Penmarric

by Susan Howatch

  “Attractive rascal,” said Alice. “It’s odd how many girls fall for a man who’s absolutely no good. What a funny thing love is.”

  “Yes, it must be,” I said seriously and blushed when she laughed.

  “You’re rather sweet!” she said in her frank, abrupt manner, and patted me fondly on the head as if I were six instead of sixteen.

  I think it was then that I began to suffer the first stirrings of calf-love.

  Since she was such a frank person I soon learned what she thought about a great many things. She was deeply interested in current events, and although she had always lived in such a remote village far from the hub of London life she knew far more than I did about contemporary politics, social questions and the great public issues of the day. In my desire to emulate Papa’s taste for history I had always been too concerned with the past to be interested in the present, but now all that was changed. It was Alice who opened my eyes to the fact that today’s events would be tomorrow’s history, and I began to read the newspapers avidly in my efforts to match her knowledge and give a new depth to our conversations.

  Alice was a Liberal, I discovered, and an admirer of Sir Edward Grey, the foreign secretary, despite the fact that he had been recently criticized for pursuing a policy which had led England dangerously close to war the previous summer.

  “But you have to take a firm line sometimes,” said Alice. “Especially with the Germans. How can anyone talk of placating the Germans when they do nothing but build their wretched submarines and challenge our naval supremacy? I’m glad Churchill’s at the Admiralty now—he at least has the right ideas about expanding the navy so that the Germans won’t outdo us. He’ll do a lot better there than he did as Home Secretary—oh, he and that horrid little Lloyd George! When I think of how they handled the entire question of women’s suffrage …”

  It was then that I learned that where women’s suffrage was concerned Alice was more radical than many of the Liberal members of Parliament.

  “But do you really think all women should have the vote?” I said doubtfully, having grown up with Papa’s theory that women should have no part in politics.

  “Why not?” said Alice. “Do you think it’s either right or just that a person should be discriminated against for something they cannot help?”

  “Certainly not!” I said fiercely, thinking of my illegitimacy, and suddenly found myself a supporter of women’s suffrage.

  However, I retained enough of my old convictions to add, “But I think the suffragettes go much too far. I’m not surprised Churchill and Lloyd George lost patience with them.”

  “Unfortunately,” agreed Alice, “there are always fanatics in every good cause and they’re always the ones that get the publicity. No, much as I dislike Churchill’s attitude I wouldn’t attack him with a horsewhip as that woman did the other day. That only convinces people that women should never have the vote under any circumstances.”

  “What would women do with the vote anyway?” I said, veering back again toward my conservative views. “Take Mariana, for instance. She couldn’t care less whether she has the vote or not. All she can think about is marrying a lord, living in London and wearing her wretched diamond ring.”

  But Alice, who was supposed to be Mariana’s friend, was careful not to say too much against her. Mariana was always glossed over, I noticed, and since Alice seldom spoke of Philip either I assumed that he too found little favor with her. In fact the only person whom Alice openly confessed to disliking was Mrs. Castallack, and soon I found myself acquiring some information which I had never heard mentioned by my half-brothers and sisters.

  “I have an aunt,” Alice told me. “She was Miss Clarissa Penmar and was brought up at Penmarric, but she married a farmer, one of Mrs. Castallack’s stepsons by her first marriage, a man named Joss Roslyn. They have one of the biggest farms at Morvah now. Joss’s brother Jared and his family used to live at Roslyn Farm after Mrs. Castallack’s marriage to your guardian—they were tenants, and Jared always understood that his family home was to be his for a nominal rent for the rest of his life—”

  “It was a five-year lease, Alice dear!” said the rector, coming into the room in time to hear this last sentence. “And Mrs. Castallack waited till the third term expired before she evicted him!”

