Plotted in Cornwall by Janie Bolitho Page B

winter was building up, later in the year than usual and promising to be fierce. From the warmth and comfort of the kitchen they listened to the wind. Nothing could be heard over its constant shrieks. Through the window, even in the darkness, they saw the shrubs bend and sway. The sea had lost the myriadcolours of daylight and had become a black, threatening terror as it surged forcefully to the shore and crashed against anything that was in its way. The local news had warned that the Promenade was awash and already closed to traffic.
    ‘It won’t be long,’ Rose said as she turned from the window and lit the gas beneath the vegetables. ‘What is it?’ she asked, aware that Barry had been watching her.
    He picked up a fork and twirled it between his fingers. ‘You tell me, Rosie, you’re the one who’s hardly speaking. You should’ve cancelled if you don’t feel well.’
    ‘I’m fine.’
    ‘But?’
    He doesn’t know, she realised, word hasn’t spread as quickly as I thought it would. It was a week yesterday since Jack had broken the news and she had not heard from him since. Will Barry gloat? she wondered as she joined him at the table. ‘Jack’s found himself a girlfriend,’ she said, without preamble.
    ‘The bastard.’
    It was not the reaction she had expected any more than her own had been when she learned of the existence of Anna Hicks. Barry’s anger was genuine, on her behalf, and she loved him the more for it. ‘Well, wehadn’t been together properly for some time really.’
    ‘Don’t defend him, Rose.’
    ‘I wasn’t intending to. Anyway, now you know. Let’s eat.’
    She served the mushroom soup she had made earlier and soft rolls from the local baker’s.
    ‘How’s the portrait going?’ Barry asked when half of his soup had been drunk. He would think about Jack later.
    ‘So far, so good, although I’ve barely started. We’re agreed on how the finished article should look.’
    ‘What’re they like, these spinsters?’
    ‘Sisters, not spinsters. One of them was married.’ And before she could stop herself she was telling Barry all she knew.
    ‘So the boy who persuaded you to butter up his father for him is their nephew. It seems odd them denying, what, at least four relatives, including the daughter.’
    ‘Well, they certainly are related. When I developed the roll of film I took I could see the distinct likeness between Joel and his Aunt Wendy I knew she reminded me of someone the first time I went there. And, of course, there’s this Frank Jordan thing.’
    ‘Rose.’ Barry’s voice was stern.
    She laughed. ‘Don’t look at me like that.’
    ‘Like what?’
    ‘Over the top of your glasses like a martinet schoolmaster.’
    ‘It’s because I worry about you. Especially now with Jack no longer on the scene to keep you in check. You’ll only get involved in something that is none of your business and find you’re out of your depth and he won’t be around to bail you out.’
    ‘Then I’ll just have to rely on you. And he didn’t keep me in check, as you call it. Besides, Jack is irrelevant because Joel’s father asked me to find out what I could. I liked the man and if I can help, I will.
    ‘But you have to admit, it’s a peculiar situation.’ Rose stood to clear away the soup bowls. She drained the vegetables and served the mackerel stuffed with apricots and almonds. Barry’s favourite.
    For a while they ate in silence. The wind continued to howl and the first splatter of rain hit the windows. Rose was unconcerned. The house, built of Cornish granite, had withstood over a century of battering by the elements. She cooked by gas, the heating was fuelled from the same source and there were plenty of candles should the electricity be cut off again.
    ‘Do you think,’ Barry began, picking a small bone from the side of his mouth, ‘that the sisters did away with Frank Jordan just before they moved away and that’s the reason they are denying they’ve any family?