The Little B & B at Cove End

A quick tomato sandwich with lashings of black pepper for lunch and Cara was ready to tackle the soft furnishings. Cushion covers were whipped off and put through the washing machine, and were soon dry on the line and back on again. She even vacuumed the curtains in the sitting room, before spray-polishing every surface to within an inch of its life.

Then she went outside, rang her own doorbell as though she were a guest, and came back in again.

She tried to see Cove End as a stranger might see it and decided it was more than okay – it was a very lovely home. A much-loved home. Lived in. And it would more than do for her next guests. The flowers in the garden – so many varieties – were coming into their own now and Cara made a mental note to put small posies in the bedrooms and a big display of whatever flowers and greenery she could find in the hall. It was the little touches, she told herself, that mattered. Chocolate. Yes, chocolates. She had a whole pile of glass dishes she’d saved from when she, Mark and Mae had had chocolate mousse or panna cotta or some other treat from the supermarket for pudding and she would use those to put a few chocolates on the bedside tables. A welcome.

Cara ran up the stairs, surprised but pleased beyond belief that a drama of sorts had made her more positive than ever to make a go of her B&B. She showered off the effort of her mad activity, changed into a pair of cropped leggings and a navy linen shirt and came back downstairs to ring Rosie.

‘Rosie, have you got a moment?’ Cara asked. She’d texted Rosie after breakfast but her text hadn’t been answered, not that that was unusual if Rosie had a salon full of clients booked in. She was using the landline now.

‘Half an hour before the next client. What’s wrong? I can tell something is. You sound a bit breathy.’

‘I’ve been all domestic goddess this morning.’

‘Spare me!’ Rosie laughed. ‘But that’s not all, is it?’

Cara sighed. She could never get anything past Rosie really – her friend knew her too well. It would take half an hour to tell Rosie everything – about the theft of her property, how Mae practically freaked out coming home to find Cara missing and her room trashed, and how things were now with her and Mae, and about Josh, and the police going all over the house and the fingerprinting and everything.

‘Well, the précis is that I was an idiot last night and I left two strangers who knocked on the door asking for a bed for the night alone while I ran to the corner shop to get the wherewithal for breakfast … and …’ Just talking about it all was making her hyperventilate.

‘Shit, Cara, you didn’t? No, don’t answer that, ‘cos you obviously did. What’s missing?’

‘Silver, a bit of cash I had in the back of a kitchen drawer for emergencies, Mae’s laptop … amongst other things. But the thing is, I can’t be certain whether these lowlifes – they told me they were called Hine, but that’s no doubt stretching the truth – took my jewellery, or if Mark did. Sold it down the pub or something. Mae’s boyfriend told me that there’s a rumour going around that Mark had sold stuff in the pub and other places so …’

‘Okay, okay. I’m getting the drift. Why didn’t you ring me last night? I could have come over. No, scratch that, I would have come over. Look, Cara, I’m cross for you and could strangle these people with a length of barbed wire, but I’ve got a client coming soon, so shall I come over when I’ve dealt with that?’

‘No, it’s okay. But I was wondering if you know if there are any pawn shops in the area?’

‘You want to know what?’ Rosie yelled into the phone. She sounded shocked.

‘Pawn shops,’ Cara said. ‘Do you know if there are any pawn shops in the area?’

‘Cara, sweetheart, are you okay?’ Rosie spoke slowly, her voice guarded. ‘I don’t know how that’s going to help. I know this is an area we’ve not talked about now Mark’s no longer with you – you know, sex and the lack of it – but, well, looking at porn won’t help, I don’t think. Not really. It would be a bit like someone holding an open bottle of Bollinger in front of you and then ramming the cork back in without giving you any. It’s the emotional side of things you need. And yes, I know this is a woman talking who puts physical before emotional every time, but I’m not you, or you me. Lecture over.’

‘Oh my God,’ Cara said. ‘I need to sort my diction. I meant p-a-w-n, not p-o-r-n.’ Trust Rosie to get the wrong end of the stick. Cara knew that Rosie would often say something ridiculous just to make Cara laugh, lift her spirits, but she wasn’t laughing now because the thought of both sex and Bollinger weren’t thrilling her as once they had. Would she ever get back to them?

‘That’s all right, then,’ Rosie said. ‘But you do know pawn shops are a bit Victorian, don’t you? You know, the downtrodden wife with six kids and a husband who spent his wages in the pub before coming on home on payday, so she had to take her wedding present linen down the pawn shop, yet again, so she could put a bowl of broth on the table for her family.’

