Rocks, The (15 page)

A
fter she’d showered off
the salty, slightly oily residue of her swim in the port, Lulu put on white cotton shorts and a large white linen shirt and told Claire that she would have a salad beneath the leafy trellis out on her front terrace that overlooked the rocks and the sea and was not used by guests.

As she ate her salad, she could see
Dolphin
rolling slowly in the light breeze about a mile offshore, its sails billowing. How picturesque—that fatuous man!—but she was happy to see the yacht, off in the distance like that, because it made her intensely glad she was not aboard.

Her body convulsed with an involuntary shiver.

She’d tried for Luc’s sake—he had no idea what concessions she’d made to herself—but it had been a mistake. She’d broken a rule and look what had happened. She would never set foot on a boat again, not for any reason.

After lunch, Lulu took her siesta. She woke at four and swam fifty slow laps in the pool. She showered again. It was cool finally in the house. She put on a cotton djellaba with nothing underneath and went into the kitchen. Claire was preparing dinner:
merluza con samfaina
, a Mediterranean fish sautéed with tomatoes, peppers, aubergines; a cobbler made with gooseberries Judy Plumley had just brought down from England; and Claire’s homemade peach ice cream.

“Perfect, Claire,” said Lulu.

“Lulu?”

Cassian stood in the kitchen doorway. In one hand a silver cocktail shaker that dripped with condensation, in the other two crystal glasses half full of olives. “Martini?”

“You don’t know how much.”

They went out onto the front terrace. Lulu arranged herself on the wide white sofa; Cassian sat in a large wicker armchair. He poured their drinks, passed a glass to Lulu, and put his feet up on an ottoman upholstered with a threadbare piece of kilim. “You didn’t go out with the others, I see,” he said.

“No. I escaped.”

“I thought you might have.”

“And thank God too.” She peered out at the sea. “They’ve disappeared. They’ve either sunk or gone round the corner somewhere. God knows how anyone can stick it for hours at a time, floating so near to where you want to go but not getting there—as often as not on purpose. It must be a very particular enthusiasm, like Morris dancing. Torture if you ask me.”

“That’s because you need to be the captain of your own ship, Lulu.”

“Bless you, darling. Someone understands.” Lulu sipped her martini. “Perfection. Your sainted father taught you well. The trouble with most Englishmen is that they learn to drink in pubs, where a properly prepared cocktail is a mystery on the order of turning mercury into gold.”

Cassian smiled. “When was the last time you were in a pub, Lulu?”

“I don’t go to pubs, darling.”

“I didn’t think so.”

“I was in one during the war. It was horrible,” she said, in the tone people use when referring to distressing wartime experiences best forgotten.
“Salud.”

They sipped.

“Did you know that Gerald Rutledge doesn’t have a telephone up at his house?” asked Cassian.

“I’m not surprised. Why do you ask?”

“Because Fergus Maitland has given out your number here for people to contact him.”

“Yes, darling, everyone does. I don’t mind.”

“No, quite.”

They sipped.

Cassian said, “Have you heard of El Niño?”

“No. What is he, a bullfighter?”

“Possibly. The one I’m talking about is a periodic weather phenomenon occurring in the Pacific Ocean, which brings unusually warm water to the west coast of South America. It makes more rain on the land. It happened this last winter. There were catastrophic floods in Paraguay.”

“Poor Paraguay.”

“Actually, it changes the weather all over the world. Australia got less rain than usual, and had lots of fires instead. Drought in Africa.”

“Poor old Australia. Africa’s always been completely ruined.”

“The thing is, last winter’s El Niño caused billions of pounds of damage in Paraguay and Brazil and Australia and lots of other places.”

“What rotten luck,” said Lulu, sipping her martini.

“Yes. Not only to those places and millions of their benighted inhabitants but to their insurers. If you’re a Name at Lloyd’s—if you’re personally liable for all that insurance—right now you’re rather wishing you weren’t.”

“I see. You’re about to make a stunning point of all this.”

“Yes.” Cassian smiled. “If you’re a Name at Lloyd’s, this has been a bad week. The numbers for worldwide damage caused by last winter’s El Niño and the resultant liability are in.”

“Well, darling, I’m awfully sorry for everybody, for Lloyd’s, for the whole world. Is there anything I can do?”

“There is, in fact. You know my friend Johnny Barton.”

“I’ve heard you speak of him.”

“Johnny’s been calling here all day for Fergus Maitland. He’s in with Fergus on this property they’re developing on the land they’ve just bought from Gerald Rutledge.”

“Ah,” said Lulu. She put her glass down on the coffee table. Then she picked at and rearranged the djellaba around her crossed legs.

“You know about it?” asked Cassian.

