Carpet Diem
Page 14
The screaming in his head got louder and he moved to run away. As he took a step back, however, the woman instantly returned to her previous, beautiful state. She stood there, looking utterly bemused at him, but without the disgust of a moment ago. Over her shoulder, Simon caught sight of himself in a wall mirror and was deeply relieved to see himself returned to his previous, Adonis-like condition.
Thus, here they were. Standing looking at each other, confused, befuddled and wondering what the hell was going on. After a few moments of looking for an explanation on the floor, which stubbornly refused to offer one, Simon looked up to see the woman walking slowly back to her table, still looking confused.
He knew how she felt. It was time to be somewhere else. He wondered if there was any more MASH on.
----
Sean sat huddled against the door, backed up against it like a cat that had accidentally stumbled into an illicit cat-eating club. His eyes were wide and staring, and he pointed, limply, back at Harriet, who sat up, gloriously naked in the bed.
“Wh…wh…” he panted, trying in vain to get out more than one syllable.
It was a fairly understandable reaction from a man who’d just seen his latest bedroom gymnastics partner instantly age 60 years mid-stroke. The speed with which he’d extricated himself from the situation, bounded out of bed and found the nearest hard surface to back up against would have put that cat to shame. Language, however, had not quite come back to him yet.
“Right, so…,” said Harriet, “there’s probably something I should explain.”
----
“You did what? Are you serious?” Lily’s mouth gaped.
“Just for a few seconds,” Daniel shrugged his shoulders. “Five, at the most.”
Lily couldn’t decide whether to scream at him for being so reckless or roar with laughter.
“You know something? I think you’re loosening up.”
“Don’t be silly,” said Daniel, turning away from her. “It was a sound tactical decision. To remind them we’re here.”
“Well, you better hope they’re the only ones you reminded of anything, that’s all I’m saying…”
Daniel smiled. Just a little.
----
“Right. OK. So you’re not a witch.” Sean asked.
“I’ve been called a lot worse than that!” laughed Harriet.
“No, but seriously. You’re not. Right?”
“Seriously? There are witches? Bugger me.”
“Oh aye. And you don’t want to be getting on the wrong side of them. I made that mistake once.”
“Right. Well, no, not a witch. Just the other thing that rhymes with it. Is that going to be OK with you or am I going to need to look for another toy boy?”
“Toy boy?” It was Sean’s turn to smile. “Heh, well, that’s funny, you see. I’m a little older than I look too.”
“Oh really?” Harriet braced herself for being under whelmed by his admission of being over 30.
“1812,” said Sean.
“What about it?”
“That’s when my boat landed here.”
It wasn’t often that Harriet was speechless. Scratch that –Harriet had never been speechless in her entire life. It was an odd experience.
Sean grinned. “So technically, I’m the one robbing the cradle here.”
Harriet grabbed at the whisky on the bedside table and knocked back what was left of it. “OK. You can explain that later. For now, since we’ve sorted that out and I seem to be 21 again –do you think we could get that working?” she nodded toward Sean’s crotch.
“Get it working? Jesus woman, we’ll have to coax the thing back out of me diaphragm, first!”
----
Luke burst into the room.
“Something weird happened!” he announced.
Gabby wondered what he would consider weird. This could be interesting.
“He changed! Just for a moment, but he definitely changed.”
“Who did?”
“Debovar! He was talking to one of the witches and just for a moment, he went back to himself! What do you think it means?”
“Back to himself? You mean, what, older?”
“Back to normal.”
“I don’t know. What do you think?”
“I think maybe their powers aren’t entirely working here. I think maybe they can’t keep them young for long.”
“Really? Is that possible?”
“I think so. Maybe. They’re banned from coming here, aren’t they? Do you know what that means?”
“Not really.”
“If they can’t keep Debovar and his aunt young indefinitely, then all we have to do is keep them here long enough for them to turn back to normal. Then they’ll be thrown off the island.”
“But don’t we want them off the island as quickly as possible?”
“Well, we want them out of the way, where they can’t do their job.”
“So how do we do that?”
Luke finally paused, his energy depleted, and sat on the edge of the bed.
“Well, that’s the thing, isn’t it? How can we keep them tied up?”
Now and again, when everything came together and the stars were in the correct alignment, or in this case, as she looked across the room at the massage oil she’d lovingly prepared for Luke’s return, something sparked for Gabby.
“There’s a prison downstairs! We just need to get them arrested for something!” she brandished the bottle of oil at him, as if to confirm the point.
Luke’s eyes widened. It wasn’t a bad idea.
“Why did the bottle make you think of prison?” he asked.
Gabby looked down at it as if it had just appeared in her hand.
“I dunno. Massage oil …prison? It just did.”
“Right. So we just have to get them to do something wrong,” said Luke. “Well, something illegal, anyway.”
