by Helen Burton
"I studied psychology at Uni. It just takes a bit of listening."
Paul stood up. "Well it's all very interesting but we've still got a grisly job ahead of us. Let's round up Clearview, who's probably heard by now and see if we can somehow manage to get Mr Strong back up the cliff.
"I've got an emergency stretcher which should make it easier."
Paul peered out into the weather. "Hauling a dead man up a cliff in the middle of a cyclone? I don't think anything is going to make this easy."
12
Later, standing at the top of the cliff, Lou wondered about whether what they were doing made any sense at all. She was nearly getting blown away and Paul, Nathan and Ed were obviously struggling down the bottom. The waves were bigger than she had ever seen them and they were crashing around the men's feet as they clambered along the edge of the rock face. She wondered what was going through each of their minds as they risked their own lives for a man that none of them had any respect for.
She had been surprised by Clearview's reaction when they had told him the news just half an hour before. She and Paul entered the lounge just after Yasmin, who had obviously told all the Medivalue staff. Kylie, Ed and Nathan were clustered around her, trying to make sense of what she was saying between sobs.
"Is this true?" Nathan saw them enter and came charging over towards them. "Is Arnold dead?"
Lou nodded. "We were just coming to tell you. I've spoken to the police on the mainland but with the cyclone coming they can't reach us by boat and the road's out and even so they have enough to do in town at present." Lou looked at each of their faces, trying to gauge whether any of them would be capable of murder. They all looked shocked and upset but their concern seemed out-of-place considering what they all thought of Arnold.
"But how could this have happened? I mean, what was he doing out there at the cliff?" Nathan looked wildly from Paul to Lou. "What's going on?"
"I wish I knew Mr Clearview but…," Lou started.
"You mean one of your guests has died and you don't have a clue about how it happened or what's going on?" Nathan's face was white and Lou could see a vein throbbing at the side of his forehead.
Kylie, comforting a sobbing Yasmin, stepped in. "I hardly think that's going to help things now, Nathan." She placed a hand on his shoulder and he nodded and bowed his head, taking a few deep breaths.
"Sorry." He looked at Lou. "It's just a shock that's all."
"Forget it. I'm very sorry for your loss." Lou looked at all of them in turn.
Kylie recovered first and broke the silence. "So what do we do?"
"When I explained to the police about the body's location and that I thought it might get washed away they suggested that we retrieve it."
"So we've come looking for volunteers," Paul said.
"Retrieve it?" said Yasmin, standing up. "You're going to climb down and carry up… Arnold's body?"
"Yes unless anyone's got any better ideas?" Lou looked at each of her guests. "No? Well let's get going then before the cyclone gets so bad we can't do anything."
"Yes, yes of course," Nathan pinched his lips with his fingers. "I'll come."
"I will too of course," said Ed stepping forward. "I might not be as fit as I once was but I learnt how to handle myself in the army."
"What can we do?" Kylie looked calm and prepared for anything.
"You and I will wait at the top of the cliff just in case we are needed," said Lou. "Yasmin, perhaps you might like to help Clara in the kitchen make us some sandwiches and strong coffee?" Lou added, more to give Yasmin something to do than for any assistance she could probably offer. Clara would kill her for inflicting the weeping Yasmin on her, but she'd deal with that later.
"Okay guys lets get cracking," Paul rubbed his hands together and headed out the door.
Now Lou wondered whether they'd been too gung-ho and sure of themselves in the circumstances. The wind was making every flying branch a potential lethal weapon and she and Kylie were in danger of getting swept off the top of the cliff. But the men had reached the body, just as the waves started to crash over the top of it. Paul and Nathan were carrying the stretcher between them and placed it near the body, while Ed held a blanket ready.
Lou noticed that they had stopped and Nathan and Paul seemed to be arguing about something. She could hardly see. The raindrops felt like bullets.
"What's going on do you think?" Kylie had appeared at her side and leaned over the edge. Lou pulled her back and yelled, "Don't get too close."
