Sleeping Cruelty (15 page)

At some point during the night, the tray was removed and the hand-made mosquito nets released above the bed. William turned and his eyes opened and, for a moment, he was unsure where he was. The netting above him felt like hands touching his face and he cringed. He must make it clear to all the servants that his rooms were not to be entered unless at his express permission. Returning to a half-sleep, he saw winding dark corridors, secret rooms – eerie, frightening places. He felt so cold he woke up. Pushing the netting aside William reached for the bedside lamp,
patting its base to find the switch. The lamp filled the room with a soft yellow glow. Looking around, he suddenly noticed a painting.

For a moment it looked like a mirage, suspended in the air, but then he realized that it had been framed to stand away from the wall and was intended to appear to float. It was of a woman, her blonde hair cascading from a central parting almost to her waist. A pale blue chiffon scarf covered her shoulders, revealing her perfect breasts. One hand, with long fine fingers and short oval nails, held a white lily. The other rested against the side of her pale neck, as if she was touching her pulse. The painting was in washed, muted colours. Only the face had clarity, as if the artist wanted it to be the focus. It was a childlike, innocent face. Pale blue eyes stared out above a small, delicate nose and the full lips were slightly parted. William turned off the light, but kept staring towards the painting, unsure whether he wished it to remain in the room. Eventually he fell asleep, her face the last thing he saw that night and the first when he woke next morning.

Standing on the veranda, William saw Justin in a white robe heading back towards the house.

‘Morning,’ Justin called up.

‘Morning,’ he replied.

‘I’ve been for a swim,’ Justin said, shading his eyes. ‘Have you had breakfast?’

‘Not yet, will you join me for coffee?’

‘Absolutely,’ said Justin, disappearing.

‘Justin!’ William called after him. ‘The woman,’ he said, as Justin reappeared. ‘The painting of the woman in my bedroom.’

‘Ah, yes,’ Justin called up. ‘Beautiful, isn’t she?’

‘Who is she?’

‘My sister,’ Justin said. Almost as an afterthought he added, ‘Her name is Laura.’

At breakfast, William was wearing a pair of Bermuda shorts and a loose floral shirt. On his feet were Gucci sandals, leather uppers
with rope soles, but his legs above his socks were unhealthy pinkish blobs. His pale freckled skin never tanned, but turned red and blistered if he sat in the sun too long. His fine blond hair, thinning at the back in a neat round crown, was perhaps the only thing the tropical sun enhanced, turning it from mousy blond to white-silver. Justin, in comparison, was so deeply tanned from months of working outdoors that it was hard to tell what race he was. He was wearing a cheesecloth kaftan and the flip-flops he had worn the previous day. He hitched up the kaftan around his thighs as he stretched out his long legs beside the table.

A large trolley loaded with fresh fruit cascading from iced bowls had been wheeled to within easy reach of the table, with fresh rolls, pastries and home-made breads under a covered silver warming-dish. Various jams and sweet and sour marmalades in silver basketweave jars, matching silver coffee- and tea-pots with hot-water jugs in the same but larger-woven pattern sparkled in the morning sun. The table wore a starched pale blue linen cloth, with matching napkins and heavy cutlery. Added to the array of knives and forks were diamond-shaped grapefruit spoons. Iced flutes held freshly squeezed orange juice. Jugs offered lemon water, or grapefruit juice with sprigs of mint. A small, heated tray held covered tureens with bacon, sausage, scrambled eggs, liver, kidneys and onions.

‘No cornflakes?’ William said, looking over the trolley.

‘I’ll send down for some,’ Justin said.

‘No, don’t bother. It was a joke.’ William poured more coffee and proffered the pot to Justin, who shook his head, holding up a glass of iced water.

‘Not until midday. Gets me too speedy.’ He sat munching at an alarming rate.

‘Is she dead?’ William asked, out of the blue.

‘Who?’ Justin enquired.

‘The woman in the painting.’ William dabbed the corners of his mouth with his napkin.

‘Laura? No, she’s very much alive.’

‘You’ve never mentioned her.’

‘I’m sure I have.’ Justin took out his cigarettes, noting the way the debris from William’s breakfast now dominated the table. He had read somewhere that the space a person took up on a table was representative of their perceived status in relation to their fellow diners. William clearly felt he was the dominant personality here.