“OK, so what can we get them for?” Gabby asked, seemingly having exhausted her planning contribution for the year.
“Well, Simon barely leaves his room. After the little wobble this afternoon, he went back and hasn’t left since, I don’t think.”
“So where have you been?” Gabby asked, trying not to sound too suspicious. “It’s nearly dinner time.”
Luke had a moment of that particularly male experience when a woman asks him a small question, which he knows fine well has a much bigger question hiding inside it; when she asks, “Where have you been?” but she means, “Who were you with?”
No matter how innocent he is, the man has an unmistakeable moment of guilt, before being able to answer, as if the collective male subconscious has been inexorably emblazoned with the fact that, at heart, all men are dogs and should be sorry.
He explained and, after some discussion, they actually had a plan. It was a good plan.
They hoped.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Dinner on Priest’s Island was an opulent, decadent affair. The breakfast terrace, also used for lunch, was abandoned as the whole event moved up on to the roof. On a huge, terracotta stone floor were dozens of large round tables covered in white linen tablecloths and adorned with elegant candles, silver cutlery and flowers. They were only a sample of the foliage though, with the tables surrounded by plants, vines and flowers. Overhead, some old wooden bars, which seemed once to have held grape vines, were draped in a spectacular array of fairy lights and paper lanterns –all in white.
At the end furthest from the door that led back down to the kitchen lay one long main table, where six of the ‘witches’ sat, three at either side of two empty seats.
“Do you think this is where they filmed Mamma Mia?” Gabby asked.
“What?” Luke asked. It was more ‘What the hell are you on about?’ than ‘I’m sorry, what did you say?’
“You know: Mamma Mia. I wonder if they filmed it here?”
“You’re babbling again,” he said, affectionately.
“I suppose I am, a bit. Sorry.”
“It’s OK,” Luke smiled, looking nervously toward the table across the terrace where Simon, Harriet and Bob sat with the barman and Amelia.
He wondered how they’d managed to become so friendly with two of the island’s inhabitants so quickly. It was also risky for Amelia to be sitting with Bob, he thought. It made no difference now, anyway, since he and Gabby had, just an hour ago, walked “casually” past one of the witches –a red-haired one –and “casually” Discussed a few things. It was only a matter of time.
“Do you know what I want to know?” Gabby piped up again.
“What?” Luke asked, scratching his head, which had begun to itch all over.
“What does ‘I smell like I sound’ mean?”
It was a non sequitur of epic proportions, even for her.
“Pardon?”
“In ‘Hungry like the Wolf’. Duran Duran. How can you smell like you sound? That’s stupid.”
Luke stared.
Thankfully, a waiter arrived and delivered their starters, which appeared to be some kind of roast pigeon.
“Brazil?” Gabby added, gesturing to the surrounds, as if this explained everything.
She had become less and less comprehensible since they became human.
----
To say that Simon was uncomfortable surrounded by strangers was an understatement worthy of awards.
To add to that existing discomfort, he had somehow become the fifth wheel when his travelling companions had both paired off, with somewhat undue haste. Harriet had assured him the timescale was “normal for holidays”. He wished she’d stop calling it that. It wasn’t a holiday, it was a highly dangerous, secret mission to save his life – but he seemed to be the only one focused on that goal.
Despite his discomfort, the meal was, overall, enjoyable. A main course of seafood paella was well done and the dessert was some kind of chocolate mousse cake thing, which was excellent. Even Harriet had eaten it enthusiastically, though she did dribble some of her whisky over it first. Intentionally.
Just as Simon was thinking he’d be able to go back to his room soon, having survived a whole day, the chatter died down when a spoon was clinked repeatedly against a glass. He looked up to see something terrifying –the gorgeous monstrosity he’d come across that afternoon was standing up, glass in hand. Simon did his best impression of an empty chair as she looked at their table.
“Oh God,” said Amelia, smiling and wincing in equal measure. “It’s mother.”
“That’s your mother?” bob asked.
If he was under the impression this meant that the girl by his side was going to turn into a classic beauty, Simon had bad news for him - unless he was prepared to remain outside a five-foot perimeter. Which seemed unlikely, what with the way he had mooned over her all evening.
“Ladies and Gentleman,” Amelia’s witch-mother began, hushing the assembled diners completely, “may I welcome our most recent arrivals to Priest’s Island. I hope you will enjoy your stay.”
Her voice was like a young Katherine Hepburn’s. She had a sensuous Southern drawl that made Simon think of hot summer nights, white cotton shirts, repressed homosexuality and insidious racism.
“As most of you know, our host is away from the island on personal business at the moment, meaning that control of the island is left to us. This means we are here to make your stay as enjoyable as possible, but also that we have to deal with any legal issues that arise.”
