The Last Mrs. Summers

by Rhys Bowen

  “What are those for?” I asked.

  “Those are standing stones, from Celtic times. Cornwall is full of them,” Belinda said. “Older than Stonehenge. I think they used to have human sacrifices.”

  “Charming. Now I feel really welcome.”

  Belinda laughed. “We are near the coast now,” she said. “I remember this part.”

  She slowed. “What does that signpost say?”

  I stared out of the window. “Saint Tudy and Saint Mabyn in one direction, Saint Breock and Saint Issey in the other. Those surely aren’t real saints,” I said, laughing.

  “They are Cornish saints,” Belinda said. “They were the first Christian monks to come across from Ireland.”

  “Tudy and Issey were monks?”

  She shrugged. “Don’t ask me. I’m not an expert. I’m only repeating what I was told.”

  “So what are we looking for now on the map?”

  “Splatt and Rock and Pityme.”

  “You’re making it up.”

  She laughed. “No, I’m not. They are real places.”

  “Splatt? People live in a place called Splatt?”

  “Not many. Oh, and if Rock doesn’t show up on the map, look for Trebetherick or Polzeath.”

  “Do they not have any normal names here?” I asked.

  “Those two are Cornish. Another language, you know. Like Welsh.”

  “Do they speak another language here?”

  “Not anymore. Only the very old people can remember Cornish. It has pretty much died out, I’m afraid.”

  “I’m not. I have enough trouble with French,” I said.

  We paused at another signpost. The light was now fast fading and it was hard to read. “Oh, that’s right. Polzeath, straight ahead,” Belinda said. “We’re going in the right direction. Now we are very close. I wonder if we should stop and get some supplies if we pass a village shop that is still open.”

  “It’s almost dark. Perhaps we should locate the house first,” I replied. “We can always come back and eat a meal at the nearest pub tonight.”

  “Good idea.” She negotiated a particularly sharp bend as the lane passed under a stand of trees, and drips rained onto us, thudding on the soft top roof. On the other side we emerged to a glimpse of shining water.

  “The sea at last,” I said, uttering a little prayer of thanks that we had arrived safely.

  “Not technically. It’s the Camel Estuary.”

  “Camel?” I asked. “They have camels in Cornwall?”

  “No, darling. It’s the name of a river and it must be high tide,” she said, “because at low tide this is almost all sandbars. But the end really is in sight now. Trengilly is just down on the shore. And from my recollection there is only one big house beyond Polzeath and then it’s just grass and rocks. White Sails must be on the other side of the headland.”

  The road now climbed above the river estuary into which great waves from the Atlantic were rolling. On either side of us was nothing but bleak grass and heather. The rain had picked up again, blowing straight at us from the Atlantic Ocean. The windscreen wipers were working furiously.

  “Bloody hell,” Belinda muttered we went around a sharp bend, rather too fast and rather close to the edge of what was now definitely the Atlantic Ocean and not an estuary. Yes, I know a lady does not swear, but there are extenuating circumstances and almost going over a cliff is one of them. She gave me a nervous grin. “I hope the house has good heating, don’t you? I’m ready for a bath and a nice hot cup of tea. Do you think there is a resident servant? Wouldn’t that be nice?”

  “Very nice,” I said. “But not very likely that your grandmother would have kept a servant in a house you didn’t even know about. I’m rather hungry too. I hope that pub isn’t too far away.” I didn’t like to admit that I hadn’t seen any house since we left the last village behind. A steep upland of bare grass rose ahead of us, topped with a rocky outcropping. The road had become little more than a track.

  “This can’t be right,” Belinda said. “I don’t remember this at all. I thought it was supposed to be near Trengilly.” She slowed the car to a crawl. “Oh, look. An answer to our prayers, darling. There’s someone to ask. Be an angel and find out, will you?”

  “You want me to get out into that? I’ll be blown away.”

  “You grew up in Scotland, darling. You’ve faced much worse. See. He’s not being blown away.”

