Aunt Bessie Volunteers

by Diana Xarissa

  Bessie sighed. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s fine, really. I’m just feeling rather badly done to because it’s all been dumped into my lap, that’s all. I should be grateful that we have the money to do whatever we’d like and that George is happy to redecorate this house and isn’t still trying to persuade me to move back to Douglas.”

  “I thought you were going to sell the Douglas house.”

  “So did I. George is now talking about giving it to one of our sons, although they both have perfectly lovely homes of their own. I don’t know. He simply can’t seem to let that house go.”

  “As long as you get to stay at Thie yn Traie, I suppose it doesn’t matter.”

  “You’re right, of course. You didn’t come to listen to me complain, though. Let me think. Maybe I can tell you more about Sam Owens.”

  Bessie sat silently next to Mary as the woman shut her eyes and frowned.

  “I’m afraid I don’t know much,” she said eventually. “I didn’t even know he was married until I saw the article in the paper. I’d always thought he’d been a lifelong bachelor.”

  “How long have you known him? Since you moved to the island?”

  “Oh, longer than that. He and George worked together on something years ago. They used to golf together once a month at the club George belonged to in Manchester when we lived there.”

  “So you knew him when he was younger. You never saw him with a woman?”

  “He used to bring his secretary to special events,” Mary replied. “She was at least twenty years older than he was and she was very happily married, as well.”

  “Interesting,” Bessie said thoughtfully.

  Jonathan Hooper walked into the room. The man who walked in behind him glanced around and then frowned at Bessie. He had a full head of grey hair and was dressed in a very expensive-looking suit.

  “Mr. Samuel Owens,” Jonathan said. He bowed and then turned and left the room.

  Chapter 13

  “Sam,” Mary said warmly as she got to her feet. “Do come in.”

  She waited until the man had crossed the room to join her before she spoke again. “You know Bessie Cubbon, don’t you? I always assume that everyone knows Bessie.”

  “We’ve met,” Samuel conceded with a tiny nod at Bessie.

  “It’s lovely to see you again,” Bessie said.

  He gave her a thin smile. “I’m here to see Elizabeth,” he told Mary.

  “Yes, of course. She said something about planning a small gathering for you. Let me go and find her. You can chat with Bessie while I’m gone.”

  Sam looked as if he wanted to protest, but Mary didn’t give him the opportunity to do so. She was out of the room before he had a chance to speak.

  “Please, have a seat,” Bessie invited.

  He shrugged and then sat very carefully in the chair opposite hers.

  “I haven’t seen you in years,” Bessie began. “It seems odd, on an island this small, that we haven’t seen more of one another.”

  “I never travel to Laxey. I assume you usually spend your visits to Douglas in the town centre. I don’t believe we have friends or acquaintances in common.”

  “Aside from Mary and George.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “How have you been?” Bessie asked.

  “I’m fine. How are you?”

  “Fine, thank you.” After a long pause, she spoke again. “Aside from finding dead bodies nearly everywhere I go, of course.”

  He winced. “It is rather odd, that.”

  “It’s also rather sad.”

  “I suppose it must be.”

  “You know people are speculating that the body could be Joselyn’s,” Bessie said softly.

  Sam stared at her for a minute and then shrugged. “I’m not really interested in what people think.”

  “The police are concerned as well.”

  “They shouldn’t be concerned about my wife. She’s fine.”

  “I hope you were able to provide the police with proof of that.”

  He scowled at her. “They should take my word for it, as should you. The weather today has been interesting.”

  “It’s been quite windy,” Bessie agreed. “I suppose we should expect as much in the winter months.”

  “Yes, perhaps.”

  The mantle clock ticked slowly as Bessie stared at the sea. Samuel had made it clear he wasn’t going to answer any of her questions, but she still felt the need to ask more. “I’m glad Joselyn is well,” she said eventually. “She seemed sweet, the few times I met her.”

  “She was, er, is a very sweet person,” he agreed.

  “It was odd, her just leaving the island the way she did.”

  “She had a good reason for leaving and has several good reasons for staying away now. None of this is any of your business, of course.”

  “No, of course not. I truly don’t mean to pry. Finding the body was quite upsetting, though.”

  “I’d have thought you’d be used to that by now.”

  “I’m not certain that I’ll ever get used to any such thing. There are a tremendous number of unanswered questions with this body, though. The police aren’t even certain if the woman was murdered or not.”

  “If she wasn’t murdered, how did she end up at Peel Castle, tucked away in one of the tower walls?”

  “I wish I knew. Maybe she died in an accident or even of natural causes and someone simply wanted to hide the body.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. She must have been murdered.”

  “It will be easier for the police to work out what happened to her once they know whom they’ve found.”

  “I suppose so. They haven’t found Joselyn, anyway.”

  “They won’t cross her off their list until they have proof of that. You do realise that, right?”

  “They shouldn’t need proof. My word should be enough.”

  “You’d lie, though, if you’d killed her.”

  He looked shocked. “If I’d killed her,” he echoed. “What an appalling thought.”

  “You must know that’s why the police have questioned you.”

