May as well get pissed and watch TV I s’pose. There’s nothing else to do. I don’t know anyone, and where can I go with my head looking like this anyway. There’s no way in the world I’d go back to that pub I walked into last night. I’d be in there five minutes and end up getting bunned by poofs. And I sure as hell don’t feel like walking around St Kilda. All it is is Kings Cross with seagulls. He took a healthy slug on his drink that made him cough slightly and his eyes spin around like revolving doors. Then a thought hit him.
What about the pub where we did that ad this morning? There’s a band there tonight. It could be all right. I could find a spot where no one would notice me. Yeah. Bloody oath. Why not? He climbed back into his R. M. Williams, changed his shirt, tidied his hair and cleaned his face up as best he could. Then with the rest of the quickly-downed J and B warming his stomach he strolled down to the Boulevard Hotel.
The old pub looked pretty much the same at night as it did in the day, except there was a man selling hot dogs at the top of the stairs and two swarthy looking Europeans standing inside the door as you walked in. They were reasonably well dressed and Norton guessed they were either the owners or ran the place. They gave him a bit of a look as he ambled past and that was about it. Even with his burnt and battered head Norton was still as good a style as anyone in the place. For a supposedly ritzy hotel promoting a supposedly up-market drink on television, the actual clientele are a pretty seedy-looking bunch, thought Les.
The place wasn’t packed but there was a fair crowd, mostly mid-twenties, early thirties. Some seated. Some standing. The men all seemed to have sallow faces and pale, oily skin that looked in need of a few hours of sunshine. Their clothes, especially their T-shirts, looked in need of a good dose of Rinso too. They were nearly all wearing faded blue jeans and jackets. Some had studded belts with some sort of animal skins hanging off them. The way they walked gave Norton the impression they were all trying to look and move like the lead singer of INXS.
All the women had dark hair: there wasn’t a blond to be seen. Plenty of make-up, cheap silver jewellery, clothes made out of recycled jeans and black stockings with ankle-length boots appeared to be the order of the day or night. Whatever the case, the women all looked bored. The men looked half asleep. A gang of pimply-faced skinheads tossing empty beer cans at each other across the room was the only sign of movement.
It was much the same in the Neptune room, except for a small group of Aborigines in Akubra hats and moleskins. On the bandstand a man and a woman in cowboy hats, playing guitars and backed by a drum machine, were absolutely strangling ‘On the Road Again’. If Willie Nelson had heard it he would have got the mafia to break both their arms. Norton winced and moved across to the bar.
The two barmaids were full of cheek as they ran up and down between the bottles and the taps and added a bit of life to the place. They were both as skinny as rakes. One had dark hair and a kind of French sailor’s outfit on. The other had on a long white dress and strawberry-coloured hair and a sort of strawberry-coloured face. Perched on her head was one of those little fake leopard-skin pill-box hats, a la Annie Lennox.
‘What’ll you have love,’ she said brightly as Norton walked up to the bar.
‘Ohh. Just a glass of beer’ll do thanks,’ shrugged Les.
‘There’s a beer strike on and we’ve only got cans of VB or Carlton. The imported stuffs three dollars a bottle.’ She stood there waiting for Norton’s reaction.
Les looked at her evenly for a moment. ‘Give us a Jack Daniels and Coke, will you. Make it a double. And plenty of ice.’
‘No worries.’
Norton paid her, left a sizeable tip and moved away from the bar to have a look around. It was pretty ordinary and there didn’t appear to be too many stray women about.
Not that any of them would have actually rushed Les, considering the state of his melon. Though if some of the lifeless-looking scrumbos propped round the place passing for men could get a girl, Norton, battered and all as he was, would still have to be a chance. The drum machine kicked into another beat and the duo took the hatchets to ‘Islands in the Stream’. Norton winced again, finished his drink, got another and moved out to the foyer. Christ, I can’t see myself lasting long here he thought.
