by Nancy M Bell
“Do ya have the money for the ticket?” Sarie asked.
When Bella was in full flight there was no talking her out of something she had set her heart on. No matter how impractical it might be. Far better, Sarie knew, to get her to see the problems on her own.
“Not yet. I have almost enough saved and I thought that I could maybe borrow the rest.” Bella looked hopefully at Sarie.
“You’re my best mate Bella, you know I’ll give you what I have. Have you worked out how you’ll pay for your books and living expenses?” Sarie tried again to get Bella to see the cold hard truths of going to London on her own.
“Joseph’s sister took nursing, and he said I can have her used books and pay for them when I have the money. I asked him about them before I applied.” Bella smiled triumphantly at Sarie.
“Okay then, you have books and money for a ticket. What about food?” Sarie asked.
“Don’t be such a wet blanket! I’ll figure something out,” Bella said airily. “They give breakfast and dinner at the Nurses’ Residence.”
Bella pushed her chair back from the table and picked up the dish rag from the sink. Wish brisk movements she wiped down the table and the counters. Sarie got up as well and banked the fire for the night. Barney wouldn’t be home until the night was well past half over, there was always a good game of darts to be had at the Arms on a rainy evening. Bella flicked the light switch off as she and Sarie left the kitchen. The hall outside the kitchen door was cold after the close warmth of the main room of the house. Bella and Sarie hurried down the narrow hall and climbed the steep stairs two at a time.
Once they were in Bella’s little bedroom at the back of the house, Bella quickly laid a fire in the grate and soon the cheery glow of the flames was chasing the shadows and the chill from the room. Sarie and Bella huddled under the covers leaning up against the headboard with the quilts pulled up to their chins.
“It’s so exciting. I have to pinch myself to make me believe that I actually got accepted.” Bella wrapped her arms tighter around her knees.
“I’m happy for you, that I am,” Sarie said slowly. “But London is a long ways from Penzance. I’m going to miss you like crazy.”
Bella hugged Sarie tight. “I’m going to miss you, too. But you can come up to London to visit on a weekend, and once Da cools down I can come home for holidays.”
“What about Raven? Will your da keep her or take her to the horse fair?” Sarie had a sudden thought. She knew that Bella loved that mare more than anything.
“I was hoping that you could take her to your place.” Bella made the statement a question. “Da won’t come and take her from there, he’s afraid of your mum.” Bella smiled as she said the last.
“I’ll have to ask Mum of course. I don’t think she’ll mind, as long as you don’t mind if she gets a foal out of Raven from our stud,” Sarie said.
“As long as you foal her out and make sure nothing goes wrong,” Bella said.
“You know I won’t leave her alone when it’s her time. I’ll sleep in her box if it comes to that,” Sarie promised.
“Can we talk to your mum tomorrow when you go home?” Bella needed all the pieces to fall into place to make her dream come true.
“Sure, can you get free to ride out with me then?” Sarie answered.
“Da will sleep late if he’s at the Arms till all hours, so I’ll be gone before he can stop me,” Bella said confidently. “The tide’s running so he won’t be able to put out of the harbour until later.”
Sarie straightened her legs and slid down into the soft warmth of the bed. Bella did the same and they snuggled together for warmth.
“We’d best get some sleep then, or we’ll be as late as your Da sleeping past cock crow.” Sarie smothered a yawn as she spoke.
“Night Sarie, and thanks.” Bella hugged Sarie tight. “I just know that everything will work out.”
Sarie didn’t answer Bella but lay awake long after her friend’s slow, even breathing told her that she was asleep. Sarie hoped Bella wasn’t riding for a fall; it was very hard to keep any kind of secret in such a small community. With any luck at all Barney wouldn’t hear about Bella’s plans before she could put them into action.
