Demelza said: ‘So it will not come easy to either of them.’
‘No.’
‘Perhaps it will give them both time.’
‘Did you ever want it to happen?’
‘Did you?’
‘I don’t know. I see exactly what Clowance means. Yet all the time I find Stephen’s company a stimulus, a goad . . .’
‘I only want her to be happy.’
‘So do we all. Except Stephen. Who wants her in an altogether different way.’
Demelza slipped off the wall. Except for resting her feet, the position had not been comfortable. He – she – had not liked it at all.
‘And Cuby?’
‘You know I met her at the races?’
‘Yes, yes.’
‘Well, not since then, but that meeting greatly helped. It was – frivolous. We had both wined well and the sun was out, but I can’t believe . . .’
‘Good. I’m that glad . . . I wish I could meet her.’
‘So you shall . . . if my suit prospers a little more.’
They began to walk down towards Nampara. Again he linked her arm.
Demelza said: ‘When a family is close-knit, such as ours, it is terrible vulnerable. Whoever comes from outside to marry into it must be welcomed, must be made to feel a part. But the risk is . . .’
‘The risk is?’
‘That he or she who comes from outside is interested only in the one person they wish to marry and resentful of everything that happened before they met. Really resentful, to the extent they wish to blot it out. All, all those distasteful faces around their loved one belong to another age, which is past. They want to take their husband or wife and walk with him alone into the future.’
‘How do you think these things?’ Jeremy asked. ‘Seeing that it could never have happened to you?’
‘It never happened to me,’ Demelza said. ‘But I have seen it happen.’
‘Seriously,’ Jeremy said, ‘I would rather see Clowance married to Stephen than to some vapid, goody-goody young man whose only thought was to please her. Yet, like a responsible brother, I had anxious thoughts about the marriage. Maybe this way will do no harm – give them a little more time.’
Demelza watched something stirring in the tangled undergrowth beside the wall. ‘By the way, Emma tells me she heard there had been a victory, a big victory – by the Russians over Napoleon. I don’t know if it’s true. She said Stephen had told her.’
‘It would be amazing if one of our allies could do something useful at last! I was reading the other day about the subsidies England was paying to every country in Europe which will fight Napoleon. It is costing us millions every year – and we so small a country! Precious little so far we have had in return.’
‘I was a thought dismayed at Geoffrey Charles’s letter yesterday. It looks as if they are back where they began, and all’s to do again.’
‘I hope it is not as bad as that,’ said Jeremy. ‘But I still wonder from time to time . . .’
‘What?’
‘You know. Whether I should not be with him.’
Demelza thought perhaps she should not have spoken.
Yet was this not all better out in the open?
‘I suppose your father will be leaving for London early in the new year.’
‘Yes . . . Sometimes there are two duties, aren’t there. It depends which comes uppermost . . .’ Jeremy kicked at a stone. ‘I wish Ben were not such a fool. I wish he would come back, as we all want. He’s so stiff-backed, so pig-headed . . . He knows enough about the mines to run them. And Carnow and Nanfan can tend the engines just as well as I.’
‘And – the new whim engine?’
‘Can be operating by March or April. It is really quite straightforward, once one has accepted the basic design – it should present no problems. But to be truthful . . .’
‘Yes?’
‘I confess I have no towering ambition to become a soldier. It is not in my nature to fancy winning death or glory. Even the discipline would, I believe, greatly irk . . . And of course I can make the excuse to myself that the mine engine at Leisure is still young, has to prove herself over a longer period of time. And while I have this sort-of friendship with Cuby . . . If I went away now I should be abandoning what chance I have of making something of that . . . Cowardice, you see, can find many reasons . . .’
‘What has cowardice to do with it? Is it not a choice you are free to make? You know well, Jeremy, that if – if it was really your wish to become a soldier neither your father nor I would stand in your way. But if it is not particularly your wish, then the fear of being thought afraid should not enter into your mind. It does not appear to have occurred to Stephen Carrington that he must join the Navy – indeed, according to Clowance, he fought hard to stay out! So did your other friend, Paul Kellow. Horrie Treneglos has not bestirred himself. Nor has – well, I could name a dozen other young men of your age – and so could you.’
