Cliffs and sandhills faced the sea at intervals towards the end of Hendrawna Beach, and they passed two bluffs of rock before Drake stopped. ‘I’d best lead the way,’ he said. ‘Then if Miss Chynoweth could follow me I’d be at hand to give her a help up; while Mr Geoffrey, you will be behind her to help her too if need be.’
They went up. It was, as Drake had said, an easy climb, and Morwenna could have been up like a cat if she had not been impeded by her skirt and her determination not to lift it. So she had to take Drake’s hand twice, and on consideration this was perhaps a worse choice. His hand was warm and hers cold. There was some frightening transmission between them.
At the top he took them across a small green platform to a cliff of overhanging rock. Raised a foot from the ground by its rocky sides was a pool of water about four feet across.
‘This is it,’ said Drake. ‘Tis fresh water – taste – though so near the sea, and they d’say twas consecrated by St Sawle more’n a thousand year gone and twas used by all the early Christian pilgrims walking ’long the coast from one monastery to the next. Taste, tis pure water.’
‘You know all this – so soon,’ said Morwenna.
‘Old Jope Ishbel told me – he as works at Wheal Leisure. He d’know all there is to know. But, mind, I had to come and find ’n for myself.’
‘It’s lovely water,’ said Geoffrey Charles. ‘Taste it, Wenna.’
She tasted. ‘Um.’
‘It is a wishing well too, or so they d’say. What you must do, Jope Ishbel says, is put the first finger of your right hand deep in the water and make three crosses with it, saying “Father, Son, Holy Spirit” and then you get your wishes granted.’
‘It’s sacrilegious,’ said Morwenna.
‘Oh, no. Oh no tis not, begging your pardon, Miss Chynoweth. It’s a holy place just so much as a church. Don’t we ask for things in church? I do. You do, Master Geoffrey.’
‘Yes, yes, surely, I shall wish. Show me. Do you say it aloud?’
‘Only the prayer, not the wish. See, this way.’ Drake rolled up his sleeve, dipped his finger and hand into the well, glanced quickly at Morwenna. Then he made his three crosses, saying ‘Father, Son, Holy Spirit’, hastily withdrew his hand but did not shake the drops off it. ‘You must let it dry,’ he said.
Geoffrey Charles, much intrigued, soon followed, and then pestered Morwenna to do the same. At first she refused but presently gave way. With the boy and the young man watching, she took off a small garnet ring and put it on a stone, then slid the sleeve of her riding jacket up till her wrist and slender forearm were bare to the elbow. She put in her hand, finger extended, thought a moment, then made the three crosses and muttered the prayer. As she leaned over, her hair fell about her face, showing through it gleams of cheek and curve of ear.
‘No, not yet!’ said Geoffrey Charles, as she straightened up and moved to pull her sleeve. ‘You must let it dry!’
They all stood in silence. The sea was quiet too, and the only sound was the breeze stirring the grasses on the cliff edge and a lark trilling in the high sky.
‘How foolish we must all look,’ said Morwenna quietly, slipping her ring back. ‘I am sure the old monks would not consider us suitable pilgrims, making our flippant wishes at this well.’
‘Mine was not flippant,’ said Drake.
‘Nor mine!’ said Geoffrey Charles. ‘It is hardly flippant to ask for—’ He stopped just in time, and they all laughed.
As they came to the descent Drake said: ‘Half a mile on, near the Dark Cliffs, there is some handsome great caves. One’s called the Abbey. Tis just like a great church inside: arches, pillars, naves. One day I’d dearly like to show them to ee, if so be as you’d be interested.’
‘Oh, yes!’ said Geoffrey Charles. ‘We would, wouldn’t we, Morwenna. When could we go? When?’
‘It is not the sort of thing you could do without your mother’s permission.’
‘Tis a lot easier than this here,’ Drake said. ‘No climbing. You just walk in off the sand. But if you could name a day I’d bring candles, for with candles you can see the more.’
‘Oh, Wenna!’ said Geoffrey Charles. ‘We must!’
‘Perhaps you can persuade your mother,’ Morwenna said obliquely. ‘You know how much she will do for you.’
