Penmarric

by Susan Howatch

  She stared, her cheeks wet with tears, her lips trembling, but in spite of her grief I saw a faint smile hover at the corner of her mouth. “Oh?” she said. “I never noticed. I always thought your looks were so striking. I never thought you were plain.”

  I opened the window and leaned out over the sill. The fresh air cooled my face. Gulls wheeled over the harbor far below and soared effortlessly into the sky above the narrow alleys of the town.

  Her hand touched my arm. “Mark, I should go before Mrs. Treen discovers I’m missing. Oh, Mark, forgive me for being sad and cross. I am so very grateful to you for coming to help me like this.”

  And after that there was nothing else I could do but say that I was sorry too if I had spoken harshly or been unkind.

  When I had escorted her back to the Treens’ house I stopped at the gates of the drive to kiss her good night. “Remember that there’s no need for you to worry,” I said for the last time that evening. “I promise I’ll look after you. You mustn’t worry any more.”

  She smiled as well as she could. Her face was by this time pinched with exhaustion, but even as I opened my mouth to express my concern she turned away from me without another word and walked on alone up the drive to the house.

  4

  The doctor eventually decided that she was pregnant. Moving ahead at once with the plans I had made earlier, I paved the way for Rose’s withdrawal from St. Ives by forging the necessary letter from my mother and sent it to Rose with a suitably bland note to say that she might wish to show the letter to Mrs. Treen. After that I turned my attentions away from St. Ives and rode into Penzance to confide my troubles to Michael Vincent.

  He looked pale, as if he had spent long hours working at some unrewarding task. His gray eyes were bloodshot, and I noticed for the first time that his hair was already thinning at the temples.

  “How are you?” I said perfunctorily. “I haven’t seen you for a long time. How’s Clarissa?”

  He shrugged. “I haven’t been at Penmarric lately.”

  So that was it. Clarissa had become bored with toying with the affections of an impecunious provincial lawyer and had turned her attentions elsewhere. I felt sorry for him. After making arrangements to lunch with him. I left him to his business and did not see him again until we met two hours later at the tavern we frequented.

  Once we were seated I embarked on the difficult task of seeking his advice after providing him with the minimum of explanation. Knowing he was well acquainted with Penzance, I asked if he could advise me where to look to find respectable but reasonably priced rooms for Rose, and as I had anticipated he was able to make several helpful suggestions. However, his curiosity was finally aroused and I felt obliged to tell him that I required the rooms for a friend of mine who had had the misfortune to succumb to a certain feminine condition.

  He stared at me round-eyed. “Good God,” he muttered at last, “you Penmars are a fast crowd, I must say. We had to pay off one of Harry’s mistresses the other day. She had heard of his engagement to Judith Carnforth and was trying to make trouble.”

  “My name is not Penmar,” I said, much too sharply. “It’s Castallack. And Harry isn’t related to me by blood at all. He’s the adopted son of Giles, his nephew by marriage.”

  “Yes, I know. I—”

  “And frankly, Vincent, if you’ll forgive me saying so, you had no business to tell me that story about paying off one of Harry’s mistresses. I thought lawyers were supposed to hold that sort of thing in confidence.”

  “Yes—yes, I’m sorry. You’re absolutely right.” He looked haggard. “I’m afraid I’m rather embittered about the Penmars at the moment. You mustn’t listen to me. But, Castallack, what kind of woman is this—this friend of yours? How did it happen? What the devil are you going to do if your father finds out?”

  “He won’t find but because you’re the only person I intend to tell.” The very thought that my father might discover my affair with Rose was enough to make me feel stiff with fright. I told Vincent as little as possible, but he was still shocked to the core. It was clear he thought I should marry Rose to put matters right and disapproved of the fact that I took the practical and not the gentlemanly point of view.

  After lunch I walked back to his office with him. It was a gray day at the end of September and the smell of boats and fish floated up toward us from the harbor. Close at hand the clock of the church on the hill was pointing its hands to two o’clock, and I was just about to bid Vincent goodbye when there was a stormy clatter of horse’s hoofs behind us, and, swinging around, we saw Justin Carnforth rein to a halt as he shouted a greeting in our direction.