  “Yes, but it was a mean trick really, Grandpapa! Fortunately for Jared, Adrian, his brother Joss bought him a farm and land at Morvah, so everything ended happily, but if Joss hadn’t had Aunt Clarissa’s money—”

  “Alice dear! There’s no need to go into that—”

  “Yes, but Grandpapa, she did give him all her money when he married her, didn’t she?”

  “Yes, but that’s none of our business, my dear, and you know that as well as I do.”

  I was sorry when I had no more opportunities to spend my Sunday evenings at Zillan rectory, but in mid-January I returned to school and was away from Penmarric until the end of March. When I next saw Cornwall spring had come, the roadside verges were ablaze with wildflowers, and the sunshine was sweeping across the bleak landscape to that dark and brilliant sea.

  5

  Following the established tradition, Marcus had spent a few months abroad before returning to England for Mariana’s September wedding; he was in Paris by the time I returned to Penmarric at the end of March. Mariana had gone to London to spend the Season at the townhouse with her chaperone, and Papa was also in town combining some research with one or two long-term arrangements relating to the coming wedding. At Penmarric Jeanne and Elizabeth were already discussing bridesmaids’ dresses, and Jan-Yves, determined not to be left out, was making himself obnoxious by demanding to be a page. William was so busy with estate matters during Papa’s absence that I soon realized I would see little of him. Presently when Hugh came home from Harrow and began his daily treks to the farm again I became tired of solitude, and one day, more out of boredom than any better reason, I followed him cautiously on horseback as he rode over the moors to Zillan.

  I decided I was curious to see the farm for which Mrs. Castallack had abandoned Penmarric. Obviously it was a house of character. I had no intention of walking to the very walls, but I thought it might be fun to encircle the place from a distance, and besides I was tired of reading and the weather was fine enough to tempt me out of doors.

  I set off in Hugh’s wake. I did not see him turn around once as we left St. Just and took the road to Morvah, and he still did not turn when he left the road and followed the bridlepath up onto the moors.

  A decayed signpost by the bridlepath read: “TO CHUN, ZILLAN AND DING DONG MINE,” and suddenly Cornwall was all around me, the great tracts of the moors heavy with memories of a bygone civilization, the towering summit of Carn Kenidjack bursting black granite toward a cloudless sky. We rode on, and the land was wild, prehistoric, forgotten.

  Heather and bracken whispered together beneath the salt breeze from the sea, and far below us on the coast was the headland of Pendeen and the engine houses of the Tin Coast.

  We reached the summit of the ridge. The view was extraordinary. I could see south to St. Michael’s Mount shimmering in the blue of Mount’s Bay, north to Morvah and the sea, east to the engine house of Ding Dong Mine and west to the mighty crest of Carn Kenidjack. Directly in front of me, further along the ridge, Hugh and his horse seemed to be disappearing slowly behind a heap of weathered rocks.

  I was puzzled but when I rode nearer I saw what it was. It was an ancient hill fort, its stone walls still standing, and suddenly I remembered my father speaking once at dinner of the “castle” which still stood on the ridge at Chûn.

  I rode warily through the heather to the castle walls.

  There was an outer ring and an inner ring. I rode into the inner ring on the assumption that the place had two exits and that Hugh had entered by the first and left by the second. I was wrong. Just as I was reining my horse to a halt in the middle of the inner circle Hugh’s voice said coolly behind me, “What the devil
are you doing, following me like that!”

  I swiveled around in the saddle. He had dismounted and was standing with his horse in the shadow of the walls. I dismounted too and turned to face him.

  “I’m sorry,” I said readily. “I didn’t intend to spy on you—I realized you were going to the farm. But I was bored and wanted a ride, so I thought I would see which route you took. By the way, what’s this? Is it Chûn Castle?”

  “Yes,” said Hugh, who cared nothing for history. “It is.” He smiled his wide charming smile, “Why didn’t you tell me you wanted a ride? We could have ridden over together.”

  “I … thought perhaps you might have wanted to be alone.”

