Page 51

Penzance

I opened the list of counsellors that Tash’s husband, Gareth, had sent me.

As soon as I began to blame myself, he told me I was not at fault.

He recommended that I talk with a professional who could help me work through my feelings.

I would ring them all later today. Gareth suggested I talk to each of them and see who I felt most at ease with. It was all overwhelming.

The front door opened and Tash came in. She handed me a coffee. ‘Thought the caffeine might help.’

‘Thanks.’ I blew on the surface. ‘Not sure a double or even quadruple espresso could take away the exhaustion I feel.’

‘Take the day off.’

‘Tash, I can’t take another day off.’

Both of us were exhausted. Mum had called Tash when she’d heard what was happening. Tash had arrived minutes after Paul had gone. She had stayed up with me unpicking my life from his. This had meant extracting my money from the joint accounts and changing the backup email addresses to hers.

Yesterday we’d driven to London, where Gareth met us.

Thankfully, Paul was out, so we removed my stuff from the flat.

There were a few pieces of artwork, the most important being the Laura Knight sketch that my father had given me for my twenty-first birthday, the Jaunty Blythe painting of the boat, the Maddie Hollis painting of Kynance and the Elise Tremayne portrait of my great-grandmother.

In under four hours, my life with Paul was erased and we were back on the road to Cornwall.

To be honest, it was like I had a bit of whiplash, and I didn’t know what to think, let alone feel.

The funny thing was, aside from a few shadow spots on the walls, the flat looked little altered without my things.

‘Then tell me what you need, and I’ll bring it to you here,’ Tash said.

We faced each other off. I wasn’t going to win when she looked like that; I knew this of old.

‘Fine, the full files on Harbour House, and Dad’s iMac.’

‘Consider it done. And you will put your feet up until I’m back.’ ‘No, I’m going to go through some more of the correspondence and write a news release.’

She sighed. ‘Rory will be coming by in a bit. He wanted to go through a few things with you.’

I put a hand to my hair.

‘You look fine, just a bit tired.’ She smiled.

‘Please try and rest, and if you can’t do that, then set the world alight with the genius of Sheba and Viv.

And also, I think you should talk to someone at The West Briton about our lady in the portrait.

It could be Katherine Forster, but without a photo of her, we have nothing to go on.

Maybe if you get an article in the local paper, the nationals will pick it up.

’ She paused. ‘Personally, I agree with you that she wrote the poems, and even Rory agrees.’

‘What do I agree?’ He stood by the study door. Mum smiled at me. Rory had charmed her, and I wasn’t surprised. She had been addicted to his series.

‘The lines of poetry on the page in the painting.’

‘That’s why I’m here. Tash left me the key and I spent yesterday going through all the paperwork that you didn’t have here.

And I found this.’ He held out a yellowed and folded sheet of paper.

With a hand not quite steady, I took it and opened it.

In a beautiful handwritten script was the poem, but better.

The addition of the seven lines at the start, the ones on the portrait written in Katherine’s hand, gave me shivers. I looked up at him.

‘I know.’ His glance was full of kindness and something more. Maybe it was pity, but my heart said it wasn’t.

‘Good, I’m off. The two of you can work together here.’ Tash dashed out the door. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear she was doing this on purpose.

‘Is that OK with you?’ Rory asked.

‘Of course.’

He looked concerned. ‘I’m sorry about what happened to you.’

A lump the size of a melon arrived in my throat.

‘For what it’s worth, I never liked Paul, and he’s not well thought of by half of the faculty, but he plays the game well.’

I looked down. It didn’t reflect well on me that I had stayed with someone who was so . . . I couldn’t even find the word I wanted. Rory touched my hand. His glance was filled with understanding when I couldn’t understand it all myself. It was difficult seeing it in someone else.

He touched the paper with the poem. ‘So I do believe your theory is correct: that Simon’s wife, Katherine, was the actual poet.’

‘Does this often happen?’ I sat back.

‘Sadly there are many instances, like the early work of Colette.’

I let this sink in. ‘What do we do now?’

‘We obtain all the evidence we can to prove it.’ He lifted a cardboard box from the floor to the desktop.

‘OK. This is the type of work I love.’ I smiled.

‘Good.’

My stomach growled so loudly I had to acknowledge it. It was the first time in days I’d had any desire for food. ‘Sorry about that.’ I looked at my watch. It was almost noon. ‘Can I offer you a sandwich.’

