The Shell Seekers

by Rosamunde Pilcher

  Nancy peered in the direction of the orchard and the billowing smoke that poured above the privet hedge and up into the pristine sky.

  “How’s it all going?”

  “Like a bomb. Everybody’s hard at work.”

  “Not you, I hope.”

  “Me? I’ve done nothing except cook the lunch.”

  “And the girl … Antonia?” Nancy pronounced the name coolly. She still had not forgiven Olivia and Penelope for the presence of Antonia, and could not help hoping that the arrangement would prove to be a total failure.

  But her hopes were dashed.

  “She’s been up since dawn, and pitched in with the others as soon as she’d eaten her breakfast. Noel’s up in the attic, giving orders right, left, and centre, and Danus and Antonia are carting the rubbish and stoking the bonfire.”

  “I hope she’s not going to be a nuisance to you, Mother.”

  “Oh, heavens no, she’s a darling.”

  “What does Noel think of her?”

  “To begin with, he said she Wasn’t his type because she’s got pale eyelashes. Can you imagine it? He’s never going to find himself a wife if he refuses to look further than her eyelashes.”

  “To begin with? Has he changed his mind?”

  “Only because there’s another young man around, and Antonia seems to have made friends with him. Noel was always the most dreadful dog in the manger, and I think his nose has been quite put out of joint.”

  “Another young man? Are you talking about your gardener?”

  “Danus. Yes. Such a dear boy.”

  Nancy was shocked. “You mean Antonia’s taken up with the gardener?”

  Her mother only laughed. “Oh, Nancy, if you could just see your own face. You mustn’t be such a snob, and you mustn’t make a single judgment until you’ve met the young man.”

  But Nancy remained unconvinced. What could be going on? “I hope they’re not burning anything you want to keep.”

  “No. Noel’s really being very good. Every now and then, Antonia is sent to fetch me, and I have to go and give my opinion about something or other. There was one small argument concerning a worm-eaten desk. Noel said it was to go on the fire, but Danus said it was too good to burn and that the worm could be treated. So I said that if he wanted to treat the worm … lucky old worm … he could keep the desk for himself. Noel was none too pleased. Stumped upstairs in a sulk, but that’s neither here nor there. Now come along, we must make up our minds. Let’s have lunch here. You can help me lay the table.”

  Which they did, companionably together. The leaves of the old pine table were opened up and the table spread with a dark-blue linen cloth. Nancy fetched silver and glasses from the dining room, her mother folded white linen napkins into mitres. The final touch was a pink potted geranium set into a flowered cache pot, placed in the middle of the table. The result was delightful, both pretty and informal, and Nancy, standing back, marvelled, as she always did, at her mother’s natural talent for creating not only an ambience, but a real visual pleasure out of the most mundane of objects. Nancy supposed it was something to do with having an artist for a father, and thought in a dissatisfied way of her own dining room, which, however hard she tried, never looked anything except dark and dull.

  “Now,” said Penelope, “there’s nothing for us to do except wait for the workers to come and eat. Sit here in the sun while I go and tidy myself up, and then I’ll bring you a drink. What would you like? A glass of wine? A gin and tonic?”

  Nancy said she would like a gin and tonic, and, left alone, removed her jacket and took stock of her surroundings. When her mother had first announced the intention of building a conservatory, she and George had come out strongly against the notion. It was a foolish luxury, was their opinion, a wild extravagance that Penelope could not possibly afford. But their advice had been ignored, and the delicate airy addition duly erected. Now, warm, scented, leafy and flower-filled, it was, Nancy had to admit, an enviable place, but she had never managed to find out how much it had cost. Which brought her, inevitably, back to the vexing question of money. When her mother returned, with her hair dressed, her face powdered, and smelling of her best scent, Nancy, settled in the most comfortable of the basket chairs, was wondering if this was the right moment to bring up the subject of selling the panels, and was even trying out a few tactful opening sentences; but she was forestalled by Penelope’s steering the conversation into a quite different and totally unexpected tack.

