Bella Poldark (23 page)

'Oh, thank you. But I--'

'This is not -- what you call it? -- superficial; this is serious. I want you, Mam'selle. I need you. I am making my way, and you are making your way. I need your voice and your presence. With them I could get to Paris, and take you to Paris. I do not know if you were jesting with me about your looks, but to me you are beautiful, and I long to put you in a new opera called The Barber of Seville. I would want you forthe principal part, the mezzo part of Rosina. It is an opera that has not yet been seen in France. Will you please consider it?'

Bella looked into his earnest eyes. She felt suddenly hot.

'I - will . . . yes, I'll consider it, Monsieur Valery. But. ..'

'Pray say no more now. I shall be in London again in early March. Return me your answer then.'

She had been about to move away, but she turned back.

'Monsieur Maurice ... I do not think you can ask me to make such a decision. I am, as you know - committed. And willingly, happily committed. You have great hopes for my career. Christopher has great hopes for my career. I am that grateful for your - your admiration and your interest. Perhaps somehow we might all get together sometime so that your hopes - and his hopes - can be put to the - put to the trial, the test. I am not ungrateful for your - your warm words, believe me. It is very good to be so - wanted. But I am - have been for a long time - bespoke.'

He smiled. 'You are very gentle. If--'

'No, I am not!'

'At least, you are very young. I am thirty-one. As life goes on one becomes more - more cynique. I admire you for your loyalty. But in ten years' time, looking back, you may feel that loyalty is not all.'

The house that Christopher was proposing to buy was in the Green Lane, which ran north parallel with Tottenham Court Road, a little further from Mrs Pelham's than Bella would have liked, but it was pretty, or would be when it was finished, being a smallish terraced house built in the style of Nash. The air, Christopher explained, was fresher up here, and the area was being rapidly developed for that reason. She had found him last night asleep in a chair in the cloakroom; and he had staggered to his feet and then fallen down before pulling himself up again with Bella's help. Their carriage had been called and Bella had been irritated to have to wait inside the coach while Christopher was helped down the steps of the hotel to join her. As usual he was full of apologies and tender in his concern for her, but she felt his apologies a shade superficial as if he had accidentally trod on her foot in a cotillion. As they were returning to Mrs Pelham's after visiting the new house, she interrupted him by saying: 'Christopher, have you heard of a man called Rossini?'

'Who? Rossini. I think he's a tenor. An Italian tenor. Why?'

'I'm told he has written an opera.'

'Oh? What is it called?'

' The Barber of Seville.'

Christopher stroked his moustache. 'I have heard of it. But I cannot recall where. What is it to you, my pet?'

'Maurice mentioned it last night. He said it was very good.'

'Has it been performed in England?'

'He did not say.'

There was a pause as the carriage rattled over some specially uneven cobbles. 'Bella,' he said, 'my sweet and lovely Bella, was I over-indulgent with the drink last night?'

This was the first time he had ever mentioned it on the following day. Yes, you were.'

He studied her face. 'All men do it from time to time, d'you know. It is like a safety valve in these newfangled steam engines.' 'When you are like that I cannot control you. I cannot really speak to you.'

He looked displeased. 'I doubt if it is as bad as that. One comes to drink substantially in the Army. Perhaps it helps to keep one's courage up.'

She was minded to drop the matter, but some worm of contention in her nature pressed her to go on.

'Why do you not eat, Christopher? I mean on such occasions. Most men eat as heavily as they drink. I mean, they do it at the same time. You eat and drink normally at ordinary times. But -- but on evenings like last night it is as if a demon is in you and taken away your appetite for food altogether, and leaves only

'A love of white wine? You are right. So it does. It is very sad, and I am sorry if it distresses you. But it happens but seldom. Maybe it is frustration.'

'Frustration?'

'Perhaps I shall be able to mend my ways after we are married.'

'Yes, here in London at the King's Theatre - oh, three or four years ago. I did not see it, but I read it. Please to tell me what your interest is?'

'I think you have met Maurice Valery? At my aunt's house? He is the musical director of the theatre in Rouen. He was speaking of this opera on Wednesday evening. He hopes to put it on himself, in France.'

'Does your Monsieur Valery know Rossini?'

'I don't know. I don't think so. But he thinks highly of the opera.'

'Good. Good.' Dr Fredericks eyed his pupil thoughtfully.

'I do not think it is for you, my little one. It is ... opera buffa - opera comique. You know - light in weight. Had you been thinking of it for yourself at some far, far future date?'

'No,' said Bella.

The following day Bella said: 'Dr Fredericks, do you know of a musician called Rossini?'

'Is it that you mean the horn player or his son, Antonio? It will be Antonio, no doubt. He has written several operas. He is a young man of talent. He was, I think, made musical director of the San Carlos Theatre in Naples when he was in his earliest twenties. What have you heard about him?'

'Did he write an opera called The Barber of Seville?'

'il Barbiere di Siviglia? He did, yes, indeed. Of course it is a much-used subject, but he rewrote it in a new style. It is the most musically substantial of his works - so far.'