‘Yes please. I didn’t have breakfast this morning, but my stomach was being polite.’

I sent him a smile as I left him. My mother was playing cards with Meg in the garden in the sunshine.

In all of this I had to remember what I was here to do.

I needed to arrange the return of my parents’ money so that my mother could be looked after properly going forward.

I wanted this so much. Seeing her struggling with words and other things was hard, and it must have been even harder for my father.

In the kitchen, I raided the leftover chicken from that fateful night and made chicken salad sandwiches.

Rootling about in the cupboard, I found a packet of crisps.

The last of Dad’s secret stash. I hesitated.

Once they were finished, it was like another bit of evidence that he had been here was gone.

I stopped myself heading down that line of thinking.

Instead I needed to believe that every time I had ready-salted crisps, he was sitting with me and we were sharing.

Adding crisps to both plates, I put them on a tray with glasses and a jug of water.

Mum came into the kitchen. ‘That looks good.’ She stole a crisp. ‘That Rory . . .’

‘Mum.’ I sent her a look.

‘I may be old and losing my mind, but he is one fine specimen.’

I glanced over my shoulder and hoped that Rory hadn’t heard her.

‘I want to say again how sorry I am that I thought Paul was saying true things. Your father never quite believed him, whereas I did. I was wrong.’

I put the tray down and gave her a big hug. ‘Apology accepted. I believed him too.’

‘Oh my darling.’ She stepped back. ‘That is the saddest bit.’ She blew her nose. ‘Now go and feed that divine man.’

I envied her ability to switch her thoughts so quickly.

Mine were not clear and were slow-moving.

Mostly I was waiting for the backlash. Paul couldn’t reach me, I told myself, but I knew that wasn’t true.

He knew where I was. He could say vile and untrue things about me.

He knew the state of the business, and if that went public, fixing things would be impossible.

In the study, Rory was on his feet, pacing. His face was thunderous and I couldn’t imagine what had set this off in him. I put the tray down and he looked at me.

‘Is this yours?’ he asked in a voice that was quiet and measured.

‘Is what mine?’ Only when I stepped closer did I see that he was holding my thesis. ‘Yes, it’s mine.’ All the hours I had put in, and then Paul had made me believe it wasn’t good enough. That was what he had done to me. He’d taken away my confidence, my belief in myself.

Rory held out a sheet. ‘Are these Paul’s notes on it?’

I nodded. ‘He was trying to help me bring it up to a good enough level to submit for my master’s, but sadly he convinced me it would never make the grade.’ I laughed bitterly. ‘It wasn’t until I listened to him on Radio 4 that I realised he’d taken my work.’

‘He told you it wasn’t good enough?’ His voice was very soft.

‘Yes, hence you’ve found it here and not registered at the uni.’

‘I saw Paul give this paper at a conference almost word for word, and then it was published.’

‘What?’

‘He stole your work and put his own name to it.’

‘He published it?’ I sank into a chair.

He nodded. ‘It was so good, he was given tenure on the back of it, and with your permission he will be fired because of it.’

‘What?’

‘This is outright plagiarism, and he was working for the university when he took advantage of a student he was in a relationship with.’

I swallowed. It was all there in front of me, and I felt so grubby. I couldn’t meet Rory’s gaze.

He kneeled beside me. ‘This isn’t your fault.’

I shook my head. ‘It is. I let it happen.’

‘No, he made it happen, and it makes me so angry. He used his position of power to steal your work.’

So many thoughts ran through my mind. Most were the mistakes I’d made, but some of that was overridden by anger. Rory just stayed quietly by my side. Eventually I asked, ‘What does this mean?’

‘Once I hand this over, he will lose his position and should never be hired by another university again.’ He put the paperwork down. ‘This makes sense of his odd behaviour at Harbour House. He is no champion of women artists. He is simply a thief and so much more that I won’t say.’

‘I thought he loved me.’ Once the words were out of my mouth, I felt pathetic.

‘He made you think that.’ He sighed. ‘People like him love only themselves and think only of themselves.’

I looked at the floor, letting the words sink in. It wasn’t my fault. Paul had used me.

‘Thank you for helping. Knowing that he will face consequences for what he’s done makes me feel better.’ I sighed. ‘I wouldn’t want him to do this to anyone else.’

‘Nor would I.’ He picked up a letter. ‘Shall we begin to set this record straight for Katherine Forster?’

‘Yes please.’ It was more important than ever to make sure that Katherine received the credit for her work. My heart went out to her.