Penmarric

by Susan Howatch

  “Well, Papa,” said William uncomfortably after an awkward pause, “I’m afraid I’m finding it very difficult to come to a decision about this. The truth is that the only thing I really want to do seems to be out of the question, so I’m rather at a loss to know what I should do instead.”

  “I’m very much in favor of people doing what they really want to do,” said Papa. “What is it you have in mind?”

  “Well … to be honest, I would like to manage an estate and spend most of my time out of doors in the country, but I know a bailiff is a very lower-class occupation and I couldn’t expect you to approve of it.”

  Papa looked surprisingly interested. “Estate management is a skilled job,” he said agreeably enough. “It’s not a career I would have preferred you to choose, certainly, but if you really want to pursue this, William, then I shan’t stop you—in fact it’s possible I may even be able to give you a start and see that you have a training on a large estate.”

  William brightened and leaned forward in his chair. “That’s very good of you, Papa! Did you … was there any particular estate you had in mind?”

  Papa took a cigar from the box on his desk. I stiffened instinctively, then forced myself to relax. Even after seven years Papa’s cigars would remind me of that dining room at Brighton.

  “Yes,” said Papa, making a great business of lighting his cigar. “Yes, as a matter of fact I did have a certain estate in mind.”

  I knew then. I stared at him but he did not look at me; he was too busy shaking out the match, and suddenly I was back at Brighton and Papa was saying through a cloud of cigar smoke, “I’m afraid I have something to say which should have been said a very long time ago.”

  “Which estate is that, sir?” said William innocently.

  “Penmarric,” said Papa.

  There was a silence. I clenched my fists and looked at the carpet and gritted my teeth so that I should not speak.

  Papa began to explain. He said he had decided to sever his ties with Oxford for the time being and return to Penmarric to work on a book. He was always able to write well in Cornwall, and besides Penmarric was his home and he was beginning to miss it. As for Allengate, he had decided to sell it. He was sure we understood why. The house was so full of memories for him—for all of us—of Rose ill … suffering … dying … He did not want to live here any more. Besides, he was sure we would like Cornwall. We had both been there, and although we might find the Cornish Tin Coast strange at first he felt certain we would soon settle down—

  “I’m not going there,” I said violently. “I’m not going to Penmarric. I absolutely refuse. I’ve no intention of being publicly humiliated.”

  “We can maintain the fiction that I’m your guardian.”

  Yes—the fiction no one believes!”

  “Adrian, what on earth does it matter what a few village gossips think? You must learn not to be so sensitive! Try to take a mature, sensible attitude—as I’m sure William will—”

  “William!” I exploded. “William will just take the line of least resistance as usual, but I’m not like that! I stand up for what I believe in and—shut up!” I hissed at William, who had managed to kick me on the foot—“and I don’t think it’s right or just for you to drag us back to Cornwall and parade us as your … your …”

  “I’m merely trying to do my best for you.”

  “You’re not! You’re discriminating against us—just as you discriminate against William when you say he has to earn his living while we all know Marcus can be a gentleman of leisure for as long as he likes! It’s unfair! You treated Mama as if she were your wife—you should treat us as if we were your legitimate sons!”

  “I would hardly have suggested you come to Penmarric unless I had wanted to treat you as my legitimate sons. But I can only treat you as legitimate up to a certain point, and beyond that point I cannot go if I’m to remain fair to my legitimate children. Now don’t interrupt me or I swear I’ll lose my temper too and then we’ll both be sorry! You’re nearly sixteen years old and it’s high time you began to view this situation realistically. Your mother was not my wife. It was a great pity she wasn’t, but there it is. One can’t undo the past. One must merely learn to live with it. She was my mistress. You know that and I know that and nothing we say is going to make that fact otherwise. I loved her, I treated her as my wife, I would have married her if I’d been free to do so, but she was my mistress. You are my illegitimate sons. You must face that. Illegitimacy is unfortunate, I admit, but it needn’t in the long run prove to be a handicap. You’ve both been given a decent education and upbringing. If you do well in your chosen professions and live your lives as satisfactorily as possible I doubt if anyone will ever even question your parentage.”

  “But—”

  “What I’m saying is this: Don’t waste your time pretending you’re not illegitimate and reading insults into every nuance of my behavior toward you. Face your illegitimacy, see it for what it is—a handicap which need not ultimately affect you at all—and make up your mind to live with it as best as you can.”

  “Yes—at Penmarric of all places!”

  “If you can learn to live with it at Penmarric you can live with it anywhere in the world.”

  “I won’t go there!” I was on the verge of tears suddenly. “I’ll go to America, I’ll—”

  “My dear Adrian, you won’t solve your problems by running away from them. And how are you to fulfill your ambition to lecture in history at a university if you leave on the next boat to America without completing your education?”

  I was aware of him getting up and coming around the corner of his desk toward me. I wished William wasn’t there. I felt sure I was going to make a fool of myself and I did not want him to witness my foolishness.

