The Little B & B at Cove End

by Linda Mitchelmore

  ‘Oh God,’ Mae said.

  ‘And I don’t trust that Josh Maynard not to spread more stuff now he’s been outed as a non-swimmer who got in a bit of a panic and had to be rescued by a girl.’

  ‘Yeah, well,’ Mae said. ‘Thanks, you know, for letting me know. Although how I’m going to get through my shift now, I don’t know.’

  All she wanted to do was go back home and confront her mum. And if she was honest, she wanted her mum to deny everything Bailey had told her, but she didn’t think that was going to happen. She knew silver had disappeared from the dresser in the sitting room – perhaps she ought to have asked at the time where it had gone? Her dad had sold the dinghy without asking her and other stuff so … oh God, she felt sick with the weight of all this.

  ‘You’ll be fine, Mae. You’re strong. Really strong. But I could meet you afterwards if you like. We could get a coffee or something …’

  ‘No, it’s okay, but thanks,’ Mae interrupted him. ‘I’ll be okay.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Bailey said, as instinctively they both got up and began walking back the way they’d come. ‘Sure you will.’

  Chapter Twenty

  ‘In here, darling,’ Cara called from the sitting room where she’d just managed to grab half an hour to read, doing her best to put the embarrassing scene she’d had with Tom earlier out of her mind. But it kept creeping back in. She glanced at the clock on the wall beside the fireplace – a huge railway-style clock that she’d loved and bought from a stall in the market at Totnes. It was perfect for checking the time when sitting down. That would be Mae who had just come in, letting the door bang noisily. She was back later than Cara had expected.

  ‘Now there’s an offer I ought not to refuse,’ Tom said, suddenly appearing in the doorway, leaning against one side of it, arms folded, legs crossed at the ankles.

  ‘Oh, oh ….’ Oh my bloody God! What had she said? Just a few hours ago he’d told her he was going to be having supper with his ex-wife and the wind had been knocked right out of her sails, and she’d squirmed with embarrassment for ages after he’d left at how forward and needy and downright bloody sad she must have sounded. It wasn’t helping now, either, that Tom was looking so downright, well, shaggable was a word Rosie would have used.

  ‘My guess is you were expecting someone else,’ Tom said. ‘Can I come in?’

  ‘Yes. Double yes. I was expecting it to be Mae around now, but come in. I thought you were meeting, um …’

  ‘Louise,’ Tom said. ‘I will be later. Just come back to dump some sketches I did today and pick up some paperwork.’

  ‘Okay. Fine. Right,’ Cara said. Her mouth seemed to be going ahead of her brain. She couldn’t be making it more obvious she’d been thrown that Tom’s ex-wife was still in the equation, could she? It was just sod’s flipping law that she was beginning to fall for Tom and now his ex-wife had put in an appearance. Couples did divorce and then realise they’d made a massive mistake and then remarried. Perhaps that was how it was going to be for Tom and Louise.

  ‘You made those three words sound as though they’re anything but, Cara,’ Tom laughed. ‘Can I sit down?’

  Cara couldn’t trust herself to say anything coherent so she merely waved an arm towards the chair opposite her. Tom sat down.

  ‘Explanation needed, I think,’ he said. ‘Louise and I have been divorced for four years now. She was my muse. Still has been a few times between then and now. You understand what I’m saying?’

  So Louise had been his model. And still was sometimes, post-divorce. None of her business.

  ‘Yes?’ Tom prompted her.

  Cara nodded.

  ‘We’re still business partners, Louise and I,’ Tom said. ‘We hold joint copyright on some of my work that’s gone to limited edition prints. All part of the divorce settlement. I know I don’t have to tell you any of this, but I want to. I’m feeling a bit of a heel that I’ve had to refuse your offer of supper tonight. I had no idea Louise was thinking of coming down today until she texted me after breakfast. I like it here, Cara.’ Tom leaned forward in his chair, placing his hands on his knees. ‘I’ve been happier here than I’ve been in a long time. I’ve loved hearing you pottering about in the kitchen, singing snatches of old Beatles songs. Not our era but I love Beatles songs too. And I’ve loved watching you in the garden hanging out the bed linen between guests, stopping on the way back in to pull up dandelions or some other weed. Do you understand?’

