The Stranger From The Sea (20 page)

Much later still when the moon had risen and was lighting the sky with a false dawn he said:

'I've so much to tell you.'

'Tell me. I don't intend to sleep at all tonight.'

'Before I met Geoffrey Charles
...'

'Well
...
?'

'I
came across an old friend, an old flame of yours. Captain McNeil.'

'Judas! That all seems so long
ago. Was he well?' 'Yes, and a C
olonel by now.'

'Geoffrey Charles .
..
You didn't say much about him tonight.'

'I didn't want Jeremy to feel I was praising or admiring him too much
...
He's lost a little piece off his face. But he looks no worse for it.'

'Do you care for Geoffrey Charles more than you do for Jeremy?'

'Of course not. It's quite different.'

'But you and Geoffrey Charles seem to have an affinity
...'

'We often seem to think the same, to feel the same.' 'And Jeremy?'

'Well, Jeremy's so much younger.'

She waited for Ross to say more but he did not. In spite of his assurances she could sense the things unsaid, the little reserve.

'And Clowance?' Ross said. 'I hear she has been in some travail about a young man.' 'Who told you?'

'She did. On the way home. The night we spent in Marlborough. I gave her a little more wine and she came up to my room and sat on my bed.'

'Perhaps she told you more than she told me.'

'I doubt it. Clowance is nothing if not honest - with us both.'

'I think she's involved, Ross. Sometimes then it's not possible to be truthful with other people because you don't know what is the truth yourself.'

'She said she'd talked to you and you had advised her to go away for a few weeks.'

‘
I put it to her, like. She agreed. I think she was afraid -
1
know I was - that it would go too far too soon.'

'You don't like him?'

Demelza stirred. 'Not
that.
Not as positive as that. . . Maybe I have a peasant's suspicion of a "foreigner".'

'What a strange way of describing yourself! Is this a new humility?'

For once she didn't rise to the bait. 'He came - out of the sea, almost dead; Jeremy and Paul and Ben picked him up. He said first he was in his own ship when it was struck by a storm. Later he said that wasn't the truth; he was gunner on a privateer that had been caught between two French frigates and sunk, the captain killed. He
-'

'That does not sound like the truth either,' said Ross.

'Why not?'

'French frigates don't
sink
privateers. They capture 'em and take them into a port as a prize. The French captains are not going to be such fools as to lose their prize money.'

'...
Even if they were fought to the end?'

'Nobody fights to the end. Not since Grenville.'

A seagull, awakened by the moon, was crying his abandoned cry, as if hope were lost for ever.

Demelza put her head against Ross's arm. 'You've gone thin. Was it the influenza? It has been widespread down here.'

'A few pounds. Nothing. Your cooking will soon give me back my belly.'

'Which you never had. You always fret your weight away.'

'Fret? I might fret if I thought Clowance had fallen in love with a rogue.'

'I don't think he's
that.
I'm almost sure not. Howsoever, perhaps we shall not need to be anxious.'

'Why not?'

'He has disappeared - almost as sudden as he came. He said the privateer he was on had captured a small prize and left it in the Scillies, and he asked Jeremy and Paul and Ben to take him there in
Nampara Girl.
So they did - and Paul and Ben came back in
Nampara Girl,
while Jeremy helped Stephen Carrington bring in his prize. But they made for Mevagissey because Stephen wanted to sell it there, but there was a storm and they came in at a cove in, I believe, Veryan Bay. There they were embayed - is that the word? - for a day, and then Stephen Carrington sent Jeremy off overland alone and he sailed away in the prize. No one has heard or seen anything of him since.'

'Does Clowance know?'

'I reckon Jeremy will have told her by now.'

'So perhaps she went away to good effect.'

'Maybe. Of course, he might turn up again any time.'

Sleep now was coming to their eyelids.

Ross said: 'Clowance made quite a conquest in London.'

'In London? Who?'

'Lord Edward Fitzmaurice. Brother of Lord Lansdowne, a very rich and talented peer. I think the younger man is talented too, though perhaps not so much in politics.'

'So what occurred?'

'They met at a party given by the Duchess of Gordon. He seemed to take a fancy to Clowance and invited her to tea to meet his family.'

'And then?'

'She declined.'

'Oh. Wasn't that a pity?'

