The doctor came and said Mr. Tregarland was tired. He should not have attended the funeral and stood in the cold wind.
One afternoon, Jane, one of the maids, came to me with a message from Mr. Tregarland. He would like to see me.
When I went to his room, he was lying propped up on his pillows; he looked small and very frail, but I caught the old look of mischief in his eyes.
“Ah,” he said, “the good Violetta—the sensible one. I noticed that from the start. It is kind of you to come to see me.”
“But of course I came.”
He nodded. “Things have been happening here, haven’t they? Odd, isn’t it, how we go on for years in the same old rut and then suddenly everything erupts into drama. Well, that’s happening all over the world now, and events in Tregarland’s are mild enough when compared with most of today’s tragedies. ‘Every prospect pleases, and only man is vile.’ Not true. There is much good in man. Don’t you agree, wise Violetta?”
“I don’t know why you call me wise. I am as foolish as most people, I suppose.”
“Not you. That is why I want to talk to you before I shuffle off this mortal coil singing ‘Nunc Dimittis.’ How I indulge in quotations this morning! That’s a sign of something. When one looks back and considers one’s past, one remembers those lines which suddenly assume a significance. Is that so, do you think?”
“I imagine it could be so.”
“When a man is drowning, they say his past life flashes before his eyes. Well, so it is with a man who has come to his end in any other way. There is the past mocking him, saying: ‘You should have done this.’ But mostly: ‘You should not have done that.’ Ah, there’s the rub. I’m back again, Violetta. The time has come for repentance. I look back on my life and I say, ‘What good have you done, James Tregarland?’ A little, perhaps, but the balance weighs more heavily on the other side. And now I am a sick man preparing for the last journey. I am bowed down by my sins and the havoc I have created … mostly for others. Not a pleasant conclusion, Violetta.”
“I don’t suppose you have been much worse than most people,” I said.
He looked solemn for a moment.
“‘The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars but in ourselves that we are underlings.’ That man Shakespeare had a tab to stick on everything, didn’t he? This is a sort of confessional.”
“To be made to me?”
“Why not? You are the most suitable person in this house. You will be here after I am gone. You know a little about me. I have noticed you observing me in the past. You know my wickedness, how, when I was infirm, my life changed so that I was confined to this place for my last years. I liked to watch others—particularly Matilda. She was a source of interest to me because I was never sure how she would act. You see, she was brought up in a puritanical home, but there was nothing puritanical about Matilda underneath that veneer. Her parents had fitted her into a mold. She was bound to break out sooner or later. When we met there was a spark which ignited the future.”
“She willingly did what she did, I suppose.”
“It was not as simple in that age. Matilda had been brought up in fear of offending against the laws of the Church, which meant the laws laid down by Père and Mère Lewyth. When she was about to produce an illegitimate child, they turned their daughter out. Imagine that! I set her up in a place and when my wife died I brought her here as housekeeper. That’s an old story which you have heard already. There was Dermot and there was Gordon; how much more fitted Gordon was to be the heir of Tregarland’s. I watched her. I teased her. I might make her son my heir … and I might not. It was like that all the way through. My poor Matty, she was in despair and she set about making possible what she believed would never be if she did nothing about it.”
“Why did you not tell her your intentions right away?”
“I wanted to watch what she would do. To have told her would have spoiled the fun.”
“The fun of tormenting her?”
“You could say that—and yet I was fond of her. And now that I have come to the end, like many before me I wish I had acted differently. The awful thing is that if I had, Matty would have ended differently. I wanted to see what she would do. And I did. I drove her mad and made a murderess of her. Do you think I am responsible for what she did?”
“You have been wrong. You have been heartless, but I am sure you never thought for one moment that there would be murder.”
“I can say with honesty that I did not. But it was only when I understood what she was ready to do to the child that I understood what I had done.”
“It is over now,” I said, “and there is nothing you can do about it.”
“Only regret. I have made reparations as far as I can. The estate will go to the boy. It must. It is his by right. As for Gordon, he should have been the one. It is sad that he was born on the wrong side of the blanket. Dermot was no good. He was weak and pleasure-seeking … oh, a charming young man. Rather like his father and grandfather. But Tregarland’s needed a strong steady hand to keep it on course. Gordon had that. It was one of those tricks of fate. The bastard is the one the place needed and the rightful heir is useless. Why couldn’t it have been the other way round? Perversity of life, I suppose. Poor Gordon has suffered; but I will tell you this, wise Violetta. I have made what reparations I can. I have acknowledged Gordon as my son in this will of mine, and I am leaving him capital so that he can start up his own place, but I shall express the hope that Gordon will stay until Tristan is of an age to manage.”
“Then it will be too late for him to start on his own.”
“When Tristan is twenty, he will be close to fifty. Not too old for a man of his energies … if he keeps his health. However, it is what I shall do.”
“Do others know of this? Does Gordon?”
“He will know when the will is read.”
“Why do you tell me?”
