In the Frame (18 page)

Jik arrived exactly on time, driving up Swanston Street in the hired grey car and turning smoothly round the corner where I stood waiting. He stopped outside the Yarra River Fine Arts gallery, got out, opened the boot, and put on a brown coat-overall, of the sort worn by storemen.

I walked quietly along towards him. He brought out a small radio, switched it on, and stood it on top of the car. The commentator’s voice emerged tinnily, giving details of the runners currently walking round the parade ring at Flemington races.

‘Hello,’ he said unemotionally, when I reached him. ‘All set?’ I nodded, and walked to the door of the gallery. Pushed it. It was solidly shut. Jik dived again into the boot, which held further fruits of his second shopping expedition in Alice Springs.

‘Gloves,’ he said, handling me some, and putting some on himself. They were of white cotton, with ribbed wristbands, and looked a lot too new and clean. I wiped the backs of mine along the wings of Jik’s car, and he gave me a glance and did the same with his.

‘Handles and impact adhesive.’

He gave me the two handles to hold. They were simple
chromium plated handles, with flattened pieces at each end, pierced by screw holes for fixing. Sturdy handles, big enough for gripping with the whole hand. I held one steady, bottom side up, while Jik covered the screw-plate areas at each end with adhesive. We couldn’t screw these handles where we wanted them. They had to be stuck.

‘Now the other. Can you hold it in your left hand?’

I nodded. Jik attended to it. One or two people passed, paying no attention. We were not supposed to park there, but no one told us to move.

We walked across the pavement to the gallery. Its frontage was not one unbroken line across its whole width, but was recessed at the right-hand end to form a doorway. Between the front-facing display window and the front-facing glass door, there was a joining window at right angles to the street.

To this sheet of glass we stuck the handles, or rather, Jik did, at just above waist height. He tested them after a minute, and he couldn’t pull them off. We returned to the car.

One or two more people passed, turning their heads to listen to the radio on the car roof, smiling in brotherhood at the universal national interest. The street was noticeably emptying as the crucial time drew near.

‘…
Vinery carries the colours of Mr. Hudson Taylor of Adelaide and must be in with a good outside chance. Fourth in the Caulfield Cup and before that, second at Randwick against Brain-Teaser, who went on to beat Afternoon Tea
…’

‘Stop listening to the damn race!’ Jik said sharply.

‘Sorry.’

‘Ready?’

‘Yes.’

We walked back to the entrance to the gallery, Jik carrying the sort of glass-cutter used by, among others,
picture framers. Without casting a glance around for possible onlookers, he applied the diamond cutting edge to the matter in hand, using considerable strength as he pushed the professional tool round the outside of the pane. I stood behind him to block any passing curious glances.

‘Hold the right-hand handle.’ he said, as he started on the last of the four sides, the left-hand vertical.

I stepped past him and slotted my hand through the grip. None of the few people left in the street paid the slightest attention.

‘When it goes,’ Jik said, ‘for God’s sake don’t drop it.’

‘No.’

‘Put your knee against the glass. Gently, for God’s sake.’

I did what he said. He finished the fourth long cut.

‘Press smoothly.’

I did that. Jik’s knee, too, was firmly against the glass. With his left hand he gripped the chromium handle, and with the palm of his right he began jolting the top perimeter of the heavy pane.

Jik had cut a lot of glass in his time, even if not in exactly these circumstances. The big flat sheet cracked away evenly all round under our pressure and parted with hardly a splinter. The weight fell suddenly on to the handle I held in my right hand, and Jik steadied the now free sheet of glass with hands and knees and blasphemy.

‘Jesus, don’t let go.’

‘No.’

The heavy vibrations set up in the glass by the breaking process subsided, and Jik took over the right-hand handle from me. Without any seeming inconvenience he pivoted the sheet of glass so that it opened like a door. He stepped through the hole, lifted the glass up wholesale by the two handles, carried it several feet, and propped it against the wall to the right of the more conventional way in.

He came out, and we went over to the car. From there, barely ten feet away, one could not see that the gallery was not still securely shut. There were by now in any case very few to look.

