The Phelps File by Diana Xarissa

Author:Diana Xarissa [Xarissa, Diana]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2025-06-06T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 10

Bessie gave Andrew directions to the property. He’d been there before, but it wasn’t easy to find.

“I’m not sure this is the best location for a restaurant and event centre,” Andrew said as he turned down the barely visible road to the house.

“Andy is going to widen the road and have it paved. And people will travel across the island for his cooking. I have no doubts about that.”

“And the views are gorgeous,” Andrew said as he pulled up in front of the house. “It would be a beautiful place to host a wedding.”

“Exactly.”

Andy pulled the door open as they walked up the path.

“Not that we’ve been watching for you or anything, but Robert thought it made sense to wait until you got here to show me the pictures. And I can’t wait to see them.”

Andy led them into the sitting room. Robert was on the couch, looking at his phone. There was a small box in his lap. He looked up as they approached.

“Thanks for coming,” he said. “Now that I’ve started talking about Mum, I can’t seem to stop. I want to talk about her all the time.”

“I’m happy to listen,” Bessie said as she sat down next to him. “This is my friend, Andrew Cheatham.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Inspector,” Robert said, holding out a hand.

Andrew shook it. “Call me Andrew. I’m not here in any official capacity.”

“Andy said you’d rung someone in Liverpool about the case, though,” Robert said.

“I did, but I haven’t heard anything back from him yet. He said it could take a while before he found time to go and search through the old records.”

Robert nodded. “It’s been thirty years. Another week or even another month or two won’t matter. And there probably isn’t anything in the file, anyway. The more I think about it, the more I’m convinced that my mother must have let a stranger into the house. I don’t want to believe it, but it’s the only thing that makes sense.”

“Let’s look at the pictures, then,” Andy said eagerly.

Robert chuckled. “He’s been very patient, really. I should have just let him look through them, but I wanted Bessie to see them first.”

He opened the box and pulled out a framed photo. “My mother on her wedding day,” he said, passing the frame to Bessie.

“She was beautiful,” Bessie said as she stared at the black-and-white photo.

Robert nodded. “She really was. They didn’t have much money for the wedding, but my mother had a friend who knew a professional photographer. He took that picture and a couple of others. My parents only bought a few of the pictures, because they were really expensive, but my mother loved that picture. My father kept it on his bedside table while Mum was alive. After she died, he put it in a drawer. One day, when I was about twelve, I found it and put it in my room on my bedside table. My father must have seen it there, but he never said a word about it.

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