‘ – nor was the least thought of it in my mind. But it’s no good! Every time I see him – and seeing him in Francis’s old home; it has been almost as much my home as this; and his airs . . . Then when he said that, I could stand it no longer and suddenly the respectable little scene broke up. My, but it did me a world of good! And his parlour—’
‘Good!’ said Demelza.
‘And his parlour is in ruin. We batted to and fro across the room for three or four minutes, with that squint-eyed attorney crouching in a corner and Mr Chynoweth under the table. George is getting soft, I’ll swear it; it is this city life or his wedding or something; I have never beaten him so easy before. But then three of his flunkeys came bursting in— Ach! what are you doing, man?’
‘Putting some stitches in your head. You don’t want to be scarred this side as well.’
‘And then three of his men came in and set on me. It was weighted the other way then, but two of them were puny fellows and had no real stomach for the thing. I threw one of them through the window. Then at the last they got me and threw me out after him. So I whistled for Darkie and she came trotting round. Even then I rode over their new flower beds. This eyetooth is loose; should it come out?’
‘No, leave it. The gum is bruised, but the tooth is unbroken.’
‘And where was Elizabeth during this?’ Demelza asked quietly.
‘I didn’t see her. She was unwell or unwilling. You’d not believe the difference they have made to the place, with Turkey rugs and brocade curtains and new pieces of furniture. Already it’s ceasing to be the home of the Poldarks and becoming the home of the new-rich Warleggans. I was impressed.’
‘But what was it started it?’ said Demelza. ‘How did you come to blows when ’twas to have been just a business meeting and a signing of papers?’
Ross lifted his good eyebrow. ‘He made an offensive remark.’
‘What did he say?’
‘Nothing I should wish to repeat to you.’
‘Was it about me?’ she asked, scenting as much from the expression of his face and thinking instantly of the Bodrugan party.
‘It was about nobody I have any connection with.’
‘Why then did you take offence over it?’
‘Because I chose to.’
They stared at each other, and presently he laughed at her expression. It was as if the fight had done him the good that he claimed. She found herself warming to his attitude of mind.
When dinner was over and Dwight had gone, Ross told her what had passed at the meeting earlier. She was indignant and incredulous.
‘I don’t know if Elizabeth is party to such a manœuvre,’ he said, ‘but I must see Pascoe this week to know if the sale was watertight.’
‘Not this week,’ she said, looking at his head.
‘Well, as soon as possible. George is marked too – that’s some consolation. Until I see Pascoe, I shall not know what there is to be met.’
‘I’m glad at least that you do not intend to return the share to Geoffrey Charles.’
‘Well, I do not believe Elizabeth will have neglected Geoffrey Charles in any marriage settlement she has been able to arrange. He is the last person. If I see him short of money when he comes of age, I shall give him a share then. But not until then. I’m not having George with a finger in this pie!’
‘I hope this new quarrel will not make things worse betwixt you and George.’
‘I wouldn’t wish it to improve them.’
‘We live too close now for feuds, Ross. You may meet any time, accidental, about other business. Or he may attempt reprisal. Remember Jud. It will not do for you to be out at night alone.’
‘Violent solutions seem to be the only ones that come natural to me at present. I’m very sorry, Demelza. It is an uncivilized attitude. But at least I can have no room for complaint if someone fires back.’
She did not reply, and he grimaced as he changed his position.
‘You know the big parlour,’ he said. ‘They have a set of new chairs in there of fine polished – well, mahogany I suppose it would be, with delicate carved backs and satin-covered seats. I am not one with an expert eye for furniture, but they seemed to me as good a sort of work as any I’ve seen.’
‘Oh, yes,’ said Demelza.
‘A great many things had been done to the room – some good, some bad. They have blue damask curtains with a broad gold fringe, and the new Turkey carpet is very thick, inweft with human figures. There were some considerable number of china ornaments on the mantelshelf – very rare no doubt – but these I did not care for. And they have a great candelabrum of cut-glass suspended from the ceiling. And before the door, to shut off the draught, a Chinese screen.’