  Was she supposed to be reading between the lines? When he’d said he’d loved – past tense – listening to her pottering around, and being in the garden, he was trying to tell her he was leaving, wasn’t he?

  Cara nodded again, her hands clasped tightly together. She really, really didn’t want him to go, and it wasn’t just the very generous money he was paying her each week.

  ‘There’s a calmness about it here, Cara, if you ignore the drama going on when I arrived. I never had calmness in my marriage.’

  Nor me for a long time. Cara had been permanently on edge around Mark from the moment she’d found out he was a compulsive gambler.

  ‘Hmm,’ Cara said, lips pressed firmly together to stop any other inane comments pouring out, but she couldn’t just keep on nodding to everything Tom said, could she?

  ‘Tongue out,’ Tom said. He poked his own out to show her how it should be done, grinning at her. ‘Only I’m beginning to think you’ve lost yours.’

  Cara obliged with a wobbly smile. Just the tip of it. God, but she was going to miss him. She glanced at the clock again. Where was Mae? She was more than hour overdue now.

  But Tom must have seen the glance because he said, ‘I’m keeping you from something. Sorry.’

  ‘No, no. It’s just that I thought Mae would be here by now and she isn’t.’

  ‘Phew!’ Tom laughed. ‘She speaks! That’s a relief. I don’t think I’ve ever rendered a woman speechless before. But she’ll be back soon. Perhaps she’s met up with a friend or something. It happens. Especially when you’re a teenager and live by a different clock to the rest of society.’

  ‘Yes, there’s that,’ Cara agreed.

  Tom stood up, and on rather wobbly legs because she hadn’t allowed for just how much she was falling for Tom, Cara stood up too.

  ‘One more thing before I go and fetch my paperwork,’ Tom said. ‘Just so you know how sorry I am about not being able to take up your invite. My guess is my dinner with Louise isn’t going to be the restful scenario I imagined when you asked me to join you later. My second guess is Louise will arrive with another list of demands, mostly monetary, and she isn’t going to be best pleased when I tell her I’m changing genre. And my third guess is she’s going to be very less than thrilled when I put her right back on the train again afterwards. Wish me luck.’

  He stepped towards Cara and leaned in for a kiss on the cheek.

  It’s me that’s going to need the luck that you don’t get sucked in by Louise and her wiles and whatever it was that made you fall in love with her for the first time, Cara thought, as she watched Tom hurry from the room, and take the stairs three at a time. And another dose of luck that Tom hadn’t been letting her down gently about leaving soon, and that he would stay.

  She put a hand to her cheek where Tom had kissed it – his lips warm and dry against her skin. If she were a teenager, she would have vowed never to wash that cheek again, but she wasn’t. No harm in not washing it until the morning though, was there? And then the door opened again, and Mae came flying in, slamming it so hard that the stained glass rattled in its frame.

  ‘Mae …’ Cara began. She could see by Mae’s face that something terrible had happened.

  ‘You, you …!’ Mae shouted, her face red, her hands in tight fists.

  ‘Sssh, sssh. Don’t shout, darling. What’s happened? Oh my God, not Josh again?

  She hurried to Mae and reached for her arm to pull her to somewhere they could talk. But Mae shrugged her off.

  ‘Not here,’ C
ara said. ‘Tom’s upstairs and …’

  ‘I don’t care if Michelangelo is upstairs and can hear me. I want the truth, Mum! Did Dad gamble? Did he pay off his debts by selling stuff down the pub? Bailey Lucas had to practically drag me into the Beachcomber to show me. He told me about Dad’s gambling and him selling stuff before I did my shift at work and he said he’d meet me afterwards and even though I told him not to he was there. He said he thought I needed to see the evidence, just in case his dad hadn’t got the facts right about it being Dad who’d sold the painting to Andy Povey. I nearly died of shame to see the picture that used to be over the fireplace in our sitting room in one of the alcoves. The frame was all dusty. Apparently, there are two more of our paintings in the Boathouse and I’m afraid to go and see what state they’re in. So tell me the truth, Mum. Please.’

  Mae was rightfully angry, and Cara knew she was to blame for that. Josh had told her much the same as Bailey had now told Mae – some sort of brinkmanship going on between the two boys?