  “Here you are. Gin and tonic … I hope it’s strong enough.” For herself she had poured a glass of wine. She pulled forward another chair and sank into it, her long legs outstretched and her face turned up to the warmth of the sun. “Oh, isn’t this blissful? What are your family doing today?”

  Nancy told her.

  “Poor George. Fancy being stuck indoors all day, with a lot of moose-faced bishops. And who are the Wainwrights? Have I ever met them? So good for the children to get off on their own. For that matter, so good for all of us to get off on our own. Would you like to come to Cornwall with me?”

  Nancy, startled, turned a face of astonishment and disbelief upon her mother.

  “Cornwall?”

  “Yes. I want to go back to Porthkerris. Quite soon. I’ve suddenly become possessed by this tremendous urge. And it would be so much more fun if I had somebody with me.”

  “But…”

  “I know. I haven’t been there for forty years, and it will all be changed and I shan’t know anybody. But I still want to go. To see it all again. Why not come too? We could stay with Doris.”

  “With Doris?”

  “Yes, with Doris. Oh, Nancy, you haven’t forgotten Doris. You couldn’t have. She practically brought you up until you were four years old and we left Porthkerris for good.”

  Of course Nancy remembered Doris. She had no clear recollection of her grandfather, but she remembered Doris, with her sweet talcum-powdery smell, and her strong arms and the soft comfort of her bosom. The first clear memory of Nancy’s life included Doris. She had been sitting in some sort of push-chair in the little field behind Carn Cottage, surrounded by foraging ducks and hens, while Doris pegged out a line of washing in the strong sea-breeze. The image was printed on her mind forever, bright and colourful as an illustration in a picture-book. She saw Doris, with her hair blowing and her arms upstretched; saw the flapping sheets and pillowcases; saw the starch-blue sky.

  “Doris still lives in Porthkerris,” Penelope went on. “She’s got a little house, Downalong, we used to call it; the old bit of the town, around the harbour. And now that the boys have gone, she’s got a spare bedroom. She’s always asking me to go and stay. And she’d love to see you. You were her baby. She cried when we left. And you cried too, though I don’t suppose you realized what it was all about.”

  Nancy bit her lip. Staying with an old servant in a pokey cottage in a Cornish town was not her idea of a holiday. Besides …

  “What about the children?” she asked. “There wouldn’t be space for the children.”

  “What children?”

  “Melanie and Rupert, of course. I couldn’t go on holiday without them.”

  “For heaven’s sake, Nancy, I’m not asking the children. I’m asking you. And why can’t you go on holiday without them? They’re old enough to be left with their father and Mrs. Croftway. Indulge yourself. Get away on your own. It wouldn’t be for long. Just a few days, no more than a week.”

  “When do you plan to go?”

  “Soon. As soon as I can.”

  “Oh, Mother, it’s so difficult. I’ve got so much on my plate … the church fete to be planned, and the Conservative Conference.… I have to have a lunch party that day. And then Melanie’s Pony Club camp…”

  Her voice trailed away as she ran out of excuses. Penelope said nothing. Nancy took another sustaining mouthful of the icy gin and tonic and stole a sideways glance at her mother. She saw the clear-cut profile, the closed eyes.

  “Mother?
”

  “Um?”

  “Perhaps later on … when I haven’t so much on my plate. September, maybe.”

  “No.” She was adamant. “It has to be soon.” She raised a hand. “Don’t worry about it. I know you’re busy. It was just an idea.”

  A silence fell between them, which Nancy found uncomfortable, loaded with unspoken reproach. But why should she feel guilty? She couldn’t possibly take off, with so little notice, so little time to set things in order, to Cornwall.

  Nancy was not good at sitting in silence. She liked to keep up a constant flow of chat. Trying to drum up some other lively source of conversation, she found her mind a blank. Really, Mother could be dreadfully irritating at times. It wasn’t Nancy’s fault. It was just that she was so busy, so involved in house, husband, and children. It wasn’t fair suddenly to be made to feel so guilty.

