The Sand Men (16 page)

‘You know there were bombs found at the Dream World resort? Did your husband tell you that somebody smashed a sewer pipe today, causing poisonous effluent to leak into the sea?’

‘No, he told me he had to work late, but didn’t explain why.’

‘Because of this we will undergo a heightening of status to the area’s security, an inconvenience to everyone. How we handle such situations is as crucial as anything we build. In Britain every move you make is filmed by closed circuit television cameras every minute of the day. We do not wish to take that path, because we must be able to trust our citizens. We cannot afford to start curtailing the freedom you enjoy here.’

‘But that’s nonsense—there are CCTV cameras all over the place.’

‘The compound cameras only record during the day. They don’t operate after midnight. The ecological lighting—’

‘It’s too low to see anything, I imagine.’

‘The presence of the cameras is intended to warn, not to control.’

Lea wanted to argue that it was a waste of time having them if they couldn’t be properly used, but kept her counsel.

Mr Qasim checked his notes. ‘Is there anything else you can remember about the men who planted the bomb?’

She thought for a moment. Something drifted just beyond the edge of her consciousness. ‘Something.’ She said, trying to remember. ‘They both had hats of some kind. White, with no brims—’

‘A
kufi
.’

‘Maybe, I’m really not certain.’

‘Muslims.’

‘Surely Christians wear them too.’

Mr Qasim closed his book, clearly disappointed. ‘Mrs Brook, I would like you to think carefully tomorrow about what you saw. It could be very important. You must call me if you think of anything else.’

She emerged to find Roy and Davenport waiting for her. She began to wish she had lied to Mr Qasim, and remained silent on the drive home, unwilling to share her thoughts with Dream World’s PR chief.

As soon as they were back in their own car, she could sense a bad atmosphere building between them. ‘I don’t know why you wouldn’t speak to James on the way back,’ said Roy, nettled. ‘He was good enough to wait for you.’

‘Anything I say to him will go straight back to his bosses, you know that,’ said Lea.

‘No, I don’t, Lea. He has a difficult job to do. He’s here to help you. Anyway, what the hell were you doing wandering about the neighbourhood at that time? I came home to find the place empty. Where did you think you were going?’

‘You hadn’t come home, Cara was still out with her friends and I needed to stretch my legs. We’re not in a police state. I’m still free to come and go, or perhaps you’d like to lock me away inside the house like Mr Mansour does with his wife.’

Roy gave a sigh of impatience. ‘Jesus, Lea, try to see it from my side just once. We had a terrorist act at the resort today. Somebody smashed a section of temporary pipe and tampered with the pressurisation software. The police are involved now.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Lea. ‘It’s been a bad day for me too. I know it’ll seem like a small thing to you, but I’m trying to find some work that actually pays instead of writing free content for a website nobody reads.’

‘You don’t have to look for work anymore,’ he said gently, touching her arm. ‘We’ve got good money coming in and we’re saving a ton each month. I’ve been meaning to tell you. I’m in line for a directorship.’

‘How is that possible? You’ve only been here a short time.’

‘Jeez, I thought you’d be pleased for me.’

‘I am but—’

Roy shrugged. ‘A couple of group heads decided not to renew their contracts, so I got fast-tracked. I’m just waiting for the confirmation letter.’

‘I’m really happy for you, honestly.’

‘Well, you should be. There’s no going back now. I’m senior management material. Cool, huh?’

‘Of course—’

‘But what?’

‘I need to do something too. It’ll put me in a better mood and stop me from moping about the house while you’re out building an empire.’

‘You make it sound like such a bad thing. It’s giving us better lives, Lea.’ Roy’s anger would not allow him to stop. ‘So it’s a leisure complex—big crime. It creates employment and pours money back to places where the standard of living is lower, so that people can buy houses and start families. Think about that for a change.’

She forced a smile. ‘I’m sorry. I know you think I’m being selfish. I hope the police don’t come down hard on your workers. There’s no proof that any harm was meant. I hated having words put in my mouth.’

‘Why? You were just telling them what you saw.’

‘But if I hadn’t been there, no-one would have been hurt.’

