The Loving Spirit

by Daphne Du Maurier

  The children said nothing, they stood silently by the door, uncertain whether he meant them to stay or to go away.Then Susan came down and they ran to her at once.

  ‘Well, now,’ she said, ‘have you answered your father nicely when he spoke?’

  They clung to her hand, while Joseph sat alone by the fire, wretched and uncomfortable.

  ‘Show me your play,’ he suggested, flushing a little, watching Susan’s eye and wanting to hold Christopher next to him. Immediately the boys disappeared and returned in a minute with a toy horse. Joseph thought of his old moth-eaten rag monkey, and how he had slept with it until he was twelve years old.

  ‘Ah!’ he said cheerfully, ‘that’s a very fine animal, I’m sure. I reckon he can gallop to Plymouth an’ back in no time.’

  Christopher stared up at his father in wonder, and squeezed Albie’s hand. ‘S’only a toy,’ he said politely.

  ‘Oh! I see.’ Joseph roared with laughter, and then pulled himself together, afraid of appearing a fool before his boys.

  ‘There now,’ declared Susan, clapping her hands, ‘isn’t father funny, joking with you.’

  The children summoned up a laugh at once.

  ‘This is terrible,’ thought Joseph. ‘I don’t seem to know how to treat ’em at all.’ He began to feel in his pockets.

  ‘Here’s a nice bright penny for you both,’ he said, bending down and twisting a curl in Christopher’s hair.

  ‘Thank your kind father, dears, immediately,’ cried Susan. ‘Was there ever such spoilt childrun, I wonder?’

  ‘Thank you, father,’ said the pair together. What queer little mortals they were, impossible to get a word from them separately. He wondered what Chris thought about, whether he knew he was going to be a sailor. Oh! well, they were only babies after all. He yawned, and took up his paper which he had already read from corner to corner. ‘Run back an’ play i’ the kitchen, or you’ll fuss your father,’ said Susan.

  Joseph made no attempt to keep them back, he saw how eager they were to get away. He drummed his boots in the fender moodily, wondering whether to go out or not.

  What was the use, though? There was nowhere to go.

  Lizzie was married now, and the mother of a baby boy. Joseph liked the old rough farmhouse where they lived, two miles from Plyn, on the road to St Brides. Lizzie was always ready to welcome him, but he had been there only two days ago, and it looked odd to be always going there, as if he was not made comfortable at home. He watched Susan as she drew the curtains and trimmed the lamp. Her three children had aged her considerably, she was forty now, and looked more. There were many grey streaks in her hair. She looked more worn than Janet had done at fifty, with six children. Not that he minded this. He had chosen her for the qualities of wife and mother, and not for youth and beauty. Joseph yawned again and stretched himself.

  ‘Sleepy, dear?’ asked his wife, ready to turn down the bed upstairs if he wanted a nap.

  ‘Think I’ll go along an’ take a look at the ship,’ said Joseph, and he went from the room.

  It was better outside in the fresh air, with the wind on his face. It had been stuffy in the parlour, and difficult to breathe, and his legs were cramped from sitting still. Not quite dusk yet, but the men were coming back from their work at the jetties, and the lights were beginning to shine in the windows. He glanced at the yard, and saw that his brothers had closed down for the night. They would be up in their homes now having a late tea. He went down the slip, and cast the painter of a small pram. He jumped into this, and seizing the paddles pulled swiftly against the tide up harbour towards the buoy where the schooner was moored. This was better than being inside the house with those queer little brats and Susan. The tides were springing, and he had to work his boat carefully along the edge of the harbour, out of the run of the channel. From the entrance to Polmear creek the tide was ebbing swiftly, and there was a hint of an easterly wind. This meant a strain on Joseph’s muscles, and he enjoyed it. He was bare-headed and the wind blew his hair over his eyes. He had to keep shaking his head to push it back. He chewed a quid of tobacco, and every now and then he spat into the water. The pram shot ahead in spite of the tide, and before long he reached the buoy, and lay on his oars, glancing up at the figurehead. A gull was perched on the foremast, facing the wind, and uttering a weird triumphant cry. The ship had just had her bottom scrubbed, and a coat of paint all over. She was ready to move up to the jetties for her load of clay and then away to sea again. She looked smart and trim, and worthy of her name as the fastest schooner in Plyn. Only the figurehead of Janet had been left untouched. The colour was a little faded now from the friction of the sea, but the features were unchipped and unspoilt as on the day she was launched.