  * * *

  It was thus that Noel found them. If Nancy had had a good morning, then Noel had had a gruesome one. Going through all that stuff in the attic yesterday had been one thing because there had always stayed, at the back of his mind, the conviction that he was about to turn up something immensely valuable. The fact that he hadn’t had made this morning’s toil no easier. Also, he had been slightly thrown by the appearance of Danus. Expecting some thick-headed, muscle-bound country boy, he had instead been confronted by a cool and silent young man, and had found himself disconcerted by his straight and unblinking blue gaze. The fact that Antonia had taken so instantly to Danus did nothing to improve Noel’s disposition, and the sound of their companionable chatter as they journeyed up and down the narrow stairs with armfuls of cardboard boxes and broken furniture became, during the course of the morning, an increasing irritation. The altercation over the worm-eaten desk was almost the last straw, and by a quarter to one, with everything more or less cleared, and what remained pushed to the side of the wall, he had had more than enough. As well he was dirty. He needed a shower, but more, he needed a drink, so he compromised by washing his face and hands, came downstairs, and poured himself a dry martini of mind-boggling strength. With this in his hand he took himself through the kitchen to the sun-baked conservatory, and his mood was not improved by the sight of his mother and his sister, relaxed in basket chairs and looking as though neither of them had done a stroke of work all day.

  At the sound of his footstep, Nancy glanced up. She smiled brightly, as though for once she was actually pleased to see him.

  “Hello, Noel.”

  He did not return the smile, simply leaned a shoulder against the jamb of the open door, and surveyed the pair of them. His mother appeared to have fallen asleep.

  “What do you two think you’re doing, lounging there in the sunshine, while others work their fingers to the bone?”

  Penelope never moved. Nancy’s smile lost a little of its spontaneity, but remained there, stuck on her face. Noel eventually acknowledged it with a nod of his head. “Hi,” he said, and went to pull a chair away from the carefully laid lunch table, and take, at last, the weight from his legs.

  His mother opened her eyes. She had not been asleep.

  “Are you finished?”

  “Yes, I’m finished. Done for. A physical wreck.”

  “I didn’t mean you, I meant the attic.”

  “Just about. All we need is some busy housewife to go up and sweep the floor, and then the job’s done.”

  “Noel, you are a wonder. What would I have done without you?”

  But her grateful smile was wasted on him. “I’m ravenous,” he told her. “When’s lunch?”

  “Whenever you want it.” She set down her glass of wine and sat up to gaze out beyond the pot plants and into the garden. Smoke continued to billow up into the sky, but there was no sign of the others. “Perhaps someone should fetch Danus and Antonia, and then I’ll go and make the gravy.”

  There was a pause. Noel waited for Nancy to volunteer for this not very arduous task, but she was intent on picking a small piece of fluff from her skirt and generally acting as though she hadn’t heard. Noel said, “I haven’t the energy.” He leaned back, tipping his chair. “You go, Nancy, the exercise will do you good.”

  Nancy, recognizing this as a dig at her ample figure, instantly took umbrage, as he had known she would do.

  “Thank you very much.”

  “You don’t look as if you’d raised a finger all morning.”

  “Just because I happen to tidy myself up before I come out for lunch.” She glanced pointedly in his direction. “Which is more than I can say for you.”

  “What does George wear for Sunday lunch? A frock-coat?”

  Nancy, belligerent, sat up. “If that’s meant to be funny…”

  They snacked on, niggling at each other, sounding much as they always had. In rising exasperation and impatience, Penelope knew that she could not listen for another moment. She got abruptly to her feet. “I shall fetch them,” she announced, and her offspring let her go, across the sunlit lawn, across the rough, uncut winter grass, while they stayed where they were, unappreciative of the sweet-scented warmth of the conservatory, not speaking, not looking at each other. They nursed their drinks and their mutual animosity.