He was thoughtful for a moment, then he said: “I think you have an interest in people … very like my own, but yours is benign where mine was mischievous. You would never have done what I did. You are too good-hearted—and, shall I say, too wise to meddle? You see, I am now brought to this stage of repentance because of what I did, and that was foolish of me, for I am now mourning as I approach death and asking the Almighty not to punish me as I deserve. How much cleverer I should have been if, at this stage to which we all must come, I could have had a balance sheet with the good deeds outweighing the evil? And you are here—part of the scene. Perhaps you will continue with the saga after I have gone.”
“How?”
“You have become part of Tregarland’s. Your sister is the mother of the heir. Violetta, that young man of yours … you are still waiting?”
“I am still waiting.”
“And hoping? It is a long time.”
“It is nearly two years since Dunkirk.”
“This war will be over one day, and when it is and he has not come back you will spend your life in mourning for someone who is lost to you forever.”
“I cannot see so far ahead.”
“Forgive me. I am making you sad. It is the last thing I want to do. You are a serious young lady. I knew that from the first. It would have been different if Dermot had married you.”
“It would have been different whomever he had married.”
“The wayward delectable Dorabella was not the one for him, but she is the mother of my grandson. I should like to say a word for Gordon. He is a good man; he would make a faithful husband. If the Jermyn boy does not come back … and in time you must cease to hope … Gordon will be waiting, I am sure.”
I could find no words. I could only think of a bleak future without Jowan.
“I should like to think of you here at Tregarland’s,” went on the old man. “Gordon is calm … level-headed … a little like you, my dear. It would be pleasant for me, looking down from heaven, or more likely from the fires of hell, to see you at Tregarland’s with Gordon, and my grandson g
rowing up under Gordon’s guidance to love the place. Here I am again, arranging people’s lives for them. But, of course, they must arrange them themselves.”
We were silent for a while before he continued: “I often think of how your mother wanted to take Tristan back with her and how she procured the good Nanny Crabtree to look after him. And thank God she did. There is another sensible woman. Do you remember how I refused to let the boy go?”
“Yes, I remember.”
“If I had not done that, he would have escaped danger. It is yet another sin to be laid at my door. When I am gone, you must take him to your mother. My dear girl, you will be happier away from this place. Memories of Jowan come back all the time. You will never escape from your grief here. You need to get away … you, your sister, and the child. I should have let you go before.”
He was tired, I could see, and I told him he must rest a while and I would come and see him again. Our talk had been very interesting, I added.
“Not very productive,” he said. “But what is there to produce? Confession is a sort of self-indulgence. It is good for the soul, they say. One talks and the listener, because he or she has been specially selected by the confessor, makes the necessary comforting excuses, which you have done admirably, my dear. Thank you. Do you believe in premonitions?”
This abrupt change of subject disconcerted me a little.
“I am not sure,” I said.
“Nor am I, but I have just had one. The end is nigh, it says. I have unburdened my soul—and now, my dear, it is farewell. I hope your future will be a happy one. I fancy it will be. This evil war must end, and when you have made your decision, I am sure it will be the right one.”
I stooped over him and kissed his forehead.
“Thank you, my dear,” he said, and closed his eyes.
Three days later he had a massive stroke from which he did not recover. The premonition of which he had spoken had proved to be a warning of what was to come.
So there was another journey to the cemetery.
When we were back in Tregarland’s the lawyer from Plymouth read the will. Tristan had become the owner of the estate; Gordon was acknowledged as James’s natural son; he was to remain administrator of the estate and was to inherit forty thousand pounds. Glasses of sherry were served and there was a hushed atmosphere throughout the house.
It was amazing how we missed the old man. We had not seen a great deal of him, but we had always been aware of his presence. What changes there had been since I had first seen Tregarland’s, although it was not so very long ago. For so many years it had gone on in the same way and then, suddenly, the changes had come … drastic changes, death, and disaster. And what now, I wondered?
The days were passing. Summer … autumn. My mother wrote often. She thought I should get away … come back home for a while. I knew she was thinking I would be better somewhere else that I might escape from memories of Jowan.
They had all made up their minds that he was lost forever. I guessed what my mother was saying to my father:
“The sooner she gets away from that place the better. She ought to be meeting people … young people. Dorabella is very interested in that nice Captain Brent, and it seems he is in her. Perhaps she will marry again. But Violetta, she is different. She doesn’t shrug off these things like her sister does. She should get away.”
I had my work which I took very seriously. We had made over rooms at Tregarland’s to the convalescing soldiers and were kept busy. I was glad of that. I tried to stop brooding, and the long talks with Gordon helped. He told me he had shelved the idea of getting a place of his own and would not leave Tregarland’s until he could pass it over to Tristan.
I wondered what he would have said if he knew his father had talked of our getting together. I believed that he did have tender feelings towards me, and sometimes I let myself imagine that Jowan did not come back and that I married Gordon. No, I thought. That could not be. And Jowan would come back. There were two of us—his grandmother and myself—who believed he would, though perhaps we forced ourselves to do so because we could not bear it to be otherwise.
