The Brush-Off mw-1

by Shane Maloney

  ‘A retired union official?’ I asked. ‘With a taste for trad jazz and the French New Wave?’

  ‘Financial services, actually,’ said Veale. ‘Started as a carpenter. Joined his father-in-law’s building firm back in the fifties, turned it into a major player in the housing industry, then sold up to concentrate on investment consulting.’ An ex-chippie made good. No wonder he got up Veale’s aristocratic nose.

  A large colour-field painting hung on the wall behind the minister’s desk. It was hard-edged, all surface, a bled-out pink with a broad stripe of yellow running right through the middle. Not unlike many in the party. Veale saw me looking over his shoulder and turned to follow my gaze. ‘Taste in pictures is such a personal matter,’ he said, as though he’d never seen the thing before in his life. ‘Does our master have a liking for something in particular?’

  Human blood, I nearly said. ‘Perhaps something to match his mental processes,’ I suggested.

  ‘Nothing too abstract then, I take it,’ said Veale, cocking a jovial eyebrow. I had a feeling that he and I were going to get along like a house on fire.

  Veale left me alone with my homework. I took it over to the big desk and started in. As well as the National Gallery, the State Theatre and the Concert Hall, all of which I could see out the window, Arts was the overseer-in-chief of everything from the State Library to a regional museum so small the brontosaurus skeleton had to stick its neck out the window. All up, the annual budget topped forty million. Not in the major league by any means, but enough to have some fun with. And enough to generate some pretty vocal squabbling, if Ken Sproule was to be believed.

  The list of recent grant recipients revealed some familiar names. The Turkish Welfare League had scored a thousand dollars to run traditional music classes for Turkish Youth. In my experience, your average Turkish youth preferred heavy metal to Anatolian folk songs. Doubtless the dough would go to pay a part-time social worker. At the other extreme, the Centre for Modern Art had copped three hundred grand for a ‘one-off extraordinary acquisition’. I wondered what you could acquire for that sort of cash.

  I closed the folder. Plenty of time for that sort of thing later. Reminding myself of more pressing realities, I rang Agnelli and caught him on the way to Government House for the swearing-in of the new Cabinet. I told him about the Karlin brunch invitation, making it sound like a minor formality, and asked for his okay to decline. Right on cue, at the magic words ‘Max Karlin’, he was dead keen.

  ‘It’s important that we maintain continuity of appointments during this transition,’ he said.

  ‘You’re the boss,’ I told him.

  By then, it was just on five o’clock. I was feeling a little parched in the back of the throat, but it was ninety minutes before I was due to meet this Lloyd Eastlake bloke. I was flicking absently through the Centre for Modern Art annual report when Phillip Veale’s well-barbered mane appeared around the door. ‘Drinkie winkies?’ he mouthed.

  I could tell immediately that I’d have to pull my socks up in the duds department if I ever hoped to cut the mustard in this culture caper. Aside from Phillip Veale’s two-tone shirt, I counted three bow ties, a pair of red braces and a Pierre Cardin blazer. And that was just what the women were wearing.

  All up, about fifteen people were milling about the conference room, enjoying what Veale described as the ministry’s customary end-of-week after-work convivial for staff and visiting clients. In no time at all, a glass of government-issue fizzy white had been thrust into my hand and the director had waltzed me about the room and presented me to sundry deputy directors and executive officers. The natives seemed affable enough and bid me welcome with the wary amiability of practised bureaucrats.

  Three drinks later, I was cornered by a large woman wearing a kaftan and what appeared to be Nigeria’s annual output of trade beads. ‘Does the new minister have strong interest in anything in particular?’ she asked. Her name was Peggy Wainright and she’d been introduced as the executive responsible for the visual arts.

  ‘The visual arts,’ I said. ‘Naturally. And puppetry, of course.’

  My lame wit fell on deaf ears. The woman grabbed my elbow and began to drag me through the throng. ‘In that case,’ she said. ‘You simply must meet Salina Fleet. She’s the visual arts editor of Veneer .’

  ‘ Veneer?’

  ‘The leading journal of contemporary cultural criticism.’ In other words, an art magazine. Peggy was shocked I hadn’t heard of it. ‘Very influential.’ In other words, an art magazine with very few readers.