"I can take care of myself." Kylie adjusted her cap and jacket.
"Yes well that's what your boss thought too."
"I don't think he would have gone over the edge without some encouragement." Kylie's words were hard to make out.
"What did you say?" Lou shouted into the wind.
"Look there's something going on down there," Kylie ignored her question and pointed to the bottom.
Paul had turned the body over and it flopped like a rag doll against the rocks. The three men stood and looked down at the body and then Paul looked up at Lou shaking his head slowly. Nathan seemed to be shouting at Paul and Ed and gesturing towards the ocean as it crashed against their legs. But Ed placed a hand on his shoulder and he seemed to calm down. He nodded at Paul and, with what seemed like little effort, they placed the body on the stretcher, covered it with a blanket, strapped it in and turned slowly to retrace their steps.
Lou hoped they would hurry as the path was quickly disappearing under the rising water. She saw Paul shout something at Ed who moved ahead of them, parleying out the ropes that were attached to the sides of the stretcher. Ed made his way up the cliff path. He had reached the handrail at the bottom of the stone steps and started to make some ground.
"He's stronger than he looks," thought Lou as she and Kylie moved to the top of the steps. Ed was panting hard by the time he reached them but he efficiently handed them the ropes which they tied to the top of the rail. There was no point in speaking with the howl of the wind and so with hand gestures they positioned themselves on the ropes and started to haul.
Paul and Nathan had reached the base of the steps and, as the ropes tightened, they started to ascend. It seemed like hours before they reached the top but in reality within forty-five minutes they had all reached the doors of the lodge. Paul and Nathan continued to carry the stretcher down the main corridor to the kitchen and then out the rear door to the lean-to cold-room. Lou unlocked the padlock and, exhausted and grateful, they placed their burden on the clean tiled floor.
They each stood for a moment in silence staring at the bundle wrapped in an old grey blanket before Yasmin burst through the door and threw herself at the body. Nathan reached down and roughly hauled her to her feet.
"You can stop pretending to be upset Yasmin," Nathan snarled. "He doesn't deserve your tears. Or anyone else's for that matter."
"Nathan there's no need for that," Kylie held the sobbing Yasmin. "There's no need to be so cruel."
"Oh I'm not the cruel one here. I'm just one of the poor suckers who just risked his life walking up and down a cliff face in a freaking cyclone. Arnold's still the biggest bastard here."
Kylie looked at Nathan and then turned to Paul. "What's going on?"
Paul knelt at the side of the stretcher. "It seems that your boss has a sense of humour." All eyes focused on the blanket. Paul untied the rope and pulled the blanket aside.
"No!" Yasmin gasped as Kylie staggered against her weight. Lou's hands went to her mouth and she looked at Paul, who shrugged and shook his head. "I don't know what the hell your boss thinks he's up to, but I'd like to have a word with him."
"Get in line," Nathan snarled. "I can't believe you insisted on bringing it back up here. I wanted to throw it into the ocean and be done with it."
Lou knelt next to Paul and gingerly pulled aside the cap which was covering the head. The hair came off and revealed the full extent of the hoax. An eerie wax face stared back at her. "He brought a dumm
y with him?"
"Well the head anyway. The rest is a kind of cloth bag in the shape of a body, filled with sand so that it would fall I guess. And he dressed it in his clothes." Paul replaced the blanket and stood up.
"A pretty elaborate joke don't you think?" Lou asked, looking at the Medivalue staff standing around.
"Well I'm glad he's not here," said Kylie, "Because if he was I'd want to kill him."
Yasmin pulled free of Kylie's arms. "But… if this isn't Arnold, then where is he?" She looked frantically from one to another. "We have to find him. We have to see if he's all right."
Lou found it hard to meet Yasmin's eyes.
Ed was the only one who took pity on her. "I'm sure he's fine dear. If he was fit enough to haul that thing off a cliff last night then I'm sure he's around here somewhere, just waiting to jump out at us and shout 'Surprise.'"
