“Yes, really,” the old man finally answered John Tremain’s pleased if surprised inquiry. “I mean, this table we’re sitting at, drinking from: a table of driftwood—but see how the grain stands out, the fine polish!” In fact the table was quite ugly. Jamieson pointed across the room. “And who could fail to admire your plant stand there, so black it looks lacquered.”
“Yacht varnish,” Tremain was all puffed up now. “As for why it’s so black, it’s ebony.”
“Diospyros,” said Doreen Tremain, entering from the kitchen with a tray of food. “A very heavy wood, and tropical. Goodness only knows how long it was in the sea, to finally get washed up here.”
“Amazing!” Jamieson declared. “And not just the stand. Your knowledge of woods—and indeed of most things, as I’ve noted— does both of you great credit.”
And now she preened and fussed no less than her husband. “I do so hope you like turbot, er, James?”
“Psetta maxima,” said Jamieson, not to be outdone. “If it’s fish, dear lady, then you need have no fear. I’m not the one to turn my nose up at a good piece of fish.”
“I got it from Tom Foster in the village,” she answered. “I like his fish, if not his company.” And she wrinkled her nose.
“Tom Foster?” Jamieson repeated her, shaking his head. “No, I don’t think I know him.”
“And you don’t want to,” said John, helping the old man up, and showing him to the dining table. “Tom might be a good fisherman, but that’s all he’s good for. Him and his Gypsy wife.”
Sitting down, Jamieson blinked his rheumy eyes at the other and enquired, “His Gypsy wife?”
“She’s not a Gypsy,” Doreen shook her head. “No, not Romany at all, despite her looks. It seems her great-grandmother was a Polynesian woman. Oh, there are plenty such throwbacks in Devon and Cornwall, descendants of women brought back from the Indies and South Pacific when the old sailing ships plied their trade. Anyway, the Fosters are the ones who have charge of that young Geoff person. But there again, I suppose we should be thankful that someone is taking care of him.”
“Huh!” John Tremain grunted. “Surely his mother is the one who should be taking care of him. Or better far his father, except we all know that’s no longer possible.”
“And never would have been,” Doreen added. “Well, not without all sorts of complications, accusations, and difficulties in general.”
Watching the fish being served, Jamieson said, “I’m afraid you’ve quite lost me. Do you think you could... I mean, would you mind explaining?”
The Tremains looked at each other, then at the old man.
“Oh?” he said. “Do I sense some dark secret here, one from which I’m excluded? But that’s okay—if I don’t need to know, then I don’t need to know. After all, I am new around here.”
“No,” said Doreen, “it’s not that. It’s just that—”
“It’s sort of delicate,” her husband said. “Or not exactly delicate, not any longer, but not the kind of thing people like to talk about. Especially when it’s your neighbour, or your ex-neighbour, who is concerned.”
“My ex-neighbour?” Jamieson frowned. “George White? He was your neighbour, yes, but never mine. So, what’s the mystery?”
“You’ve not sensed anything?” This was Doreen again. “With poor Jilly? You’ve not wondered why she and Anne always seem to be sticking up for—”
“For that damned idiot in the village?” John saw his opportunity to jump in and finish it for her.
And the old man slowly nodded. “I think I begin to see,” he said. “There’s some connection between George White, Jilly and Anne, and—”
“And Geoff, yes,” said Doreen. “But do you think we should finish eating first? I see no reason why we can’t tell you all about it. You are or were a doctor, after all—and we’re sure you’ve heard of similar or worse cases—but I’d hate the food to spoil.”
And so they ate in relative silence. Doreen Tremain’s cooking couldn’t be faulted, and her choice of white wine was of a similar high quality...
* * *
“It was fifteen, sixteen years ago,” John Tremain began, “and we were relative newcomers here, just as you are now. In those days this was a prosperous little place; the fish were plentiful and the village booming; in the summer there were people on the beaches and in the shops. Nowadays—there’s only the post office, the pub, and the bakery. The post office doubles as a general store and does most of the business, and you can still buy a few fresh fish on the quayside before what’s left gets shipped inland. And that’s about it right now. But back then:
“They were even building a few new homes here, extending the village, as it were. This house and yours, they were the result. That’s why they’re newish places. But the road got no further than your place and hasn’t been repaired to any great extent since. Jilly and George’s place was maybe twenty years older; standing closer to the village, it wasn’t as isolated. As for the other houses they’d planned to build on this road, they just didn’t happen. Prices of raw materials were rocketing, the summers weren’t much good any more, and fish stocks had begun a rapid decline.
“The Whites had been here for a year or two. They had met and married in Newquay, and moved here for the same reason we did: the housing was cheaper than in the towns. George didn’t seem to have a job. He’d inherited some fabulous art items in gold and was gradually selling them off to a dealer in Truro. And Jilly was doing some freelance editing for local publishers.”
Now Doreen took over. “As for George’s gold: it was jewellery, and quite remarkable. I had a brooch off him that I wear now and then. It’s unique, I think. Beautiful but very strange. Perhaps you’d like to see it?”
“Certainly,” said the old man. “Indeed I would.” While she went to fetch it, John continued the story.
“Anyway, Jilly was heavy with Anne at the time, but George wasn’t a home body. They had a car—the same wreck she’s got now, more off the road than on it—which he used to get into St. Austell, Truro, Newquay, and goodness knows where else. He would be away for two or three days at a time, often for whole weekends. Which wasn’t fair on Jilly who was very close to her time. But look, let me cut a long story short.
“Apparently George had been a bit of a louse for quite some time. In fact as soon as Jilly had declared her pregnancy, that was when he’d commenced his... well, his—
“—Womanising?” The old man sat up straighter in his chair. “Are you saying he was something of a rake?”
By now Doreen had returned with a small jewellery box. “Oh, George White was much more than something of a rake,” she said. “He was a great deal of a rake, in fact a roué! And all through poor Jilly’s pregnancy he’d been, you know, doing it in most of the towns around.”
“Really?” said Jamieson. “But you can’t know that for sure, now can you?”
“Ah, but we can,” said John, “for he was seen! Some of the locals had seen him going into... well, ‘houses of ill repute’, shall we put it that way? And a handful of the village’s single men, whose morals also weren’t all they might be, learned about George’s reputation in those same, er, houses. But you’ll know, James—and I’m sure that in your capacity as a doctor you will know—it’s a sad but true fact that you do actually reap what you sow. And in George White’s case, that was true in more ways than one.”
“Which is where this becomes even more indelicate,” Doreen got to her feet. “And I have things to do in the kitchen. So if you’ll excuse me...” And leaving her jewellery box on the table she left the room and closed the door behind her. Then:
“George caught something,” said John, quietly.