The Tropical Issue (16 page)

Which was their look-out, both of them. I got my gear and hiked down to the kiosk for water skiing.

Proving, Rita, that you don’t know when to let well alone.

There was a short queue: kids, students, beginners. The big hotels had their own arrangements. There was only one boat, and a longish wait in between. The guy who ran it spoke English, and I got talking to him. After a bit, he said, ‘You ski a lot? There is a fast boat, not here just now.’

What I wanted was a fast boat that wasn’t feeding a queue. And that wouldn’t mind, for example, taking a turn past all the other ski stages, and having a look at anyone else in the water.

We agreed, not for nothing, that he would get the big boat to come back, and I’d have it. The kid he worked with ran off to organise it. I stayed on the stage, dangling my legs and chatting up the talent in bits of English and bits of mime, which was fine once they’d got over the shock of my hair and my two sets of lashes.

The kids were good value, and I’d already sold them the news that I’d a special boat lifting me, by the time the special boat came.

And I’ll say it was something out of the way. A white Avenger launch which cut its way towards us like an electric saw, throttled down, went into reverse, and floated up to the staging, flipping its ski rope towards me.

There was nobody in it but a wee black-haired Portuguese guy at the wheel, who grinned and exchanged shouts with the ski-boss on the ski platform behind me. As he threw me the tow, I saw his shirt was tucked into creased belted trousers, which meant he didn’t plan to enter the water very often, if at all.

By then I was in the sea, my skis sticking up in front of me. The speedboat guy said, ‘O.K.?’ smiling to me, in an accent you would cut in Sauchiehall Street, and before I could answer, never mind talk about where we were going, he leaned forward, still watching me, and set the launch moving.

He was good. That boat slid into its racing speed like a nappy going under a baby and I rose up on to my skis without a shake or a tremble. And we were off.

It was a sort of high spot, that, in the whole hellish business.

From the sea, Madeira really looked like an island of flowers, with the palms and the green, and the thousands of red-roofed white houses climbing all the way up the hillsides. The sea was bluer than ink, and the spray was warm and expensive-looking, and my knees and thighs and shoulders were behaving like best quality bed springs: strong and firm and elastic.

I hoped thousands were looking at me, and wished Kim-Jim were among them. And Ferdy. And even possibly Johnson and Natalie.

Except that Johnson, convoluting at Reid’s and getting people to pay for their telephone calls, might object to the sight of his porter-bashing Miss Geddes skiing all round his yacht and pricing it. Which was one of the reasons why I was here. Singing, actually. I can’t sing, but I was.

We skimmed out towards the sea, passing little boats, and big boats, and yachts. We didn’t pass a yacht flying the Red Ensign because there wasn’t one. The spot where I’d seen it before lunch was empty. If Lenny had sailed Johnson’s boat in from Tenerife, he must have upped anchor and sailed it off again.

I did some fancy stuff, sheering from side to side. I jumped. I sang, between puffs. I yelled a few times to the boatman, freeing a hand to point in to shore, where from time to time you could see other skiers, not nearly so far out.

He turned round the first time, in case, I suppose, I was bawling to say I had broken my neck. After that, he just waved vaguely behind. I suppose he thought he could judge by the yell whether he was pulling a load of snapped bones behind him or not.

There are people who can tell by the sun where they are going, but nothing ever tells me but people. It was therefore with quite some surprise that I recognised in the distance the striped top of the fish market where Ferdy and I had seen the poor passing-out turtles.

Camara de Lobos, six miles out of Funchal. The Naval Club. Water skiing.

I began to yell at the driver. Competing with me, music tootled out over the water. There had been a bandstand in Camara beside the church and the taxi rank.

I couldn’t see the bandstand for this yacht, anchored well out, which was bang in my way.

This white yacht, flying club colours and a snazzy Red Ensign, with a short name on her bows I could almost see.

I didn’t need to see it. I knew what it was. I took a huge breath and roared to the guy at the wheel of my launch, stabbing the air with one finger.

‘Over there! Over there to the yacht! I want to get close to the yacht!’

And glory be, this time he turned round, grinned, looked where I was pointing and, spinning the wheel, put his thumb up.

