Primmy's Daughter

by Primmy's Daughter (retail) (epub)

  ‘Like our Primmy and Cresswell, you mean? That was a turn-up, if ever there was,’ said Walter. ‘I never did fathom out quite why there was such a to-do about it.’

  ‘Objections to cousins marrying, wasn’t it?’ Cathy said, but Walter shook his head.

  ‘There was more to it than that. Anyway, there’s nothing unusual in that in our family, nor in any large rural families. No, there were too many discussions behind closed doors that we weren’t allowed to hear. It had summat to do with Albie, I think.’

  He shrugged. It was a puzzle that had no relevance any more, and Cathy put down her cup with a clatter, unconsciously underlining his thought.

  ‘There’s no point in worrying about it any more,’ she said briskly. ‘It’s Primmy’s daughter we should be thinking about, and how we’re going to welcome her. You know what your grandmother would have done, don’t you?’

  ‘Given her a party,’ Walter stated uneasily, knowing it was exactly what Bess Tremayne would have wanted to do. Gathering her clan around her like a comfort blanket, the way womenfolk did, had always been one of Bess’s simple pleasures. ‘If that’s what you think, I suppose we should do it here.’

  ‘Of course we should! Where else would the girl feel most at home but at Killigrew House? It’s where the whole family began, after all. I’ll arrange it with Morwen, but I’m sure there’ll be no objection. At her age, she wouldn’t want to be bothered with having a noisy crowd of people at New World.’

  Walter ignored the comment about his mother’s advanced age. Knowing her as he did, she wouldn’t want to be left out of things either.

  ‘Then take my advice and keep it small,’ he told his wife. ‘The girl will be overwhelmed enough at meeting all these folk who are family, but still strangers. We don’t want to make her feel out of her depth the minute she sees us all, so if any of ’em make excuses and say they can’t come, don’t force ’em.’

  Cathy was laughing by the time he’d finished, dropping a light kiss on his balding pate as she passed his chair.

  ‘You’re so transparent, my ‘andsome!’ she said, lapsing into the Cornish for a moment. ‘You’d far rather be tramping the moors and catching your death of cold by grubbing about in a clay pit, than being a party host, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Well, o’ course,’ Walter agreed, his blue eyes twinkling back at her. ‘There’s no comparison, is there?’

  She ran her hands down his broad chest, loving him, still seeing him as the virile young boy he had been, and the still virile man that he was.

  ‘Just be gentle with Primmy’s girl, that’s all,’ she said, with a smile that remembered…

  * * *

  Philip Norwood smiled at the delightful young woman who had been his fairly constant companion on board ship for the past two days now. They were playing deck quoits, and Skye was winning, as usual.

  ‘So how do you think you’ll take to these relatives of yours? They sound a formidable bunch, from all that you’ve been telling me. Are you very nervous of meeting them?’

  Skye tossed her head, sending her glossy black hair swirling around her shoulders and across her face. She flicked it back with a laugh and a tilt of her chin. Her blue eyes had dancing lights in them, and Philip drew in his breath. She was truly glorious, he thought, and if he had been uncommitted…

  They had found an incredible rapport with one another. They had discussed so many things by now, exchanging family details, hopes and ambitions, in the way of brief companions hugely in accord with one another’s company, but who would probably never meet again. Like the proverbial ships that passed in the night… But he had never mentioned Ruth.

  ‘Why on earth should I be nervous?’ Skye said now, in the quick, light voice he enjoyed hearing so much. ‘They’re only people, and my daddy always said that if I was nervous of meeting big-wigs – or small-wigs, come to that – I should just imagine them in their underwear, and that would surely cut them down to size.’

  It wasn’t an original saying, but it had tickled Skye and Sinclair enormously when Cress had first told it to them so solemnly. And the whole family had convulsed at the time, imagining one of Sinclair’s new-found pompous Washington cronies, sitting on their beach-house porch in his underwear and suspenders, and trying to sort out the fate of the nation.

  ‘That’s rather a daring thing to say, Miss Tremayne,’ Philip said, laughing, and revelling in such frankness. ‘And have you imagined me in my underwear, I wonder?’