‘Yes,’ said Jeremy. ‘Oh yes. Perhaps they do not have a soldier for a father.’
‘That’s not clever,’ said Demelza, ‘that’s proper stupid. Your father was in the army only for four or five years. He is known – at least in Cornwall – as Captain Poldark more because he owns a mine than because he served in the American war. If your father is to be the example, you could as well put up for Parliament!’
Jeremy laughed. ‘Along with Valentine.’
‘Emma tells me,’ Demelza said, moving herself uncomfortably, ‘Emma tells me that you and Paul and Stephen sit in the Bounders’ Arms together as if you were having a council of war.’
‘Does she now?’
‘Yes, she does.’
Jeremy laughed again, but more grimly this time. ‘Believe me, Mama, it is not that sort of war we discuss. And anyway the greatest part of it all is hot air.’
‘I hope so.’ They began to walk down the valley. Demelza swayed.
‘Mama, are you ill?’
‘No!’ she said, ‘of course I’m not ill. But I believe this baby must be a little lop-sided within me and weighs me over from time to time. Small wonder with such a family possing around him.’
‘I shall be jealous if it’s another boy,’ Jeremy said. ‘He’ll want those wooden toys I have. Those that I would not let Clowance and Bella get their grubby hands on.’
‘I see Dwight now,’ said Demelza, ‘and your father. How anxious they are looking! Do they not look like two mother hens, Jeremy? Do they not now?’
She was sweating slightly, aware that the fever had come back.
III
Geoffrey Charles had written:
Well, it was to have been a great triumph. To have ended the year on such a note of victory as Salamanca sounded. But in the end all went wrong before the fortress of Burgos. I do not know if his Lordship over-reached himself, for I was not there; but it is clear we have many more battles still to fight before we have the Frenchies out of Spain.
The Light stayed behind with Hill in Madrid, to their great disgust, and, abandoning the capital six weeks later and marching northwest, we rendezvoused with Wellington and his retreating troops on I believe the 8th November on the River Tormes, by which time his First Division was in a very poor state, thousands of them having drunk themselves into Insensibility in the wine vats of Torquemada and been picked up by the French, who were following close behind.
Even so all would have been well but for this unprintable fool Gordon – Colonel Gordon. Our part of the army – Hill’s army – was in good Fettle. Wellington’s – when we joined it – was losing discipline but would have stood and fought well enough if the French had come too near. But Gordon, our quarter-master-general, misdirected our food supplies by twenty miles, so that after short rations for the first week we then marched the last four days of the retreat with no food at all, except for the wild nuts in the fields and anything that could be culled or stolen. So we became a broken rabble, rain-drenched, fever-ridden, sinking ankle deep in mud, quarrel
ling, fighting and dying by the thousand. When at last we reached Ciudad Rodrigo it was as if we had suffered a Crippling Defeat at the hands of the French, instead of there only having been a few skirmishes and no battle at all!
Old Douro looks Beside himself with anger and frustration.
However, to end this wailing missive on a happier note, I have now with Hamilton – did you ever meet him? – I have now with David Hamilton for the last two weeks been billeted on a charming Spanish family in Ciudad. Señor Amador de Bertendona is a member of the Cortes and normally lives in Madrid; but when Wellington left Madrid he decided to leave also and came to his country house in Ciudad with his wife and family. He has been an outspoken critic and opponent of the French, and he feared reprisals.
Señora de Bertendona, who is Portuguese, and her three children, are quite charming. The two boys, of eighteen and twelve, are called Martin and Leon, the daughter, aged about nineteen, is Amadora and is considered a Beauty. I would not quarrel with that estimate. All are graciousness itself; and that under stress; for not only do we two English officers share their home but a priest and seven Spanish guerrillas, all for their various reasons fugitives at this time! Fortunately I now speak Portuguese fluently and Spanish a modest second; but all of the Bertendonas except the Señora have a little English.
