Aunt Bessie's Holiday (20 page)

A handful of people were out walking,
including one very tired-looking woman pushing a pram with a crying baby in it,
but everyone Bessie saw seemed to walking in the opposite direction to
her.
 
She enjoyed the solitude and
the chance to think.
 
The only thing
she could think about, of course, was Charles’s death.
 
The holiday park was so large and had so
many guests that it seemed as if anyone could have killed the man.
 
Still, Bessie couldn’t help but think
that the men and women she’d talked about with John the previous evening seemed
like the most likely suspects.
 

By the time she’d finished going around the
lake, she’d decided that either Jessica or Herbert Howe had to be the
culprit.
 
She didn’t much like
either of them and they’d both threatened Charles.
 
I just hope Margaret Hopkins sees things
the same way, Bessie thought as she turned the key in the cabin’s front door.
 
Although Bessie had taken her time on
her walk, even pausing to sit for a while and watch some of the boats on the
lake, it was still nowhere near time for lunch when she got back.
 

“Doona, I’m home,” she called as she shut
the door behind herself.

“I’m still in the tub,” Doona shouted.
 
“It has a heater, so it stays warm
forever.
 
I suppose I’ll have to get
out soon, because I’m awfully wrinkled, but it is so lovely in here and I’m
laughing over Bill Bryson’s book while I soak.”

“Don’t rush out on my account,” Bessie
replied.
 
“I’m going to curl up with
a book myself.”

She took both the Agatha Christie book and
the Bill Bryson one with her out onto their patio.
 
Having read the Christie story many
times before, she started with the other, chuckling her way through a number of
chapters before switching to reacquaint herself with Christie’s wonderful
prose.
 
It was only when her tummy
rumbled that she thought about lunch.

Doona was bustling around the kitchen when
Bessie went back inside.
 

“I’ve started getting lunch ready,” she
announced.
 
“I was going to come and
get you in a minute.”

Bessie was relieved to see that her friend
was looking much better than she had the previous evening.
 
Because she knew her so well, Bessie could
tell that Doona was still feeling stressed, but her colour was better, at
least.

“I didn’t realise how late it was,” Bessie
said.
 
“We’ll have to eat quickly if
we’re going to get to our watercolour class by one.”

“It’s only really a snack,” Doona said.
 
“We’ll go out for a proper meal after
class.”

“Where do you want to go?” Bessie asked.

“There’s an American restaurant,” Doona
said.
 
“But I imagine that will be
burgers and chips, won’t it?”

“I expect so,” Bessie said.
 
“We never did get to the Italian
restaurant yesterday.
 
Why don’t we
go there?”

“That sounds good,” Doona agreed.
 
“Maybe we should try the American place
for lunch one day.
 
Then, if we
don’t like it, we can have a big dinner to make up for it.”

Bessie laughed.
 
“That sounds like a good plan,” she
agreed.

It had just begun to rain when Bessie and
Doona headed out to the Rainbow Centre.
 
They both grabbed umbrellas before they left, but as it was still windy,
they both also got quite wet on their walk.

“I feel like I’m dripping,” Bessie said as
she folded up her umbrella in the small lobby of the building.

“Stuart, it’s raining,” a woman sitting in
the lobby said loudly to the man next to her.
 

He glanced over at Bessie and Doona and then
shrugged.
 
“What can I do about
that?” he demanded.

“You can go back to the cottage and get the
rain cover for the pram and my umbrella,” the woman replied.
 
“We don’t want Jocelyn-Mae getting wet,
now do we?”

Stuart shrugged again and then got to his feet.
 
“Of course not, darling,” he said mechanically.

The woman gave him a smug smile and then
returned to her magazine.
 
The lobby
was very full, and Bessie and Doona gave up on finding seats and simply walked
over to stand near the windows.
 

“It’s busy today,” Doona remarked.

“I’m hoping this class finishes at one,”
Bessie whispered.
 

A moment later, the door to the classroom
swung open and an exhausted-looking Andrea appeared in the doorway.

