Silent Faces, Painted Ghosts by Kathy Shuker

Author:Kathy Shuker
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General fiction, Mysteries, Literary fiction, Character-driven, Art, Set in France, Family secrets
Publisher: Shuker Publishing
Published: 2014-11-27T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

At Terri’s request, Gilles Arnaud, from the security firm, came to the studio the following Friday to upgrade the locks and fit an alarm. Before leaving, he explained how to programme whatever code she chose into the alarm, how it worked, and how to deactivate it. There was no-one else in the studio to hear. An old artist friend of Peter’s had an exhibition preview that evening in Vence and Peter had invited Luc along. He’d asked Terri too, almost diffidently, and she might have been tempted but they had to leave mid-afternoon and she couldn’t leave Gilles alone in the studio. ‘Indeed not,’ Peter had replied vehemently. ‘Well...there we are then.’

Now she saw Gilles to the door and turned back into the room, glancing up at the huge clock on the wall. It was barely ten past six. She retrieved her things from her office, left the studio and locked the door behind her, feeling a buzz of nervous anticipation. Earlier that afternoon she had taken the key ring from the drawer in Peter’s study. Her fingers automatically felt for it now in her pocket as she quickly climbed the hill to the house.

The two sisters had gone away and the old mas was quiet. According to Corinne, they were staying in a smart hotel in St. Raphaël near Cannes. ‘A few refreshing days by the sea,’ was the way Angela had described it. Lindsey had been working late all week; Corinne would have gone home. This was Terri’s best, if not only, opportunity to gain access to Madeleine’s studio. She deposited her things in her room, quickly changed into cropped trousers and a T-shirt, and made her way back through the house and up the stairs, on and up the hidden flight from the linen room, to the attic room door.

Once there, she fumbled with the lock. There had been two key rings in Peter’s desk drawer – neither were labelled - but the one she’d left behind held cupboard or suitcase keys, too small for an old door. The ring she’d taken held three large old keys. The first entered the lock but wouldn’t move; the second was simply too big. By the time she tried the third - sure that someone would come back any moment and find her there - her hands were damp with sweat. It fitted and turned with a clunk which seemed to echo through the whole house. A wild idea had thrust itself into her mind earlier that day and had refused to leave: suppose there was someone hidden up there, alive or maybe even dead? It was nonsense, of course, and anyway she’d come this far...She pushed the door back and took a cautious step inside.

It was a studio cum day room. Dust motes hung in the air along with a dry musty smell mingled with a tired hint of lavender. There was no body. She looked around. The windows she recognised: low and wide, two into each long wall and one at the front, open a crack at the top.

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