The Shell Seekers

by Rosamunde Pilcher

  “Lovely,” said Mr. Penberth. Rummaging, he unearthed an old newspaper, bundled the fish into clumsy parcels, and laid them on top of the peach tins. “There.” Penelope picked up the baskets. They were extremely heavy. Mr. Penberth frowned. “Going to manage, are you? Not too weighty for you? I could bring them up, mind, next time I’m your way in the cart, but the mackerel won’t stay fresh for another day.”

  “I’ll manage.”

  “Well, I hope you’ll all enjoy them.…” He saw her to the door. “How’s Nancy?”

  “Blooming.”

  “Tell her and Doris to come and see us soon. Haven’t set eyes on them for a month or more.”

  “I’ll tell them. And thank you, Mr. Penberth, so much.”

  He opened the door to the chinkle of the bell. “It’s a pleasure, my dear.”

  Weighed down with peaches and fish, Penelope set off for home. Now, well into the afternoon, there were a few more people around, emerging to shop or go about their business. And Mr. Penberth had been right about the weather forecast. The tide had turned, the wind already was beginning to drop, the rain to ease off. She looked up and saw, high in the sky beyond the racing black clouds, a ragged scrap of blue sky. Enough to make a cat a pair of trousers. She walked briskly, feeling relatively cheerful, for once not having to worry over what she was going to give everyone for supper. But after a bit the laden baskets began to take their toll, her hands ached and her arms felt as though they were being tugged out of their sockets. It crossed her mind that perhaps she had been wrong in refusing Mr. Penberth’s offer of delivery, but almost at once this thought was chased from her mind by the sound of a fast-approaching vehicle, coming from behind her, from the direction of the North Pier.

  The road was narrow and the puddles deep. Not wishing to be drenched in a wave of dirty water, she stepped aside to wait until the oncoming car was safely past. It shot by, and then, a few yards on and with a screech of brakes, almost immediately halted. She saw the open Jeep, the two familiar uniformed occupants. Major Lomax and his Sergeant. The Jeep stayed where it was, its engine running, but from it Major Lomax, unfolding his long legs, stepped out into the road and walked back to where she stood.

  Without preliminaries, he said, “You look overburdened.”

  Grateful for an excuse to be shed of her baskets, Penelope set them down on the pavement and straightened to face him. “I am.”

  “We met the other day.”

  “I remember.”

  “Have you been shopping?”

  “No. Collecting a present. Six tins of peaches. They were blown up this morning on the North Beach. And some mackerel.”

  “How far have you got to carry them?”

  “Home.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “At the top of the hill.”

  “Can’t they be delivered?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I want to eat them tonight.”

  Amused, he smiled. The smile did something extraordinary to his face and caused her to look at, and really see him, for the first time. “Unremarkable” had been her own private verdict, that day he had ambled in on them at the Gallery, but now she saw that, on the contrary, he was not unremarkable in the very least, for his well-ordered features, his strangely brilliant blue eyes, and that unexpected smile assembled themselves into a pattern of quite extraordinary charm.

  He said, “Perhaps we can help.”

  “How?”

  “We can’t give you a ride, but I can see no reason why Sergeant Burton shouldn’t drive your peaches home.”

  “He’d never find the way.”

  “You underestimate him.” With that, he stooped and picked up the baskets. He said, quite crossly, “You shouldn’t be carrying these. You’ll hurt yourself.”

  “I carry shopping all the time. Everybody has to.…”

  She was ignored. Major Lomax was already on his way back to the Jeep. Penelope, still feebly protesting, went after him. “I can manage.…”

  “Sergeant Burton.”

  The Sergeant switched off the engine. “Sir?”

  “These are to be delivered.” He stowed the baskets firmly onto the back seat of the Jeep. “The young lady will give you directions.”

  The Sergeant turned to her, waiting politely. With no apparent alternative, Penelope did as she was told. “… up the hill, and then right at Grabney’s Garage, and then follow the road till you get to the top. There’s a high wall and it’s called Carn Cottage. You’ll have to leave the Jeep on the road and walk through the garden.”

