by Beth Good
Charlie knocked at the door and waited.
Stop thinking about Gideon so much, she told herself sternly. He’s just a man. And you have more important things to worry about than a man.
There was the sound of a bolt being drawn back, and the rattle of a chain, and then the door opened very slowly.
Mrs Trevellyan peered out, keeping the door on its chain and clutching her gnarled walking stick in readiness as though expecting to be leapt upon and robbed by Cornish bandits.
‘Yes?’ she demanded in a peremptory tone. ‘I don’t give to charity unless it’s donkeys.’ She looked Charlie up and down. ‘I know you,’ she said suspiciously. ‘You’re not donkeys.’
‘No, I’m Charlotte Bell from the Cornish Tea Rooms.’ She stifled a giggle at the old woman’s narrow-eyed stare, and held out the box of scones. ‘I’m so sorry to disturb you, Mrs Trevellyan. But I’ve brought you some cakes.’
‘Why?’
‘Erm, well …’ It was a good question, but she knew the truthful answer would be unlikely to gain her access. Then a bolt of inspiration hit her. ‘You said you didn’t want to visit the tea rooms because of the curse,’ she said cheerily. ‘So I’m bringing the tea rooms to you.’
The old woman harrumphed, but did not immediately slam the door in her face. Instead, she released the chain and leant out a little, studying the Tupperware box.
‘Cakes, you say?’
‘Scones.’ Charlie hesitated. ‘A selection of really very delicious cheese and fruit scones. Fresh-baked this morning by my new chef, Gideon Petherick, to his own family recipe.’
Again, Mrs Trevellyan harrumphed. ‘Men can’t bake cakes for toffee.’
‘Well, I believe they can,’ Charlie said gamely, and once again held out the box of scones. ‘And today is my chance to demonstrate that fact.’ She paused, looking past Mrs Trevellyan into the little cottage. ‘Maybe I could come in for five minutes?’
‘In return for what?’
She might be ancient and weather-beaten, but the little old lady was no fool, Charlie had to give her that.
Charlie decided to be frank. ‘For information.’
‘Now we’re getting to it!’ Mrs Trevellyan thumped her stick twice on the front mat, and twisted her lips with strange satisfaction. ‘I knew this weren’t no kindly social visit, a-coming-here with your fresh-baked scones and your big Petherick bandying about, like he’s somebody to be reckoned with.’ She nodded sagely. ‘Aye, all righty then. Scones for information. But information about what, missy?’ She screwed up her face, glaring at Charlie in a suddenly aggressive manner. ‘Maybe I ain’t got no information, my ducks. Maybe I don’t know nothing about anything.’
‘But I think you do know about this,’ Charlie said quickly.
‘How’s that, then?’
‘Well, you see, it’s … ’ She paused, and then lowered her voice as one of Mrs Trevellyan’s neighbours walked past, touching his cap when he saw the old lady in the doorway. ‘It’s about my aunt Pansy.’
Mrs Trevellyan waved her stick at her neighbour, then turned her attention back to Charlie ‘Ah, your aunt. I thought so, I thought so. Soon as I saw them scones … ’
‘You want to smell them?’ Charlie unsnapped the lid of the Tupperware box and held it out to the old lady, wafting Gideon’s scones right under her nose. ‘They taste fantastic too. Gideon bakes a mean cheese scone, I can tell you. Still warm, these are. And they’re totally delicious buttered. Like a little taste of heaven.’
‘Hmm.’ Mrs Trevellyan had another good sniff of the scones, then seemed to come to a decision at last. ‘I suppose you’d better come in, then,’ she said reluctantly, and shuffled away into the gloom of the cottage, calling back over her shoulder, ‘Close the door after you, missy, and put the bolt across too. Don’t want none of them good-for-nothing tourists coming in and stealing my wickerwork, do we?’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Mrs Trevellyan led the way through her cluttered house to a narrow galley-style kitchen with pine cupboards and a dark green range. A huge black cat stood on the draining board, clearly just disturbed from sleep, staring at them accusingly. Tail erect, ears slightly flattened, the cat had a striking circle of white fur around its right eye, rather like a pirate’ eye-patch, only in reverse.
‘What an adorable cat!’ Charlie exclaimed, and rushed to stroke the animal behind its ears. When it began at once to purr, she laughed in delight. ‘Oh, but you’re gorgeous!’