They began the descent, which was not quite so easy for a woman shod for riding.
‘D’you know why they are called the Dark Cliffs?’ Drake said, stopping halfway. ‘A simple answer: because they are always dark. See, even now with the sun full on ’em they’re black as night. ’Vyou ever been that far, Mr Geoffrey?’
‘No. We’ve never been this far before.’
‘I’ve never been that far neither. Not yet. Come, Miss Chynoweth, you must leave me help you.’
‘No, thank you.’
‘You must. Tisn’t safe else.’
‘I can manage.’
‘Please . . .’ He took her arm and hand like a precious treasure newly gained.
The library had always been held in particular affection by Demelza. When first in this house as a child servant she had spent hours of her time in it, exploring the broken-down room and the treasure-trove of its mildewed contents. Since then much of the detritus of twenty-five years had been thrown away or given away, and the better pieces had been repaired and brought into the house. At the far end was a trapdoor leading down into a larger cavity built for purposes Demelza preferred not to remember. Apart from the walls there was not much of the room worth saving. The roof would have to be demolished, all the window frames knocked out, the floor renewed, for there was rot in it all over.
Ross’s first idea, born when prosperity was only just sprouting, had been to incorporate the library into the living space of the house for the first time. (Never completed, it had never been anything but a lumber room at best.) But as his financial condition became more assured so his sights were raised. The rooms he had seen in the house in London when he had visited Caroline Penvenen, the improvements at Trenwith, an occasional elegant room in one of the town houses of Truro, had all inspired him with ideas to build and decorate at least one room at Nampara, and that the largest, in a manner suitable to a more gracious way of living. So it had been planned to lay an oak polished floor, put up a good plaster ceiling, and perhaps have walls of light pine panelling. But the prospect of another child caused a further reassessment. There were six bedrooms at present; little enough if four servants slept in. Jeremy would soon need one of his own. There had never been a way into the library except by going out of doors or through Joshua’s old bedroom with the box bed. Why could they not turn Joshua’s bedroom on the ground floor into a dining-room, and raise the library up a floor to the same level as the rest of the house, building two larger bedrooms above it, and make a way to them through the lumber room and the apple cupboard which were now above Joshua’s bedroom?
Lack of skilled, or even semi-skilled, craftsmen would be one of the obstacles to such an undertaking. Nampara House, when Joshua put it up, had been built to a utilitarian design, and the men who worked on it were as rough-hewn as the house they built. If the house had mellowed in thirty-five years the quality of the available workers had not changed. Plasterers would probably have to be brought from Bath or Exeter. Carpenters to put up a new roof were easily found but not to make a handsome door or mantelshelf. Stone masons could build a wall to last for ever but few around could work the resistant granite or ornament the slate.
Drake had worked at the mine for his first weeks but had soon been moved to begin some preliminary dismantling of the library, and he soon showed that he was the best carpenter around, even though it was not his trade.
One day when Ross was away and Demelza had come into the library in search of a dust sheet, Drake said to her: ‘Sister, do you never have no trade with the folk of Trenwith?’
She said: ‘No, Drake.’ Just that and no more.
‘Mr Francis, who died, he were Cap’n Ross’s cousin. Th
at correct?’
‘That is correct.’
‘Was they not partial to each other?’
‘They had disagreements. But they were good friends in the last years of Francis’s life.’
‘I’ve asked you ’bout Geoffrey Charles before. Do you not wish ever to see him?’
‘I’d be glad to see him, but his mother and his stepfather would not want him to see us.’
Drake took two nails from between his strong teeth and put them on the bench. ‘Is there not too much ill will in the world, sister? Don’t you think so?’
‘That I do. But you may take it from me, Drake, that this is an ill will that no Christian prayers will blow away. I don’t wish to explain it to you the more, but that is the way of it.’
‘Can I ask, is the ill will on your side or on their side?’
‘Both.’
She had found her dust sheet and was now looking through some old cost books. There was a certain set to her chin.
He said: ‘Sam wishes you would turn to Christ, sister.’
She frowned at the book and pushed back her curl of hair. ‘Sam wishes a lot.’
‘Do you not ever have ardent longings to find your Saviour?’