Dawn came with a blustery, watery light. The wind continued to gust wildly and a light rain still was falling. Sarie and Bella swung up into their saddles in the half light of the grey dawn. With one eye on the back door of the house in case Barney should suddenly appear, the girls splashed out of the yard and headed for the street that would take them out of Penzance and on to the Waters’ place. Sarie had hoped that the cold light of day would calm Bella’s excitement about London, but Bella seemed more determined than ever to make her dream come true. The ponies slogged along happily in the drizzle, they were Cornish born and bred and it took more than a little wind and rain to dim their spirits. Raven snatched at her bit and jogged along rather than walking, Tristan lengthened his stride to keep up with her but didn’t break out of his walk.
“Where did you leave your letter?” Sarie asked Bella over the whistle of the wind.
“I have it right here.” Bella patted her jacket pocket and smiled. “I want to show your mum.”
“She’ll be happy for you too,” Sarie assured Bella.
Chapter Two
Mrs. Waters was the closest thing to a mother Bella had while she was growing up. Bella’s mum had left when Bella was only seven. The small town life of Penzance wasn’t enough excitement for Lily Raginnis. She had married Barney Angarrick only because she had found herself in a most unsatisfactory position for a young unwed girl. There was never any great affection toward Barney on her part; Barney had adored her. Lily Raginnis was a beauty, the whole town agreed. She was a bit flighty but that was only to be expected from someone so lovely who had only to ask for something and her da would get it for her. She was just young and spirited, the folks of Penzance told each other over tea, and didn’t it do the heart good to see such a lovely child having a good time.
Lily had gone out with Barney on a lark, he was good-looking in an ordinary kind of way and not such a bad bloke to talk to if one had to. Lily wasn’t much on small talk, just enough to get what she wanted. Which was usually a couple of pints of bitters, or if she was lucky one of the boys in her crowd would get his hands on some rum. Lily didn’t consider herself fast, she just liked to have a good time, and if sometimes having a good time crossed the line of what her mum and dad would consider decent, well, they didn’t have to know now, did they? Lily turned seventeen the day she went out with Barney Angarrick for the first time. Her boyfriend, Paul, dumped her that day because she refused to give his friend Brian a bit of a kiss and a cuddle. Paul had been bragging to his mates about how he could get Lily to do anything he asked, it just took a little bit of rum, and there you were. Lily didn’t want to admit it, but if Brian hadn’t made the mistake of telling her what he wanted after only one shot of rum, she most likely would have gone along with the plan. As it was, Paul got all bent out of shape and accused her of making him look a right fool and broke it off right then and there.
So, there was Lily, the belle of Penzance, without a date for her seventeenth birthday celebration. Barney heard Paul and some of his mates talking out on the quay by the where the fishing boats came in. Barney had worshiped Lily from afar for years, since elementary school. Lily hardly knew that Barney was alive. Here was the chance Barney had been waiting for. He gathered up his courage and marched himself up to Lily’s parent’s house and rang the bell. He was still dressed in his work gear and smelled strongly of the sea with a very fishy undertone. Lily’s da was glad to see him, a good hardworking lad come to ask his Lily out instead of the fast crowd she usually ran with.
Lily came to the door and took one look at Barney’s hopeful face and agreed to go out with him to a dance over in St. Just. She took great pleasure in knowing that Paul would be there and would see her with Barney not twenty four hours after they broke up. Lily was not one
to let grass grow under her feet. Barney couldn’t fathom his good fortune and hurried home to wash and change. He borrowed his da’s motor car and before he could think twice about it, Barney and Lily were headed off across the Penwith Peninsula to St. Just. Lily wasn’t very good at small talk Barney decided before they were half way there. Other than asking if Barney had managed to score any rum for the drive, Lily barely said a word. She powdered her nose constantly and fluffed her hair and re-applied her lipstick. The evening wasn’t going exactly as Barney had pictured it but he really didn’t mind. He couldn’t believe his good fortune to be taking Lily Raginnis to the dance. People would look at him differently now, more respectful like. If Lily Raginnis would go to the dance with Barney there must be more to the big slow-talking hardworking young man than met the eye. Oh yes, things were definitely looking up for Barney Angarrick.
