Chapter Fifteen: House Meeting
“A visit to Bloody Mary’s is obligatory.”
• • •
A meeting was called for seven o’clock that evening. Corrie told Stuart, and asked Stuart to tell Ian, if he saw him. She said that Jenny had been contacted. How?
Norbert did not beat around the bush, “We’ve got a problem.”
“Two problems,” Mike interrupted, “Ian’s not here.”
“Has anyone seen him today?” Norbert asked.
There were four shakes of the head in answer, although Mike added, “If he did the same as yesterday, he’ll be at Bloody Mary’s, getting drunk.”
“That doesn’t sound like Ian,” said Jenny.
“We live in interesting times,” said Mike, philosophically.
“I’ll go along there later,” offered Norbert, “We don’t want him becoming a liability. I need to talk to him. If he is capable of listening,” he added.
There was a new steeliness in Norbert’s voice which Stuart had not noticed before. It was not the tone that would calm the obviously terrified Englishman. “Let me go,” said Stuart, “You know, fellow countryman to fellow countryman. He might listen to me. Besides, I know someone who hangs out at Bloody Mary’s. If Ian is completely out of it, it might be useful to have someone else to help carry him.”
Norbert saw the sense in Stuart’s proposal. “OK,” he conceded, “Just make him aware of the seriousness of the situation.”
“I don’t see how he can be unaware ...”
Norbert interrupted Stuart, “No, something new has happened. As I was beginning to say, we’ve got a problem.”
• • •
Stuart thought back to the earlier meeting and what had been said, as he walked along the road to Bloody Mary’s bar in search of the errant Ian. When he had first heard what Norbert had described as ‘the problem’, he had thought that he was joking.
“The cheese-thief!”
Mike was even more explosive, “Is this the only reason that you have called this meeting? Fucking hell, I thought it was something serious. Haven’t you got anything better to think about. For fuck’s sake, Norbert, less than two day ago we ran down a poor bugger and buried ...”
“Pipe down, Mike.”
Mike, seeing the nervous glances of his companions, worried that, despite having the kitchen to themselves, they might somehow be overheard, instinctively lowered his voice, “... buried his body in the sands. I think we’ve all got rather more important things on our mind than the frigging cheese-thief.”
Norbert sat undemonstrative, waiting for Mike’s wrath to dissipate, like the teacher in front of his class, waiting for absolute silence before he will continue speaking. He stared straight ahead, not meeting the eye of any of his fellow conspirators, all seated around the large, wooden table: confident that what he is about to say will prove his point; patient, allowing his audience to make fools of themselves before coming to their rescue. Finally, he said, “Thank you. If I may continue. The cheese-thief ...”
“Argh!” Mike stood up, striking the table with his fist, “What is this?”
Corrie came to Norbert’s aid. She lightly clasped Mike’s arm, coaxing, “Listen to him. It’s important.”
Norbert continued, “Thank you. OK. We all remember the cheese-thief from Tahiti. It seems that he was something of a legend. A traveller’s equivalent of an urban myth, perhaps? Cheese stolen from refrigerators, kitchens, even from among backpacker’s private possessions, so I heard, and little cryptic notes left in their place. A joker. So what?”
“Quite,” said Mike.
“The so what,” said Norbert, “is that the cheese-thief is now here. No myth. No joke. We, well Corrie, really, I suppose, was the victim. We had kept our food in the cooler here.” He pointed to a large ice-box in the corner of the communal kitchen.
“And now it has gone,” supplied Mike, sarcastically.
“Yes,” said Norbert, unmoved.
“It was marked with our initials and everything,” Corrie added, blushing, realising she sounded petty and foolish. “You know how it is,” she added, quietly. They all did: anything edible which was not either nailed down or laid claim to in big letters written in indelible ink was generally considered fair game in communal households, all the more so in the dog-eat-dog world of international shoestring globe trotting. This is perhaps why the cheese-thief had always been considered something of a joke: his crime was a common phenomenon; his perversity gave the nuisance a certain humour; his notoriety meant that becoming one of his victims had a certain street cred.
“I still say, so what?” said Mike, confrontational.
Norbert was holding back his ace, like an expert card player. He withdrew from his pocket a dirty scrap of lined paper, overwritten in large handwritten letters. “This.” He pushed the paper into the middle of the table, so that everyone could read the message. “This was left where our cheese used to be.”
