“Apparently our general manager had some sort of accident,” Andrea replied.
“Oh, I do hope he’s okay,” the woman said.
“Unfortunately, he passed away,” Andrea said sadly.
“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that,” Nancy said.
“I hope his passing doesn’t change anything here,” Jack said. “I suspect our children will be sending us here again next year.”
“I’m sure things will remain the same,” Andrea assured him. “Charles was only here for a short time. The previous manager, Harold, has taken back over, at least for the time being.”
“What was Charles like to work for?” Doona asked, her voice quiet.
“He was lovely,” Andrea said. “Oh, he was a bit of a flirt, but he didn’t mean anything by it. One of my friends, she’s a waitress in the Italian restaurant, she flirted back once and he turned her down flat. Told her he was married, although we never saw any sign of a wife around here, that’s for sure.”
“Wasn’t he a bit old to be flirting with you?” Bessie asked.
“Like I said, he didn’t really mean anything by it. He just had a way of talking to you that made you feel like the only person in the world.” Andrea sighed. “If I were a bit older, I might have been tempted.”
Bessie looked hard at Doona, whose eyes were now filling with tears. “I think I need a little break,” she announced. “Can I get a glass of water or something?”
“Oh, goodness, I nearly forgot,” Andrea exclaimed. “We’re meant to break for tea and biscuits. Just give me a minute.”
While the girl fixed the tea and dumped biscuits onto a plate, Bessie crossed to Doona. “Are you okay?” she whispered.
“Mostly,” Doona answered. “Nothing a cuppa and a chocolate digestive can’t fix, anyway.”
Bessie shook her head. She knew Doona was being brave, but the hurt that her friend was feeling went far beyond what tea and a sugary treat could fix.
“Your golf ball actually looks like a ball,” Andrew said from behind them.
Bessie looked at Doona’s drawing and smiled. “He’s right,” she said. “Yours is much better than mine.”
Doona glanced over at Bessie’s sketch and then smiled an almost genuine smile. “I did better than I thought I could,” she said.
“If you want to feel even better about yours, come and look at mine,” Andrew offered. “My golf ball looks like a hand grenade.”
Bessie and Doona took the three steps needed to get to Andrew’s easel. Bessie looked at the picture and then looked at Doona. They both struggled not to laugh, as Andrew was exactly right. His golf ball did rather resemble a hand grenade.
“You can laugh. I know you want to,” he said. “I never claimed to be able to draw, and I’m actually having fun, so I don’t even mind.”
“The tea’s ready,” Andrea called, saving Bessie from needing to find a polite reply to Andrew’s comments.
“So where is everyone from?” Jack asked as everyone fixed their drinks and selected biscuits. On hearing that Doona and Bessie were from the Isle of Man, he and Nancy launched into a seemingly endless story about a long-ago holiday they’d had on the island. That filled in the tea break nicely. When it was time to get back to their drawings, Andrea had a new challenge for them.
“We’ve been working with fairly uniform shapes,” she told them. “Let’s see how you do with something slightly less geometric.”
After taking away the balls and the box, she set a vase full of flowers on the table. “The key to this is to start with the shapes you can see,” she said. “The flowers are round, the vase is rectangular. Work from there, using your shading techniques to give shape to the flowers.”
Bessie tore off her previous sketch, folding it carefully so that she could take it with her, and then stared at the blank sheet of paper. She wasn’t even sure where to begin with this new challenge.
“Start with the shapes,” Andrea said from beside her. She had a small piece of blank paper in her hand and she held it against Bessie’s easel. With her other hand, she quickly began to sketch. Bessie watched as the girl drew a large rectangle for the vase with several light circles above it.
“There’s your starting point,” Andrea said. “Now you just have to fill in the detail.”
With that, the girl set to work and within minutes she’d turned the rough shapes into a beautiful sketch. Bessie shook her head. “I can’t do that,” she said firmly.
