Питер Джеймс - Short Shockers - Collection Two

‘No.’

They left the house at 3 a.m., caught a 5.15 a.m. Eurotunnel crossing, and, allowing for the one-hour time difference, were on the road heading out of Calais towards the autoroute by 7 a.m. French time. The satnav which Nigel, being Nigel, had already programmed the night before, told them their ETA in Montreux was 3.55 p.m.

Due to a couple of stops to take turns behind the wheel and for coffee, snacks and loo breaks, they arrived at the hotel shortly after 5 p.m., on a glorious, balmy afternoon. For the last half hour, travelling around the shore of the lake, they’d had the sunroof open, and despite feeling a little tired, Annie felt happy — and relieved that they’d made the right decision. And, hey, they still had time to unpack, have a rest and make it for cocktails on the terrace.

She had already decided what she would wear that night. A pair of cobalt-blue suede Manolo Blahniks, and a totally stunning handbag to match, with a Stella McCartney A-line cocktail dress that stopped a couple of inches too high above her knees. Naughty, she knew, but it showed off her legs, by far her best asset — although for knocking on thirty and having had two sprogs, she didn’t reckon the rest of her was too bad either. Tits still firm, stomach reasonably flat. So far, so good…

Out of curiosity, Nigel went online and checked the easyJet flight they would have been on. It had landed ten minutes early, shortly after midday. He told Annie.

‘But the thing is, darling, as I said to you. Even if we’d got here safely, I would have spent the entire holiday fretting about the flight home. I didn’t have the dream last night. We did the right thing.’

Nigel told her that if she felt they had done the right thing, then they had.

The first two days of their stay were blissful. Tired from the journey, they spent much of Sunday chilling, relaxing on loungers beside the hotel’s infinity pool and reading. On Monday they went hiking up in the mountains and, later, Annie had a massage. On their third day, Tuesday, in the personal organizer section of Nigel’s phone was, Picnic lunch on boat. Dep. 11 a.m., return 4 p.m.

‘Couldn’t be more perfect weather for a day on the water, could it?’ Nigel said, pulling on his Dyke Golf Club baseball cap to cover his balding dome. He cast off the mooring rope of the brown-varnished, clinker-built dinghy they had rented. There was an outboard, if they wanted to use it, but Nigel was keen to row. He patted his stomach, which Annie had noticed was definitely in an expansionist mode these past few years, although he was a long way from what one could call fat. ‘Promised myself I’d lose this by the end of the week,’ he said.

‘Let me know when you get tired and I’ll have a go on the oars too,’ she said.

‘You can take over when we get to France, and row back!’ he said with a grin, and pointed at the craggy peaks of the Alps on the far shore. Deeper into the mountain range, some of the peaks were still snow-capped, but the visibility was not good enough to see them today.

‘How far is it across?’ she asked.

‘About fourteen kilometers — nine miles,’ he said.

‘Quite a row!’

‘Could do it in a couple of hours — shall we try? We can use the outboard to motor back.’

‘Do we have to pay extra if we get back after 4 p.m.?’

‘There’s an hourly charge, but it’s not exorbitant.’

‘Let’s go for it. Splice the main brace, Sir Francis!’

It was a baking hot morning, with a faint breeze, the blue sky smudged with just a few wispy cirrus clouds high above them. Annie sat back, watching Nigel in his pink shorts, white polo shirt and trainers steadily rowing, keeping up a good speed. She breathed in the smells of boat varnish and rope and the fresh, faintly reedy tang of the water, and listened to the steady splash of the oars. In the distance, she saw a ferry crossing, and a large pleasure boat heading along the lake in front of them.

Suddenly, her phone pinged with a text. She pulled it out of her bag and looked at the display. ‘From Mummy,’ she said, opening it.

All fine here. Zak good as gold. Taking them to Drusilla’s Park today. Hope you’re having a nice time!

She sent a reply that they were — they were having a really lovely time. Then as she put her phone away she said to Nigel, ‘Zak, good as gold !’

‘Respect to your parents, I’d say!’

An hour later the mountains of the French Alps ahead of them grew steadily larger and higher as they rowed nearer, but the far shore was still a long way off. Nigel had pulled off his top and, moving carefully in the boat, making sure not to rock it too much and capsize, he made his way over to Annie so she could rub sun cream onto his back and chest.

‘Want me to take over yet?’ she asked.

He was sweating heavily but looking relaxed and cheery. ‘No, thanks, I’m fine.’ He took his hands from the oars to pat the big roll of flesh that was his stomach. ‘Is it looking any smaller?’

‘Definitely, darling!’

Suddenly, she felt a sudden swirl of cold air; it was so fleeting that for an instant she thought she had imagined it. Then from the faint frown that crossed Nigel’s face, she knew he’d felt it too. But it was gone, as suddenly as it had come. A couple at the next-door table on the terrace last night, who told them they came to Montreux every year for their holiday, said to be careful out on the lake — there were strange eddies and currents, and treacherous mists could descend quickly and with little warning.

But of course Nigel had checked the weather forecast carefully this morning with the concierge. It was going to be a fine day on the lake as well as on the shore. No mists were forecast. A perfect day for boating!

But, almost imperceptibly, the water seemed to be getting choppier; although not unpleasantly rough, it was definitely no longer as calm as it had been. She commented on it to Nigel.

‘It’s because the breeze is coming from the Montreux side — the lee shore,’ he explained. ‘We’re heading towards the windward shore, so the further out we get, the choppier it will become.’

As he spoke, a wave, from the wake of some bigger craft, broke over the bow, sprinkling a few droplets over Nigel’s back — and she felt a few of them on her face; nice and refreshing, but at the same time, staring at the darkening water, she felt a faint tinge of apprehension. They were a long way out now, in a very small craft. She turned her head and looked back at Montreux, so far in the distance it took her a moment to identify their hotel.

‘Maybe we shouldn’t go any further,’ she said.

Nigel looked at his watch. ‘Twelve thirty. Hmm, it is taking longer than I thought.’ He looked over his shoulder at the French shore. ‘It will take a good hour more at least to get there.’

‘Longer, I’d say,’ she replied dubiously.

‘We could go up the lake a little way instead, and then drift and have lunch in around half an hour. How does that sound?’

She nodded. ‘OK. Or we could row back a little towards the lee shore — it would be nicer to eat not rocking around so much.’ She suddenly had to grip the gunwales as the boat was rocked harshly by another, much bigger wave; the wash from a powerboat heading into the distance at high speed.

Nigel did not seem to need much persuading to turn the boat around. Annie offered to take over rowing, but he was fine, he said, and she could do some after lunch. But as he pulled on the oars he was looking less happy than when they had started out this morning, and the water was looking distinctly less happy too. Instead of getting calmer it was definitely getting a tad rougher all across the lake.

Above them the clouds were building up. Annie delved into the picnic hamper prepared by the hotel and brought out some bottled water. She took a long swig then offered some to Nigel. He shook his head. ‘When we stop, thanks, darling.’