‘You seem to have taken in a very fair number of changes.’
‘I was kept waiting ten minutes, which naturally put me in a good mood to begin. One does not realize until one has seen it the variety of things money can buy these days.’ He looked around, a man seeing his own house afresh. ‘We’re poverty-stricken here, aren’t we?’
‘Yes, I believe so.’
‘Well, it need not be quite so much so any longer. What do you say to coming in with me, when I go to see Harris Pascoe, and we could buy a few new things for the house.’
He watched her as he spoke, but as always when the conversation took a personal turn she seemed to draw in from the natural response.
‘It is just as you say, Ross. I’ll come with you if you want me to.’
‘Yes. I want you to.’
‘The interest on our debts is due next month.’
‘The south lode is twenty-five feet wide and still increasing. Our profit last month was £580. For a month only. If this goes on, we shall have no debts at all.’
Demelza got up, began collecting together the building bricks that Jeremy had left in a corner. ‘I still can’t hardly believe it.’
‘Nor I. I shake myself twice daily. Don’t do that, not just now. I saw the look in your eyes when I come in with a bloody head. I believe you still care for me.’
It was the first challenge, the first direct approach.
‘Of course I still care for you, Ross. What a thing to say . . .’
‘Then listen to me, please. Tell me what you think we should buy. Women know better than men what are the first essentials. We need so much that I should not know where to begin.’
She came over to him. ‘Suppose I made out a list and you take it in.’
‘That was not what I suggested.’
‘Well, there is so much to see to in the mornings. And Jeremy . . .’
‘That was not what you promised.’
‘Well, there’s only Darkie.’
‘We’ve shared her before. We can buy a horse for you to return on if you dislike the proximity.’
She smiled, trying to release her hand. ‘There are many things we need more badly than a horse. Let me fetch pen and ink.’
‘And you’ll come with me to get them?’
‘Yes, Ross, I said I would. If you want me to.’
A fortnight passed before Ross’s head was clear of its plaster, and then they went in together. He went first to see Harris Pascoe, before any purchases or extravagances were begun. Pascoe said:
‘Th-they haven’t a leg to stand on. The investment was legally transferred. I do not believe a civil court would waste time even on hearing their case; but if they did, there could be only one verdict, in your favour.’
‘It may be George was making an idle threat. I thought that, but I came to you for reassurance.’
‘You have it. I am sorry this quarrel has broken out afresh, though. With Warleggan your close neighbour on both sides . . . I don’t b-believe feuds of this sort ever profited anyone.’
‘What do you mean, a neighbour on both sides?’
‘I was speaking figuratively. Mr Coke has sold his holding in Wheal Leisure to the Warleggans.’
‘It is what I expected, but I don’t welcome it all th
e same. Wheal Leisure is on Treneglos property, but the workings enter my land underground.’
‘I should not be astonished if the Warleggans soon gain a controlling part.’
‘Well, George may organize his days as he thinks best. I shall seek no brush with him so long as he seeks none with me.’
Ross got up. Demelza was waiting for him in the room outside. He had often promised himself the pleasure of taking her out to spend money as she pleased, but the promise had gone sour with keeping.
‘Oh,’ he said, turning from the window; ‘very soon I shall be able to clear off my debt to the man who saved my skin last Christmas. It’s an agreeable thought. You should give me his name now, so that when I do pay him I shall be able to thank him in a suitable fashion.’
Mr Pascoe stroked his pen along the line of his cheek. ‘The matter is one of confidence, as you know.’
‘Which you are now entitled to break. D’you realize what he did? – but of course you do—’
‘Yes, I do—’
‘Without his timely help I should be in a debtor’s prison with probably little hope of release. The mine would have closed. My wife and son would be paupers. It’s no longer a question of confidence, Harris. It’s one of common gratitude.’
‘Oh, yes, I agree. B-but it does not absolve me—’
‘I contend that it does. I owe him virtually everything and would wish to tell him so. What is his name?’
Pascoe wavered. ‘I will write and ask his permission.’
‘Nonsense. It was not you, then?’
