Framed in Cornwall

by Janie Bolitho

  ‘Mr Meecham, come away now.’

  ‘What are you going to do with her?’

  ‘We’re going to put on a clean nightdress,’ the nurse explained tactfully. ‘I’m really sorry, you were so close to your sister, weren’t you?’ She touched his hand, knowing there was nothing he could say. ‘Is there someone we can telephone to take you home?’

  Fred shook his head. Home. The word was meaningless now. He shuffled out of the ward, turning back too late because the curtains had been redrawn around Marigold’s bed. No! he wanted to scream, but he knew it was no use. Down in the carpark he sat cocooned in the car watching the rain stream down the windscreen. It was as if with the final closing of Marigold’s eyes his own had been opened. He saw himself for the hypocrite he was, his whole life a lie. Yes, he believed in and prayed to God but he had broken many of the commandments. He took no comfort in the fact that none of it had been for himself; it did not lessen the wrongness of the deeds. Had Dorothy been right all along? Now was not the time to think of Dorothy.

  He drove home and sat in the flat with the lights off, his head in his hands. If he had been a drinking man he reckoned he would have got drunk. But he wasn’t, it was one of the vices he did not have.

  Later that evening when Fred went downstairs to answer the summons of the bell at the side of the shop door he initially thought that it might be a customer in urgent need of something. Then he wondered if his thoughts had somehow transmitted themselves to the rest of the world. Why else should the police be standing on his doorstep? All that other business was years ago.

  ‘What a great welcome. Cheers.’ He took a sip of wine. He had been expecting Rose to behave coldly towards him. Pulling out a chair he sat down and leaned back. Rose wondered what it was that made people more comfortable in her kitchen than anywhere else in the house. ‘Now, are you going to tell me what it is that might or might not be important?’ Quite relaxed, he crossed his legs.

  Rose explained about the painting, adding the alternative possibilities she had worked out for herself.

  ‘But the others are still hanging, you say?’

  ‘Yes. And there’re a couple that are worth a few bob.’

  Jack was thoughtful. ‘So why not take them all? Look, Rose, a thief isn’t going to bother to swap a painting.’

  ‘Why not? What if he knows Dorothy can’t see too well, what then?’

  ‘You have a point, but how would he have had access to her bedroom?’

  ‘You’re supposed to be the detective.’

  ‘Yes, but you think like one. Answer me this one, then. If the drugs were not self-administered, how come she didn’t notice them being forced down her throat or taste them in something or other?’

  Rose shrugged expressively, causing her hair to fall forward. Jack reached out to push it back, touching her face as he did so. Rose’s head jerked up, startling Jack.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Alcohol.’

  ‘Alcohol?’

  ‘You said the police surgeon noticed the smell, I did too. Dorothy didn’t drink. Well, not really. A glass of sherry on special occasions. If someone gave her, say, whisky, she wouldn’t have noticed.’ Her face was animated. Whatever Jack Pearce decided, she was going to discover the truth. ‘Perhaps whoever it was didn’t mean to kill her, just knock her out for a while. Perhaps they didn’t realise she wasn’t used to drink or medication of any sort.’

  Jack was only half listening. What had happened to the paracetamol bottle? If it had contained the means of Dorothy’s death there might be fingerprints. ‘Rose, as I said, I’d already decided to ask a few questions. I think I ought to start tonight. But tell me one thing, you’re certain that what you saw the first time was an original?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Then it was worth a considerable sum and, with the way things were in the county at the moment, enough to consider murdering for. Fishing-boats were being decommissioned whilst foreign ships trawled British waters and the Government as well as the EU thumbed its nose, South Crofty, the last working tin mine, was on the verge of shutting down unless something truly drastic happened and the towns and villages that had relied upon both industries were fast losing their identity as the once proud miners and fishermen became no more than statistics in the unemployment figures. Jack ground his teeth. And the beef crisis was causing farmers to tear their hair out. Their three main industries were being wiped out and Cornwall, his birthright, was being sanitised for the sake of the emmets who littered the place with their fast food containers and ignored the signs telling them not to feed the gulls and who preferred the tourist attractions and visitor centres to the unspeakable beauty all around them. He was angry, with himself as well as the world, because he was powerless to change the way things were going, angry also with the people who brought to Cornwall or expected to find here all that they had come to escape. One bloody great theme park, that’s what we’ll be, he thought. Youngsters were moving away because the average wage would have been laughed at elsewhere. Yes, he decided, an original Stanhope Forbes was definitely worth killing for.

