The House on the Strand

by Daphne Du Maurier

  "Ready? What for?" they would query, looking up from fitting together a model airplane or something momentarily engrossing their attention.

  "Church, of course," she would answer, sweeping from the room again, deaf to their wails of protestation. It was always a let-out for me. Pleading my Catholic upbringing, I would lie late in bed, reading the Sunday papers. Today, despite sunshine flooding our room as we awoke, and the beaming smile of Mrs. Collins as she bore in our tray of toast and coffee, Vita looked preoccupied, and said she had had a restless night. I at once felt guilty, having slept like a log myself, and I thought how this thing of how well or how badly one had slept was really the great test of marital relationship; if one partner came off poorly during the night hours the other was immediately to blame, and the following day would come apart in consequence.

  This particular Sunday was to be no exception to the rule, and when the boys came into the bedroom to say good morning dressed in jeans and T-shirts, she immediately exploded.

  "Off with those things at once and into your flannel suits!" she said. "Have you forgotten it's Sunday? We're going to church."

  "Oh, Mom... No!"

  I admit, I felt for them. Sunshine, blue sky, the sea below the fields. They must have had one thought in mind, to get down to it and swim.

  "No arguing now," she said, getting out of bed. "Go off and do as I say." She turned to me. "I take it there is a church somewhere in the vicinity, and you can at least drive us there?"

  "You have a choice of churches," I said, "either Fowey or Tywardreath. It would be easier to take you to Tywardreath." As I said the word I smiled, for the very name had a special significance, but to me alone, and continued casually, "As a matter of fact, it's quite interesting historically. There used to be a priory where the churchyard is today."

  "You hear that, Teddy?" said Vita. "There used to be a priory where we are going to church. You always say you like history. Now hurry along."

  I have seldom seen a sulkier pair of figures. Shoulders hunched, mouths drooping. "I'll take you swimming later," I shouted as they left the room.

  It suited me to drive the party to Tywardreath. Morning service would be at least an hour, and I could drop them off at the church, and then park the car above Treesmill and stroll across the field to Gratten. I did not know when I might get another chance to revisit the site, and the quarry with its surrounding grassy banks held a compulsive fascination.

  As I drove Vita and the reluctant boys, dressed in their Sunday suits, down Polmear hill I glanced over to the right at Polpey, wondering what would have happened if the present owners had discovered me lurking in the bushes instead of the postman, or, worse, what might well have happened had Julian Polpey bidden Roger and his guests inside. Should I have been found attempting to break into the downstairs rooms? This struck me as amusing, and I laughed aloud.

  "What's so funny?" asked Vita.

  "Only the life I lead," I answered. "Driving you all to church today, and yesterday taking that early morning walk. You see the marsh down there? That's where I got so wet."

  "I'm not surprised," she said. "What an extraordinary place to choose for walking. What did you think you were going to find?"

  "Find?" I echoed. "Oh, I don't know. A damsel in distress, perhaps. You never know your luck."

  I shot up the lane to Tywardreath elated, the very fact that she knew nothing of the truth filling me with a ridiculous sense of delight, like hoodwinking my mother in the past. It was a basic instinct fundamental to all males. The boys possessed it too, which was the reason I backed them up in those petty crimes of which Vita disapproved, eating snacks between meals, talking in bed after lights out.

  I dropped them at the church gate, the boys still wearing their hard-done-by expressions.

  "What are you going to do while we are in church?" Vita asked.

  "Just walk around," I said.

  She shrugged her shoulders, and turned through the gate into the churchyard. I knew that shrug; it implied that my easy-going morning mood was not in tune with hers. I hoped Matins would bring consolation.

  I drove off to Treesmill, parked the car, and struck off across the field to the Gratten. The morning was superb. Warm sunshine filled the valley. A lark soared overhead bursting his heart in song. I wished I had brought sandwiches and could have had the whole long day ahead of me instead of one stolen hour.