‘His name is Patch,’ Mrs Trevellyan told her, filling the old-fashioned metal kettle and then putting it on the range to boil. ‘Tea?’
‘Yes, please.’
‘He’s a good mouser, which is the best that can be said for him. Likes to claw my curtains, he does. Big nasty brute.’
‘Surely not?’ Charlie winked at the cat, who, much to her surprise and pleasure, seemed to wink back. ‘He’s a charmer.’
‘Not him.’ Mrs Trevellyan shook her head, partway reaching for an ancient battered tin marked TEA, and then stopped what she was doing to watch Charlie tickle the cat under his furry throat. ‘Ah now, you shouldn’t have done that,’ she said darkly, and clucked her tongue loudly. ‘You’ll never get away now.’
Charlie laughed, and lowered her hand, taking a step back.
‘Miaow,’ Patch said loudly, and then arched his back when she did not respond, flattening his ears again and glaring at her. ‘Mi – aow!’
‘Oh dear,’ Charlie said, and bit her lip.
‘I did warn you,’ the old lady said, and shooed the huge cat onto the floor. ‘Go on, away with you, great vicious beast. Go catch mice!’
The cat hissed vaguely in their direction, then sauntered away, disappearing into the cottage somewhere, no doubt in search of somewhere more peaceful to sleep.
Once the tea was made, and the still-warm scones had been split and lavishly buttered, Mrs Trevellyan ushered her through into a long, sunlit conservatory.
Charlie carried the tea tray.
‘Down the shady end,’ the old lady said, nodding ahead to where a large vine had shrouded the walls and roof of the conservatory, swaddling it in cool green leaves that cast a mysterious green shade over everything. ‘It’s too hot to sit in the sun. Best put the tray on the table there, and sit yourself down,’ she said, adding grimly, ‘I’ll pour.’
There were only two seats under the vine. A half-egg shaped wicker seat that hung suspended, via a reassuringly thick chain, from a bar bolted to the conservatory roof above, and a two-seater sofa.
Mrs Trevellyan settled herself on the two-seater sofa, propped her stick beside her, and then nodded Charlie towards the egg-shaped hanging wicker chair.
‘There you go,’ she said gruffly.
Charlie sat down on the hanging chair, which skittered nervously under her weight, like an untrained horse. She glanced up as the chain creaked, then down at Mrs Trevellyan, who merely smiled and leant forward to pour them both a cup of tea, using a strainer to catch the leaves. When Charlie sat back, trying to get comfortable in the half-egg shaped seat, the whole structure groaned alarmingly, and she sat very still instead, eyeing Mrs Trevellyan with new respect. The old lady certainly knew how to control and intimidate her guests without needing to lift a finger.
Well, let’s see,’ Mrs Trevellyan said, and took a bite out of one buttered scone half, then sat back to enjoy it.
Charlie waited, still trying to move as little as possible.
‘Hmm,’ Mrs Trevellyan said at last, having finished her scone, dashing away a few cheeky crumbs from the front of her patterned dress. ‘Not bad, that. Maybe a little too cheesy for my tastes. But perfectly acceptable for a tea room scone. Home-baked by your Mr Petherick, you said? Not “bought in”?’
She said the words “bought in” with every evidence of loathing.
‘I told you, Gideon made them himself this morning,’ Charlie reminded her, ‘in the tea room kitchen. With his own hands.’ At the words, “hands,” a vision of Gideon’s
strong hands filled her head, touching and squeezing her naked body, and she felt her cheeks heat up alarmingly. Her eyes widened. No, no, no. Not in front of Mrs Trevellyan. There was a place for that kind of errant thought, and it was definitely not here, in an old lady’s conservatory. ‘Erm, I mean … Yes, not bought in.’
‘Hmm,’ Mrs Trevellyan repeated, watching her closely.
Charlie forced a smile to her mouth.
‘The tea rooms,’ Mrs Trevellyan said slowly, as though thinking aloud, and then nodded, jabbing a crooked finger at Charlie. ‘You should never have re-opened that place. A terrible mistake if you ask me.’
‘Well, exactly,’ Charlie said promptly, and leant forward to pick up her tea cup. Again, the hanging chair creaked and groaned, and she sat back gingerly without managing to grab her cup. Though to be honest, the tea did not look very appetising. It had a kind of grimy film over the top, with a few black tea leaves floating on it. ‘I am asking you.’
