CHAPTER FOURTEEN – OLD LOVERS
Next, we decided that we needed to talk to Nellie’s old vicar again. He may know more than he had previously told, or we may have missed something the last time. We headed for Bishop’s Down once more and after inquiring at the vicarage found the old guy’s cottage on the outskirts of the village.
Apple Tree Cottage was as cute and pretty as its name, small with whitewashed walls and a brick path winding its way through a garden stuffed with roses, forget-me-knots, violas, petunias, and every kind of colourful flower that makes up a classic English cottage garden. The roof was thatched and the picket fence freshly painted white. It was, in short, the perfect cottage for a retired vicar and was a reminder of a quieter and gentler age.
We knocked at the front door, but there was no answer, so we made our way around to the side of the house. As we turned the corner into the back garden that was similar to the front, with the exception of an expanse of perfectly manicured lawn, John appeared from the herbaceous border, with clippers in one hand and an old-fashioned gardener’s basket in the other. He wore one of those long green aprons that some gardeners like and he looked every bit the gentleman villager, enjoying his flowers in the autumn of his life.
‘Hallo folks,’ he called out, ‘how nice to see you both again. I was just about to put the kettle on. Would you like a cup of tea? I think I have some wonderful homemade ginger cake too if you’d like!’
‘Thank you John, we’d love to join you.’ I answered for us both.
‘So, what brings you to pay a visit on an old fellow then?’ he enquired as we trooped in through the back door into a perfect cottage kitchen, complete with butchers block and butler’s sink.
‘We were wondering if we could ask you some more about Nellie.’ said Tara, leaning over to give him a hand with filling the kettle.
‘Oh, thank you my dear, I’ll get the cups and saucers while you do that. The cake is in the larder, I won’t be a second.’ With that, he disappeared through a small door at the far end of the room, only to reappear a minute later having discarded his apron and carrying a plate with the largest and most delicious looking cake I had seen in a long while.
‘What would you like to know about her?’ he asked. I could probably tell you lots, but I would have thought you’d know most of it already, being as close to her as you were.’
‘Yes, well you’re half right about that John,’ I sat down at the scrubbed pine table as I spoke, looking forward to a large slice of the cake, ‘but it’s more about Nellie before we were born that we were interested in.’
With that, he sensed that we wanted to know more about Nellie’s upset when she first arrived, and a frown creased his forehead for a moment. ‘How large a slice would you both like?’ he avoided my comments as he wielded a silver cake slice over the plate. There is plenty here and I won’t eat it all, so don’t be shy. Mrs. Carver makes it for me and drops one in nearly every week. Such a kind woman and such an excellent cook too.’
I smiled at him and asked for a large piece. Tara kicked me under the table and asked for just a small slice for herself. John eventually cut two large pieces anyway, and sat down with us, concentrating on pouring the tea for a moment before saying anything else.
‘I don’t know if I can tell you anything further,’ He said, ‘there wasn’t anything else to add to what I told you at the funeral. You have to understand that it was a long time ago and I can’t remember most of it anyway.’
I decided to carry on, somehow sensing that this was just a delaying tactic to allow him time to think up some other way to put us off. ‘I totally understand, it was a long time ago and I wouldn’t expect you to be able to remember every little detail from way back then. However, I just feel that there may be something that we perhaps misunderstood or misheard and I wondered if you would be so kind as to just run through it again so we can be sure.’ Tara nodded her agreement with this and as he looked first at Tara and then at me. He relented and started to tell the story once more.
When he finished, I realised that we had not learnt anything more than we already knew. Nellie had been upset when she arrived in the village, but had quickly gotten over it and not mentioned it again. We questioned him some more, but he could add nothing.
We thanked John for his time and the truly delicious ginger cake before starting to make our way out. Just as we reached the little gate to the lane, Tara told him how much she admired the old apple trees around his garden. She said it must be lovely to doze off in their shade on a warm summer’s day. We walked off into the lane when he called after us.
‘There is something else that you may be interested to know,’ he said, ‘I’ve only just remembered it actually, after your comment about sleeping under trees, the old mind is playing up a bit these days.’
‘That’s okay,’ I replied, ‘I forget things all the time even at my age. ‘What is it that you remembered?’
