They set off down the drive. Kite hadn’t warmed up properly and his knee immediately started to ache. At the gates he paused and told Luc that he needed to stretch.
Near the bottom of the wall, as clear as day, was a four-inch line drawn in white chalk, the signal from Peele to make contact.
They were back at the house within half an hour. There had been no sinister reason why Luc had decided to go for a jog, no hidden agenda in his desire to accompany Kite. Or so it seemed. Though Kite tried to talk to him, Xavier’s father remained monosyllabic throughout, very obviously testing his fitness against a young man almost thirty years his junior. Back at the house, Kite leaning on his knees and gasping for breath, Luc made a point of drawing himself up to his full height, puffing out his chest and saying: ‘I thought you did this every day?’ Kite played the gracious, admiring underling, flattering Luc’s vanity by telling him that he had the heart and lungs of a professional athlete. That seemed to satisfy him. He went back into the house preening like a matador taking the applause of the crowd after a kill. Kite stumbled back to his room, tired and paranoid, and decided that there was only one way left open to him to contact Peele.
After taking a shower and eating breakfast, he asked Rosamund if he could phone his mother to find out about his A-level results. She thought that was a marvellous idea and told Kite to send Cheryl her love. Dialling the number felt like an act of surrender. He pictured Carl at the safe house, beckoning Peele towards him as he listened on the line, drawing a hand across his throat to indicate that Kite had hit the wall.
The number his mother had given him rang out until it was picked up by an answering machine. Kite did what he had been trained to do.
‘Mum, hi, it’s me, calling from France. Just wondering if you’ve heard anything about my results? Also, have there been any letters from the University of Edinburgh? I’m waiting for them to write to me. Give me a call. Hope everything’s OK with you. Lots of love.’
He would have liked to have spoken to her, to hear his mother’s voice. She probably wouldn’t have wanted to know much about France or Martha, but by speaking to her, Kite might at least have been able to forge some kind of connection with his old self, however briefly. He hung up and realised that he had said nothing about the holiday, hadn’t given the number of the villa or any indication when he would be back home. Eskandarian, Rosamund and Luc had all been in the kitchen as he made the call, well within earshot of the sitting room. Kite wondered if he should call back and leave the number but didn’t want to sound amateur to the eavesdropping Falcons. Xavier came into the sitting room looking surprisingly well-rested and beckoned him onto the terrace.
‘What happened last night?’ he whispered, closing the door behind him.
‘You passed out,’ Kite replied.
‘Did Mum see?’
‘I don’t think so. It was very late. They were asleep.’
‘Did you take off my clothes?’
‘Yeah, but nothing happened. You weren’t in the mood.’
Xavier made a face. ‘Very funny.’ He grabbed Kite on the shoulder and squeezed the muscle. ‘Thanks, mate. What happened to the bottle?’
‘Stuffed it in the cupboard in my room with the rug. What do I do with them?’
Xavier looked perplexed. ‘Maybe give them to Hélène?’ It was the kind of thing a boy who had grown up with servants assumed was the easiest thing to do. ‘Sorry to fuck up,’ he said. ‘Lost it a bit last night.’
‘It’s OK. I’m sorry you’re drinking so much.’
Xavier stepped back, as if Kite had swung a punch and missed.
‘I’m on holiday.’
‘We’re all on holiday, Xav.’
It wasn’t in the nature of their friendship for Kite to admonish him. Xavier looked puzzled.
‘What does that mean?’
Kite held up his hands as an indication that he wasn’t going to press the point. He wanted Xavier to know that he was worried, but didn’t want to come across as a prig.
‘It’s just that you seem upset about something. About your dad.’
‘Forget that.’ Xavier opened the door into the sitting room, escaping the conversation. ‘I’m going into Mougins on the Vespa. Want anything?’
Kite thought about going pillion in the hope of running into Peele, or perhaps a random Falcon carrying a rolled-up copy of the FT, but not enough time had passed since he had flown the signal. Besides, Xavier didn’t seem in the mood for company.
He went back to his room and lay down on the bed. He closed his eyes and quickly fell asleep, waking two hours later to the sound of the Vespa coming back and the noise of a car on the drive. Moments later Xavier was shouting up the stairs.
‘Lockie!’
Kite rolled out of bed and opened the door.
‘What?’
‘Come down. Look who I ran into.’
Standing in the hall, a bottle of wine in one hand and a box of chocolates in the other, beaming from ear to ear beneath a crumpled Panama hat, was Billy Peele.
‘Lachlan Kite, as I live and breathe,’ he said. ‘Fancy seeing you here.’
50
Peele had come prepared. He knew their A-level results – two As and a B for Xavier, the same for Kite – and gave a faultless account of running into Xavier ‘quite by chance’ in the back alleys of Mougins.
‘I’m here with my girlfriend,’ he explained to an enraptured Rosamund, who seemed delighted that a cultivated, charming, intelligent Englishman was visiting the villa. Jacqui and Martha were beside her in the sitting room, Luc and Xavier looking on. ‘She’s not been well, unfortunately. Ate some shellfish in Antibes and the blighters exacted a terrible revenge. I’d warned her – no oysters when there isn’t an “r” in the month – but she wouldn’t listen. So