‘What about?’
‘About the curse on the tea rooms.’
‘So you admit there is a curse?’ Mrs Trevellyan was nodding with obvious satisfaction. ‘That those tea rooms will bring you nothing but trouble.’
It already has, Charlie thought drily, if trouble could be categorised as an undeniably attractive though taciturn male.
‘I don’t admit anything,’ she said. ‘But I am curious. And I’d like to hear more about it, if you can spare the time.’
‘Don’t you want your tea first?’ Mrs Trevellyan asked, watching her expectantly, like a terrier waiting for a treat. ‘And your scone?’
Charlie sucked in a breath. Then she leant forward again, lunging for her cup, and finally managed to grab it without incident.
Collapsing back into the egg-shaped chair, the china tea cup sloshing about on her lap, Charlie eyed her buttered scone with mounting resentment, then gave up on the idea. It was just out of reach, and would almost certainly involve jumping out of the chair, and then climbing straight back into it.
And she didn’t want to reward her host with a less than elegant dismount.
‘Not want your scone, then?’ Mrs Trevellyan enquired, then seized the unclaimed cherry scone before Charlie could say a word, and crammed it into her mouth. ‘Mmm, very good,’ she muttered through a generous mouthful of cake. ‘Not too sweet, just how I like ‘em.’ She took another bite, and considered it thoughtfully. ‘A little crumbly, p’raps, but not bad texture, this. Nice big cherry pieces too.’ She nodded. ‘Proper job.’
‘So,’ Charlie said delicately, nursing her tea cup, ‘what can you tell me about my aunt’s drowning?’
‘Her droning? What on earth are you saying, girl?’
‘Not droning, Mrs Trevellyan.’ Again, she had to hold back a mad giggle, fearing to offend her host. ‘I said, drowning. Her drowning.’
‘Oh, then why didn’t you say so first off?’ Mrs Trevellyan descended into irritable mumbling. ‘Young people today … Always muttering … Never making a blessed word of sense … We called that rude behaviour in my day.’
‘You were going to say something about my aunt’s death,’ Charlie reminded her, prodding the old lady gently back to the subject in hand.
Mrs Trevellyan looked up at her, startled. ‘Was I?’
‘Yes,’ she said patiently. ‘Something about the curse.’
‘Oh, well … ’
Mrs Trevellyan picks up her own cuppa and slurps on it with obvious enjoyment, sucking the tea noisily past her dentures.
‘There’s not much you don’t already know, I should imagine,’ she said in the end, and then peered at Charlie over her cup, her look suddenly quizzical. ‘Except it weren’t no drowning. Not if you ask me, any road.’
‘Not a drowning?’
Despite herself, Charlie was now fascinated. Nobody had ever suggested that her aunt’s death had been anything but a tragic accident. She leant forward again in the creaking chair, spilling a tiny puddle of tea on her leg which she chose to ignore. It was lukewarm now anyway.
‘Sorry, Mrs T.,’ she added quickly, seeing that the old lady’s focus had begun to wander again, ‘I don’t understand. What exactly do you mean?’
Ever since Gideon had claimed to know the ‘true story’ of Pansy, she had been curious to discover what he could possibly know that she didn’t. But his attentions last night had pushed that question out of her head, and then he had been totally mysterious about it this morning, drat him.
It was burning her up inside, the suspicion that half the village – not to mention the man she was now sleeping with – knew something about her aunt that had been hidden from her.
‘Oh,’ Mrs Trevellyan waved a hand vaguely, ‘you know how it is. People won’t be told. Not in this village. They don’t want the truth, not when a lie suits ‘em all much better.’ She harrumphed again. ‘These folk … They all do say the poor woman walked out into the sea that night. But did she? That’s what I keep asking myself. Did she?’
‘And do you ever give yourself an answer?’
Mrs Trevellyan glanced at her, as though surprised by the interruption. ‘Oh yes, your aunt walked out into the sea all right,’ she agrees blithely.
‘But you just said – ’
But the old lady interrupted her. ‘A broken heart, she had. That’s what they do say in the village.’ She took another long, terrifying slurp of tea through her dentures, and then tapped the side of her nose. ‘But I know what I know. And I saw what I saw that night.’
