Roskov, Book 22, page 5
‘A year later they set sail together but their ships lost sight of each other.’ He stood back and waited.
Julie, is it genuine?
Yes.
I told the bishop, ‘Release it to the media, there’s nothing in there to worry the church.’
‘Yes, sir,’ the bishop responded, bowing his head.
‘Have the tablet shipped to Rome, to join the others, but photographed first.’
I led Bill and Ted out and to a quiet spot. ‘It mentions five foreign soldiers.’
‘Us?’ Ted puzzled.
‘We’ll never know. But I’d hate to think that Bonza escorted her on a ship, farting all the time.’
They laughed.
‘A hellish voyage,’ Bill noted. ‘And Bonza said he gets sea sick badly, so it would have been hell for him as well as the passengers.’
Ted put in, ‘This stone tablet, it does not mention that they were married, so … not so much the trouble for the church.’
‘It says that she nursed him, still alive after the crucifixion, and that he loved her the most, so … a change of some detail.’
Staff thanked, police to guard the stone tablet, we headed back up to the lake valley. Finding the Rasmussens parked at the side of the road, I informed them of the stone tablet, and what it said.
They keenly led me down a slope to a point two hundred yards from the water, a cove, not that interested in the stone tablet.
‘This will be great for a special villa,’ Rolf enthused.
I took in the rocky sides and the nice evergreen trees. ‘One big villa, some gardens, not much room for anything else.’
‘We can claim this land?’ Rolf asked.
‘Yes, I’ll update the site managers today and mark the map, a road built down here, water and electrics run.’
Bishop Armani called. ‘The new stone tablet will cause some debate, but we are not panicked by it nor worried.’
‘It doesn’t say that they were married or had kids, so you have that. And it is genuine, but test it anyhow.’
‘It will reach the news very quickly, we have already released a statement and a translation.’
‘The Christian world will see it as further proof of small detail, so … that helps you.’
‘It does, to have solid proof that she was at his crucifixion and got the body afterwards.’
‘Got his body and kept his body,’ I noted. ‘Took it on a damn boat to Spain!’
‘We … would not speculate on that obviously.’
‘Obviously. How is it in Cadiz?’
‘Busy, as expected. And this is new tablet will add to the interest.’
Tony Blair called as we arrived at the Lake Valley Marina site. ‘You found another stone tablet…’
‘Not me, the local staff did. It’s on its way to Rome.’
‘Anything interesting in it?’
‘Mary is not listed as being his wife, but as being most loved. And it details her visiting him in prison as well as getting his crucified body back after dark - he was still alive, a few words spoken. Apparently he suggested forgiveness, whereas I would have asked her to poison the Roman bastards and to cut their cocks off.’
‘Yes, quite. And she may have taken his body to Cadiz.’
‘What heresy!’ I quipped. ‘And from a Catholic. He was resurrected and walked off, remember.’
‘The detail is less important than the message,’ he insisted.
‘This will add to the proof, of the basic players and characters in the story, but with no mention of him being the son of God. And, as ever, the different groups will all interpret it their own way.’
‘They will, yes. How’s the beach?’
‘Hot, with many nude girls on it. You miss it?’
‘The heat, not the nude girls, it’s raining here.’
‘Is it a warm rain?’ I teased.
‘No, and I miss the Gun Room silence, but it was a bit spooky. As a father and a Prime Minister … I miss the silence.’
‘My mother now has two kids.’
‘You … have a sibling?’
‘Goats. The mother goat gave birth on their lounge floor, two kids now running around.’
‘They are cheeky goats, but nice to play with. And before we boarded the plane I checked my boys for any baby rabbits.’
‘They once found one in someone’s luggage, luckily before it suffocated. Any political issues to hassle you this week?’
‘Princess Diana is flaunting it on a yacht, and planning to marry a Muslim, which would cause concern in the palace.’
‘It would,’ I agreed. ‘But who are we to judge who and what makes her happy.’
‘Quite. But it is causing a few odd headlines. Chat soon.’
Call ended, a shiver went through me at the thought of Princess Diana, and I had to wonder why.
Back with the Rasmussens, we discussed which types of sailboats would be good to bring in, expensively airlifted in, and we all agreed that residents and tourists would wish to hire yachts for a week at a time.
I told them, as machines clanked loudly behind us, ‘Some rich residents, people who stay here, will want to buy a yacht and keep it here.’
‘Of course,’ Rolf agreed.
‘If we aim to airlift thirty, and then we can assess it in the second year.’
‘I would wish to hire one myself when visiting,’ Rolf told me. ‘We like to sail as a family, and this lake is ideal, a stiff breeze yet calm water.’
Rita asked, ‘What if someone wishes to live on the water?’
‘Live? On a boat?’ I queried.
‘Yes, many people do.’
‘We’d have to airlift-in more boats, comfortable ones,’ I told her.
Ingrid noted, ‘The lake will be very long when full, interesting coves to stay in, animals to see. It will be popular for people who wish to live on a boat.
‘They will need many places to moor their boat, with electric and water supplies, and a bar and restaurant, and a shop with supplies. Some lakes offer this, a holiday service.’