He stood in the foyer gazing around and brooding a little about Pamela. But there was another thing he was trying to figure out, that had been on his mind almost since he got off the plane on Friday night. It was Melbourne women. There was something about them, apart from their clothes and white skin, that made them completely different from Sydney women. What was it? More peering around and halfway through his drink Norton figured it out. It was the way they made their eyes up. All the women had beautiful, sensuous eyes. Even the ugliest, fattest, most unkempt scrubber in that hotel had her eyes made up to perfection. It had been the same with every girl or woman he’d met. Pamela, Mrs Perry, the girls on the film set, the girl on the door at Richards. Even those two old-birds in the op-shop at Whittlesea and that bleach-haired tram conductress. They all had beautiful, even fascinating eyes. Sydney might be a city of blondes, bikinis and suntans. But Melbourne’s a city of brunettes and eyes. Don’t know what they look like in the morning when they scrape the make-up off though, chuckled Les. Probably like two holes burnt in a sheet. Anyway, you can keep both of them, chuckled Les to himself again. Give me a good old Queensland girl with plenty of freckles any day.
His thoughts were running back to Dirranbandi and the banks of the Narran River when he heard a girl’s voice from one of the cubicles behind him.
‘Well, well, well,’ it said slowly and sarcastically. ‘If it isn’t our big movie star from Sydney.’
Norton turned around slowly and suspiciously. He had to look for a moment or two to recognise the face. It was the young girl from the catering truck he’d been talking to earlier. The one he’d saved from falling on her face. She was sitting in one of the cubicles near the front door with two other girls, similar in appearance and dress to herself.
‘Well I’ll be buggered,’ smiled Norton. ‘It’s the gourmet chef. The botulism queen of Victoria. How are you mate?’
‘Not too bad handsome. How’s yourself?’
‘I’m pretty good. Probably because I got away before lunch.’
‘Ooh, you’re a smart big bastard, aren’t you.’
‘Only for getting away before you had a chance to poison me,’ grinned Les. ‘I’ve heard your cooking’s killed more people than road accidents.’
‘Listen digger, I told you before. There’s nothing wrong with my food. It’s the grouse.’
‘Yeah. If you were in a lifeboat out in the middle of the Indian Ocean.’
The girl smiled and shook her head. ‘What’s the bloody use. Anyway. What are you doing in here, Wally? Just posing around are you? Letting everyone know the film star’s back in town.’
‘No,’ shrugged Norton. ‘I’m staying just up the road so I thought I’d come in and have a drink. See what the place is like of a night. Can’t say I’m over impressed. That band would give you corns on your ears.’
‘Yeah. You’re not wrong. If they were playing for meals, you wouldn’t give them a paper plate. Anyway — George Hamilton, why don’t you get your drink and join us? It doesn’t worry you to drink with the peasants does it?’
‘Well,’ drawled Norton taking a glance around the room, ‘I do have my image to think of. But I don’t see any photographers around. So why not? Thanks.’
‘I never got your name earlier,’ said the young cook as Les plonked his behind down next to her facing the others.
‘Les.’
‘Well I’m Dixie, Les. And these are my friends, Mia and Penny.’
‘Hello girls,’ smiled Norton. ‘Pleased to meet you.’
Neither girl said anything. They just nodded their heads and smiled. A smile of amused curiosity with a kind of confidence about it. They weren’t bad looking. Somewhere in their early twenties. Mia, on Norton’s left, had c
opper-coloured hair combed into an untidy bun on top of her head, a full, heavily made-up face, solid figure but no boobs. There was no shortage of silver chains and trinkets round her neck and wrists and underneath the sleeve of a black disposal store leather jacket. Norton thought he could see a tattoo of a mushroom or something on the back of her wrist. Penny had long, dark punked-up hair tinted with pink. Like her girlfriend, she too had a sensuous, heavily made-up face. But where Mia was wearing a denim mini, Penny had on a sort of white pinafore and a sleeveless Levi jacket with a Huxton Creepers T-shirt underneath. She didn’t appear to be a grub, but Norton tipped that her Levi jacket hadn’t seen any soap and water since the War of the Roses. Neither had the Tshirt.
They struck Les as either students or something to do with music or the arts. There was also something else about them that struck Les, but he just couldn’t quite put his finger on it.
‘So what’s doing anyway girls?’ he asked pleasantly. ‘And how come you’re down here?’ he said, turning to Dixie. ‘This your usual Saturday night hang is it?’
‘No not really,’ she replied. ‘Mia and Penny live just up the road and I’m staying at their place tonight. I live at Footscray. You know where that is?’
Norton shook his head. ‘No . . .not really.’
‘You’re lucky.’