  “Anyone at home, miss?”

  “Yes. My father.”

  “What’s his name, miss?”

  “Mr. Stern. If he doesn’t hear you … if nobody answers the bell, just leave the baskets on the doorstep.”

  “Right, miss.” He waited.

  Major Lomax said, “That’s settled, then. Carry on, Sergeant. I’ll walk the rest of the way. See you back at HQ.”

  “Sir.”

  He saluted, started up his engine, and was off, with his cargo looking strangely domestic on the back seat of the Jeep. It rounded the corner by the Lifeboat House and was gone. Penelope was left with the Major. She felt ill at ease, disconcerted by this unexpected turn of events. She also felt unsatisfied with her appearance, which normally troubled her not in the very least. There was, however, nothing to be done about it, except pull off the unbecoming woollen hat and shake loose her hair. She did this, stuffing the hat into the pocket of her oilskin.

  He said, “Shall we go?”

  Her hands were cold, so she put them into her pockets as well.

  “Do you really want to walk?” she asked him doubtfully.

  “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”

  “Haven’t you anything else you should be doing?”

  “Like what?”

  “An exercise to plan, or a report to be written?”

  “No. The rest of the day is my own.”

  They began to walk. A thought struck Penelope. She said, “I hope your Sergeant doesn’t get into trouble. I’m sure he’s not allowed to carry people’s shopping in his Jeep.”

  “If anybody gives him a rocket, it’s me. And how are you so sure?”

  “I was in the Wrens for about two months, so I know all about rules and regulations. I wasn’t allowed to carry a handbag or an umbrella. It made life very difficult.”

  He appeared interested. “When were you in the Wrens?”

  “Oh, ages ago. In nineteen-forty. I was in Portsmouth.”

  “Why did you leave?”

  “I had a baby. I got married and I had a baby.”

  “I see.”

  “She’s nearly three. She’s called Nancy.”

  “Is your husband in the Navy?”

  “Yes. He’s in the Mediterranean, I think. I’m never very sure.”

  “How long is it since you’ve seen him?”

  “Oh…” She could not remember and did not want to. “Ages.” As she said this, high above, the clouds parted for an instant, and a watery gleam of sunshine broke through. The wet streets threw back the reflection of this light, and stone and slate were washed in gold. Amazed, Penelope turned up her face to this momentary brilliance. “It really is clearing. Mr. Penberth said it would. He listened to the weather forecast and he said the storm would blow over. Perhaps it will be a beautiful evening.”

  “Yes, perhaps it will.”

  The sunlight disappeared as swiftly as it had come, and all was grey again. But the rain had finally stopped.

  She said, “Don’t let’s go up through the town. Let’s go by the sea and up by the railway station. There’s a flight of steps that comes out exactly opposite the White Caps Hotel.”

  “I’d like that. I haven’t really found my way around yet, but I suppose you know it like the back of your hand. Have you lived here always?”

  “In the summer-time. In winter we lived in London. And in between we went
to France. My mother was French. We had friends there. But we’ve been in Porthkerris ever since the outbreak of war. I suppose we’ll all stay here till it ends.”

  “How about your husband? Doesn’t he want you around when he comes ashore?”

  They had turned into a narrow lane that ran alongside the beach. Pebbles had been flung up onto this by the high tide, and scraps of seaweed and a ravelled end of tarry rope. She stooped and picked up a pebble and slung it out into the sea. She said, “I told you. He’s in the Mediterranean. And even if I could be with him, I couldn’t, because I have to take care of Papa. My mother was killed in the Blitz in nineteen-forty-one. So I have to stay with him.”

  He did not say, I’m sorry. He said again, “I see,” and sounded as though he really did.

  “It’s not just him and me and Nancy. We’ve got Doris living with us and her two boys. They were evacuees. She’s a war widow. She never went back to London.” She looked at him. “Papa liked talking to you that day in the Gallery. He was cross with me because I couldn’t ask you for supper … he said I was very rude. I didn’t mean to be. It’s just that there wasn’t anything I could think of to eat.”