'Has it been performed in England?'

Katie Thomas called to see Demelza. She was profuse in her apologies, but it seemed it was all to do with Mr Valentine's monkey. When he was brought here some months ago he had seemed a frightened thing, chattering, scratching, jumping about, up to all sorts of mischief, but no one really so much minded. Gentry often had strange pets, didn't they. But he was growing and growing - just like some magic pumpkin, as Cook said -- mornings you could hear him barking, thumping the walls, and then screaming and coughing just as if he was being tormented. The upstairs maids had not really liked the monkey even when he was small, but now he was growing so big and so hairy twas like a nightmare when come upon sudden like.

'Where does Mr Valentine keep it?' asked Demelza.

'Two rooms at the back of the kitchen, ma'am. They'm just being fitted wi' bars. Last week he broke the windows and climbed over the fence they put up. Maisie, that's one of the maids, was affrighted out of 'er life when she seen

'im running round the cabbage patch!'

It happened to be the evening when the Enyses came over for their monthly supper, so Demelza brought up the subject of Katie's call. She added as she finished: 'I think most of the folk are scared of approaching Ross, so they come to me with their problems.' 'Very proper,' said Ross, 'but I think my influence on Valentine has been greatly exaggerated.'

'I've seen it,' said Dwight.

'What, my influence or the monkey?'

'It's an ape really. Valentine called one morning and asked my advice. The beast had a cold, a rheum, just like you and me. I rode back with him and made out a prescription.'

'He's growing fast?' Ross asked.

'Very fast. I don't think I have ever seen the like.'

'And what miracle does Katie expect me to perform?'

Ross asked Demelza. 'Since the death of Agneta Valentine and I have scarcely spoken.'

'She wants for you to ask him to keep the monkey in a compound outside.'

'I doubt he'll take notice of anything I say.'

'It is unlikely you could keep him alive there without heating,' Dwight said. 'These apes all come from Africa and are none too hardy in spite of all their fur.'

'Perhaps that is in the minds of the staff,' Caroline said.

'It would certainly be in mine.'

'And to think I always supposed you to be an animal lover,' Dwight said ironically.

'Within limits, yes. I like dogs, especially pugs, spaniels, hounds, terriers, retrievers, bulldogs, beagles, collies; I like badgers and foxes and hares and rabbits and chicken and ducks; I like horses, cows, bulls - less extravagantly - sheep, deer, geese--'

'Very good, very good -- '

'Very good. But that does not mean I relish the thought of some hairy beast at large in the village -- or at least in a position to be let loose on the village by that dangerously neurotic young man who now lives at Trevaunance.'

Demelza laughed.

'What are you laughing at?' Ross asked.

'At Caroline, of course. It all seemed, suddenly seemed -very funny.'

'I suggest,' said Ross after a moment, 'that funny is all at present it can be. I'm sorry for Katie and the other maids, but unless Valentine does let the animal loose on the village there is little or nothing to be done. Certainly for me to call with a protest would be to invite the rude rebuff I'd deserve.'

Dwight said: 'I was reading only yesterday that there are large farms in Mongolia where dogs are bred for their skins. When the dogs are eight months old they are all strangled, skinned, and after being cured the skins sewn together and made into a coat. I believe they fetch about six shillings and sixpence per coat.'

'Sometimes,' Caroline said, 'I wonder how I came to marry you.'

Clowance had been riding with Philip Prideaux when he asked her to marry him. A brilliant March day with a light easterly wind made the air cold, but if one got out of the wind, the sun, unfiltered by haze or a heavy atmosphere, was strong and powerfully warming.

They had stopped and dismounted at Helford Passage, where the ferry crossed the Helford River to the village of Helford, but they had no intention of crossing. The ferryman, short of custom, had had to be waved away. In early March Philip's father had died, and he had been absent two weeks. She had missed him, even the slight abrasiveness that was now a part of their companionship. Two days ago he had called and suggested they should ride together today if the weather kept up. As they rode he had told her a little about his family. They were country gentlefolk of long ancestry -- could trace their ancestry, he said with that touch of arrogance, to Devon and Cornwall before the Norman Conquest. His uncle, the Reverend Charles PrideauxBrune, occupied the family house at Padstow, his father had been son of a younger brother, but they farmed extensively in Devon. There were villages in Cornwall called Prideaux and Little Prideaux near Luxulyan.

'My uncle,' he said, smiling, 'was ordained, and since the living of Padstow was in his gift, he gave it to himself!'

Philip's father had died of a sudden heart attack. Philip said he would have to return shortly to comfort his mother, but before he did this he specially wanted to ask Clowance if perhaps they might plan a future together. This much was said before they dismounted. Tethering their horses, they sat on one of the green benches placed along the river bank where one could wait to catch the ferry. On the opposite bank the little town of Helford crouched among its massive shelter of trees. The river gleamed peacock blue and emerald in shafts of the morning sun. Three tiny boats with ochre and scarlet sails were lacking here and there, casting for mackerel and whiting. Clowance said: 'When the trees are in leaf it's hardly possible to see the town. It might be a church tower sprouting in a forest.'

