He paused for a moment.
‘But that was not what I saw, on this. That was not what I saw at all.’ He produced the memory stick from his pocket.
A wave broke, surged up over the pebbles, fell back. It was really getting dark now. All around the island people would be getting into the capes and masks that had been delivered to their cabins, wondering if there was any significance to the comedy or tragedy mask they had been given. Nikki would have been glad to have something to hide behind.
‘I’ve been wondering why Ned was so sure I’d pay up. I mean he knows I’ll have the money, knows I’ll have even more when Dad dies and it won’t be too long before that happens. It can’t hurt my mum now either, because she’s gone. But he’s asking for a lot and he must realize that after seeing this, I won’t think my father deserves his legacy. Ned thinks I’ll pay to protect my brothers and sisters, doesn’t he? That if I say no now, I’m making a decision on my own that will hurt all of us. But you know what – this isn’t my fault, and it isn’t my secret to keep. Give this back to Ned, and tell him no. Tell him I’m going to leave this island right now.’
Kurt handed her the memory stick, turned on his heel and disappeared off into the darkness. She took it, closed her fingers around it tightly.
Back in her cabin, Nikki flipped open her laptop and plugged the memory stick into the side of it. The footage began to autoplay immediately. Twenty-seven minutes of it, all shot in such a way, at such an angle, that the suites could never be identified as Home, footage jerkier and grainier than she had imagined but still unmistakably Ron. Frozen in time, exactly how she remembered him, hair still dark, creases around his eyes still smile lines, not yet deep wrinkles, the girls next to him on the sofa, on the bed, remarkably similar to how she now imagined herself acting in that suite twenty-five years ago. Although none of them were her. Ned had spared Kurt that as well as the graphic detail – with the obvious threat that the unedited version was on file somewhere. An extended trailer for what would be leaked if Kurt failed to pay up.
‘God, I never do this, but you’re so pretty, you know that? And so smart, my God. So sophisticated . . .’ That self-assured drawl. Those familiar words. ‘Come here, baby.’
Nikki ran to the bathroom to be sick.
Jess
All the way from cabin forty-two Jess had followed Georgia’s golf buggy in her own, keeping always just a turn or so behind, swearing under her breath when another buggy cut in, furious when that buggy stopped at a junction to let another by. And thrilled when their little convoy made it to the circular drive in front of The Manor – where all the guests had been instructed to gather for the start of that evening’s performance – to spot Georgia （and it was unmistakably Georgia, that long pale neck, those clavicles, that glossy dark hair）， with her mask on but her hood back, being assisted onto the gravel by her driver.
Just a few feet away – just a few people away – from Georgia she had hovered, next to the fountain in the middle of the drive’s turning circle, while they all waited expectantly for something to happen. Jess wrapped her own cloak more tightly around her chest – it was so long she was terrified she might trip and rip the whole thing off, instantly giving the game away – pulling the hood down over her hairline so it almost met the top of her mask.
And then the performance had finally begun, with a sudden screech of violin, an announcement, the appearance of a troupe of costumed footmen and ladies-in-waiting in the doorway of The Manor, who then proceeded down the steps and off in various directions, instructing groups of people to follow them as they passed, and Jess had needed to be quick off the mark to keep her in view as Georgia and the three or four people standing with her were steered off – ‘This way!’ – through a brick arch into the old herb garden. All through the garden, up the path through the woods （the trees uplit a ghostly white） Jess had kept her eyes fixed on the back of Georgia’s hood, picking up the pace when it looked as though Georgia was pulling ahead of her, hanging back when Georgia paused or slowed.