The Little B & B at Cove End

by Linda Mitchelmore

  ‘That sucks,’ Josh said. ‘Sorry. Anyway, I walked back should anyone be asking. You were right, Mae. I wasn’t in a fit state to drive, but I’ve sobered up now. I don’t know what Mae’s told you, Mrs Howard, but I was properly out of order. I apologise for that, frightening her and that.’

  ‘I appreciate that,’ Cara said. ‘But what with the burglary and the police being here, Mae and I haven’t had chance to talk about … well, whatever it was that happened between you tonight. Apart from the fact you’d had too much to drink and she felt she had to get away.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ Josh said, nodding. He looked more than a little embarrassed now, as though he was regretting coming. He ran his tongue around his lips as though he was nervous and they’d suddenly gone dry. ‘I’m sorry about what happened to your frock and that, Mae.’

  ‘You’re not the only one!’ Mae snapped.

  Cara flinched at the vehemence in her daughter’s words, but could understand her reason for it. This whole conversation was beginning to feel bizarre – as though they were all part of some stage play, a farce or something – and she considered inviting Josh to come on in, have a cup of coffee to sober up further before he went home, but it was getting late now and she was bone-tired.

  ‘Actually,’ Mae went on, ‘I don’t think the police should have let you just walk in here.’

  ‘WPC Maynard? My cousin? Amy?’ He said it as though he thought Mae ought to have known. ‘Her dad – my dad’s brother – is superintendent down Plymouth way. I told Amy we were going out, and I’d seen their car and thought I’d just pop in and see how things are. So, what’s happened here? Just a straightforward burglary or …

  ‘Like burglaries are just normal, right?’ Mae snapped.

  ‘Darling …’ Cara began. She was about to admonish Mae for being rude, snappy, but decided against it. Of course her daughter was angry about not just the burglary, but what Josh had done as well. She would allow her to express that anger, rather than have it fester inside.

  ‘Have you been hurt, Mae? Mrs Howard?’ Josh asked as though neither she nor Mae had spoken. He walked into the room without being asked. ‘Has much been stolen?’

  ‘A fair bit,’ Cara said.

  ‘Sorry,’ Josh said. ‘Looks a bit of a mess in here.’

  ‘It does,’ Cara said, and left it at that. There were gaps on the dresser where the silver had been and drawers had been left open, cushions scattered, and the seat pads of the couches pulled out as the Hines had riffled swiftly through her home. They were a mess – her and Mae. All she wanted in that moment was for Josh to leave so that she and Mae could take a shower and get to bed. She might suggest they share a room tonight because if Mae felt as shaky as she did, she probably wouldn’t want to sleep alone. ‘But it will get better.’

  ‘Like I said, I saw the police car and well, I wasn’t exactly a gent earlier to Mae, Mrs Howard, and I thought Mae might have made a complaint or something.’

  ‘I guessed that might be the case,’ Cara said.

  ‘Well, now you know I didn’t,’ Mae said. ‘Not as entirely altruistic as checking to see we were okay, but—’

  ‘Mae,’ Cara interrupted, ‘can we just leave this? I’m tired, you’re tired, and I think Josh has had as much of a shock as any of us.’

  Cara knew Josh was popular with the girls and, if rumour had it, some older women too, and it can’t have been easy for him having a fifteen-year-old squaring up to him, refusing to do his bidding, although why Cara was feeling sympathetic towards him she had no idea – tiredness probably.

  ‘Yeah,’ Josh said. He hung his head. ‘Sorry. You know, for being a jerk earlier and also about the robbery. Hope they catch whoever did it. Have they cleaned you out?’

  There wasn’t a lot to be ‘cleaned out’ seeing as Mark had pretty much done that.

  ‘Pretty much,’ Cara said with a yawn – the last thing she wanted was to pursue this conversation, but poor Josh was looking genuinely contrite now, and concerned. ‘Mae’s laptop. Her jewellery. And a fair bit of my stuff’s gone as well.’

  ‘Look, Mrs Howard,’ Josh said. ‘I can see you want me to go. I can see you’re both pretty shook up and tired by events. It’s true I saw the police car and panicked a bit, wondering what it was Mae might have said about me earlier, but I was on my way here anyway. When I sobered up, I remembered stuff. So I’ve got something I have to tell you. Before Mae hears it in the village. Bailey Lucas is spreading rumours. Look, can I speak to you on your own, Mrs. Howard?’

