Page 114 of Kate and Clara's Curious Cornish Craft Shop
‘Yes, we took holidays down here with my mother.’
‘That explains the graffiti in the cupboard! We thought it was your mother, but she seemed a bit old to be playing in a cupboard under the stairs.’
‘No, that was my Maggie,’ Susan says. ‘She was obsessed with Harry Potter at the time – still is a bit, I guess, even though she’s almost thirty now. So youdoknow the house then?’
‘Yes,’ I admit. ‘We did visit with the estate agent when it came up for sale.’
‘But why?’
‘It’s an odd thing, but Jack and I met because we’d both bought things that had come from that house. You asked the owner of Noah’s Ark antique shop to do a house clearance for you, didn’t you?’
Susan nods. ‘Yes, it took a number of years but we began to realise that Mom’s forgetfulness was becoming more serious. She was forgetting to feed herself and wash, and often she didn’t seem to know what year it was, let alone what day. She resisted moving out of the house, of course. She was stubborn, as I said earlier, but we had to make her for her own good. Maggie, my daughter, said she would look after her at her house in Penzance as there was more care assistance available there, so Mom didn’t have to go into a retirement home, but how long she can do that I’m not sure. She’s getting pretty bad these days. Have either of you ever had anyone close to you suffer from dementia?’
We shake our heads.
‘I’m glad. I hope you never do. It’s truly awful to witness, but like I said earlier there are some brighter days. I’ve been staying with Maggie while the house is cleared and sold, so she doesn’t have all that to deal with as well as Mom. We didn’t want to sell the house, but if Mom does need specialist care then that will help to pay for it as it’s incredibly expensive. You said you bought some things from the house?’
‘Yes, I believe I have your grandmother’s old sewing machine.’
‘And I have Arty’s old easel,’ Jack says.
‘You do! Oh how wonderful. I’m glad they went to good homes. My mother always said they were special. It’s a real shame we couldn’t keep everything, but that house held a lot of stuff and a lot of memories too,’ she says wistfully. ‘That’s why we brought my mother back here not so long ago. She was desperate to see the place again, so we let her – well, her memories – lead us around St Felix. She took us to some strange places.’
‘Like where?’ I ask, wondering if I already knew the answer to my question.
‘She took us to the end of the harbour up by the lighthouse? And then along the coastal path. My mother’s mind may be failing her but her body certainly isn’t! Then to some holiday flats that I think might once have held Arty’s studio judging by what she was saying, and afterwards, and this is really odd, to one of the old fisherman’s cottages. She just stood outside looking at it, and then started muttering something really strange. She kept saying something about Freddie and Freddie’s paintings. We had no idea what she meant?’
I glance at Jack. He looks as white as I suddenly feel.
‘She got quite upset,’ Susan continues, ‘so we took her for a cup of tea in the outdoor café, up by the Lyle Gallery. She calmed down a bit, so we thought everything was okay, but then she saw a poster for an art exhibition that was on at the gallery and I swear I’ve never seen my mother move so fast. It was like she was a young girl again.’
‘What happened then?’ I ask, knowing almost exactly what had taken place. Julian had mentioned an incident at the gallery, and knowing what I knew now I was sure this was going to be it.
‘We paid to go in and she headed straight for the temporary exhibition they had on. That’s when she went very quiet. She stared at the paintings for a short while and then she began to cry. She broke down completely in the middle of the gallery, sobbing. We tried to console her and explain to some silly woman who came over to see what was happening that she had dementia and didn’t really know what she was doing, but she asked us to leave as we were disturbing the other visitors. There were only a couple of people in there, for goodness sake!’
I bet that was Ophelia, I think. Stupid stuck-up—
‘And that’s when my mother truly lost it,’ Susan continues, before I have time to finish my thought. ‘She turned from inconsolable to incensed in seconds. She started shouting about how this guy’s paintings were stolen and that they weren’t by him, that they were by this Freddie again. We could barely control her. Like I say, it’s not my mother’s body letting her down at all – she’s still very strong. Eventually my daughter and I managed to calm down both her and the gallery staff, and we were escorted from the building.’
‘Did your mother say anything else?’ I ask. ‘About Freddie?’
Susan shakes her head. ‘She’s barely said a word since. She’s retreated back into her own world. She hardly communicates with us. It’s heartbreaking, and I know it’s something to do with this Freddie person, but she won’t talk to us about it. When we ask she just clams up, so when you phoned me out of the blue and mentioned his name, I knew I had to come and find out what you knew – to see if we could piece this mystery together between us.’
‘I think we can do better than that,’ I tell a distressed-looking Susan. ‘I think we might be able to solve the mysteryandput right a wrong that’s been kept secret for far too long.’
Thirty-five
‘Thanks for driving,’ Jack says, as we travel together down towards Penzance in my battered old Land Rover. ‘I’ve not got around to getting myself a permanent car yet, and as you can imagine it has to be aspecialone.’ He rolls his eyes as he says the word special.
‘That’s okay,’ I tell him, ‘I don’t mind. I don’t really drive all that much either. This poor thing sits in a locked garage most of the time. Cars aren’t really necessary when you spend nearly all your days in a little seaside fishing town like we do.’
‘No, that’s true. I guess that’s why I haven’t really needed one yet. Luckily all my stock is delivered to me, and the public transport around here is quite good if you need to travel further afield.’
‘How do you get on with that?’ I ask, overtaking a slow-moving tractor and trailer. ‘Public transport, I mean?’
Jack shrugs. ‘Okay, it can be a hassle if you have to ask for ramps and the like on trains and taxis, but a lot of buses have steps that lower automatically these days, so that’s a bonus.’
I nod. ‘I expect it’s the things you don’t think about that are the hardest.’
