Soon (25 page)

‘Greed is good' had the unspoken corollary: poverty is good. So long as it was someone else's.

Simon gently flexed his knee. He thought: don't mention these musings to Claire.

At Rotokauri, drinks were under way under the pohutukawa. Sharon Cahane had her foot up on a stool, her ankle wrapped in a bandage.

The Cock leaned back in his chair. ‘My wife will use any excuse to be waited on.'

Sharon rattled her empty glass suggestively at Trent, who advanced with a jug in which pieces of fruit bobbed in a thick, clear liquid. He bent and poured, she wafted a napkin over her suntanned décolletage and said to the Cock, ‘Your sympathy is touching.'

‘My wife swathes herself in bandages at the slightest mishap. Some call it a cry for help . . .'

Sharon's laugh caused Trent to start. The jug wobbled.

‘In my wife's case I merely call it strategy.'

The women leaned together, tapping pretty nails on their glasses.

‘A cry for help.'

‘He's off again.'

‘He's got that look on his face.'

‘If only he'd wear a sunhat. Colin darling, you look boiled.'

David and the Cock, summoned by a staffer, went off for a conference call.

Ed Miles suddenly stood up, shaking his sleeve, a pink stain spreading on the material. ‘Christ, Juliet. Can't you be careful?'

Sharon said, languid, ‘Ooh Ed, your beautiful shirt. Is that a new one?'

Juliet's cheeks were scarlet. ‘Sorry.' She grabbed a napkin and tried to mop his sleeve; he snatched his arm away. ‘You've done enough damage, thanks.'

There was an awkward silence.

Roza said, ‘I don't think people should talk to other people like that in my presence.'

Ed smiled with difficulty at Roza. Red spots appeared on his cheeks.

She said, ‘If they do, I think they should apologise. What do you think, Sharon?'

‘Oh definitely,' Sharon drawled, fanning her chest, her eyes on Trent. Juliet looked down, her face rigid.

A little flare of rage burned in Ed's eyes. He shrugged, smiled again at Roza and said, ‘So sorry. I'll just nip off and change.' He threw a napkin on the table and left.

‘Hmm,' Sharon said. ‘Touchy!'

Juliet took a breath, fluttered her hands. ‘Oh, what can you do with them?'

Roza pressed her lips together, gave her a look of polite enquiry. ‘
Do
? With who? Whom?'

‘Men are hopeless, you know.' Juliet smiled weakly and waved her hand, tipping over Karen's glass, which was fortunately empty. ‘I'd better just go and . . .' She didn't finish, pointed across the garden and rushed off.

‘Off to fuss around him,' Sharon said. ‘Off to grovel.'

‘Men are hopeless,' Roza repeated slowly. ‘Do you know, I
hate
that one. Men are hopeless. So when men do nasty things — cheat, lie, beat us, make us wear our burqa — we don't complain. We say cosily, “men are hopeless”. It's the flipside of “all men are beasts” and it's just as meaningless. It's worse because it's slavish.'

‘Touched a nerve, have we?'

Roza smiled, ‘Oh shut up, Sharon.'

‘My husband's definitely hopeless.'

Karen joined in their laugh, giving Simon a look. ‘Yeah,' she said.

Silence. Roza and Sharon glanced at her and then at each other, amused lift of eyebrows. Karen blushed.

‘Not wanting to gossip . . .' Sharon said.

They laughed, since this was her usual opener to gossip.

‘Not wanting to gossip, but Janine told me she and Peter Gibson are going to counselling.'

‘Oh,
her
.'

‘Roza, you're such a snob. Just because she wears leopard-skin miniskirts.'

‘Whole matching leopard-skin outfits. And drives that massive sort of tank. And her husband with his gold chain.'

‘And his dental implants. Those sparklingly whitened gnashers.'

‘But they're extraordinarily rich,' Karen said.

Another pause. Roza and Sharon looked at her.

‘Yes, they are,' Sharon said, as though encouraging a child. She turned back to Roza. ‘They're going to counselling because he had an affair with some little twenty-year-old.'

‘Ugh.'

‘Is that all you can say? Peter and Janine are very dear friends.'

Roza laughed, ‘Oh, rubbish.'

‘Well, of course, Colin only puts up with Gnashers for his own mysterious business reasons. Anyway, Janine's panic-stricken old Toothy-Pegs is going to leave her.'

Roza signalled to Trent for a refill of diet Coke, held up her glass, thanked him nicely. She said, ‘Gnashers won't leave her.'