‘Laura?’ William said, his head cocked to one side. ‘The name suits her. She’s very beautiful.’

Justin nodded, picked up a book of matches and lit his Gitane. He drew the ashtray close and laid the match in the bowl then slid it, with a half-amused smile, directly in front of William. He had now reclaimed his space. ‘We should go over the accounts,’ he said quietly.

‘Fine. Whenever.’

Justin stood up and stretched his long arms above his head. ‘Half an hour? Your study would probably be best. Then I can lay out all the plans.’

‘What does she do?’ William asked, looking up at Justin.

‘My sister?’ Justin drew deeply on the cigarette, then let the smoke drift from his nose. ‘She fucks.’ With that he strolled away, the smell of his cigarette hanging in the air.

Justin was waiting in William’s study. He had changed into a pair of white shorts, frayed at the edges and a washed-out blue vest. William pointed to a stack of receipts and invoices. ‘Has Michael been privy to all of this?’

‘Most,’ Justin said, concentrating on the account books.

‘He’ll need copies of everything,’ William said, wandering around the room, noting the contents of the bookshelves and cabinets.

‘Absolutely.’

William stared out of the window. ‘Christ, it’s a wonderful view from here,’ he said.

‘From every room,’ Justin corrected, concentrating on his
papers. ‘Shall we get started?’ He stepped away from the desk, gesturing to the carved chair behind it. William sat as he placed an open, leatherbound account book in front of him. He pointed to the control panel on the desk. ‘You have a hi-tech calculator there if you need it. It’ll give you the costs in any currency, plus exchange rates. This is the master copy.’

William nodded and flicked briskly through the pages of neatly handwritten accounts until he got to the last page and glanced down. Justin was becoming irritated. He knew that William was looking for the final total. ‘If you have to look for it, you can’t afford it,’ he said. ‘The truth is, it’s peanuts compared to what some interior designers would have charged.’

‘Jesus Christ!’ William uttered under his breath. The total was one hundred and twenty-six million dollars. ‘Peanuts?’ He looked up as Justin averted his eyes.

‘I’ll start at the beginning. Go to page one, structural repairs,’ he snapped.

‘Yes,’ William said flatly, adding a curt, ‘I think you had better do just that!’

At last there was some energized response from William, even if it was not necessarily a good one. His depression hung around him, pervaded the island and infuriated Justin. He simply could not understand his lack of energy and enthusiasm. He was like a dead man set in cement. Only the money angle seemed to have given him a spark of life.

Later, a business lunch of crisp salad and chicken breast wrapped in spinach leaves on a bed of saffron rice was brought in to them. William did not want a break, and Justin, under a barrage of questions, didn’t eat a morsel. William demanded to know the cost of every item. By mid-afternoon Justin had to get out. He needed to clear his head. He’d not even left the room for a piss. Neither had William.

No wonder the man was rich, he thought. Nothing went unnoticed – he even enquired about bars of soap.

‘Look, Sir William, we must discuss more than nit-picking
costs. There is more at stake here.’ William peered at him quizzically. ‘I suggest we both take a break. I’ll arrange for a drink to be brought up to you at the jacuzzi.’

Reluctantly William acquiesced. He didn’t like jacuzzis and he could have easily continued all day and into the night.

‘I’ll take some of these folders,’ he muttered.

‘Fine. Just don’t get them wet.’ Justin was trying hard to control his temper.

Justin walked to the edge of the pool, kicked off his shorts and dived naked into the cool blue water. William was sitting in the jacuzzi on the higher level, wearing Justin’s baseball cap with a cigar clamped in his teeth. He was checking through the lists of paintings and tapestries that had been shipped in from Sotheby’s and Christie’s showrooms in New York and London. The hot water was pumping and shaking over his rather flaccid thighs and buttocks. He had put on at least two and a half stone since Maynard’s death, partly due to Sylvina’s constant round of dinners. His pot belly hung over his maroon bathing shorts. He watched Justin swim length after length.

After about half an hour William showered and changed, gathered up the folders and returned to the study. He was surprised to see Justin already at work, bent over the computer, with a glass of chilled wine.

‘You mind?’ Justin asked, holding up the bottle, which was already three-quarters empty.