  “William,” said Papa, “we’ll speak again later about your profession.” And when William had gone he stooped over me and put an arm around my shoulders and said in his kindest voice, “Poor Adrian, how very confused you are. I’m sorry.”

  But I did not want his sympathy. “I’m not in the least confused,” I said rapidly. “It’s crystal clear that we’re an embarrassment to you and that you’re only inviting us to Penmarric out of respect for Mama’s memory. It’s equally clear that you feel you must put your legitimate children first—”

  “In my affections? I never said such a thing.”

  “But …” It was no use. I could not go on, and as the words stuck in my throat there was nothing for me to do but fight a losing battle with my tears.

  “Listen,” he said. “I do want you at Penmarric—and not merely out of respect for Rose’s memory. Do you think I couldn’t make other arrangements if I secretly wanted to rid myself of you both? If I didn’t want you in my house any more now would be the ideal time for me to get you off my hands. But I do want you in my house. Now try and trust me, please, about this move to Cornwall. If I thought you were going to be unhappy there I wouldn’t force you to come, but I think you’ll like it. Promise me at least that you’ll try to like it.”

  I managed a nod.

  “And promise me you’ll never again think I don’t want you in my house. Will you promise me that?”

  I nodded a second time.

  “Well, in that case,” he said, relieved, a note of encouragement in his voice, “our troubles are over, aren’t they?”

  But they were only just beginning.

  3

  I could not bear to say goodbye to Allengate. I packed my possessions into a trunk, as Papa requested, but when it was time for me to leave for Winchester I left the house pretending I would be returning to it as usual for the Christmas holidays. I think if I had allowed myself to admit I would not be living there again I would have found it intolerably painful to turn my back on it. The only step I did take in recognition of the fact that I would not be at Allengate again for some time was to give my savings to the vicar’s wife and ask her to see that flowers were placed from time to time below the fine headstone
which Papa had had erected above Mama’s grave.

  In some ways it was a relief to get back to school. I flung myself into my work again and tried to forget the world beyond the school walls, but letters from Papa kept arriving regularly and I found it impossible to shut out the world as completely as I would have wished. William wrote too, of course. He did not write very erudite letters but they always seemed to be full of news.

  “… so Mariana is engaged,” he wrote at the end of September. “She had a lord, a baronet and an honorable wanting to marry her, so of course she chose the lord. His name is de Leonard, a baron, I think. Pots of money, of course …”

  “Dearest Adrian,” wrote Mariana’s flowing hand, “thank you so much for your divine letter! Of course, it’s wonderful news and I’m quite fantastically happy. Darling Nick is just what I’ve always wanted and I know titles and money don’t matter a scrap but they are rather fun! Imagine me—Lady de Leonard!!! Nick has a beautiful country house in Kent, but I think we’ll spend most of the time in London (Upper Grosvenor Street). My ring is GORGEOUS! Of course I know material things are quite unimportant but somehow they do make one feel more comfortable, if you know what I mean …”

  Papa wrote to say he had insisted on a year’s engagement since Mariana was only seventeen, and so the wedding date had been provisionally set for September of the following year. Mariana was now with him at Penmarric, but her fiancé planned to visit Cornwall directly after Christmas and I would have the chance to meet him then.

  But I did not want to think of the Christmas holidays I would have to spend at Penmarric. I turned in relief to William’s next letter—only to discover that William had written of nothing but Penmarric, how much he loved the spectacular scenery, how amazed I would be when I saw the house, how surprising it had been for him to see the portraits in the gallery and realize what a telltale feature his Penmar eyes were.

  “… you’re lucky you don’t resemble the Penmars in any way,” he added cheerfully. “At least you’ll be spared the old butler giving you funny looks whenever he thinks your back’s turned! Incidentally, talking of the Penmar looks, wait till you meet the youngest member of the family. Jan-Yves is without doubt the most obnoxious infant you could possibly imagine. Poor little devil! He’s ugly, rude, loud, disobedient, dirty and looks like something the gypsies left behind. However, for some reason he’s formed an overpowering attachment to me and follows me wherever I go. The little beggar doesn’t like anyone else, so I suppose I should feel flattered. Do you know his mother hasn’t been to see him once? Not once! And she only lives a few miles away at Zillan. What a strange woman she must be! The more I hear of her the more thoroughly dislikable she seems, but the others seem enraptured with her and even Mariana’s attitude seems to have melted a little. And if you think that’s a surprise, let me tell you that Papa no longer makes any attempt to stop them from seeing their mother and says they can go to Roslyn Farm as often as they like. It’s almost as if he no longer cares now that Mama is dead…

  “Anyway, Marcus and the girls have fallen into the habit of visiting the farm every Saturday for lunch, but Jan-Yves won’t go and personally I don’t blame him. Even when Papa encouraged, him to go he wouldn’t listen. Between you and me I think he dislikes Papa almost as much as he dislikes his mother, in spite of the fact that Papa is now bending over backward to be nice to the child. You’d be amazed how remorselessly patient and even-tempered Papa is being in the face of so much deliberate provocation, but he seems determined to be as long-suffering as possible toward the little devil … I wonder what you’ll make of all this when you arrive. Looking forward to seeing you. …”

  It was December. The term was drawing to its end, and at last on December the eighteenth, 1911, I left Winchester and began the long tiring journey to the west, to Cornwall and to my new home. It was my sixteenth birthday.

