THIRTEEN
Jude was, in fact, having the beginnings of a perfect holiday day at Morning Glory. She had sploshed around idly in the pool for some time, then lazed on a lounger and let the already scorching sun dry her off. Then she’d had a leisurely shower and sensibly anointed herself with Factor Fifteen before putting on a dry bikini and wrapping a diaphanous drape around her ample body.
Breakfast by the pool had consisted of a nectarine chopped up in yogurt, sprinkled with honey. Then more honey on bread and butter. She’d also found in the fridge door a carton of a Turkish favourite, sour cherry juice, which tasted wonderful.
As for plans for the day, she had none. Whatever Carole had said, Jude felt sure that going out to eat in the evening would be part of it, and a visit to the supermarket might have to be fitted in at some point. But there was no pressure to work out a timescale for either excursion.
She was glad that Carole had gone out for the day. Not from any lack of affection; it was just that Jude recognized the differences in their personalities. Her own method of untwitching involved running her system down to a state of almost complete torpor and then letting her energy rebuild itself. In two or three days she’d be up to thinking about active sightseeing.
Carole, she knew, worked in exactly the opposite way. The tensions within her demanded constant activity. Even though Jude had been aware of the ill-disguised trepidation with which her friend had set off in the Fiat, going to Pinara was an essential part of her holiday acclimatization. After a few days of busily doing things, Carole would, Jude reckoned, be sufficiently relaxed even to spend a few hours on a lounger by the pool.
And by the end of the fortnight it might even be a case of Jude suggesting excursions and Carole preferring to loll around at Morning Glory.
Jude’s poolside idyll was interrupted by a voice saying, ‘Hello again.’
She shaded her eyes against the sun to see the unwelcome outline of Travers Hughes-Swann. Instinctively, she felt glad that she still had the wrap on. Thin though it was, it afforded some protection from his prying eyes.
‘Oh, good morning,’ she said, fearful that his appearance was going to become a daily occurrence. And also mentally rescheduling the urgency of her trip to the supermarket. It was the only excuse she had, should she need to get away from his cloying presence.
‘Just came to check you’d settled in all right.’
‘Very well indeed, as you see.’
‘Sleep well?’
‘Like the proverbial log. And will probably fit in a few more hours in the course of the day.’
‘Very good, very good. That’s what a holiday’s for, isn’t it?
‘Exactly.’
‘Just lazing around on your own, with no interruptions.’
‘That’s what I like, yes,’ said Jude, not daring to put quite as much edge into the words as she wanted to.
‘Well, I’m sure you’ve earned a break. What is it you do?’
‘I’m a healer.’
‘Oh.’ That was a conversation-stopper for Travers. He appeared to have no supplementary questions on the subject of healing. Instead he went on, ‘I think doing nothing on holiday is entirely legitimate.’
‘Good,’ said Jude, not feeling any need to have her plans validated by the likes of Travers Hughes-Swann.
‘What gets up my nose is people who do nothing and haven’t earned the right to do nothing. Benefit scroungers, layabouts, a lot of them immigrants, you know.’
Before he could get up a full head of fascist steam, Jude said, ‘Well, we don’t have to worry about that kind of thing out in a beautiful place like this, do we?’
Her words had the desired effect of stopping his diatribe before he had really got into it. Travers Hughes-Swann moved his tortoise head around to take in the whole villa. ‘I haven’t met your friend yet.’
‘No. No, Carole’s gone off on an expedition to Pinara.’
‘Really? Well, there’s a coincidence.’
‘Oh?’
‘Phyllis and I were thinking of going over in that direction today.’
‘Ah.’
‘There’s a little restaurant we quite like up in a village near there. I’d thought we might go there for lunch … but Phyllis says she doesn’t feel up to it.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘There’s not much she does feel up to these days. It was probably rather foolish of me to imagine that she might be able to accompany me.’
‘Well, there you go …’ said Jude fatuously.
‘Yes. So I was just wondering …’
‘Mm?’
‘… whether you’d like to come with me?’
‘For lunch?’
‘Yes. Give you an opportunity to see a bit of the surrounding area. It’s very beautiful.’
‘Well, Travers, that’s terribly kind of you, but I had really planned just a lazy day by the pool.’
‘Oh, very well,’ he said. ‘Another time, perhaps?’
Over my dead body, thought Jude.
Pinara was not what Carole Seddon would have regarded as an archaeological site. The ones she’d been to in England had all been protected like Fort Knox, with guard rails and grilles everywhere. Nobody was allowed to wander off the authorized routes. Health and Safety was clearly higher up the organizers’ priorities than historical interest.
Whereas Pinara seemed to be open to everyone. True, there was a small wooden hut near the car park, beside which a small motor scooter was drawn up. From the amiable man inside she bought a rather attractively decorated ticket about the size of a five-pound note. But it didn’t look as if it would be difficult to get into the site illegally if one wished to (something which, of course, Carole Seddon never would wish). But apart from the odd signpost there was little in the way of official intervention into how one wished to conduct one’s visit. And, so far as she could see, there were no areas roped off.
As she’d stepped out of the Fiat in the car park, Carole had had two dominant feelings. One was, as she felt the almost brutal impact of the heat, that she was very glad she’d bought the straw hat.
And second was a sensation of satisfaction that was almost gleeful. She had managed it. She had found her way to Pinara. The start of the journey, it was true, had not been easy. The narrow roads, the unfamiliar car, driving on the right in a foreign country, all of those factors had contributed to state that was close to panic. Until she got through the tangled traffic of Fethiye, in spite of the air conditioning, she had been sweating like a pig and felt that her bladder was about to burst.
But gradually, the further she progressed on the expedition, the calmer she became. And she gained confidence from the efficiency of her navigational skills. They had always been one of her secret sources of pride. Carole Seddon would never set out on a journey without having made a thorough study of the route beforehand. She had an instinctive memory for road numbers and target destinations. She could visualize a route rolling out before her, knowing which place name she had to aim for, which villages she would have to drive through to get there.
During their marriage her husband David, a nit-picker and minor control freak in many ways, had never challenged her superiority as a navigator. On the few uneasy holidays they’d taken in France with the silent teenage Stephen, David had driven with Carole at his side, map on her lap, as reliable as a homing pigeon. In such situations, though not many others, her ex-husband had known his place.
So, to have negotiated the wild terrain and unfamiliar signposting between Kayaköy and Pinara gave a huge boost to Carole’s confidence. As she neared the destination, she felt positively buoyant. She was no longer sweating, the air conditioning had done its work, and when she drew the Fiat up beside a purple tourist coach in the car park she had completely forgotten how desperately, a mere half an hour before, she had wanted to find a loo.