He was bloody good. From the roaring speed he’d kept up, he slackened until there was just enough to keep me upright. He set a course for the bows of the yacht, and took me on a wide, gentle arc that brought me along one white, glossy side, round the stern and up the other.

When you got near, the name was big enough to read quite easily.

Dolly, it said.

And she was smashing. Whoever he’d bought her from had got it right. She had two tall pale masts, and brass railings, with a blue fringed awning over the cockpit. The curtains were blue, too, at the saloon window, and there were cushions and shining wood everywhere, and glittering gear and neatly coiled ropes.

She wasn’t trailing a boat, and although there were clips on the cabin roof, the dinghy it was fixed for was missing. I looked, as I went round, but nothing moved. If Lenny had been there he had gone, leaving a companionway, I saw, down the offshore side.

An invitation to loot.

Not very clever, I thought.

An invitation to board?

I could never get my boatman to drop me off and pick me up again. He didn’t understand English. And if he did understand, he would probably call in the
guardias.

I couldn’t make up my mind. My mind was made up for me. I suddenly swallowed the sea.

I swallowed it because the rope had gone slack. Losing power, I had crashed over sideways and was sinking.

I came up, choking, coughing and swearing, with the tow rope still in my grasp, and cursing the boatman for stopping.

Shaking the sea from my face, I saw the launch hadn’t stopped.

On the contrary, the launch was now leaping off into the distance. Having cast off its end of the tow rope. And leaving me alone, in deep water, beside
Dolly
’s heaving white beam, with the companionway glittering on it.

It was too neat by far.

I thought of the long swim to the beach of Camara de Lobos, and the dripping ride back in some taxi.

I thought, Sod you, whoever you are. You got me here. You can get me back to the villa in comfort. After I’ve seen your bloody yacht.

I grabbed the companionway and heaved myself on to it, and up three grained rubber steps, and on to a golden deck varnished like satin.

On the satin, someone was waiting for me.

‘Miss Geddes. Please come aboard,’ said the yellow-haired man from the fire escape; and clicked the bar of the bulwark behind me.

I said, ‘If this bloody toy has a telephone, you can tell Mrs Sheridan her skis are here, and I expect to be brought back to the villa pronto.’

The guy looked down at me.

This time, he was stripped to the waist, and there was a lot of him. In the sun, his hair was blond and frizzed like crimped crepe, as I’d seen it earlier that day in the car, and under the light, outside Johnson’s flat. On his chest, the fuzz looked nearly white over the KM-4 Pinked Tan.

He looked hard and stringy-fit, with a freckled, banged-about face, and the sort of big hands you see in films, closed round a rifle, or giving someone a knuckle sandwich. Instead of black he was wearing white espadrilles and beach shorts and an identity bracelet, I suppose in case anyone blew him up.

I went on blowing him up. I said, ‘Was that your boat that dropped me just now? And nearly drowned me?’

I leaned my hand on the rail, while I glared at him. A foot away was the catch for the bar. Even if I didn’t reach that, I could always flip over the rail. It was a long swim to the beach, but not a hopeless one.

He raised his eyebrows, which were as light as his hair. His lashes were white, and his eyes were resting on my wandering arm. He said, ‘It was
Dolly
’s launch, yes. How lucky you managed to come aboard. I thought I was going to have to help you in with a boathook.’

I didn’t want to be speared with a boathook. I shifted my arm off the rail. I said, ‘I spoke to plenty of people on the ski stage. The villa knows where I went. I have an appointment at five with Mrs Sheridan. If you want something, say so. I haven’t all bloody day.’ After the long ski, I could feel my legs trembling, and I hoped he didn’t think he had frightened me.

Which he had.

He said, ‘Dry yourself,’ shortly, and scooped up and flung me a towel. It was thick and Turkish and blue, and had JJ embroidered on one corner. As I hugged myself in it, I had a sudden affectionate feeling for Natalie Sheridan. Somehow, she’d been conned, too.

Then he said, ‘You remember me?’

There seemed no point in denying it.

‘Who wouldn’t?’ I said. ‘If you run about under lights, and talk and smoke in a non-smoker’s bedroom? That’s dumb. That way, you’ll never get picked to hand out the jotters.’

He had the same accent as Johnson. The accent my aunt would jump through hoops for. He said, ‘I was trying to persuade him to throw you out.’

