Norton got into a pair of jeans, Mambo T-shirt and joggers, checked his overnight-bag to make sure he had everything he needed and put the $500 KK had given him into his wallet. He then went to the secret panel in his wardrobe and looked at the stash he kept in there, drumming his fingers on a panel as he did. Will I? Or won’t I? Yeah, why not. He took $2,000 out and stuffed it down the bottom of his overnight-bag. You never know, I might meet a good sort up there. Les went outside to make sure that no desperate could steal his old Ford, then went back inside and settled back, listened to the Rev. Dr Doug and waited. At five past nine a horn tooted out the front. That sounds like my brother. He tossed his bag in the boot, jumped in the back next to KK and they were on their way to Mascot.
KK was wearing the same trousers as the day before with a blue cotton jacket and reading a copy of the Gold Coast Bulletin. ‘So how are you, Les?’ he said, very casually.
‘Not bad, KK,’ answered Norton. ‘How’s yourself?’
‘Good. Good.’ KK continued to flick easily through his paper.
The taxi headed up the steep hill in Wellington Street, past the school, towards Bondi Road.
‘So where did you say we’d be staying up there again, KK?’ asked Les. Partly out of trying to make conversation, partly out of curiosity.
‘My family owns a block of six units right on the beach at Surfers. About five hundred metres from Cavill Avenue. No one’s in them at the moment. Crystal and I will be staying in one. You’ll be in another.’ KK looked up at Les and smiled. ‘Five days in your own fully furnished luxury apartment; the beach at your door, five minutes from the heart of Surfers.’ KK went back to his paper and shook his head. ‘You should be fuckin’ paying me.’
‘You wouldn’t take any money off your brother, would you?’
KK half smiled. ‘When we get there, just remember what I told you about those white-shoe gags, Rodney Rude. Okay?’
‘You’re the boss, KK.’
They were in the first-class section of the plane twenty minutes before take off. Kramer continued to read his paper. There was plenty of room so Norton sat back and checked out the punters getting on the flight. About another three or four got in the first-class section; the rest were mainly couples, families or singles filing into the economy section, probably on package holiday deals. A team of football yobbos from Newcastle surged through, doing their best to let all the other passengers know the Muleville A Grade Mules or whatever they called themselves were on tour. Then a bunch of men, all in their late thirties roared in, wearing yellow Bonds shirts with ‘Mac’s Head Muff Divers Annual Tour Of Duty’ stitched on the front pocket. ‘No Muff Too Tough.’ Norton checked his watch and shook his head as they drunkenly shoved each other down the aisle. The stewardesses shook their heads as well. Les also noticed the stewardesses steal a glance over at KK now and again, say something to each other and giggle.
Norton hardly had time to read a magazine, eat some sort of ham quiche and drink the orange juice before they were approaching Coolangatta airport. He didn’t have a beer and noticed that although the stewardesses offered them champagne, KK, the international playboy, wasn’t bothering either.
‘I thought you liked drinking champagne?’ enquired Les.
‘I do, Les,’ replied KK indifferently. ‘Champagne, not Flemington Blush, or whatever it is they throw at you on Australian airlines.’
‘Fair enough,’ agreed Norton.
The stewardesses flung themselves in front of the curtain separating first class from economy when they landed so those up front could get off before the riff-raff surged through. The next thing Les and KK were walking across bright, sunny and windy Coolangatta airport. Their bags were the first two on the conveyor belt. As KK went to get his, Les picked it up for him.
‘It ain’t heavy,’ he winked. ‘It’s my brother’s.’
KK shrugged, gave another half smile and nodded for Les to follow him across to the Hertz counter. Out in the hire section of the carpark, KK checked the car number plates then opened the boot of one to let Norton throw their bags in.
‘Okay, Les,’ he said, handing him the key. ‘You can start earning your money. You know how to drive one of these?’
Norton looked at the brand new maroon XJS Jaguar with the spoiler on the boot, and shrugged. ‘I’ll soon learn.’
Inside, the XJS was pure air-conditioned luxury. Four-speaker stereo, power everything; the seat felt better than the one behind the desk in Price’s office.