“We’ve finished just a few minutes early,”
she announced to the crowd.
 
“I’ll
bring the children out now.”

A moment later a swarm of toddlers emerged
from behind Andrea.
 
Bessie and
Doona pressed themselves to the wall, hoping to stay out of the way, as tiny children
threw themselves into waiting arms.
 
The excited babble of tiny voices had Bessie wishing she’d taken
headache tablets before they’d left the cabin.

Bessie watched as one little girl raced up
to the woman who’d sent Stuart out into the rain.
 
She was covered pretty much head to toe
with blue paint.
 
For some reason
her hair was dripping wet, but at least the drips looked like water rather than
paint.

“Jocelyn-Mae, what happened to you?” the
woman demanded stridently.

“I’m afraid Jocelyn-Mae decided to dump a
pot of paint over her head,” Andrea answered for the little girl.
 
“I washed as much of it as I could out of
her hair.”

“But her clothes are ruined,” the woman
said.

“That’s why we tell you to bring the
children in old clothes,” Andrea replied.
 

“You were negligent,” the woman snapped.

“We can’t do a finger painting class without
giving the children paint,” Andrea retorted.

“I’m going to complain to your supervisor,”
the woman said.
 

“Here,” Andrea replied, handing the woman a
slip of paper.
 
“This is the
manager’s name and phone number.
 
Feel free to give him a ring and talk to him.
 
I’ve already spoken to him about the
incident and I will be filing a full report this afternoon.”

“I will certainly be ringing him once I’ve
cleaned up my daughter,” the woman said.

“In light of what’s happened, I’m sure you
won’t want her to do finger painting again tomorrow.
 
We can cancel that booking and refund
your money.”

The woman gave her a shocked look.
 
“Of course I want her to take the class
again tomorrow,” she said.
 
“She
needs constant stimulation of her creative energies.”

Bessie looked around, Jocelyn-Mae was at
that moment rummaging through her mother’s handbag, helping herself to what
seemed an unlimited supply of chocolate biscuits.
 

“Yes, well, you’ll have to talk to the
manager about that as well,” Andrea told her.
 
“Under the circumstances, we’d have to
add a member of staff to help deal with her and I’m not sure we have anyone
available.”

“We’ll see about that,” the woman
sniffed.
 
“Come on, baby girl, into
the pram.
 
Daddy has gone to get the
rain cover so you don’t get wet.”

Jocelyn-Mae looked at her mother and then
stomped her foot.
 
“No pram,” she
yelled.
 
“No go.
 
Paint more.”

“I’m sorry, darling, but we’re all done with
painting for today,” the woman said.
 
“We have to go.”

“No go!” Jocelyn-Mae shrieked.
 
“No go, no go, no go.”

Bessie and Doona watched with morbid
fascination as Jocelyn-Mae continued to scream while her mother attempted to
cajole her into the large and obviously expensive pram.
 
The rest of the children were all whisked
away by parents who looked either sympathetic or relieved as they left.
 
Finally, Stuart walked back in, carrying
the plastic cover and an umbrella.

“Daddy,” the child shrieked.
 
She threw herself into her father’s
arms, causing him to drop everything he was carrying.

“Why is she blue?” he asked his wife.

The woman rolled her eyes and then stormed
out of the room past him, pushing the empty pram.
 
After a moment, he shrugged.
 
Andrea picked up the things he dropped
and handed them to him wordlessly while he balanced Jocelyn-Mae in one hand and
the rest in the other.
 
With the
child still shouting and crying in his arms, he turned and followed his wife
out into the rain.

 
“Just when I think my life is a mess, I realise how lucky I am that I
don’t have a spoiled, over-sugared, blue toddler that I have to live with,”
Doona remarked.

“She did eat rather a lot of biscuits,”
Bessie said, shaking her head.

“She ate several during our break, as well,”
Andrea told the pair.
 
“Whenever I
turned my back, she’d take another from the plate.
 
When I finally moved the plate, she
started taking them from the other children.”