Andrea laughed. “I do it twice a week,” she said. “If you did the same, you’d get good, too.”
Bessie grabbed a pencil and started in on her picture. An hour later she had something that was just about recognisable as a vase of flowers, even if it was nowhere near as good as the very quick sketch Andrea had done.
“It’s just about time to wrap this up for today,” Andrea announced. “You’re all welcome to stay for another half hour if you’d like to keep working, but after that I have a class of four and five-year-olds that I’m sure you’ll want to miss.”
Bessie looked over at Doona. “I’m ready to go, but I can walk back by myself if you want to stay a little bit longer.”
“I think I’ll stay for a short while,” Doona told her. “I’ve just about done and I’d like to finish.”
Bessie looked at her friend’s picture. It was much better than Bessie’s, and she could see why Doona wanted to stay. “If mine looked like that, I’d stay, too,” she told Doona. “I’ll see you back at the cabin.”
“I’ll walk back with you,” Andrew offered. “I gave up on mine about twenty minutes ago anyway.”
Bessie looked over at Andrew’s board. His vase looked like a shoebox and his flowers didn’t look very healthy at all.
“I had fun,” he told Bessie with a wink. “And that’s all that matters.”
“I can’t argue with that,” Bessie told him. She tore her last picture off her easel and then carefully put all three of her sketches into her handbag.
“Thank you so much for coming,” Andrea told them both. “I hope you enjoyed yourselves. You’re more than welcome to take the class again. If you do, we can work on more advanced techniques.”
“Once is enough for me,” Andrew replied. “Although I think Bessie shows promise.”
“I think Doona’s the one with the talent,” Bessie replied. “Anyway, we’re trying watercolours next. Do you teach that as well?”
“Oh, no, sorry,” Andrea said. “That’s Mai’s class now.”
Something in her tone made Bessie curious. “Mai Stratton?” she asked. “I thought she was guest services manager.”
“Oh, she is,” Andrea replied. “But she wanted to teach the watercolour class too and, well, whatever Mai wants, she gets.”
“Why?” Bessie had to ask.
Andrea shook her head. “Let’s just say she was very close to the general manager, shall we?” she replied.
“She had an affair with Charles?” Doona asked.
Andrea shook her head. “It wasn’t that,” she said. “I always thought Mai knew something about him that he didn’t want anyone else to know. But I mustn’t speak ill of the dead.”
Doona pressed her lips together and went back to her drawing. Bessie thought about staying.
“I can wait for you,” she said tentatively to her friend.
“No, you go,” Doona said. “I’m fine.”
“Let’s go, then,” Andrew suggested, offering Bessie his arm.
“You haven’t taken your last sketch,” Andrea reminded him.
Andrew looked at his easel and shook his head. “I don’t really think I need it.”
“You should take it and give it to your grandson,” Bessie suggested. “You could tell him how hard you worked on it and how you’d love it if he’d frame it and hang it in his house.”
“What a splendid idea,” Andrew said, laughing. He carefully tore the drawing off the easel and rolled it up.
“I have cardboard tubes if you would like one,” An
drea offered.
“Oh, yes, definitely,” Andrew said. “I might even wrap it up and give it to him as a special present.”
With his sketch safely inside the cardboard tube, Andrew offered his arm to Bessie again. “Shall we?”
Bessie grinned. “Let’s.”
Nancy and Jack were still busily putting the finishing touches on their drawings, so Bessie and Andrew walked out by themselves.
“All kidding aside, that was much more enjoyable than I expected,” he told Bessie as they walked slowly around the lake.
“Andrea is a very talented instructor,” Bessie said. “I felt like I learned an awful lot in a very short time.”
“She seemed quite sad about Charles’s death as well,” Andrew commented.
Bessie could feel his eyes on her, but she kept hers turned towards the lake. “I’m sure everyone is sad about that,” she replied.
“I understand Doona was his wife,” he said.
