‘That she looks good?’
‘You know exactly what I mean. She’s trying to be more perfect than perfect, all over again.’
‘Oh, Tim—’
‘You’ve dealt with her before, haven’t you?’
‘More than anything I’ve experienced her having everything under control here.’
‘Everything here has Lynn under control!’
‘Fine, so what should she do, in your opinion? Julian’s invited a crowd of filthy-rich eccentrics that she’s got to look after. He’s promised them two weeks in the most exclusive hotels of all time, and Lynn’s responsible for them all. Should she start letting herself go, and walk around the place looking all unwashed and with her hair in a mess, neglect her guests, just to prove that she’s a human being?’
‘Of course not.’
‘This is a circus, Tim! She’s the ringmaster. She has to be perfect, or else the lions will eat her.’
‘I know that,’ Tim said impatiently. ‘That’s not the issue. It’s just that I can see that she’s starting to get agitated again.’
‘She didn’t seem specially agitated to me.’
‘That’s because she deceives you. Because she deceives everybody. You know how well her personal diplomacy works.’
‘I’m sorry, but isn’t it possible that you’re dramatising everything just a little bit?’
‘I’m not dramatising anything at all. I’m really not. Let’s leave aside the question of whether it was a brilliant idea to join in all this nonsense in the first place, but fine, nothing to be done. You and Julian, you—’
‘Hey!’ A warning light flashed in Amber’s eyes. ‘Don’t go saying we twisted your arm again.’
‘What else?’
‘No one twisted your arm.’
‘Oh, come on! You insisted like mad.’
‘So? How old are you? Five or something? If you really hadn’t wanted—’
‘I didn’t. I’m here because of Lynn.’ Tim sighed and rubbed his eyes. ‘Okay, okay! She looks fantastic! She seems to be stable. But still.’
‘Tim. She built this hotel!’
‘Sure.’ He nodded. ‘Yes, sure. And it’s great! Really.’
‘I’m taking you seriously. I just don’t want you to start blaming Lynn simply because you can’t sort things out with your father.’
Tim tasted the bitterness of the insult. He turned to face her and shook his head.
‘That’s unfair,’ he said quietly.
Amber turned her lemonade bottle between her fingers. Silence fell for a while. Then she put her arms around his neck and kissed him.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘It’s fine.’
‘Have you talked to Julian about it?’
‘Yes, and I’ll give you three guesses. He insists she’s doing brilliantly. You say she looks as if she’s in the pink. So I’m the idiot.’
‘Of course you are. The most lovable idiot who’s ever got on anyone’s nerves.’
Tim grinned crookedly. He pressed Amber to him, but his gaze was fixed beyond the parapet. The helicopter that had brought the athlete and the Indian couple here hummed its way out to the open sea. The next one was hovering above the heliport and preparing to land. Below it, Lynn was leaving the lobby to welcome the new guests. Tim’s eyes drifted across the steep terrain between the hotel and the cliffs, the abandoned golf course, then followed the walkway down to the coastal path. Dips and gorges had required the construction of several small bridges, with the result that you could comfortably stroll along the whole of the eastern side of the Isla de las Estrellas. He saw someone ambling along the path. A slender form came darting up from the opposite direction, its body gleaming bright in the sun.
Bright as ivory.
Finn O’Keefe saw her and stopped. The woman was running at an athletic pace. She was a curious creature, with willowy limbs, almost on the edge of anorexia, but still shapely. Her skin was snow-white, as was her long, flowing hair. She wore a skimpy mother-of-pearl-coloured bathing suit and trainers of the same colour, and moved as nimbly as a gazelle. Someone who belonged on the front pages.
‘Hello,’ he said.
The woman stopped running and approached him in springy steps.
‘Hi! And who are you?’
‘Finn.’
‘Oh, of course. Finn O’Keefe. You look somehow different on screen.’
‘I always look somehow different.’
He held out his hand. Her fingers, long and delicate, gave a surprisingly firm handshake. Now that she was standing right in front of him he could see that her eyebrows and eyelids were the same shimmering white as her hair, while her irises were almost violet. Below her narrow, straight nose, a sensuously curving mouth arched with almost colourless lips. To Finn O’Keefe she looked like an attractive alien whose firm skin was starting to crease in places. He guessed that she was just past forty.
‘And who are you?’
‘I’m Heidrun,’ she said. ‘Are you part of the tour group?’
Her English sounded as if it ran on crunchy gears. He tried to guess her accent. Germans generally spoke a kind of saw-toothed English, the Scandinavian version was soft and melodious. Heidrun, he decided, wasn’t German, but she wasn’t Danish or Swedish either.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I’m part of it.’
‘And? Fed up?’
He laughed. She didn’t seem even slightly impressed to find herself bumping into him here. Exposed as he was to the wearying and universal admiration of women who would happily have ditched their husbands just to go to bed with him, not to mention the men who fancied him too, he was constantly on the run.
‘Quite honestly, yes. A bit.’
‘Whatever. Me too.’
She brushed her sweat-drenched mane from her brow, turned round, spread the thumbs and index fingers of both hands into right angles, brought the tips together and studied the platform in the sea through the frame she had created. You could only make out the vertical black line if you looked very carefully.
‘And what does he want from you?’ she asked suddenly.
‘Who?’
‘Julian Orley.’ Heidrun lowered her hands and directed her violet gaze at him. ‘He wants something from each of us, after all.’
‘Really?’
‘Oh, come on. Otherwise we wouldn’t be here, would we?’
‘Hmm.’
‘Are you rich?’
‘I get by.’
‘Silly question. God, you must be rich! You’re Mr Royalties, aren’t you? If you haven’t somehow screwed everything up, you must be worth a few hundred million dollars.’ She laid her head curiously on one side. ‘And? Are you?’
‘And you?’
‘Me?’ Heidrun laughed. ‘Forget it. I’m a photographer. With what I own he couldn’t even have the platform repainted. Let’s say I’m part of a job lot. It’s Walo that he’s after. Walo.’
‘Sorry, who’s that?’
‘Walo?’ She pointed up to the hotel. ‘My husband. Walo Ögi.’
‘Doesn’t ring a bell.’
‘I’m not surprised. Artists are incapable of thinking about money, and he doesn’t do anything else.’ She smiled. ‘But he does have a lot of good ideas on how you can spend it once you’ve got it. You’ll like him. Do you know who else is here?’
‘Who’s that?’
‘Evelyn Chambers.’ Heidrun’s smile assumed a mischievous quality. ‘Darling, she’ll put you through the wringer. You can run away from her down here, but up there—’
‘I have no problem talking to her.’
‘Let’s bet you do?’
Heidrun turned her back on him and started climbing the path back up to the hotel. O’Keefe came after her. In fact he did have a brontosaurus-sized problem talking to Evelyn Chambers, America’s number one talk-show host. He avoided those shows more than anything else in the world. A thousand times, perhaps more, she’d invited him onto Chambers, her high-rating spiritual striptease that millions of socially depraved Americans gathered in front of their screens to watch every Friday evening. On every occasion he’d declined. Here, now, without the bars between them, he was the fillet steak and she was the lion.