  “I much enjoyed meeting him. When I knew I was being sent here, it crossed my mind that perhaps I might see the famous Lawrence Stern, but I never really imagined it would happen. I thought he’d be too old and frail to go out and about. When I saw you first, up on the road outside HQ, I knew at once that it had to be him. And then, when I walked into the Gallery and you were actually there, I could scarcely believe my luck. Such a painter, he was.” He looked down at her. “Have you inherited his talent?”

  “No. It’s very frustrating. Often I see something that is so beautiful it hurts, like an old farm building, or foxgloves growing on a hedge, blowing in the wind against a blue sky. And I wish so much that I could capture them, put them on paper, keep them for ever. And, of course, I can’t.”

  “It’s not easy to live with one’s own inadequacies.”

  It occurred to her then that he did not look a man who knew what the word “inadequate” meant. “Do you paint?”

  “No. Why do you ask?”

  “Talking to Papa, you sounded so knowledgeable.”

  “If I did, it was because I was brought up by an immensely artistic and creative mother. As soon as I could walk, I was marched around every gallery and museum in London, and made to go to concerts.”

  “It sounds as though you might have been put off culture for life.”

  “No. She did it quite tactfully and made it all immensely interesting. Made it fun.”

  “And your father?”

  “My father was a stockbroker, in the City.”

  She thought about this. Other people’s lives were always fascinating. “Where did you live?”

  “Cadogan Gardens. But after he died, my mother sold the house because it was too big, and moved into a smaller one in Pembroke Square. She’s there now. She stayed there all through the bombing. She said she’d rather be dead than live anywhere but London.”

  Penelope thought of Dolly Keeling, snug in her little bolt-hole at the Coombe Hotel, playing bridge with Lady Bloody Beamish and writing long loving letters to Ambrose. She sighed, because thinking about Dolly always made her feel a bit depressed. There was always this guilty feeling that Dolly should be asked to stay at Carn Cottage for a few days, if only to see her granddaughter. Or that Penelope should suggest visiting the Coombe Hotel, taking Nancy with her. But both prospects were so appalling that she never found it too difficult to put them hastily out of her mind, and start thinking about something else instead.

  The narrow road leaned uphill. They had left the sea behind them and now walked up between rows of whitewashed, terraced fishermen’s cottages. A door opened and a cat emerged, followed by a woman with a basket of washing, which she proceeded to peg out on a line slung across the face of her house. As she did this, the sun came out again, quite strongly now, and she turned a smiling face upon them.

  “That’s a bit better, isn’t it. Never seen such rain as we had this morning. Be lovely before long.”

  The cat wound itself around Penelope’s ankles. She stooped to stroke it. They went on. She took her hands out of her pockets and unbuttoned her oilskin. She said, “Did you join the Royal Marines because you didn’t want to be a stockbroker, or because of the war?”

  “Because of the war. I’m known as an Hostilities Only Officer. I always think it sounds a bit derogatory. But neither did I want to be a stockbroker. I went to University and read Classics and English Literature, and then I got a job teaching little boys in a Prep School.”

  “Did the Royal Marines teach you how to climb?”

  He smiled. “No. I was climbing long before that. I was sent to a boarding school in Lancashire, and there was a Master there who used to take a gang of us climbing in the Lake District. I got completely bitten at fourteen years old, and I just went on doing it.”

  “Have you climbed abroad?”

  “Yes. Switzerland. Austria. I wanted to go to Nepal, but it would have meant months of preparation and travelling and I never could spare the time.”

  “After the Matterhorn, the Boscarben Cliffs must look easy.”

  “No,” he assured her drily, “no, they are not easy.”

  They continued on their way, ascending, taking the hidden, twisting lanes that the visitors never found, and mounting flights of granite steps so steep that Penelope was left with no breath for conversation. The last flight zigzagged up the face of the cliff between the railway station and the main road, finally to emerge directly opposite the old White Caps Hotel.

