J.G. Ballard - Cocaine Nights

'And who's in charge of all this – Crawford?'

'No.' Reluctantly, Paula shook her head. 'He'll be miles away in Calahonda. Drinking with friends at the new tennis club.'

'But you say he planned everything?'

'Not exactly. In fact, he knows almost nothing about the details.'

'Then who does? Mahoud and Sonny Gardner didn't dream this up themselves. Who's behind it all?'

Paula wiped the smudge left by my fist on her windscreen. 'There's no single person. They're in it together – Betty Shand, Hennessy, the Keswick sisters, and most of the people you saw at Bibi Jansen's funeral.'

'But why do they want to kill Sanger? Because he's going to the police?'

'No, they didn't think of that. No one even knew until today, when you talked to Betty Shand and Hennessy.'

'Then what conceivable motive is there? Why pick Sanger as the target?'

'For the same reason they picked the Hollingers.'

Paula steadied me when I swayed against the car, suddenly dizzied by the trembling light. I realized for the first time that I was involved in a conspiracy to kill the psychiatrist. Paula squeezed my arms, trying to pump the chilled blood back to my heart.

'All right…' I leaned against Frank's car, and waited until my breath was even. 'You can tell me now, Paula – why were the Hollingers killed? You've always known.'

Paula stood beside me, waiting until I calmed myself. Her face was composed, but she seemed to speak from behind a mask, like a tour guide at some macabre historical site.

'Why were they killed? For the sake of Estrella de Mar and all that Crawford had done for us. To stop everything falling apart when he left. Without the Hollinger fire Estrella de Mar would have sunk back into itself and turned into just another brain-dead town on the coast.'

'But how does that explain all those deaths? Five people were murdered.'

'Charles…' Paula turned to Andersson, hoping that he would help her, but the Swede was staring at the instrument panel of the Jaguar. Controlling herself, she continued: 'A great crime was needed, something terrible and spectacular that would bind everyone together, seal them into a sense of guilt that would keep Estrella de Mar going for ever. It wasn't enough to remember Bobby Crawford and all the minor crimes he committed – the burglaries and drugs and sex-films. The people of Estrella de Mar had to commit a major crime themselves, something violent and dramatic, up on a hill where everyone could see it, so we'd all feel guilty for ever.'

'But why the Hollingers?'

'Because they were so visible. Anyone would have done, but they had the big house on the hill. They'd begun to cause trouble for Betty Shand, and threatened to bring in the Spanish police. So the finger pointed to them. Tant pis.'

'And who did start the Hollinger fire? Not Crawford?'

'No – he was playing tennis with his machine at the Club Nautico. He knew nothing about the detailed plans. I don't think he knew the Hollingers were the target.'

'Then who did? Who planned the fire?'

Paula lowered her head, trying to hide her cheeks behind the black tresses that fell from her temples. 'All of us. We all did.'

'All of you? Not the whole of Estrella de Mar?'

'No. Just the same key group-Betty Shand and the others, Hennessy, Mahoud and Sonny Gardner. Even Gunnar here.'

'Andersson? But Bibi Jansen died in the fire.' I turned accusingly towards the Swede. 'You loved her.'

Andersson stared stony-faced at the garage ramp, feet shifting, ready to race away and join the wind. He spoke tersely, as if he had already heard his words repeated a hundred times inside his echoing head. 'I did love her. I know it looks bad for me – Crawford had taken her away and made her pregnant, she went to live with the Hollingers… But I didn't want her to die. She should have got out by the escape stairs. But the fire was so strong.' He tore the police tape from the Jaguar's windows and crushed it in his hands.

I left him and turned to Paula. 'And what about you?'

She pressed her lips together, reluctant to let the words emerge. 'They didn't tell me what they planned ~ I thought it was some sort of glorified prank that would send up the Hollingers' feudal notion of how to run a party. The idea was to start a small fire in the house, let off some smoke bombs and drive them down the fire escape. At last they'd have to mingle with their guests.'

'But why the ether? It's not all that flammable, compared with petrol or kerosene.'

'Exactly. They needed a volatile liquid, and asked me to supply it. The real motive was to bind me to them, and they were right. Mahoud added petrol to the ether, and I have five deaths on my hands.' Angry with herself, she brushed the hair out of her eyes and gazed coldly at her reflection in the windscreen. 'I was a fool – I should have guessed what they were really planning. But I was under Bobby Crawford's spell. He'd created Estrella de Mar, and I believed in him. After the fire I knew people would go on killing for him, and that he had to be stopped. Still, he and Betty Shand were right – the fire and the deaths held everyone together and kept Estrella de Mar alive. Now they plan to do the same thing for the Residencia Costasol, with poor old Sanger as the sacrifice. If Laurie Fox dies with him in his bed that makes it all the more lurid – no one will ever forget it, and the bridge parties and sculpture classes will run for ever.'

'And Frank? Where was he in all this?'

Paula wiped the dust from her hands. 'Did you bring the car keys? The ones I saw on your desk?'

'They're here.' I took them from my pocket. 'Do you want them?'

'Try the door.'

'Your BMW? I already have-weeks ago, when we first met. I've tried every car in Estrella de Mar. They don't fit.'

'Charles… not my car. Try the Jaguar.'

'Frank's car?' I stepped past her, wiped the grime from the lock on the driver's door and inserted the key. The socket was stiff, and I felt a surge of relief that the key failed to fit and Frank was still innocent. But when I reversed the key I heard the four-door locking mechanism unclasp itself.

I lifted the handle, opened the door and gazed into the car's musty interior, at the route maps and driving gloves on the passenger seat, and the copy of my travel guide to Calabria on the rear shelf. A sense of loss and exhaustion came over me, as if all the blood had been drained from my body in some blundered transfusion. I no longer wanted to breathe, and sat in the driving seat with my feet on the garage floor. Paula knelt beside me, a hand pressing my diaphragm, eyes watching the pulse in my neck.

'Charles – are you all right?'

'So Frank was there. He took part in the Hollinger fire, after all. Did he plan it?'

'No, but he knew something spectacular was going to happen. He accepted that Bobby Crawford was right, that once he left Estrella de Mar everything he'd done would fall apart. We needed something to remember him by. Frank thought the fire would be some kind of stunt for the Queen's birthday.

He didn't realize that the Hollingers would be trapped in the house and burn to death. Frank felt responsible, since he organized everything.'

'And you all played a part?'

'All of us. I ordered the ether from a laboratory supplier in Malaga, Betty Shand moved it around in one of her vans, the Keswick sisters stored it in their refrigerators at the Restaurant du Cap. Sonny Gardner buried the flagons in the orchard. By then Mahoud had secretly poured off most of the ether and refilled them with petrol. Frank and Mahoud dug up the flagons a few minutes before the loyal toast and carried them into the kitchen while the housekeeper was serving the canapés on the terrace. Cabrera's timetable was pretty well right.'

'But who rigged the air-conditioning system? Frank?'