‘No?'

‘No, he loves her. They're perfect for each other. She should just keep calm and carry on.'

‘Well, that's sage advice,' Sharon said, brushing some invisible thing from her neckline.

Roza looked intently at her glass. ‘I'm not convinced by the idea of counselling.'

‘Why not?'

‘I don't know.'

‘You and David would never need it. You're a dream couple.'

‘It's not that. But what if a marriage is like a work of art? A completely unique work created by two individuals. How can an outsider intervene?'

‘That seems a bit complicated. What do you think, Simon?' Sharon leaned towards him, rattling the ice in her glass.

He was realising the folly of mixing painkillers with Trent's strong fruit punch. Tilting his glass at Roza he said, ‘
She's
a work of art.'

‘Ah, such a gentleman. And how was your day at work?'

But he'd caught sight of Ed Miles heading back across the lawn, and didn't reply.

Politics

‘Coming,' Roza said. ‘I'm just talking to Johnnie.'

The Green Lady walked on the lonely shore with the Ort Cloud, the Dead White Cat, the Red Herring and Tiny Ancient Yellow Cousin So-on. Soon and Starfish followed.

“A rolling stone gathers no moss,” the Red Herring observed, and Tiny Ancient Yellow Cousin So-on added, “My enemy's enemy is my friend.” The horizon was a haze of red against the black sea, and the Bachelor's bed could be seen driving over the treetops, the feathers of the Cassowaries spiky in silhouette, the Bachelor lounging on the cushions, evening cocktail in hand.

“Look!” said the Green Lady. At the far end of the beach in the dusk, a figure was walking towards them.

It was Soonica, and she was alone.

Johnnie was handed over to Tulei, who backed out of the room with a disapproving look. Roza said under her breath, ‘Bless you, Tulei.'

In the dining room Roza told Karen she would have to move to the far end of the table because Ed enjoyed her company so much and she was sure they could squash in, Trent having brought an extra chair. There was an atmosphere of low-level tension among the help, even an outbreak of bickering, with Trent flouncing campily out of the room and Troy banging the door. The first course was cold and the second arrived in uneven batches, after which Simon heard David say to Roza, who was remonstrating with Shane or Chad, ‘You fire Jung Ha out of the blue, you get chaos in the kitchen.'

Simon gave up pushing his cold meal around the plate. He leaned close to Roza. ‘The gap between rich and poor. Ford says it's getting wider.'

Roza dabbed her mouth with a napkin. ‘I know what your brother thinks.'

‘What about you?'

She looked vague. ‘When I was growing up, my father was the fourth-richest man in the country.'

‘Your money got David started.'

She glanced around. ‘Don't say that to him.'

‘I wouldn't. David always says you're not interested in politics.'

‘I'm not.'

‘Ford says apolitical's not good enough. It's not intellectually good enough.'

She smiled and said, ‘Your brother's so fierce', in the indulgent tone all the women used for Ford, as if he were a noble savage: so sexily primitive and unspoiled
.
Which was a tremendous irony, Simon thought sourly, given that Ford regarded the women of Rotokauri as frivolous and anti-intellectual, and condemned their refusal to discuss anything serious.

Even Karen had started echoing the lenient tone. What a chameleon she was. Irritated, he'd reminded her, ‘But you hate Ford.'

‘He's lonely, the poor man. Don't be nasty about your own brother.'

‘What? I
love
my brother. You're the one who said he shouldn't even come here.'

‘Oh, don't be mean-spirited, Simon.'

Now he whispered to Roza, ‘Is the gap between rich and poor too wide? I've just had a big tax cut and I earn a million a year. I didn't need it. The poor got a tiny tax cut and a rise in GST. So the gap is . . .'

The look she was giving him was hard, faintly amused, slight curl of the lip.

‘Darling Simon. Don't try to be Ford. It doesn't suit you.'

Simon walked slowly along the path under the trees. Light spilled across the lawn and voices and music came from the open French windows of the big house, where David had shown no sign of wanting to go to bed. Figures moved behind the wire in the artificial green light of the tennis court. He heard Elke laugh. ‘Fuck
off
Marcus,' she said. Beyond the dunes the sea was calm, with a sheen of moonlight. Someone called his name, he turned.

Ed Miles took off his glasses, polished them on a handkerchief and put them on, a studied move. Simon gave what he hoped was a look of mild inquiry. ‘It's a beautiful evening.'

