A Week in Winter(48)

He looked down at the small patchwork green fields far below. He could see the coastline. Maria Rosa had been to Ireland once with a student group some years back. She said she had enjoyed it. Everyone she met had some kind of story to tell. He thought fancifully about what it would be like to go on a vacation with his daughter. She was now in her early forties – a handsome woman absorbed in her teaching, equally at ease in the flower shop with her mother and Harvey, or having drinks with her father in the top Hollywood hotels.

Still no sign of a romance in her life, but she laughed it away and so Corry stopped enquiring. She might even enjoy a holiday with him. As soon as he got home, he’d call her and suggest it.

He looked at his watch again. This was going to be very close. He would have to run to catch his connection to Germany.

It was, in fact, too close. Corry stood and watched the flight to Frankfurt leave without him.

Tireless Trevor would be waiting at the airport, the publicity machine would meet a plane on which he was not travelling. He called Trevor’s cell phone and held his own phone away from his ear as his agent fumed, protested and raged about the news. Eventually, he ran out of adjectives and abuse and just sounded weary.

‘So what are you going to do?’ he asked.

Corry said, ‘I’m tired. Very tired.’

‘You are tired?’ Trevor’s voice had risen again dangerously. ‘You have nothing to be tired about. It’s the rest of us that have things that are making us tired, like trying to explain what can never be explained.’

‘It was the airline . . .’ Corry began.

‘Don’t give me the airline. If you had wanted to be here, you’d have been here.’

‘Can they not have the meeting tonight or tomorrow?’

‘Of course they can’t. Who do you think these people are? They’ve all flown in specially. They got on planes that didn’t sit on their butts on the tarmac,’ Trevor raged.

‘Then I’m staying here for a week. If it’s too late for the meeting, then to hell with it. I’m getting out for a while.’

‘Hey, this is no time . . . I’ve set everything up.’

‘And I tried to get there, but the airline let me down. Goodbye, Trevor, talk to you in a week’s time.’

‘But where are you going? What are you doing? You can’t go wandering off like this!’

‘I’m a grown man. An old man, as you never tire of hinting. I can have a week’s vacation here or a month, if I like. See you back in LA.’ Corry closed his phone and turned it on to message.

He went to get himself another coffee. This kind of freedom was new to him. He had escaped the meeting he had been dreading. He could now do what he wanted to without consulting any handler, manager or agent. He was actually free.

The airline had done him a favour.

But where would he go? Perhaps he should buy a tourist guide book or find a travel agent. On the tables around there were various brochures offering suggestions of what to do in the region. There was a medieval banquet in a castle. There was a tour to some spectacular cliff face called Moher, which was meant to be one of the Wonders of the World. There were golf packages. None of them appealed to Corry.

But one little sheet advertised A Week in Winter and promised a warm, welcoming house and miles of sand and cliffs and wild birds. He called the number to know if there was a vacancy.

A pleasant-sounding woman said there was indeed room for him, told him to rent a car and drive north. He should call again when he arrived in Stoneybridge for directions to the house.

‘About payment?’ Corry began; he didn’t want to give his name, and there was a possibility that he might even go unrecognised, which would be a real treat.

‘We’ll sort all that out when you get here,’ Mrs Starr was brisk. ‘And your name is . . .?’

‘John,’ Corry said, without pausing.

‘Right, John, take your time, and be very careful of Irish drivers, they are inclined to pull out suddenly without indicating. Assume they are going to do that and you’ll be fine.’

His shoulders felt less tense. He was an ordinary tourist going on an ordinary holiday. There was no press reception, no junket of showbiz writers following him.

It was a cold, bright morning. Corry Salinas put his bag into the back of the rented car and drove north obediently.

He must remember he was called John from now on.

The other guests seemed to have settled in. The house looked just as it had done in the brochure. John turned his collar up to shield his face partially.

He was so used to people doing a double take when they met him and shouts of, ‘Oh my God, you’re Corry Salinas!’ But at Stone House, nobody recognised him. Perhaps Tireless Trevor had been right when he said that Corry Salinas was in grave danger of being a forgotten brand.

He told them, when asked, that he was a businessman from Los Angeles taking a well-deserved week off. And then he began to feel that there was no need to turn up his collar any more. If they recognised him, they were not going to say anything. But it was much more likely that they hadn’t a clue who he was.

The food was good, the conversation was easy, but he felt very weary. He was used to putting on an act, giving a performance. It wasn’t demanded here, which was a relief, but on the other hand he felt somewhat at a loss. What was his role?

He was the first to go to bed. He asked them to forgive him and to believe that he hadn’t invented the International Date Line. They laughed and told him to sleep well.