  Reluctantly I tied a scarf firmly around my head and stepped out into the full force of the gale. A man was leaning on a gate, watching us. He didn’t seem to mind getting wet at all. I went over to him.

  “Excuse me, but do you know a house called White Sails?”

  “Ooo arr,” he said, nodding with enthusiasm. He was an older man with a weathered face and a mouth missing several teeth. He was wearing an old sack over his shoulders and a shapeless faded hat on his head. “Fish!”

  “No, I don’t want fish. I want directions to a house called White Sails.” I tried not to sound too exasperated.

  “That’s right. Err wants fish.” He had a really strong burr to his accent and he was grinning at me. Clearly only the village idiot would be out in rain like this.

  “White Sails,” I said again, trying to be patient. “It’s a house on the coast near here. Could you tell us how to get there?”

  He was eyeing me up and down as if I was a creature from a distant planet. “Round little rumps,” he said with even greater enthusiasm.

  “Well, really.” I stalked back to the car.

  “Disgusting old man.” I slammed the car door behind me. “He was leering at me and then he said I had round little rumps. The nerve of it.”

  Belinda looked at me and then suddenly started laughing.

  “It’s not funny. You might not mind having men comment on your shape but I certainly do. Especially when I’m cold, wet and hungry.”

  “He was telling us the way, darling. I’ve remembered now. The headland is called Little Rumps. We’re on the right track.”

  “Little Rumps,” I muttered. “What a stupid name for a headland. Camels and Splatt and now Little Rumps. This really is a very silly place!”

  Belinda steered us carefully around the side of the headland. I could feel the motorcar being buffeted by the wind. Below us we could see the waves crashing against the rocky shore. Then the road wound up and over the top, leaving the shore. The rain had abated as quickly as it had begun and the last rays of a setting sun poked between dark clouds over an angry Atlantic Ocean. It was a red sun, painting the landscape as if it were on fire. On the top of the hill, rising from the short cropped grass, was another standing stone and now it glowed bloodred. In that fading light it almost looked like a figure standing there and I shivered.

  “This is a spooky sort of place, isn’t it?”

  “Not normally,” Belinda said. “It will look much better by daylight. I only have fond memories, you know. Of course Granny’s proper house was down by the estuary, where it’s more sheltered and not so bleak as here.”

  We crested the headland, passing that standing stone, then dropped to the other side to find another bay ahead of us. Suddenly she jammed on the brakes and pointed. “Look. Here we are.”

  There was a sign on the gate beside the road. It said White Sails.

  Chapter 4

  TUESDAY, OCTOBER 15

  AT WHITE SAILS, A COTTAGE IN CORNWALL

  Not exactly what I had expected. Belinda is keen to stay and fix it up. Frankly I think she’s being a trifle optimistic. Foul weather. Cold and damp. I’m missing Darcy.

  Belinda pulled onto the grass beside the road. “I see the sign but I don’t see a house, do you?”

  “Not at the moment.” I opened my door, only to have it nearly snatched out of my hands by the force of the wind. I grabbed my scarf as the wind threaten
ed to rip it from my head and tear open my overcoat. I held on to the car as I came around it. I heard Belinda utter a swear word as her door nearly slammed on her. “Who in their right mind would build a house here?” she asked. “And where is it, for God’s sake?”

  We peered together over the gate.

  “Oh, there it is,” I said. Through the growing darkness we could see a steep flight of steps going down the hillside. And below them we could make out the roof of a house.

  “Extraordinary,” Belinda said. “No wonder Granny never mentioned this. She’d never have made the steps with her rheumatism. I wonder why she bought it in the first place. Perhaps it came with Trengilly. Oh well. We’re here now. Let’s go down and investigate, shall we?”

  The gate opened with a creak and we started down the steps. It wasn’t easy going, as they were wet and steep and there was no rail. The house was in a little gully, sheltered from the worst of the wind.