‘It was not I. I said so at the time. I only wish my position would have allowed me—’
‘Does he live in Truro?’
‘No. In fact . . .’
‘In fact what?’
‘Well . . . In fact it was not a man at all.’
‘What?’ Ross stared, thunderstruck. ‘What do you mean? That it was a woman? A child?’
‘A woman.’
‘Who? Your daughter?’
‘No. Dear me, I feel that I have already—’
‘There cannot be many heiresses of my acquaintance. In fact I can think of none! I know no one, not one single woman with fourteen hundred pounds to put down for me. The thing’s impossible! You’re joking, Harris! Tell me you’re joking.’
The banker looked upset. ‘I feel I have already been guilty of a breach of confidence. Only the fact that you will soon be able to pay the capital back . . . It was Caroline Penvenen.’
‘Caro . . .’ Ross swallowed and stared. After a moment he said: ‘Oh, but I don’t believe that!’
‘It’s the truth.’
‘Caroline Penvenen? But I hardly know her! I spoke to her two or three times, no more. We said . . . How could she know? I don’t go about confessing my financial situation to every slip of a girl. It’s – monstrous! How did she approach you?’
‘She came into this office one morning, said she was looking for an investment and that she considered the best investment she could make was loaning fourteen hundred pounds to you. She knew all about the bill, about the Warleggans possessing it, about the straits you were in. I felt it my duty – forgive me, but I felt it my duty to warn her what a risk she ran of never seeing her money again. She paid no attention to it. If I would not arrange it for her, she said, she would go elsewhere. Having done what I could to p-put her off, I was of course only too gratified to do what she insisted.’
‘I positively can’t believe it.’
‘I don’t know what she will feel at my having told you.’
Ross rubbed the new-healed scar on his head. As it healed it itched. ‘Well, I have never been so upset with astonishment. Never! I can guess, I suppose, how she came by the information. But that she should choose to act on it . . . No wonder I could not think who had helped me. God’s life! What a strange creature! I – can’t begin to understand. I must tell my wife. She too will be taken aback.’
‘I’d appreciate it if you allowed the information to go no f-further,’ said Pasooe. ‘It is the first time I have ever broken an undertaking of that nature. I’m sorry that you forced it out of me.’ ‘I am not,’ said Ross.
They bought several new items of furniture: a fine dressing-table for Demelza’s room, for which they paid £5 10s 0d, another clock to replace the one they had sold two years ago, a new table – new secondhand – with a splendid polish on it and latest-fashion pedestal legs, two Turkey rugs at £4 each, fine calamanco cloth for bedroom curtains, and a rich cream silk paduasoy for the curtains for the parlour. Some cloths Ross bought because Demelza liked the feel of them – a piece of crimson velour and another of green satin – without an actual purpose in view for them, unless it was the purpose of tempting Demelza into a new attitude of mind. They bought six new-shape wineglasses, which cost them 28s, and a dozen pewter tankards – cheap enough, these, at 4d each – and new crockery and new cutlery – very expensive – and a cane-bottomed rocking chair.
Demelza bought two pairs of Dantzig shoes and some fine wool for a coat for Jeremy and a toy horse and a rattle. Ross bought neckcloths for himself and two for John Gimlett, and Demelza some striped muslin for Jane.
And in their minds the whole time, at the back of all their purchases, was the news they had learned about Caroline Penvenen.
By the time they had finished, the afternoon was well on, and it meant a long ride in the dark. So they went home as slowly as they came in, closer together physically than they had been for many months. In the old days when she was a child she had sometimes ridden on the pommel of his saddle, but that had been out of the question today. He found it pleasurable to feel her hand on his belt, and the occasional rub of her shoulder against his back; one could talk easily too, without raising one’s voice or having it carried away by the wind.
He had not devised this shopping expedition with any motive other than the most obvious one; but on the way home he wondered if it had achieved a double end. Once or twice this afternoon he had noted a richness in her tone which he had not consciously missed until it came back.
Halfway home Demelza said: ‘Ross, the more I think of Caroline the more I feel we have gravely misjudged her.’