  ‘Jack?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Rose, I was thinking.’ The scowl left his face because of the concern showing in hers. ‘Well, not thinking exactly, more like conducting a mental diatribe against the human race.’

  ‘Me included?’

  ‘No, Rose, never you. I’ll have to go. I’m sorry. I hope you didn’t go to too much trouble with the meal. What was it anyway?’

  ‘Monkfish with fennel.’

  He groaned. ‘Just my luck. I’ll make it up to you.’

  ‘No need.’ Just get to the bottom of this, Jack, she thought as she bolted the kitchen door behind him.

  ‘Shall I come back later?’ he called through the partly open window.

  Rose looked down. ‘No, not tonight.’

  She might as well eat, and eat a proper meal. As she slid the monk into the pan she tried to see if she could be wrong, if there had been anything different about Dorothy on her last few visits. There hadn’t, not unless she counted that business with the envelope. ‘Oh, no!’ The fish slice clattered to the floor. All that fussing around with the envelope – had that been a pantomime she was meant to remember? The last time she had been to see her, Dorothy had slipped something into an A5 envelope, written ostentatiously on the front, sealed it and tossed it into a kitchen drawer in a rather dramatic manner. Surely it wasn’t a suicide note? There’s only one way to find out, she decided. But it was too late that night.

  Fred Meecham’s sister, Marigold, outlived Dorothy Pengelly by only a couple of days. Naturally it was Doreen Clarke who rang Rose the following morning to tell her. ‘I know you never met her, but you know Fred and I thought you might want to write a note or something. The shop’s shut, he’s put a sign on the door. It’ll be a double blow for him. First Dorothy, now this. It’s awful, isn’t it, both of them going in a week?’

  Going. Typical Doreen, Rose thought. If there was a euphemism available Doreen would use it. Rose had met Fred Meecham on several occasions when he had stopped at Dorothy’s place to deliver a case of dog food or a box of heavy groceries, and once or twice she had been into his shop. With her painter’s eye, in the way she did with all interesting faces, Rose had committed the details of his to her mind. He had a shock of red hair which seemed to have a life of its own. With his washed-out blue irises and pallid complexion he was far from attractive but his lean body and sensual mouth made him seem so. His Cornish accent was not pronounced and bespoke his Truro origins. Dorothy had told Rose about the sister, Marigold, and had said she thought it was time that Fred faced up to the gravity of the situation. ‘He won’t allow himself to believe she’s dying. And he should have more sense than to think money can solve everything,’ she had said. ‘It’s going to hit him hard when it happens.’ At that point Dorothy had clammed up, realising – too late – that it was another painful reminder for Rose.

  ‘I’ll be going to the funeral,’
Doreen continued. ‘I’m sure most of Fred’s customers will be there. I wonder if he’ll close the shop that day, too? Out of respect, like. Dear me, it’s ages since I’ve been to one, do people still wear black? Doesn’t seem right somehow, not for someone so young. She was only in her forties.’

  ‘Wear whatever you feel comfortable in, Doreen,’ Rose answered, allowing her chatter to drift over her head. Face to face she enjoyed her company but it was often difficult to end a telephone conversation. Rose finally replaced the receiver. Having met Fred on so few occasions she wondered if it was appropriate to send a message of condolence. On the other hand they had both been friends of Dorothy so there was a mutual, if tenuous bond. She got out a pen and some paper.