'Caroline thought so. Indeed she carried on in such an alarming way when she knew, saying it was simply not socially acce
ptable to refuse such an invitati
on, that Clowance was quite subdued into believing her. Of course I don't think it true! Caroline was up to her old games.'

‘
Well?'

'Caroline insisted on sending a message on the following day to the Lansdowne residence in Berkeley Square saying that she would wish to call on Lady Isabel Petty-Fitzmaurice herself, and might she bring Miss Clowance Poldark? The request was acceded to.'

Demelza let out a gende breath. 'It's all a long way from the Clowance we know - galloping across the beach on Nero with her long hair flying
...'

'It is.'

'And did you allow her to be so bullied?'

Ross laughed. 'I allowed her to be so bullied. Saving yourself, Caroline is the strongest-minded woman I've met, and after an initial rejection of the idea, I came to the conclusion that Clowance could come to no harm with such a duenna and that it would broaden her experience to take tea in such refined company.'

'Which I hope it did. Did you hear what happened?'

'Tea was taken.'

'No, Ross, it's too late to tease.'

'I think in fact Fitzmaurice
was
offended by Clowance's refusal; so honour was satisfied all round. His aunt clearly did not dislike our daughter, and Fitzmaurice suggested that, as they would be spending some weeks at their family seat at Bowood in Wiltshire this summer, perhaps Miss Poldark would care to visit them there - suitably escorted, of course.'

Demelza began to wake up. 'I hope you wouldn't want
me
to escort her! Dear life!'

'Who better? But from what Clowance said at Marlborough, she is not sufficiently taken with the idea to accept the invitation even if it is remembered and was not a polite expression of the moment.'

Demelza walked around this in her mind.

'I think if she is asked she should accept
...
Don't you? Caroline would say so.'

He kissed her shoulder. 'Sleep now. The cocks are abroad.'

'Oh, well
...
yes
...'
Silence fell.

'And the war?' she asked after a while.

'Will continue now - as I said at supper - thanks to the complete turn about of the Prince Regent.'

'
I
wonder what made him change at the last minute in such a way?'

'I have no idea.'

'Do your friends have?'

'They speculate, of course.'

After a few more moments Demelza said: 'Were you involved in some way?'

'What ever makes you ask that?'

'Just that you kept on putting off coming home - I don't think you would have stayed up there just to vote -and I have a sort of - sort of feeling in my bones that you might have done something. What with your visit to Portugal and
...'

Ross said: 'If I know those feelings in your bones they'd probably elevate me to being personal adviser to Wellington.'

'I'm crushed,' said Demelza.

'No, you're not
...
So far as the Prince's change of mind is concerned, it was probably because of an accumulation of things - of causes
...
Of course, he might switch back at any time . . . But I have a reasonable hope that he won't now for a little.*

'You want the war to go on?'

'I want peace with honour. But any peace now would be with dishonour.'

'So Geoffrey Charles cannot come home to his inheritance yet.'

'He could come any time. He told me he had leave due; but I question that he'll take it. The casualties have been heavy.'

'That is what I am afraid of,' said Demelza.

Ross lay on his back, hands behind head, looking out at the lightening windows.

'Father,' Jeremy said, 'do you know the Trevanions?'

They were walking back from the mine together, Ross having paid his first call at Wheal Grace since his return.

'Who? Trevanions?' Ross was preoccupied by what he had seen and heard and by his examination of the cost books.

'Over at Caerhays.'

'I have met John Trevanion a few times. Major Trevanion. Why?'

'When Stephen Carrington put me ashore, it was near their house. They kindly invited me in
...'

Ross said after a moment: 'He was Sheriff of Cornwall at some early age - Trevanion, that is; then a member of parliament for Penryn, though he soon gave it up. I came to know him better a couple of years ago. There were meetings at Bodmin and elsewhere in favour of parliamentary reform. He spoke in favour of it. We were in accord in this.'

'You liked him?'

'Yes, I liked him. Though he has the high arrogance of many Whigs that make them seem so much haughtier than the Tories.'

'He wasn't there,' Jeremy said, 'but his - his family invited me in - greatly, cared for my comfort, and loaned me a horse. Their house is a huge place, isn't it. A castle!'

'I've never seen it.'

'D'you remember taking us to Windsor five years ago? Well, this house at Caerhays reminds me of Windsor Castle.'

