Chapter 27 Lodged
Lodged
Evie was there for breakfast, so perhaps my suspicions last night were unfounded. On the other hand, she did have a rather smug expression on her face.
Kate left right after breakfast to visit her mysterious friend, the teddy bear collector who lived near Barmouth, while the rest of us scattered in pursuit of our own muses.
I found it very hard to settle down to work. While I was sure everyone was right and Will didn’t have any claim on my property, that mention of his having consulted a solicitor still worried me.
What if he did manage somehow to make a claim on the money I’d got for the cottage? It would be so unfair and make it difficult to buy somewhere new.
But at lunchtime Rhys told me he’d arranged an appointment with the family solicitor in St Melangell that afternoon and would drive me there. Then we could pick Cariad up from the castle on the way back.
‘And you will stay with me when I talk to the solicitor, won’t you?’ I asked, and he said he would if that was what I wanted.
The cleaners had been in since early morning and were now engaged in turning out the guest bedrooms while we lunched, so the retreat guests had minimal disturbance if they wanted to work on in their rooms afterwards.
‘They’ll have to work around Opal, although she’s recovering and sitting in a chair in her room,’ Nerys said.
‘But Verity is still in bed and is complaining that Opal has the TV in her room when she must be so much better now, and she should have it instead. I’m starting to feel as if I’m running a nursing home full of querulous patients! ’
‘We don’t even have a TV at home,’ said Pearl, who had come back from the pottery with Timon.
‘I think she’s become an addict, Pearl, but I’m sure it would do her good now to come downstairs and watch it in the TV room instead,’ said Nerys firmly.
‘She said she felt very weak and wobbly when I looked in first thing,’ Pearl said doubtfully. ‘And she seems very down.’
‘That’s the flu for you,’ said Evie. ‘I expect she was run down. She looks anaemic to me.’
‘The trouble with a vegan diet is you have to be sure you get all the right nutrients, and neither of us is much of a cook,’ confessed Pearl. ‘I must admit I feel a little better now I’m eating vegetarian and a bit of fish … although I have got the fish on my conscience.’
Toby smiled at her and said she was very soft-hearted, but he understood her feelings.
Evie, who would eat anything put in front of her and hadn’t been paying attention, now said, ‘I’ve been reading Gwendolyn Sutler’s diary all morning. She’s no Pepys. It’s mostly gossip about the other artists in the community. But then, that’s what I want, really.’
‘Does she mention Arwen Madoc?’ I asked.
‘Yes, a couple of times. She says she was a talented young artist and the ward of Cosmo Caradoc.’
She took another sip of coffee and cut herself a chunk of brie.
‘Gwendoline also mentions later on hearing that Cosmo Caradoc had died in a tragic accident and then, next day, that it seemed Arwen had taken the opportunity to run off with the friends who had been staying in the village. Her absence hadn’t been immediately noticed.’
‘So, if Gwendoline is right, and she ran away, then she can’t have been very happy here, can she?’ I asked.
‘It wouldn’t seem so,’ agreed Evie.
‘My step-grandmother did tell me that Arwen wanted to live with her friends in Cornwall, but Cosmo didn’t think that was suitable and refused his permission – I’d quite forgotten that,’ said Nerys.
Evie gave her one of her bird-bright looks. ‘Well, now we know exactly when she left and why. The death of her guardian obviously meant she was left in peace to make her life in Cornwall, with her friends.’
‘You are tying up the loose ends, Ma,’ I said. ‘Did Gwendoline have anything else interesting to say?’
‘One or two things – and of course, when I come to write her biography, too, the diary will be invaluable.’
As we were finishing lunch, a small, rectangular package arrived for Evie, which she fell on with glad cries.
‘At last! This must be the painting by Arwen that I bought on eBay.’
We gathered round as she took it to one of the small tables and unwrapped it, using kitchen scissors fetched by Rhys.
It was another tiny seascape like the photos I’d seen of the two that Charlotte Vane had, but despite its small size, it was a very powerful depiction of the elements: stormy sky and sea.
Nerys seemed particularly interested. ‘I’ve never seen any of her work, and it’s hard to believe this was painted by someone so young!’
‘It is. Unfortunately we can only imagine what she would have become had she not died so tragically early,’ agreed Evie. ‘This one is even better than the two Charlotte Vane has, so perhaps it was painted slightly later.’
She carried off her prize and, while Timon and Pearl returned to the pottery, I got ready to go into St Melangell with Rhys to see the solicitor, feeling rather nervous and glad he would be with me.
But I needn’t have worried, because Mr Jenkins, a pleasant, middle-aged man with sandy hair and eyes the colour of faded denim, assured me that Will had no claim on the proceeds of the cottage and that no solicitor – assuming Will had given him the true facts – would have advised him otherwise.
‘He’s coming here tomorrow and told me to meet him at eleven, at the Star and Stone. Rhys and my mother will be present too, but he doesn’t know that.’