  ‘No!’ Mae shrieked. ‘Everyone treats me like a baby and I’m not. Anything you have to say to Mum you can say to me. Right, Mum?’

  ‘What do you want to tell me?’ Cara asked.

  ‘Not in front of Mae,’ Josh persisted.

  ‘Oh, stuff it!’ Mae said. ‘That Bailey Lucas is just making trouble because I finished with him. I only went out with him a couple of times anyway so it’s not like we were an item! Whatever he’s saying it’s probably nothing much, nothing even worth staying here to listen to anyway. I’m going to have a shower and wash my hair because the thought that strangers have been through my stuff is making me feel dirty. Get it? Let me know when I’m old enough to be in your company, Josh Maynard!’

  Cara watched her daughter go, waited until she heard the shower running. Josh put his hands in the pockets of his jeans and took them out again at least half a dozen times.

  ‘So?’ Cara asked when the shower had been running for a good two minutes – Mae would be in there at least fifteen minutes.

  ‘Bailey Lucas is saying that Mae’s dad had a huge gambling habit and owed money and that half the goods from this house are in pawn shops all over Devon or sold to whoever would buy them. Pub landlords mostly.’

  Cara put her hands to her mouth. What could she say? She’d kept Mark’s gambling from Mae until now. But even she hadn’t known about the selling of her household goods in pubs until Rosie had told her. But pawn shops? Cara didn’t even know where there was one – or what you had to do to use one. But she didn’t doubt what Josh was saying was true – Mark’s addiction had been so great she’d often wondered if he’d sell his own body to fund it. Why, she wondered, was all this coming out now, two years after Mark’s death? Respect, perhaps, for when she was newly widowed had stopped people saying anything before, but now time had passed, tongues were loosening up again?

  ‘Do you have proof Bailey Lucas is saying these things?’

  ‘Well, um …’

  ‘You haven’t, have you?’

  ‘Must be him. We met him in Meg Smythson’s earlier and he was, like, confrontational. His sister, Xia, works behind the bar …’

  ‘That’s not proof, Josh,’ Cara said. ‘And I think it would be a good idea not to spread that particular rumour yourself. But it is true my husband gambled.’

  ‘But Mae doesn’t know?’

  ‘No. Not yet.’

  ‘I won’t say a word,’ Josh said. ‘But she needs to know. Soon.’

  ‘Of course. But I have to find the right moment. Come with me.’ Josh followed as she led the way into the kitchen. ‘You probably noticed the patches on the walls that hadn’t faded like the rest of it … where paintings had been. It’s the same in here. Mark took the paintings, little by little, to sell them to fund his gambling. He left me – us, Mae and me – choosing gambling over his family. And it seems the Hines have taken what Mark left behind: my mother’s silver, which was valuable.’

  Cara knew she might be taking a risk telling Josh, but he seemed more man than boy. And he was the son of a vicar. He had to be used to his father being told things that would go no further.

  ‘Lowlifes,’ Josh said.

  ‘More than,’ Cara agreed. ‘But I can’t risk telling Mae any of that, Josh …’

  But then Mae came back into the kitchen in the towelling robe that had been her dad’s – her comfort robe she’d called it, wrapping it around her the night Cara had told her that her dad had been kille
d, and using it at every opportunity since; it drowned her, making her look so vulnerable, so small somehow, although she was already five feet six inches tall, almost as tall as Cara. Mae fiddled with the towel wound around her wet hair, loosening it then winding it tight again.

  ‘Can’t tell me what?’ Mae said.

  ‘That you’re very beautiful when you’re angry,’ Josh said, grinning at them both. ‘The biggest cliché of them all but hey, it’s true at the moment. Forgive?’ he finished, making a prayer gesture with his hands to Mae, and Cara remembered how Meg Smythson had said Josh could charm the birds from the trees. Was that a flutter of Mae’s eyelashes?

  ‘I might consider it,’ Mae said.

  ‘Another chance?’ Josh asked.

  ‘Try me?’ Mae said, which served for Cara’s heart to plummet to somewhere down around her feet that she hadn’t given Mark another chance – all this wouldn’t be happening if she had. ‘As long as alcohol isn’t involved.’