‘…
Most jockeys have now mounted and the horses will soon be going out onto the course
…’

I picked up the radio. Jik exchanged the glass-cutter for a metal saw, a hammer and a chisel, and shut the boot, and we walked through the unorthodox entrance as if it was all in the day’s work. Often only the furtive manner gave away the crook. If you behaved as if you had every right to, it took longer for anyone to suspect.

It would really have been best had we next been able to open the real door, but a quick inspection proved it impossible. There were two useful locks, and no keys.

‘The stairs are at the back,’ I said.

‘Lead on.

We walked the length of the plushy green carpet and down the beckoning stairs. There was a bank of electric switches at the top: we pressed those lighting the basement and left the upstairs lot off.

Heart-thumping time, I thought. It would take only a policeman to walk along and start fussing about a car parked in the wrong place to set Cassavetes and Todd on the road to jail.

‘…
horses are now going out on to the course. Foursquare in front, sweating up and fighting jockey Ted Nester for control
…’

We reached the front of the stairs. I turned back towards the office, but Jik took off fast down the corridor.

‘Come back,’ I said urgently. ‘If that steel gate shuts down…’

‘Relax,’ Jik said. ‘You told me.’ He stopped before reaching the threshold of the furthest room. Stood still, and looked. Came back rapidly.

‘O.K. The Munnings are all there. Three of them. Also
something else which will stun you. Go and look while I get this door open.’

‘…
cantering down to the start, and the excitement is mounting here now
…’

With a feeling of urgency I trekked down the passage, stopped safely short of any electric gadgets which might trigger the gate and set off alarms, and looked into the Munnings room. The three paintings still hung there, as they had before. But along the row from them was something which, as Jik had said, stunned me. Chestnut horse with head raised, listening. Stately home in the background. The Raoul Millais picture we’d seen in Alice.

I went back to Jik who with hammer and chisel had bypassed the lock on the office door.

‘Which is it?’ he said. ‘Original or copy?’

‘Can’t tell from that distance. Looks like real.’

He nodded. We went into the office and started work.

‘…
Derriby and Special Bet coming down to the start now, and all the runners circling while the girths are checked
…’

I put the radio on Wexford’s desk, where it sat like an hourglass, ticking away the minutes as the sands ran out.

Jik turned his practical attention to the desk drawers, but they were all unlocked. One of the waist-high line of filing cabinets, however, proved to be secure. Jik’s strength and knowhow soon ensured that it didn’t remain that way.

In his wake I looked through the drawers. Nothing much in them except catalogues and stationery.

In the broken-open filing cabinet, a gold mine.

Not that I realised it at first. The contents looked merely like ordinary files with ordinary headings.

‘…
moved very freely coming down to the start and is prime fit to run for that hundred and ten thousand dollar prize
…’

There were a good many framed pictures in the office, some on the walls but even more standing in a row on the floor. Jik began looking through them at high speed,
almost like flicking through a rack of record albums.

‘…
handlers are beginning to load the runners into the starting stalls, and I see Vinery playing up
…’

Half of the files in the upper of the two drawers seemed to deal in varying ways with insurance. Letters, policies, revaluations and security. I didn’t really know what I was looking for, which made it all a bit difficult.

‘Jesus Almighty,’ Jik said.

‘What is it?’

‘Look at this.’

‘…
more than a hundred thousand people here today to see the twenty-three runners fight it out over the three thousand two hundred metres
…’

Jik had reached the end of the row and was looking at the foremost of three unframed canvasses tied loosely together with string. I peered over his shoulder. The picture had Munnings written all over it. It had Alfred Munnings written large and clear in the right hand bottom corner. It was a picture of four horses with jockeys cantering on a racecourse: and the paint wasn’t dry.

‘What are the others?’ I said.

Jik ripped off the string. The two other pictures were exactly the same.

‘God Almighty,’ Jik said in awe.

‘…
Vinery carries only fifty-one kilograms and has a good barrier position so it’s not impossible
…’

‘Keep looking,’ I said, and went back to the files.