Norton downed what was left of his drink, rattled the ice in the glass and looked at the others. ‘Can I shout you a drink girls?’
‘Sure,’ said Dixie as the others nodded too. She ordered a Vodka and squash, the others a Scotch and dry. Les got three doubles, plus a Jack Daniels and Coke for himself.
‘Anyway, cheers girls,’ he said, holding up his glass when he sat back down at the table. ‘It’s nice to find someone to talk to.’
‘Yeah. Thanks Les,’ said Dixie. ‘It’s nice to sit next to a movie star.’
‘Don’t give us the shits.’
They all had a healthy pull on their drinks, with the girls giving a bit of a splutter and a comment as to the strength of them. Norton smiled and told them that if you’re going to drink you may as well drink. He got no argument there.
‘So how long have you been into modelling, Les?’ Mia asked. Her voice was a little expressionless but sounded as if she was actually curious rather than just trying to make polite conversation.
Norton threw back his head and roared laughing. ‘Me a model?’ he grinned. ‘You got to be bloody kidding. I think I’d better tell you girls the whole story.’
Les told them what he did for a living and how he came to be in Melbourne doing the ad. About Warren, the casting and how he had done one ad before in Brisbane. Pretty much the same story he’d told Pamela when she picked him up at the airport on Friday night. Dixie thought it a great hoot. The other two were amused all right, but still seemed a little reserved, almost distancing themselves from Les . . . as if, even though they appeared to be enjoying his company, it wouldn’t have mattered to them that much if he’d got up and left. Norton asked them if they wanted another drink. They all said yes. Mia got them, doubles. Les paid.
The next round went down even easier than the first. It turned out Dixie was working casual on the catering truck. She was a silk-screen printer, but the factory where she’d been working had gone broke a couple of months ago. Penny had worked there too; she wasn’t working at all now. Neither was Mia. She’d been playing organ in a band. The Boils. But the lead singer got killed in a car accident so the band broke up. She did do a little part-time work in a health food restaurant in Carlton. All three were on the dole, and all three were broke. Which was how they came to be sitting in the Boulevard, holding onto their drinks like hourglasses until Les came along. Norton didn’t mind shouting the three battlers a drink. He still had more than half of Abraham Goldschmidt’s money plus the $300 Pamela had given him, and there could be anything in that strongbox. Not counting the money he’d eventually pick up for doing the ad. So Les was releasing money easily enough. If he’d been paying for it out of his wages though, it might have been a different story.
‘So girls,’ smiled Norton, ‘you could say between us we lead a pretty checkered sort of an existence.’
‘Yes. We’re not exactly what you’d call solid citizens are we,’ agreed Penny.
Dixie looked at Norton with a derisive kind of smile. ‘Hey Les,’ she said slowly. ‘There’s something I’ve deadset got to ask you.’
‘Sure. What is it?’ shrugged Norton.
‘Well, I’ll try and be as tactful as I can about this,’ she said, running a finger delicately around the rim of her glass. ‘But what happened to your bloody head?’ She had to laugh at the grin on Norton’s face. ‘No, fair dinkum, Les. Your head’s pretty ordinary at the best of times. But at least on the commercial you could look at it without getting frightened too much. But now. Christ! It looks like a kicked-in shitcan.’
‘Jesus you’re bloody good,’ said Les, trying not to laugh. ‘I shout you drinks. Let you sit and talk to a big star like me, and what do you do? Turn around and insult me. Fair dinkum — are all Melbourne girls as horrible as you?’
‘You’re right Les,’ nodded Penny. ‘It was a tasteless thing to say.’ Then she smiled. ‘But Jesus. It does look rough. I was nearly going to ask you the same thing myself. You look like you’ve been playing water-polo against a school of piranhas.’
Norton chuckled like a drain. But now it was time for a bit of bullshit he thought. The kerosene heater story’s a bit naff. And I can’t tell them the truth. Tell them any bloody thing. They wouldn’t know the difference.