  FOUR

  King Henry had now another son, John… He was a dear little boy.

  —The Devil’s Brood

  ALFRED DUGGAN

  Their mother, who had long ceased to enjoy any conjugal felicity, had in fact for some years lived apart from her husband, ruling with her son Richard over her own inheritance in the south.

  —Oxford History of England:

  From Domesday Book to Magna Carta,

  A. L. POOLE

  I HAD NOT BEEN west of Truro. I arrived at Penzance, the train sweeping along by the sand of Mount’s Bay, and there before me rose St. Michael’s Mount, shimmering in the December sun, a shining pinnacle of medieval splendor afloat on the sparkling Cornish sea. I felt the strangeness of Cornwall then, the antiquity, the echo of a lost nation whose language had faded away so that one forgot they were a different people with a different past. My memory sharpened; suddenly I seemed to hear my mother saying to us long ago in St. John’s Wood: “Papa is a very foreign-looking gentleman.”

  But my first favorable impression of Cornwall quickly faded when I met William on the station platform, for behind William, treading on his heels, was a very small, very ugly urchin. He had thick black hair, a rebellious sulky mouth and the black slanting eyes of the Penmars. As I stared at him he put out a small pink tongue and jeered at me.

  “This is Jan-Yves,” said William. “I’m sure you recognize him from my descriptions. Jan-Yves, this is my brother Adrian.”

  “Hullo, spotty,” said the urchin.

  “Stop that, fatty,” said William.

  “I’m not fat!”

  “And Adrian’s not spotty. Now run along and make yourself useful. Take Adrian’s overnight bag—that’s right, is it too heavy for you?—very well, and take it out to Crowlas and the carriage. Thank you.”

  The urchin grabbed the suitcase out of my hand and trundled away, staggering a little, toward the entrance.

  “What a perfectly frightful child,” I said in distaste. “How do you put up with him?”

  “Oh, he’s a nice little beggar really … Let’s get out to the carriage.”

  The journey to Penmarric. was entirely spoiled by the tiresome child. He bounced around the carriage, interrupted all attempts I made at conversation with William and boasted about what he was going to do when he was grown up.

  “I’ll be a genius,” he said, looking at me impudently with his narrow black eyes, “and I’ll be rich. I’ll be so rich everyone will beg me to like them, but I shan’t. I’ll throw them over the cliffs and watch them get mangled on the rocks below.”

  I said cautiously to William, “Y a-t-il une malade de la tête, peut-être?”

  “He’s trying to shock you,” said William placidly. “So far he thinks he can only get people’s attention by shocking them. Isn’t that so, Jan-Yves?”

  The child laughed uproariously and aimed a cuff at William’s chest. William absent-mindedly parried the blow and patted the child’s head as the carriage crawled on toward Penmarric.

  Of course I disliked the Cornish Tin Coast as soon as I set eyes on it. It was so different from the trees, lanes and picturesque villages of the Oxfordshire countryside; here everywhere was stark and ugly, for there was not a tree in sight and the houses of the mining villages were gray and somber. The scars of the mines, most of them derelict, were a hideous blight on that godforsaken landscape, and even before we reached the point in the road which gave me my first view of my new home I felt I already knew what I could expect.

  “There it is!” cried the child. “There’s Penmarric!” He turned to me and his little black eyes shone. “I lived there all alone,” he said proudly, “just the servants and me. It was my very own castle. Until they came. But I’ll get it back one day.”

  It was a gray sprawling monster of a building, and when we drew closer I found myself sneered at by bleak walls, leering gargoyles, tall chimneys, sightless windows and grotesque pseudo-battlements.

  “Nice, isn’t it?” said William. “I like it.”

  I was speechless. As we got down from the carriage the front door opened and Papa came hur
rying out to meet me.

  “Adrian! Welcome to Penmarric!”

  Jeanne was behind him and Elizabeth.

  “Hullo, Adrian!” said Jeanne breathlessly. “How lovely to see you here! Isn’t it the most beautiful house you ever saw? It’s so exciting to be home!”

  “Hullo,” said Elizabeth. “Cook has made a very special cream tea for you with the very best Cornish cream. The food here is very nice indeed.”

  Marcus was in the doorway. “Hullo!” he called. “Do you fancy a sea view? We’ve given you Philip’s old room so you can look out toward Land’s End. It’s an awfully nice room.”

  Mariana came flying across the hall. “Adrian, what fun! Do come in! Do you like my ring? The central diamond is terribly fine, isn’t it? I think it’s the most divine ring I ever saw in my life—”

  “Medlyn,” said my father to the butler, “tea in ten minutes in the drawing room, if you please. James, take the luggage upstairs, would you?”