  She shot her quoit across the deck with such fervour that it went out of play, and the game was instantly null and void. She had spoken unthinkingly, as she too often did, just to get a reaction. Philip had a rich, hearty laugh, and she liked that in a man. But despite his laughter, she had registered the deeper, more personal tone in his voice, whether he was aware of it or not. And she knew she had gone too far.

  ‘I wouldn’t dream of doing any such thing, Mr Norwood,’ she said. ‘It was a silly family joke, and it wasn’t meant to be taken seriously! Please forget that I said it at all.’

  The moment passed, but Skye had the most extraordinary and disturbing thought that although she may not have imagined him in his underwear – and what respectable young woman actually did such a thing – Philip Norwood might very definitely have imagined her in hers.

  ‘I’m tired of this game, anyway,’ she said now. ‘And it’s getting very hot this afternoon. Shall we have some lemonade?’

  ‘A good idea. And then you can tell me more about this large clayworks that belongs to your family.’

  He followed her trim figure across the deck, admiring the cool blue day frock she wore with such aplomb, and the glimpse of her slim ankles above the sensible cream button shoes. Many of the other women passengers dressed up to the nines even for the day-time sporting and other activities. But Skye Tremayne had style and an unerring dress-sense, and when she appeared in a more sophisticated creation for the evening’s dinner, she always looked a sensation.

  And Philip told himself he had better keep a firm hold on his emotions, for they were already in danger of running away with him. He should definitely mention Ruth, knowing it would create the required barrier between them. But when you left out a vital piece of information for too long, it became more and more difficult to find the right moment to reveal it.

  ‘And you can tell me more about your lecturing,’ she went on. ‘I’ve never heard of exchange semesters before.’

  ‘It’s not that new,’ Philip said, when they had settled themselves on canvas deck-chairs, and a steward had appeared as if by magic with two glasses of cool lemonade.

  ‘I always liked the idea of travel,’ he went on, ‘and I applied to be available for any exchange positions that might occur. I’ve been in New York for a year, and now I’ll be tutoring at Madron College in Truro for about six months—’

  Skye sat up. ‘Truro! Then we’ll be almost neighbours. Why haven’t you told me this before?’

  ‘I wanted to surprise you,’ he said with a smile. ‘You don’t expect me to reveal all my secrets at once, do you?’

  ‘You’ll be telling me next that you have a wife and six children waiting at home,’ Skye said with a laugh.

  ‘I don’t,’ Philip said briefly.

  She hardly realised she had been holding in her breath until he answered. It would make no difference to her if he did have a wife and six children – though it would probably make quite a difference to the wife if he was such a travel-bug. Skye wasn’t looking for a husband or any kind of attachment, not for years yet. But she did enjoy this man’s company, more than any other man she had ever met, and it was refreshing that his conversation wasn’t peppered with details of children’s ailments and domestic doings.

  And dear Lord, how shallow and awful that made her sound, she chided herself. Such a bigoted attitude would all change when the right man came along, of course, and she cheerfully expected it to happen one day. Just not yet.

  ‘Well then,’ she leaned back in
her deck chair, half-closing her eyes against the fierce glare of the afternoon sun. They were almost halfway across the Atlantic and there was hardly a breath of a breeze today. Early summer was already upon them, the way her mother said it always suddenly arrived in Cornwall. Though, listening to her lyrical reminiscences, a person would think it was always springtime and summer there.

  ‘Well then – you first,’ Philip encouraged, breathing in the light floral scent she always wore.

  If he went into a roomful of people blindfolded and she was there, he would know it by her scent, he thought.

  ‘You wanted to know a bit more about Killigrew Clay,’ Skye said. And then she turned her head to look at him and spoke more slowly, with a note of amazement in her voice.

  ‘Do you know, I’ve only just realised that every time I say those words, my heart beats a little faster? Isn’t that extraordinary? I’ve never been there. I know next to nothing about how china clay comes out of the ground and ends up as pots and plates on people’s dining-tables – and medicines – and yet the very name has that weird effect on me.’