“How old is she?” Bessie had to ask.

“Two,” Andrea replied.
 
“They don’t call them the ‘terrible
twos’ for nothing.”

“I hope you aren’t going to be in too much
trouble with Harold,” Bessie said.
 
“Tell him that we’re witnesses to just how badly behaved the child was.”

“It’s fine,” Andrea assured her.
 
“Jocelyn-Mae has already been kicked out
of several of the activities here as well as the crèche.
 
She’s just never told ‘no’ at home and
doesn’t understand how to behave.
 
I
actually feel sorry for her, but I hope I don’t see her again.”

The door to the outside opened and Jack and
Nancy Strong rushed in.
 
“I do hope
we aren’t late,” Nancy said.
 
“The
rain slowed us down.”

“Because you have to run and jump in every
puddle,” Jack told her.

“Well, yes, rather,” Nancy agreed
cheerfully.

As she was wearing pink polka-dotted
Wellington boots, Bessie could see the attraction of puddle jumping.

“I’m probably last again,” Andrew Cheatham
said from the doorway.

“Actually, Mai is probably last,” Andrea
told them all.
 
“She’s usually a few
minutes late.
 
If she isn’t here by
ten past one, I’ll get you started.”

The little group chatted easily about the
weather as they waited.
 
With about
thirty seconds to go before Andrea’s deadline, the door swung open and Mai
stomped in.

“Let’s get started,” she said grimly.

Chapter Ten

Mai walked over to the door to the classroom
and pushed it open.
 
Bessie and the
others followed.
 
Inside the room,
in the corner where they’d had their pencil sketching class, Andrea was on her
hands and knees, cleaning up blue paint.
 
She looked up and nodded at Mai, who ignored her completely.

“Right, everyone should find an easel at the
windows,” Mai told the group.

Bessie chose one near the centre of the row
that was just about the right height for her.
 
She looked out at the dark and rainy day
and frowned.
 
She wouldn’t need any bright
colours for her painting today.

The weather seemed to match Mai’s mood
perfectly.
 
The girl waited for
everyone to choose an easel with ill-concealed impatience.
 
Doona and Andrew again were on either
side of Bessie, with Nancy and Jack leaving an empty easel between themselves
and Doona.

“Right, I’ll just pass out some paints,” Mai
said.
 
She went over to a large
cupboard and began pulling out trays of paints.
 
Then she carried a covered tray to each
person in turn.

“If you’ll come over here, you can collect
your water and your brushes,” she told them.

They formed an orderly queue at the sink and
Mai handed each of them a small cup of water and a pack of different types of
brushes.
 
Back at her easel, Bessie
set the cup down carefully and then opened the paints and the brushes.
 
She was excited to learn about watercolour
painting, and she looked at Mai expectantly.

“As you can see, you have an excellent view
of the lake for you to paint.
 
Try
not to get the tablets of paint too wet, at least in the beginning.
 
You can always add more water for a
lighter colour, but once the paint gets really wet it takes a long time to
dry.
 
I’m here if you have any
questions,” Mai said.
 
She walked
over to a chair in the corner and pulled out her mobile phone.
 
Within a minute, she was talking to
someone in a low voice.

Bessie looked over at Doona.
 
“But I don’t know anything about
watercolour painting,” she whispered.

“Me, either,” Doona replied.
 
“I don’t even know where to start.”

Andrea had finished cleaning the floor and
now she walked over to them.
 
“You
should approach this like you did my class,” she said, glancing nervously at
Mai as she spoke.
 
“Start with a few
simple shapes and get the feel for how the paints work.
 
You have nearly three hours and as much
paper as you need, so take your time and play with techniques and brushes.
 
Then spend the last hour working on
painting what you see in front of you.”

“Andrea, isn’t this your lunch break?” Mai
called from her corner of the room.
 
“You need to get going so you’re back to set up for the cartoon drawing
class.”

“I’ll be back,” Andrea said sharply.
 
“You might want to think about setting
up some flowers or a still life or something for your class to paint, as the
view outside is pretty miserable today.”
 