Although in the Army the death toll from sickness still runs at about 500 a week, those who survive are quickly recovering their spirits and their ardour. Tobacco and such luxuries are cheap, and Señor de Bertendona’s port wine is beyond Praise! Soon we shall be fox-hunting and beagling to regain our health and our address, and of course to pass the winter away. I only hope I shall be permitted to stay in my present quarters!
As always, please pass on my love and respects in whatever measure you deem fit to all who know me.
I have a feeling that I shall visit Trenwith soon!
Love to you both,
Geoffrey Charles.
Chapter Three
I
Being an honest girl – honest with herself as well as with other people – Clowance did not pretend to herself that she was happy or contented during her visit to Verity. But she put on a show and partly deceived the lady who, though actually her father’s cousin, had always been regarded as an aunt. And after that last encounter with Stephen, Clowance was specially grateful for the move. Her love for him, which had often warred with her cooler judgments, was now turned inside out and become a sense of self-disgust which for the first time allied itself to reason. This made it no easier to live with. But that the object of so much of her thoughts and wayward sentiments should not be liable to turn up round any unexpected corner like an ogre or a handsome hobgoblin made life more endurable.
After the break-up it seemed she had not slept for a week. Over and over again, in endless repetitive procession, came the events of that day, what he had said, what she had said, what Ben had said, the hideous fight, which perhaps in all could only have lasted three minutes but which spoke for ever of male violence, hatred, rivalry and the utter determination to inflict serious injury. She could still hear the thumps, the muttered curses, the grunting breaths, the scuffling feet, the crash of bodies. In an earlier time she supposed she would have been expected to feel flattered at two men fighting over her. But at least then there would have been an element of chivalry. This encounter was devoid of any such element; it had been vile, sordid, and shocking. In a fairly rough society in a fairly rough age, she had never seen men fight like dogs before.
Over and over again, what he had said, what she had said, what Ben had said, in endless procession; but it was the same sheep over the same gate, and counting them did not send her to sleep, they made sleep impossible.
It was a fine December, the occasional damp day interspersed with days of slanted sunshine and gentle autumnal airs. The sun lay white upon the front of the Blameys’ house, which drowsed like a square-jawed cat. The river glimmered, and blue shadows and stained-glass reflections were broken only by the passage of a fishing boat on the way to Penryn, a coracle conveying someone across the creek, or a group of swans paddling with the tide. On the other side of the pool Falmouth climbed the hill, grey and hunch-backed and smoking, but at night it looked like a fairy castle lit with lanterns.
Clowance always enjoyed pottering with a boat, though on the north coast the constant surf made launching hazardous. Here one simply walked down to the quay, untied the painter and cast off. So in spite of the month she spent two or three hours most days exploring the Penryn River, or sometimes sailing the other way round Trefusis Point and into Carrick Roads and the Fal. There were seldom less than a dozen packet boats moored in the area, and Andrew Blamey senior took her with him to visit old friends. There they would climb down into the little cabins and exchange reminiscences and latest news and drink wine. The captains were ever courteous to her – all except one old man, who was afraid that because she was a woman she would bring him ill luck.
So she listened to talk of the swift four-day passages from Lisbon; the narrow escapes of this and that packet; the running fights; the constant double qui-vive against storm and privateer. She listened to a Captain Erskine telling of the loss of his sister ship, the Princess Amelia, homeward bound from St Thomas’s, taken by the American privateer Rossi after an action of two hours, in which the captain, the master and three others were killed and nine wounded, and the loss of the mails. (Rossi had put the wounded ashore in Gibraltar, and they were just home.)
A week later – the day before Valentine called – another captain, Morrison, came to the house to tell of the capture of a 36-gun naval frigate, HMS Macedonian, Captain Carder, with thirty-six killed and seventy wounded, by an American frigate, the United States. ‘A pretty pass,’ said Morrison. ‘Macedonian was much out-gunned and did not strike until a mere wreck; but I question what our own navy is about! This United States had the scantlings of a 74-gun ship; crew of near on 500 and none pressed; 30 long 24-pounders, howitzer guns in her tops and a travelling carronade on her upper deck. She’s been well designed. It is doubtful if those who could kill her could catch her or those who could catch her could kill her.’