“Just the little I’ve heard here and there,” said Lulu. “Holiday villas. Is that it?”

“That
was
it. Johnny represents the majority of Fergus’s partners. Most of them are Lloyd’s Names. They want out.”

“He wants new partners?”

“No. Not at all. They want to sell the land. They bought it on extremely favorable terms—just yesterday, I gather. Today, they want to dump it. They’ll probably offer it back to Gerald if they can’t get rid of it.”

“How extraordinary. The disasters of the world come home to roost in our back garden. What do you have in mind?”

“I’m thinking of taking it off Johnny, but doing something different with it. What Fergus was planning—separate villas with gardens—underutilizes the land. Many more units could be put on it, for a lot more profit. Like those condominiums down in Porto Cristo. Do you want to come in with me?”

“You mean build an entire village of those semidetached hovels? How revolting.”

“It made their developers a lot of money.”

Cassian lit a king-sized Dunhill.

Lulu knew the small eyes behind the thick yellow lenses. “You’ve thought it through, then.”

“Yes,” said Cassian.

“How much?”

“About a hundred thousand pounds. I’ll put up the same. We’ll use your lawyer, Beltran, to draw up a partnership. We’d get a couple of models up and then sell the rest to be built on contract.”

“I don’t think I’ve got a hundred thousand pounds, darling.”

“I think you’ll find you do, actually. More than that, with your share of Mummy’s estate.”

“Oh. Would
we
make a lot of money?”

“I reckon three to four times our outlay at the end of two years. A lot more in the following two years. We could run all the purchases through an offshore company. Use my bank, the Butterfield, in Bermuda.”

“Who else have you asked?”

“Nobody. This would be just you and me. I won’t bother if you’re not interested. It can go back to Gerald.”

Lulu picked up her drink from the table.

“What about Fergus? Does he come with it?”

“No. He’s a shareholder only with Johnny’s group. He can’t stop the sale. He’s finished, out.”

“Could Gerald stop us building what we want?”

“Not a chance. But we need to move quickly. I want to tell Johnny today or tomorrow—preferably before Fergus comes back on that boat, calls Johnny, and goes home to talk it over with Gerald.”

Lulu looked away, out over the rocks to the sea.

C
harlie woke at seven
in the evening. His afternoon nap, which in London began at one or half-past, didn’t start until three or four in Mallorca where, with all the beach-going and playing with Bianca and helping his grandfather with the lemons and olives, he slept longer hours.

He could tell it was evening. His room was dim, the color gone out of it. Through the open window he could see the fading pale blue sky over the green leaves of the lemon trees.

He knew where he would find everyone beyond the door of his room. Grandpa would be in the living room, smoking his smelly cigarettes, listening to the radio that called itself the BBC World Service and told Grandpa what was happening in the world. There was always a disaster somewhere and when the BBC World Service told him about it, Grandpa would blow his smoke toward the ceiling and say,
“Plus ça change.”
Mummy and Daddy would be on the terrace having their drinkies. Charlie liked lying in bed, knowing where everyone was and that he could go be with them as soon as he decided to get up.

I will get out of bed very soon, he thought.

He waited as long as he could, which was about seven seconds, and then he got up and went to the door.

He heard the radio as he came out of his room.

“Ah, Charlie, there you are,” said his grandfather, standing up as Charlie came into the room. “How are you?”

“Good,” said Charlie. He walked sturdily through the room and out onto the terrace. No one there. He turned around. His grandfather was behind him.

“Where’s Mummy and Daddy?”

“Yes, they’re not here right now,” said Grandpa cheerfully. “Daddy went for a boat ride, and Mummy’s gone into town to see when he’ll return. She’ll be back any minute.”

Charlie walked past his grandfather and into the kitchen. No one there either.

“Would you like some TriNaranjus, Charlie? Orange drinky?” Grandpa was smiling in a very big way at him.

“Where’s my mummy and daddy?” Charlie’s voice rose to a squeak and he began to cry.

“Now, don’t worry,” said Grandpa. He picked Charlie up. “They’ll all be back soon. It’s all right, Charlie boy.” Grandpa kissed his forehead.

Charlie bawled and pushed away from the stinky cigarette smell.

Grandpa carried him into the living room and put him down on the sofa. “Shall we play a game, Charlie? What about noughts and crosses?” They’d been playing that recently and Charlie had won all the games. “Or shall I read you a story?”

Charlie jumped to the floor and ran out to the terrace. He reached the rail and cried out over the drive below.
“Mum-myyyy!”

Grandpa caught him and lifted Charlie into the air and they moved away from the rail and back into the living room. “Everyone’ll be back soon, Charlie, don’t you worry,” said Grandpa, bouncing him up and down and pretending to laugh. Charlie didn’t want to hear it. He placed his hands on his grandfather’s chest and pushed strongly. He wailed.