‘Well, it may be nothing, but there was one day when I visited her at her home. We had had a lovely lunch and as it was a warm summer’s day, decided to sit out in the garden. We both fell asleep for a while, as one does with a full tummy in the warm sunshine,’ he smiled at the memory, ‘but I woke up to the sound of Nellie’s voice. She was talking in her sleep and what she said was a little disturbing.’ He hesitated again as if he was remembering exactly what it was he had heard. ‘She said something about dead men in the trees, or was it under the tree?’ he paused again and then said, ‘No, it was there are dead men behind the tree, that was it, behind the tree. Very odd don’t you think?’
We looked at each other in astonishment and chorused that yes, it was a little odd. ‘Probably just a bad dream though.’ Tara sought to reassure him.
‘Yes you’re right. Just a dream, but odd just the same.’ He pondered this for a few seconds and then his face brightened. ‘Well, I hope I’ve been of some assistance to you. Please feel free to drop by again some time. It’s nice to have some company.’
We assured him that we would certainly be back for some more of Mrs. Carver’s cake, and bade him goodbye.
As soon as we were out of earshot, we both started gabbling at once. ‘Behind the tree! Did you hear him say it? Behind the tree! That’s exactly where Frederick said the treasure would be. What do you think Nellie was talking about with dead men behind the tree though? Tara quickly asked the question we both wanted the answer to.
‘Don’t know. It may have just been a bad dream after she had read the book of course. It’s easy to see how she would have dreamt about dead men behind trees after that, isn’t it?’ I tried to be the voice of reason and not jump to any conclusions for which we had absolutely no basis in fact, as they say in detective novels.
‘Frederick doesn’t mention anyone dying behind, in front, or anywhere near the tree does he? So why would she transpose the dead men from the cave to there? Tara asked the same questions that were whizzing through my mind and again, to which neither of us had any answers.
All of a sudden, I remembered that I had never asked Tara about her conversation with old Dotty Hanshaw at the funeral.
‘So what did Dotty tell you?’ I asked suddenly.
Tara was blank for a second and then seemed to remember what I was talking about. ‘God yes, I’d forgotten all about that. Let me think a minute.’
‘You’re as bad as old John back there; it wasn’t that long ago you know.’ I gave her a nudge that she duly ignored.
‘Do you want to know what she said or don’t you?’ she said mock sternly.
‘Sorry, just joshing with you. Go ahead, tell me what she said.’ I replied, mock contrite.
‘Okay, I can’t believe I’d forgotten this actually, I was so excited by it at the time, but events have somewhat overtaken us since.’ We reached an old wooden bench by the side of the lane overhung with a large beech hedge, so we sat down for a moment while Tara gathered her thoughts. ‘She told me the same story as John for the most part, about Nellie being upset and down when she
first arrived, but after awhile, perking up and never looking back again. However, she said that Nellie had been having nightmares. Dotty lived across the road even then and used to pop over a lot to chat. Nellie had seemed quite tired for some time and told Dotty of her bad dreams, which had been waking her up and not allowing her to get back to sleep again. When Dotty asked her about these dreams, she said that Nellie had been reluctant to tell her about them. All she would say is that they were about some bad memories she had of Africa and about a particularly dreadful event that had occurred before she left for England.’
Tara paused for a while and I said, ‘So, I wonder if these dreams were about the same thing that John told us?’
‘I would imagine so, wouldn’t you?’ Tara replied. ‘It would have been at around the same time and must have all been to do with whatever Nellie’s problems had been in Africa. But there’s more.’ She paused; I was sure for dramatic effect. ‘There was a boyfriend.’
‘What’s your point?’ I could see why Dotty and Tara had been so animated at the funeral. There is nothing more likely to get two women excited than the prospect of a bit of gossip about boyfriends and so on, no matter what age they are; they seem to thrive on that stuff.
‘The point is, you new age man you, that Nellie was very much in love with him, from what Dotty says, but they never really got together and he eventually left the scene.’
I may have been a little slow on the uptake, but could still not see the relevance of all this. ‘Sorry, but you really are going to have to get to the point of this. I have to go back to work next week and I may be late at this rate.’
She glared at me as if I were pond-scum, which is the usual reaction of women who are talking to men about romance, especially when the man doesn’t get it! ‘Were you born this stupid or do you practice at it?’ she asked sweetly.
‘Very funny, now would you please just get to the point.’
‘The point is Romeo, why would this guy who loved her and she him, just disappear like that. Why have we never heard of him? Why has no one ever heard of him and again, why wouldn’t he have stuck around?’
