Guests with planes, guests with yachts; guests with neither who had to be fetched by Roper jet or, if they lived on a neighbouring island, Roper chopper, with the Crystal insignia and the Ironbrand colours of blue and grey. Roper invited them, Jed welcomed them and did her duty by them, though it appeared to be a matter of real pride to her that she knew not the first thing about their business.
"I mean, why should I, Thomas?" she protested, in a gulpy stage voice, after the departure of a particularly awful pair of Germans. "One of us worrying is quite enough in any household. I'd far rather be like Roper's investors and say, 'Here you are, here's my money and my life, and mind you bloody well look after them.' I mean don't you think it's the only way, Corks? I'd never sleep otherwise ― well, would I?"
"Dead right, old heart. Go with the flow, my advice," said Corkoran.
You stupid little equestrienne! Jonathan raged at her, while he piously agreed with her sentiments. You've put yourself in size-twelve blinkers, and now you're asking for my approval!
For his memorising, he filed the guests by category and dubbed each category with a piece of Roperspeak.
First came the keen young Danbys and MacArthurs, alias the MacDanbies, who manned the Ironbrand offices in Nassau and went to the same tailor and trailed the same classless accents and came when Roper beckoned and mixed when Roper told them mix, and left in a flurry or they'd never make it to their desks in time next day. Roper had no patience with them: neither had Jonathan. The MacDanbies were not Roper's allies, not his friends. They were his cover, forever twittering about land deals in Florida and price shifts on the Tokyo exchange and providing Roper with the boring outer shell of his respectability.
After the MacDanbies came Roper's Frequent Fliers, and no Crystal party was complete without a smattering of the Frequent Fliers: such as the perennial Lord Langbourne, whose luckless wife minded the children while he danced groin-to-groin with the nanny; such as the sweet young titled polo player ― Angus to his friends ― and his darling wife. Julia, whose shared purpose in life, apart from croquet at Sally's and tennis at John-and-Brian's and reading housemaids' novels by the pool, was to sit out their time in Nassau until it was safe for them to claim the house in Pelham Crescent and the castle in Tuscany and the five-thousand-acre estate in Wiltshire with its fabled art collection and the island off the coast of Queensland, all of which were presently the property of some fiscal offshore no-man's-land, together with a couple of hundred million to oil the wheels.
And Frequent Fliers are in honour bound to bring their houseguests:
"Jeds! Over here! You remember Arno and Georgina, chums of Julia's, dinner with us in Rome, February? Fish place behind the Byron? Come on, Jeds!"
Jed frowns the dearest frown. Jed opens first her eyes in incredulous recognition, then her mouth, but holds a beat before she is able to overcome her joyful astonishment. "Gosh, Arno! But, darling, you've lost pounds! Georgina, darling, how are you? Super! Gosh. Hullo!"
And the obligatory embrace for each of them, followed by a reflective Mmnh, as if she were enjoying it a little more than she ought. And Jonathan in his fury actually goes Mmnh in imitation of her under his breath, swearing that next time he catches her pretending like this he will leap up and shout: "Cut! One more time, please, Jed, darling, this time for real!"
And after the Frequent Fliers came the Royal & Ancients: the sub-county English debutantes escorted by brain-dead offshoots of the royal brat pack and policemen in attendance; Arab smilers in pale suits and snow-white shirts and polished toecaps; minor British politicians and ex-diplomats terminally deformed by self-importance; Malaysian tycoons with their own cooks; Iraqi Jews with Greek palaces and companies in Taiwan; Germans with Eurobellies moaning about Ossies; hayseed lawyers from Wyoming wanting to do the best by mah clients and mahself; retired vastly rich investors gleaned from their dude plantations and twenty-million-dollar bungalows ― wrecked old Texans on blue-veined legs of straw, in parrot shirts and joky sun hats, sniffing oxygen from small inhalers; their women with chiselled faces they never had when they were young, and tucked stomachs and tucked bottoms, and artificial brightness in their unpouched eyes. But no surgery on earth could spare them the manacled slowness of old age as they lowered themselves into the kids' end of the Crystal pool, clutching the ladder lest they split again and become what they feared to be before they took the plunge at Dr. Marti's clinic.
"My goodness, Thomas," Jed whispers, in a strangled aside to Jonathan, as a blue-haired Austrian countess dog-paddles herself breathlessly to safety. "How ever old do you suppose she is?"
"Depends which bit you're thinking of," says Jonathan. "Averaged out, probably around seventeen." And Jed's lovely laugh ― the real one ― her bucking, born-free laugh, while she once again touches him with her eyes.
After the Royal & Ancients came Burr's pet hates, and probably Roper's too, for he called them the Necessary Evils, and these were the shiny-cheeked merchant bankers from London with eighties striped blue shirts and white collars and double-barrelled names and double chins and double-breasted suits, who said "ears" when they meant "yes" and "nice" when they meant "house" and "school" when they meant "Eton"; and in their train, the bully-boy accountants ― the bean counters, Roper called them ― looking as if they'd come to extract a voluntary confession, with take-away-curry breath and wet armpits and voices like formal cautions that from here on everything you say will be taken down and faked in evidence against you.
And after them again, their non-British counterparts: Mulder, the tubby notary from Curaçao, with his twinkling smile and knowing waddle; Schreiber of Stuttgart, constantly apologising for his ostentatiously good English; Thierry from Marseilles, with his pinched lips and toyboy secretary; the bond sellers from Wall Street, who never came in less than fours, as if there really were security in numbers; and Apostoll the striving little Greek-American, with his toupee like a black bear's paw, his gold chains and gold crosses and unhappy Venezuelan mistress toppling uncomfortably behind him on her thousand-dollar shoes as they head hungrily for the buffet.
Catching Apostoll's glance, Jonathan turns away but is too late.
"Sir? We have met, sir. I never forget a face," Apostoll declares, whipping off his dark glasses and holding up everybody behind him. "My name is Apostoll. I am a legionary of God, sir."
"Course you've met him, Apo!" Roper cuts in deftly. "We've all met him. Thomas. You remember Thomas, Apo! Used to be the night chap at Meister's. Came west to seek his fortune. Chum of ours from way back. Isaac, give the Doc some more shampoo."
"I am honoured, sir. Forgive me. You are English? I have many British connections, sir. My grandmother was related to the Duke of Westminster, and my uncle on my mother's side designed the Albert Hall."
"My goodness. That's wonderful," says Jonathan politely.
They shake hands. Apostoll's is cool as snakeskin. Their eyes meet. Apostoll's are haunted and a little mad ― but who is not a little mad at Crystal on a perfect starlit night with the Dom flowing like the music?