  “No, I didn’t know that,” he said. “It’s such a ridiculous notion that it never crossed my mind. Why would I kill Joselyn? I had no reason to hurt her.”

  “She fell pregnant while you were away,” Bessie said softly.

  “Maybe I came home for a weekend in the middle of my trip.”

  “Did you?” Bessie asked, wondering why such a possibility had never been mentioned before.

  “No, but that’s not the point,” he replied. “I’m not discussing this with you. It’s all ancient history.”

  “Let’s hope the police work out the woman’s identity quickly. Once that happens, they’ll leave you alone again.”

  “I just hope that horrible man at the newspaper leaves me alone, too. He’s been ringing my house every day since that body was discovered.”

  “Dan Ross can be very persistent.”

  “He isn’t the only one, either. Some woman rang and demanded that I tell her how to find Joselyn. People have been pointing and whispering when they see me in the streets. It’s all very unpleasant.”

  “I’m sure it was worse when Joselyn first disappeared.”

  “I don’t know about that. Her parents supported me. They knew where she’d gone, of course, so they didn’t have any worries about what might have happened to her. People respected privacy a good deal more in those days, too. It wasn’t polite to be nosy.” The look he gave Bessie suggested that he was putting her firmly in the “not polite” category.

  “Maybe Dan will manage to track Joselyn down himself. As I said, he’s very persistent.”

  “I can’t allow that,” Sam said. “What must I do to stop him?”

  “I don’t believe you can stop him. He’s simply doing his job.”

  “Sticking his nose into things that don’t concern him. Surely I have a right to keep my private life to myself.”


  “I’m sure Dan would argue that the public has a right to know the truth, especially during a murder investigation.”

  “The body isn’t Joselyn’s. That’s all the public needs to know.”

  “Tell Inspector Anna Lambert where to find Joselyn. Once she’s confirmed that Joselyn is alive, she’ll tell Dan Ross that Joselyn has been eliminated from consideration. That should be enough to stop Dan from investigating any further.”

  “Are you quite certain?”

  Bessie shook her head. “I’m not going to lie to you. If Dan has decided to find Joselyn, he isn’t going to be put off by anyone or anything. You just have to hope that he’s more interested in discovering who was found in Peel than anything else.”

  Sam frowned. He slid down in his chair and stared out the window, breathing in and out in a controlled manner. After several minutes, he looked at Bessie.

  “I assume you know Inspector Lambert?”

  “I do, yes.”

  He nodded and then pulled a small notebook out of his pocket. He jotted something on the first sheet and then tore the sheet out and handed it to Bessie. “Tell her she can find Joselyn there.”

  Bessie looked down at the note. “Lakeside Lodge,” she read.

  Sam sighed. “You aren’t going to be happy until you hear the whole story, are you?”

  “You don’t need to tell me anything,” Bessie assured him. “I’ll give this to Anna Lambert. She’ll take care of it from there.”

  He shook his head. “I’ve never talked about Joselyn. Her parents didn’t want anyone to know anything, and that was fine with me. I still don’t want to talk about her, but I’d rather tell you than read about it in the paper.”

  “As long as Inspector Lambert can find her, that’s all that matters.”

  “We were happy. She was very young when we fell in love, but we waited until she was eighteen to get married. Her parents wanted us to wait longer. Later, after she was gone, they told me that they were worried about her fragility, but they never mentioned that at the time. They just said they wanted to make sure we were both certain as to what we were doing.”

  “You don’t have to tell me this.”

  “I was sure, so very sure,” he continued as if Bessie hadn’t spoken. “Joselyn insisted that she was sure, too. We ran away to Gretna Green. It seemed romantic and a bit wild, just like my wife. I’d have done anything to make her happy. I still will.”

  Bessie glanced at the door. Where were Mary and Elizabeth? Surely one of them should have come back by now.

  “I worked hard for her father and he gave me more and more responsibilities. I travelled all the time, but I didn’t mind. I usually took Joselyn with me, which was wonderful. We saw the world together. She loved travelling more than I did. She had such a huge sense of adventure.”

  He stopped and looked at Bessie. “To my mind, things were just about perfect, but Joselyn, well, she wanted one more thing. She wanted a baby.”

  Bessie nodded. She’d guessed that that was where the story was headed.

  “I told her we’d talk about it when I got back. I was going away for six months and I didn’t want to leave her behind pregnant and alone. She didn’t want to come with me. It was the first time she hadn’t wanted to come along. She said she was going to stay home and decorate the nursery.” His voice caught. “I would never have gone if I’d known.”

  Sliding forward in her chair, Bessie patted his arm. “You truly don’t need to tell me any of this.”

  “It’s cathartic, talking about it,” he replied. “Maybe I should have done it years ago. Maybe it would have made a difference to someone somewhere.”

  “Secrets get harder to give up the longer we keep them.”

  Sam nodded. “I’m sure you think you’ve heard the next part of the story. When I came back, Joselyn was five months pregnant. I’d been gone for six months, so the baby wasn’t mine. That’s what you’ve heard, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, that’s story the I’ve heard.”

  “We decided, her parents and I, that that was a better story than the truth. I didn’t mind if people thought Joselyn had cheated on me. Her parents thought that was preferable to people finding out just how ill she actually was.”