With that, Andrea left the room.

Mai looked at everyone and then shook her head.
 
“I’m sure you’d much rather paint the
lake, even if it is a bit damp.”
 
Before
anyone could reply, she was back on her mobile, talking and laughing with
someone.

“I’m not finding a soggy October afternoon
especially inspiring,” Andrew told Bessie after a few minutes.

“I’m just painting a circle,” Bessie
replied.
 
“I’m not ready to tackle
the view yet.”

They both heard a sheet of paper being torn
off an easel and looked at Jack Strong.

“My circle was rather more soggy than I’d
planned,” he told the others.
 
“I
shall try again, I suppose.”

After a few more minutes of working in
silence, everyone jumped when the studio door opened suddenly.
 
Lawrence Jenkins stuck his head in.
 
He looked around the room, and when he
spotted Mai, shook his head.
 
She
disconnected her call as Lawrence crossed to her.

Bessie worked on her circle, wishing she
could hear the conversation going on in the corner of the room.
 
After a few minutes, she decided that
she really needed some fresh water to rinse her brushes in.
 
She walked to the small sink and slowly
emptied her cup.

“…
doesn’t
matter.
 
Harold will fire me as soon
as he’s officially back in charge,” Mai was saying in an angry whisper.

“Maybe not,” Lawrence answered.
 
“I still have some say about what
happens here, even without Charles’s support.
 
And I’m working on getting someone else
on my side, as well.
 
But in the
meantime, you have to do your job and teach your classes.
 
You can’t sit here on your phone and
ignore the guests.”

“I’m tired of the guests,” Mai complained.
 
“You said this would be a fun job, but
all I do is run around listening to complaints all day.”

“I still own that plastics factory in
Birmingham.
 
If you’d prefer, you
can spend a few months putting deodorant containers together,” Lawrence snapped
back.

Mai made a face.
 
“I don’t see why I can’t just have some
time off,” she replied crossly.

“We aren’t having this conversation now,”
Lawrence told her firmly.
 
“You get
to work.
 
I need a word with one of
your students.”

He spun around and nearly tripped over
Bessie, who quickly turned the tap on and filled her cup.
 
For a moment he looked angry, but then
he gave her what looked like a fake smile.

“Mrs. Cubbon, isn’t it?” he asked.

“It’s Miss Cubbon,” Bessie replied.

“Oh, of course.
 
Well, I do hope you’re enjoying your
stay,” he told her.

“I am, aside from what happened to Charles
Adams, of course,” she replied.

“Yes, of course, that was tragic,” he said,
waving a hand as if dismissing the man’s murder.
 
“Anyway, if there’s anything I can do to
improve your visit, do let me know.”

“I didn’t realise you work for Lakeview,”
Bessie said in a questioning tone.

“I’m a shareholder in the company that owns
the property, along with many others,” he replied.
 

“Ah, and Charles was as well?” Bessie asked.

“More or less,” was the evasive
reply.
 
“Anyway,
I just need a word with your friend, Mrs. Moore,” he told Bessie, walking
quickly away from her.

Bessie followed more slowly, not wanting to
eavesdrop on the man’s conversation with her friend.
 
If Doona wanted her to know what they’d
discussed, she’d tell Bessie later.
 

Whatever Lawrence said to Doona had her
quickly following the man out of the room.
 
Bessie watched her friend leave, suddenly worried.
 
Doona was
back
,
alone, within a few minutes, but Bessie could tell that her friend was upset.

“Are you okay?” she asked as Doona picked up
one of her brushes.

“No, but we’ll talk later,” Doona
whispered.
 

Before Bessie could work out the correct
reply to that, Mai spoke.
 
“Okay,
I’m sorry about that,” she announced.
 
“I had to ring a couple of people about issues they’re having with their
stay and it took much longer than I expected.
 
Let’s see how you’re all doing.”

Apparently, Lawrence’s lecture had been
effective.
 
