The Tour (19 page)

Corlene was on the way to being restored to the blonde bombshell she knew herself to be. Her mood gradually began to lift. Everyone needs a little help now and then, she said to herself. Her recent run of bad luck was just due to a little bit of slippage in the maintenance department. New hair colour and a chic cut, and all would be well. She passed a pleasant few hours in the salon, enjoying the free coffee and the magazines and eavesdropping on the conversations of the stylists, which, to Corlene’s ears, was like most conversations with the Irish, utterly bewildering but, in this case at least, very entertaining. Aisling was regaling the salon with a tale of her farmer boyfriend’s new bull who seemed to be showing very little interest in the cows but who did seem to enjoy staring at Aisling herself as she tried to get dressed each morning.

‘Do you know what Aisling?’ one elderly woman said between roars of laughter, ‘If they could bottle you, there’d be no need for antidepressants.’

As the junior stylist was putting the finishing touches to Corlene’s do, she overheard Aisling say: ‘I think they have the credit card machine working now. They said they’re just running another check on the system. Should be up and running in about ten minutes.’

Corlene was horrified. Her Visa card had maxed out a week ago, and she was relying on the fact that the salon would just take an imprint to be redeemed at the bank long after Corlene had left town.

Corlene shot up out of the chair. ‘Oh my God! Is that the time? I need to go, this second. I should be on my way to the airport by now. I swore to my husband I’d be back by four at the latest. We’re meeting Elton John and Tom Jones this evening,’ she couldn’t help herself adding as she grabbed her handbag.

‘Well,’ Aisling said, ‘if you could just hold on for a minute…they promised me this machine would be working. Unless you have cash…’

‘No, I’m afraid all I have are Rand and Aussie Dollars. We have been travelling so much lately, I never seem to get to a bank. I’m afraid I really must dash, I’m under terrible time pressure.’

‘If you’re in that much of a rush, we’ll have to use this old one then,’ said Aisling, producing a manual machine from underneath the counter. ‘The money probably won’t come out of your account for a few days, though, OK?’

Corlene had lied and cheated all her life. Wearing her most convincing expression, she replied as she scribbled her name on the imprint, ‘Oh I never look at those things anyway. My husband’s accountant takes care of all that.’ With a tinkly laugh, she dropped the counterfoil into the gaping maw of her handbag and fled the salon as fast as her scuffed five-inch heels would carry her.

Once safely back in her hotel room, she assessed her wardrobe critically. Tonight was going to be a resounding success, she convinced herself. All she had to do was dress to kill and exude confidence, and this big land-owning Irishman would be in the bag. The advertisement stated that he was a farmer, surely a few thousand acres anyway she reckoned, as she chose her reliable leave-nothing-to-the- imagination leopard-print wraparound dress once again.

She wasn’t an outdoor kind of girl as such, but she could do the big house and the four-wheel drive cars bit no problem. She wouldn’t have to actually
see
the animals or the crops or whatever. No, this guy is going to be so blown away for having punched so far above his weight that she just knew she’d be able to get him to hand over whatever she wanted. Hey, maybe he has a place in Dublin too. I mean, most of those land-owning types have a city pad for nights out and so on, right? Humming tunelessly, she imagined herself featuring on the society pages of those glossy Irish magazines she had spent the morning browsing through in the salon. She had been quite taken aback at how glamorous the Irish could be and she was happy to see lots of photos taken at race meetings. As the wife of a wealthy landowner, breaking into the horse racing set shouldn’t be a problem.

By the time she finally managed to wriggle into the maximum-control body shaper – which held all her lumps and bumps in place – she was red faced and sweating. The big problem with these industrial-strength undergarments, she thought ruefully, is taking them off. The image of a sexy man whispering in her ear as he seductively undid her wraparound dress to reveal the cappuccino-coloured silk lingerie irresistibly caressing her curves was blown out of the water by the reality – a greyish-beige body shaper with inch-wide straps and a reinforced gusset that resembled a 1950s swimsuit.

