nurse sat down and tried not to think about the briefcase.
So, Danny, what story did you give the missus?
It was a bushmans voice, rapid and almost unintelligible, but the man was a pilot, not a bushman. Nurse wondered how the air traffic controllers ever understood him. A weekend training session for bank staff, he said.
Did she buy it?
Nurse nodded.
Fucking women. Take my advice, ditch the family, become a free man. Lovell nudged the briefcase across the carpet. You know what you have to do?
Im in room 212. Between ten and four tomorrow Ill have three visitors. They each give me twenty-five thousand dollars
Count it, Lovell said. Dont let the bastards pull one on you. and I give them the stuff.
Say it, Lovell grinned. Heroin.
Heroin.
Then the genial crinkles disappeared from around Lovells eyes and he sat forward in his chair. No fuck-ups, understand? Make sure you count the money first.
You told me that.
Im telling you again.
I dont like it, Nurse said. How do I know these people wont just knock me on the head and take the stuff, the heroin?
Lovell leaned back again and laced his hands behind his head. He had a long trunk full of tightly bunched muscles, and Nurse feared it. Two reasons. One, they know its good stuff and theres plenty more where it comes from. Two, they know I know where they live. He showed his teeth. Same as I know where you live.
Nurse played with a paper clip. He needed to go to the mens again. What if I get arrested? Id get ten years for trafficking.
You wont get arrested. The palms down there are well oiled. Weve been dealing out of the Tradewinds for years.
I told Bone Id have the money I owe him by next month. I dont see why I have to do this.
Lovell didnt reply immediately. He stared at Nurse. After some time he pulled on each finger. The knuckles cracked and Nurse experienced it like a series of shots from a small handgun or the smack of an iron bar across his ankles, knees, elbows. Then Lovell spoke. This time he was soft and all the garbled diction was missing. Because you owe Mr Bone sixteen thousand dollars and he is tired of waiting for it, tired of listening to promises. Lets face it, you are an unlucky punter. You shouldnt gamble. You dont know when to cut your losses.
Nurse tried to rally. If Im only getting two thousand for this trip, that makes seven more trips before Ive cleared the debt. The wife will never buy it.
Fuck the wife. Ill see you Sunday arvo in the Irish Club, four oclock.
When Lovell was gone, Nurse went to the mens again. He was in there a long time. Then he worked through the afternoon and at five oclock he declined an invitation to go to the pub with the others, even though Angie would be there. He carried Lovells briefcase out to the Volvo. By five-fifteen he was well clear of Logan City. Traffic was smooth and fast on the freeway to the Gold Coast, but Nurse hadnt the concentration to stay with the flow. He found himself crawling along at fifty ks sometimes, angry drivers blasting their horns as they passed him. He didnt see the massive theme parks carved out of die scrubby trees at the side of the road, not even the looming billboards that invited him to look. He felt too weak, too fearful, too bleak.
The Tradewinds faced the water. Room 212 had a view of buildings just like it, glass towers stretching to the horizon. The casinos were nearby, smaller, drenched in bright neon. Nurse collapsed on his bed. He slept fitfully, trying to forget Lovell and the people Lovell did this for. But at seven oclock he showered and the shower changed everything for him. He put on his dinner suit and hit the Monte Carlo.