Penmarric

by Susan Howatch

  “Yes, he—he’s upstairs … hiding … He’s frightened.” She accepted the handkerchief I gave her and began a halfhearted attempt at mopping-up operations. Her fingers were shaking. “He won’t say a word except that Philip took him to the beach and he—Jonas—was so frightened that he ran away. Oh God, what shall I do? I should never have trusted Philip, never! I should have remembered what Hugh always said about him. I shouldn’t have been deceived by the fact that Helena was living with him again—I’ve read about people like that in the newspapers—just because they’re married it doesn’t mean they can be trusted—”

  “My dear Rebecca,” I said, hardly able to believe my ears, “are you seriously trying to tell me—”

  “What else could have frightened Jonas so much?” Tears were streaming down her face again. “I’m not letting Jonas ever go back there again,” she said fiercely. “And I’m not letting Philip dictate to me about which school to send him to. Everyone knows what goes on at boys’ boarding schools. I wouldn’t put it past Philip to choose one which was specially—”

  “My dear, you must be out of your mind.”

  “I was out of my mind before in letting him go off alone with Philip! I’m not letting my boy be brought up by a … a …”

  “—a generous honest man?” I did not even stop to think that it would be to my. advantage to foster her grotesque suspicions. All I was conscious of was indignation that she should repay Philip, who had acted with the best of intentions, with such an unjust and unwarranted distrust. “For Christ’s sake, Rebecca, pull yourself together and stop being so ridiculous! Philip may not care much for women, but there’s a world of difference between a preference for masculine company and the kind of behavior you’re trying to impute to him. Let me talk to Jonas. He’ll soon tell you that you’ve allowed your imagination to lead you astray. Where is he? Bring him in here and let me talk to him.”

  “No,” she wept, “no, I’m not letting Jonas be cross-examined by you about anything. Jonas is upset and frightened and he doesn’t like you anyway. He hasn’t forgotten that time at Penmarric when you—”

  “Oh, for God’s sake!” My patience snapped. I turned on my heel and wrenched open the back door. “If you won’t let me help you and won’t accept my advice, what the devil do you expect me to do? I’ve had enough of your melodramatics! I had more than enough of them in the past and I’ll be damned if I’ll put up with any more of them either now or in the future. Have hysterics if you must, but don’t expect me to offer you my shoulder to weep on. I’ve got better things to do with my time even if you haven’t.”

  I didn’t wait for her to reply. I walked out, slammed the door and strode off angrily around the side of the house to the car.

  The fresh summer breeze blew softly against my cheek. I stopped but I was too late; I was already in sight of the car and could no longer pause to consider what I should say to Philip. Opening the car door, I slid reluctantly into the driving seat.

  “Did you get any sense out of her?”

  I frowned at the dashboard, fidgeted with the keys.

  “Jesus Christ, Jan! What are you hesitating for? What did she say? I want to know!”

  I made the decision. Leaning back in my seat, I drew a deep breath and told him the truth.

  There was a silence.

  We sat there in my car, looking at each other, and from somewhere nearby a cow bellowed restlessly while a dog barked far away in the village. We went on looking at each other. Philip’s face was so devoid of expression that I thought at first he had not understood me, but then I saw his mouth narrow into a hard line and his eyes turn slate-gray as he clenched his fists.

  He looked away. I was still trying to think of something to say when he spoke.

  “What a stupid woman,” he said. His voice sounded flat and tired. “What a stupid, stupid woman.”

  I opened my mouth to agree with him, but before I could say a word he rounded on me in a fury and shouted, “But I suppose you believed her! Maybe you even put the idea into her head! I wouldn’t put it past you to suggest to Rebecca that her son wasn’t safe with me! You’d like me to be estranged from, Jonas, wouldn’t you? You’d do anything you can to enable his mother to drive a wedge between us!”

