He’d done all that on the previous night. Dellen had pills but he would not take them.
Ben looked at Alan. He saw him through a fog, as if a veil existed between his eyeballs and his brain. He could take in the younger man, but he had no ability to process what he was taking in. So he said, “Go on. I understand,” although he didn’t want the first and didn’t mean the second.
They were in the marketing office, a small former conference room that opened off the erstwhile reception area. It had likely been used for staff meetings when the hotel was in operation. An ancient blackboard still hung on the wall, stained with ghostly copperplate, undoubtedly the work of a manager stirring his troops to action if the excessive underlining was anything to go by. Beneath this writing surface and encircling the room, the walls were covered with gouged wainscoting, above it faded wallpaper featuring hunting scenes. The Kernes had determined to leave all this as it was when they’d taken over the hotel. No one would see it but themselves, they’d decided, and the money could be more profitably spent elsewhere.
Which was the purpose of this meeting with Alan. Ben tuned in to what the young man was talking about and heard “…must consider the cost as an investment towards returns. Additionally, it’s a onetime cost but not a onetime use of the product, so we’d amortise what we spent producing it. If we’re careful to avoid a look that will date the piece, we’ll be fine. You know what I mean: keep away from shots of vehicles, avoid sites likely to demonstrate anachronicity in five years and use sites likely to demonstrate their history. That sort of thing. Here. This sample came the other day. I’ve already shown Dellen, but she probably…well, understandably she probably won’t have mentioned it to you.” Alan rose from the conference table-a pitted and scratched pine affair with countless burns from forgotten cigarettes-and went to the video player. He had coloured in a febrile manner as he spoke, and not for the first time Ben speculated about his daughter’s relationship with this man. He reckoned he knew the reason behind Kerra’s choice of Alan, and he was fairly certain she was wrong about him in more ways than one.
He and Alan were having their regular meeting about marketing strategies. Ben hadn’t possessed the will to cancel it. He sat in mute attendance now, considering which of them was the more heartless bastard: Alan for ostensibly carrying on as if nothing had happened or himself for being present. Dellen was meant to be in attendance as she, too, worked in marketing, but she’d not risen from bed.
On the video monitor, a promotional film began. It featured a resort in the Scilly Isles: a high-end hotel and spa with golf course attached. It wouldn’t attract the same sort of clientele as Adventures Unlimited, but that wasn’t the point of Alan’s showing it to him.
A suave voice-over provided the commentary, a sales pitch for the resort. While the voice recited the expected panegyric, the accompanying film featured shots of the hotel sitting atop white sands, spa goers basking under the ministrations of lithesome and tanned masseuses, golfers whacking away at balls, diners on terraces and in candlelit rooms. This was, Alan said, the type of film one showed at travel venues. They could do that as well, but with a much broader base of appeal. This, then, was what Alan was after: Ben’s permission to pursue yet another way to market Adventures Unlimited.
“As you’ve mentioned, we’ve got bookings coming in,” Alan said once the film had finished, “which is brilliant, Ben. That piece the Mail on Sunday printed on you and what you’re doing with this place helped enormously as a promotional vehicle. But it’s time we looked at the potential we have for a larger market.” He ticked items off on his fingers. “Families with children from six to sixteen, independent schools with programmes taking pupils for weeklong maturing courses, singles looking to meet life mates, mature travelers in good condition who don’t want to while away their golden years rocking on a veranda somewhere. Then there are drug-rehab programmes, early release programmes for young offenders, inner-city youth programmes. We’ve an expansive market out there, and I mean to see us tap into it.”
Alan’s face was shiny, his ears were red, and his eyes were bright. Enthusiasm and hope, Ben thought. Either that or nerves. He said to Alan, “You’ve got big plans.”
“I hope that’s why you took me on. Ben, what you have here…This place. Its location. Your ideas for it. With an investment in areas likely to be fruitful, you’re looking at the goose and gold eggs. I swear it.”
Alan seemed to study him, then, just as Ben had himself studied Alan. He ejected the video from the machine and handed it over, putting a hand on Ben’s shoulder momentarily. “Watch it again with Dellen when you’re both up to it,” he said. “We’ve no need to make a decision today. But…soon, though.”
Ben’s fingers closed round the plastic case. He felt its little ridges press against his skin. He said, “You’re doing a good job. Organising the Mail on Sunday piece…That was brilliant.”
“I wanted you to see what I could do,” Alan told him. “I’m grateful you took me on. Otherwise, I’d probably have been forced to live in Truro or Exeter, which I wouldn’t much like.”
“Much larger places than Casvelyn, though.”
“Too large for me if Kerra’s not there.” Alan gave a laugh, which sounded embarrassed. “She didn’t want me to come on staff here, you know. She said it wouldn’t work out, but I mean to show her otherwise. This place”-he extended his arms to take in the hotel as a whole-“this place fills me with ideas. All I need is someone to listen and okay them when the time is right. I mean, have you thought about everything the hotel can actually be in the off-season? It’s got room for conferences, and with a little tweaking of the promotional film…”
Ben tuned out, not because he wasn’t interested but because of the painful contrast to Santo that Alan Cheston was presenting. Here was the zeal Ben had hoped for in Santo: a wholehearted embracing of what would have been Santo’s inheritance and that of his sister. But Santo hadn’t seen things that way. He’d hungered for experiencing life instead of for building life. That was how he and his father had differed. True, he’d been only eighteen years old, and with maturity might have come interest and commitment. But if the past was the best indicator of the future, didn’t it stand to reason that Santo would have continued to engage in more of what had already begun to define him as a man? Charm and pursuit, charm and pleasure, charm and enthusiasm for what enthusiasm could gain him and not what enthusiasm could produce.
Ben wondered if Alan had seen all this when he’d asked for employment at Adventures Unlimited. For Alan had known Santo, had spoken to him, had seen him, had watched him. Thus Alan had known a gap was present. He’d assessed this gap and had deemed himself the man to fill it.
Alan was saying, “So if we combine our assets and present a plan to the bank-” when Ben interrupted, our having broken into his thoughts like a sharp rap on the door of his consciousness.
“Do you know where Santo kept his climbing kit, Alan?”
Alan stopped dead in his verbal tracks. He looked at Ben in some apparent confusion. It was feigned; it was not feigned. Ben couldn’t tell. Alan said, “What?” And when Ben repeated the question, Alan appeared to think about his reply before making it. “I expect he kept it in his bedroom, Ben, didn’t he? Or perhaps wherever you keep yours?”
“Do you know where mine is?”