‘It might be best if I was there as well,’ suggested Mr Jenkins.
‘If he arrives thinking he will be meeting you alone, and finds a reception committee, he’ll quickly realize that his position is untenable.
I can also advise him that any attempt on his part to have further contact with you would amount to stalking. ’
‘That would be wonderful,’ I said gratefully.
‘We’ll pop into the pub and book one of their small private function rooms for an hour tomorrow,’ Rhys said. ‘I know the landlady and I’ll get her to direct Will to the room when he arrives.’
‘There, that’s all settled,’ said Mr Jenkins.
When I thanked him, he added that it all made a change from the usual run of business.
*
It turned out that Rhys had arranged to meet up with Max Prynne in the garden centre cafe before we picked Cariad up, to discuss whether there might be something I could rent for a couple of months.
He was waiting for us when we arrived and once we’d sat down he said, ‘I’ve been thinking about it since you rang me, Rhys. It would just be a short-term let, a couple of months?’
‘Yes, it’s while I find a cottage I want to buy,’ I explained. ‘I’ve sold my old one and put everything into storage so I’m ready to move when I find the right place.’
‘And we all hope she’ll choose to settle round here,’ Rhys put in.
Max grinned at him. ‘I see. Well, in that case I could let you have the West Lodge for two months, if that would suit? It’s at the rear gates near the cliffs.
It’s not huge, but it’s been modernized, with a small kitchen and bathroom extension.
The head gardener usually lives in it, but the new one has bought a bigger house locally. ’
‘Sounds perfect,’ I said gratefully. ‘It would give me the breathing space I need.’
‘I’ll let you know when you can look round it. Then, if it suits, it’s agreed,’ he said. ‘It isn’t furnished, by the way.’
‘I can have what I need sent up. My last cottage wasn’t huge, so I don’t have a lot of furniture anyway.’
Max went off to work then. Rhys explained that when the quarry garden was closed, Max usually helped in the rare shrub nursery.
Rhys laid his hand over mine on the table and said, warmly, ‘I hope you like the lodge, Ginny, because now I’ve found you again, I really don’t want you to vanish out of my life.’
He may have felt my instinctive slight withdrawal, for he added, quickly, ‘We’ve already become good friends, haven’t we?’
But despite his words, there was no mistaking the light in his amber eyes … or the sudden fast beating of my heart.
I was sure he had more than friendship in mind – but exactly what? And was I going to fall for him all over again?
I’d never been interested in casual affairs and my only other foray into a serious relationship, with Will, hadn’t exactly ended well.
I looked at him doubtfully, conflicting thoughts running through my mind … but then, I seemed to feel Annie’s ghostly presence between us once more, reminding me that I still hadn’t confessed to him that I’d been present when she died. And the longer I delayed it, the harder it seemed to become.
‘Rhys …’ I began, then faltered to a halt.
‘What is it, Ginny?’ he asked, looking concerned.
‘I – nothing,’ I said, changing my mind, then got up abruptly. ‘Hadn’t we better go and collect Cariad?’
*
When we arrived, Cariad came bounding down the steps of Castle Newydd, an impressive castellated stone building, and was excited by the news that I would be staying in the area, at least for a little while.
‘I think it should be for ever,’ she declared. ‘Don’t you, Daddy?’
‘Definitely, and I’m hoping she’ll love living here so much, she’ll never want to leave,’ he agreed. ‘She’s become – quite literally since we found out she’s related to the Caradocs – part of the family!’
*
A battle had been fought in our absence and Verity was now in triumphant possession of the family TV upstairs, as I discovered when I popped my head in to see how she was.
She looked fine to me, sitting up in bed and, although her nose was a bit pink due to the sniffles, I suspected she was malingering.
Opal, however, who had come downstairs in her dressing gown and taken up residence in the small TV room, had genuinely had flu and it had left her listless and pale.
Pearl had said she seemed depressed and she certainly didn’t welcome any enquiries about her health from any of us, but remained in there with her dinner on a tray. Still, as Nerys said, that was an improvement on someone having to carry it upstairs.
That evening there was no mistaking the rosy glow surrounding Toby and Pearl. It was love!
And when Kate came back, late, from visiting her teddy bear expert acquaintance, she too looked rather flushed and self-conscious when she told us that her friend had asked her to stay for a day or two after the retreat, before she went home.
‘You know, I think love is in the air,’ I said to Nerys, as Kate answered one of many text messages on her phone after dinner, with an absorbed expression, while Pearl and Toby sat close together on a sofa, talking in quiet voices.
There was Evie and Noel, too, who had seemed thick as thieves ever since they’d met. My mother’s one previous foray into love hadn’t worked out that well. But perhaps they were just good friends, like me and Rhys.
Before I could shut off that train of thought I heard Rhys say, softly, ‘Let’s hope it’s as catching as flu, then.’
‘Running a marriage bureau would certainly make a change from being the reluctant proprietor of a plague house,’ Nerys agreed, with an amused glance at him.