‘Oh, Lea, you’re always the liberal. You know the police have a detention protocol that could have kept you in for questioning tonight? They were good enough to let you out. You have to start taking this kind of stuff more seriously.’ He shook his head in wonder. ‘Boy, I’d love to live in your world for a while.’

‘You did, Roy. When we first met, remember?’

‘Don’t start that again. You know what? You always say you want one thing and then back off when you get it.’ He concentrated on the road in silence.

When they reached home, Roy looked in on Cara and sat with her for a while, then went to bed. He held Lea in his arms for a brief moment and kissed her on the forehead, but a distance had opened between them that would not easily be closed.

T
HEY SAT AROUND
the breakfast table in silence as Lastri made buttermilk pancakes. The maid had claimed the kitchen as her own domain, and refused to let anyone help her. Cara was absorbed with her iPad. Lea waited for Lastri to finish so that she could talk to Roy. She still didn’t feel comfortable having the young woman waiting on them.

‘What are you doing today?’ she asked.

Roy had been studying his Blackberry with angry intensity for the last twenty minutes. ‘Intermittent electronic faults. The inspectors found non-approved materials above some ceiling panels, and now the whole lot will have to come out. What are you doing?’

‘I honestly don’t know,’ Lea admitted. ‘Preparing meals. Looking for magazine contacts.’

He put down the Blackberry and rubbed his eyes. He looked exhausted. ‘It means a lot to you, doesn’t it?’

‘Of course. I don’t like feeling useless. Nobody does.’

‘Something will turn up. It’ll take time.’

‘I’ve never had much patience. I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t be. I have to run.’ He raised his voice slightly. ‘Don’t do me any pancakes, Lastri.’ Roy’s electronic gadgetry was lined neatly along the kitchen counter, fully charged and waiting to be placed in his shoulder-bag. She watched as he carefully packed each item, already at work in his head. He kissed her absently and headed to the carport.

That evening, he called to say that he would be late again. Lea decided there was no point in planning family recipes. Instead, she cooked separate dishes and sealed them in plastic freezer tubs. She took no pleasure in eating alone. It was becoming obvious why the wives arranged coffee mornings and lunches at the golf club.

Rachel called to say that Milo had left instructions concerning his ashes, which were to go to a nephew in Hamburg. There was to be no formal send-off. Lea raised her lemonade glass to him.

Roy arrived home close to midnight. His eyes were dark and tired. ‘Harji Busabi’s team found the cause of the problem,’ he said, rummaging in the refrigerator for a sandwich. ‘The remains of a pipe bomb attached to the main sewage outlet out by the marina. It was made from a soft drink can, just like your one, with another can finely grated up into aluminium filings for the filling, so that it acted like thermite. They chucked in some magnesium powder, a firework fuse and a cheap plastic wristwatch, that’s all. The can is an Indian soft drink popular with the workmen. They have vending machines at the barracks. It’s specially imported for them, a brand you can’t buy anywhere else.’

‘The couple who got bin-bombed,’ said Lea, ‘you know them?’

‘Bill Cooper from Seattle, works in HR. It was his wife who helped you. She remembered you from the welcoming party.’

‘There were too many people to take in that day. How do you know it was the same kind of bomb?’

‘I shared notes with your Mr Qasim.’

‘He didn’t call me, and I was the one it happened to.’ Lea was unable to keep the tone of irritation from her voice.

‘He has my number. Besides, why would he think you needed to know?’ He rose from the fridge. ‘I don’t like cold beef. Isn’t there anything else?’

‘Look in the bowl at the back. If it wasn’t a prank, why do you think they targeted the Coopers?’

‘One of Bill’s jobs is to release any workman who fails to show at the resort site on time.’

‘What happens to the people he fires?’

‘They’re escorted back to their barracks and sent home on the first cheap flight that becomes available, so it’s unlikely to be anyone he’d just let go.’

‘Maybe the workers are upset about somebody getting fired. When I saw them in the underpass, they seemed pretty angry.’

Roy looked up from the fridge. ‘Why are you so interested?’

‘What happens in your job is going to affect all of us,’ she replied, trying to sound casual. ‘I need to know what’s going on.’

He narrowed his eyes at her in suspicion. ‘I wonder.’

‘What do you mean by that?’