As the night wore on Lily became more animated and made a point of leaning in close to Barney and resting her head on his shoulder. If her breath was rich with the sweet smell of rum, Barney didn’t bother to question where she had gotten the drink from. He just blessed his luck that it was his shoulder she was leaning into and his shirt that her small fingers kept finding their way inside. Lily kept one eye on Paul for most of the evening and made sure that Paul saw how friendly she was with Barney Angarrick. If she could have planned it, it couldn’t have been more perfect. When Barney showed up at her door that afternoon, cloth cap twisted in his big fisherman’s hands, asking her to out tonight, it was too perfect a way to show Paul that he didn’t own her. It would sting doubly she knew that it was Barney and not one of their own crowd that Lily had chosen to go with this evening. Some of the girls she chummed with had a stash of rum which they were more than willing to share in the girls’ cloakroom. Before too long, Lily had a pleasant buzz going. Barney was kind of cute in a bumbling kind of way and awfully sweet. Offering to walk her to the loo when she stumbled getting up from her chair and waiting patiently outside while she chatted with her friends and consumed more rum than was probably wise. Lily was past caring, she just felt so good. She blinked in the darkness of the dance floor as she left the bright light in the girls’ cloakroom. Barney appeared in front of her and offered Lily his arm. Lily giggled and poked her wet finger in Barney’s ear. She was totally unprepared for Barney’s reaction. He jumped liked she’d hit him with a cattle prod and then swept her into his arms and kissed her deeply, his tongue slipping between her lips. Lily gulped and tried to draw back, but her head kept spinning and then it just felt so good that she didn’t want to stop. Barney pulled back and rested his forehead against hers. The room stopped spinning around Lily and she clung tightly to Barney’s arm.
“Let’s get out of here,” Barney said huskily.
“Somewhere cooler,” Lily agreed.
The cool air outside made Lily feel much better and she began to giggle.
“I bet I can fly!” she told Barney and started to run and dance toward the car park.
“Lily, wait!” Barney hurried after her.
Lily twirled in circles by the car and then hopped up on the hood of Barney’s car and leaned back against the windscreen. She laughed breathlessly and watched the stars slowly revolve in crazy circles above her. Barney caught up with her, grabbed her hands and slid her down the bonnet of the car so that she was standing between the car and Barney, wedged between his legs. He caught her chin in his large rough hand and tipped her head back so he could capture her lips again. Lily knew she should stop him when Barney slid his hand under her sweater around her waist. She had let Paul get more familiar than he should a couple of times, but it had never gone very far. She must have drunk more rum than she thought. Lily let herself drift away on the alcohol-induced euphoria. Barney’s hands felt so good she didn’t want him to stop. Somehow, Lily found herself in the back of the car with his hands all over her. This was way beyond anything that she ever allowed Paul to do. She hiccupped and tried to find the words to tell Barney to stop. She lost track of the words as Barney’s lips trailed down her neck and the buttons on her blouse were suddenly gaping open under his hands. The roughness of his hands felt marvelous on her bare skin, Lily was past caring whether she should or shouldn’t. Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew she had drunk far too much rum. She was dimly aware of the fact Barney would stop if she asked him to. But somehow the words never made it out of her mouth and before she knew it Lily had done what her friends in the cloakroom only whispered about. Barney lay on top of her breathing heavily. Lily found it hard to breathe with his weight crushing her and the burning between her legs. Suddenly she felt very sick. Lily pushed at Barney and mumbled that she needed to get up. The idiot man took her fumbling to mean that she wanted to repeat the act and pressed his mouth down on hers. His hands once again taking the liberties that she had encouraged minutes earlier. His fingers pinched her breasts, sending thrills of pleasure through her belly, even while she gasped at the hot stab of pain each time he plunged into her. When Barney was finished, he pushed himself up off of Lily and fastened his trousers without looking at her. Lily pushed the door of the car open, flipped over on her stomach and hung her head out over the gravel of the car park. She emptied her stomach and kept on heaving. Barney held her hair back from her face and drew a car rug up over her naked shoulders. Finally, Lily pulled herself together, rearranged her clothes, and got into the front of the car. What in God’s name had she done? If the bloke bragged about what they’d done she’d be ruined. In the dim light that reached them from the dance hall Lily tried to repair her hair and make-up with trembling hands. She couldn’t go home looking like she’s just jumped in Mount’s Bay. Lily refused to look at Barney who sat quietly behind the wheel suddenly looking very unsure of himself.