  “I don’t fancy carrying groceries and supplies down here,” Belinda called to me. The wind snatched away her words. “I hope someone delivers.”

  “Are you sure this is the right place?” I shouted back. “It doesn’t seem the sort of place your grandmother would want, does it? Somehow I’m pretty sure there is no servant in residence.”

  The steps turned to the right, crossing a rushing stream by a little bridge, and there below us was the house—well, rather a gray stone cottage with a slate roof. It sat on a rocky platform, nestled into the cliffside, not far above the shoreline and to one side was a natural harbor in the rocks, onto which a stone jetty had been built, protecting it from the worst of the waves.

  “Oh, I see,” Belinda said. “I understand now. It was probably built as a smuggler’s cottage with that convenient little harbor beside it. And more recently it was a fishing cottage. Yes, I do remember somebody mentioning this once. My uncle Francis was staying at the fishing cottage and Granny said not to get our hopes up that he’d ever catch anything because he was bone idle.”

  “Fish!” I exclaimed. Belinda looked at me inquiringly. “That’s what the old man said when I asked him for directions to White Sails. He said, ‘Err wants fish.’ Maybe that’s what the locals call it. The fish house, perhaps.”

  “Well, at least we made it,” Belinda said. “It looks like quite a pretty little place, doesn’t it?”

  “It does,” I agreed, although I wasn’t so sure. It was a simple one-story cottage, built of rough Cornish stone. There were white shutters at the windows, but one of them was now hanging loose, flapping in the wind and in danger of flying off at any moment. Bushes had been planted around the house, in the hope, probably, of sheltering it from the worst of the wind. As we came down the last of the steps I tasted the salt of spray. Belinda paused at the front door and fished in her handbag for a key.

  “For heaven’s sake, don’t drop it,” I pleaded. “We’d never find it again.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m quite capable,” she said. She stepped up to the front door and waved the key at me. It turned in the lock and Belinda opened the door triumphantly. “I suppose it’s too much to hope that there is electricity,” she said as we both stepped into a damp and musty room. She fished in her handbag again and produced a cigarette lighter. “Lucky that one of us smokes,” she said. She flicked it on and held it up, illuminating the room. What we saw did not look too promising. We were standing in a living room with a table and two chairs on one side, a battered old sofa in front of a fireplace on the other. Belinda located an oil lamp on the windowsill and miraculously there was oil in it.

  “Do you know how to light one of these things?” She carried it over to the table.

  “Not really. We used them when the power went out at Castle Rannoch but we always had servants to light them.”

  “That’s just the problem, isn’t it?” Belinda said. “We’ve never had to stand on our own feet.”

  “Don’t you think it would be wise to go back to the nearest village and stay the night somewhere? We need to eat anyway.”

  “You’re suddenly obsessed with eating,” Belinda said. “Are you pregnant?”

  “No, I’m not,” I snapped at her. “I’m just a normally hungry person. And then we can explore this place properly in the morning.”

  “That might be a good idea,” Belinda agreed. “I wonder where the nearest pub might be? Probably all the way back in Rock. I’m not sure there was a pub in Polzeath.”

  “What would we find if we kept on going the way we were heading?”

  Belinda frowned. “I don’t think there is anything for quite a while. This is a deserted stretch of coast as far as I can remember. No, we’ll have to go back to get something for dinner. Come on, then. My lighter won’t keep going much longer.”

  We closed the front door, then made our way up the steps again. We were both out of breath by the time we reached the motorcar.

  “Those Cornish people must be hardy,” I gasped. “This is worse than Castle Rannoch.”

  “It will all look better in the morning,” Belinda said. I could tell she was trying to sound cheerful. “And we’ll feel much better after a good hot meal and a glass of something.”

  Belinda managed to turn the motor around successfully while I said a little prayer, then we negotiated the winding road until we saw the first welcoming lights of human habitation, with, thank goodness, a pub. But there was no sign of life as we pulled up outside the Smuggler’s Inn.