"I hope he does," said Nathan. "Just give me five minutes with him and I'll…"
"You'll what?" challenged Kylie. "Give him a good talking-to?" She rolled her eyes. "Don't make threats you don't have the guts to follow through on. Arnold's playing another one of his macho boot camp games and he expects us to all fall to pieces. Well I for one, am not going to crumble." She turned to the door. "I'm going to have a hot shower and a change of clothes and then have something to eat." She looked at Lou. "I think I heard you say something about coffee and sandwiches?"
Lou quickly got to her feet. "Yes sorry, I'll arrange to have it served in the lounge now. Please excuse me, I'll have to call the police and tell them there's been a mistake." She followed Kylie out of the door. Ed ushered Yasmin out, still babbling about finding Arnold. Paul shook his head and nodded at Nathan. "After you mate."
Paul took one last look behind him as he locked and bolted the door behind them.
13
A short time later, the group reassembled in the lounge. The rescuers had all showered and changed into dry clothes and gratefully accepted the hot drinks and sandwiches. Lou had radioed the mainland and told the police the results of the morning's expedition. They seemed annoyed but busy and had kept the conversation short, promising only to "keep in touch". Lou was relieved that they had the distraction of the cyclone and hadn't asked too many questions. She checked the cyclone reports and learned that Bertha had once again changed course and was heading directly south — straight for the tiny peninsula where they sat, jutting out into the bay.
As she left the office and headed towards the lounge she heard what sounded like an argument coming from the training room. Looking around at the empty corridor she walked quietly over to the door and leaned against it. It sounded like Kylie and Nathan but she couldn't be sure and cursed her good planning at making the doors to the training rooms soundproof. "You're quite the snoop aren't you?" whispered a voice in her ear. Lou spun around and clasped her heart. Paul stood there grinning. "You scared the, the crap out of me."
"Couldn't resist," began Paul before Lou grabbed him and put her finger to his lips. "Shhh," Lou whispered and leaned back towards the door. "Listen." With mock seriousness Paul leaned with her, enjoying the excuse for their faces to be so close. "You know, you really have beautiful lips," whispered Paul.
Lou frowned and shook her head. "They're talking about Arnold. Maybe they know more than they're telling."
"Well why don't we ask them?" and with that Paul opened the door and entered the room.
Kylie and Nathan were bent over the laptop as they argued, but both snapped upright when Paul and Lou strode into the room.
"You okay?" asked Paul. "Only we could hear arguing and..."
"We're fine," said Kylie quickly closing the laptop's lid. "We just wanted to get some news about the cyclone."
"Well I was just coming back to tell you what I'd learned," said Lou. "Is the computer working?"
"No the internet seems to be down. No signal."
Nathan took a step forward in front of the desk. "I wanted to send an email to my wife. She's pregnant. It's our first and, well I just wanted to let her know that I was okay."
Lou almost felt sorry for him, he seemed so sincere. "I could try to get a message to Cairns and get someone to ring her if you like."
"Could you? Thanks. That would be great."
"Sure, come to the office now and we'll see what we can do." Lou led him out of the door and towards the office, looking pointedly at Paul on the way.
Kylie remained where she was. Paul stood near the door and waved his arm gallantly towards the doorway.
She hesitated and then with one last look at the laptop walked out of the door.
Paul followed her back to the door of the lounge. "I'll join you in a minute," he said as he closed the door behind her and then scooted back to the training room. He opened up the laptop but Kylie had been too quick and shut it down. Paul smiled wryly as he headed back to the lounge. Either they've got something to hide or Lou's paranoia was contagious.
Lou hung up the handset and turned back to Nathan who was standing near the window looking out at the storm. He seemed to be lost in thought for a few seconds then remembered Lou was there. "Thanks for that."
"No problem." Lou decided to press him a little. "It must be tough for your wife with you working crazy hours and being such a high stress job."