There was a silence, before Jenny asked, “And you’re sure this was meant for you?”
Now Mike turned his frustration on the young woman, “Can’t you read? Who else could it have been meant for?” He quoted, “Roquefort. Good taste, Swiss. I would have had you as a Gruyère couple, myself. You know, some cheeses mature when buried underground, but bodies only rot. It’s pretty plain, isn’t it?” he added, sarcastically.
“So what does it mean?” asked Jenny, “That someone saw us?”
Norbert was picking at the skin of his lower lip, but otherwise did not show any signs of being ruffled by the revelation, “That would have to be the assumption,” he said evenly.
Stuart was more practical, “So what are you going to do? Confess?”
There were so many people to explode at, Mike was making sure he spread his fury equally, “What! Now? It was bad enough then, but at least then we could have said it was an accident. Now?” He clasped his head in his hands, “We’d all be banged up for years.”
“It was an accident?” queried Stuart, suddenly unsure, misinterpreting Mike’s words.
“Of course. Figure of speech,” said Mike.
“Mike is right,” Norbert said, “We cannot confess now. Our actions would be ... misinterpreted.”
“What then?”
“I have been thinking about this,” said Norbert, “I think our first task is to identify this mysterious cheese-thief.”
“And you think that we can, where no one else has been able to?”
“I don’t see any other alternative,” said Norbert with a shrug.
“What do you think he will do?” asked Jenny. Her normal bubbly spirit was gone. Her hair hung lank and greasy, unwashed in two days, and her mouth twitched nervously, one corner moved by an involuntary spasm. Stuart still wished that she would pay him a little more attention, though.
“I doubt that this will be the last that we hear from him,” said Norbert.
“Or perhaps her?” suggested Stuart. Political correctness works both ways.
“Or her,” Norbert agreed. “I am afraid that we have opened ourselves up to potential blackmail. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I don’t want to just wait around doing nothing, waiting for his ...” he glanced at Stuart but this time wasn’t corrected, “next message.”
“This isn’t just Ian, is it, playing some sort of sick practical joke?” asked Jenny, clutching at any more palatable alternative.
“Have you seen Ian in the last couple of days?” asked Mike.
“No.”
“He’s in a real state. He wouldn’t be capable of something like this.”
“OK. So what do we do?”
All eyes were turned towards Norbert, but at this point the leader relinquished responsibility. “I don’t know. That is what I wanted to ask all of you?”
“Whoever it was had access to this kitchen,” said Stuart, trying to think like a sleuth.
“That could be anyone,” said
Mike, dismissively. “Anyone who works here. Anyone that is staying here. Anyone from outside. No one would question a new face.”
“It is more likely,” suggested Corrie, “to be an old face.”
Everyone looked puzzled, so she explained, “The cheese-thief has been around for a long time. We heard the stories about him when we first arrived on the islands, and it sounded as though they were not particularly new then. So it is not one of the backpackers that just stays for a few days and then moves on somewhere else. It is someone more permanent.”
“A local?”
“Perhaps, although I can’t really see it.” said Stuart.
“Or one of the travellers who has made a permanent base here. The lazy life can be addictive,” said Mike, “Some of these bums have been hanging out here for years.”
Stuart remembered his conversation with Cedric on the balcony of Hiti Mahana. It seemed like a lifetime ago. For Stefan, it was. Could he have been telling the truth, when he admitted to being the cheese-thief? Stuart had thought that he had just been stoned, but who knows? He did fit the DNA profile that they were currently constructing. Perhaps better not to voice his suspicions just yet. Yes, he had seen Cedric on the boat, and yes, it seemed logical that he was here, somewhere, on Bora Bora at this moment, but, before he said any more he decided that he would do a little bit of private investigation.
“Maybe it is the Browns?” said Corrie, trying to lighten the atmosphere, “Haven’t they been travelling for years.”
It had been at this point that the door of the kitchen had opened, and as if by magic, spirited up like a Genie summoned by name, the Brown female had entered the cabin, a dirty saucepan in one hand, a handful of cutlery in the other. Surprised to see all eyes turned towards her she felt a need to explain her presence. She held her silver bounty up for inspection, and said in uncertain English, “I wash up.” It had signalled the break-up of the meeting.
