Escape, p.1
Escape, page 1
ESCAPE
THE HUNTER CUT
L.A. DAVENPORT
“Ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.” James 4:14
CHAPTER ONE
I dropped my suitcase on my hotel bedroom floor with a thud. The door closed behind me with a soft click. The silence of the room after the constant din of a day’s worth of travel was oppressive. I stood awkwardly in the middle of the room, unsure what to do.
Maybe you could go for a swim.
I stared at my suitcase. Had I packed my trunks?
Maybe a shower would be better, to freshen up.
A wave of tiredness swept over me.
Or you could just go straight to bed.
I glanced around the room again. The ornate mirror, the richly upholstered furniture, the hand-painted French doors. All was in soft gold and ivory, with decadent hints of old colonialism. None of it was me.
What am I doing here?
It had all seemed so remote, like a dream. The intense heat as I stepped out the plane. The boy trying to catch my eye at the luggage carousel as he played. The bored driver leaning on the side of his battered taxi outside Arrivals. The perfect blue of the sky as we followed the coast road.
I snapped out of my reverie. I placed the Do Not Disturb sign outside the bedroom door and shut it firmly. I hung my jacket on the back of a chair and put my mobile phone, wallet and passport in a neat row on the mantelpiece. I picked up my suitcase and laid it carefully on the bed. I took out several shirts and pairs of trousers, putting them in an orderly pile. I picked up a neatly folded t-shirt, but froze when I spotted the photo frame beneath.
I dropped the t-shirt on the bed. A torrent of emotions crashed through me. I was nearly sick.
How long did I manage, not thinking about her?
I started counting. But in reality, at no time, not one single second was she not in my mind. I picked up the frame. The smiling, happy woman stared at me from beneath the glass. I could almost sense her in the air, hear her laugh, taste her skin. I put the photograph carefully on the mantelpiece, positioning it so she looked at my bed.
Eventually, I turned back to the bed and sighed. I spotted my wash bag, grabbed it and marched to the bathroom.
CHAPTER TWO
The marble sink, the plush bathtub, the vintage shower…I couldn’t process it all. I stared blankly for several seconds, then decided I wanted to be clean. I pulled myself out of my clothes while the water warmed up.
A cold shower would have cooled my skin down. But I wanted to burn away the sticky remnants of airports, taxis, trains, air-conditioned rooms. To burn away the last few weeks and every well-intentioned smile, every kind word, every moment of patient understanding. They meant well, of course. All the same, I wanted to shout into every one of their faces: please, just leave me alone.
I stared in the mirror. My eyes were bloodshot. My mouth was drawn. I looked desperate, haunted. I wanted to scream, to punch, to kick, to throw something, to break something, anything, everything. But I just stood there motionless. I hardly recognised my own face.
I could smash the mirror.
I stared back at the face I didn’t recognise. Then I turned away and watched the water crashing and bursting against the glass wall of the shower.
I could smash that too.
I imagined the water pouring onto the floor, mixing with the shattered glass. I imagined deliberately, almost carefully treading on the broken shards, my blood mixing with the water and flowing to the drain in the middle of the floor, down into the sewers and out to sea.
Why am I still alive? Why me?
I observed my hands open the shower door. My feet, thinner than I remembered, stepped inside. The steam billowed up around me. The hot water seared my skin. I welcomed the pain.
I stepped fully into the shower, wincing as I forced myself beneath the burning cascade.
I placed my palms on the wall and bowed my head. The heat scorched my neck and back. My tears fell into the raging water, lost forever in the churning torrent.
CHAPTER THREE
I let the towel fall as I reached the bed. I pulled back the duvet and slid into the soft, cool space underneath. Before I could drag it over me, I fell deeply asleep.
From nowhere, banging and rattling started outside the room. It was as if someone was struggling to open a set of doors. My eyes opened instantly. The bedroom, now shrouded in semi-darkness, was strange and unfamiliar. Outside in the hotel garden, the cicadas struck up their low drone. Slowly, my eyes adjusted to the light. I recalled the flight, the hotel, the room. I must have been asleep for hours.
The banging and rattling started again. Two men urgently and furtively whispered as they continued to struggle with a door outside my bedroom. Yet, from the strange presence of the sounds, they seemed almost to be in the room with me. I looked around in panic. They must have been just outside the door.
As abruptly as it had started, the banging and whispering stopped. The room slipped back into silence. I fell instantly asleep.
Then it started again, this time more urgently. I placed my hand on the duvet, ready to spring out of bed. Again, the noise stopped as soon as it had started. After a pause, more whispering. Then footsteps down the corridor. I checked the bedside clock. Without registering the time, I fell asleep again.
CHAPTER FOUR
Sometime later, I lay in the near-dark room with only the moonlight reflecting on the marble floor. I stared at the ceiling. I traced patterns in the ancient plaster and listened to the start-stop of the cicadas. I tried to catch an animated conversation drifting up from an unknown bar.