I was still none the wiser, but for the sake of coming up with anything at this point, I said, ‘Well perhaps he did what guys do and just got cold feet, did a runner and met someone else.’ I was truly bemused by this conversation.
‘No, Dummy, Dotty said that they were madly in love with each other, but she thinks that Nellie drove him away. Now why would she do that?’
‘I give up. Why would she do that?’ I had become a little disinterested in this exchange it must be said, but tried to humour Tara for the time being.
‘Because she was afraid that whatever happened in Africa would somehow come between them, that’s why. She was scared of something either catching up with her or maybe happening again. That’s the only thing we could think of that would make Nellie get rid of a man she loved as much as she did. The only way she could have really scared him off is if she told him what happened in Africa. Don’t you see? He may know more than anyone else about what happened out there, so if we can find him, then we may get the lead we have been looking for.’ She finished with a flourish as if she had solved the whole thing single handed and we could now retire and spend the treasure until the day we died.
‘Yes, well this is all very interesting, Mrs. Holmes,’ my turn to hand out the nicknames now, ‘but you’re forgetting one tiny detail. How do we find him? I mean, do we even have a name to go on?’
I think I got her with this one as she quietened down considerably before muttering that Dotty had said his name was Gordon someone or other.
‘Brilliant!’ I exclaimed. All we need to do then is ring up directory enquiries and ask for Gordon someone or other who lived in Bishop’s Down some several decades ago and we’ve pretty much cracked it!’
I thought she had got my point until she said, ‘Of course! A list of names of people living in Bishop’s Down at the same time. The parish register will have a list of anyone born here from 1066 probably.’ With a laugh of self-congratulation, she was up off the bench and heading towards the church.
‘Bloody women!’ I muttered as I trailed after her. ‘Think they know bloody everything.’
As we got to the church, the current vicar was just locking the door and leaving. We called out as we headed up the path and he turned to us.
‘Hi there,’ Tara smiled her broadest smile, ’we were wondering if we could take a peek at the parish register. Is it kept in here?’
‘I’m afraid not. It used to be, but as you can see even the Lord’s House is subject to burglary these days, so I keep it at the vicarage under lock and key.’
‘I don’t suppose there’s any way we could have a quick look at it now is there?’ Tara pressed him.
‘Well, it is unusual, but as it happens, I haven’t got much going on right now, so I suppose it won’t be a problem. Can I ask what you hope to find?’
Tara had obviously decided that truth was the best way to go so she said, ‘Our great aunt died a little while ago and we are trying to track down an old friend of hers who lived here in the village back before the war.
‘Ah, I see. Yes, of course you must take a look then. Follow me; the vicarage is just over there.’ He pointed down another path towards a grand Victorian redbrick building, just outside the old flint wall of the graveyard and so off we all trooped. ‘What is this friend’s name?’ he asked as we walked.
‘Well, that is where we may have a problem,’ I spoke for the first time, anxious to not appear as a mute appendage to Tara, ‘the only name we have is his first name, Gordon, and a very approximate age, and even that we’re not sure of.
‘Yes, well that may well be a problem,’ the vicar replied as he looked at us closely, pursing his lips in thought, ‘mind you, the village was only small back then. Probably only a few hundred people here, so you may be lucky to find only one or two candidates.’
We reached the vicarage and he bade us come inside. We followed him to his study, where an old, solid looking safe stood in the corner. He fiddled with the tumblers for a second and the door popped open. Then, he reached inside and drew out a large, leather-bound book and carried it over to the old partners’ desk that dominated the central part of the room. Folding back the cover, he flicked through several pages before coming to the place he was looking for. ‘Right,’ he said, ‘his name was Gordon, you say, and he lived here before the war. Any better idea than that as to his approximate birth date?’
We looked at each other and then Tara spoke. ‘He must be around eighty now if that helps.’
‘Yes, yes, that will help enormously. Let me see now.’ He ran his finger down page after page and jotted several names down on a piece of paper before closing the book again and putting it back in the safe. ‘Okay’ he said, ‘here are all the Gordon’s, born within ten years of your estimate. Now we shall have to consult one more oracle of all knowledge of Bishop’s Down and see if we can discount any of them.’ He went to the door and shouted, ‘Beryl, could you pop into my study a minute please.’ A woman of about sixty-five came in, but said nothing. ‘I would like to introduce Beryl who has looked after the vicars of Bishop’s Down since she was a slip of a girl. She is indispensable around here, worth her weight in gold. More importantly for you two, she knows everything there is to know about the goings on in the village, past and present.’
