Free Unfinished Portrait by Anthea Fraser Page B

some kind of contact – a postcard or phone call. But all we’ve received is a Christmas card – seven months, mind you, after she left –wishing us well and saying she was fine. It was posted in London, but there was no address and no hint of when she was coming home. And this is where I owe you an apology, because I thought that if you agreed to write her biography, she might hear of it and be annoyed, which would bring her out of the woodwork.’
    â€˜Well, thanks!’ Rona said.
    â€˜Oh God, that came out quite wrong! I’m sorry! I do want you to do it, and so do my parents, though I have to tell you Richard and Marcia are totally against it.’
    â€˜Are they prepared to speak to me?’
    â€˜I don’t know, to be honest. But it would be worth seeing them if you can, because Elspeth was always closer to Richard than to the rest of us.’
    â€˜I’ll need their address, then, and also those of anyone else who knew her. Did she have help in the house, for instance?’
    â€˜Yes, Mary Strong. She still goes in once a week to dust around, open windows, and so on, and her husband keeps the garden tidy. I’ll look up their address for you.’
    â€˜Thank you.’ Rona hesitated. ‘What about Chloë’s family? Do you think they would see me?’
    Naomi looked surprised. ‘I really don’t know. You could try.’
    â€˜You’re not in touch with them?’
    Naomi shook her head. ‘I only met them briefly at her funeral. Elspeth had begged me to go with her, and it was all pretty harrowing, as you’d imagine. Her father’s disabled in some way – he was in a wheelchair.’
    â€˜Was Nathan Tait there?’
    â€˜Yes, but keeping a low profile, and he didn’t go back to the house.’ She glanced at Rona’s empty cup. ‘If you’re ready, shall we go?’
    Naomi’s car was on a meter in a road just off the square, and they drove to an area on the outskirts of town, where the houses were widely spaced, hidden behind high walls or hedges. Having parked, Naomi pushed open a gate to reveal, to Rona’s surprise, not a substantial house but an attractive-looking cottage dating, she judged, from the eighteenth century.
    â€˜It’s a listed building,’ Naomi said over her shoulder, as she opened the front door, ‘but thankfully the plumbing’s twenty-first century. Hang on a minute, while I switch off the alarm.’
    The door opened on to a small square hall, with the staircase straight ahead, and it was clear any necessary modernizing had not destroyed the character of the place; the doorways were low – Max would need to stoop to go through them – the windows mullioned, and the rooms small by today’s standards, but the overall effect was enchanting.
    â€˜It’s a little gem, isn’t it?’ Naomi said. ‘I came with Elspeth to view it, years ago, and we both fell for it at once. But it will be the studio that interests you, I imagine, and that’s in the back garden.’
    Rona turned in surprise, and Naomi laughed.
    â€˜She couldn’t put extra windows in the house, but an additional selling point was a stone building outside, not visible from the road, which she could modernize to her heart’s content. Come and see.’
    At the back of the hall was a small but fully equipped kitchen, and through its window Rona had her first sight of the studio.
    â€˜It’s larger than I was expecting,’ she said. ‘Are there two storeys?’
    â€˜Yes, you go up a ladder-cum-staircase to the studio itself.’
    The garden, mainly laid to lawn but bordered by beds of peonies and dahlias, was neat and tidy, testament, Rona presumed, to Mary Strong’s husband, and only a few recently fallen beech leaves lay scattered on the grass.
    Naomi unlocked the sturdy wooden door, and the air that met them was unexpectedly warm.
    â€˜Central