‘I am not learned in these things.’
‘Well no more’re we . . .’
‘But you think you know?’
‘Tisn’t the question of learning. Tis the question of feeling you’re dead in sin and in the bonds of iniquity, and seeking the forgiveness of God.’
She looked up, her eyes at their most direct. She had not heard him speak like this before. ‘And you have had that?’
‘I b’lieve so. Sam have had it more so.’
‘Sam,’ she said, ‘has had everything more so. He reminds me of Father.’
‘Oh, but he’s not like Father. Father was a – was a bull. He’d fight for Christ in just the same way as he’d fight when he were drunk. Sam’s gentle. He’s a born Christian, Demelza.’
It was not often he used her name. She smiled. ‘Perhaps I was not born one. Maybe that’s what’s wrong. I go to church once a year with Captain Poldark. Christmas Day we go together and take communion. Rest of the time I try to behave as a Christian should. Maybe there’s one neighbour we can’t love as ourselves, but most of the others we try to live with peaceable and kindly. I think maybe the trouble with me – or is it the trouble with you? . . .’
‘What?’
‘I’m not convinced of that much sin, brother. Oh, I know I could do better, this way, that way, the other way. And of course I don’t love God enough. I’m – earthy. I don’t look at a figure on a cross, I look at the things round me. Those are what I love; my husband, my child, my dog, my garden, my spinet, my bedroom, my home. Earthy. You see. But I have love overflowing for all those. Those are more important to me than a Man sitting on a throne in Heaven. I hope if I explain it to Him when I see Him, He’ll come round to see it my way . . .’
‘But don’t you see, Christ is among us all the time. Love him first and all the rest will be made over again.’
She was silent. ‘I don’t think I want it all made over again, Drake. I think I want it just as it is.’
Drake sighed. ‘Oh, well, I promised Sam I’d try.’
‘You promised . . .’ She laughed. ‘So that explains it all! It is not you speaking at all but Sam. I might have guessed!’
Drake picked up his hammer and stared at it in frustration. ‘No. No, sister, tisn’t true. I’m saved and in grace just same as him. But he’s the more convinced in trying to save others. And he thought – we thought . . .’ He picked up a nail and hammered it home.
‘And you thought your sister was utterly in the dark and estranged from God? Isn’t that what you call it?’
‘Well, it come natural, don’t it, to think of folk close home. And Sam d’know that I’m more with ee than he is. And he thinks ye’ve more of a taking for me than for him . . .’
‘If you put nails in like that you’ll have to draw them out again. And that’ll split the wood . . .’ She turned a page of the cost book. ‘I’m sorry, brother. You should first try to convert Captain Poldark.’
‘I’d dare not try,’ said Drake.
‘No more would I,’ said Demelza. ‘But for all that, don’t tell me he’s not a good man!’
Drake perceived he could do no more. ‘Pity, a rare pity. This library . . .’
‘What of it?’
‘Sam were thinking. Only just thinking. That as the Society grew this’d be a handsome place for our meetings.’
Joe Nanfan had come into the library carrying a deal plank. Since he was injured in the mine collapse of last year he had taken to carpentering and was learning fast.
Demelza let out a long pent breath. ‘I think I believe you both take after Father.’
Drake smiled uncertainly at her as she got up and left.
Later that evening, Ross still being away, Drake came to her in the garden.
‘Excuse me, sister, if I were taking liberties this forenoon. I trust you think no worse of we.’
Demelza said: ‘I couldn’t but think worse of someone who wants to use our new room as a meeting house.’
They both laughed. ‘But serious,’ he said.
‘Serious,’ she said, ‘you’ve a beguiling way, Drake. I tremble for the young women around here.’
His face changed. ‘Well, maybe yes, maybe no. I fear tis not all so simple as that . . . Sister, I have another favour to ask of ee, and this is my own and maybe I shouldn’t ask this neither . . .’
‘I’m sure you should not,’ Demelza said. ‘And I’m sure you will.’
‘Well . . . I can read if I go slow and careful; but we’ve only one bible betwixt the both of us, and Sam d’have it all the time. He d’read to me out of it, but that don’t help my reading. And I can’t write. Mind, I can pen my name but naught else. I want the practice.’