Oh well, she thought, a quick trip to the ladies and change from greyish-beige to a cappuccino silk slip had worked in the past, so it would have to work again. Hopefully, the candlelight and champagne would distract him from the red weals caused by the tourniquet-tight undergarment.

In normal circumstances, Corlene would have planned to hold out on the physical end of things. Well, at least for a few weeks, in order to build up her victim’s sense of anticipation. Unfortunately, however, on this occasion, time was of the essence. It meant she would have to give this Pa a night he would never forget and ensure he believed he couldn’t last one more day without her. The false eyelashes were once again pressed into commission, along with several layers of make-up. By the time she was finished, she had to admit she looked ravishing.

Her feet once more squeezed into the five-inch heels, she teetered out the door and headed for the lift. Crossing the lobby, she couldn’t help but notice the glances from the young girls on Reception. No doubt about it, she still had it, she said to herself.

Chapter 21

Dorothy Crane tramped around the National Park. Even she had to admit that it was an area of exceptional beauty; once one got away from the car park a little bit, there was a real sense of peace and tranquillity. The lake water lapped gently on the rocks surrounding the shoreline, and every so often she could hear the sound of animals or birds or something or other rustling in the woodland. Despite the lovely surroundings, however, she couldn’t enjoy herself. She was so annoyed at the way Juliet had spoken to her.

Juliet. That little mouse. If it weren’t for Dorothy, she’d still be in Des Moines playing bridge and growing flowers in her little suburban garden. Dorothy recalled one occasion when she had eavesdropped on a conversation at a church social about how, years ago, Juliet had been accused of stealing a baby. It turned out she hadn’t actually succeeded in stealing the child, but nonetheless.

Had Dorothy ever raised the subject of Juliet’s shameful past with the rest of the tour group? No, she had not. They wouldn’t think much of her if they knew the truth now would they? That ungrateful, stupid woman, Dorothy raged. She has given her experiences she would never otherwise have had. She taken her to see sights so far beyond the imagination of an Iowan housewife, and what did she get for it by way of thanks?

She had never been spoken to in that way by anyone in her entire life. She knew that Juliet was in awe of her, what with her academic record and vast life experience, but instead of benefiting from such a friendship, learning from it, she does the total opposite and attacks her. And, as for the rest of them. They were just like all the other groups she had met over the years. Morons!

Dorothy never considered herself a tourist, she was a traveller, whose experience had led her to develop what she herself regarded as a quirky cynicism about the world. She had seen so many amazing places, and had so many amazing experiences, she really felt embarrassed by gauche people who gazed in wide-eyed wonder at things. These people were to be pitied and, if possible, educated.

She thought back to the conversation in the corridor. Imagine Juliet saying that Dorothy had no friends, that no one liked her, that she was a bully and a snob. Good Lord, the woman must be unhinged. This was the only conclusion she could come to. Since they had left Des Moines the previous week, she had made such efforts with Juliet, knowing she wasn’t well off, trying to save her money. Juliet was so foolish and trusting, she would hand over her cash to any charlatan who spun her a line, and Ireland seemed to have more than its fair share of such individuals.

Dorothy remembered a previous trip she had taken to the former Yugoslavia. The guide was asked how the children’s education in Bosnia had been affected by the war there. By way of response, she offered to take the group to see a school. Dorothy knew right away this was a scam, but the rest of the group were taken in by the young woman. Both she and her husband were volunteer teachers, the guide said. They worked whenever they had some free time. She had some sob story about the fact that many of the children were orphaned during the war and needed both an education and somewhere to live. Apparently, the economy was in bad shape and voluntary programmes like their one depended entirely on charity. Dorothy was very sceptical as it seemed highly unlikely that a country would be unable to provide education for its people through taxes and so on.

