The Fethering Mysteries 12; Bones Under The Beach Hut

never contemplated suicide, however bad things have been. And before that, when I was normal, if that’s the right word…well, the idea of me topping myself would have been laughable. I’ve never suffered from depression. I’ve always been told I’m a rather annoyingly positive person.”

Jude nodded. “Yes, but depression can lie low in someone for a very long time. And your lifestyle had always been pretty pressured, hadn’t it?”

“That’s exactly what one of the psychiatrists said to me. Almost word for word. Do you have special expertise in that area, Jude?”

“I do a bit of healing.”

“Ah.” He looked at her appreciatively. “I would imagine you’re very good at it.”

“Thank you.”

“What I can’t understand,” said Carole, “is when you did finally begin to remember who you were, why you didn’t make contact with anyone?”

“I hadn’t got many people to make contact with. My parents are both dead. There was no way I wanted to see Nuala again until I was sure I was firing on all cylinders.”

“But what about Philly?”

“Yes.” Mark Dennis looked sad and confused. “Yes, I know I should have got in touch with Philly as soon as I could, but…it’s complicated. I guess it’s something to do with our relationship. Philly…she’s…well, she hasn’t got a lot of confidence. She doesn’t show it, she always seems bright and bouncy, but her self-esteem is actually very low.”

Jude, who knew this all too well, didn’t say anything, as he went on, “And the previous men in her life haven’t done much good for her. From what I can gather, they were mostly inadequates, needy emotional vampires who monopolized all of her energy with their problems rather than her giving any time to her own.

“But when we met, it was different. I was used to being in charge, I was full – perhaps over-full – of confidence, and I loved her. And the fact that someone like me loved her, that gave her a lot of confidence. And the fact that I enjoyed being in charge, and that I sort of protected her, she liked that too. Then of course I’m that much older, so a bit of a father figure maybe. I was like her rock. She knew that, whatever happened, she could rely on me.”

Carole and Jude guessed more or less what he was about to say, but they did not break the silence. “Well, when our finances started to go belly up, I wasn’t so much of a rock, was I? No more Mr Reliable.”

“But Philly didn’t take it out on you for what had happened?” asked Carole.

“Good Lord, no. It’s not in her nature to do that. No, she was very understanding and supportive. And very practical. She said we’d have to sell Seashell Cottage, and I knew how much she loved the place, but she didn’t put any pressure on me. Philly is entirely incapable of emotional blackmail.”

“Which, after Nuala,” Carole suggested tartly, “must have been quite a relief for you.”

“God, you can say that again.”

“So, when you got your memory back, the reason you didn’t contact Philly,” said Jude perceptively, “was because you were afraid you had become needy, like all her previous men.”

“Exactly that. I wanted to wait till my own confidence had built up a bit, till I could once again be the person she needs. But I’m afraid getting to that situation promises to be a horribly slow process.”

“You could at least have just given Philly a call, though.” There was a note of reproach in Carole’s voice. “Assured her you were still alive. She’s been worried sick about you.”

Mark Dennis looked shamefacedly down at the sticky table top. “I know. I should have done it. But I didn’t want her to see me…damaged.”

“You did, however, come down to Smalting last week, didn’t you?” continued Carole in the same tone. “Why didn’t you see her then?”

“Ah.” His naughty schoolboy expression was just the same as Gray Czesky’s in similar circumstances. “I didn’t know anyone had seen me down here.”

“You must’ve lived in a country village long enough to know that nothing – absolutely nothing – you do in a place like that is unseen.”

“Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

Jude’s approach was, as ever, less confrontational than her neighbour’s. “So why didn’t you contact Philly?” she asked gently.

“That was what I meant to do. I’d been out of the Lewes hospital for over a week, I’d sorted out the rather dingy room I’ve got here in Littlehampton, and I felt ready to at least try and see Philly. So I took a cab to Smalting that Monday evening.”

“Without ringing Philly to tell her you were coming?”

“Yes, without doing that. And I think I know why. If I’m brutally honest with myself, I didn’t ring her because that meant I could still duck out of the meeting if I wanted to. You know, if when I got to Smalting I lost my nerve.”

“And I assume you did lose your nerve. That was why you didn’t go to see her.”

“Well, it wasn’t exactly losing my nerve, though I suppose it was in a way. I got to Smalting and rather than going straight to Seashell Cottage, I…well, I thought I might drop in on Gray Czesky, just to see if he’d heard anything about Philly, to see if he knew whether she was actually still in Smalting and…Yes, I suppose I did lose my nerve.”

“And you also, I assume, knew,” said Carole, “that going to see Gray Czesky would inevitably lead to another drinking session with him.”

Jude continued the chain of thought. “And you wouldn’t want Philly to see you in a drunken state, because that is one of the few things you argued about. So the moment you decided to go and see Gray was the moment you decided you weren’t going to see Philly that evening.”

Mark Dennis’s nod confirmed that she’d got it right. “And I did get very drunk, I’m afraid. I’d been off the booze since I’d had the breakdown. No bars in psychiatric hospitals – at least not that kind of bar. So the stuff I drank at Gray’s went straight to my head. And I don’t think it mixed very well with the medication I was on. Am still on, actually.” He gestured to his mineral water. “That’s why I’m drinking this. Anyway, that night I was certainly in no condition for a heart-warming, violins-in-the-background reunion with Philly.”

“And then, of course,” Carole observed acidly, “Gray Czesky chose that evening for another of his anti- bourgeois exploits, didn’t he?”

“Setting fire to the beach hut,” Mark agreed glumly. “Yes, he’s a madman when he gets a few drinks inside him.”

“What exactly happened?”

“Oh, he got into one of his tirades about how no one understands artists, and the rest of the world has a down on them and only cares about middle-class consumerism.”

“Great from someone whose lifestyle is funded by a rich wife.”

“I know, I know. Anyway, Gray suddenly gets into this great rant about beach huts symbolizing everything that’s wrong with the bourgeoisie, and then he disappears. Helga and I thought he’d just gone for a pee, but ten minutes later he’s back proclaiming that he’s set fire to one of the beach huts.”

“Do you think he deliberately chose Quiet Harbour?” asked Carole. “Did he know that you and Philly had rented it?”

“Who knows? Perhaps he did. Quite possibly he was getting at me because he reckoned I was too bourgeois to be what he defined as a proper artist.”

“So you and Helga,” suggested Jude, “immediately rushed down to the beach to put the fire out?”

“Yes.” The two women exchanged looks. Curt Holderness’s sighting had been confirmed. “Fortunately the fire hadn’t taken much hold. We were able to extinguish it quite easily.”

“So what did you do then? Go back to Sanditon?”

“No, I was feeling so shitty with the booze, all I wanted to do was get to bed. I called a cab, just managed to avoid throwing up over its upholstery, and went to bed the minute I got back to my room here in Littlehampton. The next morning I woke up with the worst hangover of my life.”

“So that again wasn’t the perfect day for your reconciliation with Philly?”

“Too right, Jude.”

“But that was over a week ago,” said Carole. “Why didn’t you get in touch with her once you’d recovered from