In September Dorabella had one of her frequent visits to the Poldowns during which she was away for a longish time. I knew that she was with Captain Brent. She came back in a state of depression.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“James says he is leaving the area in a few weeks’ time.”
“Where is he going?”
“He’s not sure.”
She looked wretched. I could never be sure how serious was this attachment to Captain Brent. I had thought it was a light-hearted wartime affair which had come about because they both happened to be in the same place at the same time and liked each other.
But she was certainly downcast.
“What shall you do?” I asked.
“I don’t know. Everything is so uncertain. James is in an important job, you know.”
“I guessed that. I suppose you will be hearing which part of the country he’s in. That won’t be a secret, will it?”
“He will let me know.”
“I suppose you will keep in touch?”
“Oh, yes.”
“Do you really care about him, Dorabella?”
“Quite a bit.”
“Have you talked … about the future?”
“My dear prosaic old Violetta, you don’t change. How does any of us know what our future will be?”
She was right in that.
Later she heard that he would be somewhere in the southeast, not far from London, and she was slightly less depressed.
Letters were arriving from our mother. Why did we not come home for a while? Surely they could do without us for a bit?
“Wouldn’t it be wonderful if you could come to Caddington and bring little Tristan and Nanny Crabtree with you?”
“Why shouldn’t we?” said Dorabella.
“We have our work here.”
“We’re not indispensable. Mrs. Jermyn could find plenty of others to take our place. There are many women round here who would like to find some work to do … something that would help the war effort. Mrs. Pardell, for one, would give a hand.”
“I don’t think the men would find her a good replacement for you, Dorabella.”
“She would be very efficient, and they would be amused by her North Country frankness.”
“A little different from your flirtatious chat.”
“A change is always welcome.”
“Only if it is a change for the better.”
“Well, there is that Mrs. Canter staying at Seaview Cottage. She could get someone to look after her little girl. She goes to school most of the time anyway. Now she is flighty enough and Mrs. Pardell would make a nice contrast.”
“I see you are determined to go.”
“You’d love it too, Violetta, so don’t pretend the desire to see them all is one-sided.”
“Of course I’d love to go. But …”
“But me no buts. Will you explain to Mrs. Jermyn? It would be better coming from you.”
So I sat with her in the solarium as I had so many times, and over a cup of tea I said: “My family seems to think that Dorabella and I should go home for a little while. They think it would be good for us … for me mainly.”
“Yes,” she said. “I see.”
“Of course, we could not go unless we were sure there was someone to take our places.”
Mrs. Jermyn was silent for some moments, and I thought she was going to protest and say we could not possibly go.
But she said. “They are right. You should get away, Violetta, and I know how it is with you and your sister. Dorabella seems self-sufficient, but she depends on you … far more than you do on her. And Captain Brent has left. Well, I understand. And you, my dear, are not happy. How could you be? The memory is here all the time. I am selfish and should like you to stay, but your parents are right. You should be with them. You must go. I tell you this: if I have n
ews of Jowan, I shall be in touch with you … instantly.”
“I know you will.”
“We are going to get that news one day. I feel sure of it. I have to feel sure of it, Violetta. It is that belief which keeps me going. We shall all be happy again … someday. Believe that, Violetta, and go to your family. Take an interest in what is going on there. It can’t be much longer, and we shall be happy again. Then these years will seem like a bad dream. Now let us consider the practical side of this. Who can take your places?”
“Dorabella suggested Mrs. Pardell and Mrs. Canter.”
“Mrs. Canter … well, yes, she’s bright and she should get on well with the men. Mrs. Pardell … a little grim, don’t you think?”
“But very efficient. I think she might be an asset. There are, however, one or two other wives on the estate with time on their hands. I think they would all be eager to do something useful.”
“There won’t be a great deal of difficulty, I’m sure. Of course, it won’t be the same. It has been a joy having you around, Violetta, and Dorabella has always been such a favorite with the men. But these things happen, and I know a respite from this place will be a help to you. What of Gordon Lewyth?”
“What of him?”
“What does he say about your going?”
“Nothing has been said yet.”
“He must know you are thinking of it. I am sure he will be rather sad if you leave Tregarland’s.”
She would have heard of the friendship between Gordon and myself. There was certain to be speculation.
I said as lightly as I could: “We shall be back. It is only a stay with our parents.”
She took my hand and pressed it.
“God bless you, Violetta,” she said. “I have a feeling that everything will come right for us one day.”
As we thought, there was no difficulty in filling our places. Mrs. Canter readily accepted and Mrs. Pardell hesitated only for a day or so. It was good work and she approved of it. There were, in fact, one or two who were piqued because they had not been asked. So the way was clear for us.
Nanny Crabtree was delighted.
“It’ll be like going home,” she said. “I’ll have my old nursery—I never really took to this place anyway. You’re almost falling in the sea half the time … and after all that’s gone on here. It’s no wonder my nerves get on edge … and you wonder what’s coming next.”
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