I was disorientated and lonely. Inexplicably, intense vertigo welled up, making me dizzy and nauseous. It seemed more like early morning and time to go to work than late in the evening.
What was that banging and whispering? What were they doing?
I had no idea. But what I did know was I was hungry. I pulled myself out of bed and walked unsteadily into the bathroom. I splashed cold water on my face, stared at my reflection as I patted myself dry. How desperate I had been earlier when I took my shower. It repulsed me.
Back in the bedroom, I dressed slowly and deliberately in an open-necked shirt and fine-spun trousers. I smoothed down the material and picked off the loose threads. I carefully folded back my shirt cuffs to just below the elbow and straightened them out. I checked myself in the large mirror over the mantelpiece.
I don’t know why, but I wanted to be perfect: not a hair nor thread out of place. I smoothed down my hair. It had become unruly in the hot, humid air. I inspected the greys coming through at my temple. I could have shaved the stubble that had grown since this morning. But I couldn’t be bothered. Anyway, I was dressed casually, so what did it matter?
I stared at the photograph on the mantelpiece, then turned away. I was overwhelmed by a deep sadness, like the swell of the cold, dark ocean.
CHAPTER FIVE
The hotel lobby was quiet. When I checked in that afternoon it had glowed in gold and bronze. Well-heeled guests had milled contentedly amid the clack-clack of expensive shoes and the soft ding of the lifts. Now, in the electric light of evening, the shiny decorations and highly polished marble seemed gaudy and overdone.
I wonder what all those people I saw earlier are doing now.
I remembered a couple, him late middle-aged, overweight and tanned a deep mahogany, her young, blonde, shiny and brittle. Were they, at that moment, having sex, or taking drugs, or both? I shook my head, surprised at my own assumptions.
That stuff happens only in movies.
I walked over to reception. The concierge straightened up and smoothed his jacket.
— I realise it’s a little late, but is there anywhere in the hotel I can get something to eat at this hour?
Before he could respond, a tall, alert, yet rather overweight man in his late sixties or early seventies appeared from nowhere.
— Good evening, Dr Hunter.
I turned, surprised to hear my own name.
— I’m Charles, the hotel manager. I’d like to welcome you to our little establishment.
— Thank you.
I tried to sound as noncommittal as I could. I didn’t want to encourage him. I wanted to be quiet and alone.
— I do like to welcome each of our guests individually. Are you suitably rested after your flight?
I examined his cheery face and sighed.
— Not as much as I’d like.
— I’m sorry to hear that.
Charles glanced over at the concierge and nodded. The man went back to his computer screen.
— I couldn’t help overhearing you asking my colleague here about the dinner options we have available at this time of night.
I nodded. This bustling, talkative man was clearly not going to leave me alone.
— We have three restaurants at the hotel, all of which… Charles checked his watch — are still serving.
— Okay.
— If I may, I recommend you try the restaurant at the far end of the garden.
Charles pointed through a set of French doors to the darkness beyond.
— It’s a little way from here by foot, but it’s by the cliffs. On a beautiful night like this, nothing compares.
I stared at him, unsure how to end the conversation. Then I looked down at my shoes.
— I am walking over that way. If you would like to accompany me…
— Sure, I said, partially resigned to my fate but still inwardly protesting.
Charles turned to the concierge.
— Could you call Stefano and tell him number 22 is ready?
— Right away.
Charles turned on his heel and walked briskly towards the French doors. I tarried at the reception. I really didn’t want to go with him. I wanted to pretend I had a headache and go to bed. But when he reached the garden, he turned and beckoned me to follow him.
— If you’d like to come with me, Dr Hunter.
So I followed him, a few paces behind, like a young child dragged away from his toys to something he is sure holds no interest.
CHAPTER SIX
Out in the garden, we walked along beautifully laid-out paths lined with explosions of flowers, decorative plants and fragrant trees. The occasional bench or fountain was tucked discreetly away in recesses ripe for intimate conversation. All the while, Charles chatted happily about the history of the hotel. I paid him hardly any attention.
— This wonderful old place has been many things over the centuries, you know.
We rounded a large rose bush, heavy with succulent flowers.
— Oh, really?
I tried to sound as half-hearted as possible.
— Yes, indeed. It started out as a monastery in the late Middle Ages, then became an institute of art and learning, famous throughout the Eastern Mediterranean.
— I see.
I ran my fingers through the leaves of a rhododendron in full bloom. Charles stopped and turned. I pulled up in surprise. He stood very close to me and inspected my face.
— Then, I’m afraid to say, all that respectable scholarly learning went out the window.
— Oh, yes?
He continued walking down the flower-lined path.
— Yes, he said over his shoulder. — The place fell into, one could say, less reputable hands and became a brothel, among other things.
Charles turned briefly and smiled.
— I think it’s safe to say the only lessons being learned here at that time were from the School of Life.
— Indeed.