‘Thanks for the history lesson,’ Cara laughed, and glad of it. ‘Haven’t you got a client to see to soon?’

‘Yeah, yeah,’ Rosie said. ‘But I want to help …’

‘Well, you can. If you know about pawn shops. I know my engagement ring is missing, but I also know I put it in the back of my knicker drawer long before Mark left so he wouldn’t take it to sell, so I don’t know if he found it and put it in hock or something, or if the Hines took it or what. I thought with you running a business you might know about things like pawn shops.’

Rosie sighed heavily on the other end of the line.

‘Sorry, I’m rabbiting and you’ve probably got things to prepare. Sorry …’

‘It’s not that,’ Rosie interrupted, her voice kind. ‘But I could kill Mark for what he’s put you through. Sorry, I didn’t mean kill as in snuff the light out of him … oh God, I’m digging myself in deeper again, aren’t I?’

‘Yes,’ Cara laughed. ‘But don’t worry. We all do it. Yesterday I said to Mae, “Your dad would have died rather than have guests in the house.” Since the Hine fiasco, I’ve wised up a bit, but I’m sailing by the seat of my pants because the hygiene people haven’t been yet. I’ll ring them when I’ve finished speaking to you. Mark would turn in his grave if he knew….Oh no, I’ve said it now!’

Rosie laughed nervously. ‘I know, it’s not funny, but death is a bit like meeting the vicar and then finding yourself swearing and blaspheming when you don’t do either normally – you just can’t help yourself, can you? Anyway, I’m rabbiting now and I really will have to go in about fifteen – seconds, that is. Yellow Pages or the internet should tell you all you need to know about where to find pawn shops. Torquay used to have one. Probably still has. I could get Ellie to do my clients on Thursday if you like and we could go on a pawn trail. That’s p a w n, not p o r n. Okay?’

Cara laughed, the laugh making her cough. When she recovered, she said, ‘I’m so glad you’re my friend, Rosie.’

‘Phew! Thought you’d snuffed it then. Oh, whoops … there I go again. See you Thursday, ten o’ clock? Can you get the bus into Torquay and I’ll drive over from Cockington and meet you there? It’ll save me coming all the way over to fetch you. I’ll drive you back.’

‘Yeah. Sure. No problem. Looking forward to it,’ Cara said, even though the thought that she might find her engagement ring in a pawn shop was making her feel sick.

She flicked through the local telephone directory and found the number she needed and dialled. Cara had to sit through a few minutes of canned music and ‘your call is important to us’ but she found she wasn’t nearly as irritated by this as she usually was. It was a little lull in the mad activity that had been her day already.

‘Health and Hygiene, how can I help?’ someone said.

Cara explained why she was calling, gave all the details asked of her, and was told to hold the line for a few moments.

But the person on the other end was soon back to her.

‘This could be your lucky day,’ the woman at the other end said. ‘We’ve just had a cancellation. One of our officers will be in your area on Thursday and can fit you in.’

Lucky day? Cara was tempted to ask the woman to define lucky because it had hardly come in spades so far … ‘Fortunate’ might have been a better word. And she’d just said she’d see Rosie on Thursday.

‘Er, what sort of time?’

She knew she could re-schedule with Rosie although she’d prefer not to have to.

‘Say, nine o’ clock?’

‘Great,’ Cara said.

Perhaps luck was on her side after all?

After school – and what a shock that had been coming home to a house that smelled like a hotel or something, a bit bleachy and polishy, with echoes of fresh paint, like her mum had gone mad with the cleaning products – Mae sat on her bed, leaning against the wall, her knees bent. She knew every single thing in her room had been washed and dried with scented sachets, but still she felt as though there were fingers creeping over her, touching where they shouldn’t. Her mum must have used a whole bottle of Cif cleaning every surface and had even shampooed the carpet – it wasn’t as though she hadn’t tried to make things right.

She took her mobile from the pocket of her jeans and scrolled down to Josh’s number.

‘Hello, beautiful,’ Josh said before she’d even spoken.

‘I bet you say that to all the girls,’ Mae said, attempting a joke, even though she didn’t feel in the least like joking.

‘Nope. What’s up?’

‘What do you mean – what’s up?’

‘I can tell by your voice that something is.’

‘Oh, that’s a nice thing to say,’ Mae said. ‘Like you care.’ And in that moment it felt like there was some sort of invisible cashmere blanket wrapping her up safely, keeping her snug. She was glad now she was giving Josh a second chance after the wine incident down in the cove.

‘Well, I do care. I was a total tit yesterday and want to make amends. So give. What’s up?’