And that rang true enough. Flowers have nothing on humans. Give me a perverted gloxinia any day.

‘You mean,’ I said, ‘you think we should get a divorce? And put the children in care?’

From under my feet, a peaceful voice floated up through a hatchway.

‘Miss Geddes? You are Raymond’s personal Everest, and he resents you. Don’t push him too far. He’ll just go away and come back with Sherpas.’

I couldn’t remember what Sherpas were, but I didn’t think I wanted Raymond to come back with them.

Raymond. A hell of a name. I looked at him and he said, scowling, ‘You’re to come down. To the saloon. Get a move on.’

‘That was Mr Johnson,’ I said. I said it with a slight question. So far as I knew, Pal Johnson, on sticks, was at Reid’s in residence. On the other hand, he might have a twin brother.

Raymond said, ‘Who else did you expect?’ and I cancelled the twin brother and reinstated the Gay Club. Floating. Full of Portuguese skiing instructors.

I followed the unpleasant Raymond along the cabin-side deck, and down into the cockpit, and down again into a sunlit saloon full of pipe smoke and panelling.

The man leaning against the panelling and smoking the pipe proved to be Johnson Johnson.

He said, ‘Raymond? I think we can do without you.’

Quite calmly. His glasses shone, mild as milk.

Raymond said, ‘I don’t think so.’

Johnson looked at him. ‘You don’t?’ he said. ‘What a pity. Then in that case, I go back, and you stay.’

Raymond hesitated. Outside, a distant roar got suddenly louder, and the floor rocked beneath us, and there was a light bump, while the roar dropped to a grumble.

Johnson added, ‘If the fenders will stand it,’ and after lingering a moment longer, the yellow-haired man turned on his heel and ran up the steps and disappeared.

He must have been in his mid-twenties. I’ve seen Commandos in training who looked like that. I said, ‘I don’t think much of your friends.’

The yacht swayed, and Johnson swayed with it, without moving. There was no sign of his stick. He said, ‘You should see my enemies. Come and sit down. He won’t hurt you, and neither will I.’

‘You promise?’ I said; and he laughed.

‘As if we could. Of course. I beg your pardon.’ He left the wall, and sat himself down on the long cushioned settee under the windows. He waved the stem of his pipe at the shore.

‘Nice place. Lenny saw you climbing with Ferdy. What was it? A hunt for Eduardo?’

A few moments ago, I would have said, ‘What’s that to you?’ but I was getting over my fright.

I was still annoyed at his Owner behaviour. I was bloody furious at this stupid kidnap. And no way would I risk being alone with Boy Raymond, ever again, here or anywhere else.

But I wanted to know what he was up to. And now I was here, I might as well try to find out before I fell out with him.

I said, ‘You didn’t need to bloody kidnap me to ask about Eduardo. What about a nice telephone call from Reid’s?’

The bifocals flashed. ‘But I thought you wanted to see
Dolly
? Would you like tea? Or something stronger?’ Johnson said.

I seemed to be in the way standing up, so I sat down at the other end of Johnson’s settee. I must have agreed to tea too, because it came, served by the little guy who’d driven the Daimler. Lenny somebody.

Without his peaked cap, he had brown hair streaked over his scalp, and a weathered face wrinkled by wind, and big ears. He was nippy, and wee, and not at all pleased to be serving me.

The Connie Margate, it would seem, of the
Dolly.
At least, the tea was great, and I would swear the scones were home-baked, and even the jam sponge. He noticed when the sugar bowl was empty as well, and went off to get more without telling.

The tea set was bone china too, but plain except for a thin band of blue, and the yacht’s name was on everything. I said, ‘Is it your boat?’

‘My design?’ he said. ‘Only partly. But she was built for me.’

Christ.

He could read minds, like Natalie. ‘You trained as an artist,’ he said. ‘I liked the sketches of Natalie. Do me one of Eduardo.’

There was a sketchpad at his hand, with a 6b pencil. He flipped them both on to the table.

I remembered the sketches of Natalie, wearing a similar towel but no bathing suit. I took up his pencil and let my own towel drop a bit, in case he thought I minded the comparison.

I didn’t, actually. I never do. On things to do with beauty, it’s my job to be realistic. I’m not jealous. Of other people’s faces and bodies, anyway.