“At least I didn’t want him to die.”
“Didn’t you? Why’re you here? What happened to the farm?”
“I quit the farm. All right?” Her face had gone red. Her grip on the tray she’d brought with her from the kitchen had become so tight that her knuckles were white as she went on. “Are you happy now, Kerra? Have you learned what you wanted to know? I sorted out the truth. And do you want to know how I did that, Kerra? He claimed that he’d always be honest with me, of course, but when it came to this…Oh get out of here. Get out.” She raised the tray as if to throw it.
“Hey, Mad…” Shar spoke uneasily. Doubtless, Kerra thought, the other girl had never seen the rage of which Madlyn Angarrack was fully capable. Doubtless Shar had never opened a postal package and discovered within it pictures of herself with her head cut off, pictures of herself with her eyeballs stabbed by the lead of a pencil, handwritten notes and two birthday cards once saved but now smeared with faeces, a newspaper article about the head of instructors at Adventures Unlimited with bollocks and shit written in red pencil across it. No return address, but none had been needed. Nor had been any other sort of message, when the intentions of the sender were so clearly illustrated by the contents of the envelope in which they’d come.
This quality in her former friend comprised another reason that Kerra had wanted to talk to Madlyn Angarrack. Kerra might have hated her brother, but she also loved him. It wasn’t a matter of blood being thicker. But it was still and always a matter of blood.
Chapter Eight
“I KNOW THIS ISN’T A GOOD TIME TO TALK ABOUT IT,” ALAN Cheston said. “There’s not going to be a good time to talk about anything for a long while to come, and I think we both know that. The thing is, though…These guys have a diary to fill and if we’re going to commit, we need to let them know or we’re going to lose out.”
Ben Kerne nodded numbly. He couldn’t imagine conversing rationally about any subject, let alone about business. All he could imagine was a further walking of the corridors inside the Promontory King George Hotel, one shoulder against the wall and his head aimed down to study the floor. Down one corridor and up another, through a fire door and up the stairs to begin another corridor. On and on, spectral-like, into infinity. Occasionally thinking about how much they had spent on the old hotel’s transformation and wondering what the purpose might be in spending any more. Wondering what the purpose might be in anything at this point, and then trying to stop thinking altogether.
He’d done all that on the previous night. Dellen had pills but he would not take them.
Ben looked at Alan. He saw him through a fog, as if a veil existed between his eyeballs and his brain. He could take in the younger man, but he had no ability to process what he was taking in. So he said, “Go on. I understand,” although he didn’t want the first and didn’t mean the second.