  “Castallack! Vincent! Wait a moment!”

  We tried not to groan. Conversations with Carnforth had an annoying habit of being one-sided and interminable, and the odds were that this one would be no exception.

  “How are you, Carnforth?” called Vincent politely, and then, seeing his expression, added at once, “Is something wrong?”

  “Wrong! By God!” His race was dark with rage. “Haven’t you heard the news? I’m so angry I can scarcely contain myself! That blackguard Harry Penmar! By Jove, if I ever get my hands on him I’ll—”

  “What’s he done?” I interrupted, suddenly becoming interested. “What’s happened?”

  Carnforth was spluttering with emotion. “My sister—Judith—his own wife-to-be—”

  “He eloped with her?” said Vincent, amazed.

  “No!” roared Carnforth. “No, damn it, sir, he jilted her! He’s eloped with the rector of Zillan’s daughter! He’s eloped with little Miriam Barnwell! A clergyman’s daughter, by heavens! When I think of my poor sister, humiliated, shamed—”

  “Good God,” said Vincent “What a terrible shock for the rector!”

  “Mrs. Barnwell will be pleased anyway,” I said, amused. “Her daughter will be marrying into county circles even if the marriage is conducted in a rather unorthodox fashion.”

  “Damn the Barnwells!” spluttered Carnforth. “What about my sister? Jilted, by God! Now listen, Vincent—you’re often at Penmarric nowadays, aren’t you? When you next see Clarissa you tell her to tell her brother that if he ever sets foot in Penzance again, I’ll—”

  “Yes, yes,” said Vincent hastily, a little white around the lips at this mention of Clarissa but anxious to quieten Carnforth as quickly as possible. His loud-voiced histrionics had already attracted the attention of the passers-by. “I’ll tell her.”

  “And if you’re ever at Penmarric, Castallack—”

  “I never am,” I said politely, and as soon as I had spoken I remembered my intention to go there the very next day in order to beg the money I needed from Giles Penmar.

  5

  “What a disgraceful situation,” said my father to me at dinner. “To think that Miriam Barnwell, a clergyman’s daughter, a well-brought-up, gentle young girl, should suddenly abandon all the moral principles instilled in her and run off with a rake like that! I can’t understand it. It’s always distressing when a girl of her background behaves in an unprincipled fashion, and this time it’s doubly distressing because I feel so sorry for her parents. Poor Barnwell will be dreadfully upset”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I hesitate to say this, but I fear part of the blame must be put upon Mrs. Barnwell. She was always much too anxious for her daughter to marry well. I’m sure she engineered and encouraged Miriam’s flirtation with young Raymond last summer before Giles sent him abroad, and it wouldn’t surprise me if she had turned a blind eye to this latest business with Harry. Heavens, surely she must have known the two of them were having secret meetings somewhere even after Harry became engaged to Judith Carnforth! How could she have let such a thing happen right under her nose? I suppose Harry decided to marry Judith in order to please Giles and his creditors and then backed out at the last minute to run away with a girl be found more attractive.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How any young man could behave so
despicably I can’t imagine. It wouldn’t surprise me if he didn’t even marry poor little Miriam, and then what will happen to her? She’ll be completely ruined. Much as I blame her for her deplorable moral lapse, I feel I must blame Harry more. I really think that any young man who uses a well-brought-up, respectable young girl for his own selfish and wanton purposes must be exceptionally wicked.”

  “Yes.”

  He looked at me closely. “I think you’re as shocked by the news as I am,” he observed. “You’re very quiet tonight. Are you feeling well?”

  “I’m a little tired,” I said. “I think, if you’ll excuse me, sir …”

  “Yes, certainly. I hope you sleep well and have a good rest.” He smiled at me, his eyes so blue and honest, and of course it never even occurred to him as he bade me good night that I might have behaved as despicably as Harry Penmar.

  6

  It was the following morning that I rode to Penmarric to see Giles.