  Twice during the course of the day Rose heard the telephone ringing but she did not bother to answer it – she rarely did if she was working. There were many jobs to catch up on and she wanted them all out of the way before she sat down and made some serious plans, which she intended doing that evening.

  Later she carefully rewrote the note to Fred Meecham, realising as she did so what the many people who had written to her during her bereavement had gone through. Almost satisfied she put down her pen. The phone rang again. Unthinkingly she reached out a hand and picked up the receiver, resting it between her shoulder and her ear. ‘Hello?’ she said cheerfully.

  ‘Keep out of it. Just keep out of it or you’re dead.’

  ‘But …? Who are you?’ But the line had been disconnected. Rose sat very still as she tried to work out if she had heard that voice before. She did not think so. And keep out of what? Dialling 1471 she learned that the caller had withheld their number. She was not easily frightened but that evening she turned on the lights before they were strictly needed.

  Fear turned to anger. She would not be intimidated by anyone, least of all an anonymous caller. Despite her intentions not to do as Jack had requested and speak to the Pengelly family, she changed her mind. Whoever had threatened her knew something which could only be connected with Dorothy’s death. But why the threat? What had she done to induce it? Nothing, as far as she knew. Not yet.

  6

  The unexpectedness of his mother’s death had shocked Peter Pengelly more than the event itself. When Gwen had told him, he had had to get out of the house. The overwhelming grief he felt was genuine, worsened by his sense of guilt. None of this hit him at first. Since then the police had been back, wanting to know if Dorothy had complained of feeling ill or depressed or if she had expressed any financial worries or any worries whatsoever. Shamefully Peter had admitted that they did not see much of his mother.

  For the first time in his life he viewed his childhood days objectively. He had never been as close to his mother as Martin and, since the day he had started school, he had steadily grown away from her. He wondered if this was because Martin had remained at home for another two years and therefore he was jealous or if he had always suspected his brother was the favourite.

  As a child and a young man Peter had found his mother odd, even eccentric, although he wasn’t sure why. She was a good deal older than most of the mothers who collected their children from school, some no more than girls themselves who had married at sixteen or seventeen. Peter could have borne the age discrepancy if Dorothy had not gone out of her way to disregard generally held opinions and to distance herself from his friends’ mothers who huddled in groups outside the school gates.

  On the death of his father her grief had seemed disproportionate. His limited experience of such things told him that people quietly wiped away the tears and suffered stoically until a normal life could be resumed. Not so his mother. She had sobbed and screamed and shouted, waving her fists in the air and railing against God. Now and then she had thrown things, but never at her sons. With them she had been loving and understanding. In the privacy of their home Peter was able to shut out these scenes by going to his room. To drown out the sounds he would play his transistor radio loudly and pretend it wasn’t happening. He did not know how to cope with such an excess of pain.

  Martin had either been impervious to it or had instinctively known how to deal with it. He would remain at his mother’s side, quietly playing with his toys or struggling with homework he could not understand. When Dorothy was calmer he would climb on to her knee and stroke her face.

  It became embarrassing for Peter at school. Dorothy had inherited their father’s car and she had learned how to drive it. Instead of coming in on the bus to meet them she would sit behind the wheel, parked some distance away safely out of reach of any words of sympathy that might have been offered. This alienated her from the other mothers further.

  Then one day, as if some dramatic catalyst had occurred whilst they were all asleep, Peter came downstairs to find his mother cooking a proper breakfast and humming as she did so. Neither his father nor God were mentioned again and an old photograph of Arthur Pengelly, which Peter had not known existed, appeared on Dorothy’s bedside table, framed in wood.

  And now she was gone and he could understand what she must have felt but it was too late to tell her so. Bitterly he wished he had spent more time with her, told her that he loved her, because now he realised that he did. All those years she had lived up at the house, alone after Martin left, and he had no idea what went on in her head or if she thought of him at all.

