Felicity and Jenna were sitting at a table at the back of the village pub, talking in low voices. It was one of those sunny September evenings so everyone else was outside: they had chosen the darkest indoor corner, a spot in which they wouldn’t be overheard.
‘Cheers,’ said Jenna. Felicity clinked her glass of wine against Jenna’s beer and thought again that Jenna had hardly changed at all.
‘Cheers,’ said Felicity.
‘What was Martha thinking of, though!’ Jenna was talking quietly, but her voice was impassioned. ‘I did it, Flick. Why does she leave me and Senara the house when she knows what happened, and she knows it was me? I caused all this. I don’t deserve her house.’
Felicity reached out and put her hand over Jenna’s.
‘She didn’t leave it to you. She left it to Senara. I don’t know why, because you never really could know with Grandma, but it’s probably just for the reason she said. That Senara reminded her of her own young self. Not being born into it, but coming to Cliff House by chance.’
‘I don’t blame Clem for being furious. Honestly, I don’t. I wish none of it had happened. I wish the house was staying with you. I’m so sorry.’
Felicity took a sip of wine. ‘Don’t be,’ she said. ‘I don’t want it. I’m glad you and Senni are in the cottage. I’m so pleased it’s gone. And mostly that I don’t have to write those fucking awful cards any more. Thirty-four of them, I did. I’d feel it hanging over me all year.’
Even though she’d grown up in Cliff House, Felicity hadn’t realized what a burden it had been. She was delighted to be rid of it, hadn’t enjoyed any part of being a second-home owner with all the baggage that brought, quite apart from the fact that they’d conspired to bury a man in the flower bed, and they could never move out because, if they did, the body would be out of their control.
‘Maybe it’s a curse,’ said Jenna. She fixed Felicity with her sharp gaze. ‘That’s what I’ve been thinking. She’s given it to us to take the curse off her own family. And now Senara’s earnestly trying to work out what we can do with it. She’s talking about making some kind of a museum of Martha, but can you imagine? Everyone knows there were bodies in the garden. Everyone would come for that. It’s a terrible idea, but she won’t listen.’
Felicity nodded. She was only down from London for a few days, and it was such a relief to stay at Chapel House in Penzance, a gorgeous B & B where her room had a huge bath, a shower, perfect furnishings and a view across the bay. And someone made her breakfast. It was all so much easier than turning up at Cliff House and having to start cleaning.
She’d been wondering the same thing as Jenna: Martha had done Felicity and Alex a huge favour, and Martha didn’t do things by accident. Maybe this was some kind of payback for Jenna, in a weird, twisted moneyed sort of way.
‘You didn’t mean to kill him,’ she said, dropping her voice to a whisper. ‘And any one of us would have fought him off if we could have.’
Jenna was making a strange face, trying not to cry. Felicity knew they wouldn’t stay friends, unless Jenna and Alex’s relationship really did become ‘a thing’, in which case they’d have to. The guilt they shared was too big, too destructive. It smashed everything it touched: it had destroyed Clem and Senara’s friendship in the same way it had destroyed theirs.
‘It was madness,’ said Jenna. ‘The whole thing. All of it.’
‘But it’s over.’
They finished their drinks. Felicity didn’t think she’d come to Pentrellis again, and she never did.