‘Well,’ he drawled. ‘It’s a funny bloody story. You know that pub up the road, the Duke of Kent?’ The girls nodded. ‘Well I finished up in there this afternoon and I bumped into these girls and they invited me back to their flat for a drink and a smoke.’ At the mention of the word ‘smoke’ Penny and Mia’s eyes lit up like birthday cakes. ‘Anyway. They had this little bong there. I was half full of drink and picked it up and put a match to it before they packed it. One of the girls in the flat had been cleaning it and it was still full of methylated spirits. The rotten bloody thing blew up in my face. And when I’ve jumped up like a big mug, with my eyes closed, I hit my head on the door. That’s how I got the black eye and the cuts on my face. I felt like a nice wombat, I can tell you.’
Dixie cracked up. Even the other reserved pair had to laugh openly at Norton’s ridiculous, but by the look of his face, believable story.
‘Ohh, that’s one of the best ones I’ve heard,’ said Dixie.
Norton smiled and nodded his head in agreement as they settled down a bit and sipped on their drinks. He was going to suggest another round when Mia spoke.
‘You don’t look much like a dope smoker,’ she said evenly.
‘Ohh, I have a puff now and again,’ shrugged Norton. ‘What’s wrong with that?’
‘Nothing,’ replied Mia enthusiastically. ‘In fact I could go one myself right now.’
‘Yeah. Me too,’ said Dixie. ‘You... haven’t got any smoke on you. Have you Les?’
Norton shook his head.
‘Skinny Jimmy’s got some good deals of hash going for a hundred dollars,’ said Penny. ‘It’s that grouse black putty too.’
‘Yeah. But who’s got a hundred bucks?’ said Dixie.
There was silence for a few moments as the girls reflected into their drinks. Then Norton spoke.
‘I’ll tell you what we could do if you like, girls,’ he said.
‘What’s that?’ answered Dixie.
‘Well you got to admit it’s pretty boring in here, isn’t it?’
‘Are you kidding,’ said Penny. ‘You’d have more fun sitting around watching a plank warp.’
‘Right,’ nodded Norton. ‘Well I’m staying at the St Moritz, just up the road. I’ve got a huge room with a bar stocked full of piss and a stereo. How about I buy one of those deals of hash and we all go back, have a smoke and a few drinks and sit around and have a bit of a mag for a while.
It couldn’t be any worse than sitting in here. Besides, I’m going back soon anyway.’
The girls looked at each other for a moment. You didn’t need ESP to know what was going through their minds.
‘Have you got a hundred dollars Les?’ asked Mia.
‘Here you are,’ Norton slipped a hundred out of his wallet and palmed it across the table to Mia. ‘Can you get that bit of Johnny?’
‘I’ll be back in about two minutes.’ She got up and disappeared into the Neptune Room.
‘Well, what do you reckon girls?’ said Norton turning to the others. ‘Is it a good idea or what?’
‘Bloody oath,’ nodded Dixie happily.
‘You’ve got me,’ said Penny. ‘Thanks Les.’
‘That’s okay. Now why don’t you insult me some more.’
‘It’s funny you should say that Les,’ said Dixie. ‘I was just going to say what a good looking bloke you were.’
They laughed and sipped their drinks while they waited for Mia. She was back in a little over five minutes.
‘How did you go?’ asked Les, as she sat back down. ‘Did you get it?’
‘No worries. It’s right here in my bag.’
‘Good.’ Norton finished his bourbon and Coke and looked around the table. ‘Well. Do you want to have another one here or will we hit the toe?’
‘No. Let’s piss off,’ chorused the three Melbourne lovelies. They quickly finished their drinks and picked up their bags. The next thing they were out the front of the hotel heading towards the St Moritz.
Mia and Penny didn’t say a great deal during the walk back to the motel, still distancing themselves from Les and preferring, it seemed, to keep to each other. Dixie however was all bright and bubbly and appeared to have taken a bit of a shine to him, even slipping her arm in his at one stage on the pretext of helping him along seeing he was all scarred and in pain. Norton was getting a little keen on her too. She had a good sense of humour and wasn’t half a bad sort in a pale, punkish sort of way. Certainly different from a lot of other girls Les had met. Pity I couldn’t piss those other two off he thought as they got closer to the motel. A man might be a bit of a chance with Miss Footscray once I get a few drinks into her. Can’t see anything happening with those other two in the room. Then again my head isn’t exactly a Rembrandt at the moment. Oh well, don’t really matter. A few drinks and a laugh for an hour or two’ll do. I’m starting to feel a bit buggered anyway.
The Boys from Binjiwunyawunya Page 34