Names. Dates. Places. I shook my head impatiently. We needed more than those Munnings copies and I couldn’t find a thing.

‘Jesus!’ Jik said.

He was looking inside the sort of large flat two-foot by three-foot folder which was used in galleries to store prints.

‘…
only Derriby now to enter the stalls
…’

The print-folder had stood between the end of the desk and the nearby wall. Jik seemed transfixed.

Overseas Customers. My eyes flicked over the heading and then went back. Overseas Customers. I opened the file. Lists of people, sorted into countries. Pages of them. Names and addresses.

England.

A long list. Not alphabetical. Too many to read through in the shortage of time.

A good many of the names had been crossed out.

‘…
They’re running! This is the moment you’ve all been waiting for, and Special Bet is out in front
…’

‘Look at this,’ Jik said.

Donald Stuart. Donald Stuart, crossed out. Shropshire, England. Crossed out.

I practically stopped breathing.

‘…
as they pass the stands for the first time it’s Special Bet, Foursquare, Newshound, Derriby, Wonderbug, Vinery
…’

‘Look at this,’ Jik said again, insistently.

‘Bring it,’ I said. ‘We’ve got less than three minutes before the race ends and Melbourne comes back to life.’

‘But—’

‘Bring it,’ I said. ‘And also those three copies.’

‘…
Special Bet still making it, from Newshound close second, then Wonderbug
…’

I shoved the filing-drawer shut.

‘Put this file in the print-folder and let’s get out.’

I picked up the radio and Jik’s tools, as he himself had enough trouble managing all three of the untied paintings and the large-print folder.

‘…
down the backstretch by the Maribyrnong River it’s still Special Bet with Vinery second now
…’

We went up the stairs. Switched off the lights. Eased round into a view of the car.

It stood there, quiet and unattended, just as we’d left it.
No policeman. Everyone elsewhere, listening to the race.

Jik was calling on the Deity under his breath.

‘…
rounding the turn towards home Special Bet is droppng back now and its Derriby with Newshound
…’

We walked steadily down the gallery.

The commentator’s voice rose in excitement against a background of shouting crowds.

‘…
Vinery in third with Wonderbug, and here comes Ring-wood very fast on the stands side
…’

Nothing stirred out on the street. I went first through our hole in the glass and stood once more, with a great feeling of relief, on the outside of the beehive. Jik carried out the plundered honey and stacked it in the boot. He took the tools from my hands and stored them also.

‘Right?’

I nodded with a dry mouth. We climbed normally into the car. The commentator was yelling to be heard.

‘…
Coming to the line it’s Ringwood by a length from Wonderbug, with Newshound third, then Derriby, then Vinery
…’

The cheers echoed inside the car as Jik started the engine and drove away.

‘…
Might be a record time. Just listen to the cheers. The result again. The result of the Melbourne Cup. In the frame
…
first Ringwood, owned by Mr. Robert Khami
…
second Wonderbug
…’

‘Phew,’ Jik said, his beard jaunty and a smile stretching to show an expanse of gum. ‘That wasn’t a bad effort. We might hire ourselves out some time for stealing politicians’ papers.’ He chuckled fiercely.

‘It’s an overcrowded field,’ I said, smiling broadly myself.

We were both feeling the euphoria which follows the safe deliverance from danger. ‘Take it easy,’ I said. ‘We’ve a long way to go.’

He drove to the Hilton, parked, and carried the folder
and pictures up to my room. He moved with his sailing speed, economically and fast, losing as little time as possible before returning to Sarah on the racecourse and acting as if he’d never been away.

‘We’ll be back here as soon as we can,’ he promised, sketching a farewell.

Two seconds after he’d shut my door there was a knock on it.

I opened it. Jik stood there.

‘I’d better know,’ he said, ‘What won the Cup?’

When he’d gone I looked closely at the spoils.

The more I saw, the more certain it became that we had hit the absolute jackpot. I began to wish most insistently that we hadn’t wasted time in establishing that Jik and Sarah were at the races. It made me nervous, waiting for them in the Hilton with so much dynamite in my hands. Every instinct urged immediate departure.