The Glen Innes lady who left a car with a helpful car dealer in Armidale six months ago but never went back has been in touch with the “good samaritan” who has been looking after the vehicle ever since.
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They have talked on the phone but not arranged any time for her to pick her vehicle up.
And a friend of the lady told The Examiner that she wasn’t planning to go and get the Suzuki any time soon – but she didn’t want the dealer to buy it off her either.
The bizarre saga started when Jeanette Braithwaite from Glen Innes went to have treatment in hospital in Armidale back in the winter. For whatever reason, she decided she couldn’t drive home and was told that John Cannon was helpful and would probably look after her car for her.
We know it’s Jeanette Braithwaite because she left her rego documents. The Examiner also knows her address but has decided not to disclose it.
But Mr Cannon asked us to put a picture of the car in the paper (see above) in the hope the lady would come forward. She didn’t but several friends of her did.
But now: an impasse. She seems in no hurry to get it but she won’t sell it either.
Mr Cannon said he would keep it for as long as it took. He has kept the battery well charged and he took it for a spin to Walcha last week to make sure it still ran.
But he added: “She’s going to be in trouble when her rego runs out (next June, we think) because she won’t be able to drive it home”.
He also said she was gruff with him on the phone. It seems she is alert but reclusive. Her house in Glen Innes is small but the garden and the pot plants are well tended.
The people who know her describe her as eccentric and reclusive. hey say she has long had a habit of leaving her car away from her house because she doesn’t want people to know it’s hers (for some unknown reason).
The Examiner did discuss with one friend of the lady whether some kindly soul in Glen would allow her to leave the car at his or her property.
(A note of caution to any volunteers: the English writer, Alan Bennet, had an eccentric lady who was living in a van on the road outside his house in London so he told her in an impulsive act of kindness that she could park in his drive – and she stayed there for 15 years).
In the New England case, one thing emerges: there are lots of people trying to help, from the car dealer in Armidale to kindly people in Glen Innes.
She is the beneficiary of the Kindness of Strangers.
It is not clear that she welcomes the attention.