He showed Beryl the list he had written and asked her what she knew about the names written there. She scanned the list and eventually said, ‘They’re all dead except that one and that one.’ She said while stabbing a finger at two names. ‘Mind you, the second one could be dead too for all I know. He left the village a long time ago and I can’t say that he ever came back.’
‘That must be him then,’ said Tara, ‘did he leave around the thirties do you know?’
‘Could have been I suppose, can’t say I ever knew him, just heard mother talk about him is all.’
‘That mu
st be him mustn’t it?’ Tara turned to me with a smile. ‘What’s his surname?’ she asked the vicar.
‘Fonteneau,’ he said, ‘that should help, there can’t be too many of those around, can there?’
‘You wouldn’t have thought so would you,’ Tara smirked at me. ‘Come on then Jamie, let’s go and find Gordon Fonteneau, shall we?’ She turned to Beryl and gave her a big hug, which surprised the old lady somewhat, before shaking the vicar’s hand and heading out the door, with me trailing behind.
‘So, all we do is look in directory enquiries and we should be able to find the old fella. Looks like you were right all along.’ Tara was horrible when she felt smug and right now she was definitely very impressed with her detective skills.
‘Yes, yes, very clever, but how do we know where in the country he is, even if he is in the country. After all, a lover scorned, etc. He may well have gone off to the colonies himself and died a lonely death years ago from some rare tropical disease on his rubber plantation in Outer Mongolia.’ I was getting a tiny bit fed up with her at the moment, but she didn’t seem to notice or care.
‘Firstly, to the best of my knowledge, there are no rubber plantations in Outer Mongolia, it being a tad cold and all, and secondly we won’t know until we look will we? So stop moping and let’s go look!’
We headed again for Acacia, it having the nearest phone we could think of and got through to directory enquiries. Incredibly, they had a listing for a Mr. Gordon Fonteneau in a village some twenty miles away. With a bit of subtle pressure, Tara managed to get an address too. We jumped into her little red roller skate and headed out of Bishop’s Down towards Manorford where Nellie’s old love now lived.
It didn’t take long to find the address we had been given, as the village was tiny. There only being one pub, it had no reason to grow I assume, and the lady in the village shop seemed to know all there was to know. ‘Old Mr. Fonteneau. Yes, he’s lived here as long as I can remember. Never married though, but a nice old bloke, gets involved locally when he can. He donates some of his paintings to local causes too, quite good he is, mostly watercolours, and they sometimes fetch a pretty penny.’ She waxed lyrical about him for a few more minutes before pointing us in the right direction.
‘How about that then?’ Tara said as soon as we left the shop, ‘he paints watercolours. I wonder if he painted that picture of Nellie in Mr. Tempole’s office.’ She pondered.
‘Well he may have, but I didn’t think Nellie had met him in Africa, I assumed he was a local chap.’ I frowned, trying to think back over the conversations we had had about this mysterious love.
‘And what about the fact that he never married? I mean, that’s really sad isn’t it. The poor guy was so distressed about Nellie’s rejection that he spent the rest of his life alone. I wonder if Nellie knew he lived just a few miles away.’ Tara contemplated a life lived alone for the love of another, as women do.
‘That’s just conjecture though, isn’t it? He may have just never found anyone else or he may have found he enjoyed living alone. God knows I’ve thought about it once or twice.’ I mumbled the last bit just out of Tara’s hearing.
We found Gordon’s cottage, almost a replica of John’s in Bishop’s Down funnily enough, except there were not so many apple trees here and the garden was a little more contemporary with some large ferns and sub-tropical plants adorning the front garden. We knocked on the door and heard the sounds of someone approaching slowly, shuffling towards the door. Gordon was a tall, elegant looking man despite his years, with a shock of snow-white hair on his head and a tanned, healthy complexion. He wore an old shirt and jeans, both spattered with paint of every colour. He frowned at us as we stood there not really sure what to say, and he was obviously trying to place us, but soon gave up.
‘Yes,’ he said slowly, can I help you?’
I actually recovered first and held out my hand. ‘Mr. Fonteneau?’ I asked, ‘Mr Gordon Fonteneau?’