‘You need another book? That you can have with pleasure, though our selection is small. Another bible?’
‘Well, sister, if there be another book I’d better prefer that, seeing as we have the one bible already. Some good book, mebbe, as will help to improve me in two ways at the same time, like. And also,’ he added as Demelza was about to speak. ‘If I practise to write I would dearly like for you to help me. See what I d’write, tell me where I go wrong. You know. For mebbe ten minutes a day, no more.’
She considered a hollyhock which needed staking already, otherwise the next wind would flatten it. Hollyhocks were really unsuitable for this coast, and she would have given them up long ago if she had not loved them so much. One needed sturdier things, lower growing. Anyway, she was coming reluctantly to acknowledge that this was essentially a garden which did well only in the spring. Daffodils, primroses, tulips, they were always splendid; but the soil was so light that any heat in summer quickly dried it out, and the plants lacked food.
‘Sam cannot do this for you?’
‘Sam is not overmuch betterer’n me. Now I seen that notice that you penned for the workmen ’bout them keeping off from walking on your garden, and that’s bravely writ. You must’ve writ a lot, sister. You must’ve practised at it.’
‘I started writing when I was your age, Drake. No, a year younger. That’s seven years since. It takes time.’
‘I’ve time.’
‘My writing,’ she said. ‘You should see some of the documents done by the law, done by clerks and the like. That’s writing. Mine looks like a spider with a broken leg.’
‘I just want to be able to make my wishes known.’
‘I think you do that quite well now,’ she said, stooping to grasp a weed. She tugged, but the head came away in her fingers, leaving the root.
He said: ‘Here,’ and bent beside her, dug his long fingers into the sandy soil and came out with the root. ‘What shall I do with’n?’
‘That heap over there. Thank you, brother.’ She straightened up, and the breeze blew her hair back from her forehe
ad. ‘Very well, Drake, I’ll help you. Always provided you do not try too hard to convert me.’
He patted her hand. ‘Thank ee, sister. That’s brave and fine. You’re a real Christian.’
Chapter Seven
Ross had been two nights in Looe, staying with his old friend Harry Blewett. Over a late supper he told Demelza that Blewett’s boat yard was booming, and that he was still willing to offer Ross a share in the business. Such money as Ross put in would be used to extend the yard, which at present was strained to capacity.
Demelza said: ‘What if the war is over soon?’
‘A good yard, well run, can hardly fail to remain a going concern. The need for boats may not be so great if the war ends, but the need will not altogether disappear, the way a lode of tin or copper can.’
She helped him to more chine of mutton. ‘And . . . the other thing?’
‘They have made only one run since early June, but two of their men then inquired on my behalf. So far nothing. The Breton fishermen, they say, move about from port to port but they seldom journey inland and they have no knowledge of prisons or camps or of any prisoners of war. I have offered fifty guineas for definite information that can be confirmed about the English ship Travail and possible survivors. They are going over next week if the weather is favourable.’
‘And from St Ann’s?’
‘Will Nanfan has found out nothing about Dwight, but he did hear that English prisoners in Brest had been ill-treated by the rabble, stoned in the streets and put in abominable jails. These he thought were captured merchant seamen; and of course naval officers would get preferential treatment.’
‘You will not tell Caroline this?’
‘Certainly not.’
She picked up his plate. ‘Pudding? Or jelly? Or gooseberry tart?’
‘Tart, if you have made it and not Jane. Thank you.’ He watched her get up and cut the tart. The coming child had done nothing yet to alter her figure; she still had the same leggy grace, the same look of youthful intent. ‘While I was in Looe I met two French émigrés, both aristocrats. a M. du Corbin and a Comte de Maresi. I asked du Corbin what was most likely to happen if Dwight had survived the wreck. But I think du Corbin is still living in a chivalrous time. He asserts that all officers captured are automatically exchanged or released on parole and that therefore, as we have heard nothing, Dwight is dead. What I don’t think he realizes is that, even in the year and a half since he left, conditions in France have run down. Communications are distintegrating and until some order is restored no one really can control procedures which used to be taken as a matter of course.’
The Black Moon Page 9