  After I had received Rose’s letter begging my assistance and realized that I would soon need to borrow a large sum of money, I had wracked my brains for some time to decide whom I should approach. For a while I almost thought I might overcome my pride and attempt to borrow from my mother, but I was too afraid she might write to my father and—believing herself to be acting in my best interests—demand to know why he gave me such a meager allowance that I was obliged to approach her for financial support. No, I thought, better not to involve my mother in a situation that was already disastrous. But who else was there? Cousin Robert Yorke was wealthy and fond enough of me, I knew, to give me the sum I needed, but he was my mother’s puppet and could not be expected to keep the secret from her. To approach my father, of course, was out of the question.

  That left Giles Penmar. But as soon as I had decided that he would be likely to help me I pushed all thought of him from my mind. Thinking of Giles was a dangerous pastime, a habit which I knew must be instantly suppressed. After the first onslaught of shock that had followed my mother’s wild revelations some weeks ago I built a wall around the memory to protect myself from it, and the wall had effectively repelled all speculation that might have caused me to lose control over my emotions and initiate scenes that could only end in disaster. So I refused to think of Giles, refused to think of those revelations that I would not and could not believe. I remembered only that I was his heir and that he would probably grant me a portion of the money he intended to leave me in his will, and then the door to my mind slammed shut and I did not think of him again until I realized I could no longer postpone the ordeal of a further interview at Penmarric.

  When I arrived at the house that morning, I found it lonely and deserted, its somber walls wreathed in an oppressive Cornish mist. For one long moment I stared at the place, not knowing why I loved it when it was so ugly, but aware that it was waiting for me to infuse it with life. I smiled, amused by my sentimentality, but the sentiment stayed, lodged irrevocably in my mind. It was my house, my land; and one day I would take possession.

  Five minutes later, after a tousleheaded groom had taken my horse and a footman, anxious to please his future master, had ushered me speedily across the threshold, I was standing once more in the morning room with the threadbare Indian carpet and watching the cool mist blowing across the terrace from the sea.

  I was just wondering in an agony of suspense how much longer I would have to wait for the master of the house to appear when the door opened and I saw not the dreaded spectacle of my cousin in his wheelchair but the far from unpleasant sight of his adopted daughter Clarissa.

  “My dear Cousin Mark!” she said in a tone of voice designed to make my spine tingle with delight. “I come bearing the olive branch of peace at last!”

  To give credit where credit is due, I must confess that my spine did tingle once or twice before I managed to recall my long-standing indifference to her looks. She was wearing a cream-colored gown shot with apple-green silk and it suited her very well. It was also too tight in some questionable places, and I fancied that if she had had a mother or an aunt or indeed any kind of female chaperone the dress would either have gone unworn or else would have been sent to the seamstress to be altered.

  “Good morning, Cousin Clarissa,” I said guardedly. “I thank you for the olive branch and accept it with pleasure.”

  “I’m sure you’re wondering why I’ve decided to sue for peace,” she said, arranging herself cleverly on the chaise longue and motioning me to sit down beside her. “After all, we’ve been enemies for such a long time, have we not?”

  “I’ve never wished to be enemies with anyone here at Penmarric, Clarissa,” I said, sitting down on one of the armchairs. The choice was yours, not mine.”

  “Oh, but surely you can understand how we felt! Harry and I were always just the two little poor relations who weren’t really Penmars at all. Papa—my adopted Papa, I should say—cared only for Raymond, and once Raymond was gone he saw nothing odd about making his will in favor of a complete stranger. Surely you can understand how Harry and I felt.”

  “Perhaps … But why should you feel any differently toward me now?”

  “You can thank that sly little fortune hunter Miriam Barnwell! Oh, how Harry could have been deceived by that girl simply defies all explanation! Of course, this is the final straw. Papa will disinherit him now and I don’t suppose I shall see him again for years and years and … well, it’s very lonely here at Penmarric, Cousin Mark.” She gave me a long lonely look from her dark lonely eyes. They were beautiful eyes, large, brilliant and long-lashed. “It’s such a dreary, desolate house! I could not bear to think that with Harry gone I might be entombed here for weeks without anyone coming to see me.”