  One of the occupational hazards of working at Ethnic Affairs was the tendency it encouraged to categorise people on the basis of their names. In the case of, say, Agnelli or Mavramoustakides this was not difficult. Fleet was pure Anglo. Fleet as in First, as in Street. The Salina bit was definitely an exotic ring-in. I allowed myself to be propelled forward, already a little curious. ‘Here’s Salina now.’

  Salina Fleet was a gamine blonde with apricot lipstick and dangly white plastic earrings, her slightly tousled hair growing out of a razor cut. Her limbs were bare and lightly tanned and she was wearing a mu-mu with a fringe of pompoms and a palm-tree motif. Slung over her shoulder was a terry-towel beach-bag with hula-hoop handles. A surfie chick from a Frankie Avalon movie. She was about thirty, old enough to know better, so her intention was clearly ironic.

  ‘Salina’s on the Visual Arts Advisory Panel which makes recommendations on grants to artists and galleries,’ said Peggy, by way of introduction. ‘This is Murray Whelan. He’s on the new minister’s personal staff.’

  Salina Fleet turned from pouring herself a drink, cocked her budgerigar head and gave me a long, intelligent and frankly appraising look. ‘Really?’ she said. She reached into her beach-bag and drew out a pack of Kool. ‘How interesting.’ You had to admire her attention to period detail. I didn’t know they still made Kool.

  ‘The new minister has a strong interest in the visual arts,’ added Peggy. ‘And puppetry.’

  ‘Really?’ said Salina. A flicker of mischief played between her eyes and the corners of her apricot lips. ‘How interesting.’ She took a cigarette out of the pack.

  ‘You’re not going to smoke in here?’ said Peggy Wainright with alarm.

  ‘Mind if I have one of those?’ I said. I hated menthol cigarettes.

  Salina did some jokey huffy wiggly stuff with her shoulders. ‘I suppose we’d better be good boys and girls, then.’ She nodded towards a sliding glass door that opened onto a narrow balcony overlooking the trellised white tower of the Arts Centre. ‘Coming?’ She was certainly a live wire.

  We took our drinks outside, just us smokers. It was like stepping into an oven. ‘Hope you don’t mind.’ Salina broke out the camphorated stogies and we both lit up. ‘Peggy’s a dear but she’s never off duty.’

  ‘Frankly I’m relieved,’ I said. ‘For a minute there I thought I’d have to pretend to know something about art.’

  ‘Pretence is essential in the art world.’ Salina exhaled a peppermint-scented cloud. Her fingernail polish was apricot, too. Perfect.

  ‘Any other tips for a novice?’ I was trying to pretend that my cigarette didn’t taste like fly spray.

  ‘The most important thing is always to keep a straight face. As long as you do that, anything is possible.’

  I accepted this advice with a grateful dip of my head. ‘Salina?’ I said. ‘Unusual name.’

  Too late, I realised that this must have sounded like a very lame come-on line. Do you come here often? What star sign are you?

  She didn’t seem to mind. ‘Literary,’ she said. ‘Lyrical, at least. The result of having an academic for a father.’

  The literary/lyrical reference was over my head. Troilus and Cressida. Tristan and Isolde. Starsky and Hutch. Salina and…?

  She came to my rescue. ‘ Out in the west Texas town of El Paso,’ she began to recite:

  ‘ I fell in love with a Mexican girl

  Night time would fin
d me in Rosa’s cantina

  Music would play, Salina would whirl. ’

  Either Salina’s father lacked all academic rigour or he was hard of hearing. I knew the song. Marty Robbins was on every juke box in every bar I’d ever worked in. As a publican’s son who had paid his way through university pulling beers, I had an acute ear for bar-room gunfight references in popular music. The Mexican maiden who did the whirling at Rosa’s cantina was called Felina, not Salina.

  ‘Your father’s academic discipline,’ I asked. ‘What did he teach?’

  ‘Three-point turns, mainly,’ she said. ‘And reverse parking. He was chief instructor at the Ajax Driving Academy. I followed in his footsteps. I teach cultural studies, part-time, at the Preston Institute of Technology.’

  PIT used to be a trade school for the motor industry. Not much call for that sort of thing any more. Not unless you were a Japanese robot. ‘Really?’ I said, like she might be having me on. ‘How interesting.’

