The Girl in the Portrait by Rekha Ambardar

Description:

Peggy Maynard goes down to the basement one morning to find her husband working on the painting of a young woman. He covers the painting as if to conceal it from her. Then, one day, both Will and the painting disappear from her home and from her life. This initiates a long journey of self-searching, while Peggy wonders why she didn’t see warning signs in her marriage, why she didn’t leave him before.

One day, Detective Byers, who’s on the case, tracks down a doctor who attended a former student of Will’s – Irma Vasquez. Eighteen years prior, she had a baby, and it appears the father is Will.

Peggy's search for her missing husband leads her to Queretaro, Mexico, where a startling discovery forces her to decide what her relationship with Will was truly made of, or if they ever really had one.

A short story.

Excerpt:

One day, a make-believe hobgoblin waved a mischievous and contrary wand at Will, because the late hours started again, so did the evasiveness and white lies.

Peggy knew she should have left him then, but she was a coward. She wasn’t going to start from scratch to accommodate his conniving sweetie, so she decided to stay, to endure and wear down the opposition.

That night, Peggy tossed and turned in bed, rolling the sheets into a bundle fused with perspiration. She’d doze a little and then wake up in a cold sweat. The sound of a twig scratching against the windowpane or the scurry of dry leaves on the dirt driveway sounded like a battalion of dwarves shuffling ever nearer, filling her with dread.

She thought she’d been rid of Irma all these years, but Irma was haunting her like a wraith again.

The stark memory of the last time she saw the woman seared into her mind yet again. There she stood at the front door when Peggy had gone to open it to clear way some brushwood at the entrance. She had arrived without ceremony or warning holding a canvas wrapped in cloth.

“Will told me to bring this for the gallery.” She spoke haltingly with an accent, but she exuded a mystery that surely was attractive to men.

Peggy took the painting and set it against the wall, feeling gauche and clueless, and clumsy besides. “My husband is not home. Should he call you?” Will was off on one of his urgent projects, in the next town, for all Peggy knew.

“No need,” Irma replied.

There had been no pleasantries between them. Irma had been businesslike despite the searching manner in which she spoke.

Having accomplished her task, Irma turned to leave by the dirt path skirting the ravine above the quarry. She must have parked at the foot of it; it was a risky walk.

Will would usually park his car at the end of the long dirt road that led up to the house. It was cheaper not to fret about amenities, he’d said. No wear and tear on the car driving up. Anyway there wasn’t any garage to drive into so why bring the vehicle all the way up? Healthier to walk up the hill, too, since neither of them was into working out at the gym.

Peggy had waited a few minutes, then followed Irma until she caught up with the younger woman, still keeping a few feet behind noiselessly.

A slip of the foot. Hope flickered…