  ‘Not a drop will pass my lips,’ Josh said. ‘That was one wake-up call tonight.’

  ‘Yeah, but just remember,’ Mae said, ‘that actions speak louder than words. Right?’

  Josh’s eyes widened in surprise at Mae’s words, which made Cara want to laugh. But how proud she was in that moment of her feisty daughter, coming back from her shock and commanding the situation.

  ‘Indeed,’ Josh said, pulling himself up tall, and looking directly at Mae. ‘I was wondering if you fancy going sailing next weekend?’

  Mae shrugged. I dunno, the shrug said, but Cara could tell by the light in Mae’s eyes and knowing how she loved sailing with Mark that she was considering it.

  It seemed Josh had come to that conclusion too because he said, ‘If, you know, you haven’t got any gear any more you can borrow a lifejacket from my sister. And even her Helly Hansen. She won’t mind. That okay with you, Mrs Howard?’

  ‘As long as Mae’s comfortable with it,’ Cara said. Rosie’s voice came into her head asking her what the hell she was thinking agreeing to let her daughter go off with someone who was obviously a professional charmer, because hadn’t he turned the situation around, barging in scared out of his wits about what Mae might have told the police about him, and when he found she’d said nothing at all and that Cove End had been robbed by the Hines, he’d come over all concerned for her and Mae to suit his own ends? ‘Mae?’

  ‘Yeah. Fine,’ Mae said. ‘Maybe I need the diversion? Text me, eh? Saturday or Sunday. Whichever’s best for tides and weather.’

  Cara let out an audible sigh of relief that Mae had water safety uppermost in her mind.

  ‘Yeah, will do,’ Josh said. ‘Better let you get your beauty sleep, then. Not that you need it, Mae.’

  ‘Oh give over, Maynard,’ Mae laughed. ‘I’m getting the drift. You’re sorry. You’re making amends, and I think you might be making my mother sick with all your smarmy charm, but it doesn’t fool me. Any more and I’ll change my mind about the weekend.’

  Mae yawned theatrically and it was all Cara could do not to burst out laughing. Mae might not have a father around to look out for her any more, but she was learning how to stick up for herself and Cara had to be thankful for that.

  ‘You’re too kind,’ Josh said, laughing. ‘I’ll see myself out.’

  And then he was gone.

  ‘You can change your mind if you want to, darling,’ Cara said. ‘You know, when you’ve had more time to think things through. If you think Josh might just be saying things he wants us to hear?’

  Mae sighed heavily.

  ‘Is this a lecture?’ she asked.

  ‘No, but a lot’s happened here tonight, and I wouldn’t want you to make a rash decision because of it.’

  ‘I haven’t. Okay?’ Mae’s eyebrows were practically meeting in the middle in indignation. And then she smiled at Cara, a broad beaming smile that lit up her face. ‘Why would I not want to see him again? You saw him. He’s like, lush!’

  Cara couldn’t think of a thing to say about that. Yes, Josh Maynard was a looker. And the word lush could mean more than drop-dead desirable – not that Cara was going to mention that right now.

  ‘Okay,’ Cara said. ‘You’ve got school in the morning. Up the wooden hill?’

  ‘When I’ve dried my hair.’ Mae roughly rubbed the towel over her hair. ‘And, Mum … can I, like, sleep in your room tonight?’

  ‘Of course,’ Cara said, relieved that she wouldn’t now need to ask that same question of Mae and get, perhaps, a flat refusal for the asking. Tonight had brought mother and daughter a little closer together. An ill wind and all that …

  ‘Just tonight, you understand?’

  ‘Of course,’ Cara said again. Even the fact that the Hines had violated her space by searching through drawers and wardrobes, and even under the bed, couldn’t take away her joy that she would have Mae lying close to her and could reach and give her reassurance in the night if she needed it.

  Chapter Six

  In the cool light of day, with Mae now gone to school, and time to reflect on what had happened the night before, Cara set about getting the house back to how it had been before Hines had turned up. It was almost therapeutic finding a tin of paint and glossing over where skirting boards had been scuffed. She was glad she’d chosen matt white paint for all the walls in the house and it was just a matter of taking some cleansing cream to grubby bits and giving tired-looking patches a quick touch-up. The vacuum was put into overdrive – not that Cara ever let the house look too run-down. She got the polisher from the garage and mercifully there was a can of unopened polish so she waxed the parquet in the hall.