‘So what’s doing, KK?’ asked Les, as he familiarised himself with the dash. ‘Is this going to be our transport while we’re up here?’
‘No. We’ll be getting around in a limo most of the time. I’ll just keep this on standby in case I need to go to the laundromat.’
The Jag had five on the floor. Les backed out and gingerly moved through the carpark to the Gold Coast Highway, stopping for the light at the intersection.
‘Left?’
KK nodded. ‘Left.’
The light changed, Norton eased into the traffic, slipped the Jag into second, looked at the speedo and nearly shit himself. They were doing seventy-five. ‘Christ!’ he said out loud, and tried to ease down into third. There was no noise, no nothing and he’d barely looked hard at the accelerator. ‘Bloody hell!’
KK grinned at Norton, then suddenly banged him on the shoulder with his rolled up paper. ‘Go for it, Les,’ he laughed. ‘Let ’em know KK’s back in town.’ KK continued to laugh. ‘Ahh, it’s good to be back on the Coast.’
But Les didn’t ‘go for it’ as KK told him. He would have liked to; it would have been something else to put his foot down and let that V-12 do its thing. But a $1,000 fine and doing his license for twelve months would have taken the shine right off his five days on the Gold Coast; plus who knows what might come up alongside his name on a Queensland police computer. So Norton just stuck to the speed limit and cruised along in comfort with the sun streaming in through the sun-roof while the little conman cackled away alongside him. Pointing out different high-rises he’d been involved with, or ones built by someone he knew, or others built by someone using Japanese money who’d slung either the council or some politician to get it all together. And there was no shortage of them. In fact that’s all there seemed to be on either side of the highway: shops, restaurants, blocks of flats and monstrous high-rises. It was as if some giant in a pair of white shoes had taken fifty kilometres of beautiful coastline and dropped hundreds of AMP buildings all along the beachfront. Or as close to it as you could get. Surfers has sure changed since the last time I was here, mused Norton, as he looked out at all the development that had brought money and employment and its accompanying crime and corruption to the Gold Coast. Yeah, they sure got what they wanted, but they lost what they had.
It was pleasant enough, however, motoring grandly along the ample highway, some FM station playing a bit of Jenny Morris, the sun beaming down, tapping the accelerator every now and again to effortlessly overtake any cars. Les couldn’t help but chuckle a little to himself. When he’d left Queensland he was more or less on the run from the law with the arse just about out of his pants. Now he was back with $2,500 in his kick, driving a brand new Jaguar and about to meet an international film star. Has the country boy come good or what? Norton wasn’t quite sure. Yes, it wouldn’t be hard to get roped into this sort of lifestyle. Then he looked over at KK’s oily, fat little face, cackling away behind his glasses. Yeah. For about five fuckin’ days.
A sign on their left said Neptune’s Casino, where KK said he and Crystal intended having a bit of a flutter on Saturday night; and a few kilometres further on to their right, just before the heart of Surfers, KK pointed out another sign, Hancock Avenue, and told Les to turn right.
‘It’s the block right at the very end, on The Esplanade.’
Norton turned slowly down a short street crammed with landscaped blocks of flats and high-rises standing almost cheek by jowl; each with the mandatory two pools in the back.
At the end he came to a smaller block of brick colonial flats with a kind of Spanish appearance, facing them from the adjacent street.
‘Pull up in one of those driveways out the front.’
The Jag rocked gently to a halt and Les cut the engine.
The block of flats was three storeys, two flats per floor, and all the garages spread round the bottom. What wasn’t a kind of orange-coloured brick was painted white with ochre-tinted tiles and was neither super modern nor flash but seemed to have heaps of character. The two larger flats on top had sun-decks front and back with large sliding glass windows and doors. Where the garages finished were two white wooden gates, then a high brick security fence also in matching brick and tile. A solid security door in frosted glass and oak was set in the front, and above this a sign, red on white, said ‘Zapato Blanco’. There was a high-rise on the left, another block of flats on the right with the beach right at the back door.
‘Well, what do you reckon?’ said KK, as they got out of the car.
‘Very bloody nice,’ replied Norton sincerely, as he opened the boot and handed KK his bag. ‘I could handle living here. Very nice indeed.’
