Chapter 7 Eden
EDEN
“I’m telling you the truth,” I say to the young police officer who marched me out of the art gallery and down to the old fisherman’s cottage that serves as the station in Hope Falls.
Sergeant Carter, as he introduced himself, looks like he could have been a mediocre film star had he chosen a different path in life.
His floppy hair has a habit of falling over his big brown eyes, and his good looks are just as distracting.
He sighs, suddenly looking older than his years and sounding weary for his age.
“You’re telling me that you are Eden Fox?”
“Yes.”
“That you live in the house on the hill?”
“Spyglass. Yes.”
“That the exhibition at the gallery tonight is displaying your work, and that the artist inside is pretending to be you?”
“Exactly.”
“And that your husband is going along with this elaborate identity theft for reasons you can’t explain?”
“That’s right.”
He looks a little befuddled and I’m guessing this sort of thing doesn’t happen very often in a rural fishing village like Hope Falls.
After an excruciating silence he asks, “Would you like a cup of tea?”
I nod and take a seat in what was probably once a fisherman’s front room, which is now dominated by a large desk, two chairs, and a filing cabinet.
Sergeant Carter disappears into an adjacent room, where I hear the sound of mugs clinking together and a kettle.
He clearly doesn’t believe me, which makes me think he won’t be able to help me, but I am at least grateful for the hot drink.
A ribbon of steam rises from the cup he puts on the table, and I greedily gulp down the tea, burning my mouth but not caring.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” he says. “Perhaps we could start at the beginning?” he suggests, then offers a head tilt of sympathy as though I might be confused or lost or unwell.
But I am none of those things.
“I told you already,” I tell him, unable to hide my frustration.
“There is a woman pretending to be me. I went for a run, the same way I do every Thursday evening, and when I got home, to my house, she was in it. My key didn’t work in the door—she must have changed the locks—and somehow she has tricked my husband into going along with it.
And all those people at the art gallery who also seem to think she is me!
I don’t understand what is happening, but she’s the one you need to arrest.”
“Nobody is being arrested. We’re just here to have a chat.
Hopefully we can get this straightened out in no time.
I’m afraid there is an abundance of admin with all police work these days, so let’s start with the paperwork.
” He takes a black pen with a chewed lid from the pot on his desk, then his hand hovers over a blank form.
“Name?” he asks, staring at the page.
“Eden Fox.”
He frowns. Looks up. “Well, there’s our first problem. The lady who lives in Spyglass and is having an exhibition tonight is called Eden Fox. It’s your name I’m after.”
“That is my name.”
“Okay then. Let’s suppose for a moment that it is. You must have some ID on you? A driver’s license perhaps?”
“I left my purse at home, along with everything else when I went for my run.”
“How about online?” he says, opening up a laptop. “You must have a social media account? Something with your name and a picture of you?”
“I don’t do social media,” I tell him.
“Well, let’s just see, shall we?” He starts to type my name into a search engine. “A digital footprint is often more useful than fingerprints these days.”
I really hope he isn’t going to scan my fingerprints.
“This is a waste of time. I already told you. I value my privacy and I don’t do Facebook or Twitter—”
“But you do have an Instagram account,” he interrupts, turning the laptop around so that I can see the screen.
“Or at least the Eden Fox who is at the art gallery this evening does.” My chest feels tight as I stare at the Instagram account I have never seen before.
It belongs to someone called “Eden Fox Artist” and there is a picture of the woman pretending to be me at the top.
I don’t understand what I am seeing. “And this isn’t a new account by the looks of things,” he adds, looking at a patchwork screen of square images.
He scrolls down the page and I see endless pictures of my paintings and photos of our new home.
Before and after shots of all the renovations.
There is even one of me in my overalls on a ladder, painting the walls in the kitchen, but you can’t see my face.
And from the back, I suppose I do look a bit like her.
Harrison must have taken the photo without me knowing, but the rest are all mine, and there must be a hundred of them.
All from the last few weeks. All from my phone.
But I didn’t post them.
I don’t even have an Instagram account.
“I don’t understand—”
“Looks pretty definitive to me. These are pictures of her work, her home, her life. I have no reason to think that Eden Fox isn’t who she claims to be,” he says. “You, on the other hand—”
“Those are pictures of my work, my home, taken on my phone.”
“But you can’t show me your phone?”
“Because I—”
“And you’re saying that you didn’t share these pictures online?”
“No. She must have.”
He sighs. “Why would she do that? How would she? These pictures have been posted over several weeks. There is even a picture of her husband—”
“My husband.”
The head tilt of sympathy is replaced with a look of irritation.
“Well, there is a picture of them together at the village pub a couple of weeks ago. And he isn’t the only one who says she is Eden Fox. The gallery owner confirmed it. So did the girls at the bakery where Eden pops in to get fresh bread once a week.”
“What?”
“She’s the only Eden Fox anyone in the village has seen since the new owners bought Spyglass a few weeks ago.
I met Eden myself, only last week. She came in here to the police station to introduce herself and gave me a poster for the exhibition to put in the window,” he says.
“So I think we can be fairly certain that she is the real Eden Fox. What we need to figure out is who you are.”
“I … don’t understand—”
“If you don’t want to tell me your real name is there someone we can call? A friend or a relative?”
“My husband,” I whisper.
“Great. What’s his name?”
“Harrison Woolf.”
The sergeant shakes his head. “Anyone else?” I don’t answer because there isn’t.
“You mentioned that you went for a run. Do you think there is a possibility that you slipped and hit your head?” He rolls up his sleeves and I can see the muscles on his toned arms. I can’t tell whether he knows how good-looking he is.
Men like him used to look at women like me when I was younger. Really look. Not anymore.
“No, I didn’t hit my head,” I tell him. “I know this sounds crazy, but I’m telling you the truth.”
“I believe that you believe that. But you need to understand that you can’t go around pretending to be someone that you’re not, threatening people, trying to break into houses.
” I frown and feel my cheeks burn. “Hope Falls has almost zero crime and I plan to keep it that way. Which means I can’t let you leave until we get this sorted.
So is there anyone else you can think of to call?
Someone who can help verify who you are? ”
“No.”
“Then I have no option but to drive you to Falmouth, where they have a bigger station with better facilities and more staff. They’ll keep you overnight.”
“What? No. Wait. You can’t lock me up, I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“Sorry, this is way above my pay grade.”
“Please. I don’t know why any of this is happening. I’m not a bad person.”
“Then tell me someone I can call. Someone who can back up your story.”
Any contact details for people I know are in my phone. The only numbers I know off by heart are my husband’s and—
“Gabriella. My daughter.”
“Okay, good. Now we might be getting somewhere. How old is she?”
“Eighteen.”
“Great. Want to call her now?”
“I don’t have my phone.”
“Use mine,” he says, offering me his mobile.
“I can’t.”
He looks as though he is completely out of patience. “Why not?”
“She won’t talk to me.”