‘I know it. We’re more in her debt than anyone has a right to be. I don’t feel it should be left where it is.’
‘No more do I.’
They were silent for a time. Demelza said: ‘The more you think of it, the worse it gets. Caroline Penvenen saved us from the bankruptcy prison. Dwight saved us from another prison. There’s no doubt he still loves her. There’s no doubt that but for what he did that night they would now be married and living in Bath.’
‘I cannot understand her doing it for us – unless it was with Dwight’s connivance. He must have told her of our trouble and have pressed her to help, I suppose. But he seemed as surprised as we were when we told him of our good fortune – I don’t believe him to be that good an actor. I’d like to go and see her, to ask her about it.’
‘I think she is very impulsive, temperamental,’ Demelza said slowly. ‘She would jilt one man, or help another, because she has a sudden feeling that way. She has perhaps a strong liking for you—’
‘For me? But we only met two or three times.’
‘It would be enough. Oh, I don’t mean to take away from her. But the good things and the bad things go together in her, and often I’m sure most for good, as Dwight found.’
They jogged on a little farther. It was a mild evening but damp, and every now and then a flurry of rain would beat against their faces.
Demelza said: ‘I think you are right, Ross; you should go and see her.’
‘She’s in London. I have her address from Pascoe and intended to write.’
‘I think you should go, not write.’
He tightened his grip of the reins as a badger sputtered across their path. When Darkie had settled again, he said: ‘I don’t see we can do anything to bring Dwight and Caroline together again. She is engaged now to marry someone else �
� and in any case the very shortcomings which have helped us are precisely the reasons why she would not make a suitable wife for Dwight . . .’
‘I’m not saying anything about bringing her and Dwight together. Dwight is going to sea, and she cannot jilt yet another man. But I do not think a letter from you would do, Ross. It – isn’t enough. I think you should go’n see her in person – and tell her what we feel and how we should like to thank her. Maybe she doesn’t know how much she’s helped us, maybe fourteen hundred pounds don’t count much to her; but it don’t leave us any less in her debt.’
He couldn’t question that. ‘I’ll go before Christmas. It will take a fortnight, but I can leave Henshawe in charge of the mine. I’ll take the first year’s interest with me and tell her I shall hope to repay the whole by Easter.’ Already his mind was springing ahead to details of the journey. It was over ten years since he had been to London, and then it had been only to pass through.
‘One thing,’ Demelza said. ‘I think you should do one thing about Dwight and Caroline, even if it is nothing to do with bringing them together. I think Caroline must have had some better reason for jilting him than just because he didn’t turn up that night. She may be impulsive, but that’s not the way a woman would be impulsive. Leastwise, she might well go off in an anger, but she wouldn’t stay in an anger after he had come to explain.’
‘And you think I should ask her?’
‘Yes, Ross, I do.’
‘All right, I’ll tell her that my wife thinks it unfeminine to have acted as she did.’
‘Tell her,’ said Demelza, ‘that we find we have a new debt and should dearly like to pay it any way we can.’
As they came to their own land, the lights of Wheal Grace glimmered over the valley. Mines, Ross thought, could wear expressions just like human beings. Or was it that men read their own thoughts into objects of slate and stone? Three months ago such movement as had existed seemed to be the motions of an animal already doomed and feeling the languor of death. Now everything moved with an invigorated air. Five lights burned where one had burned before. The steady rhythm of the engine was unchanged, but some new purpose had crept into it. Fifty new hands had been engaged this month, twenty for underground and thirty for the rapidly extending surface sheds. Some of the work of dressing was still farmed out, for the amount of mineral-bearing ore brought to the surface was still increasing faster than the dressing capacity grew. Young Ellery and his five partners were in the richest part of the lode, and Ellery had confessed to Ross that often he couldn’t sleep at night for thinking of his work and wanting to get back to it. When men were on tribute, the percentage they received on what they raised was adjusted month by month and was reduced in proportion to the richness of the ground they worked; but Ross and Henshawe had been very generous in their bargains, and many of the miners were making big profits.
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