  ‘Salina’s a bit prissy,’ she said. ‘You can call me Sal. But never Sally.’ No, she definitely wasn’t a Sally. And I didn’t care if she was having me on. At Ethnic Affairs, the only women who flirted with me either had moustaches or fathers with shotguns.

  ‘ Her name was McGill,’ I said. ‘And she called herself Lil.’

  ‘ But everyone knew her as Nancy,’ she replied. ‘The Beatles’ White Album is on my students’ required reading list.’

  Having a cigarette was one thing. Standing in a blast furnace was another. We ground our butts underfoot, toe to toe. ‘Let’s twist again ,’ she said.

  ‘Like we did last summer, ’ I closed the couplet.

  As we slipped back into the air-conditioned relief of the conference room, Phillip Veale materialised at my side. He pinged a fingernail on the rim of his glass. The crowd fell silent and turned our way. It was a jolly little speech, delivered in administrative shorthand.

  ‘Welcome to those just back from summer hols. A new year awaits. Exciting developments. Fresh challenges. Not least of which, a new minister, Angelo Agnelli, whose commitment is well known.’ Veale’s ambiguity raised an appreciative chuckle from the assembly. ‘A minister so keen he’s already sent his right-hand man to join us.’ Eyes darted my way, measuring my response. I tried to look sly. ‘So,’ Veale raised his glass, staring directly at me. ‘The king is reshuffled. Long live the king.’ It was blatant flattery. Always the best kind.

  I glanced about for Salina Fleet but she must have slipped out under cover of the formalities. Pity, I thought. Still, I had no cause for complaint. Semi-secure employment, congenial surroundings, a drink or three, a little light buttering-up. A man could do worse.

  Outside, the late afternoon sun was turning the harsh concrete of the Arts Centre a glowing fauvist orange. Warning-light amber.

  It had gone 6.15 and the drinks crowd was thinning to a hard core. I took one last snort for sociability’s sake, slung my hook and headed downstairs. By rights, if my day had gone as planned, I should have been at the airport, meeting Red’s flight from Sydney. Instead, I was headed for the front of the National Gallery, under instructions to find a total stranger named Lloyd Eastlake so we could go look at some modern art together. Half an hour, I’d give it. Tops.

  A slab of shadow had fallen across the forecourt of the gallery. The mouse-hole curve of the gallery entrance dozed, a half-shut eye in a blank face. The crowds were gone, the tourist buses departed, the gelati vans pursuing more lucrative business at the bayside beaches. Later, theatre goers would begin to arrive. For now, apart from a trudging trickle of home-bound pedestrians and a pair of teenage lovers having a snog on the moat parapet, the place was deserted.

  Out on St Kilda Road, the tail end of the rush-hour traffic crawled impatiently towards the weekend, raising a desultory chorus of irritable toots. I propped on the edge of the moat, trailing my hands in the cool water, and waited for Lloyd Eastlake, Our Man in the Arts, to arrive. At least he wouldn’t have any trouble finding me.

  A slow five minutes went by. Romeo and Juliet broke off their tonsil hockey and wafted away, hand in hand. The passing trams became less crowded, less frequent. A silver Mercedes pulled into the Disabled Only parking bay in front of the gallery entrance, its interior concealed behind tinted windows. It sat there for a long moment, too late for the gallery, too early for the theatre. Then the back door opened and man in a suit got out. Well-heeled, self-assured, brisk. I recognised him instantly. The man I had seen coming out of Agnelli’s office earlier that afternoon.

  He crossed directly to me. ‘Murray Whelan?’ he said, not much in doubt about it. ‘I’m Lloyd Eastlake.’

  He was quite handsome in a conventionally masculine way. Close-up, I pegged him for a well-preserved fifty-five, fit as a trout even if the good life had tipped the bathroom scales a smidgin over his ideal weight-to-height ratio.

  Shaking off the moat water, I accepted his offered handshake. His grip was competitively hard, as though advertising the fact that he had once worked with his hands. But not for some time. The nails were manicured.

  ‘Don’t let the National Gallery trustees catch you paddling in their pool,’ he warned. ‘They think its a bloody holy water font.’ He indicated the open door of his car. ‘C’mon. This’ll be fun.’ Flash wheels but still one of the boys.