  ‘In the sitting room,’ Cara said, knowing Mae would follow. ‘Now sit down.’

  ‘Why must I sit? I can hear just as well standing up, you know.’

  ‘It’s more dignified. We look like boxers squaring up for a fight.’

  ‘So? It’s how I feel right now. Anyway, what’s so dignified about you not telling me about Dad? If it’s true, which I don’t want to believe.’

  ‘I’ll tell you if you sit down, and not otherwise,’ Cara said firmly.

  With a huge sigh, Mae sat – in the chair Tom had occupied so very recently when the atmosphere in the room had been totally different.

  ‘Okay,’ Cara said. ‘The truth is your father did have a gambling habit. A big one. The internet mostly, but also betting shops. Totnes. Torquay. Dartmouth – places where he didn’t think he would be seen by customers of his bank, or neighbours. He took things to pawn shops, too. And sold them in the village pubs – you’ve just seen the evidence and I’m sorry you had to find out that way.’

  ‘Me, too,’ Mae said. ‘It would have been nice if you could have told me.’

  I couldn’t find the words to tell you the father you adored thought so little of your future and how we were going to fund it.

  ‘I regret that I didn’t now. It must have come as a shock.’

  ‘Yes, well. Anything else I should know about?’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Bailey said he’d heard rumours that Dad was leaving you because he had most of his clothes in the car when it crashed. You were always nagging him about money. That’s what he told the barmaid in the Beachcomber when he sold the picture. The barmaid is Bailey’s sister, Xia. I don’t suppose you know that.’

  ‘No, I didn’t know that, about Bailey’s sister being the barmaid, I mean. I knew he sold things, but not where until Josh told me.’

  ‘Huh! Him! He never told me!’

  ‘Perhaps he thought he was protecting you,’ Cara said.

  ‘Stand up for him, why don’t you?’ Mae shouted.

  ‘I can understand your anger, Mae, but you don’t have to be rude. And we don’t need Tom hearing our private business, which if you shout like that he will do. And I know I’m instrumental in that anger, and I’m sorry. Truly sorry.’

  Cara had heard Mae mention Bailey once or twice before. Mae had been to the cinema with him if Cara’s memory served her right. But if there was the rumour going around, via Bailey’s barmaid sister, that Mark had been leaving her because she nagged him, maybe it would be a good idea for Cara to leave it like that. But keeping secrets was doing Mae more harm than good, wasn’t it?

  ‘So, was Dad leaving us, Mum?’

  ‘Yes,’ Cara said. She got up and walked over to Mae’s chair, sat on its wide arm beside her daughter. She reached for Mae’s hand, expecting Mae to whip it away, but she didn’t. Cara took a deep breath and said, very slowly, ‘I’d asked him to go. I gave him an ultimatum to sort his gambling, but he chose gambling over, well, us.’

  Mae breathed in sharply and Cara feared for a moment she would never let the breath out again.

  ‘Well,’ Mae said, after what seemed an eternity of silence, when all sort of scenarios went through Cara’s head, ‘at least you’re not a liar.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘That’s what Bailey said Xia had told him – that you had asked Dad to leave. Because of his gambling. I made the nagging bit up to test you.’

  Glad now that she’d told Mae the truth, Cara said, ‘I’d come to the end of my tether, darling. I’d begged and begged him to sort himself out with the gambling. Little by little our home was disappearing as he took ever more stuff to sell. It was fast becoming a shell, not a home any more and I didn’t want that for you. For us. I thought it would be a wake-up call for him. Do you understand?’

  ‘Sort of,’ Mae said.

  ‘And your dad had cashed in insurance policies so there was nothing to come to us after the accident. That’s why it’s been so hard financially, and it’s why we have to make this B&B thing work. If we don’t, we’ll have to sell the house and move somewhere much smaller.’

  ‘But it’s not working, is it?’ Mae said.

  ‘It’s early days.’

  ‘Well, I hate it. You can’t say you like it, Mum. All the washing and the fried breakfasts stinking the house out and the vacuum cleaner going all the time.’

  ‘I’m enjoying bits of it. The company. After that fiasco with the Hines, the guests have been okay, hardly any trouble really. They arrive late afternoon and are out after breakfast. Aren’t they?’