  Warm with exertion, Penelope rested, leaning against the wall, waiting to catch her breath and for her heart to stop pounding. Major Lomax, coming behind her, appeared to be unaffected. She saw the Marine on guard eyeing them dispassionately across the road, but his expression gave nothing away.

  When she could speak, she said, “I feel like a bit of chewed string.”

  “Small wonder.”

  “I haven’t come that way for years. When I was small, I used to run up all the way from the beach. It was a sort of self-imposed endurance test.”

  She turned, leaning her arms on the top of the wall, and looked down the way they had come. The sea, ebbing, was calmer now, reflecting the blue of the clearing sky. Far below, on the beach, a man walked his dog. The wind had dropped to a fresh breeze, scented by the damp mossy smell of gardens soaked by rain. It was a smell loaded with nostalgia, and for once Penelope found herself caught off-guard, and was suffused with a mindless ecstasy that she had not known since she was a child.

  She thought of the last couple of years: the boredom, the narrowness of existence, the dearth of anything to look forward to. Yet now, in a single instant, the curtains had been whipped aside, and the windows beyond thrown open onto a brilliant view that had been there, waiting for her, all the time. A view, moreover, laden with the most marvellous possibilities and opportunities.

  Happiness—remembered from the days before the war, before Ambrose, before Sophie’s shocking death. It was like being young again. But I am young. I am only twenty-three. She turned from the wall to face the man who stood beside her and was filled with gratitude, because in some way it was he who had wrought this miracle of déjà vu.

  She found him watching her, and wondered how much he perceived, how much he knew. But his stillness, his silence gave nothing away.

  She said, “I must go home. Papa will be wondering what’s happened to me.”

  He nodded, accepting this. They would say goodbye, part. She would go on her way. He would cross the road, return the salute of the man on guard duty, run up the steps, disappear through the glassed door and perhaps never be seen again.

  She said, “Would you like to come to supper?”

  He did not instantly reply to this suggestion, and for a dreadful moment she thought he was going to refuse. Then he smiled. “That’s very kind.”

&nbs
p; Relief. “This evening?”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Perfectly. Papa would so like to see you again. You can continue your conversation.”

  “Thank you. That would be delightful.”

  “About seven-thirty, then.” She sounded horribly formal. “I’m … I’m able to ask you because for once we’ve got something to eat.”

  “Let me guess. Mackerel and tinned peaches?”

  Formality, restraint melted. They dissolved into laughter, and she knew that she would never forget the sound of it, because it was their first shared joke.

  * * *

  She found Doris agog with curiosity. “Here, what’s going on? There was I, minding my own business, and this smashing Sergeant turns up at the door with your baskets. Asked him in for a cup of tea, but he said he couldn’t stay. How did you pick him up?”

  Penelope sat at the kitchen table and told the whole story of the unexpected encounter. Doris listened with eyes growing round as marbles. When Penelope finished, she let out a screech of coy delight. “Ask me, and it looks like you’ve got an admirer…”

  “Oh, Doris, I’ve asked him for supper.”

  “When?”

  “This evening.”

  “Is he coming?”

  “Yes, he is.”

  Doris’ face fell. “Oh, hell.” She sat back in her chair, the very picture of despondency.

  “Why hell?”

  “I won’t be here. Going out. Taking Clark and Ronald over to Penzance to see the Operatic Society do The Mikado.”

  “Oh, Doris. I was counting on you being here. I need someone to help me. Can’t you put it off?”

  “No, I can’t. There’s a bus organized, and anyway it’s only on for two nights. And the boys have been looking forward to it for weeks, poor little blighters.” Her expression became resigned. “Never mind, can’t be helped. I’ll give you a hand with the cooking before I go, and get Nancy to bed. But I’m not half vexed that I’m missing all the fun. Hasn’t been a proper man in the house for years.”

  Penelope did not mention Ambrose. Instead she said, “What about Ernie? He’s a proper man.”

  “Yes. He’s all right.” But poor Ernie was dismissed. “He doesn’t count, though.”