J.G. Ballard - Cocaine Nights

'Danvila, yes…' Frank played with his cigarette packet. 'Sweet man, I think I've rather shocked him. And you, too, I dare say.'

The friendly but knowing smile had reappeared, and he leaned back with his hands behind his head, confident now that he could cope with my visit. Already we were assuming our familiar roles first set out in childhood. He was the imaginative and wayward spirit, and I was the stolid older brother who had yet to get the joke. In Frank's eyes I had always been the source of a certain fond amusement.

He was dressed in a grey suit and white shirt open at the neck. Seeing that I had noticed his bare throat, he covered his chin with a hand.

'They took my tie away from me-I'm only allowed to wear it in court. A bit noose-like, when you think about it -could put ideas into the judge's mind. They fear I might try to kill myself.'

'But, Frank, isn't that what you're doing? Why on earth did you plead guilty?'

'Charles…' He gestured a little wearily. 'I had to, there wasn't anything else I could say.'

'That's absurd. You had nothing to do with those deaths.'

'But I did. Charles, I did.'

'You started the fire? Tell me, no one can hear this – you actually set the Hollinger house ablaze?'

'Yes… in effect.' He took a cigarette from the packet and waited as the policeman stepped forward to light it. The flame flared under the worn hood of the brass lighter, and Frank stared at the burning vapour before drawing on the cigarette. In the brief glow his face seemed calm and resigned.

'Frank, look at me.' I waved the smoke aside, a swirling wraith released from his lungs. 'I want to hear you say it -you, yourself, personally set fire to the Hollinger house?'

'I've said so.'

'Using a bomb filled with ether and petrol?'

'Yes. Don't ever try it. The mixture's surprisingly flammable.'

'I don't believe it. Why, for God's sake? Frank…!'

He blew a smoke ring towards the ceiling, and then spoke in a quiet and almost flat voice. 'You'd have to live for a while at Estrella de Mar even to begin to understand. Take it from me, if I explained what happened it would mean nothing to you. It's a different world, Charles. This isn't Bangkok or some atoll in the Maldives.'

'Try me. Are you covering up for someone?'

'Why should I?'

'And you knew the Hollingers?'

'I knew them well.'

'Danvila says he was some sort of film tycoon in the 1960s.'

'In a small way. Property dealing and office development in the City. His wife was one of the last of the Rank Charm School starlets. They retired here about twenty years ago.'

'They were regulars at the Club Nautico?'

'They weren't regulars, strictly speaking. They dropped in now and then.'

'And you were there on the evening of the fire? You were in the house?'

'Yes! You're starting to sound like Cabrera. The last thing an interrogator wants is the truth.' Frank crushed his cigarette in the ashtray, briefly burning his fingers. 'Look, I'm sorry they died. It was a tragic business.'

His closing words were spoken without emphasis, in the tone he had used one day as a ten-year-old when he had come in from the garden and told me that his pet turtle had died. I knew that he was now telling the truth.

'They're taking you back to Malaga tonight,' I said. 'I'll visit you there as soon as I can.'

'It's always good to see you, Charles.' He managed to clasp my hand before the policeman stepped forward. 'You looked after me when Mother died and in a way you're still looking after me. How long are you staying?'

'A week. I should be in Helsinki for some TV documentary. But I'll be back.'

'Always roaming the world. All that endless travelling, all those departure lounges. Do you ever actually arrive anywhere?'

'It's hard to tell – sometimes I think I've made jet-lag into a new philosophy. It's the nearest we can get to penitence.'

'And what about your book on the great brothels of the world? Have you started it yet?'

'I'm still doing the research.'

'I remember you talking about that at school. You used to say your only interests in life were opium and brothels. Pure Graham Greene, but there was always something heroic there. Do you smoke a few pipes?'

'Now and then.'

'Don't worry, I won't tell Father. How is the old chap?'

'We've moved him to a smaller nursing home. He doesn't recognize me now. When you get out of here you must see him. I think he'd remember you.'

'I never liked him, you know.'

'He's a child, Frank. He's forgotten everything. All he does is dribble and doze.'

Frank leaned back, smiling at the ceiling as his memories played across the grey distemper. 'We used to steal-do you remember? Strange that – it all started in Riyadh when Mother fell ill. I was snatching anything I could lay my hands on. You joined in to make me feel better.'

'Frank, it was a phase. Everyone understood.'

'Except Father. He couldn't cope when Mother lost control. He started that weird affair with his middle-aged secretary.'

'The poor man was desperate.'

'He blamed you for my stealing. He'd find my pockets full of candy I'd pinched from the Riyadh Hilton and then accuse you.'

'I was older. He thought I could have stopped you. He knew I envied you.'

'Mother was drinking herself to death and no one was doing anything about it. Stealing was the only way I could make sense of how guilty I felt. Then she started those long walks in the middle of the night and you'd go with her. Where exactly? I always wondered.'

'Nowhere. We just walked around the tennis court. Rather like my life now.'

'Probably gave you a taste for it. That's why you're nervous of putting down roots. You know, Estrella de Mar is as close to Saudi as you can get. Maybe that's why I came here…'

He stared bleakly at the table, for the moment depressed by all these memories. Ignoring the policeman, I reached across the table and held his shoulders, trying to calm the trembling collarbones. He met my eyes, glad to see me, his smile stripped of irony.

'Frank…?'

'It's all right.' He sat up, brightening himself. 'How is Esther, by the way? I should have asked.'

'She's fine. We split up three months ago.'

'I'm sorry. I always liked her. Rather high-minded in an unusual way. She once asked me a lot of strange questions about pornography. Nothing to do with you.'

'She took up gliding last summer, spent her weekends soaring over the South Downs. A sign, I guess, that she wanted to leave me. Now she and her women friends fly to competitions in Australia and New Mexico. I think of her up there, alone with all that silence.'

'You'll meet someone else.'

'Maybe The policeman opened the door and stood with his back to us, calling across the corridor to an officer sitting at a desk. I leaned over the table, speaking quickly. 'Frank, listen. If Danvila can get you out on bail there's a chance I can arrange something.'

"What exactly? Charles?'

'I'm thinking of Gibraltar…' The policeman had resumed his watch over us. 'You know the special skills there. This whole business is preposterous. It's obvious you didn't kill the Hollingers.'

'That's not quite true.' Frank drew away from me, the defensive smile on his lips again. 'It's hard to believe, but I am guilty.'

'Don't talk like that!' Impatient with him, I knocked his cigarettes to the floor, where they lay beside the policeman's feet. 'Say nothing to Danvila about the Gibraltar thing. Once we get you back to England you'll be able to clear yourself.'

'Charles… I can only clear myself here.'

'But at least you'll be out of jail and safe somewhere.'

'Somewhere with no extradition treaty for murder?' Frank stood up and pushed his chair against the table. 'You'll have to take me with you on your trips. We'll travel the world together. I'd like that…'