She recalled her fellow travellers’ tears as the children told their stories of dispersed families and destroyed homes. Dorothy was in no doubt that these urchins had been coached to recount such tales in order to generate maximum donations. At the end of the tour the children sang for the guests and the director of the school made some speech about the children being the future. It was a lot of emotional blackmail. These ridiculous Catholics, Muslims and Serbs had got themselves into this mess and, once more, they were expecting the Americans to solve their problems for them. Earlier on, the guide had bored them to death with stories of the humanitarian awards the school’s director had received. She then proceeded to give undoubtedly false assurances that all monies raised for the school went directly to the school itself. The result of this elaborate begging was foolish, gullible, Americans opening their wallets. Dorothy still remembered the sense of satisfaction she felt in the knowledge that she was the only one of the thirty members of the group with the good sense not to contribute. She had explained to her fellow travellers later that evening that simply by being in these wretched countries they were helping the economy. Any additional financial help and these backward people would never learn to fend for themselves.

That particular group was remarkably stupid and gullible, she remembered. A number of them had argued against her, so she avoided their company after that.

In the case of her difficulties with Juliet, she reckoned that the best thing to do would be to put the stupid woman out of her mind. There were some people in life one simply could do nothing to help and Juliet was one of them. She had spent her life with the boring Larry living in a boring house in a boring suburb doing a boring job. The height of her ambition was to retire to Florida for God’s sake!

She knew she should employ some calming techniques but her anger was bubbling inside her, she could think of nothing else. She recalled venomously the psychologist who had facilitated the anger management course she had been forced to attend by the university after an unfortunate incident with a student two years ago. She had apparently screamed at him that he was obviously mentally retarded and threw a metal rule at him, causing him to need several stitches to his head, in front of two hundred under- graduates. She did not actually recall the exact details of the event but unfortunately all of her classes were being recorded. The head of department has insisted upon it, claiming there had been several complaints against her. He stated firmly that the only options she had were to attend therapy or to terminate her tenure.

But try as she might, her anger would not subside. Juliet would
have to
apologise for the way she had spoken to her. No, she just
wasn’t
going to let her get away with it. Dorothy turned around and headed back to the hotel. There was no way she was going to be spoken to like that by
anyone
.

Anna closed her bedroom door and headed down the corridor. She had fully expected to feel devastated after the horrible encounter with Elliot, but now she actually felt liberated. She had slept for a while and felt refreshed. Enough was enough. She had wasted so much of her life on that jerk already. She wasn’t going to waste one more minute.

She decided to call on Juliet to see if she would like to go shopping. They had drifted together often during scheduled stops on the tour, sharing a love of the luxurious Irish tweeds and linens. Juliet reminded Anna of her mother. She was kind and interested and was so excited for her about the baby. Yesterday they had stopped at a café and gift store and Juliet had bought the most darling little sleepsuit with ‘
The Leprechauns made me do it
’ written across the front as a gift for Anna’s new baby. Anna had been so touched.

She tapped gently on Juliet’s door.

‘Anna. Wow! You look much better, did you sleep?’ Juliet asked with concern. ‘Hi,’ said Anna cheerfully. ‘Oh, I finally gave that awful husband of mine the bullet…I can’t actually believe I did it to be honest. He came back this morning and he was just so vile.’ Anna surprised herself by opening up to Juliet this way. Normally she was much more reserved.

‘Well I did hear a bit of the dialogue, I have to admit. There must be something in the water in this hotel because I finally told Dorothy what I thought of her this morning too,’ said Juliet with a nervous giggle. ‘She was not happy, to put it mildly.’

‘Really? I’d have loved to have witnessed
that
. Oh God, do you think everyone heard me screaming at Elliot like a lunatic? How embarrassing. He had it coming though. You should see the bedroom. Red wine everywhere. I’m going to have to replace the whole thing I’d say.’

‘Wine? What did you do?’ Juliet asked

‘Come in and I’ll show you,’ she said, leading Juliet to the room to survey the damage. Red wine stains covered the bed as well as several on the carpet.

‘Oh my God! Well it’s done now,’ Juliet said with a giggle as she stood in the doorway. ‘I’m sure if you explain to the manager, and offer to pay he’ll be fine about it. What a pity Conor isn’t around. He’s great for sorting things out. Forget the room. Do you have plans for today? It’s just that since we’re both free of other
encumbrances
, I was going to do a bit of shopping and maybe have a bite in town if you would like join me. We can call to Reception on our way and you can fess up to the damage. I’ll come with you for moral support if you like?’