The Brush-Off (43 page)

The shops don't seem to be doing much business, though. And there's so much un-let office space upstairs that you could run a fifty-head dairy farm on some of the floors. Claire and I had a drink in there a couple of weeks ago, in the tapas bar on the second level, overlooking the mosaic floor. ‘How's business?' I asked the tapas barman.

‘Dropping off,' he said.

The children's wear boutique opening onto the horn of plenty was having a clearance sale. I bought Grace a pair of Osh-kosh overalls marked down from a hundred dollars to thirty-nine ninety-five. Still a bit rich, I know, but nothing's too good for my Gracie.

Claire is back at the National Gallery. One of the recommendations of the Human Resources Policy Review Committee was that former employees whose termination was the result of discriminatory industrial relations practices be given hiring priority if positions became available due to natural wastage. When one of the conservatorial staff was pensioned off with prostate cancer induced by chronic cadmium yellow exposure from handling too many French Impressionists, Claire got his old job.

Not that she goes near the Monets. She's in the Australian section. From what I can tell, she spends most of her time with a pair of tweezers and a magnifying glass, sticking ochre blobs back on Aboriginal dot paintings with Aquadhere general-purpose wood glue. But she feels her professional skills are much better employed than they were at Artemis Prints and Framing. Plus she doesn't have to work Saturday mornings. She sold Artemis for the cost of the stock and cleared twenty grand on the outstanding mortgage, so the property boom was not without its upside, while it lasted. The place is now called Fred's Head Shop and sells extra-width cigarette papers, blown-glass water-pipes and framed posters of Bob Marley. So some connection with the arts remains.

Speaking of art, the real authorship of
Our Home
remains a mystery. To me, at least. Very few other people know or care about its existence. The version with the bullet hole and the blood stains is in the vault at the new Police Museum, along with the bullet-riddled banister from the Trades Hall. The version which belonged to Max Karlin was eventually de-accessioned by the Centre for Modern Art. It now hangs in the collection of the Victa Motor Mower Company, although this is probably more because of its subject matter than its authorship. It was recently the subject of a doctoral dissertation published by the PIT Department of Cultural Studies entitled
(Sub)liminal Penetration in the (Sub)urban
Landscape.

Public interest in the works of Victor Szabo never scaled the heights Fiona Lambert hoped and the planned retrospective exhibition was cancelled due to lack of funding. The content of future exhibitions at the Centre for Modern Art will be determined by its interim curator, Janelle. It was Janelle who phoned Fiona Lambert that night at the flat. She rang to say that Fiona had left her keys behind, yet again. Fiona popped over and picked them up as soon as she'd brushed me and Lloyd off. Then she had an early night.

Fiona is now Assistant Curator of Naive Pottery at the Warracknabeal Regional Gallery. It's a bit of a come-down, I suppose, and a fair way from the bright lights. But that's probably the way she prefers it, given that she looks like she's had a zipper installed in her forehead. She probably still thinks the cops pinched her dough.

Salina Fleet, on the other hand, has gone from strength to strength. The commission she was charging on Marcus Taylor's knock-offs was more than enough to cover the cost of her relocation to New York, where she is now performance art commentator for
Flashy 'n' Trashy
, a theoretical journal financed by the Sony Corporation. The name Fleet, it transpired, was a legacy from an early and soon discarded husband. Her maiden name was Fletcher. Makes you wonder, doesn't it.

Obelisk's depositors were eventually paid out at forty-five cents in the dollar. So Agnelli's brief foray into high finance just about broke even—if you count Fiona's contribution. Even better than break-even if you add in the two trips to Bali, the three microwave ovens and the fourteen dinners-for-two we won in raffles and kicked back into the cause.

Red was a bit pissed off that I didn't keep the trip to Bali and take him along. He's been there twice now with Wendy and Richard. He reckons it's cool although he did get embarrassed when his braces set off the metal detectors at the airport. My alarm bells certainly rang when I saw the bill. But I insisted on paying the whole lot, not just half. It's my genes they're designed to compensate for, after all.

Wendy and Richard got married. In a church. Wendy wore white. ‘More oyster, really,' said Red. ‘Puke-a-rama.'

He's coming down next month and I've got the use of the Water Supply houseboat on Lake Eildon. Tarquin is coming too, just for the first few days. Unfortunately there's very little chance he'll drown. The water level is too low.

The drought has been going on for nearly a year now. Quite a challenge, policy-response wise. Sometimes we pray. Sometimes we dance.

The election will be late next year. We're hoping to dance it in. We definitely don't have a prayer. Not even with
Nea
Hellas
behind us, to the hilt.