“Ex-wife,” Bessie amended. “But she didn’t know he was here and she wouldn’t have come if she had known.”
“Are you quite sure about all of that?” Andrew asked.
Bessie looked at him in surprise. “I’m very sure,” she said firmly, trying to read the look on the man’s face.
“Perhaps you should have a long talk with your friend,” he said after an awkward pause.
Bessie was going to argue, but another thought crossed her mind. “Who’s been telling you about Doona, then?” she asked.
“I have various connections,” he answered vaguely. They were nearly at the village centre, having just reached the ice cream stand where their early morning walk had begun. Now, however, the stand was open and a short queue of families with small children was waiting patiently for frozen treats.
“Let’s get ice cream,” Andrew suggested.
“It’s nearly dinner time,” Bessie pointed out.
“So?”
“I don’t want to spoil my dinner,” Bessie replied.
“Why ever not?” Andrew demanded. “You’re on holiday. You can have something light for dinner if you aren’t properly hungry after the ice cream, or, more likely, you’ll discover that you can still manage a proper meal after a small treat.”
“I never have pudding first,” Bessie said, feeling slightly ridiculous.
“Well, once in a while, you should,” Andrew said firmly. He took her arm and led her to the end of the queue. Bessie spent the waiting time dithering back and forth as to whether she was actually going to get anything or not, but once it was their turn, she found she couldn’t resist.
“Just a very small cone,” she told the man behind the counter. “Vanilla, no, strawberry, no, vanilla.” She sighed and looked at Andrew. “I love both flavours,” she said apologetically.
“She’ll have two scoops,” he told the man. “One each of vanilla and strawberry. I’ll have the same, but with vanilla and chocolate.”
Bessie thought about arguing, but changed her mind. Andrew’s solution was a sensible one and the ice cream looked really delicious when the man passed it over the counter to her. Andrew insisted on paying, and again Bessie didn’t argue.
Bessie tried first one and then the other of her scoops and sighed happily. “They’re both really good,” she exclaimed.
“I thought they would be,” Andrew replied. “We visited the stand after lunch this afternoon and I thought the ice cream was exceptionally good.”
“You already had ice cream today?” Bessie asked.
“I did,” Andrew told her, his eyes twinkling. “Am I in trouble for having too much fun on my holiday?”
Bessie flushed. “I’m sorry. Of course it isn’t my place to tell you what to do. I was just surprised, that’s all.”
“I don’t usually eat ice cream twice a day,” he said. “But I do think holidays are for indulging oneself, don’t you?”
“I suppose so,” Bessie said. She lived on the beach, in what many considered the perfect holiday spot, and she’d never held a paying job. Therefore, Bessie rarely actually took holidays, feeling as if she had nothing that she needed to take a break from. The idea of indulging herself the way Andrew meant felt somewhat foreign to her.
“I’ve never really grown up properly,” Andrew whispered to her. “In spite of serving in the armed forces and working my way up in the police, I still feel like a small child inside. If I can get away with ice cream twice a day, I’m going to take advantage.”
“Good for you,” Bessie said, feeling as if she could learn a lot from the man’s attitude.
They’d reached the bridge when they’d played Poohsticks the previous day.
“Let’s sit for a while,” Andrew suggested, gesturing towards a bench that faced out towards the sea.
“I sat on one of these benches earlier today and it wasn’t very comfortable,” Bessie told him.
“Just a few minutes, then,” he replied.
Bessie sat down and stretched her feet out. She hadn’t realised how tired she was. She’d alternated between sitting and standing in the class, but she’d been on her feet more than she was used to. In spite of the uncomfortable bench, it felt really good to sit down.
The pair sat in silence for a short time, watching a few men and women in kayaks chasing one another around the small lake. Bessie finished her ice cream and crunched her way through the cone. Beside her, Andrew was doing the same.
“I love being around water,” Andrew told her.
“I live on the sea,” Bessie replied. “This lake doesn’t feel quite right.”