  She gave a shaky laugh as she continued without waiting for a reply. ‘Of course, my Mom always says it’s the Cornish in me. She calls it fey, and it proves that I’m a true daughter of Cornwall, no matter where I was born.’

  She stopped abruptly. She was the cool and sophisticated Miss Skye Tremayne of Mainstown, New Jersey; self-sufficient and utterly self-confident, with rich and doting parents; she didn’t need to lift a finger to work if she wanted to lead the indolent life; but she knew exactly where she was going with her freelance magazine work that she loved.

  And yet right at that moment, she felt as if the weight of all those past years, all those past generations, was crowding in on her. Crushing her, mocking her, and telling her that however modern she thought she was, she was still the product of all those who had gone before, who had been as strong as she, and could be just as vulnerable too.

  ‘Are you all right, Skye?’ she heard Philip Norwood’s concerned voice say.

  His face came into focus in front of her, intense, rugged, a distinguished lecturer’s face, and she nodded.

  ‘Do you believe in omens – premonitions, precognitions – and all that hokum?’ she murmured.

  ‘I don’t know that I do, but then I don’t have a Celtic background. I know it’s supposed to be part of the Celtic heritage, with the Welsh and the Irish – and most definitely the Cornish, of course,’ he said, watching her. ‘It’s that kind of sixth sense that says you’ve been to a place before, or met someone before, or even had a particular conversation before, so that you know what someone is about to say before they say it. It’s not necessarily a phenomenon, in my opinion, because too many people experience something of the same at various times of their lives.’

  ‘And there speaks the objective college lecturer,’ Skye observed, recognising the lengthy debating technique immediately, and knowing that he was trying to calm the sudden irrational fear he must have seen in her face. But what did she have to fear, for pity’s sake?

  ‘I’m sure your mother must have mentioned such things to you in the past, but we all have to choose whether or not we believe in them, Skye.’

  ‘Her own mother is reputed to have healing hands.’

  Skye hadn’t thought about that for years, but it had charmed her so much when she was a child, to think of Granny Morwen being able to put her hands on another person and cure them of a headache or a sore tooth. Whether or not that was how it actually happened, she didn’t know. At the time, she had tried it out herself on an unwilling Sinclair, but he had teased her so much she never knew if it had worked or not. And most likely not.

  ‘Is Granny Morwen her real mother, or her adopted one?’ Philip said, having heard some of the story by now, and encouraging her to go on talking until the colour returned to her pale cheeks.

  ‘Her real mother died when she was very young, and Morwen and Ben Killigrew took in the three children of Morwen’s dead brother, Sam. But Morwen was just as real a mother to her, and to my uncles, Walter and Albie.’

  ‘And then they had children of their own.’

  Skye began to smile. ‘When I think how tangled it all got, I’m thankful that my mom and daddy only had Sinclair and me! Yes, Morwen and Ben Killigrew had two children, Justin and Charlotte. Justin never married, and he died from consumption years ago. Charlotte married and has two daughters who I’m really looking forward to meeting. And I think I’ll leave the story of the Wainwrights until another time,’ she added. ‘It can’t be of any real interest to you, and you’re being very kind in letting me talk like this, Philip.’

  ‘Nonsense. I’m not being kind at all. I’ve always been fascinated to know how dynasties begin.’

  ‘My goodness,’ Skye said, starting to laugh. ‘I’m not sure we’re important enough to be called a dynasty!’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t be so certain about that,’ he said in all seriousness. ‘As a historian it sounds to me as if you have a very colourful and intriguing family background. I hope somebody is going to record it all for posterity.’

  Skye stared out to sea, watching the small, curling waves that hardly stirred the surface of the sunlit blue ocean. Thinking, not for the first time in her life, how a small snippet in a conversation could suddenly assume gigantic proportions in the mind. It was like tossing a pebble into that ocean, and seeing how far-reaching the ripples would spread. And sometimes it took someone else to see what was right under your nose, and had always been there, waiting for the right moment, and the right person, to bring it to the surface.