  He had used Gwen and the children as an excuse, as a reason for being too busy to visit. He loved them, too, of course. Gwen could be overpowering at times and usually got her own way. She also had a far greater need for sex than he did, which wore him out. Her insecurity in such matters was exhausting. He tried not to disappoint her but it was difficult at times, and he knew she bought the underwear because she thought it would please him. He did not have the heart to say it didn’t matter, that he did not expect her to be like a film star all the time. He would have liked to come home one day and find her in a pair of jeans, her hair tousled, like other young mothers. He suspected Gwen was compensating for what she considered to be his own mother’s sloppy ways, trying to prove what a good wife she was by comparison. She had nothing to fear, there was no competition.

  He had walked miles on that Friday evening, tiring himself physically but unable to still his thoughts. Very quietly he had let himself into the almost silent house. The children were in bed but a few faint sounds came from the kitchen. He had sat in his armchair in the small lounge and leant back against the cushions. Without warning his throat began to ache and hot tears filled his eyes. He had not cried for years and he wondered if his own tears were a substitute for the ones neither his wife nor his children had shed. It was a sad reflection on them all that they had hardly known their grandmother.

  Gwen had opened the door, a dishcloth in her hand. ‘I thought I heard you come in,’ she said gently. ‘I’ve kept our meal hot.’ She hesitated in the doorway. Peter’s shoulders were bowed and she did not know how to go about comforting him because she was afraid of another rebuffal. She was glad the children could not see him like this. ‘Peter?’ She advanced slowly.

  Reaching out blindly he had pulled her to him, sobbing wetly into the thin cotton of her dress. Without warning his grip tightened and Gwen fell on top of him. Before she could protest he had tugged at her buttons and pulled the dress open.

  ‘Peter,’ she had protested, but it was useless, he had pinned her down and was inside her, moving frantically as if the act could expurgate all the guilt and sorrow he felt. Gwen was too stunned to struggle. It had never been like that before.

  When it was over Peter sat up and ran a hand through his hair without looking at her. ‘It’s what you’ve always wanted, isn’t it? Just like you’ve always wanted my mother dead.’ He turned to see her face, her mouth open in horror. Getting to his feet he adjusted his clothes and left the house again with no idea where he was going.

  Tireder still, he had walked fast and without thought, trying to numb all emotions. Heedless of the dewlike moisture which clung to his clothes he hea
ded towards the soft white sand of the Towans and walked down to the water’s edge where it was damp beneath his feet and the soles of his shoes left impressions in the sand. It seemed as if he might walk straight into the sea.

  The rhythmic slap of the shallow waves against the beach had soothed him. The tide was receding and through the still night air the calls of oystercatchers feeding on the estuary carried over the water. Two gulls huddled nearby, facing the breeze, shifting slightly as he approached.

  Not once had he wished his mother harm. Yet look what he had just done to Gwen, proving he was capable of violence. His face reddened with shame. ‘Goddammit!’ he shouted. ‘I should have revelled in my mother’s differences.’ All he had done was to pretend they had not existed.

  It was very late by then and Gwen would be worried. Peering at the luminous dial of his watch he saw it was after midnight. He had to face her at some point so he began the long walk home, his footsteps dragging through the dunes. Below him the harbour lights winked. The drizzle had eased but in the distance a fine mist hung beneath the lights of the bypass. By the time he got home he felt a tiny surge of optimism. It was not too late to become a decent human being.

  Gwen had been too shocked to cry or to question Peter’s behaviour, which was beyond her comprehension. As soon as he had left she went upstairs to shower, glad that both children were asleep. Feeling dirty and defiled she let the hot water run over her body for fifteen minutes yet she had to admit that Peter was right in a way. She was sexually demanding but she had been brought up to believe that that was what men wanted, that if you were not available and willing they would find someone who was. Her father, when he had hit her, used to say that it was for her own good, that it was because he loved her. Gwen had grown up requiring endless proof that she was loved and desirable.