The frown didn’t leave his face and he took one small step back as if he suspected we were about to launch a frontal assault on his home. ‘That’s me. And who might you be?’
‘Um, my name is James Braughton and this is my cousin Tara.’ At the mention of my surname, he flinched slightly, only just noticeable under his otherwise calm exterior. ‘We are the great nephew and niece of Nellie Braughton, who I believe you once knew, some time ago.’ His face now betrayed emotions of equal part curiosity and fear about what we were here to tell him. But I ploughed on. ‘We wondered if we might have a chat with you about Nellie. We’re researching her early life in England and thought you may be able to help.’
He stood stock still for a moment or two, looking first at me and then more closely at Tara, saying nothing, neither inviting us in or pushing us away. Then he seemed to reach a decision and shook his head slightly as if clearing his thoughts.
‘You look so much like her, my dear.’ He said, looking at Tara while at last taking my proffered hand. ‘It’s like stepping back in time, just you being here. You had better come in.’
He led us down the narrow hallway into the sitting room and offered us a seat. I looked around the room and there were paintings adorning every spare bit of wall space. The pictures were mostly landscapes, with either figures in the distance or none at all. The locations seemed to cover most of the globe and I reasoned that he must have travelled extensively in his lifetime. When I questioned him on this though, he said no. ‘I have travelled a little bit I suppose, but not as much as my paintings might suggest. I have a knack for conjuring up scenes that I have never actually witnessed myself, from firsthand accounts, or photographs, or some from descriptions in writing. It is a talent that has saved me thousands in airfares over the years I imagine.’ He smiled at me as he eased himself into a winged armchair by the window.
As I looked further, I recognised the style too and asked, ‘Mr. Fonteneau, did you by any chance paint an African landscape with Nellie as the central character?’
‘Yes, I did as a matter of fact.’ He gazed into space as his mind took him back. ‘I got the inspiration for that one from some paintings Nellie had brought back from Africa as I recall.’
That explained Mr. Tempole’s painting then. Gordon had painted it, but in Frederick’s style, which is what confused us all at the solicitor’s office.
Tara then spoke up and gently said, ‘Mr. Fonteneau, I’m afraid that we have some bad news for you. Nellie passed away a little while ago. She was in no pain and we think she was happy to go when she did. She was loved by so many people.’ Tara hesitated, unsure how, or if, to go on any further. Gordon let out a deep sigh and leant back into his chair, his hand rubbing his temple. There was silence in the room apart from the slow, rhythmic tick-tock of the clock up on the mantelpiece and the faint twitter of birds in the garden.
‘Would you like us to leave you in peace for a while?’ she asked, looking over at me in concern at how he would take the news. ‘Is there anyone we can call for you, to keep you company?’
He looked up and slowly shook his head. ‘No. Thank you my dear, you are very kind and I thank you for looking me up and bringing me this news.’ He leant forward again, clasping his hands together, his face clearing a little. ‘It has been so many years since I last saw her, either one of us could have passed on and it would not have made a difference to us.
How did you find out about me though? It has been so long and there has been no contact since between us or anyone she might have known?’ I explained the path we had taken to get here and he laughed with delight at the lengths we had gone to.
‘Well, whatever it is you want to know must be important then. How can I help you?’
We glanced at each other for reassurance and Tara started. ‘We believe that Nellie was not very happy when she first got to England. The local vicar has given us some clues, as have one or two others, but no one seems to know what had really upset her. Are you able to shed any light on it?’
‘No, I’m rather
afraid I can’t.’ he pursed his lips, thinking back, ‘but I do know what you mean. I remember she was always so positive, always ready with a smile or a laugh, whatever the situation. However, she went through some terribly black moods back then, just occasionally you understand, and I think only those very close to her ever got an inkling that there was anything wrong.’ This was a bit of news for us, as we had understood that once she had got over her sadness, there were no more problems. To learn there had been recurrences of whatever it was threw new light on things.
‘How long did this go on for then?’ I asked.
‘Oh, for some months, actually. It got better after a while, but even two years after she had returned she would slump again very occasionally.’
‘But you never knew what it was that was troubling her?’ Tara asked again, ‘she never spoke of anything or gave you any clues at all?’
