Page 53 of Someone in the Water

Frankie

I know there are things I should feel grateful for.

The floor of my room was bare when I went back there at dawn this morning, no new note to greet me after spending another restless night on a sun lounger outside the staff accommodation block.

And while Lola is hanging out with Patrick again today, at least I know where she is this time.

Sailing, something she’s very good at, and in light winds.

She’s even given me permission to contact the consulate about her missing travel documents, which didn’t turn up in today’s post either.

But I feel no gratitude.

I’m too tired, too scared, too suspicious of everyone around me, for that.

After a thirty-minute wait in a telephone queue, I finally got hold of someone at the consulate, but that only strengthened what I’ve come to believe.

Lola’s papers have been stolen. Of course the woman I spoke to didn’t say that exactly – she just confirmed that the papers had been posted out, and that La Poste had marked them as delivered yesterday.

Then she gave me a consignment number and said that if I wanted to check further, I’d need to contact La Poste directly.

I haven’t called them. What’s the point in going through the motions of pretending there’s an above-board explanation when I know it’s bullshit. Someone at the hotel has received Lola’s new travel documents – signing with her name probably – then hidden them.

Which can only mean that they want to keep us here.

Who will die first? Mother or daughter?

At first, I thought the notes were just about messing with my head. Then after the second one arrived, I thought they were about scaring us into leaving. But that doesn’t make sense if whoever wrote them is hiding Lola’s documents. So do they actually want to go through with it? Kill us both?

The whole thing could still be about freaking me out of course.

Scaring me half to death and then forcing me to stay for the anniversary of Izzy’s death and the mazzeri’s darkest night to really test my sanity.

But what if it’s not? If someone really is responsible for both Archie’s and Izzy’s deaths, does that mean two more wouldn’t faze them?

I push off the bed and walk out onto the balcony. I try to use the sun – its warmth and brightness – to clear my head and feed me some energy, and it works to an extent.

I guess there always the possibility that the notes and the theft of Lola’s travel documents aren’t connected. Perhaps Patrick took Lola’s post as some creepy romantic gesture. Although he doesn’t seem the obsessive type.

And there’s Dom acting weird too. He looked so guilty last night and then – I’m pretty sure – lied about why he was here. But why would he take Lola’s documents? Is this about wanting to get me to his house? I think you need to come to Sartène. What the hell was that about anyway?

I’m too tired to make any sense of this. And hungry.

I missed dinner last night and couldn’t face more than coffee at breakfast this morning. My body – and my brain – needs sustenance if I’m going to get through this. I throw some cold water on my face, then pick up the key and leave my room.

The main restaurant is busy with chattering families and clinking cutlery, and I can’t face it, so I walk past the entrance.

At the end of the hallway, there’s a side door that will take me outside the hotel and around to the beach shack selling pizza slices.

It’s a new addition to the hotel – all distressed wood and Café Del Mar soundtrack – but it’s small and relaxed and has its own outdoor terrace.

The memory of seeing my picture in the shop makes my palms sweat, so I look away as I walk past its entrance. But I’m so focused on the door ahead of me, that I almost collide with a couple coming out of the shop. The woman drops her large parcel with a thud.

‘Shit, sorry,’ I mutter.

‘Oh no,’ the woman calls out, sinking down onto her haunches and grabbing it.

‘Is it okay?’ the man asks, like their package is a small child. He lifts it off the floor carefully.

‘God, I hope so.’

And that’s when I realise from its shape what it is. A painting. I smile at them both, manically I think, then shuffle away. But when I get to the door that will lead me outside, I can’t help pausing. And then – like a car crash you can’t drag your eyes away from – I turn and watch.

The woman runs her fingernail down a royal blue Hotel Paoli sticker, then folds back the tissue paper.

And just as my instincts warned me, it’s one of my pictures.

But not the one I saw in the shop on Monday.

I remember painting the one they’re inspecting now.

It was my final night away last summer, and I was feeling relieved to have survived another year, and excited to see Lola again.

I left clues in the painting too – the mazzera looking upwards, serene, a hint of dawn arriving in the night sky.

‘Thank fuck for that,’ the man says. ‘That cost a small fortune.’

‘It’s beautiful though, isn’t it?’ the woman counters. ‘And spooky. That mazzeri story is wild.’ She folds the tissue back over and lifts the picture up. Then I watch them walk the length of the hallway, his arm around her shoulder, until they disappear into the lift.

I don’t feel hungry anymore, but when I reach the pizza shack, I buy two slices of Napoli pizza, and a bottle of fizzy water, then find an empty table and sit down.

The smell of creamy cheese and salty anchovies does something to my tummy, because I manage to munch through the first slice.

I’m considering the second when a hand rests on my shoulder. I jerk around.

‘Hey, Frankie! Can I join you?’

I suck in air. ‘Harriet,’ I breathe out. ‘What are you doing here?’ My eyes flit left and right. ‘Is Dom with you?’

‘No, not today. He had to work so I convinced him to lend me his jeep. Sartène may be beautiful, but there’s no beach, and those mountains hug the clouds. It’s much nicer here. Are you going to eat that?’

I shake my head and watch Harriet try to navigate the now drooping pizza slice into her mouth. ‘What work does Dom do?’ I ask. Harriet points at her mouth, and I wait for her to finish chewing.

‘Well, I’m not exactly sure,’ she finally says, taking a gulp from her pink Chilly water bottle. ‘He’s always pretty cagey about it. When I asked him once, he said import, export. And I’m a lawyer, so I was not going to risk delving further into that hot potato.’

‘You think Dom’s into something dodgy?’

She holds her hands up. ‘Far be it for me to speculate. He makes an amazing bouillabaisse and that’s enough for me. But he’s not short of cash.’

I lean back against my chair. Import, export. Is Dom a drug dealer? No, he can’t be; not Dom. This is my wired brain in overdrive again. Not helped by seeing yet another one of my paintings.

Import, export.

A fear creeps over my skin as those words settle. I only paint fourteen pictures a year – one per night for the fortnight I spend hiding away – and the shop has displayed two of them in the time I’ve been here. Someone at the hotel must know my art dealer, Nick.

Import, export.

I lean forward again. ‘Do you think that Dom could be an art dealer?’

Harriet scrunches her forehead. ‘I don’t think so. I’ve never seen any pieces around his house, other than what he’s bought himself, and why would he keep that under wraps?’

Then I find a rusty fact from somewhere deep inside my brain. ‘Didn’t he study art history at uni?’

‘Well if he did, you have a better memory than me.’

I shrug, like I’m not really interested, even though my heart is clattering at the thought of Dom knowing about my paintings. ‘So how was dinner last night?’ I say, testing Dom’s assertion that Harriet was with him.

‘Not as juicy as the night before sadly. Dom had to go out somewhere, so I stayed in with some stinky cheese and binge-watched three episodes of Gossip Girl .’

I take a gulp of fizzy water. Dom looked so guilty last night and Harriet has just confirmed that he lied to me. At the time I thought it meant that he’d taken Lola’s documents, but it could have been anything. Like dropping off one of my paintings, pretending to be someone he’s not.

I think about what it would mean if Dom was my art dealer. The secrets I’ve shared with the faceless person I know as Nick Daniels on those lonely summer nights, waiting for dawn for arrive. Dom would know all about my mazzeri dreams, the fears I carry with me.

But is this just another crackpot theory I’ve come up with because I’m too tired? Harriet knows Dom much better than me and she’s more willing to suspect him of drug dealing than being an art dealer.

I’ve barely slept and I’m starting to not trust my judgement. I know where that leads.

I need to get off this island.