The Sand Men (11 page)

‘Don’t you talk about the bombs or the accidents?’

‘Sure,’ said Ben, looking uncomfortable for the first time. ‘We wouldn’t be human if we didn’t. But we don’t get much intel.’

‘If you want the inside dope about how everyone really feels, you should talk to Milo,’ Rachel said to her on the way out. ‘He hired the Persiana’s original team and was there for all of the early meetings. He never approved of the new structure though, so don’t expect him to say anything complimentary.’

‘Don’t send Lea off to Milo,’ said Ben. ‘He’s kind of a loose cannon. He exaggerates everything, you know that.’

‘He gets a little carried away,’ Rachel agreed, ‘but I’m sure Lea can figure out when he’s telling the truth.’ She smiled secretively. Lea felt as if Rachel was pushing her toward something she had not yet discovered for herself.

As Rachel saw her to the door, she placed a hand on her arm. ‘Is this really an article for
Gulf Coast
magazine?’ Her look was slightly incredulous.

‘Of course,’ said Lea. ‘What else would it be?’

‘I
’M WARNING YOU
now,’ said Milo, holding the door open for her. ‘I don’t do the whole tea-and-cake thing. I don’t have a maid. Don’t agree with ’em.’

‘I let mine stay for Roy’s sake,’ Lea admitted. ‘I’m a coward, I took the easy route. And I don’t miss the ironing. Your own coffee is fine with me.’

‘Then come in and be poisoned.’ He stepped back with a smile.

Milo’s lounge reminded her of her grandfather’s house in Kent. There was a great dark dresser overstuffed with mismatched crockery in the kitchen, and cartons of junk lined the hall. Milo made mugs of pungent coffee, then led the way along the hall to a small lounge. The room was lined with framed certificates, and there were several photos of a small, severe woman in a deep green forest. ‘I moved to a single-level property after my leg started seizing up,’ he explained, dropping into an armchair. ‘So you’re planning to write propaganda for the enemy. I’m not sure I’m the right person you should be talking to. I’m treated as a pariah by the management these days. The board has changed a hell of a lot since it was set up.’

‘How?’

Milo shifted a stack of
Financial Times
back-issues and sat down. ‘We threw a lot of stuff out of the window. We’d planned for a zero-carbon footprint and the use of sustainable resources, but the other directors deemed it unfeasible, and nobody protested the altered plans. When you’re talking about a country that builds ski-runs in shopping malls, local manufacturing tariffs don’t really top the agenda.’

‘Is that why you left? You were disillusioned?’

Milo released a death-rattle chuckle. ‘Hell no, I left because I was dog-tired. This is a young man’s game. There are all kinds of social issues.’

‘Like what?’

‘Bedbugs. As one crew returns from the night shift they take the place of those rising for the day, which causes infestations of bedbugs unless their bedding is properly aired, and Rashad can’t get them to do it.’

‘Who’s Rashad?’

‘He’s their supervisor. There are all kinds of religious and ethnic divisions. Different nationals have different habits. The Somalis chew
khat
to keep themselves awake on late shifts, and the Indians are known to take a locally manufactured amphetamine when they’re driving trucks out to the site. The work is boring and repetitive, and in hot weather it’s easy to lose your concentration, so they lose a lot of trucks.’

‘Rachel says you have the inside dope on everyone,’ Lea prompted. ‘Does that include Tom Chalmers?’

‘He was more than just a neighbour, he was someone I trusted.’ He studied her face. ‘Well, I know you a little better now, so I suppose it can’t hurt. I was sitting here one night and heard this ridiculous noise outside, so I went to see what was wrong. I found him lying on the kerb and recognised the signs of severe electric shock, so I covered him with a blanket. I can’t imagine what he thought he was doing, taking an old-fashioned steel-bladed trimmer out there. He managed to blow half the street lights. The cables for the street are only just below the surface of the grass verges, because there’s bedrock underneath. One of them was sliced in half. I called Dr Vance, but he was too late. The next day I had an argument with Tahir Mansour—who was then his assistant—over what we would say about his death. Mansour wanted to call it a heart attack.’

‘He actually said that?’

