‘If you want me to.’ She looked doubtful.
‘No, thanks!’
Her long straight hair blew around her face, framing it. He laughed, and slipped his arm about her shoulders, glad she was there.
From the top of the sandhill, the director was waving to indicate they were moving on for the next set-up. He could see the camera assistant hoisting the tripod on to his shoulder. Terry, the sound man, was folding up the little canvas stool he took with him wherever he went. Of the thug there was no sign.
Tim waved back grudgingly.
‘They’re going down to the shore for the next shot,’ he said. ‘Hope you’re not getting bored.’
‘I still haven’t worked out what’s happening,’ she confessed. ‘In the story, I mean.’
They began their climb over the sandhills, taking the easy way round to the shore, while Tim filled her in on the plot. It was the usual rubbish. His six-year-old nephew — Oliver Gulliver’s favourite grandson, naturally — had been kidnapped from his nanny while flighty Mama was on holiday in Biarritz, playing truant with her latest lover. The ransom had been set at a million dollars, but Tim, alias Jonathon Gulliver, aimed to track down the kidnappers himself, thereby saving both the child and the money. Or, if necessary, only the money.
‘Why dollars?’ Jane asked after a moment’s thought. ‘Why not pounds? Or Swiss francs?’
‘They’re trying to sell the series in the States.’
The ache below his ribs had diminished to a dull, grumbling discomfort, but he still needed to pause for breath as they reached the top of the gentle incline. Down on the flat shore, the director was gesticulating impatiently, urging him to hurry. Beyond her, the grey sea moodily licked at the sands. One after another the quiet waves advanced, broke, then reluctantly drained away.
Jane shivered. ‘I don’t like the sea,’ she murmured. ‘It’s so — oh, I don’t know — so indifferent to us. As if people didn’t matter.’
‘Maybe they don’t, in nature’s eyes. For most creatures, it’s eat or be eaten. Sharks, octopus, big fish, little fish…’
‘Oh, that’s horrid!’
When they caught up with the crew, they found the director and the cameraman arguing over the next shot. He held up his light meter at arm’s length, squinting at it; then, grudgingly, he agreed, if they could go for the take without wasting too much time.
Tim eyed the thug speculatively as she issued her instructions. He was solid bone and muscle. It was just possible he had not realised his own strength, Tim thought; hadn’t intended it, in fact. But then he saw a gleam of amusement in the man’s eye and realised he was wrong. That blow had been deliberate.
‘On the word Action,’ Jacqui-thing was saying, ‘I want you to run to the boat.’ A few yards off, the bay curved into a small estuary where a boat lay stranded on a sandbank close to the water, and she pointed to it. ‘You intend to push it into the water, but Tim is right behind you. Before you can actually move the boat, he catches up. You struggle — and that’s it. We cut there, and then go into close shots.’
‘Tomorrow,’ grunted the cameraman, listening.
‘Let’s just see, shall we?’
He shook his head doubtfully. ‘The close shots will have to be tomorrow.’
Impatiently, she turned back to Tim and the thug. ‘Right, is that clear now?’
‘When do I push the boat in the water, like?’ the thug wanted to know.
Much to Tim’s satisfaction, he detected a note of irritation in her voice as she went over it all again. Whether the thug really hadn’t understood, or whether he was playing her along, he couldn’t judge.
The make-up girl offered him a comb to get the sand out of his hair, while Audrey — in charge of costumes — brushed some of the muck off his clothes. As she did so, he made a passing remark about realism, and she gave him the answer he deserved. She was right, too. Gulliver was a glamour show, Britain’s answer to Dynasty: not a hair should be out of place.
They took up their starting positions, he and the thug, but there was a further delay while the director and cameraman went into another deep discussion. He wanted a rehearsal, but she was insisting they should take it first time while the wet sand was still free of footprints. She was getting flustered, Tim noted; he began to feel a twinge of pity for her. It couldn’t be easy, being the new girl. They had all become so accustomed to working with Molly, the previous director, who had been on the show since the beginning.
‘Took yer a while to get up again,’ the thug said smugly as they waited. ‘Often watch this programme. Wondered ’ow tough yer really was. Now I know, don’ I?’
‘I’d not count on it.’ A nut-case, he thought; another bloody nut-case. He’d not yet made up his mind what to do about it. ‘This time, remember you’re being paid to act. That means pretend — get it?’
‘Oh, yeah. Yeah.’
‘So when we get to the boat, I grab your shoulder, swing you around, and pretend to throw a punch. So just leave it at that, right?’
‘Right.’
Tim regarded the thug suspiciously, but his face betrayed nothing. Who the hell had booked the idiot, he wondered; surely there were plenty of experienced people available. The last thing they could risk was an all-out fight. Even a black eye could set production schedules back a week or more.
‘OK — stand by!’ the director shouted, turning away from the cameraman. She sounded fed up. ‘Roll ’em.’
‘Rolling.’
‘Action!’
The thug ran heavily towards the small boat. Tim waited, giving him a lead of three or four yards; then, on a signal from the director, began to lumber after him. ‘And not too quick — you’re exhausted, you’ve been in a fight,’ she’d instructed him unnecessarily. Even had he wanted to, he couldn’t have gone any faster; his body still protested, and the ache beneath his ribs was with him again.
Already before he reached the boat he had noticed the thug was making no effort to push it towards the water. He merely stood there, motionless. As though hypnotised.
‘For Chrissake, do something!’ Tim snapped as he arrived.
‘See that?’ The thug nodded in the direction of the creek. ‘Didn’t expect that. Nasty.’
In a hollow of the sandbank not far from the boat lay a body, face downwards, its feet towards them, its head and shoulders still in the water.
In the background Tim heard the director yelling ‘Cut!’ and then voicing her anger at them for messing up the shot. He turned and called back to her.
‘Come and take a look! Muscles here has found something.’
‘Name’s Arthur,’ said the thug unexpectedly, his eyes not leaving the body. All the colour had drained out of his face. ‘I reckon he’s dead.’
‘Better see.’
It was not a task he welcomed, but the thug hadn’t volunteered and somebody had to do it. He went around the boat and approached the body gingerly. Male, he guessed. Bare feet badly lacerated and raw; in places, the white bone was visible. The jeans were undamaged, though there were wounds around the midriff below the T-shirt. Must be dead, Tim thought dully, trying not to throw up. He bent down to turn the body over, just in case.
‘Jesus!’
A tangle of glistening gut spilled out through the deep vent across the belly. Startled, Tim took a step back, breaking into a sweat. He had to force himself to look at the face, only to see it was covered by some sort of shining, pink jelly.
‘Jellyfish!’ Jane exclaimed behind him, horrified. ‘Oh, my God, look at it!’
Feverishly, she fished out the miniature camera from her jeans pocket and began to photograph the body, taking one picture after the next without stopping.