  “No, indeed! You’re the solitary one these days not me! I’m glad to see you. Look, come with me down to the farm! Philip’s taken Mama into Penzance today and I’m only riding over there because Griselda promised to make me a special pasty to celebrate the start of the holidays. Come with me and help me eat it!”

  I said uneasily, “I don’t think I’d better.”

  “Oh, come on! Mama and Philip will have been gone at least half an hour by now. Look, don’t be silly—do you think I’d ask you to come if I thought for one moment they’d be there? I don’t want Philip yelling at me any more than you do!”

  I gave in. “Very well,” I said. “If you’re sure—”

  “Positive. Come on—it’s only just down the hill, in the valley and I can almost smell the pasty already! What a long time it seems since breakfast!”

  We led our horses out of the castle and mounted again before setting off down the hillside into the valley below.

  “There’s the tenant farm,” said Hugh. “That belonged to Jared Roslyn, who lived at the farmhouse while Mama was at Penmarric. When Mama evicted him later she bought him out of the tenant farm as well because she didn’t want him living on her doorstep after she’d returned to Roslyn Farm. Anyway the cottage would have been too small for him. He and his wife have eight daughters and one son. Eight girls! Imagine! And they’re all called funny names like Chastity, Fidelity and Continence.”

  “Not really, Hugh!”

  “Well, Faith, Hope and Charity, then!”

  We laughed together.

  “Jared Roslyn is at Morvah now, isn’t he?”

  “Yes, he and his brother Joss have adjoining farms. Joss has got pots of money but he won’t spend it—except to help his brother. His wife used to be a lady but you’d never guess it now, Mama says. Mama doesn’t like any of them. There’s a feud.”

  “A feud?”

  “Yes, nobody likes Joss Roslyn. He’s a real bastard.” He cleared his throat. “Sorry, old chap—unfortunate word. No offense meant.”

  But I was already thinking of something else. “Wasn’t Joss’s wife brought up at Penmarric? Why did she marry a farmer?”

  “Amor vincit omnia,” said Hugh suavely, “or so they say.”

  “Are there any children?”

  “There’s a girl. I saw her once ages ago before I went to Allengąte. She was a year younger than me.”

  We were within sight of the farmhouse, and with surprise I saw that it was beautiful. Above the slate roof rose mellow chimneys, while beneath the roof quiet gray walls slumbered peacefully in the morning sunlight; there were climbing plants around the porch, honeysuckle and a rambling rose.

  After tethering our horses by the stable we walked around through the farmyard to the back door.

  “Griselda!” yelled Hugh, stepping into the old-fashioned kitchen. “Griselda! Where’s my pasty?”

  There was a patter of feet. A servant woman, obviously simple-minded, appeared and said something unintelligible.

  “Hullo, Annie,” said Hugh. “Has Griselda made my pasty?”

  A door opened at the far end of the kitchen. An old crone in a black dress and black shawl shuffled into the room.

  “Griselda,” said Hugh, “have you made that—”

  She said something in a violent tone of voice, and I saw with a shock that her finger was pointing at me. Her voice was so heavily Cornish that I found it impossible to understand her.

  “Oh, this is a school friend of mine,” said Hugh, exercising his talent for telling plausible lies. “He’s staying at Penmarric.”

  The old crone went crimson and began to shout at him. I watched in great alarm and at the same time marveled at her lack of restraint; she did not behave like a servant at all. It was as if she were the mistress of the house.

  “Rubbish, Griselda,” said Hugh politely. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Is my pasty ready, please? If it is, I’ll take it and go outside.”

  The old crone muttered something and shook her head.

  Hugh said to me, “It’ll be ready in ten minutes. Come and have a look at the rest of the house.”

  I followed him silently into the passage. As he closed the door he said, “She knew who you were.”

  “How?” I felt chilled by the apparent clairvoyance. “How could she know?”