‘I don’t want you writing about any of this. You have to promise me, Lea.’

‘Look in the big bowl, there are hard-boiled eggs,’ she said.

Chapter Twenty

The Wives

T
HE FOLLOWING DAY,
she began to make notes for a new article.

Identifying her theme—the problems of moving to the Middle East, seen from the perspective of western women—she drew up a fresh interview-list of the neighbourhood’s wives. Some topics would have to be avoided. She could not afford to embarrass Roy and the other husbands, or damage their relationship with DWG.

By now all her neighbours would have heard about the bomb on the compound, and about Milo’s lonely death, but she had no real idea what they thought of such things. Did they know about the girls who went missing? If they did, did they care?

Tucking her laptop under her arm, she went to call on Mrs Busabi.

‘I hadn’t been expecting callers,’ her neighbour warned, leading Lea into the cool recesses of the villa. ‘It’s the maid’s morning off.’

Even so, there was an overpowering scent of polish in the still air. With a sinking heart, Lea realised that interviewing her neighbours would require the heroic consumption of pastry. ‘When we were in Delhi we had so many staff,’ said Mrs Busabi. ‘I miss India terribly. But we had to leave when Harji’s work took him to England.’ Tea was already laid out. ‘I always take a little something mid-afternoon, when I get back from the school. We haven’t many little ones there at the moment. It’s too hot for them now. I simply won’t permit you to leave until you’ve tried some of my famous seed cake.’

Lea was handed a slice and asked questions between dry mouthfuls. Mrs Busabi leaned forward, listening intently. Every now and then a look of puzzlement crossed her face and she found it difficult to form a response, as if she couldn’t imagine why anyone would want to try and write in the first place. Lea noticed that there were no bookcases anywhere on the ground floor, just an old copy of
Hello!
on the kitchen table.

‘I thought it would make an interesting subject,’ she said, although she was already beginning to wonder if she would be wasting her time.

‘I suppose there’s no harm in it,’ Mrs Busabi finally decided. For a moment, Lea thought she was going to call her husband to check. ‘After India it’s all so private here. Delhi could be very frustrating, especially when three men would turn up to lift a flowerpot or change a plug, but people worked out their problems together. Here you just get smiles and silence. It does make me wonder how people let off steam. When Indian families have a row, everyone in the street gets to hear about it. You never know what goes on behind all these closed doors.’

Lea hoped her subject might feel more comfortable after a few minutes, but Mrs Busabi continued to sit with her knees pressed together and her hands knotted in her lap, as if attending an interview for a position that was far beyond her capabilities. Her replies were impersonal and imprecise. No, she had not found the move difficult, she had lived in hot climates before. Making friends was never hard because women loved to talked about children, and she was a nurturer. There was never much friction with her husband, because when you’d been married for a long time there was nothing left to argue about.

‘What about neighbours? How did you get on with Milo, for example?’

‘I thought he lacked social grace,’ Mrs Busabi sniffed. ‘He’d say the most dreadful things after a few drinks. He was openly rude about DWG, and they were paying his bills! And this interference with the migrant workers, well, it was just asking for trouble.’

‘You think they deliberately ran him over?’

‘Don’t you think it’s likely that he made enemies? Maybe they just wanted to scare him and it went too far.’

Lea closed the lid of her laptop. ‘One other thing,’ she said. ‘When I first met you, you said you were good friends with Mrs Chalmers for a time. What did you mean?’

‘Did I say that?’ asked Mrs Busabi. ‘I really don’t remember. I certainly didn’t mean to imply anything bad—’

‘No, of course not. This isn’t for the article. It’s just that we’re living in Tom Chalmers’ house and I was interested.’

‘I wouldn’t say we had a falling out, exactly. I don’t think Tom was ever happy about being posted here. He didn’t enjoy working for the
Chinese
.’ She mouthed the last word as if they were listening. ‘They’re very
driven
. He found the job terribly stressful. And then that awful thing with little Joia, their daughter. She was twelve, I think, or nearly thirteen. They had her very late.’

‘Milo started to tell me about her. What happened?’

‘My dear, she vanished. She set off for the beach one morning and never turned up there. It was as if she’d been lifted off the face of the earth.’