‘He said it could cost the resort millions in bad press, so I went along with the story. The company is still paying for my house.’ Milo reached across and tapped Lea on the knee. ‘None of this is relevant to your little fluff-piece. Don’t you want to know if I have any good recipes for your readers?’

‘Screw you, Milo, you know what I’d rather write about.’

Milo laughed. ‘I knew there was a reason why I liked you. You’re not afraid to tell a frail old man to fuck off.’ He thought for a moment. ‘I was bothered by the whole thing. I couldn’t put my finger on it for a while. Then I realised what it was. Tom had recently undergone surgery on the tendons in his right hand. I couldn’t see how he was capable of holding the trimmer.’

‘So what do you think happened?’

‘I wondered if someone else could have been there and set the whole thing up. Of course, nobody ever sees anything. And the CCTV didn’t cover the spot—convenient, that. But everyone liked Tom.’

‘Do you think this might have had something to do with his daughter?’

‘They were worried about little Joia. She was very flirty and theatrical around men. You can’t afford to behave like that here.’ Milo gave a sharp laugh. ‘Now you’re curious! When she vanished we speculated endlessly in cocktail bars.’

‘You mean she just—’

‘Wait, I have something to show you.’ Rising with difficulty, Milo made his way to a pine dresser and pulled a folded page from a drawer. ‘You’re the writer. What do you think of this?’

She took the page and examined it. ‘Where did you get this?’

‘It was intended for Jim Davenport, but I was accidentally copied in—somebody used the wrong mailing template. A list of workers’ deaths. Mandhatri Sahonta died after a pipe burst on the beach. Deng Antonio got his arm torn off trying to clean out a separator. Obviously you’re supposed to shut the thing down first, but it shouldn’t have been operating if he was standing in the vicinity. According to this, the motion sensors weren’t working, but clearly nobody’s supposed to know that now. The third one was Garcia Rodriguez.’ He tapped the sheet. ‘He fell from the top of the Persiana. Not exactly an uncommon occurrence. They get filed under
misadventure
. These guys have a lot of experience with heights but the wind’s pretty fierce up there. It could easily have lifted him. I did some digging, just out of curiosity. His workmates say he slipped on something. When the inspectors went up there they found the floor clean and dry. I bet you someone in his crew spilled something on the floor, and cleared it up so they wouldn’t get in trouble.’

She held up the email. ‘Are you saying there’s something especially unusual about these?’

‘I’m just asking for your opinion.’

‘Given the size of the workforce, I guess three deaths aren’t that strange.’

‘Not at all, no.’

‘Then I don’t understand—’

‘What if I told you there was something connecting all three of them?’

‘Try me.’

‘Sahonta lost his daughter. She just disappeared, never left the country.’

‘How do they know?’

‘The company holds all the manual workers’ documentation. They can’t move anywhere without it. Antonio’s daughter vanished some weeks before his death, similar situation. And guess what? Rodriguez lost his daughter as well. They found her dead in the creek a month before he died. Nobody knows what happened to her because the police took the body and the report wasn’t made public. Right after the funeral he had to go back to work. They clean up accidents overnight.’

‘But don’t they investigate?’

‘Investigations throw the schedule out. It’s better for everyone that things keep moving on.’ He let the thought sink in.

‘Were the girls sexually mature?’

‘They were 21, 14 and 12.’

‘Did they know each other?’

‘Not to my knowledge.’

Lea felt an emotional shift, loss, pain, something momentarily revealed.

‘I made a few calls but got nowhere. Could you look into it?’

‘Milo, what can I do?’ she replied. ‘If they won’t tell you, they’re certainly not going to open up to me.’

‘Maybe not, but you have an advantage.’

‘What’s that?’

‘You’re the new wife on the block, and you’re married to an executive who’s tipped for promotion. They’ll all want to talk to you. If not the men, then the women. Just keep your ears open for me.’

‘Milo, I’m in enough trouble as it is. I’m not an investigative journalist. I’m trying to be good.’

‘You mean you’re trying to be what your husband wants you to be.’

‘Yes, I suppose so, for the sake of our family.’

‘Forget it. It was just an idea.’ He took the page from her and carefully refolded it. ‘It was wrong of me to ask. You’re right, you should sit back and relax while he makes a shedload of money, and then get the hell out. This place isn’t for you or Cara.’

