“No, no, you sit down. Someone else will do it.”
A member of the catering staff hurried out of the kitchen, and Fintan told him where to find the various types of cheese, and to take the butter out of the fridge—but the stuff in the cow dish, not the paper, he explained, as if he didn’t believe the waiter would know the difference between real and bought butter. The man practically scurried out of there as if his job depended on it, which it did. The ma?tre d’ explained that the chef wouldn’t come out to speak to them: he was too scared. Colton sighed, ordered gigantic whiskies all round, and they headed back into the bar to wait.
Joel hung back and walked with Flora. She couldn’t help her heart leaping. She could smell a tinge of something expensive—lime cologne—and even though he had obviously shaved that day, a distinct hint of stubble was already noticeable along his tight jawline. Her senses felt so finely attuned to him, to every tingly iota, to the very aura that surrounded his body, that she forgot about everything else: the restaurant, the island, the job, the fact that he was her boss. How could he not notice how she felt? Or was he so used to it from every woman? Or perhaps he simply didn’t care.
“Unusual strategy,” he observed as they moved through.
“I know,” said Flora. “Sorry, do you want me to take him home?”
He turned to her.
“Is he gay?”
“No,” said Flora.
She paused.
“I’ve been away for a while.”
Joel blinked.
“You don’t know if your own brother is gay?”
“It’s not the kind of thing I’d . . . Do you have siblings?”
Joel had drunk too much of the good wine, and eaten too little of the bad food; he didn’t mean to blurt out what he said next, and he cursed himself as soon as he did.
“I don’t know,” he said.
Flora stopped abruptly. Joel froze.
“What do you mean, you don’t know?” she said.
“I mean, no,” said Joel. “I mean, even if I did, it wouldn’t matter.”
“I didn’t say it mattered,” said Flora. “I said that I . . . I’m not a hundred percent sure.”
Joel nodded and walked on ahead of her, moving toward the large picture window as she stared, confused, at his back and toward the landscape beyond.
Outside there was a gentle fog rising, rendering everything softer and more mysterious. The water was still absolutely perfectly flat as a pond; it looked less like the sea and more like a gentle pool of smoke. The long, flat, familiar outline of Mure rose up behind them in pastel shades of green and brown, the little lights of the harbor just visible around to the right.
Joel glanced at his watch.
“This place is nuts,” he said. “It’s ten P.M. and it looks like eleven o’clock in the morning. I can’t sleep at all. When does it get dark?”
“It doesn’t,” shrugged Flora.
“What are you guys, like, Finland?”
“Oh no,” she said. “We’re far farther north than that.”
He turned round to look at her, bathed in the strange white light from the window. Once again, he noticed, her eyes were the color of the sea, even though the sea he was looking at now was gray from the mist, not green as it had been the other day. It was as if her eyes changed with the water. It was so strange.
Flora was feeling strange, but not for that reason. She was watching Colton, who’d headed out the front door and lit a large cigar out on the wooden deck, and was now offering one to Fintan. Fintan paused for a couple of seconds—Flora was reasonably sure he’d never had a cigar in his life, but what did she know?—then accepted, and they moved to sit on one of the expensively hand-hewn wooden benches, with the expensive cashmere blankets strewn over them. Little candles in jam jars fluttered everywhere, even though their lights weren’t needed; and the air was heavily scented with something that smelled amazing but was in fact designed to keep the gnats away.
“It’s like Avalon,” Joel was saying, turning back toward the sea view. “Like a mirage, like the entire thing will fade away at any minute.”
“I think you’re confusing us with the cell phone signal,” said Flora, and was rewarded with a hint of an extremely rare smile. But he didn’t take his eyes off the floating horizon.
Chapter Twenty-six
Bertie dashed back with the boat as fast as he could; the waiter was utterly terrified that he’d upset Mr. Rogers. To Innes and Eck’s bemusement, the young man had crashed into the dairy and basically grabbed everything he could find. Glancing around, Innes had added Flora’s leftover fruitcake and oatcakes to his haul, along with various jars from the larder.
When they saw him rushing back up the lit path, Joel and Flora left the house and joined Colton and Fintan on the terrace. It was chillier now, but braziers had been lit, so it felt cozy instead. The music had been turned off, and there was nothing to be heard except the low cooings of birds, who seemed to know it was night time even if nobody else did, and a barking noise from the water.
“Are there dogs here?” said Joel, glancing around. The others laughed.
“Seals bark too,” said Flora.
“You’re telling me I’m listening to a pack of barking seals?” said Joel. “Seriously, man, this place is completely made up.”
They all watched as, marching like a slightly tipsy toddler, a grouse proceeded slowly along the red carpet behind the waiter. Then, suddenly, they all burst out laughing.
“Completely fucking made up.”
“There you go,” said Colton. He raised his glass to Joel. “Everyone falls under its spell sooner or later. The entire damn place is woven out of clouds.”
“Whatever you say,” said Joel.
The waiter, looking terrified and slightly breathless, handed over a huge basket.
“Here you are, sir!”
Plates, knives, and more whisky arrived without anyone appearing to do anything. Colton drew out the oatcakes together with two rounds of dark yellow butter—one studded with crystals of salt that caught the light, the other plainer and darker—and three cheeses: the hard, the soft, and the mix.
Flora took a breath; there too was some of her mother’s chutney, and her chili jam. She couldn’t work out how it had gotten in there. Quick-thinking Innes, it had to have been. Fintan was desperately searching for somewhere to put out his cigar. He looked nervous and proud.
Colton frowned.
“Seriously, if your plan here is to poison me with bacteria . . . I mean, this stuff is full of bacteria . . .”
“All cheese is bacteria,” said Fintan. “Your body currently has about a hundred and thirty billion different strands of bacteria in it.”
“Yes, that’s why I drink probiotics.”
“Really? I thought it’s because they taste like strawberry milk shakes.”
“That too.”