  I kept my head. “That’s not true, Philip,” I said strongly. “I don’t blame you for not trusting me and I don’t blame you for suspecting me of such a thing, but I gave Mama my word that I wouldn’t meddle in your relationship with Jonas and I’ve kept my promise. If you doubt that, ask Mama. She’ll back me up. She knows I’ve turned over a new leaf. Talk to her, if I can’t convince you! If you want to know the truth I’ve hardly spoken to Rebecca for over a year. We’re estranged. This is the first time in eighteen months that I’ve been near the farm.”

  He stared at me in distrustful silence. He did not speak. His eyes were bleak and cold.

  “Don’t be a fool, Philip,” I said, still keeping my head. “Give me credit for a little sense. I’m not a hysterical woman like Rebecca. Of course I don’t think you harmed that child. You no more go around assaulting eight-year-old boys than I go around ravishing eight-year-old girls. The whole idea’s absurd.”

  His fists began to unclench themselves. I saw his shoulders slump. After a long moment he said “Oh God” and stared blindly across the fields to the sea.

  I felt sorry for him. In a clumsy attempt to show him I wanted to be friendly I said, “I feel I need a drink. Why don’t we drive over to the Tinner’s Arms at Zennor for a beer?”

  He nodded, not speaking, still staring out to sea, so I started the engine and guided the car down the lane to the road. Beyond Morvah to the east along the coast road to St. Ives stood Zennor and the old pub. It was a beautiful evening. The sun was sinking toward a golden sea and the summer air was scented with the aroma from a small garden of flowers nearby.

  “Let’s sit outside,” I suggested as we left the car. I thought he would prefer the open air to the intimacy of the bar. “I’ll get the drinks. What will you have?”

  “Anything. It doesn’t matter.”

  When I emerged with two pints of bitter I found him sitting stiffly on a bench, his head bent, his hands clasped before him as if in supplication. Sitting down at his side, I handed him his glass.

  “Thanks,” he said.

  We were silent. I wondered whether to speak of Jonas again but decided it would be better to let the matter rest. However, Philip came to the opposite decision: As I stared into my tankard I heard him say quietly, “How did Rebecca know that I prefer men to women?” And when I started, never having dreamt that he would refer to the subject other than obliquely, he added with careful logic, “She must have known that or else she wouldn’t have imagined such a thing as this.”

  I tried to match his casual offhand manner. “She knows nothing,” I said at last. “I used to say to her often that you took no interest in women, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Hugh cast a few aspersions on your moral character while he was alive, but the scene at the farm just now was entirely the result of her imagination. She was upset because the child came home unexpectedly, and once she was upset any simple explanation of Jonas’s behavior wasn’t good enough for her.”

  “But she must have known something.”

  “Why should she? No one else does.”

  “Except you,” he said. “You know. If you knew why didn’t you tell Rebecca about it? She was your mistress.”

  “I preferred to keep what I knew to myself.”

  “Why? Why should you have bothered? What prompted you to be so discreet?”

  “Respect, perhaps.”

  “For me?” He was mocking. He was even smiling in incredulity.

  “No,” I said. “Not for you. For Trevose.”

  The smile was wiped off his face. He was silenced.

  “I liked Trevose,” I said. “He was good to me. He needn’t have been good to me, but he was. I don’t forget people who are good to me like that, and I don’t speak i
ll of them after they’re dead. That’s all.”

  He still did not speak. His eyes had an inward look as if he were thinking of the past.

  “Besides,” I said, “what was there for me to tell? That I had seen you one night in St. Ives with Trevose? You were often seen with him—that was nothing new. Short of describing the expressions on your faces there was nothing I could tell anyone.”

  “We often went to St. Ives.” He lit a cigarette, shook out the match. “Helena knew, of course,” he said abruptly. “It was inevitable that she should guess, but I knew Helena had too much pride to do anything but keep the knowledge to herself. I always took great trouble to be discreet, because I didn’t want a shred of gossip to get back to Mama.”

  “She doesn’t know anything.”