Lea felt the need to explain. ‘It’s just that we went through some tough times. I need this to be a success for all of us.’

‘Hey listen, don’t worry. You mustn’t get a reputation.’ As Milo returned the email to its drawer she couldn’t help feeling she had failed him. She liked Milo and admired his honesty, but had seen something in his eyes when he handed her the email that she could not understand or interpret.

‘How’s your daughter getting on?’

‘She’s fine, I think. I don’t see as much of her as I expected.’

‘Well, keep an eye on her. This place may look like Disneyland, but under the surface it’s still an ancient civilisation.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Just keep Cara close,’ Milo replied, and for a second Lea felt the air turn cold. ‘You’re in the land of conspicuous consumption, and people get consumed too.’

‘You think the girls are connected.’

‘I have no proof of that. I’ve worked in a dozen countries on hundreds of projects, and sometimes you see patterns, that’s all. It may be just coincidence. There was a teenaged girl on the other side of the compound called Sarah. She was made pregnant by a local man. We were all shocked when she killed herself.’

‘What did she do?’

‘She jumped from the bridge near the Autodrome and landed in six lanes of traffic. There wasn’t an investigation or an autopsy because there wasn’t much left of her.’

‘That’s awful—did nobody know about her state of mind?’

‘That’s the point. We know and we don’t know. We
choose
not to know. I’m not being dramatic but remember, there are snakes in paradise.’

As she rose to go, waiting for him to see her out, she had a chance to look more closely at something that had caught her eye, a shiny brass box screwed into the inner lintel of the lounge door. It looked like some kind of security device. She was about to ask about it when the doorbell rang.

Milo looked through the window and cursed. ‘Jesus, you see what you did now? Mrs Busabi’s brought cakes over. She’s trying to give me diabetes. Get out while you can.’

Lea promised to reciprocate his kindness another day. ‘We’ll see about that,’ he said, opening the door, ‘I’m not sure I’m ready to follow the witches into their perfect world of coffee mornings. They probably sit around casting spells on people they don’t like. Come in Mrs Busabi, we were just talking about you.’

Lea waved goodbye and headed home, but when she glanced back she was surprised to see Milo still standing in the doorway, watching her leave. She found herself wondering what had persuaded someone living in a gated community to fit brand-new locks on the inside of his lounge doors.

Chapter Thirteen

The Beach House

T
HAT EVENING,
R
OY
surprised them by turning up for dinner, and even Cara managed to set aside her laptop and eat some grilled chicken salad. ‘Well, this is like old times,’ said Lea, unable to resist a comment.

‘What’s all that junk in the spare room?’ asked Roy.

‘That is your wife’s new office,’ Lea replied proudly. ‘She has a job, sort of.’

‘You’re writing again?’

‘Well, I’m pitching pieces to
Gulf Coast
magazine, if you can call it writing.’

‘Will that leave you enough time for stuff around the house? With the mall being a drive away?’

‘We have a maid who has hardly anything to do,’ said Lea, taking his briefcase off the table. ‘I think I can manage to buy a few groceries. We both worked when Cara was a baby and we coped perfectly well.’

‘But I know how you get—you pour all your time and effort into this stuff. I just don’t want you getting upset if it doesn’t work out.’

‘You never minded before.’

Roy sipped iced water, considering. ‘I’m just not sure it’s a good idea for you to be working here, that’s all.’

‘What are you talking about? It’s not like I’m threatening your status. Perhaps you’d like me to start cookery classes.’

‘If you two are going to have a fight, I’m going to take my meal to my room,’ Cara warned.

Lea looked down at her plate. ‘I was over at Milo’s house today. He has locks on the insides of his lounge doors.’

‘Maybe he’s scared of burglars,’ said Roy.

‘There’s never been a single burglary in the compound. I checked with the guards.’

‘You checkedwith the
guards
?’

‘I was just talking to them while they were looking under the car. They’re not great conversationalists.’

‘Well, I heard ol’ Milo has been getting a little weird lately. He probably misses his old job. The guy has nothing to do now except sit around and complain. He hates what we’re trying to achieve.’

‘Really?’ Lea set down her fork. ‘That’s not the impression I got at all. He seems incredibly proud of Dream World. He kept telling me how well they looked after their people when he was in charge.’