He narrowed his eyes and his lips pursed again before he answered. ‘I have gone over and over things in my own mind and I have ideas of what happened, but she never told me anything specific. However, I did some digging of my own back then. She had been married in Africa you know, and had borne three sons, all of whom perished at a very young age. Her husband, too, I think died in some tragic accident before she came to England. I imagine that is why she left her home in the first place, as it must have been awful for her living there amongst the ghosts of her entire family.’
Tara and I sat there open mouthed at this news, as we had never known any of this and couldn’t remember anyone in the family saying anything before.
Gordon carried on though. ‘I believe she blamed herself for the deaths of all of them. For some reason, she believed that something she had done caused them all to die. I did manage to find a news report of her husband’s death, but it was very sketchy. It appears there was an accident involving a gun. He was cleaning it and hadn’t realised it was loaded. When it went off, it killed him instantly. There was some speculation as to why an apparently sensible and capable man had made such a basic mistake, but it came to nothing. An inquest found that he had died as a result of a tragic accident and the matter was closed.’
‘I can’t believe we knew nothing about all this.’ Tara was incredulous as was I, and I felt shock at this unexpected and disturbing news.
‘Where was Nellie at the time, did it say?’ I asked.
His voice lowered as he answered, obviously not keen to release this piece of the story; ‘It said Nellie was in the room when it happened.’
‘Poor Nellie,’ Tara said, ‘it must have been horrible for her.’
‘How did she manage to hide all this for so long?’ I asked no one in particular. ‘I mean, there must be someone in the family who knows something of this. If you managed to find it out then someone else could have.’ As I spoke, I realised that there was someone who possibly did know something. Mum. That’s why she had needed to talk to someone before revealing what she knew. So who else knew, or did everyone know apart from us?
Tara was talking again as these thoughts trampled through my head. ‘Can I ask a very personal question, Mr. Fonteneau?’
‘You want to know if any of this had anything to do with Nellie and I parting ways don’t you?’
Tara blushed, something she doesn’t do very often. ‘I’m sorry. It was very rude of me. I really shouldn’t have asked?’ She back-pedalled as fast as she could, but Gordon merely smiled at her.
‘No, my dear, it’s really okay. Yes is the answer to your question. Nellie was terrified that I would also meet a tragic end if we stayed together. She didn’t ever say as much, but when she asked me to leave, she was very upset and said that she didn’t want history to repeat itself. She said that sometimes you just have to believe that there is something else out there and that if you tampered with it, you stood the chance of great happiness or great sadness. She believed that she had upset the balance of things in some way and that whatever was out there was taking its revenge.’ He stared off into the distance. ‘But one wonders if giving up something dear to oneself is ever going to be the answer.’
We both looked at each other again as he spoke, Tara’s eyebrows lifted as she looked at me in a silent message I understood immediately. However, more than thoughts of my own love life, we were both puzzled as the things he was saying just didn’t make sense. Nellie was so down to earth and gave no credence to spirits or good and evil. She always said that it was just us here and the sooner we all got used to that fact then the better the world would cope and the more chance there was for peace with all our neighbours.
There were no further revelations during our visit with Gordon Fonteneau, but we left feeling depressed and shocked. The fact that Nellie had suffered so much personal tragedy in her life that we knew nothing about was a terrible notion now that she was dead and there was nothing we could do to comfort her anymore. The fact that Gordon had lived his life alone too was a tragedy in itself. I do believe now that Tara’s thoughts about him not being able to meet anyone else because of his love for her were correct, but there was a small comfort to be had from the way he had accepted her passing, as if now happy that her nightmares would bother her no more.
We drove in silence back to Bishop’s Down, Tara choosing not to hammer home her previously unspoken message about unrequited love. Although we had not discussed it, both of us wanted to go to Acacia again to be close to Nellie for a while. When we arrived, we automatically headed for the veranda and slumped down on the huge sofa.
‘What does all this mean?’ I spoke out loud, not really expecting an answer to the questions in my head.
‘It means that there is a lot more to find out than we previously thought, isn’t there?’ Tara answered anyway, but I wasn’t convinced that I wanted to find out anymore.
‘This accident that killed Nellie’s husband though, it all sounds a bit suspicious, don’t you think? I can’t for one minute believe there was anything more to the story than Gordon found out, but it just sounds wrong somehow. Do you understand what I mean?’
‘Yes, yes I do actually. It sounds like the cover story for a murder in a detective novel. You know the sort of thing; wife kills husband and then sets it up to look like an accident, and of course, gets off the hook, at least for a while.’
