shaded tables close to the bar. Shirley’s smile showed nothing but certainty that he was still the supremely Nice Man that her daughter had married. Once, years ago when he’d helped her choose the right savings account and explained some complicated banking pros and cons, she’d confided that he was just what she’d always wanted for Theresa, as if he was something she’d started trawling every shop in the land for since the moment Theresa was born: a safe, reliable, secure item that had been at the top of the christening wish-list. ‘There’s no silliness about you,’ she’d said, but hadn’t elaborated, leaving him to work out for himself what ‘silliness’ was. He’d decided it must be to do with deviousness, with what you see being what you get, a concept which Shirley’s sensible Northern origins very much approved of. Now, as he took his place at the sun-bleached wooden table next to Theresa, he was pretty sure Shirley had also been approving his lack of adventurous spirit, a lack of imagination which would keep him faithful to Theresa and give none of them any trouble. He felt almost more guilty towards his trusting mother-in-law than towards his wife.
‘Right, everybody here? Ready to order?’ Simon was ready with a pen and notebook, bustling like a waiter.
‘What all of us, all at once?’ Lucy looked across to the circular bar area where one lone barman was concocting fruit punches, taking food orders and directing waiters all at the same time. He seemed to be the only person moving fast.
‘Of course all of us. The hotel accommodates over two hundred people, they should be able to cope with a lunch order for fourteen,’ Simon told her.
‘Now Simon,’ Shirley warned, ‘we don’t want unpleasantness.’
‘Sorry Ma. OK, now food …’ Simon wrote down the order, meticulously checking and rechecking what everyone wanted until Becky started banging her foot backwards and forwards against the chair leg with impatience. He then handed the list over to the waiter who smiled with gleaming politeness before rewriting the whole thing on his own pad using his own code. Theresa smirked and Simon scowled and Luke’s abrupt giggle got him a glare from Perry. Shirley seemed oblivious, looking around her, absorbing the views from all directions. Lucy watched her, saw her gaze taking in the pink and white cake-like buildings, the banana trees with voluptuous purple flowers and bulging clumps of fruit, the massive hibiscus plants that made the puny specimens from British garden centres look like tragic underfed bits of twig.
It was the hotel’s clientele that looked vaguely out of place amongst all the leafy lushness. Most of the guests were British or German, pale and lazy and slightly self-conscious in lurid swimwear. They moved around slowly as if the heat was a burden, glistening with protective lotions and potions and being sure to remind their children constantly to keep their hats on. The Phonetech men, whom Lucy collectively christened the Steves, all kept their chunky steel watches on and wore reflective aviator sunglasses, behind which, she suspected , they were eyeing anything in a bikini. She watched a portly man who must have been in his late sixties, buttoning himself into a shirt that he would probably never wear again once the holiday was over, a pattern of turquoise and lemon zigzags that must have come straight from the cruisewear department of a large city store. She imagined him shopping reluctantly with his wife, being dragged round a vast out-of-town mall where his head would grow light in the dried-out air conditioning and his lost sense of direction would make him panic that he would never find the car park again.
‘We aren’t very good at hot weather, are we?’ Lucy commented to Plum as she watched the man making himself respectable enough to join the tables for food. ‘The sun-starved Brits have to have a special separate wardrobe for being hot, and it sits on most of
‘Right, everybody here? Ready to order?’ Simon was ready with a pen and notebook, bustling like a waiter.
‘What all of us, all at once?’ Lucy looked across to the circular bar area where one lone barman was concocting fruit punches, taking food orders and directing waiters all at the same time. He seemed to be the only person moving fast.
‘Of course all of us. The hotel accommodates over two hundred people, they should be able to cope with a lunch order for fourteen,’ Simon told her.
‘Now Simon,’ Shirley warned, ‘we don’t want unpleasantness.’
‘Sorry Ma. OK, now food …’ Simon wrote down the order, meticulously checking and rechecking what everyone wanted until Becky started banging her foot backwards and forwards against the chair leg with impatience. He then handed the list over to the waiter who smiled with gleaming politeness before rewriting the whole thing on his own pad using his own code. Theresa smirked and Simon scowled and Luke’s abrupt giggle got him a glare from Perry. Shirley seemed oblivious, looking around her, absorbing the views from all directions. Lucy watched her, saw her gaze taking in the pink and white cake-like buildings, the banana trees with voluptuous purple flowers and bulging clumps of fruit, the massive hibiscus plants that made the puny specimens from British garden centres look like tragic underfed bits of twig.
It was the hotel’s clientele that looked vaguely out of place amongst all the leafy lushness. Most of the guests were British or German, pale and lazy and slightly self-conscious in lurid swimwear. They moved around slowly as if the heat was a burden, glistening with protective lotions and potions and being sure to remind their children constantly to keep their hats on. The Phonetech men, whom Lucy collectively christened the Steves, all kept their chunky steel watches on and wore reflective aviator sunglasses, behind which, she suspected , they were eyeing anything in a bikini. She watched a portly man who must have been in his late sixties, buttoning himself into a shirt that he would probably never wear again once the holiday was over, a pattern of turquoise and lemon zigzags that must have come straight from the cruisewear department of a large city store. She imagined him shopping reluctantly with his wife, being dragged round a vast out-of-town mall where his head would grow light in the dried-out air conditioning and his lost sense of direction would make him panic that he would never find the car park again.
‘We aren’t very good at hot weather, are we?’ Lucy commented to Plum as she watched the man making himself respectable enough to join the tables for food. ‘The sun-starved Brits have to have a special separate wardrobe for being hot, and it sits on most of
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