  I did not enter the quarry with its trailing ivy and old tin cans, but stretched myself full-length on a grassy bank in one of the small hollows, wondering how the place would look by night when the sky was full of stars, or rather how it had looked once, when water filled the valley below. Lorenzo's scene with Jessica came to my mind.

  "In such a night,

  Troilus methinks mounted the Trojan walls,

  And sighed his soul towards the Grecian tents

  Where Cressid lay that night...

  "In such a night

  Stood Dido with a willow in her hand

  Upon the wild sea-banks, and wav'd her love

  To come again to Carthage.

  "In such a night,

  Medea gather'd the enchanted herbs

  That did renew old Aeson..."

  Enchanted herbs was apt. The point was that, when Vita and the boys were getting ready for church, I had gone down to the lab and poured four measures into the flask. The flask was in my pocket. God knew when I should get the chance again...

  It happened very quickly. But it was not night, it was day, and a day in summer, too, though late afternoon, judging from the western sky, which I could see from the casement window in the hall. I was leaning against a bench at the far end, with a view of the entrance court with its surrounding walls. I recognized it at once--I was in the manor house. Two children were playing in the courtyard, girls, aged around eight and ten possibly--it was difficult to tell, with the close-fitting bodices and ankle-length skirts--but the long golden hair falling down their backs, and the small clear-cut features so much alike, proclaimed them miniature editions of their mother. No one but Isolda could have produced such a pair, and I remembered Roger saying to his companion Julian Polpey at the Bishop's reception that she had grown stepsons among the first wife's brood, but only two daughters of her own.

  They were playing some checkers game upon the flags, on a square marked out for them, with pieces like ninepins dotted about, and as they moved the pieces shrill arguments broke out between them as to whose turn was next. The younger reached forward to seize a wooden pin and hide it in her skirt, and this in turn led to cries and slaps and the pulling of hair. Roger emerged into the court suddenly, from the hall where he had been standing watching them, and thrusting himself between them squatted on his haunches, taking the hand of each in turn.

  "You know what comes about when women scold?" he said to them. "Their tongues turn black and curl into their throats, choking them. It happened to my sister once, and she would have died had I not reached her side in time to pluck it back. Open your mouths."

  The children, startled, opened their mouths wide, thrusting out their tongues. Roger touched each in turn with his fingertip, and waggled it.

  "Pray God that does the trick," he said, "but it may not last unless you let your tempers cool. There now, shut your mouths, and only open them for your next meal, or to let kind words fly. Joanna, you're the elder, you should teach Margaret better manners than to hide a man under her skirt." He pulled out the ninepin from the younger girl's dress and set it down upon the flags. "Come now," he said, "proceed. I'll see that you play fair."

  He stood up, legs wide apart, and let them move their pieces round him, which they did at first with some hesitation, then with greater confidence, and soon with peals of delighted laughter as he rocked sideways, stumbling, knocking the pieces down, so that all had to be set straight once more with Roger helping. Presently a woman--their nurse, I supposed--called them from a second doorway beyond the hall, and the pieces were taken up and given solemnly to Roger, wh
o as he took them, promising to play again next day, winked at the nurse, advising her to examine both their tongues later, and let him know if they showed signs of turning black.

  He put the pieces down near the entrance and came into the hall, while the children disappeared into the back regions with their nurse; and it seemed to me for the first time that he had showed some human quality. His steward's role, calculating, cool, very possibly corrupt, had been momentarily put aside, and with it the irony, the cruel detachment I associated with all his actions hitherto.

  He stood in the hall, listening. There was no one there but our two selves, and looking about me I sensed that the place had somehow changed since that day in May when Henry Champernoune had died; it no longer had the feeling of permanent occupancy, but more of a house where the owners came and went, leaving it empty in their absence. There was no sound of barking dogs, no sign of servants, other than the children's nurse, and it came to me suddenly that the lady of the house herself, Joanna Champernoune, must be away from home with her own brood of sons and daughter, perhaps in that other manor of Trelawn, which the steward had mentioned to Lampetho and Trefrengy in the Kilmarth kitchen on the night of the abortive rebellion. Roger must be in charge, and Isolda's children and their nurse were here to break their journey between one house and another.