  She was upset: She had allowed them to upset her. She could feel the blood coursing to her cheeks, her heart begin its uneven jigging dance. She went slowly, taking her time, breathing deeply, telling herself not to be a fool. They did not matter, those grownup children of hers, who still behaved like the children they no longer were. It did not matter that Noel thought of no person but himself, or that Nancy had become so smug and self-righteous and middle-aged. It did not matter that none of them, not even Olivia, wanted to come to Cornwall with her.

  What had gone wrong? What had become of the babies she had borne and loved and brought up and educated and generally cared for? The answer was, perhaps, that she had not expected enough of them. But she had learned the hard way, in the London years after the war, not to expect anything of any person except herself. Without parents or old friends to support her, she was left with only Ambrose and his mother to turn to, and within months she had realized the futility of doing any such thing. Alone, she was—in more ways than one—thrown back on her own resources.

  Self-reliance. That was the keyword, the one thing that could pull you through any crisis fate chose to hurl at you. To be yourself. Independent. Not witless. Still able to make my own decisions and plot the course of what remains of my life. I do not need my children. Knowing their faults, recognizing their shortcomings, I love them all, but I do not need them.

  She prayed that she never would.

  She was calmer now, able, even, to smile at herself. She went through the gap in the privet hedge and saw the orchard sloping away, dappled in sunlight and shadow. At the end of it the enormous bonfire still crackled and flamed, belching forth smoke. Danus and Antonia were there, Danus raking in the red-hot ashes, Antonia sitting on the edge of the wheelbarrow watching him. They had shed sweaters and were in their shirt-sleeves and talking nineteen to the dozen, their voices clear in the still air.

  So absorbed and companionable did they appear, it seemed a pity to disturb them, even to announce that it was time to come indoors and eat roast spring lamb, lemon soufflé, and strawberry shortcake. So she stayed where she was, allowing herself the pleasure of simply watching the charming pastoral scene. Then Danus paused to lean on his pitchfork, and make some unheard remark, and Antonia laughed. And the sound of her laughter brought back, with a piercing clarity, ringing across the years, the memory of other laughter, and the unexpected ecstasies and physical joys that happen, perhaps, only once in any person’s lifetime.

  It was good. And nothing good is ever lost. It stays part of a person, becomes part of one’s character.

  Other voices, other worlds. Recalling that ecstasy, she was filled, not with a sense of loss, but of renewal and rediscovery. Nancy and Noel and the tedious irritations they had unleashed were forgotten. They did not matter. Nothing
mattered but this instant, this moment of truth.

  She might have stood there, day-dreaming, at the top of the orchard for the rest of the day, but Danus all at once spied her and waved, and she made a trumpet of her hands to call and tell them that it was lunch-time. He acknowledged this with a gesture of his hand, then drove his pitchfork into the earth and stooped to collect their abandoned sweaters. Antonia got off the wheelbarrow, and he put her sweater around her shoulders and tied the sleeves in a knot beneath her chin. Then they started up the orchard path, up between the trees, walking side by side; both tall and slender and tanned and young, and, to Penelope’s eyes, quite beautiful.

  She found herself filled with gratitude. Not simply to them for all the hard work they had accomplished during the course of the morning, but for them as well. They had, without saying a word, restored her tranquillity of mind, her sense of values, and she sent up a swift and heartfelt thank-you to the twist of fate (or was it the hand of God?—she wished that she could be certain …) that had introduced them, like a second chance, into her life.

  * * *

  One thing that could be fairly said in Noel’s favour was that his evil moods were short-lived. By the time the little party finally assembled, he was onto his second dry martini (having refreshed, as well, his sister’s glass), and Penelope was much relieved to find them actually chatting quite amicably.

  “Here we all are. Now, Nancy, you haven’t met Danus, and you haven’t met Antonia. This is my daughter, Nancy Chamberlain. Noel, you be in charge of the bar … give them both something to drink, then perhaps you’d come and carve the lamb for me.…”

  Noel set down his glass and rose with exaggerated effort to his feet.

  “What would you like, Antonia?”