"Yes. Something Arnold never seems to understand. Just because he cheats on his wife and never spent any time with his kids growing up he thinks everyone should live their lives the same way. Nathan sighed and sank into a chair opposite Lou. I used to be like him, or think that I wanted to be like him — powerful, rich. But with the baby coming, I don't know." Nathan looked down at his hands. "My priorities are shifting. I want to be able to come home in time to have dinner with my family and to actually see my kids grow up. That's what Arnold and I were fighting about all the time. He wanted me to succeed him, which would mean working twelve hour days, six days a week. And I told him that wasn't me. I'm committed to the company but…," Nathan threw his hands up in the air.
"He's not into staff having a work/life balance?" Lou leaned against the windowsill.
"Hasn't heard of the concept." Nathan shook his head.
"So how did you feel about coming away for the weekend?"
"I told Arnold that we didn't need to spend thousands of dollars coming away to some corporate retreat to analyze business plans when we could have done that just as successfully back at the office — and maybe given everyone a cash bonus as a reward instead."
"But he wanted to come."
"Yes. He had a bee in his bonnet about something. He wanted to do team-building exercises and pretend he was Crocodile Dundee. We know what he was planning now I guess.
We've all been working very hard over the last year developing the launch and marketing for a prototype for a new technology, a healing agent dispensed through a bandage. Trials show positive results and after we went public, our shares soared. We're about to sign a lucrative deal with a firm in China and so Arnold wanted to take everyone away. In my opinion, he just wanted a bit of time away from his wife, if you know what I mean."
Nathan looked at Lou. She smiled grimly. "Yes I picked up on that. They are … separated?"
"No way. The money to set up the company came from her you see. Family money. From what I can tell she keeps a pretty tight rein on him — and the business. Difficult to tell what she cares about more. I spoke to her in the lift at the office just a few days ago and she seemed very excited by this Chinese deal." Nathan sighed and looked down at his hands again. "But now I'm not sure how stable Arnold is. If the board finds out about this, well they might expect me to step into Arnold's shoes and I don't know if I want to. In fact," said Nathan, shifting back in his seat and looking Lou in the eye, "I know I don't want to." It was the first time she had seen him smile.
"Well it looks like Medivalue will have to find itself another 2IC," said Lou.
Nathan's smile widened. "Yes it will."
14
Paul stopped his story and
glanced over at David, who had been twisting his hands around his bottle for the last few minutes, deep in thought. "Does this Nathan guy remind you of anyone?"
David looked up. "Yes, a bit…" He sighed. "No, a lot. He sounds a lot like me, except he has the wife, family, the things that are important." David leaned forward. "But I know what he means about the pressure. I used to think that the money was the most important thing. I really busted a gut to get my first job in this company. I wanted it all — the money, the big house, the flashy car.
"And then you get on the financial roundabout. You take out a huge mortgage, which means that you need to get that next promotion and you buy the big screen TV and the sound system, and soon your credit card debt looks like it could feed a Third World nation and the pressure to get the next job and the next is, well, it's insane."
David rubbed his eyes. "And the irony of it is that you are becoming less and less content the more you fight to get to the top."
Paul considered his new friend. David was speaking a foreign language as far as he was concerned, but he could see how unhappy he was. "Well mate, it sounds like you are ready for an F."
David looked at him.
"F for FINANCIAL OBJECTIVES," Paul explained. "You need to sit down and work out just how much money you need to have in order to be happy with what you've got. Some people might need a million bucks to be happy and are willing to make the sacrifices needed to get it. Others, like our friend Nathan, are deciding that maybe they can get by on less in order to achieve more in other areas of their lives."
Paul managed to let the silence hang between them for a few minutes. He could see that David was going through an internal struggle. The to-ing and fro-ing of his thoughts was almost palpable. Finally David looked up and smiled. "Okay, I think I have a bit more thinking to do on that one, but I want to hear the rest of the story so I'll put F aside for a bit."