“Take me home,” Lily ordered him when she had made herself look as good as possible considering the circumstance. She pressed her thighs together and willed her legs to stop shaking.
“What’s the matter, Lily? You wanted to do it, didn’t you? You never said to stop,” Barney said into the dead silence of the car.
Lily Raginnis sat ramrod straight in the passenger seat and said nothing.
Barney dropped Lily off without her saying another word to him. When she saw him in town she would cross the street and refuse to speak to him. Barney withdrew back into himself and outwardly no one would guess that his heart was breaking. He didn’t know what he had done wrong. Lily knew that none of it was Barney’s fault, but that didn’t mean she had to be nice to the big idiot. She was embarrassed that she had let things go so far and secretly was grateful that Barney wasn’t bragging about his conquest down at the Arms. Lily’s dreams of leaving Penzance for the hustle bustle of London where she planned to work in a typing pool and marry a rich business man came to an abrupt halt when her monthlies failed to come. Before she was showing and could become the target of gossip Lily became Mrs. Barney Angarrick. Barney was stunned, and secretly very pleased and happy. He was married to the woman he loved and she was carrying his child. Barney thought that his life was complete. That lasted only until the baby was born, then Lily had no time for the child and demanded Barney hire a nanny. Barney tried to explain that on a fisherman’s pay he couldn’t afford such a thing. Lily took to leaving the child with Barney’s mum and going up to London for the weekends and shopping with her girlfriends. Barney tried to understand and explain her absence.
When Bella was seven, Lily went to London for the weekend and never came home. The divorce was final in six months and Lily gave Barney uncontested full custody of Arabella. Barney tried the best he could to do right by the child and he did love her, but every time he looked at her, he saw Lily looking back at him from Bella’s eyes. Barney sometimes thought he was too hard on Arabella, but then he would remember how Lily used to gad about the village and her da with nothing to say about it.
Barney vowed that his Arabella would not follow in her mother’s footsteps. And now this nonsense about going to London. London! Aga
in the woman, for Arabella was a young woman now, Barney had to admit to himself, was wanting to leave him behind and head off for the bright lights and noise of London. He might have been a fool once, but never again. Arabella was staying right here in Penzance and no amount of pleading on her part was going to change his mind. She could marry one of her mates from school and provide Barney with lovely grandchildren for him to spoil. Why just the other day wasn’t Daniel, Brian Treliving’s brother, saying what a handsome woman Arabella was becoming. Brian was a fine upstanding young man with a bright future; it stood to reason that his brother Daniel would be a good match for Barney’s Arabella.
* * *
Arabella was in the dark about her da’s plans for her future as she rode blithely along with Sarie clutching the letter from King’s College like a lifeline. In no time at all, Sarie and Bella were drinking tea with Sarie’s mum in her cozy kitchen. The infamous letter lay on the table in between them. Mrs. Waters regarded Bella with a worried expression on her face.
“Have you talked to Barney about this?” Mrs. Waters asked.
“You know I haven’t. You’d have heard him shouting from here if I had,” Bella said acerbically.
Mrs. Waters exchanged a quick look with Sarie who shrugged to indicate that she had already tried to talk Bella out of the wild scheme with no success.
“Have you talked to Matron about a place to stay?” Mrs. Waters inquired.
“She says I can stay in residence and work in the kitchen in my off hours to pay for my board,” Bella said enthusiastically.
“You can’t just go and leave your da without telling him first,” Mrs. Waters cautioned Bella.
“But I’m afraid he won’t never let me leave if I tell him first,” protested Bella.
“It would be very cruel of you to do that to him, after what your mum up and did to him years ago this month,” Mrs. Waters said sternly.