Miles looked down and smiled. ‘Oh yes.'

Simon said, too sharply, ‘Well, I'm off to bed . . . ?'

‘David wants a word.'

‘Now?'

‘He's in the main office.'

Miles walked beside him. Were the three of them going to talk together? Should he ask Miles whether he'd found anything out? The adrenalin had started to run around his body, hard and sharp, as strong as pain, but his hands were steady. It was like this in the operating theatre; even on the rare occasions when things had gone wrong and some urgent reversal was required, his hands did not shake.

They crossed the deck, passed Ray and entered through the glass door, Miles following Simon.

David was leaning on his desk, his arms folded. Simon looked at Miles in the reflection of the glass, saw him nod at David and walk out, closing the door.

‘Just wanted to give you an update,' David said.

‘Sure.'

‘Ed's been looking into the question of the young man.' David went to the glass and looked out at the sea beyond the dunes. There was a light moving in the distant sand hills. The tree at the point was like the black outline of a man, arms outstretched. ‘Ed can't interfere in operational police matters.'

‘No.'

‘But he can enquire. He tells me there's potential here for inconvenience. It's the kind of thing that could be picked up by the media.'

‘Potential for inconvenience . . .' Simon almost felt like laughing.

‘A lot of inconvenience.'

Simon looked down at his hands. ‘You think they might invent some nonsense around the fact he was writing about a prime minister? One who looked like you, the limp and so on?'

‘I really don't know, but if there's material on which to base nonsense, they'll use it. Ed will do what he can, and just between you and me, he can do a lot more than we'd ever admit to. Do you know what I mean?'

‘I think so.'

‘We have to preserve appearances; the separation of the powers must be maintained.'

‘I understand.'

‘But I want you to know Ed's on the case, and Ed's the best person to have on your side. One of his special talents is calming things down.'

‘Calming things down. Sounds good.' Simon was about to say ‘thanks' but stopped himself. Instead he said, ‘That must be a relief for you. You won't want hacks making up ridiculous stories about you and a dead stalker.'

He glanced up. David was looking oddly at him. He went on, ‘You don't need that kind of distraction, with all you want to achieve. And what if Cahane got hold of it? The guy's so ambitious he's about to explode.'

David made an amused sound. He came close. ‘You look tired. Go to bed. I'll see you for breakfast.'

‘I will. Thanks for filling me in.'

‘There's one other thing. I've been talking to Roza.'

Simon felt his hands twitch. He flexed his fingers. ‘Oh yes?'

‘I think it would be good if Elke came to us when we go back to Auckland.'

‘Came to you. You mean to live?'

‘If anything inconvenient were to come out of this, Simon . . .'

Simon said blandly, ‘But it won't. You said it yourself, it's a non-issue.'

‘We hope it is. Nevertheless . . .'

‘I don't understand.'

‘Roza thinks Elke's at a bit of a crossroads. She's worried about her psyche.'

Simon raised his eyebrows. ‘Her psyche? The girl's hard as nails.' He added hurriedly, ‘I mean that in a good way. She's totally positive. Bouncy. Rock solid.'

‘Her mother doesn't think so.'

‘Karen does.'

David lowered his voice, ‘Right. But don't you think her real mother would have the surest feeling? I agree with Roza. Elke shouldn't be exposed to anything potentially upsetting.'

‘Nothing upsetting is going to happen.'

David's tone was mild, soothing, ‘But we don't know that. At the moment Ed's described the situation as inconvenient. That means it has the potential to go pear-shaped. We don't know that it will, but best to be prepared, eh?'

Simon was silent. David put his hand on his arm, squeezed. ‘I can say this to you too, just between us, because we're friends. I worry about Roza's state of mind too. I need her. And I need her to be happy.'

They looked at each other.

‘You're tired. Go to bed, have a rest, and in the morning you can tell Karen what we've discussed.'

‘Yes, sure,' Simon said.

‘One more thing: Elke's nearly grown up. She can choose for herself where she lives. So you'll have to encourage her to make the right choice.'

Simon wished him goodnight. When he approached the door, Ed Miles opened it from the other side.

He limped out to the point and sat on the wooden seat. It didn't make sense: the Weeks problem had the potential to cause the Hallwrights as much unpleasantness as it did the Lamptons, so Elke would be no less protected if she was living with them . . . But how strange that he kept forgetting! He was the one who'd killed Weeks, who could be charged and tried, even jailed. Or at least shamed, struck off and ruined. David didn't know that; he had no idea that Weeks and Simon had met. Or had he? How thoroughly had the Police Minister delved into the evidence? It was another terrible aspect of crime, the not knowing.