‘But this is Nellie we are talking about!’ I almost shouted, ‘We both know she couldn’t have been involved in something like that, she just didn’t have it in her.’ I felt as if I was being pulled in two directions. Firstly, I knew that Nellie just couldn’t have done it, but on the other hand, it all sounded too convenient.
‘I know she couldn’t have, we all do,’ Tara reasoned quietly, trying to calm me down a little, ‘but there could have been someone else involved, someone who wanted him gone but wanted it to look like an accident.’
‘Hang on a minute, though. For all we know, it was just what it sounds like: a tragic accident, nothing more or less than that. We really shouldn’t jump to conclusions and don’t forget, the court, or whatever, gave a ruling that that’s what it was.’ I suddenly felt as if we were heading down a possible wrong track and really should be applying some brakes before we got too far.
‘Well, we will need to dig up some old newspapers or court records then and see what we can find out. If we have decided to go to Africa, then I suggest that we do that sort of digging there, rather than look here in England where there is less likely to be a comprehensive record.’ Again, Tara brought up the fact that only in Africa would we be likely to find the answers we were looking for.
‘Before that though, I want to talk to Mum and find out what she, or anyone else in the family, knows about all this.’ I stopped, the thought of Nellie having to cope with the deaths of her children and her husband hitting me all of a sudden.
‘God, she really was tough wasn’t she?’ I said again to no one in particular.
‘Yeah. She had a backbone of steel; hard to imagine how hard it all must have been for her.’
We arrived at Mum�
�s a little while later and headed straight round to the back of the house, where we knew she would be on a sunny day like this. She was up to her eyes in weeding the flowerbeds around the edge of the garden, and jumped when we called a greeting from the house. I may have imagined it, but I think there was a look of trepidation on her face as we approached as if she was steeling herself for an ordeal.
I decided to relieve her of the pressure if she was going to tell us about Nellie’s family, even though I was still angry that the information had been kept from us all this time.
‘Mum, we have found out some things about Nellie that I am not sure if you know or not.’ I said, gesturing to the comfy outdoor furniture on the back porch.
I told her everything we had found out and watched for her reaction. She didn’t seem to be overly surprised as I had suspected, and so I pressed her for more.
‘So what do you know Mum?’ I asked firmly but quietly.
‘I know what you just told me at least,’ she replied with a thankful smile, that she at least didn’t have to break that news to us. ‘And I may know some more too.’
Tara and I unconsciously leant forward at the same time, paying Mum rapt attention, not wanting to miss anything.
‘Firstly though, we are sorry that you haven’t been told before. To be honest, I wasn’t sure of most of this until very recently myself, before Nellie died, but not long before.
‘So who told you then?’ Tara asked the question.
‘I’ll come to that in a moment perhaps, but firstly, let me tell you everything that I know.’ She paused and then continued. Her hands were palms together, held up in front of her face as if in prayer.
‘Nellie was indeed married, but he was not a nice man by all accounts. The three poor children died so early and I imagine that sort of tragedy would strain any relationship, but he was violent towards Nellie and anyone else who got in his way.
From what I understand, there were money problems too. He earned well for those days, taking wealthy tourists out hunting and that sort of thing, but they lived in relative poverty and Nellie was forced to stay at home, looking after the children for as long as they lived and making ends meet where she could. I don’t know where the money went, but I imagine it was on drinks and gambling, as there were apparently numerous local news reports of him being arrested for being drunk on the streets.’
Mum’s knowledge seemed to be fairly well researched and I was dying to ask her how she knew all this, but didn’t want to interrupt the flow, so I remained silent for now.
‘The children’s deaths were all unexplained, but in those days, mortality in that part of Africa would have been problematic to young families I imagine. There were all sorts of diseases that they could have caught, or it may have simply been cot death in all three cases.
Anyway, his drinking and violence got worse, meaning less money, more stress, and he got drunk more often. It was a vicious circle and something had to give. One day he came back to the house after a particularly long binge and he attacked Nellie, beating her so severely that she had to go to the hospital. What happened after that is unclear, as he disappeared for some time, no one knows where, but when he returned, Nellie was back at home. It was only a few weeks after that that he died and Nellie left for England.’
There were so many questions to ask from all this that I didn’t know where to start, and nor for that matter did Tara, as she was as silent as I was.
