Page 39 of Kate and Clara's Curious Cornish Craft Shop
Arty, competently, not only carries Maggie and her chair down the hill towards his easel but guides Clara too by holding on to her hand so she can make her way safely over the grass towards the edge of the cliff.
Now they all sit together looking out over the rocks that hug this part of the St Felix coastline and towards the sea that today delicately licks the edges of the granite but on a less calm afternoon would try to batter it into submission.
‘I like your painting,’ Maggie says, peering intently at Arty’s easel.
‘Thank you. Probably not one of my best, but it’s awork in progressas us artists like to say when things aren’t going too well.’
‘Is this your full-time job?’ Clara asks, in a tone that suggests it can’t possibly be.
‘It is.’
‘And do yousellmuch?’
Arty grins. ‘It may surprise you to know I do. It keeps the wolf from the door anyway. I teach a bit as well,’ he adds.
‘Would you teach me, Arty?’ Maggie pipes up. ‘I’ve always wanted to learn how to paint!’
‘Maggie!’ Clara admonishes. ‘Don’t be so presumptuous. I’m sure Arthur is far too busy to have you as a pupil.’
‘Quite the contrary,’ Arty says, eyeing Clara meaningfully. ‘It would be my absolute pleasure teaching you how to paint, young Maggie.’
The pictures suddenly become blurry again and the colours, so sharp and vivid only a moment ago, spin around in a maelstrom, a bit like a child’s kaleidoscope toy before the pattern takes shape. Our brief trip back to 1950s St Felix has ended once more.
‘It’s like reading a single chapter of a book a day at a time,’ I say, still staring wistfully at the painting and the embroidery, ‘except you’re not allowed to read more – even though you desperately want to.’
‘Or watching Netflix and only being allowed one episode when all you want to do is binge-watch the whole series,’ Jack says, looking at me.
I turn towards him.
‘I feel my slightly more … poetic analogy is a little more appropriate to the situation and the time, don’t you?’
Jack shrugs. ‘Probably. It’s still the same thing though, I want to know what happens next.’
‘Me too. I wonder if any more works of art will magically create themselves now we’ve seen these first two – I’ve a feeling there’s so much more to this story.’
‘Yup, Arty obviously has the hots for Clara.’
My face screws up in distaste. ‘Has the hotsfor her? This isn’t some lascivious made-for-television movie, you know. I sense a delicate love story is going to develop between these two star-crossed lovers.’
‘One,’ Jack says raising his eyebrows, ‘how do you know they’re going to be star-crossed? They could get it on in the next painting!’ He grins at my horrified expression. ‘And two, what the hell does “lascivious” mean?’
I shake my head. ‘Lascivious means salacious, indecent or vulgar, even. And I hardly think they’re going toget it onas you put it. Clara is obviously a very well-brought-up lady – you can tell by both her clothes and her manners.’
‘That’s always the worst sort.’ Jack winks. ‘Okay, okay!’ he says, holding his hands up in surrender. ‘I’ll stop. They all seem like good people from what we’ve seen so far. Clara reminds me a lot of you actually.’
‘She does?’ I’m not sure whether to be pleased by his comparison or not. Jack’s opinion of Clara so far seems to be as far away from mine as possible.
‘Yeah, she’s a classy lady, who holds herself in reserve, and yet I suspect there’s a much more complex side to her.’
‘Go on?’ I ask, intrigued.
‘She’s obviously very protective of her daughter, as you are of Molly, and we don’t know this for sure yet, but I suspect she might be a single mother too.’
‘Why do you think that?’ I’d wondered this too. We hadn’t seen or heard any mention of Maggie’s father thus far. ‘It would be very unusual back then, unless she was widowed in the war, of course.’
Jack smiles at me, in a kindly way this time, instead of teasingly. ‘Trust you to think of the honourable answer. What if she got pregnant accidentally, and the father abandoned her.’
Then she would be more like me than Jack knew.
