I let that go by. ‘Why there?’
‘It’s a good gym. Plus it’s close to the marina and the yacht club.’
‘Stewart has a yacht?’
‘No, Mr Hardy. I do, the Merlot, and Stewart doesn’t know about it. It’s that kind of a marriage. Is that all?’
More than enough, I thought. All I could say was, ‘Thank you.’
The Atlas was located in a small street on the eastern edge of Watsons Bay. Unlike a lot of gyms-the Redgum, for instance, which has had earlier lives as a factory, a warehouse and dirty movie house-it didn’t bear the signs of having once been something else. The cement block building with the landscaping and tiling and tinted glass couldn’t have been more than a few years old and the discreet neon sign and name etched into the glass door were fresh and sparkling.
‘Can I help you, sir?’
The young woman behind the desk was wearing a top that stopped just below her breasts and well above her track pants, revealing a perfect midriff. She was fined down and buffed up and jumping out of her skin to be helpful. Even after my workout and clean-out I suppose I still wore my look of an approaching use-by date. She arranged her sharp, low-body-fat features sympathetically.
‘I’d just like to look around,’ I said. ‘Thinking of joining a gym, you know.’
‘Sure. New to Sydney?’
Felt like an insult, but I took it. ‘Up from Melbourne.’
The sympathy increased. ‘Look, by all means, Mr…?’
‘Master.’
‘Mr Master. Everything’s clearly signposted-weights room, machines, aerobics, sauna, pool.’
‘Pool,’ I said. ‘That’s nice.’
Her phone rang and she picked it up. ‘Heated,’ she said and her smile dismissed me.
It was mid-morning, and the place was busy. The free weights and machines sections were well patronised, mostly by yuppies but with a few oldies thrown in. Lines and wrinkles moving substantial weights, good to see. One sauna is much like another; the pool was a twenty-five metre job and would be very inviting at almost any time. I could see Lorraine Master here in her spandex with her personal trainer. What about Stewart?
At a gym there’s always someone as interested in talking as working out, sometimes more interested. I spotted him in the weights room. He took every opportunity to chat to the other people there, worked the weights reluctantly and put them down gladly. A class started up on the aerobics floor and that took most of his attention. Well-toned women moving rhythmically will do that. I watched the whip-thin instructor bounce and strut and most of the class stay in sync. I felt my age and caught his eye as he towelled off unnecessarily. He wandered over.
‘Gidday. Lookin’ the joint over?’
‘That’s right. Not that aerobics stuff, though it’s nice to look at.’
‘Tried it once. Fuckin’ near killed me.’
I gave him a conspiratorial nod. ‘My brother comes here and I thought I’d take a look. Stewart Master, know him?’
He was a big bloke, fiftyish, balding, overweight but not too bad. Nothing he couldn’t lose if he treadmilled, lifted more and talked less. ‘Yeah, I know him. Knew him anyway. Bad luck, that.’
‘Right, well I don’t make a song and dance about it. I’m up from Melbourne to help his wife straighten things up a bit. It rocked the family. I mean, we knew Stewie was no angel, but drugs… not like him. Did you see much of him?’
He was cooling down and had to make a decision now whether to go on talking or go back to the weights. The talking won. He swigged from his water bottle and wrapped his towel around his shoulders.
‘We chatted a bit, yeah. Not much. Nice enough bloke, Stewie. I’m Les, by the way.’
I played safe. ‘Bob.’ Forgettable.
We shook. ‘Yeah, he mentioned he was from Melbourne. Talked about the AFL. Meant bugger-all to me. I’m a League man. Broncos. Ex-Queenslander. He put in serious time here. Going for tone rather than bulk, you know? But he was bloody strong. You’d be a fair bit older than him, eh?’
I grinned. ‘I’ve lived hard. I’m not as old as I look. Still, I should’ve kept an eye on him.’
‘Right, I know what you mean, but you can only do so much with a goer like Stewie. Still, it’s going to be a blow to the people here.’
‘How’s that?’
‘Stewie put in a bid to buy the place. Big, big bucks. Didn’t you know? I thought…’
I clapped him on his beefy shoulder. ‘It’s all right, mate. Just playing it a bit close to the chest. Melbourne boy being cautious in the big smoke. Well, you never know. It could all work out okay. See you.’
Time to go. I didn’t know whether I’d got away with it or not and wasn’t going to hang around to answer questions. It was something to show for the visit. Hard to interpret. There’d been no reaction to the surname from the receptionist but it’s not an uncommon name, and chances were she didn’t know anything about the business side.
I walked away and looked back at the building. Freehold, very big bucks indeed, and even the price of the lease and the business goodwill would be heavy. I drove back to Darlinghurst and went to the office. Lorraine Masters fax with the PIN for an account with the Banque de France had come through. The card would be with me tomorrow, she said. I folded the sheet and put it in my wallet after writing the number in my notebook. Under the number I jotted two questions: did Stewart Master have that sort of money? Did Lorraine know about his interest in buying the gym?
I went out for a sandwich and when I got back there was a message from Peter Lo. I made instant coffee and rang him, talking between bites.
‘Karl Knopf says he’ll talk to you, Cliff. He’s stationed in Darlinghurst so you could drop in and see him. Here’s his number.’
‘Thanks, Peter. He sounded interested, did he?’
‘He did when I told him about the customs guys.’
I was about to take a bite but I dropped the sandwich on the desk. ‘What?’
‘Verdi was posted to Brisbane and Baxter to Perth.’
‘Soon after the trial?’
‘Right.’
‘Something’s going on.’
‘Looks like it. Be careful, Cliff.’
‘Why d’you say that?’
‘Customs is federal. Don’t get caught in the middle of a state and federal fuck-up. It’s not a good place to be.’
I thanked him again and hung up. I finished the sandwich and the coffee without tasting them. Then I wet my finger and picked up the crumbs I’d dropped on the desk as I thought. In the old days I’d have smoked but now crumb-picking would have to do.
I dropped the sandwich wrapper in the bin and wandered to the window. St Peters Lane isn’t much to look out on unless you happen to like the feel of old Sydney, which I do. It’s narrow, trapped between the buildings that front onto William Street and the weathered sandstone of the church. It’s a sun-starved stretch, cold and windy in winter and shadowy in summer. There’s no parking and it’s never become a shooting gallery. It’s not a place to linger in, so why was a man standing down there, staring up at my window and ducking out of sight when he saw me?
I’m mates with Stephanie Geller, aka Madame Stephanie, who runs a mail order, and these days online, astrological business in the office adjacent to mine. I have her key and occasionally let people into her waiting room when she’s late.
‘Zay like to be kept waiting, Cliff,’ she once told me. ‘So zay can feel zee vibes.’
She wasn’t around, so I let myself into her office, which commanded a longer view of the lane than mine, and peeked out. No watcher. Had he followed me from Watsons Bay? Through all that traffic that’s slowly strangling Sydney? No way to tell.
6
I phoned Knopf but he wasn’t interested in having me visit him at his place of business.
‘I’d say it’s time for a drink, wouldn’t you?’
‘Sure.’
‘Know a place where there’s never any cops?’
‘Never? No.’
‘I do.’ He named a pub in Oxford Street with an almost exclusively gay clientele and said he’d be there in an hour.