  “And she never will.” He ground the burned stub of the match into the rough wooden table before us. His face was without expression now, without trace of pain or grief or regret. “I didn’t find a second Trevose,” he said. “At first I thought I could, but I was wrong. He was unique. I know that now. I’ll never have a better friend than he was to me.” He took a drag on his cigarette. “I liked Canada,” he said. “The mines were interesting and I made plenty of friends, but no friend ever matched up to Trevose and after a while I got tired of looking. Then I found this widow. It was a relief to start living in a woman’s house again by that time, but eventually she wanted an affair and—well, that sort of thing doesn’t interest me. However, by that time I was clearer in my own mind about what I wanted. I saw I liked to live with a woman but I had to have my separate bedroom and my independence. No sex. No emotional scenes. I began to think of Helena again, but I knew I had no right to ask her to come back to me after the way I’d treated her, so I hardly expected her to agree to a reconciliation, let alone a reconciliation on the terms I wanted. But she did. Apparently she had tried an affair while she and Jeanne were abroad after Gerald’s death and discovered she didn’t like sex any better than I did. Ironic, wasn’t it? It turned out that we were much better suited to each other than either of us had ever suspected.” He flicked ash onto the ground and watched the breeze scatter it across the earth. “I think we’re happy,” he said. “We’re certainly happier now than we were before.”

  “Yes,” I said. I could think of nothing else to say.

  ”I’m glad I’m back in Cornwall. I liked Canada but I missed Cornwall a lot. Sometimes the homesickness seemed more than I could bear, but I stuck it out for three years, just as I said I would, and in the end I was glad I did. Those three years helped to give me a perspective on the past and also helped me to know myself better. It’s important to know oneself well.”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s a pity about Jonas,” he said. “Poor little devil; I don’t think it’s his fault he’s so difficult. It’s a combination of his father being dead and his mother being the woman she is and his environment making him nervous of big houses like Penmarric and the way of life we take for granted. I’ll still give him what assistance I can—if Rebecca will accept it—but he’s not the son I wanted and I was no doubt optimistic in hoping that he ever could be. It’s a pity, but I feel there’s nothing more I can do about it now. I’ve done what I can. If Rebecca wants to blame anyone for what happens next she can blame herself—God knows it’s not the child’s fault that I’ve decided he’s not after all suited to inherit Penmarric one day.”

  “You mean—am I to understand—”

  “What else can I do? After this incident I have little choice but to change my will.” He tossed his cigarette away and ground the butt to ashes beneath his heel. “Penmarric can go to you if you outlive me, and I wish you joy of the whole bloody inheritance. God knows you’re the only one who seems to have any use for the place nowadays.”

  I tried to speak. I tried to smile. But as I began to stammer a few inadequate words to express my gratitude, he got up and walked away in calculated rebuff before turning to smile right back bitterly into my eyes.

  SEVEN

  It is possible that during the years that followed, Richard himself, and his immediate entourage, began to acquire a respect for the reformed John that then emerged, for he spent them serving his brother faithfully on the field of battle and in the council chamber.

  Isabelle of Gloucester played no part in John’s public life, and it is doubtful if she played much part in his private life either; certainly she bore him no children … John set about freeing himself.

  —King John,

  W L. WARREN

  IT WOULD BE UNTRUE to say that after this incident Philip and I became close friends, but we were on better terms with each other than we had been before; I began to be invited to dinner parties at Penmarric at last, and occasionally Philip and I would go drinking at the local pub. My position began to improve. I was more likely to be given responsible work. At last I felt I was beginning to leave the most disagreeable part of my life behind, and as the months passed I became less conscious of the memory of my humiliation and disgrace.

  Shortly after the scene with Rebecca, Philip told me he had signed a new will in my favor and had left it in the care of another firm of solicitors, Pomeroy and Pomeroy of St. Ives. On this particular matter he had avoided the offices of Holmes, Holmes, Trebarvah and Holmes in order that no word should reach Simon Peter that Jonas had ceased to be heir to Penmarric.

  “I want no more scenes with Rebecca,” Philip said to me bluntly. “I’ve told Mama I’ve changed my will, and Helena knows, but if the news travels back to the Roslyns I’ll never hear the end of it. Someone’s sure to accuse me of being unfair to the child, poor little devil.”

