Page 58 of The Island in Bramble Bay
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MAGGIE LOOKED AT the picture on the screen in front of her and tried not to think the worst. But she couldn’t see how Jessica came to have a photo of Charlie sleeping, without her having been there when he fell asleep, and that opened up all kinds of other questions because why would he fall asleep while someone who is just a work colleague was in his room? And it wasn’t that he’d dozed off while she was there working; he was in bed, his shoulders were bare and the other side of the bed looked slept in. Plus, she could see it was a recent picture because the scar on Charlie’s arm was clearly visible.
It wasn’t the right time to confront Charlie about it. The High 5 hack had made the UK national news so Maggie knew it was a huge crisis and although he didn’t own the company anymore, he would be trying his best to help them and could be putting himself under a lot of pressure. That Charlie wasn’t the person in that picture. He wouldn’t sleep with Jessica, Maggie knew that. And yet, based on the evidence, what other conclusion could she come to?
Maggie closed the email and decided that the only thing she could do was to put it out of her mind until she knew Charlie had time to talk. Yet again, it was so hard to deal with things when he wasn’t here and unfortunately, she was beginning to get used to it.
Alex had sent through a basic plan, along with costings, for building the infrastructure of the water lodges. It was possible, expensive but possible. Maggie emailed Rob Tanner to set up a meeting. He came back to her almost immediately and said that he was happy to make a site visit the following week to review the work that Ben had done and although she hadn’t told him what her reason for wanting to meet was, he said he was happy to make time to see her.
Rob looked at his iPad and then looked at the trees.
‘I thought Ben had marked the trees up. Are we in the right place?’
‘Sorry, I took the markers off because they’d been causing some concern with visitors. I didn’t think it would matter now that the locations are grid referenced?’ Maggie was sorry now that she’d taken off the markers. She didn’t want Rob to be annoyed with her before she pitched her idea. ‘Basically, the front couple of metres all along the beach were marked,’ she said, gesturing towards the edge of the woodland, ‘and the sections marked in yellow on your map are here.’ She walked along the tree line and stopped periodically to illustrate to Rob the positions of the lodge plots.
‘Okay, I can see now. It probably is affecting more of the woodland than I’d envisaged from the drawings,’ he said, and Maggie saw her opportunity to pitch.
‘I’ve been doing some research on an alternative.’
Rob pursed his lips, ‘We’ve already ruled out the other areas on the island.’
‘This isn’t strictly on the island,’ said Maggie, producing the artist’s impression that Alex had prepared.
‘Wow, that’s seriously inventive,’ said Rob, looking impressed, ‘but probably seriously expensive.’ He handed the picture back to Maggie who handed him the costings from Alex in return.
‘Yes, the infrastructure would cost more but we can charge more for such unusual accommodation, plus it has a much lower impact on the island itself.
Rob scrutinised the costings while Maggie studied his face, trying to guess what he thought.
‘It’s very interesting,’ he said after a minute of silence. ‘I think it’s worth considering.’
‘That’s brilliant, thank you so much!’ In her most optimistic daydreams about what Rob would think of the idea, he hadn’t been as keen as this.
‘Don’t get too excited. We’ll need to have a proper look at the proposal. I can understand that people want to preserve the woodland and I think that’s the best argument in favour of this plan, it just depends whether your costings stack up with what we think the increased revenue could be.’
Even with Rob’s caveat, Maggie was delighted that he had readily accepted the idea as a valid alternative and she felt sure that it was such an attractive idea, it would win over anyone else that might be involved with the final decision.
She saw Rob onto the ferry and headed over to the Scout campsite where the volunteers were clearing and tidying up after the last camp of the summer holidays. There was hardly any opportunity during the summer to cut back the rhododendrons and other leafy shrubs which encroached over some of the paths and if they didn’t cut it back now, it would get out of hand quite quickly.
‘Hi, Maggie!’ called Megan from her vantage point near the top of a ladder where she was pulling ivy off the roof of the toilet block.
‘Doing a good job there, Megan!’
‘How was the meeting with Rob Tanner?’ Megan asked, climbing down the ladder as Maggie came over.
‘Very positive.’ Maggie hadn’t told anyone about the water lodge idea but now that Rob was willing to consider it, it seemed like it would be okay to tell the volunteers that there was a different option. ‘I pitched him the idea of having the holiday lodges on the water instead of in the woods.’
‘Oh my god, that would be amazing!’ said Megan. ‘That makes the best use of the setting and saves the woodland, it’s perfect.’
‘It is,’ agreed Maggie, ‘but it’s also expensive. Whether they go for that option depends on whether they think they can make more money from the fact they are on the water, to justify the extra cost. But he did seem really keen.’ Maggie couldn’t help a huge grin spread over her face.
‘Well, fingers crossed. I’ve never heard of anything like that before. What made you think of that?’
‘Charlie came up with it when we went to Shell Bay for dinner. There are a couple of old houseboats moored over on Bramblebush Beach.’
‘And how are things with Charlie? You didn’t manage to spend much time with him when he was back.’
Maggie shrugged. ‘It’s just hard work with him not being here. There’s been a hack at High 5 so he’s helping with that but I could do with talking to him. His ex, Jessica sent me a photo of him in bed.’