  He crossed over to the window, through which the late sunlight came, and looked out. Almost at once he flattened himself against the wall as though someone from outside might catch sight of him, and he preferred to remain unseen. Intrigued, I also ventured to the window, and immediately guessed the reason for his maneuver. There was a bench beneath the window, with two people sitting on it, Isolda and Otto Bodrugan, and because of the angle of the wall, which jutted outward, giving the bench shelter, anyone who sat there would have privacy unless he was spied upon from this one window.

  The grass beneath the bench sloped to a low wall, and beyond the wall the fields descended to the river where Bodrugan's ship was anchored. I could see the mast-head, but not the deck. The tide was low, the channel narrow, and on either side of the blue ribbon of water were sand-flats, crowded with every sort of wading bird, dipping and bobbing around the pools where the tide had ebbed. Bodrugan held Isolda's hands in his, examining the fingers, and in a foolish sort of love-play bit each one of them in turn, or rather made pretense of biting them, grimacing as he did so as though they tasted sour.

  I stood by the window watching them, oddly disturbed, not because I, like the steward, was playing spy, but because I sensed in some fashion that the relationship between these two, however passionate it might be at other times, was at this moment innocent, without guile and altogether blessed, and it was the kind of relationship that I myself would never know. Then suddenly he released both hands, letting them drop on to her lap.

  "Let me stay another night and not sleep aboard," he said. "In any event the tide may serve me ill, and I may find myself hard aground if I make sail."

  "Not if you choose your moment," she replied. "The longer you remain here the more dangerous for us both. You know how gossip travels. To come here anyway was madness, with the vessel well known."

  "There's nothing to that," he said. "I come frequently to the bay and to this river, either on business or for my own pleasure, fishing between here and Chapel Point. It was pure chance that brought you here as well."

  "It was not," she said, "and you know it very well. The steward brought you my letter telling you I should be here."

  "Roger is a trusty messenger," he answered. "My wife and children are at Trelawn, and so is my sister Joanna. The risk was worth the taking."

  "Worth taking, yes, this once, but not for two nights in succession. Nor do I trust the steward as you do, and you know my reasons."

  "Henry's death, you mean?" He frowned. "I still think you judged unfairly there. Henry was a dying man. We all knew it. If those potions made him sleep the sooner, free from pain and with Joanna's knowledge, why should we shake our heads?"

  "Too easy done," she said, "and with intent. I'm sorry for it, Otto, but I cannot forgive Joanna, even if she is your sister. As for the steward, doubtless she paid him well, and his monk accomplice."

  I glanced at Roger. He had not moved from his shadowed corner by the window, but he could hear them as well as I did, and judging by the expression in his eyes he hardly relished what she said.

  "As to the monk," added Isolda, "he is still at the Priory, and adds something to his influence every day. The Prior is wax in his hands, and his flock do as they are bidden by Brother Jean, who comes and goes as he pleases."

  "If he does so," said Bodrugan, "it is no concern of mine."

  "It could become so," she told him, "if Margaret comes to have as much faith in his herbal knowledge as Joanna. You know he has treated your family lately?"

  "I know nothing of the sort," he answered. "I have been at Lundy, as you know, and Margaret finds both the island and Bodrugan too exposed, and prefers Trelawn." He rose from the bench and began pacing up and down the grass walk in front of her. Love-making was over, with the problems of domestic life upon them once again. They had my sympathy. "Margaret is too much a Champernoune, like poor Henry," he said. "A priest or a monk could persuade her to abstinence or perpetual prayer if he had the mind to do so. I shall look into it."