‘Not at all.’ William gestured to the chair beside him. ‘I need you to run these by me. Mexican artefacts? Were they necessary?’

‘No, not at all, but rather nice, don’t you think?’ Justin slumped down into the chair.

‘At this price they should be.’

And so it continued.

At last, by nine that evening, William was satisfied that he had covered the entire expenditure on his island paradise. He closed the last book and reached for a cigar from the specially designed
humidor, embossed with his initials in gold. ‘You took some liberties,’ he said quietly.

Justin leaned forward. ‘I’m sorry?’

William pushed back his chair. He puffed at his cigar then spat out a fragment of tobacco. ‘I said, you took liberties. Some of the costs are ridiculously high.’

‘You’ll find it worth it.’ Justin handed William a pen and blank piece of paper. ‘Now, can we discuss the original reason for my rebuilding this place?’

William wrinkled his brow. ‘We did. I thought I’d cleared that up on my arrival.’

Justin smiled. ‘Fine. You’re the one who’s been made to look the arsehole, so it’s your decision. I mean, I’ve seen you publicly humiliated. If I were you I’d want revenge. But I’m not you, obviously, and it’s always been your decision about everything.’

‘Revenge?’ William shifted uneasily, recalling that late-night conversation all those months ago in the South of France. ‘It’s been too long now.’

‘William, everyone has called you a wanker. The press, your family, everyone. Doesn’t that bother you? Even with all your money, you’ll never be free of that. The only thing you can do is pay the bastards back, but you’re too much of a pussy to do it. I’ve set it all up for you, worked my butt off.’

‘You’ll be paid.’

Justin lifted his hands in exasperation. ‘Fine, pay me off like Sylvina and I’ll walk out of your life. I don’t care any more, I just don’t want to waste any more of my time on you.’

William sat down, head in his hands, and fell into the trap. ‘This grand plan you’ve conceived . . .’

‘I didn’t, you did. It was your idea.’

‘Refresh my memory.’

Justin’s eyes narrowed as he wondered how much to elaborate. He must choose his words carefully.

‘Okay, the original plan was for you to become socially accepted again, which partly worked via Sylvina. You listed the
specific names of people who had, to your mind, done the dirty on you. People like—’

‘Baron von Garten,’ William muttered.

‘Exactly. Then everyone on the hit-list would subsequently be invited to join you here on your island, where they would be at your mercy.’

Justin looked for a reaction, but there was none.

‘Once here, they would be lulled into a false sense of security, entertained on such a lavish scale that they would relax . . . unaware that you had another motive. Payback. You would systematically get every single one of them.’

‘Caught in a sexual scandal,’ William added quietly.

‘Exactly,’ Justin said softly, then got up and touched William’s shoulder. ‘That was what we hatched up. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten.’

‘Of course I hadn’t,’ William said hoarsely. ‘I hadn’t forgotten, Justin, but so much has happened, and the Sylvina débâcle turned round to my benefit. Sometimes the press that I despise so much—’

‘Makes you look even more of a buffoon,’ snapped Justin.

There was that word again. William clenched his hands in anger.

‘Go to bed. You think about it tonight. Then if you decide to go with it, we can start things rolling. If not, then I’ll be finished here and I’ll leave, with no hard feelings.’

Justin strolled out. He might have been discussing something as mundane as cushion fabric, not a complex revenge plot.

William felt as if he had been holding his breath too long, and let it out. ‘Oh, my God,’ he whispered. He wondered whether Justin was unbalanced. But it was himself who had sown the seeds of the plan. That night in France he had wanted to make someone pay for what had been done to him. His injuries had still smarted then. But did he still want that? William patted his pockets and removed his wallet. Neatly folded into a small square was the original list he had made out of people whom he
believed should pay for what he had been put through. But now that he had just such an opportunity, he found it didn’t make him feel good. Instead it disturbed him. He needed to think hard before he made any decisions.

The sound of speedboat engines drew William to the balcony of his room. The night-lights and lanterns illuminated the path all the way to the water’s edge creating a carnival feeling. He could see a group of people on the jetty watching the Sunseeker Hawk 34 being tested. Justin was shouting instructions to Sammy at the wheel, and the engine came to life with a sound almost as loud as Concorde. The boat lifted out of the water leaving a foaming wash behind as it disappeared out of sight.