KK let Norton take the place in for a moment or two. ‘Just remember what I told you about those white-shoe gags.’
Norton wasn’t sure but KK seemed to be looking at him a little odd. ‘If you’ve told me once, KK, you’ve told me a thousand times. I think I’ve got the picture by now.’
‘But I’ve got some good news for you.’
‘Yeah? You gonna give me that other grand now — are you?’
Kramer smiled. ‘You’ve got the afternoon off. And tonight.’
‘Yeah?’
KK nodded and checked his watch. ‘There’ll be a bloke coming round in about an hour I want you to meet. I’ll be with him part of the time, he’s in the music industry. Then after that.’ Kramer made an expansive gesture with his arms. ‘Enjoy.’
‘Sounds all right to me.’
‘You won’t be able to take the car because I’ll probably need it. You’ll be sweet though. But tomorrow, we leave here at eleven to pick Crystal up in Brisbane at one. All the media rattle starts after that.’
‘Rattle and hum, eh?’
‘Don’t worry, Les. You’ll have plenty to keep you occupied till Tuesday. And keep your eyes off my girl’s tits too.’
‘That and the white-shoe gags?’
KK seemed as if he was trying not to grin. ‘I think you’ve got it.’
Kramer gave Les a key, which he said was a master key to every door in the flats including the garage. Then he opened the security door and they walked up two flights of nicely carpeted brown stairs with white walls and indoor-plants to their flats, KK’s on the right, Norton’s on the left.
Holy shit! said Norton to himself, as he stepped inside and closed the door behind him. How good’s this? The flat was two bedrooms, fully furnished, with an en-suite and queen-size bed in the master bedroom. Thick beige carpet lead past a massive bathroom and laundry into the loungeroom. The furniture was expensive and comfortable; paintings on the walls and a large glass table and chairs sitting in front of a modern kitchen. Thick, dark curtains drew back across floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doors to give a million-dollar view north and south of Surfers Paradise and out over the ocean. From Norton’s point of view the beach was that white it almost looked like snow, and the water blue and inviting.
The only thing that struck Les as a little curious when he stepped out onto the sundeck was a kidney-shaped pool in the backyard completely drained. Oh well, he thought, who gives a stuff when you’ve got all that ocean; and a set of stairs at the edge of the sundeck told him you’d be there in less than a minute. A flick of a switch told him the remote-control TV worked perfectly, as did the stereo alongside, and a check of the kitchen told him it was fully appointed — there was even a jar of coffee, sugar and a carton of milk and several cans of soft drink in the softly humming fridge. The phone, sitting on a kind of bar-cum-table, worked also.
Oh well, surmised Les, I imagine KK would have a caretaker who’d know when he was arriving. Les had another look around then started unpacking and hanging up his clothes, putting his shaving gear and that in the en-suite. And to think I’m getting paid for this. He gave a little wink towards the sky. How sweet it is.
With the FM radio drifting in from the lounge-room, Les took his time unpacking, leaving his ghetto-blaster in the bedroom. He changed into a pair of grey canvas shorts and a white T-shirt, made a cup of coffee and stepped out onto the sundeck. There were a number of people dotted along the beach and a thick cluster near the flags in front of the surf club about five hundred metres or so north. A number of brightly coloured kites of various shapes and sizes drifted and fluttered in the breeze above the beach, and, if Les wasn’t mistaken, some radio station was setting up a kind of a promotion with a DJ and dancers on the beach.
He made another cup of coffee then opened the sliding glass doors on the other balcony to let some air through and take in another view. Traffic swished past or slowed down, tourists on hired motorscooters, the odd tour bus, people walking or riding pushbikes. A very balmy, touristy scene in the warm, Gold Coast sunshine. Ahh Queensland, thought Norton, as he happily sipped his coffee. Monday one day. Tuesday the next.