  ‘Apart from Michelangelo up there!’ Mae pointed to the ceiling and Tom’s bedroom two floors above it. ‘It smells in there. I can smell it through the door. Something chemical anyway. I’m not sure he’s a painter at all, to be honest. I mean, we haven’t seen any paintings, have we? I’m always having to tell him to put used coffee mugs in the dishwasher and not leave them sitting in the sink. Dad …’ Mae’s eyes welled with tears and she swiped them away with the back of a hand. ‘Dad used to do that. Leave his mugs in the sink.’

  Cara gulped. Yes, Mark had always done that although it had never bothered her much.

  ‘And…and,’ Mae went on, ‘he leaves the toilet seat up. He’s got an en suite for goodness’ sake, but he uses the downstairs cloakroom and he always leaves the toilet seat up.’

  ‘It must be a man thing,’ Cara said, trying to lighten the mood. ‘Men do that. And the not putting things in the dishwasher thing.’

  ‘I hope that wasn’t meant to be funny,’ Mae said.

  ‘No. Just an observation. Men don’t put the caps back on toothpaste either. Or hang their flannels up to dry, and they don’t put the soap back in the rack but leave it to go all slimy on the edge of the basin. Well, all of the men I’ve ever known do all of those things.’

  ‘And another thing,’ Mae said. ‘Michelangelo never lets you go in his room. He keeps it locked and you have to leave his clean bed linen and towels outside on the landing. He could have a pet orangutan in there for all we know.’

  ‘Oh, Mae,’ Cara said, unable not to laugh. ‘You say the funniest things.’

  Yes, Tom had asked that he be responsible for his own room and Cara had respected that. He’d have all sorts of things laid out for his artwork, she imagined, and it would be impossible not to touch things she ought not if she were to go in there and clean. The vacuum made regular trips up the stairs anyway so he was keeping to his side of the bargain too.

  And how come your rant at me about not telling me the truth about your dad has turned into a litany of Tom’s misdemeanours?

  ‘So,’ Cara went on, bringing Mae back to what they’d originally been talking about, ‘how do you feel about things now you know the truth about your dad’s gambling?’

  ‘Hurt. Hurt that you didn’t tell me. If Bailey Lucas knows, then everyone knows. Anyone else who was in the pub when Dad sold the paintings and other stuff could have spread the rumour, couldn’t
they? Bailey hasn’t blabbed and he says his family aren’t blabbers either and I want to believe him. I think I can because it would have got back to me before if they had, don’t you think?’

  ‘Yes,’ Cara said. If what Mae was saying was true, she was surprised she hadn’t heard the rumour before. Perhaps Mark hadn’t sold things openly and had known who he could trust, people like Andy Povey and the Lucas family. Perhaps no one else but them did know. She’d never know now though, would she? ‘Did Bailey tell you why he was telling you all this now?’

  ‘Yeah. He said he’d heard Josh was telling people Dad gambled. And he said it was spite because Josh wouldn’t be liking it one little bit that he’d been a big wimp and I’d had to save him from drowning and, like, I said I didn’t want to go out with him any more because he was going to leave me in the cove and just rescue himself, and he …. Oh God, I don’t know … revenge or something.’

  ‘Oh Mae, I’m so sorry that this has happened and …’

  ‘But not sorry enough to think it would have been better to tell me yourself!’ Mae’s voice rose a few octaves and she had angry furrows of lines between her eyes, squinting at Cara as though she didn’t really want to be looking at her. ‘It was much easier believing Dad had just been driving too fast and had an accident. I feel sad all over again – like he’s only just died and we haven’t had the funeral yet, but I know we have because bits of that come back to me in dreams sometimes. Well, nightmares really. I worshipped Dad. He was my hero.’

  Mae began to cry silently, the tears sliding down her face. She did nothing to wipe them away.

  Gathering her daughter into her arms, Cara said, ‘You can still worship him. He loved you, Mae. You were his little princess.’

  ‘I know,’ Mae said huskily. ‘It’s why I do the old-fashioned flowery frocks – I wanted to live up to his image of me. I don’t want to wear jeans that are ripped to shreds up the front or crop tops that show muffin tops, or look like a mini Beyoncé or something. You should hear some of the stick I get because I always say frocks and not dresses.’