  “Ill?” Bessie echoed.

  “She wanted a baby. Over time, it became something of an obsession. I didn’t notice the changes in her. They were subtle, happening slowly over weeks and months. It was obvious, when I came back, but by that point it was too late.”

  “Mentally ill,” Bessie guessed.

  “Very badly mentally ill. As I said, her parents told me well after the fact that they were concerned about her mental health before we got married. They would have told me more, I believe, over time. They weren’t expecting us to run away to Gretna Green.”

  “I’m sure the rest of the story is difficult for you,” Bessie said sympathetically. “Coming home and finding her pregnant must have been incredibly hard.”

  “That’s just it,” he sighed. “She wasn’t pregnant, she just thought she was pregnant.”

  Bessie stared at him for a moment and then shook her head slowly. “But I remember seeing her in the shops one day. She was laughing and talking with a friend about getting ready for the baby.”

  “She was over the moon about the baby. When I asked her who the father was, she insisted that she’d been faithful, that I was the father. When I suggested that the dates didn’t work, she simply ignored me. She hadn’t been to see a doctor, not once, while I’d been away, so I made her go, insisting it was for the baby’s health. He couldn’t find a heartbeat.”

  Bessie blinked back tears. “That poor girl.”

  He nodded. “I had my suspicions by that point. Her refusal to see a doctor worried me. I could never feel the baby moving, either, although she kept insisting that she could. When the doctor suggested that she might not be pregnant, she became hysterical and had to be sedated. Her parents, her doctor, and I agreed that we’d simply let her continue with the fantasy for the time being. There wasn’t anywhere on the island that was equipped to deal with her at that time.”

  “I’m not sure there is now.”

  “Probably not. It’s a very specialist form of mental illness. I had a difficult job finding a place in the UK that could treat her. Her parents insisted that we tell no one where she was going. She was told that it was a specialist birthing centre.”

  “What happened to her?” Bessie asked.

  “She’s received the best care that I can afford, but her mental health is still incredibly fragile. When the nine months were up, they gave her a baby doll, and she remains devoted to that baby to this day. She’s lost touch with the passage of time. As the baby hasn’t aged, she assumes she’s still in her early twenties. I had to stop visiting a few years ago as she refused to believe that I was her husband. We talk on the phone every night. Fortunately, my voice hasn’t changed. She tells me all about what the baby is doing and I make up stories about her parents who simply can’t seem to find time to ring but are thinking of her.”

  Bessie gave up on trying to hold back her tears. She dug around in her handbag and found a tissue. “I’m sorry, but it’s all terribly sad.”

  “Don’t be sad for her. She’s completely unaware of reality. To her, life is just about perfect. She has her baby and I’m going to come and collect them both as soon as the baby gets a little bit bigger. Then we’re all going to live happily ever after as a family.”

  “I’ll be sad for you, then,” Bessie told him. “You’ve missed out on so much of life, having to deal with all of this.”

  He shrugged. “I had options. There were more aggressive treatment plans that might have snapped her out of her fantasy world and dragged her back to reality. I couldn’t bring myself to try them, as they also carried risks that included permanent brain damage. Her parents left those decisions to me, although we discussed them regularly.”

  “Did they want to try more aggressive treatments
?”

  “They were terrified to try anything,” he sighed. “She’d had problems when she was very small. They called it an unfortunate episode. They didn’t like to talk about it, but from what I could determine, she’d decided that her parents weren’t really her parents but that she’d been stolen from her real family. They ended up taking her to a hospital in London where she was heavily medicated for several months. When they brought her back to the island, it was some time before she began to behave normally again. I believe they worried that the medication she’d taken then might have led to her problems when she was older.”

  “Doctors need to focus on mental health the same way they do on physical health,” Bessie suggested.

  Sam shrugged. “Her parents actually urged me to divorce her. At first I refused because I was sure she was going to get better. I thought I’d be willing to try anything and everything to cure her. I truly believed that the doctors would be able to find some combination of drugs and therapy that would turn her back into the woman that I’d married. The reality of the situation didn’t hit me for several years, actually.”

  “I can’t even imagine.”

  “When I used to go to see her, the doctors would sit me down and give me a rundown of alternatives we could try. They’d tell me about the success rates they’d had with other patients or how well some drug had done in clinical trials, and then they’d tell me about possible side effects. After a while, I came to believe that Joselyn was better off where she was, in her own world, than she would have been in ours, possibly so brain-damaged as to be unable to walk or talk.”

  “I’m sure you’re right.”

  He shrugged. “I’ve given up trying to work out if I’ve done the right thing or not. In some ways, it seems as if her life has been wasted, but if I had it to do over again, I’m not sure I’d do anything differently.”

  “You’d still stay with her, even knowing that she was never going to get well?”

  “I promised her that much on our wedding day. I was desperately in love with her and I meant every word I said.”

  “You’re a good man, Sam Owens.”

  “I don’t know about that. I’ll never stop wondering if I made the wrong choices along the way. Maybe, if she’d been given the right drugs, we could have been happy together again.”