  Joseph stood up in his boat, holding the water with one paddle. ‘Hullo, my beauty,’ he called softly.

  Dusk sank upon Plyn. The gull lifted his wings and flew away. The harbour was deserted. The hour chimed out from Lanoc Church, borne on the easterly wind. Only Joseph remained, a still figure in his boat, watching the shadows creep along the figure-head above him.

  6

  A daughter was born to Joseph and Susan in 1871, and this completed their family.

  Susan was seriously ill at the birth of Katherine, and the old doctor warned her that she must be very careful in the future if she wanted to be sure of her life. Suspecting that she would say nothing to her husband, and would in all probability keep the matter to herself, making light of his words, the doctor determined to tackle Joseph himself.

  Joseph returned to Plyn three weeks after his daughter had been born, and was amazed to see the man’s long face, and that he still visited Susan and the baby every day.

  ‘Why, she’ll be up and about soon, surely,’ he said. ‘The house is very uncomfortable with a woman hired in to do the work, and to only give an eye to the children now and again. My wife is strong and healthy, isn’t she?’

  ‘Your wife is past forty, Joe,’ said the doctor seriously. ‘She’s borne four children now, and this one has all but killed her. Unless she takes very great care of herself from now on, I won’t answer for the consequences.’

  ‘Thank you, doctor,’ said Joseph slowly, and turned into the house. He supposed he had been selfish and inconsiderate, but all said and done he did not consider he had been entirely to blame. After all, Susan had never complained, she had never said a word to him about weakness in health. He could not be expected to guess this sort of thing, when he was away at sea for nearly eight months in the year. Supposing something happened to Susan and he was left with this young family on his hands. What in the world would he do with them? And Lizzie was married, no possible hope in the thought that she would come and live in the house.

  Susan would always be something of an invalid in the future. What a hopeless outlook it was going to be. She would just act as his housekeeper and bring up the children. No more than this.

  ‘Doctor says you’ve been worse than poorly this time, my dear,’ he began awkwardly. ‘Somehow I didn’t come to realize things, bein’ away so much, and then just at home for short whiles now an’ agen. I ought to have known that . . .’ He broke off in confusion, afraid to hurt her by alluding to her age. He had always made a point of ignoring it. ‘I reckon that men don’t figure matters out the same as women do,’ he went on, trying to be as gentle in his words as possible. ‘Sailors, too, are a selfish, careless crowd, seldom givin’ a thought to others. I’ve been as bad as any o’ them. We’ll start things different in future, an’ you must get well quick an’ get out in the air, ‘twill pull you together in no time.’

  ‘That’s what’s been the worryin’ of me up here,’ cried Susan fretfully, ‘to know as you’re back an’ I can’t look after you. I know the house’ll be all upside down, an’ nothin’ like comfortable for you. The place not clean nor tidy, in all likelihood, and the boys runnin’ wild. You’ll be that irritated you’ll be wantin’ to go off to your ship again. Oh! dear - oh! dear.’


  ‘There, there, dear,’ said Joseph, taking his wife’s hand. ‘Everythin’ is in perfect order, all shipshape an’ Bristol fashion. I’m perfectly happy an’ content, an’ the boys no worry. Susan, my love—’ He was stumbling to tell her how sorry he was for bringing her to this state, how he cursed himself for a selfish blind ruffian, and that in the years to come, from now onward, he would love her devotedly and selflessly, protecting her and caring for her. Perhaps it was not too late to start some sort of companionship, nothing physical nor passionate, but a deep understanding born of mutual trust and affection. This poor tired-eyed woman was his wife, Christopher’s mother; who had slaved and worked for him while he had grumbled and groaned that she could not share his dreams.