‘How on earth do you know all this though?’ I was the first to recover and I asked the question I had held back earlier.
‘Through a number of sources,’ she replied, looking over at Tara, ‘your parents told me some of it and Peter knew some of it too. The rest I got from Nellie over the years, she let little bits slip now and then and I just added it all up.’
‘What was her husband’s name?’ Tara asked the obvious question.
‘His name was Harry Porter and the children’s names were John, Edward, and Anthony.’
None of these names rang any bells, so I was sure that Nellie hadn’t mentioned anything to me over the years. ‘Do you know anything else about him at all?’ I quizzed her.
‘Only that he was English, from round here somewhere I think, and that he went to Africa shortly before he and Nellie were married. That’s all I’m afraid.’ She stopped, and gazed at us both with a look of concern etched on her face. ‘Are you two okay with all this? It must be a bit of a shock, I know it was to me.’
We briefly glanced at each other before I reassured her. ‘We’re fine Mum, although you’re right, it is a bit shocking, especially the manner of his death.’
‘Probably not that unusual in those days,’ Mum said, practical as always, ‘everyone had a gun back then, so these sorts of accidents must have happened all the time.’
She was right of course. I had read somewhere that in the USA, there were hundreds of deaths and accidents caused by careless use of firearms every year. No reason to suppose it would have been any different back then. Something still nagged at me and I wasn’t sure what it was.
‘Did you know about Nellie’s boyfriend when she got back to England?’ Tara suddenly asked. I had forgotten all about that part of the story, and I was intrigued to hear Mum’s answer.
‘God, no I didn’t.’ She seemed genuinely surprised at this news. ‘How did you find out about that then?’
We explained how we had found Gordon and she insisted we give her his phone number and address, as she wanted to get in contact with him, just to let him know we were there, she said.
As we were leaving, Tara suddenly turned to Mum again. ‘How did my parents know about all this? Did they ever tell you?
Mum’s face dropped again with that same look she had when we arrived. ‘I think you should talk to your parents about that,’ she said, placing a comforting hand on Tara’s arm, ‘it would be better that way.’
Not knowing quite how to take this, Tara said nothing more and we departed.
Before we drove off in different directions to our own homes though, we decided to meet up again the next evening to determine when and where our trip to Africa was going to take place.
Tara said that she was going to call a friend of hers who worked as a freelance journalist, as she wanted to see if he could dig up anything on Harry Porter. ‘Just a long shot,’ she said, ‘but as he was English, you never know.
I agreed that it was worth a go and said that I would check out flights and times to southern Africa so we could really start planning when we met the next day.
As I drove towards home, all the information we had gathered during this strange day whirled around in my head and I tried to piece all of it together. Nellie’s doomed marriage, Frederick’s story about diamonds, his dire warning to take care and then the happenings of the past couple of weeks. There were so many mysteries to solve and I hoped that everything would come together once we got a little more into it.
First though, I had to face my fears and talk to Eden. I wasn’t sure how she was going to react when I told her I was now heading off to Africa without her. After all, the last few weeks had not been great between us and we had still not solved any of the issues swirling around us like a fog in the night.
I went to her place after rehearsing exactly what I wanted to say, despite that speech changing several times a day, proving to myself that I was still unsure what I did want. Once I told her that Tara and I were planning on going to Africa on family business she was silent – ominously so I thought. I hadn’t really told her much about the mystery apart from some general comments about wanting to trace the family tree a little. She said that she knew I had some issues to sort out and that perhaps this trip would be the thing that would help me sort out my life. She also told me she had to do some thinking.
My carefully rehearsed speech didn’t get a look-in. I was too scared to utter a word in case I tempted Eden into a rash decision that would end our relationship but as much I didn’t want to commit to anything more tha
n we had. That thing inside me was holding me back. I was in turmoil, trying to second guess the future – one second mourning my current comfortable, easy existence and the next yearning for a new settled life with Eden enjoying the love I believed we held for each other.
I left hurriedly, feeling like the coward I knew deep down I was; ashamed that I had treated Eden with far less respect than she deserved. God, what a mess. The worse thing was, I loved her deeply and couldn’t bear the thought of losing her.
The other thing I felt, as I guided my car along the winding lanes towards the main road, was a strange foreboding, as if something dire was going to happen and there was nothing I could do to stop it.
Acacia - Secrets of an African Painting Page 15