• • •
Ian was not so drunk as Stuart had anticipated. He had been drunk earlier he explained, but had since moved on to melancholic and philosophical. Stuart thought that he had better take the opportunity to speak to him before he progressed to hung-over and sick.
Bloody Mary’s is a Bora Bora institution. The place to be seen. If the photographs and celebrity names on the board outside are to be believed, it has been the frequent for a roll-call of the rich and famous for several generations. John Denver, Jack Nicholson, Ringo Starr, Marlon Brando: they had all passed through here at some point. Stuart walked underneath the entrance archway, past the large, carved wood canoe which sits in the forecourt, and tried not to glance at the prices on the menu pinned up at the door. Nonchalant, that was the style to adopt. To hell with his budget this evening; for one night only he would mingle with the smart set and meet them on equal terms.
It was something of a disappointment, upon entering the large, open interior, to find the place almost deserted. Admittedly, the room was rather dark, the dense, thatched roof letting in not a glimmer of moonlight and the glow from the bar so dim that Stuart was not even sure if they were still serving drinks. He glanced at his wrist-watch. Only nine-thirty. It was hardly time for last orders. A long table which looked like it might have held a sumptuous buffet earlier on in the day had been cleared, leaving just a spotless white cloth and a colourful floral arrangement of reds and yellows. It was hardly the happening place he had built up in his imagination. Perhaps the jet set go to bed early?
He placed the two middle-aged men sitting on stools at the bar as Americans. It was not so much their corpulent waists, brightly-coloured shorts, or expensive, flashy gold watches, so much as the fact that they were both drinking bottles of Bud. It is a very patriotic beer. There can be no other reason to drink it other than from a misplaced sense of national duty. There was a young couple, blonde, good-looking and wealthy, wearing designer labels and unsullied deck shoes, chatting animatedly in one of the booths, and then there was Ian. The Englishman was waving at him rather feebly, from where he sat at a round table towards the back of the bar. Stuart ordered a bottle of Hinano from the bar and joined him.
“All right?”
“Yer. All right?”
“Yer.”
They sipped from their respective bottles in unison. As with Mike earlier on in the day, Stuart found there was very little to say. Words changed nothing. In the end it was Ian that broke the silence. It was not the conversation that Stuart had anticipated.
“I wonder if you would ever get used to the lizards?”
It was a bit of a David Icke moment, “Pardon?”
“The lizards. They’re everywhere. I can’t stand them.”
Humour him, “Yes.”
“In the shower. In the kitchen. This morning I was in the kitchen, just wanted to make some toast, there was a lizard in the bread-bin. Ugh.” Ian shuddered at the memory. “Horrible. It’s the way they move. So fast. So sudden. And the noise they make. Have you heard them? At night, I hear them all the time.”
“You mean the little geckos?” asked Stuart, finally understanding what Ian was talking about.
“Do you hear them? They get up on the ceiling, between the rafters. Don’t you worry about them dropping down on you while you’re asleep? I can’t sleep for thinking about it. And the noise. They chirp away. I can’t stand it. All night long, like little birds. Chirp, chirp, chirp.”
“I thought they were good at keeping the mosquitoes away?” said Stuart, the voice of reason.
“I don’t care. Do you know what I think?”
“No,” said Stuart, wearily.
“I’ve been thinking about this,” said Ian.
“I’m sure.”
“It’s the price of paradise.”
“What?”
“You’re like me,” said Ian, bonding, bonding, “A Brit. Abroad. It’s all a bit different. All a bit ...” He pulled a face. “You know, it should be fantastic. It’s all here. Everything you ever imagined: sun, sea, se ... OK, not sex maybe, but everything else. It should be fantastic, but ...”
“But?” coaxed Stuart. Mr Counsellor.
“There’s always a downside.”
“Which is?”
“Insects.”
“Yes, I’m with you there.”
Ian was counting off the hazards on his fingers, “Sharks.”
“Only in the water, surely?” said Stuart, amused.
Ian shrugged. Bloody hell! Even Ian can shrug like a European. “Cold showers.”
Stuart hummed. The jury was out on that one.
“And lizards,” Ian said with conviction.