‘It has been a problem in naval warfare,’ said Andrew Blamey senior, ‘ever since the Armada.’
‘Nelson solved it,’ said Morrison.
‘Oh yes. And always would. But you cannot stop the solitary marauder. And you have to admit it: Yankees make fine seamen.’
For the most part Clowance was alone with her uncle and aunt. The days were too short and passed swiftly, the nights, by candlelight sitting round the fire, too long. So as dusk was falling on the Tuesday, the clatter of horses on the cobbled street was not an unwelcome sound to her. Janet showed two young men into the withdrawing-room.
Verity said: ‘I cannot come for a few minutes. Go and greet them for me, will you?’
Valentine was standing with his back to the fire warming his coat-tails. His dark narrow face lit up at the sight of her.
‘Cousin Clowance, by the Lord God! This is standing the world on its head! But what a delightful bouleversement! I thought you were wed by now! Or are you passing by after your honeymoon?’
‘No,’ said Clowance.
He bent over her hand and then kissed her on the mouth, allowing his lips to linger.
‘Have you met Tom Guildford?’
‘No, I haven’t.’
‘This is my cousin, Clowance Poldark. Tom is a nephew of old Lord Devoran and has come down to spend Christmas in Cornwall. We only arrived yesterday. Tom, may I present you to my cousin, Miss Clowance Poldark. Or Mrs Stephen Carrington. Which am I to say?’
‘Miss,’ said Clowance, ‘as yet.’
The young man was shorter than Valentine, but rather the same colouring, sallow, dark. In spite of being thin he was strongly built. Not good-looking but a sweet smile. He bent over her hand.
‘So, Miss,’ said Valentine, ‘pray explain yourself, Miss. Is Stephen here?’
‘No.’<
br />
‘Put off? Postponed? Cancelled?’
‘All,’ said Clowance, smiling at last.
‘“And now their honey-moon that late was clear, Doth pale, obscure and tenebrous appear.” How droll! I do take the most outrageous pleasure in inquiring into other people’s affairs. Tom, my beautiful cousin was sworn and betrothed to a handsome sailor lad called Carrington; but while I have been away tediously drinking myself into an early grave in Cambridge all has changed! A single term! When I was riding that nag at the races in September, you were there with him, Clowance, and all was well. Now – a bare two months later! But tell me, have all the Blameys fallen into Gwennap Pit? Janet I recognize, but . . .’
‘My aunt will be down in a moment. My uncle is in Falmouth but should be home within the hour.’
‘And Andrew?’
‘Still at sea. I believe his vessel is due in on Friday or Saturday.’
‘Ah, it was him we called to see, hoping he would be free to play backgammon tonight.’
‘What a disappointment for you,’ said Clowance.
‘On the contrary! Not that I would ask you to game with us. But you must come to Cardew tomorrow! We are giving a party to celebrate the Russian victories.’
‘Have there been some?’
‘Oh, my little cousin, have there not! Not that anyone is quite sure of the extent as yet. But the country is rife with semi-official rumour! In any event, I am seeking an excuse to celebrate something. Could there be a better excuse? I have even prevailed upon Smelter George.’
They went on talking, chattering, with Valentine occupying eighty per cent of the floor. Clowance’s common sense remained mildly critical of his flamboyance; but her injured soul leapt in response to such light-hearted chatter. It was the first time she had really laughed for weeks.
Presently Verity came in, and they drank wine and joked and made the evening noisy. They refused an invitation to sup, but before leaving they extracted a promise from Clowance to go to Cardew tomorrow and spend the night. Because the elder Andrew disapproved of Valentine’s influence on the younger Andrew, it was perhaps fortunate that he was late home and missed them.
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