He flipped some tall grasses back and forth with the end of his riding crop. It had been easy for him so far, words could be spoken out loud, cast into the air, some she might not even have heard.

'Clowance,' he said, 'I have long, as you know, had a deep affection for you. I - trust I have made that clear.'

'Yes,' she said.

'I have hitherto refrained from attempting to take it further for -- mainly two reasons. One, I was not sure I had sufficiently recovered from my breakdown to offer myself as a husband and friend. Two, my income was too slight. Now - now my father's sudden and much regretted demise will result in the second objection being removed. I shall not be rich, but I shall have more than a competence. As for the first. . .'

She did not speak, assembling her thoughts and feelings. He said: 'As for the first, I confess I'm not yet quite the man I was. I cannot get control of my responses to some situation that suddenly presents itself - often too hasty, sometimes regrettable. Nervous tensions appear to build up unawares.'

'Are you suffering nervous tension now?' she asked, with a smile. Stopped in his tracks, he said: 'Well - er - not, not in the way I had meant--'

'Because I am.'

Her interruption had lightened the mood. He smiled back, though still a little tightlipped.

'You must,' he said, 'be lonely at times, as I am lonely. Loving companionship is beyond price. I find it quite difficult to smile when I am on my own! There's not much lightheartedness in solitude. Your very presence at my side would, I'm convinced, give me the strength to overcome these nervous tensions. Possibly they will go of their own accord in a year or so. They have already improved - I'm certain that you are capable of dismissing the last of them at the altar!' One of the boat fishermen threw something into the river and gulls swooped down in a patter of conflicting wings to seize on the prospective food. For a moment the assembly of them looked like a large paper dart fluttering in the boat's wake.

'This,' she said, 'is a - a considered proposal, Philip. Perhaps I need a little time to give you a considered answer.'

'Of course,' he said, 'of course.'

He had put a hand in his jacket pocket to take out his glasses, but only grasped them and released them.

'You see, Philip,' she said, 'it is not perhaps as easy for me as one might suppose. But thank you, thank you for paying me this compliment'

'What does that mean?'

'It means that I was in love with my husband.'

He pursed his lips. 'And still are?'

'No. No. I was in love. It's a very complex situation. I -- I tell you it's hard to explain.'

'Pray pay me the compliment of trying.'

The two ferrymen were rowing over to Helford, having spotted someone who wanted to cross.

'Sometimes I find it hard to explain to myself! It is all really bound up in feelings that are hard to describe. I can't remember how old I was when I first saw Stephen -- about seventeen - but I fell completely and immediately in love with him! We had a long - and once interrupted -- courtship before I married him. He was not, Philip, a very admirable man. He had been brought up rough and lived rough all his life until he came ashore from a wreck at Nampara and met Jeremy and the rest of my family. Although I thought - truly believed - during the time when we had quarrelled and he had gone away, that it had all been a girlish passion which had now blown over, I knew instantly, irrevocably, when I saw him again that there was only one man for me, and that there never would be anyone else in quite that way.'

The wind had backed a point or two and was coming round the corner. Within five minutes the river had quickened into life and little wrinkles disturbed its placid surface. Clowance put her hand to her hair and tucked a few errant wisps more securely under her hat.

'I married him and went to live in Penryn and we were very happy. Then, after he had escaped several dangers while he was sailing in one of our ships under letters of marque - in great danger of being captured by the French; an incredible escape from being killed by a French gendarme -- after all that he was killed in a stupid riding accident. It was too absurd!'

He touched her gloved hand. 'I'm sorry.'

'I am telling this very badly. What I have so far failed to tell you is really the crux of the matter. I will not -- cannot - go into details, but before he died, shortly before he died I found that he had lied to me, deliberately lied to me in a matter of great importance. I think for any woman it would have been a matter of great importance. And I found myself, found myself when he died, grief-stricken in two quite separate ways!'

'Lady Harriet did mention--'

'Harriet knows nothing of this. No one knows anything of this. But it has left me in the strangest way bereft. Bereft of feeling for him. In a sense bereft of feelings for other men.'

'Perhaps we can help each other.'

'Perhaps, Philip. That is what I have to decide. D'you know, I read the other day of a clergyman who had committed suicide because he had lost his faith in God. I have not lost my faith in God. I have lost faith in other human beings! And I have lost trust - completely lost trust in my own feelings, my own judgement!'

She had said more than she had intended and on the way had become as serious as he. They sat there as the cool breeze wafted against their heated faces. She said: 'I told you Harriet knows nothing of this. But if she did I think she would think me humourless and silly. She has deep feelings, but they are always controlled by a sophisticated awareness - awareness that it is fatal to expect perfection either in oneself or in other people.'

'Harriet is a very sophisticated person,' Philip said. There was a long silence. Then Clowance shivered.

'Shall we try another way home? We can make for Porth Navas and then instead of crossing the creek I know a way across country back to Mawnan Smith.'