  It felt good to be doing something physical and by lunchtime Cara was pleasantly tired but ridiculously pleased with her efforts.

  She began to sing.

  ‘I’m going to wash those Hines right out of my hair …’ She giggled as she paraphrased the famous line from South Pacific.

  A quick tomato sandwich with lashings of black pepper for lunch and Cara was ready to tackle the soft furnishings. Cushion covers were whipped off and put through the washing machine, and were soon dry on the line and back on again. She even vacuumed the curtains in the sitting room, before spray-polishing every surface to within an inch of its life.

  Then she went outside, rang her own doorbell as though she were a guest, and came back in again.

  She tried to see Cove End as a stranger might see it and decided it was more than okay – it was a very lovely home. A much-loved home. Lived in. And it would more than do for her next guests. The flowers in the garden – so many varieties – were coming into their own now and Cara made a mental note to put small posies in the bedrooms and a big display of whatever flowers and greenery she could find in the hall. It was the little touches, she told herself, that mattered. Chocolate. Yes, chocolates. She had a whole pile of glass dishes she’d saved from when she, Mark and Mae had had chocolate mousse or panna cotta or some other treat from the supermarket for pudding and she would use those to put a few chocolates on the bedside tables. A welcome.

  Cara ran up the stairs, surprised but pleased beyond belief that a drama of sorts had made her more positive than ever to make a go of her B&B. She showered off the effort of her mad activity, changed into a pair of cropped leggings and a navy linen shirt and came back downstairs to ring Rosie.

  ‘Rosie, have you got a moment?’ Cara asked. She’d texted Rosie after breakfast but her text hadn’t been answered, not that that was unusual if Rosie had a salon full of clients booked in. She was using the landline now.

  ‘Half an hour before the next client. What’s wrong? I can tell something is. You sound a bit breathy.’

  ‘I’ve been all domestic goddess this morning.’

  ‘Spare me!’ Rosie laughed. ‘But that’s not all, is it?’

  Cara sighed. She could never get anything past Rosie really – her friend knew her too well. It would take half an hour to tell Rosie everything – about the theft of her property, how Mae pra
ctically freaked out coming home to find Cara missing and her room trashed, and how things were now with her and Mae, and about Josh, and the police going all over the house and the fingerprinting and everything.

  ‘Well, the précis is that I was an idiot last night and I left two strangers who knocked on the door asking for a bed for the night alone while I ran to the corner shop to get the wherewithal for breakfast … and …’ Just talking about it all was making her hyperventilate.

  ‘Shit, Cara, you didn’t? No, don’t answer that, ‘cos you obviously did. What’s missing?’

  ‘Silver, a bit of cash I had in the back of a kitchen drawer for emergencies, Mae’s laptop … amongst other things. But the thing is, I can’t be certain whether these lowlifes – they told me they were called Hine, but that’s no doubt stretching the truth – took my jewellery, or if Mark did. Sold it down the pub or something. Mae’s boyfriend told me that there’s a rumour going around that Mark had sold stuff in the pub and other places so …’

  ‘Okay, okay. I’m getting the drift. Why didn’t you ring me last night? I could have come over. No, scratch that, I would have come over. Look, Cara, I’m cross for you and could strangle these people with a length of barbed wire, but I’ve got a client coming soon, so shall I come over when I’ve dealt with that?’

  ‘No, it’s okay. But I was wondering if you know if there are any pawn shops in the area?’

  ‘You want to know what?’ Rosie yelled into the phone. She sounded shocked.

  ‘Pawn shops,’ Cara said. ‘Do you know if there are any pawn shops in the area?’

  ‘Cara, sweetheart, are you okay?’ Rosie spoke slowly, her voice guarded. ‘I don’t know how that’s going to help. I know this is an area we’ve not talked about now Mark’s no longer with you – you know, sex and the lack of it – but, well, looking at porn won’t help, I don’t think. Not really. It would be a bit like someone holding an open bottle of Bollinger in front of you and then ramming the cork back in without giving you any. It’s the emotional side of things you need. And yes, I know this is a woman talking who puts physical before emotional every time, but I’m not you, or you me. Lecture over.’