‘Yes. And we know each other well enough not to get on each other’s nerves.’ (Though Jude wondered, given the way Carole was currently behaving, how true that assertion was.)
‘Hm. And when were you thinking of this holiday happening? Because I told you Gaby is pregnant again—’
‘Many times.’
‘—and I wouldn’t want to be abroad when—’
‘The baby is due at the end of October, Carole. There is plenty of time.’
‘When were you thinking of going, then?’
‘June.’
‘But that’s less than a month away.’
‘The sooner the better, so far as I’m concerned. And Barney says the villa’s booked solid for July and August, as you would expect.’
‘Does he go out there himself?’
‘Yes, he spends a lot of time out there, either in that one or one of the others.’
‘“One of the others”?’
‘Barney owns a lot of villas.’
‘Oh, really?’ Carole suspected yet another downside. ‘What, in blocks …? You mean crammed on top of each other like battery chickens?’
‘No,’ said Jude patiently. ‘They’re all high-spec luxury villas, set in their own grounds, with their own swimming pools. It’s just that Barney has built quite a lot of them. I told you he’s a property developer. He’s a major operator.’
‘Really?’ said Carole dubiously. The expression ‘property developer’ was not one that raised her confidence. But before she could express her doubts, a vital question came into her mind, a question that she should really have asked a lot earlier.
‘One thing, Jude … You haven’t actually said what country Barney’s villas are in.’
‘Turkey.’
‘Turkey?’ echoed Carole, as only Carole could.
It was presumably the sales of Barney Willingdon’s properties abroad that enabled him to live in such an opulent property in England. Chantry House was a genuinely Tudor pile, with extensive grounds, set in a wooded area just north of Petworth. It was a sunny early evening in May as Carole’s Renault drew up on the immaculately raked gravel drive. Both women were impressed by the scale of the house and its high level of maintenance. No expense had been spared anywhere. Also on the gravel stood a substantial Rolls-Royce. It had a ‘BW’ personalized number plate, which Carole thought was rather vulgar. But she didn’t make any comment.
What she did say, though, was, ‘Now, remember, Jude, I haven’t committed myself to anything.’
‘I will remember,’ Jude asserted solemnly.
‘I just want to meet Barney and hear more about this villa of his. I still haven’t said I’m going to go there.’
Jude nodded, again solemnly. Carole’s reaction was so characteristic, but Jude was beginning to wonder whether the whole holiday project was going to be more trouble than it was worth. If she’d asked her reflexologist friend Jools to join her for a fortnight in Turkey, the reaction would have been instantaneous, without any fuss. In fact, she had asked Jools, but her friend was at a delicate stage of a new relationship with a man she’d met at a self-awareness workshop and couldn’t risk being away from England. (Jude devoutly reminded herself that the one thing she must never do was to let Carole know she hadn’t been first choice for the holiday offer. That knowledge could prompt all kinds of recrimination and sniffiness.)
‘Fine,’ Jude said. ‘I will tell Barney that you may be coming with me.’
‘You don’t think he’ll think that’s rude … you know, as if I were, kind of, looking his gift horse in the mouth?’
‘And what are you doing … if you’re not looking his gift horse in the mouth?’
‘Well, I …’
‘It’ll be fine, Carole. Just relax.’
‘That’s easy for you to say.’
TWO
‘And there’s a ghost town,’ said Barney Willingdon.
‘A ghost town?’ echoed Carole.
‘Yes. End of the village. Some quirk of history. I don’t know all the details, but I think the people who lived there used to be Greeks.’
‘Anatolians,’ his wife Henry corrected him. She was a thin, flimsy-looking woman with ash-blonde hair. Maybe in her forties, could have been fifties. She wore black designer jeans and a white blouse with a design of violets on it. Her public-school vowels contrasted strongly with her husband’s local Sussex accent.
‘Yeah, whatever. Anyway, they was Christians in a Muslim country, and there was a kind of population exchange with some Greek Muslims coming back to Turkey and these people going back to wherever they—’
‘Anatolia,’ said Henry.
‘Right. This was in the 1920s.’
‘Nineteen twenty-three.’
‘Sure, Henry. So, anyway, all these Gr— Anatolians just upped sticks and moved out, and the town’s still there, all set on this hillside, virtually as they left it. A few of the houses have been restored – very few – but most of them have been empty all that time. Windows gone, roofs fallen in, but most of the stone walls are still standing.’
‘Sounds like a good place to wander round,’ said Jude.
‘You’d love it, darling. Fabulous place, Kayaköy.’
‘That’s the name of the village?’
‘Right, Carole. I got half a dozen villas out there, but the one’d be perfect for you two is called Morning Glory. Set up a bit on the hills, lovely view over the valley … infinity pool, all mod cons. You’d love it, Jude.’
‘Sounds great.’
‘But how would one deal with, sort of … everyday things?’
‘Sorry, Carole? Wodja mean?’
‘Well, neither of us speaks any Turkish or—’
‘No worries. Most of the locals speak English. Certainly all the ones involved in the tourist business, and in Kayaköy most of them are.’
This prompted a new suspicion in Carole. ‘So is it very touristy?’
‘No, that’s the beauty of the place. Near some very touristy places … Ölüdeniz, Hisarönü … but Kayaköy itself is remarkably unspoilt.’
‘It does sound blissful,’ said Jude.
They were in the Willingdons’ sitting room, drinking an absolutely delicious New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, whose bottle lolled in an ice bucket with another unopened by its side. The evening was warm enough for the French windows to be open, showing perfect lawns rolling down to the edge of the woodland. The room’s interior was beautifully designed with what Carole thought was a surprising degree of taste. The inherent prejudices which the words ‘property developer’ brought to her mind included lots of onyx and swirly carpets. And when they’d been greeted at the door by Barney Willingdon he had reinforced that expectation. A large man, full of restless energy, he had longish hair and a trim beard beginning to give way to grey. He wore a tailored leather jacket above designer jeans, and his body seemed to taper down to surprisingly small loafers with leather tassels on them. His size and rough vowels were at odds with the elegance of his surroundings. Carole suspected that Henry Willingdon had had more input into the decor of Chantry House than her husband.
Jude, too, was making observations about the environment in which they found themselves, but hers were more personal. And, of course, she knew a little more than Carole about the Willingdons from the healing sessions she had given to Henry. She knew that theirs was a second marriage for Barney and that he was some twelve years older than his new wife. The lack of photographs in the sitting room reinforced Jude’s impression that both marriages had been childless. And the peremptory way in which she had corrected her husband suggested that, in spite of her pale wispiness, Henry was at least an equal partner in the relationship. And possibly even the dominant one.
‘Anyway,’ said Barney, ‘if you have any problems out at Morning Glory, I have an extensive network of people on the ground out there who can sort everything. Plumbing, electrics, problems with the pool or the car, leaking roof … there’s a list of phone numbers in the villa that will instantly summon up the best in the business. I’ve worked out there so much, I know everyone.’