Les was leisurely sipping his coffee when a large, dark green BMW saloon with tinted windows came down Hancock, stopped for the traffic then pulled up in the driveway alongside the Jaguar. Two men in their late twenties, one stocky, the other more Norton’s size, got out wearing T-shirts, trousers and light cotton jackets. The stocky one opened the back door and as he did Norton got a quick glimpse of a gun sitting in a holster near his kidneys. A tallish man around forty or so got out, wearing a white shirt, brown trousers and matching shoes, and gold-rimmed sunglasses. He had straight blond hair combed across his face, and from the angle of his jaw and mouth he didn’t look like the happiest person Les had ever seen in his life. He said something to the two younger men and they walked to the front door; the taller man noticed Les on the sundeck, said something and they all looked up. Norton caught their eye and came inside.
This must be KK’s mate from the music industry, mused Les. S’pose I’d better play minder and let them in. Funny about the gun, he thought, as he went down the stairs. Then again maybe that’s what they mean in the pop music business when they say, this record’s number one with a bullet. They’d barely rapped on the door when Les opened it.
‘Hello,’ said Norton cheerfully. ‘You must be from the Mormon’s. I’ll have a Watchtower.’
All three looked at Les impassively, then the older man spoke. His voice was very clipped and completely lacking in humour, noticeably rolling the Ks and Rs as he spoke. ‘I believe Mr Kramer is expecting me.’
‘Yeah, sure. Come on in.’ Les opened the door and stood to one side.
The older man turned to the others. ‘Wait ’ere,’ he said, then stepped inside.
Norton gave the other two a smile. ‘Gotta keep the flies out,’ he winked, then closed the door in their faces.
‘Up here, mate.’ Norton lead the fair-haired man up the stairs. ‘You must be KK’s friend from the music industry?’
‘That is korrrect.’
Norton waited a moment or two as they walked up the stairs. ‘Nice day outside.’
‘Yes, it is rawther.’
Mmmhhh, thought Les. ‘Korrect. Rawther. Wait ’ere.’ I’m not all that smawt, but I reckon this bloke’s from Sowth Efrika. They got to KK’s door. Les knocked. KK opened the door, saw the blond man and smiled.
‘Meyer, how are you? Good to see you.’
‘Yes. You too, Kelvin.’
‘Les, this is Mr Meyer Black.’
‘Pleased to meet you, Mr Black.’ Meyer nodded, but didn’t offer his hand.
‘I’ll be spending part of the time up here with Mr Black. On business.’
‘Okey doke.’ Norton gave Black a smile, then turned back to Kramer. ‘Anyt
hing you want me to do?’
Kramer shook his head. ‘No. We’ll be okay.’
‘All right. Well, if you want to give me the keys, I might move the car into the garage.’
‘Not a bad idea.’ Meyer stepped into the flat. KK got the keys and handed them to Les.
‘If you need me for anything, I’ll be in the flat.’
‘Good on you, Les.’ Kramer gave Norton a smile and closed the door.
Norton jangled the keys as he thought for a moment, then trotted back down the stairs. While I’m shifting the car I might as well meet those other two young executives from the record industry. You never know, they might make me the next Slim Dusty.
Meyer Black’s two business associates were leaning against one side of the BMW watching a couple of girls walk past when Norton came out the front door. They turned briefly, Les gave them a smile and a bit of a wave; they nodded just as briefly behind their sunglasses and continued watching the two girls.
The garage was grey concrete inside, fairly clean with more than enough room for the Jag. Les had it garaged and the roller-door locked in less than five minutes. The two executives had finished perving on the girls, so Les decided to go over and maybe say hello.
‘So how’s it goin’, fellahs? All right?’
The two men moved away from the car and stood not quite in front of Les. Not quite menacingly, more an air of easy awareness.
‘Yeah, not bad,’ said the shorter one with dark hair.
Norton had come across this type of bloke before. Professional security men. Hard, fit, alert. They’d know all about knives, guns, fast driving, and if you took them too lightly in a bit of grappling you could come off awfully bruised.
‘I’m Les, anyway.’
The stocky one looked at Norton a moment, then offered his hand. ‘Steve.’
‘Steve.’
‘And this is Frank.’
‘How are you, Frank?’
Shaking hands with Steve and Frank definitely wasn’t like grabbing hold of two chocolate eclairs and they didn’t come on with those bodgie California grips either. Norton was impressed.
White Shoes, White Lines and Blackie Page 3