Charlie’s eyes widened. ‘What did you see?’
‘I saw a woman walk out into the sea, and a woman walk back half an hour later, sopping wet as she might well be, going a-swimming in her underwear like that. Not decent, that one. And I don’t care who hears me say so.’
Charlie stared, uncomprehending.
‘And then she climbed into a car right down there.’ She jabbed a finger at the other end of the conservatory, as though pointing down towards the harbour, though it was out of sight from where they were sitting. ‘It pulls up, and in she gets, wet as a mermaid, and off it goes again up the hill. Back toward the London road where it come from.’
Charlie almost fell out of the hanging wicker chair, attempting to put her empty cup down. ‘Let me get this straight,’ she said huskily, ‘you saw my aunt Pansy walk back out of the sea that night and get into a car? A car that had come down from the London road to pick her up? As though it had been arranged?’
‘That’s the long and short of it.’ Mrs Trevellyan nodded wisely. ‘Left her clothes in a big pile by the side of the harbour too, the brazen hussy. Like she’d gone for good. Oh, I tells the vicar next morning what happened, and that woman in the corner shop who dropped dead of a brain tumour a few weeks later. But nobody was bothered a-listening to me. Mad old Trevvy, that’s what they call me in the village. So I keep my peace and leave ‘em to think what they liked.’ She wiped away more crumbs from her dress. ‘More romantic, see, for a woman to be a-drowning of herself over a broken heart, than swanning off to that Lunnon with some fancy man.’
‘You think it was a man driving the car?’
Mrs Trevellyan hesitated, then shrugged reluctantly. ‘I don’t know. Mebbe. Mebbe not. All I know is that car tore up Tremmy Hill like one of them boy-racers. BRUM BRUM BRUM, he went, revving his damn engine all the way, even though it were past midnight and all the village asleep. Not a lady behind that wheel, if you ask me.’
Charlie was dumbfounded. ‘But if you knew all this time that she wasn’t dead, why go on at me about this imaginary “curse” on the tea rooms?’
‘There is a curse,’ Mrs Trevellyan said crossly. ‘There ain’t nothing imaginary about that curse, missy. Your Pansy never came back to Tremevissey, did she? Nor sent no word to your grieving grandmother about where she was.’ She shook her head. ‘Now that poor soul died of a broken heart, for sure. And though a few folk tried to take the tea rooms on, to get ‘em running again, summat always went wrong. People got sick or die
d, and there was a bad flood once, and the whole place had to be closed for a year. Then your grandmother fell ill, and the tea rooms were shut for good.’ She glared at Charlie accusingly. ‘If that ain’t no curse, I don’t know what is.’
‘But did you ever tell anyone else about this?’ Charlie asked, frowning. ‘I mean, more recently, for instance.’
‘Never,’ Mrs Trevellyan said emphatically.
Charlie sat silent for a few minutes, thinking over what she had been told. The information had certainly been worth a few scones.
But something wasn’t right.
Could this be the same true story Gideon planned to tell the villagers on Saturday night, or did he have some other version up his sleeve?
He said that her aunt had done him a great kindness once when he was a boy.
But what sort of kindness, and was it enough to make him so intimate with the true story of her disappearance?
CHAPTER TWELVE
Three days later, Charlie was sitting at her kitchen table up in the flat, studying the accounts book until the columns of figures swam before her eyes. She leant her cheek wearily on her hand, struggling not to fall asleep.
Below the table, in his wicker basket, Benjamin lay curled up, nose-to-ginger-tail, purring comfortably. She rather wished she could join the cat in his cosy sleep and forget all about work for once. But of course it was impossible.
Beside her was a pile of till receipts, plus a few hefty bills from suppliers, and some petty cash slips for day-to-day purchases and the wages she’d given out to Maisy and Tim that week. She was frowning over what she had just written in the petty cash column, unable to concentrate on her sums, though she had an easy-to-use calculator to hand and the maths involved really wasn’t that complicated.
‘Not finished cooking the books yet?’ Gideon asked softly.
She jumped, startled, and looked round at him. ‘Goodness, you frightened me. I didn’t hear the shop door.’
‘Sorry,’ he said, grinning like a boy. ‘Though, in my own defence, I didn’t exactly come creeping up the stairs like a burglar. You were just lost in thought, that’s all.’