a whisker away from tearing it off and opening it. Maybe it was a simple gift that Archie intended to give him, but in his heart, Jake didn’t believe that. Archie had never made such a gesture before … No, Jake was convinced that the paintings inside were meant to be a legacy and opened after his grandfather’s death. No matter how good an innings his grandpa had enjoyed so far, the thought of him slipping into a chair-bound twilight when his life had been so vibrant filled him with despair. Archie wasn’t young, his parents had reminded him, but Jake wasn’t ready to face up to the loss of another of the people he loved. Not yet. Not ever.
‘And anyway. I don’t have time to open it now. Not with this place in such a bloody state,’ he declared to Leo.
Leo made the feline equivalent of ‘Yeah, whatever, human,’ and went back to washing his paws.
The morning flew by and Jake was sweating and starving after all his work. He’d carried the crate over to Archie’s cottage along with the other boxes, which Archie had intended to remove from the studio. Then he’d opened the windows and hunted down a couple of portable electric heaters to try and dry out the atmosphere and ease the smell of damp in the studio and attic flat.
The work had been tedious and hard, but it had given him something to take his mind off being back in a place that held so many memories of Harriet. He’d even put Radio Scilly on loud to try and drown out any negative thoughts. It was mid-afternoon when he finally took a break from trying to get the studio into a state that wouldn’t make the new tenants take one look and head for home.
He popped back to the cottage and tucked into more of Fen’s loaf and butter and a coffee made with the dregs of an ancient jar of Grandpa’s Nescafé. There hadn’t been much else that was edible in the cottage, but there was plenty of beer in the old scullery and he’d availed himself of a couple the previous evening before he’d gone to bed.
Despite the alcohol, he hadn’t slept well, as worries over his grandpa and unhappy memories had played on his mind. He’d been as astonished as Fen that Archie had decided to rent out the Starfish Studio on a long-term basis. It had always been a haven for Archie to work in and somewhere to sell his own art and that of other local artists and makers.
The studio was only yards from the cottage that Archie had lived in with his wife, Ellie. The boathouse had been lying derelict for a while and when the owner had finally decided to sell it, his grandparents had snapped it up because Archie’s paintings had long outgrown the cottage. By then, Archie’s reputation had been growing and he’d realised the boathouse would make an ideal gallery space for his own work, close to the main ‘thoroughfare’ of St Piran’s where people arrived and departed.
Jake’s dad, Tom, had left the island after school, trained as a builder and started his own small firm. He’d met Jake’s mum, Susan, who was a nurse, when they were both in their early twenties, and they’d stayed in Cornwall, where there was more work for them and wider opportunities for Jake. Although his parents had never moved back to Scilly, they’d taken Jake there to see Archie as often as they could. Jake had spent many of his school holidays with his grandpa too while his parents were busy at work.
It was on Scilly with Archie that Jake had developed his passion for photography. Archie said Jake had inherited his creative genes and encouraged his grandson to make a living from his boyhood hobby. So, after he’d left school, Jake had gone to Falmouth University and gradually built up his own reputation as a nature photographer of some considerable talent.
He tried to get back to St Piran’s whenever he could and knew his visits were eagerly anticipated. Archie wasn’t alone. Since Ellie Pendower’s death, Fen had helped Archie to manage the gallery shop, running it alongside her own little smallholding. In recent years, she’d begun to find the long opening hours in the season too much and things had been going downhill slowly but surely.
According to his parents, all his grandpa had wanted to do in recent times – and probably all he’d ever wanted to do – had been to paint. In fact, since his family had been off his hands, he hadn’t cared much what he sold as long as he could afford to live. After Jake’s grandma died, even with Fen stepping in, he’d showed little interest in the retail side of the business. He had a reputation for paying his bills in paintings and Jake knew that half a dozen hung on the walls of the local pubs, both at the Moor’s Head on St Piran’s and the Driftwood on Gull Island, one of his favourite haunts.
When he’d finished his photography degree at Falmouth and started to go on assignments around the world, Jake had still found the time to visit Archie as often as he could. He’d brought Harriet here not long after he’d met her and a few times more … the last being to celebrate his engagement to her with a party for family and friends.
He never brought her back again.
He pushed the memories and Archie’s letter to the back of his mind, determined not to have any distractions from the task at hand as he hurried back to the studio. Time was running out …
He couldn’t do anything about the discoloured walls, which were no longer a suitable backdrop for the artworks, or the peeling display plinths. He’d attempted to rearrange some of the stock – what there was of it – and rescue one or two pieces that had fallen off their plinths. Thank God the artists couldn’t see the place now, and their precious work scattered around like junk. All of the stock was on sale or return and he wondered how long it would be before their goodwill evaporated and they came to reclaim it.
Still, that was the new tenants’ problem. He didn’t mean to sound harsh, but he couldn’t take on the responsibility of the place. He wanted to keep in the background as much as possible during the handover so the new people would have to hit the ground running.
Having decided he couldn’t do any more in the gallery space, he went up to the flat, where he found Leo stretched out on the bare mattress. The heaters and fresh air had already made some improvement to the damp odour, but the mattress was a sorry sight. Jake assumed that Poppy and Dan would be bringing their own bedding on the Islander, so perhaps that didn’t matter much. However, Archie and Fen had used the flat to make cups of tea, prepare food and use the bathroom and there were still coffee stains all over the worktops and the fridge was none too clean.
With Leo as supervisor, he cleaned the bathroom and had almost finished scrubbing the metal sink when he heard a warning toot through the window of the flat.
‘Damn. Not already!’ Jake swore.
Leo glanced at him and his eyes narrowed. Jake was convinced he was sneering.
Jake peered out of the window and saw the ferry pulling into the harbour.
Damn. Poppy and Dan were sure to be on that boat. Should he go down there and meet them? It might be a good idea to prepare them for the shock of the studio – in a cheery way, of course. He would be positive and optimistic but realistic.
He hoped that Poppy and Dan were friendly and tolerant – and didn’t chuck the first piece of artwork that came to hand at him.
Fresh butterflies took flight in Poppy’s stomach even before the boat nudged alongside the quay on St Piran’s. She could see a couple of people waiting on the quayside. None of them was an older woman, however, so she didn’t think Fen had turned up. There was, however, a vaguely familiar face. One that, as the boat came to a halt, Poppy recognised. The young guy about her own age was thinner than she remembered