Ross said: 'I remember de Dunstanville telling me the young man was building some great pile - with an expensive London architect under the patronage of the
Prince of Wales
...
It all seems a little grand for Cornwall.' 'It is certainly grand.'

Ross stopped and took a breath, looked around. On this grey February day the natural bareness of the land seemed much more barren because nature was at its lowest ebb. He was dizzy from lack of sleep and excess of love. He would have been completely happy today except for what he found at the mine. But that was how life ran. One scarcely ever threw three sixes. And this morning Jeremy did rather go on about things that were of no importance.

'How often have you been down while I've been away, Jeremy?'

'Grace? Twice a week, as you told me.' 'The north floor is almost bottomed out.' 'I know.'

'The workings are still in ore, but the grade is scarcely worth the lifting.'

'Well, it's done us proud, sir.'

'Oh yes. Thanks to it we've lived so well. And because of it I have a variety of small but useful investments in other things
...
If Grace closed we should not starve.'

'I would not want that to happen,' said Jeremy.

'Do you think I would? Apart from ourselves, more than a hundred people depend on it. God forbid I should ever act like the Warleggans; but once a mine begins to lose money it can eat up capital so rapidly.'

'We need a new engine, Father. Big Beth works well but she is mightily old-fashioned.'

Ross looked at Jeremy. 'I've no doubt there are improvements on her we could still make. Your suggestion that we should steam-jacket the working cylinder by using a worn-out older one of larger size has been a great success. The loss of heat has been dramatically less. But, as an engine, Beth has really no age - twenty years?'

'We could sell her. This would help defray part of the cost of a new one.'

'If the prospects at Grace were better I might agree. But as it is there's nothing to justify the extra outlay.'

'Not even to justify improvements to Beth?'

'Oh, it would depend on the cost.'

'Well, to begin, a new boiler of higher pressure would greatly increase the engine duty.'

'With extra strain on the engine.'

'Not with some money spent on improvements there -the whole pump could be made smoother-acting with less consequent strain on the bob wall - and of course far less coal used.'

Ross said: 'If you could get someone to work the cost out I'd be willing to look at it.'

'I could work the cost out myself,' said Jeremy.

Ross raised an eyebrow but did not comment. They walked on.

'I hear Mr Trevithick is back in Cornwall, Father.'

'Is he
...
Well, you could ask his advice. Unfortunately he only designs engines, he doesn't discover lodes.'

'And there's another man just come - from London, though I think he's of Cornish birth. Arthur Woolf. He advertised in the
Gazette
last month. He has a fine reputation and I believe a deal of new ideas.'

They stopped for a few moments to watch two choughs fighting with two crows. In the end, as always, the crows won and the choughs retreated, flapping their wings in defiant frustration.

Ross said: 'This interest you're showing in the practical side of the working of engines may well be good. But in this instance, looking at Grace only, it is putting the cart before the horse. The most efficiently worked mine in the world is not successful if there is no ore of a respectable grade to bring up.'

Jeremy gazed across at the sulky sea.

'Wheal Leisure never had an engine?'

'No.'

'Wasn't it copper?'

'Red copper mainly. High quality stuff. But it ran thin and the Warleggans closed it to get better prices at their other mines.'

'Does it still belong to them?'

Ross glanced at the few scarred and ruined buildings on the first headland on Hendrawna Beach.

'It may do. Though there's little enough to own.'

Jeremy said: 'The East India Company have offered to take fifteen hundred tons of copper this year. It's bound to put the price up.'

'Not to them. They're getting it at lower than market value. But I take your meaning. Yes . . . demand may exceed supply. Copper has a better future than tin.'

Demelza was in her garden and she waved to them. They waved back. After a suitable pause Jeremy reverted to his former topic.

'This Trevanion family
...'

‘
Yes?'

'Major Trevanion must still be young, I suppose. He has recently lost his wife and there are two young children. Also a brother and - and two sisters. And a mother too. A Mrs Bettesworth. Perhaps she has married again.'

'No . . . As I remember it, the male side died out. A surviving Trevanion girl married a Bettesworth; but that was a couple or more generations ago. The present owner - the one with such high ideas about his residence - was born a Bettesworth but changed his name to Trevanion when he came of age. I imagine the others will all be called Bettesworth still.'

'One isn't,' said Jeremy. 'One of his sisters. She's called Trevanion too. Miss Cuby Trevanion.'