“I quite like the little fellows,” argued Stuart.
“Don’t get me wrong. Outside, they’re fine. Scuttling along at the side of the road, no problem. It’s just when they pop up, unexpectedly, somewhere they don’t belong.” He shuddered again, “Have you see the way they do those little press-ups?”
Stuart might have thought that Ian had completely lost it now, except that he had seen the way they do those little press-ups. “Yes, not nice,” he had to concede.
“Even here,” Ian cast his gaze around the bar, “I’m on edge. You can never know if there is one under your chair. In the roof. Ugh. It’s a shame, because I like it here. Liked it here,” he corrected himself, a reflective expression on his face. He sank back in his wicker chair, his energy expended after his rant. “The price of paradise,” he repeated, quietly to himself, as though he had discovered some previously unrevealed truth.
Stuart was about to start a new conversation, his mouth half open, beginning to form a word, trying to find the best opening line to introduce the real subject behind his visit, when Ian sprung forward once again, reinvigorated by the thought of a new grievance.
“Choice. It is the curse of modern society.” The man could be so definite when he chose to be.
“What do you mean?”
?
??I could have been happy in my job, happy in my old life, would have been happy in my job, in my old life, if there weren’t so many choices.”
“Such as?”
“I don’t know. You know what I mean, though?” Ian was losing the direction of his argument. Alcohol was loosening his tongue but blurring his reasoning. Stuart watched as his companion’s head nodded forward slightly, his eyes closing as though he was going to fall asleep, before he once again jerked upward, alert and speaking once again. “Shall I do this, shall I do that. Shall I go to Europe, shall I go to Asia. Shall I go trekking in Peru, shall I go white water rafting down the Zambezi. Shall I become a deep sea diver, shall I run away with the circus. Shall I hire a small boat and sail around the world, shall I discover a new tribe in the Amazonian jungle. Shall I be Boris Becker, or shall I join Take That. Shall I cut off my legs and live in a monastery.” Stuart smiled, wondering if these two activities were somehow intrinsically linked. “Or shall I work the rest of my life behind the same desk in the D.H.S.S..”
The final sentence had been said in a quieter, sadder voice, and Stuart, sensing that his companion’s list had run its course, broke in, “Not everyone has such choices.”
“No, that’s the point,” said Ian, “In reality none of us have. I will never play football for Manchester United. I will never be the youngest winner of the men’s singles title at Wimbledon. I will never be the leading man opposite Debra Winger in the movies. It’s just that we are led to believe that perhaps we may.”
“By ...?”
“It’s the media, you know, they’re the ones to blame. The TV mainly. And the newspapers.” Ian held up an accusing finger, “The newspapers, now there’s a topic. Don’t get me started on the newspapers.”
Stuart knew he would regret it but he could not help himself, “What about them?”
Ian took another swig from his bottle of Hinano, wetting his lips, preparing himself for a further prolonged bout of oratory. “I can’t stand the modern approach to news. You know, journalists who really only want to be thriller writers.”
“What do you mean?”
Ian held the bottle up to his mouth, speaking into it as though he were miming that he was holding a microphone, “The sun had just begun to rise above the level of the horizon. The wind swept the endless sea of sand into a continuous shifting landscape of dune and plain. A burnt-out tank lies discarded by the side of the single track road: a road which leads to death in one direction and hell in the other. Ahead, there is the sound of gunfire. This is Ian Hunt somewhere on the Iraqi-Kuwait border. You know the kind of rubbish.”
Stuart agreed that he did.
“Why can’t they just stick to the facts, that’s what I say.”
“You sound like Mr Gradgrind.”
“What?” The allusion was lost on Ian, who sank back into his chair, his energies exhausted. He stared ahead blankly, sipping mechanically from his bottle, barely registering Stuart’s presence, lost in thoughts of his own. Shock took many forms. Stuart could only too easily guess what was his current preoccupation.
It was not the best time, Stuart was ready to admit, to add to his companion’s sense of paranoia by relaying the events of the kitchen-meeting, but it was the sole reason he had made the walk out to the bar and he was not to be diverted from his purpose. He was not sure if Ian took in very much of what was related, but he maintained an attentive silence throughout the story, waiting to the conclusion before succinctly commenting, “Well, that’s that then.”