Too late. Metherell’s description applied to everything Harding had done or tried to do since returning to Penzance. The dead held their secrets too close for the living to unlock. Mere stubbornness had prompted his latest and surely last recourse: a trawl through the public library’s microfilmed back copies of The Cornishman, in search of some vital clue buried in the roughly monthly offerings of Crosbie Hicks on subjects plucked from Scillonian history.
He had begun with editions from two years prior to the accident and was working his way slowly towards the summer of 1999. So far, Hicks had written about ancient burial mounds, King Arthur, the tin trade, rising sea levels, the Godolphins, Augustus Smith, the daffodil industry, lighthouses, dialect, place names, even the wreck of the Association. But none of what he had written seemed to come close to the “unrelated matter” he had helped Kerry with. And now, as Harding reached the spring of 1999, he began to fear he would come away empty-handed once more.
Hicks’s articles appeared, when they did, at the foot of the page of The Cornishman devoted each week to specifically Scillonian news. This seldom amounted to anything momentous and Harding had slipped into a pattern of checking at a glance to see if there was a contribution from Hicks that week before scrolling on to the next. He had, in fact, already done so with the Thursday, 29 April edition when some combination of words in one of the headlines belatedly registered in his mind. He scrolled back. And there it was. Charity Walk to Become Celebration of Miracle Cure.
The article had not been written by Crosbie Hicks. Yet there, in the phrase miracle cure, was the connection with the Grey Man of Ennor Harding had been searching for, the connection that was also a clue.
CHARITY WALK TO BECOME
CELEBRATION OF MIRACLE CURE
The campaign to pay for a fourteen-year-old St. Mary’s girl to receive treatment in the United States for a rare form of leukaemia has ended in her complete and unexpected recovery.
A sponsored walk round the coast of St. Mary’s to raise some of the money that would have been needed was planned for Bank Holiday Monday 31 May. The walk will still go ahead but will now be a celebration of the all-clear Josephine Edwards recently received from her consultant at Treliske Hospital. Her parents, David and Christine Edwards, of Guinea-Money Farm, St. Mary’s, said they were “amazed and overjoyed” when they were informed that exhaustive tests had confirmed the reason for the sudden disappearance of Josephine’s symptoms was that she was now free of the disease.
“We were told a bone-marrow transplant wouldn’t be effective for Josephine’s particular type of leukaemia,” Mrs. Edwards added, “and that her only hope was a revolutionary treatment being pioneered at a hospital in Colorado. There was no way we could afford to send her there and we’re hugely grateful to everyone who offered to take part in fund-raising, including the walk round the island. The doctors can’t explain what’s happened. They’ve never known anything like this before. It’s not just a remission. It’s a total cure. In fact, it’s a miracle. We’re over the moon.”
Harding went out into the street to call Metherell. His phone rang almost as soon as he switched it on. His first thought was that Metherell had called him, perhaps having remembered something more about Crosbie Hicks. Accordingly, he answered without checking the number. And found himself talking to Carol.
“Ah, at last. Mind telling me where you are, Tim?”
“Penzance.”
“Why have you gone back there? What the hell are you trying to do?”
“Tie up some loose ends.”
“Oh yeah? And have you tied up any?”
“For a start, I’ve learnt Humph stole the ring from Heartsease.”
“Really? Well, I can’t say I’m surprised. It’s the sort of thing he would do, just to spite Barney.”
“He thinks you’re spiting him, by holding the funeral in Monaco.”
“He flatters himself. I don’t care what he says, thinks or does. The ring means nothing to me. You must know that. Which is another reason why I just don’t understand what you’re doing.”
“Have you heard that Nathan Gashry’s dead?”
“Yes. Suicide, apparently. Good riddance.”
“Is that all you have to say about it?”
“What else is there to say? I never even met the man. But he sounds a nasty piece of work.”
“For God’s sake, Carol, don’t you see? There’s something going on here you’re missing.”
“And what might that be?”
“Do you remember Josephine Edwards?”
“Who?”
“A young girl on St. Mary’s who made a miraculous recovery from leukaemia back in 1999. Just before Kerry went to stay with you.”
“Leukaemia? What are you talking about?”
“Josephine Edwards,” Harding insistently repeated. “Do you remember?”
“No. Of course I don’t.”
“It must have been big news at the time, Carol. Your customers would have discussed it. A lot of them would have known her. Or taken part in the walk round the island intended to raise money for her treatment. Isn’t any of this even vaguely familiar?”
There was a brief interval of silence. Then Carol said, “All right. I do remember. For what it’s worth. Yeah. I put a poster up in the café and I signed up for the walk. You’re right. She got better spontaneously. Happy ending all round. What about it?”
“Did Kerry take an interest in the story?”
“It happened before she came down.”
“But people must still have been talking about it. You must have mentioned it to her.”
“Probably, yeah. What about it?”
“Did she seem interested?”
“I can’t remember.”
“Try.”
“This is crazy Tim. You’re-”
“Did she seem interested?”
Another silence. Then: “Maybe. Maybe not. I genuinely can’t remember. And I really don’t see why it should matter. For Christ’s sake, Tim, what are you-”
He ended the call there and then. And rang Metherell immediately. “Why does it matter?” he murmured under his breath as he listened to the dialling tone. “I don’t know, Carol. But it does. I’m certain of that.”
“Hello?”
“Mr. Metherell. It’s Harding again.”
“Ah, Mr. Harding. Found what you’re looking for yet?”
“I may have. Do you remember a local girl called Josephine Edwards, who made a miraculous recovery from leukaemia? The case got a bit of publicity at the time. This was seven years ago, just before Kerry’s accident.”
“Of course I remember. It was a remarkable thing. But I don’t-”
“Do you know if she’s still living on the island? She was fourteen then, so she’d be-what?-twenty-one now.”
“Certainly she’s still living here. In fact, you met her yourself last week.”
“I did?”
“Yes. Josephine Edwards is Josie Martyn now.”