My attention was drawn by the heady waft of perfume from a nearby magnolia. We rounded another corner. A bar and tennis court appeared, brightly lit by floodlights. It contrasted sharply with the falling gloom. A few hotel guests sat on high stools by the bar or at tables scattered under nearby trees. As we passed, Charles smiled at a family seated at one of the tables. The father waved back weakly.
— After that particularly insalubrious period in our history, the property was taken over by the family that currently owns the hotel.
— When was that?
— Almost two hundred and fifty years ago. They initially used it as a home for themselves and their assorted relatives, but they soon started opening it up to travellers of the better sort, one might say. It was even a rather far-flung staging post on the Grand Tour, when that sort of thing was in vogue. Although the constant meddling of outside powers stopped the region really taking off as a destination.
We passed a large azure swimming pool, glittering under hidden floodlights. Then we came out next to the cliffs, alongside a low stone balustrade. We headed to an open-air restaurant at the end of the path.
— This place seems to have gone through a lot of changes over the centuries, I observed.
— Yes, but each one has never entirely erased the traces of the past.
Charles stopped and faced me. He looked me straight in the eye.
— Everywhere, you will find clues to what has gone on before. Everywhere. Nothing that happens here is ever entirely forgotten or cannot be retraced.
Charles paused.
— One simply has to look hard enough.
I frowned and regarded Charles properly for the first time. I noticed the delicate green of his eyes, and the tired, watery bags beneath.
— It sounds like a fascinating place to be.
— That depends entirely on why you are here.
Charles broke into an enigmatic smile. He turned and continued busily along the path to the restaurant. I regarded his back for a moment, then followed.
CHAPTER SEVEN
— And ‘here’ we are, Dr Hunter, Charles said as we arrived. — One of the finest sushi restaurants outside of Japan.
He paused to let the words sink in.
— And it’s a pretty good Italian restaurant too.
I followed him as he weaved between the tables. We headed towards a bar at the far end. As we approached, Charles pointed to an empty table.
— If you would like to take a seat, Dr Hunter, I’ll fetch you a menu.
I sat down at the tastefully set table. A smattering of well-heeled diners were dotted around the chic and understated restaurant. The low hum of indecipherable conversations blended with European chill-out music emanating from unseen speakers.
To one side of the bar was a lounge area with low sofas and even lower coffee tables. Two women, tanned, well-preserved, always noticing if they were being watched, chatted on one of the sofas. They didn’t seem particularly interested in each other, although they laughed loudly and exaggeratedly each time the other said something intended to be funny.
At the next table to me, a thick-set man in an expensive polo shirt talked animatedly in Russian to another less notable man. His companion listened carefully. He nodded from time to time, but said nothing. They were finishing off plates of finely made sushi and throwing back glasses of sake as if they were shots of vodka.
What was I doing? Not just at the restaurant, but at the hotel. It wasn’t my kind of place at all. I didn’t rub shoulders with those kinds of people. I didn’t know anything about them or their lives. Surely they could see that too. I really wished I hadn’t been talked into going there.
Charles reappeared. He handed me an expensively produced folder containing the menu.
— Thank you.
— The specials are on a piece of paper tucked inside, should you be interested.
After a brief pause, he added: — Would you mind if I joined you for a drink?
— Fine.
I tried to sound noncommittal. Charles sat down opposite me. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed him lace his fingers and smile at me. My gaze remained determinedly fixed on the menu.
— Thank you, Dr Hunter. I must say, it’s always a pleasure to have the opportunity of talking to someone like me.
— Oh?
Looking up from my menu, I examined his face again. I failed to see any resemblance or connection between the two of us.
— What I mean is: we don’t get too many English guests here, and I’m one of the only non-locals on the staff.
Charles glanced around the restaurant. I went back to the menu.
— You know, it’s not so much England itself that I miss. My family send me mustard and tea, of course, and the occasional jar of Branston Pickle when I get desperate. It’s more the conversation.
— Really, I asked without looking up. — I haven’t had the opportunity to experience a lack of it so far.
— No, of course.
Charles turned to a passing waiter.
— Two glasses of champagne, please.
The waiter nodded. He noted the table number as he walked on. Charles smiled apologetically.
— A small celebration. Will you join me? It’s on the house.
I put down the menu and folded my arms.
— What are we celebrating?
— Life, Dr Hunter. It’s all we have. Don’t you think?
— Please, call me John.
— Thank you, John. I appreciate that.
He smiled again.
— I realise, of course, we should be drinking Prosecco, seeing as it’s technically a little more local to the region than champagne. And some Proseccos are really rather excellent nowadays. But there are times when only champagne will do, don’t you find?
— I suppose so.
I unfolded my arms and placed them on the table. I was aware I was being inspected by this interloper at my evening meal. It made me self-conscious. I wanted to be alone, to eat a simple meal and to acclimatise myself to this unknown and utterly foreign place.