  Jonas had not, of course, reappeared at Penmarric since the disastrous weekend in July, and eventually Rebecca informed Philip by letter that she had changed her mind about sending the child away to school. This was a most foolish decision, since she was depriving Jonas of his chance to have a decent education, but I was determined not to interfere. I had what I wanted and Jonas no longer concerned me.

  My reluctance to become involved with Jonas made me reluctant too to become involved with Rebecca. If she had suggested that I visit her I would have gone to Deveral Farm without a second thought, but she made no move toward me and soon when I heard that she had a lodger for the holidays, a schoolmaster from Middlesex, I foresaw that she would make no attempt to renew our affair. I think my reaction to her accusations against Philip had antagonized her; she had turned to me for support only to find me totally unsympathetic. As if in revenge she seemed determined to ignore me—and focus all her attention on the schoolmaster from Middlesex.

  Since my estrangement from her she had formed the practice of taking in a lodger during the summer months, and I had often wondered what her relationship was with these men whom she beckoned to Deveral Farm to supplement her income. Her first lodger, a writer from London, had been well into his sixties and obviously beneath her notice, but this schoolmaster was not much more than forty and not even unattractive. I regarded him with suspicion. Nobody else seemed to share my suspicions, but then nobody else knew Rebecca as well as I did. I knew that despite her protestations to the contrary she had a healthy sexual appetite, and I found it hard to believe she could have been without a lover since our last episode in the bedroom over two years before. After the autumn of 1934 she also had more moral freedom; her Uncle Jared, who had always kept a stern eye on her private life, died in September and was buried with his ancestors in Zillan churchyard after a memorial service at the Wesleyan chapel which he had attended for nearly fifty years. We all went to his funeral. He had been a well-respected man in the parishes of Morvah, Zillan and St. Just and was mourned by people from all stratas of society. Simon Peter was the chief mourner, and with him was not only his new wife, whom he had just taken to live at Polzillan House, but also one or two of the Trehearnes of Helston. Among the humbler mourners were the eight surviving daughters, but although Charity sobbed louder than any of them as her father’s coffin w
as lowered into the earth none of her family gave her any indication that she was no longer disowned by them.

  “Whore!” snarled Miss Hope Roslyn, the eldest of the three spinster daughters.

  “Slut!” sneered Miss Prudence.

  “Bitch!” sneered Miss Grace.

  “You wicked, un-Christian old virgins!” screamed Charity. “At least I got myself a husband and the finest gentleman who ever did breathe!” And she flung herself against William’s breast and wept piteously against his shirt front.

  William, behaving cunningly in an embarrassing situation, said with immense grandeur, “Come, my dear, let’s not keep the chauffeur waiting. I think it’s time we returned to Carnforth Hall.” To the hostile Roslyns he merely added, “If I didn’t believe grief was the cause of your bad manners and bad taste I wouldn’t be so ready now to overlook your contemptible behavior toward my wife. Good day.” And turning his back on them, he walked off slowly toward the lych-gate with his wife leaning heavily on his arm.

  It was the first time I had heard him refer to Charity as his wife. Ever since she had dragooned him to the registry office eight years before he had fought shy of any reference to the fact that he was a married man, but after Jared Roslyn’s funeral all that was changed. He had always been happily married; now he was no longer ashamed to admit it. As he left the churchyard that day with his wife I envied him his happiness and wished I had a wife who could care for me as much as Charity cared for him.

  But I had no one. Felicity and I were still good friends, but I knew our marriage was finished and that I should get a divorce so that I would be free to remarry whenever I chose to do so. Yet the idea of divorce saddened me; I lingered, postponing it for as long as possible, but early in 1935 I discussed the situation with Felicity and agreed to commit adultery at a certain hotel in St. Ives known to her private detective. Felicity behaved very sensibly about the whole business—“After all,” she said, “now that Daddy’s halved my allowance and I can’t afford to give you any money, what’s the point of staying married?”—but I became so upset that when the time came for me to commit my adultery I couldn’t take advantage of the privacy of the hotel room but merely sat chain-smoking on the edge of the bed. It was a most distressing and sordid experience.