“I’ll tell you what.” Grandpa held him out and looked into Charlie’s face. “Shall we go look for them?”

“Yes,” said Charlie. He stopped crying and was still.

“Right. We’ll go into town. I know where they’ll be. One of two places. We’ll go look at both, shall we?”

Charlie nodded. This made sense.

“All right, then. Well, let’s get something on your feet.”

Grandpa carried Charlie back into his room, where they found his little blue espadrilles. He slipped them onto Charlie’s feet and said, “Mummy’s got my car, and your daddy’s got his car, so we’ll go on Grandpa’s moped. Okay?”

“Yes, Grandpa,” said Charlie.

Now it was almost dark outside. Down on the drive, Grandpa started the moped and sat on it. Charlie was suddenly afraid Grandpa was going to leave without him and his face began to crumple, but Grandpa lifted him up and set him down on the seat in front of him, almost in his lap, with Charlie’s legs out either side between Grandpa’s legs. The machine throbbed beneath them.

“Now you hold on, with your hands on my arms, like that. Hold on tight to my arms or my shirt. Got it? That’s it. Hold on tight, Charlie. This way you can’t fall sideways or go forward and I’m right behind you. All right? Off we go.”

The moped whined, wobbled, and plunged down the steep drive. They appeared to be falling. Charlie shrieked. Somehow they didn’t fall, but continued swooping down the drive like a bird.

At the bottom of the hill where the drive met the road, they stopped. Grandpa looked around and said, “Off we go. Hold on tight!” The moped buzzed loudly and trembled beneath Charlie’s legs and then it leapt ahead. Charlie laughed a squeal of delight. The stone walls at the sides of the road blurred. A small patch of yellow light bounced in front of them as they tore through the dark beneath an indigo sky. The warm air buffeted Charlie’s face, his thick dark hair flew around his head.

“This is fun!” he shouted.

“It is, isn’t it!” agreed Grandpa.

The dark fell away as they came into town. Shops liquid with light pouring out of them and car headlights streaked past. Charlie was thrown backward into Grandpa’s chest, and forward, grabbing onto Grandpa’s arms, with the moped’s sudden fits of fast and slow. They flew through town, weaving miraculously through traffic, down dusty side streets, turning, slowing, and zooming through the dark. It felt dangerous but Charlie knew he was safe, so it was fun. The moped whined louder and picked up speed and they were racing through the port with the lights of the town streaming across the water beside them. Charlie suddenly heard another moped beside them, but it was only the breakwater wall close by as they sped down the long quay toward the blinking white light at the end. They slowed and stopped, the moped puttering softly beneath them.

“There’s Daddy’s car, you see?” said Grandpa. And so it was: the familiar boxy Range Rover shape all by itself on the long quay. “Well, he’s not back yet. He went for a boat ride and they’re late.”

Charlie started to worry about this, until Grandpa said, “I expect they’ll be back shortly. Shall we go find Mummy, then?”

Charlie nodded. “Yes.”

The engine grumbled beneath Charlie, Grandpa turned the moped, and they sped back down the quay. They whizzed around the port until Charlie found he could tell where Grandpa was going.

“The Rocks, Grandpa!” he shouted. His father had taken him there a few times, to have a TriNaranjus while his father had drinkies with his friends. Charlie liked the Rocks.

“That’s right,” said Grandpa.

They slowed and stopped outside a large house beside the sea. Grandpa turned off the moped and carried Charlie through the gate into the open area inside where all the grown-ups had their drinkies. People turned and looked at them.

“Any news from the yacht?” Grandpa asked.

“No,” several people said.

A man with red hair and yellow glasses approached them. He spoke to Grandpa in a very quiet grown-up voice: “Gerald, I think it would be better if you go home. We’ve heard nothing. If we hear anything, we’ll send someone up.”

Charlie could see that Grandpa was looking around everywhere for Mummy and Daddy, but the red-haired man put his hand on Grandpa’s shoulder and led them back outside. “We’ll let you know,” he said again.

“But then where’s Mummy?” Charlie asked as Grandpa started the moped again. He began to cry. “Where’s Mummy?” he wailed.

“She’ll probably be back home by the time we get there, Charlie boy,” said Grandpa.

The moped leapt ahead and trundled on down the bumpy road. Soon they were grinding slowly up the long driveway. Eventually they reached the top, and, the best thing in the world, Grandpa’s car was there. She’d heard them coming and was waiting for them on the steps.

“Mummy!” Charlie yelled.

She took him in her arms and hugged him. Over Charlie’s head, she looked at her father.

“Where have you been?” she asked.