‘It is popular,’ Rolf put in. ‘They do this in Lake Mecklenburg, Germany, which has rivers and canals, sixty miles of river to explore, restaurants and cafes to stop at.’
Ingrid noted, ‘Here will be many inlets like rivers, places to stop.’
I told them, ‘I’ll have floating wooden pontoons made local and brought up, twenty of them to start.’
Frieda told me, ‘In Germany we see a floating café, and we sail to it and stop.’
‘A floating café,’ I repeated. ‘What a great idea. It could be out in the middle of the lake, and people go there before the sunset.’
Rolf noted, ‘It will make the villas here more attractive.’
A car horn caused us to turn, my lake valley partner easing to a halt and then jumping down, his temporary cabin-offices not far away.
He greeted the Rasmussens.
I told him, ‘We want to bring in floats and make wooden pontoons, but also to construct a small floating café and to position it in the middle of the lake.’
‘Ah, that would be nice to see, lit up at night, boats visiting it. And there is a boat building company here, in the north, they will be glad of some work.’
‘Ask them if they can open a shed here, boats brought up, engine and mast added.’
‘It is possible, but they need to see if they will be busy and make money, and also make money in the winter.’
‘We can pay for the shed, they’ll use it when they have orders from residents,’ I suggested, my partner nodding.
He told me, ‘These people, they made the floating pontoon for your beach, and in other places.’
‘So they can do that here, for swimmers and for boats,’ I noted.
Another toot, and my partner said, ‘Ah, that is the CEO of a French oil company. He is very rich, billions of Euro.’
The grey-haired man and his wife soon approached, and with a tall son that appeared to be around my age. They said hello, the twins doing the introductions in French.
I told the man, ‘We were just planning a floating café in the lake.’
‘Ah, zis is in France also, great for summer,’ he noted. ‘We ‘av family canal boat.’
‘Will you build a villa here?’ I asked.
‘Oui, I must ask you about zis.’ He pointed north. ‘There is place, two kilometre, three hundred metre wide, with rock in middle.’
‘I know it,’ my partner told me. ‘No one has wished to buy it yet.’
I asked my guest, ‘You wish to buy all the land?’
‘Yes, from road to water, side to side. One million Euro…’
‘I may have taken less,’ I said with a smile. ‘And the cost now will be much less than five years from now.’
‘Of course, zis place will be for rich people only.’
I pointed over the lake. ‘We plan a golf course.’
‘Golf course? You can do it?’
‘They’ll flatten down the soft rocks, so yes.’
‘Fantastic.’
‘You can start to build any time you like, but it’s not so easy to find builders,’ I told him.
He nodded. ‘I bring in men, two months.’
‘Do you sail?’ I asked as the twins engaged the son.
‘Of course.’
‘In October we’ll use big S64 Skycrane helicopters to lift in yachts.’
‘Ah, then I will sail my favourite boat here ready, it is in Monte Carlo.’
‘You would retire here?’ I asked.
‘We would be here some months, yes. Zis is my young son, I ‘av two more, one has family, and I ‘av two brother and many cousin.’
I told him, ‘A large Swedish company will have a nursing home here for its staff, if you have a similar need…’
His eyes widened. ‘We can do zis?
‘Yes.’
‘Then we will like that, we ‘av much money to spend on the people who finish work, zer laws in France.’
‘We just started nursing homes in Sardinia, twenty to start. Here we may have a hundred.’
My partner handed over his card, and the land would be sold straight away.
I began, addressing the CEO, ‘If you have some recommendation about the helicopter lift…’
‘This Skycrane I see before, a yacht lifted. Zay can do it,’ he said with a positive nod.
‘Have you seen the caves here?’
‘Yes, fantastic ‘ow they live there.’
‘If you want to stay in the Gun Room let us know, some cancellations.’
‘My friend stay there, and we will stay in special villa Mandoch Valley in September.’
‘Your President was first. Well, when I told the Prefect that … he went straight to the villa to stay a night first.’
My guest laughed loudly. ‘They do not love each other, Corsica and France, an uneasy marriage, no.’
He finally drove off after pledging to buy ten villas for himself, a nice profit for me.
Down at the builders’ camp we annotated a map and reserved the land for Rolf and the model agency to build on, and we marked where the oil CEO would buy his land.
Mounted up, we followed the chief architect up the valley and to a turnoff left, and past the rocky outcrops we found a line of half-finished villas and many dusty men in hard hats, forty villas to be built on this spur road.
Down from the minibuses, we inspected a dusty grey-concrete villa with no roof, and it was a big villa, a great terrace and a large pool below that terrace – at least a large oblong hole now sat below the terrace.
Next door, and we found a loud Irish gang fitting floor tiles, men painting the walls, and someday soon the villa would be the usual orange-magnolia stone colour that the locals favoured here on the island.
The twins asked questions as if they were prospective property managers, and paints and glues were explained, along with the drying time for concrete.
A team of men were now in the empty pool and fitting light blue tiles, a loud greeting for me. And that was a surprise because these were Protestants.