  ‘Somebody probably should,’ she said slowly, trying not to admit how sickeningly fast her heart was beating with excitement, yet mixed with an inexplicible sense of foreboding too. Of touching something that shouldn’t be touched… of reviving ghosts who should be left to their silent world… impatiently Skye pushed the feeling out of her mind.

  For who better to record it all than someone who was at the heart of the family, who loved it, and had been raised on tales of the old days, even if she had only half-listened with childish impatience to them at the time? They were still imprinted in her mind and her soul. The memories were as much hers as anyone’s. She had inherited them, and therefore they belonged to her.

  * * *

  ‘A party?’ Morwen asked her daughter-in-law dubiously, when Cathy had driven herself carefully to New World in the new motor car she had persuaded Walter to buy her, and then been almost too nervous to drive except at a snail’s pace.

  Morwen accepted that motor-cars were useful things to get folk more quickly from one place to another, but they were still nasty, noisy machines, compared with the horse-driven vehicles of her youth. And she didn’t altogether trust them, even though Walter had said that you had to move along with progress, or you would stagnate.

  Cathy was removing her driving gloves now, and also the bonnet tied with a chiffon ribbon from her greying fair hair, and clearly preparing to stay for a while, though she stated that she didn’t want any tea, thank you, before she was even asked. Morwen gave a small sigh, not really in the mood for company. But Cathy wasn’t company, she reminded herself. Cathy was family.

  ‘Walter and I thought a party would be a nice thing to do for Skye, Mother, the way we’ve always done it to celebrate important occasions in the family.’

  She spoke blithely, since Morwen would know very well that Walter had little say in such women’s doings, and even less interest. ‘We ought to make Primmy’s girl as welcome as possible, didn’t we?’ she added, when Morwen didn’t respond immediately.

  ‘She’ll be staying here, of course,’ Morwen said finally, in case Cathy had any other ideas in mind.

  ‘Oh, of course!’

  Morwen Tremayne Killigrew Wainwright was the matriarch of the family now, and they all still consulted her and deferred to her, and knew better than not to do so. Even Cathy, née Askhew.

  ‘Although she may have a
mind to stay with Albie and Rose in Truro, rather than in this rambling great house with only an old woman for company,’ Morwen ruminated, as if the thought had just occurred to her. ‘But the maid has to make up her own mind on that. Just as long as she knows there are plenty of folk ready to welcome her.’

  ‘She can be assured of that, Mother,’ Cathy said, a little tartly. ‘Now then, about this party.’

  Morwen sighed again. Why should she bother her head with parties and being polite to folk dolled up to look like stuffed shirts? Besides, when someone like Cathy got that determined glint in their eyes, it was a foregone conclusion that she was going to organise everything her way.

  And she would do it as beautifully and efficiently as ever, the way her own mother would have done. Jane Askhew had been full of the social niceties in the days when Morwen Tremayne was all fingers and thumbs, and as gauche and tortured at a party as a fish out of water.

  ‘You see to it all, my dear,’ Morwen said now. ‘Just let me know what the cost of it all is, and I’ll see to it—’

  ‘Good heavens, Mother, there’s no need for that! I hope you don’t think I was hinting at any such thing, and if Walter can’t provide a party for his sister’s girl, then I don’t know what the world’s coming to. It’s not as if we’re paupers, and I understand the business is doing well, despite Theo’s constant grumblings.’

  Unconsciously, she patted her hair as she spoke, and Morwen didn’t miss the way she elevated the clayworks to “the business” in her genteel way, and glossed over the irritations of her menfolk. Cathy truly hated any unpleasantness among them, believing there should be sweetness and light and harmony in all things. It took a more down-to-earth body to know that it could never be like that. Such healthy verbal sorting out of problems had never bothered Morwen, nor even the occasional fisticuffs to clear the air.

  On the contrary, she had grown up on it and thrived on it, and a bit of hustle and tussle never hurt anyone. At least it made you feel alive. It was a pity this miss – this matron, she corrected herself – couldn’t see it in the same way.