  “My dear Clarissa,” I said pleasantly, “you’re far too modest. You know as well as I do that you have only to raise your little finger and my friend Vincent will come racing over the moors to keep you company.”

  “Oh, I had forgotten dear Mr. Vincent was a friend of yours!” She smiled at me before adding carelessly, “But how could I have forgotten? It’s true I had decided not to see him so frequently, but last night he came to Penmarric on some errand or other and I took pity on him—we drank a glass of port together and he told me—oh!—so many fascinating things about you, Cousin Mark!”

  I looked at her. She went on smiling. I can remember thinking to myself very precisely: If that fool Vincent has breathed one word to this girl about my predicament with Rose I’ll see he wishes he’d never set eyes on either me or Clarissa Penmar.

  “He really seems to know an amazing amount about you. I hear you’re very popular with the ladies, Cousin Mark. In fact that was one of the reasons why I decided to present you with the olive branch. I’m always intrigued by gentlemen who have a romantic reputation.”

  “Romantic?” said my voice, matching the languor of her measured drawl. “I fear Vincent has been too generous in his appraisal of my achievements in that field. As you see, I’m hardly sufficiently endowed with romantic looks to follow your brother Harry’s example.”

  “Who cares about romantic looks once the curtains are drawn and the candle’s out?”

  I rose to my feet as if I had been jerked upward by a violent hand. I think I even gasped. I had never heard such words from a girl of her age and background before.

  She laughed. “Don’t look so shocked! I’ve been Harry’s confidante for years! I know what goes on in the world.” She too rose to her feet, and as she strolled gracefully across the room toward me I realized with an even deeper shock that every shred of the lascivious gossip about her was true. “Would you like me to give you a tour of the house?” she said lightly. “I could show you—”

  “No thanks,” I said shortly.

  I saw her dark eyebrows raise themselves slightly at my tone of voice. Her smile faded. “Come, Mark, that’s hardly very civil, is it? I thought you’d accepted the olive branch.”

  I turned away from her and moved toward the bell with the intention of re
minding the footman that I was still waiting to see Giles. But before I could touch the bell she said coolly in that warm, flexible voice of hers, “I really think you would find me more entertaining than a doctor’s daughter. There’s something so. terribly dreary about the middle classes, don’t you think?”

  I spun around but found myself unable to speak.”

  She laughed at my expression. “You’re angry because I know about your miserable little doctor’s daughter!”

  “Listen, Clarissa,” I said in an exceptionally polite voice, “if you say one word more in that tone about a woman who is a thousand times more a lady than you’ll ever be—”

  “How boring to have a ladylike mistress!”

  I struck her, I slapped her across the face with the palm of my hand and saw her eyes blaze as her hand flew to her cheek.

  “You … bastard!” She spat at me as hard as she could, and the ugly word selected by her on an impulse without regard to its true meaning rang in my ears more viciously than any four-lettered obscenity from the gutter. “You … miserable … bastard …” She could hardly speak. She began to tremble with rage. “How dare you strike me like that?” she said in a rush at last. “Get out! Get out this minute or you’ll be sorry you ever came!”

  I pulled out my handkerchief, wiped her spittle from my cheek and sat down deliberately on the chaise longue.

  “Very well,” she said, still shaking with rage. “I’ll summon the footmen and have you thrown out.”

  I had been on the verge of losing my temper for several minutes and now I lost it completely. Leaping to my feet, I grabbed her before she could ring the bell and shook her till she was speechless. “You little … running around like a …” My white-hot temper had been the bane of my childhood, and although I had now reached an age when I could control it even under extreme provocation, once it was lost it was lost and I cared not what I said. “Do you think I can’t guess why you’re so angry? Do you imagine I don’t realize that you can’t endure to think yourself resistible? You were being vicious and spiteful to pay me back for my lack of interest in you! You think you can treat me like you treat that fool Vincent, but by God you’ve come to the wrong person this time! No woman dictates to me or tries to push me into doing what she wants. Besides, why should I be interested in you? You’re not even beautiful with your brown cow’s, eyes and your thick-lipped mouth and your repulsive mass of black curls? Why, I wouldn’t even go to bed with you if you paid me!”