For the next two hours,
Mai taught them several different watercolour painting techniques.
 
Then she gave them the last half hour to
work on painting their view of the lake.
 
While Bessie was eager to talk to Doona, she enjoyed the class and even
thought her lake painting wasn’t terrible when four o’clock rolled around.

“That’s very nice,”
Mai
told her as she made a circuit of the room.
 

“Thanks.
 
I don’t hate it,” Bessie replied.

“Are you taking the follow-up class on
Friday?”
 
Mai asked.

“We are.”

“We can work then on refining a few
techniques,” Mai told her.
 
“And, if
we’re lucky, it will be sunny.
 
That
always improves everyone’s pictures.”

As Mai wandered off towards Jack and Nancy,
Bessie looked over at Doona’s painting.

“You really do have talent,” she told her
friend, frowning slightly.
 
While
Doona’s picture was well executed, just looking at it made Bessie feel
sad.
 
The colours were dull and
muted and it was obviously raining and miserable in the two-dimensional world
Doona had captured.

“Thanks,” Doona muttered as a reply.

Bessie turned and looked to see how Andrew
had done.
 
His painting was much
brighter, almost as if he were seeing the lake in sunshine.
 

“I thought I might as well paint what I
wanted to see, rather than what I can see,” he told Bessie with a wink.

“It’s wonderful,” Bessie replied.

“It isn’t bad,” he conceded.
  
“I might actually keep this one
for myself.”

The door to the classroom swung open and
Andrea walked in.
 
She glanced at
Mai and then raised an eyebrow.

“Ah, Andrea is here, so that means our time
is up,” Mai said brightly.
 
“You’re
welcome to leave your work on your easels so that they can dry properly.
 
If you are taking the follow-up class on
Friday, you can collect today’s work at that time.
 
Otherwise, stop in anytime between nine
and five any day before you leave.
 
Whoever is here will be able to find your paintings for you.”

“Are you taking Friday’s class?” Bessie
asked Andrew as they queued at the sink to dump their water and wash their
brushes.
 

“I’m signed up for it,” he replied.
 
“So I’ll probably take it, unless
something more exciting comes along.”

“I would have thought you’d rather spend
time with the grandchildren,” Bessie said.

“I’m spending a lot of time with them,” he
told her.
 
“Starting with breakfast
and going on from there.
 
Having a
few hours to myself, even if it means making a mess of painting, is a nice
break.”

“Your painting wasn’t bad,” Bessie argued.

“It was better than my pencil drawing,” he
said with a laugh.
 

“You’re doing Friday’s class, right?” Bessie
asked Nancy.

“Wouldn’t miss it,” Nancy said with
alacrity.
 
“I’m really enjoying
these classes.”

“I’ll be here too,” Jack added.
 
“Although I’m less excited than my
lovely wife.”

With the tidying finished, Bessie and the
others headed out of the classroom.
 
The lobby was full of small children who seemed to be chasing one
another every which way.

“Okay, boys and girls,” Andrea shouted from
the centre of the space.
 
“If you
can line up in a straight line, we’ll march into the craft room and get
started.”

Bessie walked quickly through the door,
eager to get away from the chaos.
 
Outside the rain had stopped, at least temporarily, but the air was
still chilly.

“Bessie, I need to ring a few people,” Doona
said abruptly.
 
“I’m going to go
back to the cabin.
 
Can I meet you
at five at the Italian restaurant and we’ll get dinner?”

“Of course,” Bessie agreed quickly, feeling
a little hurt that her friend clearly didn’t want her around for the calls.

Doona just nodded and then rushed away,
leaving Bessie with Andrew as Nancy and Jack walked off towards their
accommodation.

“I wonder what Lawrence said to her,” Andrew
said.
 
He glanced at Bessie and then
shook his head.
 
“Sorry, that’s
incredibly nosy of me.
 
I suppose
you never stop being an investigator, even when your retire.”

“I’d like to know what he wanted as well,”
Bessie confided.
 
“Doona seemed quite
upset when she came back from talking to him.”