  “Surely the pub will still be open,” I said. “It doesn’t look . . .”

  But Belinda had gone ahead. She pushed open the heavy oak door. “It’s fine,” she called. “Come on.”

  We stepped into a warm and smoky room. Across the ceiling were oak beams, the walls were wood paneled and a fire glowed in the fireplace. Several men sat at a table and a couple more stood beside the bar. Fishermen, I thought, judging by the big waterproof boots and a lingering odor of fish. At least two of them were smoking a pipe and it was hard to make out details through the fug. But at least it was a comforting warmth. I followed Belinda up to the bar.

  “Good evening,” she said, making all the men abruptly stop their conversations and swivel to look at us, pipes poised in midair, mouths open. “I hope you are still serving food.”

  The hefty middle-aged woman behind the bar had been deep in conversation with two of the men. She stared at us as if we were alien beings before she folded her arms across her ample bosom and said, “No women allowed in the public bar, I’m afraid. Ladies lounge around the corner.” She indicated with a jerk of her head.

  Belinda glanced at me in amusement. “Come on, old thing. We’re breaking the rules.” We came out, back into the blustery night, went around to the side of the pub and entered through a side door to find ourselves on the other side of the same bar, but in a much less pleasant room. There were several leather armchairs with small glass-topped tables and no fire in the fireplace. One anemic light bulb hung from the ceiling. It was about as unwelcoming as any room could be. Belinda strode up to the bar. I followed. The barmaid turned away from the men and came across to us. “Found it all right, then?” she asked. “Now what will it be?”

  “What food do you have?” Belinda said. “We’d like a meal, please.”

  “Oh no. We don’t do food here, miss. Only in the summer for the tourists,” she said.

  “Is there anywhere else nearby?” I asked. My stomach was now growling with hunger.

  The woman considered this, then shook her head. Her several chins wobbled. “Nothing closer than Wadebridge, I wouldn’t reckon. We only cater to local folks and they get their suppers at home. You’d be better off going around the Camel and into Padstow. They cater to outsiders there so I’ve heard.”

  “How far away is that?” I asked.

  “Well, if you’re driving a motor car you have to go around the estuary, don’t you? Until there’s a bridge. I
reckon it’s at least ten miles.”

  I gave Belinda a despairing glance.

  “So you have no food at all you could find for us? We’ve been driving all day and we’re really hungry.”

  “I’ve pasties you can have,” she said reluctantly. “I always make a couple extra in case my man gets hungry between meals. He’s a prodigious healthy appetite has Mr. Trevelean. No doubt I could warm a couple up for you in the oven if you don’t mind waiting.”

  “That would be marvelous,” Belinda said. “Thank you so much. And a couple of pints of cider, please.”

  The woman pulled these effortlessly, putting the big glasses on the bar. “That will be three shillings, my lovey,” she said.

  Belinda paid her.

  “You are visiting these parts, then?” the landlady asked.

  “We are. I’ve just inherited a house near here,” Belinda said. “White Sails. Do you know it?”

  “Can’t say I do,” the woman said. “People give their houses all kinds of fancy names these days, don’t they?”

  “It’s on the coast past Little Rumps,” Belinda said. “But we’d rather wait until the morning before we take a look at it. Do you happen to have a room for the night?”

  “Room for the night?” The woman behind the bar now looked as if we had just asked her if she ran a brothel.

  “No rooms here. And you won’t find a room closer than Wadebridge, maybe. More likely Padstow. Everything closes when the summer visitors are gone.”

  “I see,” Belinda said. “Well, we’d be grateful for the pasties. If you’d pop them in the oven for a minute.”

  We carried our glasses over to one of the tables and sat on the cold leather seats.

  “Cheerful sort, isn’t she?” Belinda muttered to me. “I always remember the Cornish as being much friendlier.”

  “Perhaps she doesn’t approve of women traveling alone,” I whispered back. “She thinks we might lure her menfolk.”

  “What—that lot of old codgers?” Belinda chuckled.