  “God knows! Don’t worry, if she says anything to Mama later I’ll insist she made a mistake and that you were Aubrey Carnforth. You’re about the same height and build as Aubrey. … Now, this is the hall and through here is the parlor …”

  I followed him through the rooms. They were beautiful, the furniture old and solid, the spaciousness infinitely pleasing to the eye. Everywhere was spotlessly clean and well-kept.

  “What a lovely house,” I said with genuine admiration. “I like it much better than Penmarric. It’s so warm and comfortable and serene.”

  “How odd! It doesn’t appeal to me in the least—I much prefer Penmarric! Penmarric is so much more civilized, don’t you think?”

  “Because it has a couple of proper lavatories?”

  “Well, plumbing is an advantage, you must admit.” He was quite serious. He seemed to have no aesthetic appreciation whatever of the farmhouse. “Do you want to see upstairs?”

  “May I? I’d like that.”

  Philip had a room facing the moors. On the table by the window were several books on the Cornish Tin Coast, including a volume entitled A History of the Levant Mine. I picked it up and flicked through the pages, but Hugh was already going out into the corridor again, so I put down the book: to follow him. Mrs. Castallack had a pleasant room next door with an old-fashioned four-poster near the window and an enormous wardrobe along one wall.

  I glanced around. “What a funny little clock!” I exclaimed, wandering over to the mantelshelf. “I like it! Do you know where it came from?”

  “Haven’t a clue,” Hugh said. “Do you really like it? I think it’s hideous. … Come over and look at the view. Isn’t it fine?”

  We admired the view together and then returned to the kitchen. The pasty was ready. We took it outside, found a sheltered spot behind a stone wall and settled down to an early lunch.

  It was delicious. Presently Hugh fetched some cider, and when we had finished both cider and pasty we lay on our backs and watched the wispy clouds drift across the blue sky.

  Hugh fell asleep.

  I got up and wandered off in search of a lavatory, however primitive, but when my search proved abortive I stepped behind the barn instead. Afterward I moved back toward the house and stole a glance into the kitchen. No one was about. I went in, feeling nervous, and wandered through those beautiful rooms again, my fingers trailing lightly over the furniture. No one disturbed me. I went upstairs and the floorboards creaked beneath my feet. The door of Mrs. Castallack’s room was ajar. I went to the window, then to the bed, then to the fireplace. The little clock sat ticking on the mantelshelf, and as I touched it I looked over my shoulder as if I half-expected to see someone watching me but there was no one there, only a bird singing on the sill and the curtains blowing lightly in the wind.

  I left, walked into Philip’s room, picked up the book on the Levant Mine. To my surprise I found it interesting. I sat down and began to read, and the minutes slipped away as morning mer
ged into afternoon.

  I was just thinking that I should return to Hugh when I heard a door slam.

  I got up, put back the book and went out into the corridor.

  From the hall a Castallack voice said, “Perhaps you left it upstairs.”

  But it was not Hugh who spoke. It was Philip. I stopped, rigid with horror, and as I felt the sweat break out on my forehead I heard him add, “I’ll go up and look.”

  I wanted to run. I looked around wildly at the closed doors of the landing and my panic was so great that I could not even decide which room I might choose as a hiding place.

  And then she spoke. Her voice was low and soft, like surf breaking on a beach far away, and she said, “No, don’t bother, darling. I’ll go upstairs and find it. I think I know where it is.”

  I could not breathe. My heart was pounding so hard that there was a pain in my chest. I still could not move, but as the stairs creaked beneath her feet I suddenly knew what I must do. I walked forward to the head of the stairs. I went out to meet her, and below in the hall Philip was saying, “I wonder where Hugh is. He said he’d be coming over this morning. I must ask Griselda if—”

  I saw her. She looked up at me, and I saw those cool light eyes which I had first seen so long ago in that dining room at Brighton. When she saw me her eyes widened. Her hand flew to her throat and I heard her sobbing gasp of fear.