Simon’s heart sank even further. He’d been revealed in true form right in front of the highest-ranked person on the island.
He might as well have wobbled his danglies at the Pope.
“Unfortunately,” Amelia’s mother continued, “an issue has arisen which needs to be addressed.”
Simon’s left arm developed a nasty twitch. With any luck, he’d have a heart attack and avoid the rest of this announcement.
“As you all know, we have some local laws here which, while our island is both exclusive and dedicated to your pleasure, must still be obeyed. Breaches of these laws are taken very seriously.”
Simon felt a sudden and urgent need for a toilet. As they were sitting fairly far away from the head table, he wondered whether he could creep away unnoticed, before she finally got to the point she clearly intended to make. Harriet kicked him under the table. He looked up to see her mouth, “What’s wrong?” at him. Apparently, he wasn’t disguising his nerves as well as he imagined.
----
Harriet scowled at her nephew. He was either having some sort of fit or just being a dolt in public again, shaking like a particularly pathetic leaf in a slight breeze.
So some authoritarian bitch was making a statement about keeping to the rules. There was no reason for any of them to think they’d been compromised. It wasn’t as if one of them had done something stupid…
She’d been away from Simon all afternoon.
She kicked him again under the table, harder. This time, as he looked round, she hissed at him, “What have you done?”
He looked pathetically back at her.
Bollocks.
Harriet started to pay attention to the bitch’s statement –she was still wittering on about rules and obligations. Reaching across the table, Harriet picked up an almost finished bottle of wine and casually drained it into her glass. Then, feigning a cough, she put the empty bottle down on the floor next to her bag, from which she retrieved a tissue and blew her nose. Putting the tissue away again, she grabbed the bottle and placed it between her knees under the table, within easy reach.
She took a deep breath, lifted her large Caol Ila from the table and necked the contents.
Right. She was full of adrenalin and single malt. Game on.
----
“So, I’m afraid there is an issue that we’re going to have address,” the witch continued. “And I’m going to have to ask someone to come up here and make a statement in front of all of you, as witnesses to the openness and fairness of our system.”
She looked straight at their table. In that long, long moment of silence, Simon could hear his bowels loosening. At any moment, she was going to say his name and he would have to walk up to the front of the room and be humiliated. And possibly disembowelled.
But the worst thing was that every single person on this rooftop would be looking at him.
She paused forever. The woman seemed to be adding to the drama, just for the hell of it. Simon hated her more than most.
“Amelia,” the witch finally said, “would you come forward, please?”
Simon shook uncontrollably.
----
This was unexpected. Perhaps her calamitous nephew had not done anything wrong after all. It seemed to be some kind of family tiff, which was certainly none of Harriet’s business.
She relaxed a little and watched as a confused Amelia smiled and exchanged a look with Bob, before standing and demurely making her way towards her mother. Bob looked around at the rest of the table and shrugged, smiling. So the giant had no idea what was happening, which suggested he hadn’t done anything disastrous either.
All good. She poured herself another measure and breathed in its aroma.
Amelia arrived beside her mother, smiling that same awkward smile.
“Yes, mother?” she asked in a tone that was clearly half obedience and half irritation.
“Amelia, where were you this afternoon, at approximately three o’clock?” she asked, authoritatively.
“I think I was in the stone garden. Why?”
“And who were you there with?”
“A friend –Bob,” Amelia answered, nodding towards their table.
“Oh shit,” Sean muttered under his breath. He looked at Bob and then at Harriet. “Something’s wrong.”
Harriet went back to high alert, clenching the bottle between her thighs.
Amelia was saying something quietly to her mother in the pleading way that only a daughter who has been dragged in front of a crowd of strangers to be ques
tioned can do. Her face was scarlet.
“And Amelia,” her mother asked aloud, so that the whole audience could clearly hear, “is it true that you were seen kissing this man?”
Amelia went from scarlet to pale white as she realised where this was going.
“Oh, mother, no,’ she whimpered. “Please, you can’t…”
----
Earlier, Luke had been explaining his afternoon whereabouts to his lover, whose look was currently saying: “I’m not angry; I’m fine. But if you don’t have a very good answer for where you’ve been in the next thirty seconds I’m going to fricassee your testicles.”
“Well,” he answered, “after I saw that Simon had locked himself back in his room, I went to see what I could find out about the others. First I looked for the giant, but I couldn’t find him. But I did find out something interesting. There are these women here –they’re …very beautiful.”
Luke knew he was on thin ice again and that he’d better get quickly to the other side if he was to have any chance of seeing that massage oil in action. Gabby’s face confirmed this suspicion.
“But actually, they’re not. When you get close to them, they become, well, hideous. I think they’re witches.”
Phew –he’d made it to the point.
“How close?”
Damn. How did he not see that coming?
“Well, within a few feet.”