“I’ve always wanted to live on the sea,” Andrew said wistfully. “We were in London, or rather the suburbs of London, for many years. I sold the house when my wife passed away and I bought a tiny flat in the city. I have a distant view of the Thames, which isn’t exactly the same as a sea view.”
“You should come and visit the Isle of Man,” Bessie told him. “As the island is only thirteen miles across, you’re never far from the sea.”
“I was there many years ago,” he said. “During the war, actually. I don’t remember much about it. It was just another place I was briefly stationed. Perhaps I will visit one day.”
“There are holiday cottages a short distance down the beach from my cottage,” Bessie told him. “You could hire as many as you need and your whole family could come. You’d be right on the water.”
“I’d like that,” Andrew said, staring out at the lake. “Bessie, you seem like a good person. I’ve talked at length with John Rockwell and he can’t say enough good things about you. Please, if you feel like you need any help, let me know.”
“I assume you mean with the murder investigation,” Bessie said.
“With that and with anything else that might happen while you’re here,” he said. “The investigation is a worry, as Doona could be a suspect, but a bigger worry, as far as I’m concerned anyway, is the murderer.”
“You think he or she might target Doona next?” Bessie asked, suddenly afraid for her friend.
“I don’t know why Charles was killed,” Andrew said. “It could have nothing whatsoever to do with Doona. Or she could be right in the middle of the whole mess. I just know I’ll feel better when Inspector Hopkins has someone behind bars.”
“As long as she gets the right person,” Bessie said tartly.
“She struck me as a smart lady,” he told her. “And this is a high profile case. She’ll be under pressure to solve it quickly, but she’ll be very careful as well.”
“I hope you’re right about that.”
Andrew reached into a pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper. “My mobile number,” he told Bessie as he handed her the sheet. “I meant what I said. Ring me if you need help.”
Bessie nodded and stuck the slip of paper in her pocket. “I should give you my number as well,” she said. She dug around in her handbag for a pen and a scrap of paper.
“Here,” she said when she’d finished writing out a slip for him. “There’s m
y mobile number as well as my address and phone number at home in case you want to get in touch about a holiday on the island.”
Andrew smiled and slipped the paper into a pocket. “I think I’ll need to recover from this holiday before I’m ready for another,” he said quietly.
“You two didn’t get very far,” Doona called to them from the path around the lake.
“We just stopped here to admire the view,” Bessie told her.
“And eat our ice cream,” Andrew added.
“You had ice cream?” Doona asked, frowning. “I didn’t get any ice cream.”
“You should have stopped at the little stand by the village centre,” Bessie told her. “They have excellent ice cream.”
“Maybe I’ll just go back over and get some now,” Doona mused.
“It must be dinner time,” Bessie argued. “Are we eating back there tonight?”
“I thought maybe Italian,” Doona said.
“That sounds wonderful,” Bessie agreed quickly.
“Andrew, you’re welcome to join us,” Doona told the man.
“I wish I could,” he replied, sounding sincere. “But I haven’t seen the family in a few hours. I’m going to have to have dinner with them.”
Bessie and Doona both chuckled.
“I suppose we should stop back at the cabin and freshen up before dinner,” Bessie said, getting slowly to her feet.
“I definitely need to do that,” Doona agreed. “I think I’ll change as well. I feel as if I’m covered in pencil dust.”
“I’ll walk back with you then, ladies,” Andrew said, getting up from his bench. “I’m supposed to meet everyone in about half an hour at the Chinese restaurant, so I have time to freshen up as well.”
He looked at Bessie and winked. “And by freshen up, I mean grab a quick shot of whiskey,” he whispered.
Bessie laughed again and then the two joined Doona on the path back to their temporary home.
“How did your drawing come out in the end?” Bessie asked her friend.
“I’m really pleased with it,” Doona told her. “It’s much better than I expected to be able to do.”
Aunt Bessie's Holiday Page 13
