Frank Schätzing - Limit

She looked irritably across to the Isla de las Estrellas, which rose from the Pacific like a humpbacked sea serpent. No breeze stirred the air. The sea stretched like dark aluminium foil from horizon to horizon. She ended the conversation and turned to the two liveried men.

‘And? Did you ask again?’

‘I’m extraordinarily sorry, madame.’ The captain shook his head. ‘No permit.’

‘I’m absolutely mystified about what’s going on.’

‘The Isla de las Estrellas and the platform can’t be approached by private ships. The same applies to air-space. The whole area is one single high-security zone. If it wasn’t you, we would even have to wait for their helicopter. Unusually, they have given us permission to ferry you across in our own speedboat.’

Rebecca sighed. She was used to rules not applying to her. On the other hand the prospect of a trip on the speedboat was too much fun for her to insist.

‘Is the luggage on board?’

‘Of course, madame. I hope you have a pleasant holiday.’

‘Thank you. How do I look?’

‘Perfect, as ever.’

That would be lovely, she thought. Since she had turned fifty, she had been fighting a losing battle. It was played out on various piece of fitness equipment, in swimming-pools with cross-current features, on private jogging paths and her 140-metre yacht, which she had had built in such a way that you could perform a circuit of it unimpeded. Since leaving Taiwan she ran there every day. With iron discipline she had even managed to get her extreme hunger under control, but still her body went on expanding. At least the dress emphasised what was left of her waist, and was appropriately extravagant. Her trademark bird’s-nest hairdo was characteristically chaotic, and her make-up was impeccable.

As soon as the speedboat cast off, she was back on the phone again.

‘Rebecca Hsu is heading this way,’ Norrington said on the walkie-talkie.

Lynn left the kitchen of Stellar Island Hotel, gave the canapés a quick examination, issued instructions to her little group of waiters and waitresses and stepped out into the sunlight.

‘Has she brought bodyguards?’ she asked.

‘No. On the other hand she has checked several times to ask if we seriously intend to refuse her docking permission.’

‘Excuse me? Rebecca wants to park her damned yacht here?’

‘Calm down. We refused to budge. Now she’s coming in the speedboat.’

‘That’s okay. When does she get here?’

‘In about ten minutes. As long as she doesn’t fall overboard on the way.’ An idea that Norrington seemed to find cheering. ‘There must be some pretty good sharks around here, don’t you think? When I last saw our little darling she was fit for a banquet.’

‘If Rebecca Hsu gets eaten, you’re dessert.’

‘Funny and relaxed as ever,’ Norrington sighed and ended the conversation.

She followed the coastal path at a walking pace, as her mind split into pieces and thousands of concerned and disembodied Lynns haunted the hotel grounds. Was there something she’d overlooked? Each of the booked suites gleamed immaculately. Even in terms of furniture the personal preferences of the guests had been taken into account: lilies, mountains of lychees and passion fruit for Rebecca Hsu, Momoka Omura’s favourite champagne, a luxury volume about the history of car-racing on Warren Locatelli’s pillow, reproductions of Asian and Russian art on the Ögis’ walls, old tin toys for Marc Edwards, the biography of Muhammad Ali with photographs never before published for the edification of good old Chucky, chocolate-scented bath oils for Miranda Winter. Even the menu reflected likes and dislikes. Lynn’s worried ghosts sighed in the saunas and jacuzzis of the spa area, prowled icily over the golf course, streamed damply into Stellar Island Dome, the underground multimedia centre, and found nothing to complain about.

Everything that was supposed to work, worked.

And besides, no one would see that they hadn’t been ready in time. Unless the guests opened doors they had no business opening.

Tools were still lying around in most of the rooms, bags of cement were stacked up, the paintwork was only half finished. In the knowledge that she couldn’t keep the official opening deadline, Lynn had put all her energy into getting the booked suites ready. Only part of the kitchen was operational, enough to spoil the group, but certainly not the three hundred visitors for whom the hotel had actually been conceived.

She stopped for a moment and looked at the gleaming ocean steamer that grew out of the basalt. As if her pause were a signal, hundreds of seabirds scattered from a nearby cliff and formed a swarming cloud that drifted inland. Lynn gave a start. She imagined the creatures swooping down on the hotel grounds, shitting all over it, hacking and scratching it to pieces and chasing the few people into the sea. She saw bodies drifting in the pool, blood mixing with water. The survivors ran up to her and screamed at her for not preventing the attack. Loudest of all was Julian.

The hotel staff were frozen. Their eyes wandered back and forth between Lynn and the hotel, visibly unsettled, since their boss suddenly gave every appearance of witnessing the Day of Judgement.

After a minute of complete stillness she pulled herself together and continued down the coastal path to the harbour.

Andrew Norrington saw her walking on. From the hill above the pool where he had taken up his post, he could look out over large sections of the eastern shore. In the harbour, a natural inlet extended by blasting, several small ships lay at anchor, most of them patrol boats and some Zodiacs, marked with the familiar O of Orley Enterprises. He could have provided plenty of room for Rebecca Hsu’s yacht, but not even in his wildest dreams did Norrington imagine giving the Taiwanese woman special treatment. All the others had, as agreed, flown in on Orley’s company helicopters, why not her? Rebecca could be glad that she’d been allowed to travel in by water at all.

As he walked down to the pool, he thought about Julian’s daughter. Even though he didn’t particularly like Lynn, he respected her authority and competence. Even at a young age she had had to shoulder a huge amount of responsibility, and in spite of all the naysayers she had put Orley Travel at the top of all tourist companies. Without a doubt, Stellar Island Hotel was one of her pièces de résistance , even though there was still much to be done, but it paled into insignificance next to the OSS Grand and the Gaia! No one had ever built anything comparable. In her late thirties, Lynn was a star in the company, and those two hotels had been finished.

Norrington threw his head back and blinked into the sun. He absently flicked a saucer-sized spider from his shoulder, entered the pool landscape via a path overgrown with ferns and conifers, and gazed forensically around the area. By now the whole travelling party had met up by the pool. Drinks and snacks were being handed out, people were noisily introducing themselves. Julian had selected the participants very cleverly. The diverse group there was worth several hundred billion dollars: world-improvers like Mukesh Nair, oligarchs along the lines of Rogachev, and people like Miranda Winter, who had, for the first time, found her pea-brain faced with the task of spending money sensibly. Orley planned to relieve them all of part of their fortunes. At that moment Evelyn Chambers joined them, and smiled radiantly around. Still remarkably good-looking, Norrington thought. Perhaps she’d become a bit plump over time, but nothing compared to the progressive spherification of Rebecca Hsu.

He walked on, ready for anything.