No matter how much David knew, he had made it plain Simon was compromised, and would be obliged to do as he was told. And if Elke didn't want to live with the Hallwrights, he would have to persuade her.

Something rustled through the dune grass, pattering this way and that over the rocks and shells. A cold feeling. ‘Nothing's fair,' Ford liked to say. ‘It's just another day in the jungle. If you're weak, watch out.'

David had made the kind of decision he made all the time; he would help Simon, he would deploy Miles, and in return he would have Elke, because Roza wanted it. If Simon didn't comply, he'd be on his own. He remembered what Claire had said to Karen: ‘The Hallwrights couldn't care less about you. You know who they care about? Each other.' He remembered the darkness he'd perceived in Aaron, something competitive and watchful that was worse than lack of love.

Just for a moment, alone on the cold dune, he allowed himself to let go. His face pressed into his sleeve, emotion shaking him. He'd begun an affair with Mereana because he loved Roza so deeply he'd lost his way. His troubles were caused by love. The wry thought came to him: at least it means I'm not that bastard Aaron Harris.

He listened to the waves breaking over the shells. A shooting star crossed the sky, making a white scratch in the blackness. There was no light pollution out here; he watched a satellite travelling through the glittering chaos of the Milky Way. These nights when the stars were so bright it seemed strange that they should be fixed and still, the only movement the satellites nosing between them. He had a sense of the vastness and indifference of the cold void above and all around him the dunes were alive with sounds, the scuttling of small creatures, shifting of sand, the wind hissing in dry seed pods and rustling in the marram. After a long time he limped back on the path through the dunes, crept into the warm silence of the Little House and opened the second bedroom door.

Elke was asleep with the window open, the blind blowing in the breeze and the moonlight shining in. The bedclothes were rumpled, one of her feet was uncovered; she sighed, turned, sprawled, lay still.

Dawn came, and with it the tuis. Was any other creature such a relentless critic? They started before 4 a.m., even before the sun had come up; they were madness, fever, insomnia, yearning, and they let him have it when he was low. The self-righteous bastards. How did they always know how he felt?

Now, the usual dialogue took place in the Lampton bed.

‘What's wrong? Stop fidgeting.'

‘It's the tuis. I hate them.'

‘Don't be silly. It's just birdsong.'

‘Song? You call that song? That dirge? That
criticism
?'

He lay awake, trying to keep still. He needed to talk to Ford but couldn't face the prospect of telling his brother what David had asked. Pictures surfaced in his mind: Roza's expression as she talked to Elke, Roza smiling at Karen, David watching Roza. Overcome with weariness, he felt he'd never sleep again.

At six he got up and walked down to the beach, waded in and swam along the shore, kicking with his good leg. When he got back he showered, making enough noise to wake the others, and sat down to wait on the deck.

Karen roused Elke, who was booked for a tennis lesson. They wandered out onto the deck in their tiny Lycra dresses, both drinking coffee, Karen with yesterday's paper. Elke had a little infection on the side of her mouth and a piece of food stuck on her front tooth, her beautiful eyes were puffy with sleep and her hair was wild, with yesterday's hair tie tangled in it. The sight of her made a pressure swell in Simon's chest.

‘By the way . . .' he said.

Karen frowned over the paper. ‘Seven down.'

Elke leaned on her shoulder. ‘Disinterested.'

‘Doesn't fit.'

‘Uninterested?'

‘No.'

‘I hate crosswords,' Elke said. She flopped down on a deck chair and put her feet up on the veranda rail. She threw a crust onto the grass, the birds swooped down and started to hop and squabble. ‘Look at the beautiful tuis.'

‘Fuckers. Don't encourage them,' Simon said, his mind on auto­matic. Karen clicked her tongue disapprovingly. Elke laughed.

He said, ‘By the way, I talked to David last night.'

‘Hello, lovely tuis. Dad hates you but I think you're beautiful.' Elke ran in and fetched the bread, broke up some slices and threw a spray of crumbs. Three sparrows landed, followed by two aggressive mynah birds.

Simon fixed his eyes on Elke's back as she leaned over the rail. ‘David and Roza are keen for you to go and stay with them when we get back to Auckland.' He didn't look at Karen. ‘I think it's a good idea.'