  Isolda also rose from the bench, and standing close to Bodrugan looked up at him, with her hands upon his shoulders. I could have touched them both had I leaned from the window. How small they were, inches below adult height today, yet he was broadly-built and strong, with a fine head and a most likable smile, and she as delicately formed as a porcelain shepherdess, hardly taller than her own daughters. They held each other, kissing, and once again I felt this strange disturbance, a sense of loss, utterly unlike anything I might experience in my own time, had I seen two lovers from a window... Intense involvement, and intense compassion too. Yes, that was the word, compassion. And I had no way of explaining my sense of participation in all they did, unless it was that stepping backwards, out of my time to theirs, I felt them vulnerable, and more certainly doomed to die than I was myself, knowing indeed that they had both been dust for more than six centuries.

  "Have a care for Joanna, too," said Isolda. "She is no nearer being married to John now than she was two years ago, and has altered for the worse in consequence. She might even serve his wife as she served her husband."

  "She would not dare, nor John," answered Bodrugan.

  "She would dare anything if it suited her. Harm you likewise, if you stood in her way. She has one thought in mind, to see John Keeper of Restormel and Sheriff of Cornwall, and herself his wife, queening it over all the crown lands as Lady Carminowe."

  "If it should come about I can't prevent it," protested Bodrugan.

  "As her brother you could try," said Isolda, "and at least prevent that monk from trailing at her heels with his poisonous draughts."

  "Joanna was always headstrong," replied her lover. "She has always done as she pleased. I cannot be on watch continually. I might say a word to Roger."

  "To the steward? He is as thick with the monk as she," said Isolda scornfully. "I warn you again, don't trust him, Otto. Neither on her account, nor on ours. He keeps our few meetings secret for the time because it pleases him."

  Once again I glanced at Roger, and saw the shadow on his face. I wished someone would call him from the room so that he could no longer play eavesdropper. It would put him against her to hear his faults so plainly stated and with such dislike.

  "He stood by me last October and will do so again," said Bodrugan.

  "He stood by you then because he reckoned he had much to gain," replied Isolda. "Now you can do little for him, why should he risk losing his position? One word to Joanna, and thence to John, and thence to Oliver, and we'd be lost."

  "Oliver is in London."

  "London today, perhaps. But malice travels with every wind that blows. Tomorrow Bere or Bockenod. The next day Tregest
or Carminowe. Oliver cares not a jot if I live or die, he has women wherever he goes, but his pride would never brook a faithless wife. And that I know."

  A cloud had come between them, and in the sky too, gathering above the hills beyond the valley. All the brightness of the summer day had gone. Innocence had vanished, and with it the serenity of their world. Mine too. Separated by centuries, I somehow shared their guilt.

  "How late is it?" she asked.

  "Near six, by the sun," he answered. "Does it matter?"

  "The children should be away with Alice," she said. "They may come running to find me, and they must not see you here."

  "Roger is with them," he told her, "he will take care they leave us alone."

  "Nevertheless, I must bid them good-night, or they will never mount their ponies."

  She began to move away along the grass, and as she did so the steward also slipped from his dark corner and crossed the hall. I followed, puzzled. They could not be staying in the house after all but somewhere else, at Bockenod, perhaps. But the Boconnoc I knew was a longish ride for children on ponies in late afternoon; they would hardly reach it before dusk.

  We went through the hallway to the open court beyond, and through the archway to the stables. Roger's brother Robbie was there, saddling the ponies, helping the little girls to mount, laughing and joking with the nurse who, propped high on her own steed, had some trouble in making it stand still.

  "He'll go quietly enough with two of you on his back," called Roger. "Robbie shall sit on the pony with you and keep you warm. Before you or behind you, state your preference. It's all the same to him, isn't it, Robbie?"

  The nurse, a country girl with flaming cheeks, gawked delightedly, protesting she would ride very well alone, and there was further giggling, instantly silenced with a frown from Roger as Isolda came into the stableyard. He moved to her side, head bent in deference.

  "The children will be safe enough with Robbie," he said, "but I can escort them if you prefer it."