  The interior of the Mercedes was so cool it could have been used to transport fresh poultry. I followed Eastlake into the back seat, sinking into the soft leather upholstery. Agnelli’s Fairlane was impressive in a high-gloss velour-seat sort of way, but it had a utilitarian aspect that never let you forget that it was public property out on loan. This car said private wealth, personal luxury, a separate reality.

  As I pulled the door closed behind me, the big car purred into life. ‘Centre for Modern Art,’ said Eastlake. ‘Thanks, Noel.’

  My eyes darted forward to the driver. He was wearing a white shirt and a chauffeur’s cap. The cap fooled me for a moment, made me think that the Mercedes was hired. Then I registered the pair of fleshy flanges protruding from the sides of the man’s skull, and the wire arms of the aviator sunglasses hooked over them.

  ‘Certainly, Mr Eastlake,’ said Spider Webb. ‘Coming up.’

  ‘You’re not one of the sanctimonious ones, are you?’ Eastlake sprawled back, observing me with good-natured amusement, misreading the nature of my reaction to his driver. His red silk tie was patterned with little pictures of Mickey Mouse. The sort of tie that says the man wearing it is either a complete dickhead or he doesn’t give a flying fuck what anyone thinks of him. ‘You don’t take a dim view of a man because he’s earned himself a few bob?’

  His few bob’s worth of German precision-engineering purred gently and Spider eased it into St Kilda Road, joining the traffic stream headed away from the city centre.

  ‘Not at all,’ I said. ‘It’s just that you’re the first Labor Party member I’ve ever met with his own chauffeur-driven Mercedes.’

  ‘How do you know?’ said Eastlake agreeably. ‘You’d be surprised how well off some of the comrades are.’

  Doubtless he was right. If Labor really governed for everyone, not just for its traditional blue-collar base, then a millionaire should feel just as much at home in the party as any boiler maker ever did. If the Prime Minister had no problem with that concept, why should I? A decade in government at state and federal level had smoothed over a lot of the old class antagonisms, ideological and personal. Getting real, we liked to call it.

  We veered left and headed up Birdwood Avenue into the manicured woodland of the Domain. A late-afternoon haze had turned the sky to burnished steel, bleeding the shadows out from beneath the canopies of the massed oaks and plane trees. Geysers of water sprang from sunken sprinkler heads in the lawn and hissed across the roadway. Not that I could hear them. The cocoon of the Mercedes was a world apart.

  ‘Old loyalties run deep,’ said Eastlake, catching my mood. ‘I’m a Labor man, born and bred. You don’t change your footba
ll team just because you change your address.’

  This Lloyd Eastlake was not at all what I had expected. A wheeler-dealer ex-carpenter with a penchant for modern art. A party player with a back-stairs fast-track to ministerial ears. I toyed with the idea of asking him how his meeting with Agnelli had gone. Shake the tree, see what fell out. I decided to sit, not give anything away until I had a clearer sense of the lie of the land.

  ‘You’ll have to tell me all about the Cultural Affairs Policy Committee,’ I said, making myself comfortable, putting both of us at our ease. ‘I’m on something of a steep learning curve here, as Angelo no doubt told you. And what’s the story on this Centre for Modern Art?’

  Eastlake took a blank card out of his wallet and scrawled a couple of telephone numbers on it with a small gold pen. Private numbers. High-level access. ‘Call me next week and I’ll bring you up to speed on the policy committee.’ He tucked the card in my breast pocket. My backstage pass.

  ‘As for the Centre for Modern Art, it’s a bit of a pet project of mine, to be frank.’ He reassumed his relaxed posture and proceeded to expound. ‘The National Gallery is all Old Masters and touring blockbusters. And the commercial galleries are little more than the unscrupulous peddling the unintelligible to the uncomprehending. The CMA’s mission is to fill the gap, to provide public access to the full range of modern Australian art, from its originators through to the creative work of contemporary young artists. Being relatively new, we don’t yet have our own collection, but we’re working on it.’

  Art really turned the guy on. I could sense the genuine enthusiasm. For art, and for the games that went with it. The pleasures of collecting. And of getting someone else to pay.