‘So … how is it for you here on the island?’ I asked.
‘Fooking great, never going back,’ a man said, his mates laughing, and I guessed that being on this island was better than a cold wet night in Belfast.
‘Are you builders or finishers?’
‘Finishers, boss, we does the touch-ups and makes her beautiful to look at, aye. Then comes the electricians, plumbing is done already, then they have the pretty French ladies who place the furniture and light fittings and stuff.’
‘And when it’s done you’ll buy it?’ I asked.
They laughed.
‘Need to save our pennies,’ a man told me.
‘They inspect what you do?’
‘Fook aye, it has to be perfect.’
‘You sand down the concrete?’
‘Builders do that before we arrive, we get a smooth baby’s arse we do, all smooth and grey.’
‘You live in the workers’ village here?’
‘Aye, got a nice place, and we’s build it ourselves, and on the weekends we adds on stuff like, doing a kitchen extension now and a barbeque pit like.’
‘You get time on the beach?’
‘Saturdays and Sundays, naked girls to look at.’
‘Is there a brothel here yet?
They exchanged looks.
‘Don’t know what you’s talking about, boss, we’s good Christian boys.’
‘Uh huh.’ I left them grinning.
Rolf had heard. ‘Brothel?’
‘Girls from Marseille, a hundred of them looking for some easy work, so it was reported.’
‘In mainland France such a thing is not uncommon, nor is it illegal.’
Since all of the villas here were exactly the same we did not inspect them all, a quick chat to the gang bosses, but the men were happy with wages and conditions here. They just wished that it was not so damn hot in the summer.
Back in the minibus, Rita noted, ‘If we build villas and apartments we must make them the same or similar, to save money. And similar furniture, bought in bulk.’
I loudly stated, ‘Rolf, your daughters are learning the trade already, you can retire now.’
‘Well … a few years more,’ he suggested. ‘When they get to taxation law they will slow up and … fall asleep.’
‘We will call you each day and ask, after you retire,’ Frieda told her father, making me laugh at the look on Rolf’s face. Ingrid hid her grin and faced front.
I began, ‘So, Rolf, when you finally retire and take Ingrid on a nice canal boat holiday in the south of France, will you take a phone with you?’
‘No. Messages by delivery pigeon only.’
Back at the hotel, I plunged into a pool for a cool off, soon sat wet with a cold beer, the breeze off the ocean cooling me nicely.
At bedtime it was Frieda’s turn, and she wanted to get the buzz on, so we readied the sofa after I had gone down on Rita and made her moan.
Sip of water taken, cushions under my knees, and we had the correct height. But we started with kissing and hugging, our sex sessions morphing into something more than just mechanical pleasure, there was a need for hugging these days.
Thursday, one day to go
After breakfast, I walked next door to the holiday village with Bill and Ted, and behind the green canvas walls we found many mechanical diggers and cranes, a large wide hole having already been dug in the soft sandy soil.
That hole would be a full hundred and fifty yards long by seventy-five yards wide, the middle section to be three metres deep to allow divers to explore it. The pool would also have canals with gates that led to laboratories, fish and dolphins to be released into the pool via them perhaps.
I greeted the head builder under a hot sun, and he explained what they were building here, which would include large tourist terraces on three sides, sunbeds and sunshades to be placed on them, toilets and showers built, a café installed.
With regard to the deep section of the new rock pool, the marine biologist had asked for many ceramic pipes to be placed, large and small and very small, so that the fish could hide in them in the daytime – and avoid being eaten by larger fish.
There would also be a wooden bridge across the middle of the rock pool, so that holidaymakers could stare down at the fish. And the estimate of a week to complete it had been a bit optimistic since people kept coming up with ideas about what to place in - or sit next to - the new rock pool.
As with the first rock pool, a pipe would be laid to the ocean, under the promenade but utilising existing drainpipes, and it would pump seawater in and out as well as oxygenate it.
And surplus fish and crustaceans from the first rock pool, of which there were reportedly many – some in danger of being caught and cooked - would be moved over here.
The new pool would be a good additional feature and attraction for the holiday village, I just hoped that current paying guests would not complain about the building work. Still, the builders were not loudly smashing rocks, the soil here was sandy and needed only to be scooped-up and taken away.
Collecting the Rasmussens an hour later, plus Bill and Ted, we set off north with beach supplies, up the coast, soon to a new road that came to a dead stop, the large bay with the swamp laid out in front of us.
Builders waved at, we walked down to the white-sand beach and raised four poles with netting between them, and we soon had some shade from the oppressive sun.
‘This is a very large beach,’ Rolf noted, a hand over his eyes.
‘It is fantastic,’ Ingrid put in. ‘Such clear and shallow water, such a nice colour. This will be very popular.’
I told them, ‘There are many beaches likes this around the island, but with no damn roads. Some are surrounded by cliffs and mountains, access by boat only – unless you’re a rock climber.’
I was soon in the water with the twins, and it was just us – apart from three sailboats seen anchored in the bay, no one else seen apart from the builders at the back of the swamp, those men now extending the road around the bay as requested.