  ‘There now,’ she choked, blowing her nose, ‘now you’re vexed with me for givin’ way, and quite right an’ proper too, for you to feel like that. I’m a stupid selfish woman, who gets silly little fads into her head, an’ you’re too good to say you mind the house upside down, though I know well you hate it. Never mind, dear, I’ll be up soon, and all will go on as before.’

  Joseph rose and stood above her helplessly. She had misunderstood him again, and another fresh ideal had flown to the winds. He realized that there could never be anything permanent or truthful about their relationship. Husband and wife. Queer. Had Janet lived thus with his father? No, he believed there had been moments of beauty between them.

  He looked at the baby girl whom his wife was trying to soothe. Poor little thing, with her blue eyes like a kitten. Why could he feel no sort of emotion towards his children, except - Christopher. And Chris was a shy sensitive boy, who didn’t seem to understand.

  ‘I’ve made a mess o’ things, somehow,’ he thought, but aloud he said to his wife, ‘Don’t take on, dear, you’ll soon be better now, an’ the little girl is a dear, I can see.’

  Then he went downstairs and sat alone in the stiff parlour.

  Joseph was nearly a month in Plyn before sailing again, and he enjoyed this holiday ashore more than he had ever done since Janet had died. As Susan had feared, the house got upside down, and this was what appealed to her husband, though she never had any idea of it. It amused him to take off his boots in the fender and put his feet on the mantelshelf. He left the parlour, and spent his time in the kitchen when he was not out-of-doors. The meals were late and badly cooked by the woman who came in daily.Time did not matter, and he could wander in to one of these scrappy suppers and smoke all the time, with an old wet jacket on his back, and a newspaper in his hand.

  He started to make a great pet of Christopher, and would take him off for walks alone, leaving Albert and little Charles to play together in the garden. He crammed the lad’s pockets with fruit and pennies, he went to the shops and bought him buns and sweets. The boy was quick to see the favour shown to him, and soon lost his early fear of his father. He saw that he had only to express a wish for something, and he was immediately given it.

  Joseph imagined that by giving in to him like this and winning his affection, he was paving the way to the wonderful companionship of the future, the dream of which clung to his mind. Christopher would understand him as Janet had done.

  Already the boy ran to him with a smile on his face, and told him his troubles and his wishes.

  Once a dog barked loudly in the street, and the little fellow flung himself against his father with a cry of fear, clutching at his knee, burying his head against his trousers.

  ‘There, there, Chris sonny, father has you. He won’t let the brute harm you,’ said Joseph, running his hand through the child’s curls, lifting him up and kissing his cheek. ‘My boy mustn’t be afraid of animals. Stop cryin’, sweetheart, an’ we’ll go and buy you some sweets.’

  The crying stopped instantly.

  ‘Can’t ye keep the dog under control?’ shouted Joseph angrily to the owner. ‘My son is a nervy little chap, an’ this sort o’ thing is enough to make him ill.’

  The boy snuggled his head in his father’s shoulder.

  ‘Can I ‘ave pepp’ment?’ he whispered.

  ‘Bless you, you can have the whole shop,’ said Joseph.

  He had never imagined he could feel like this, just because the boy was next to him, and asked him for something.

  Joseph sailed next time happier than he had been for years, feeling that now at last there was somebody who mattered to him, somebody who would welcome him on his return with a solid depth of love in his heart, and who as he grew older would become his one reason for living, apart from the ship and the sea.

  It was during these years that the fruit trade was at its height, and the Janet Coombe was one of the many schooners who raced from St Michaels or the Mediterranean back to the Thames or the Mersey with this perishable cargo. Sometimes freights ran as high as £7 a ton, and there would be numbers of schooners alongside Joseph’s ship near London Bridge, waiting to discharge. Passages were made as far as Smyrna and other eastern ports, where the cargo would be currants.

  Sometimes the Janet Coombe would be out to St Michaels and back in seventeen days, for Joseph was a desperate carrier of sail, pressing his little vessel under every rag he could set; and when other ships would be held up by a westerly gale he would thrash his way down Channel, hanging on to his canvas until the last possible moment.

  It was a hard life and a rough life, and through his men sometimes cursed him for a driver, they were proud of him right enough; and when they arrived at St Michaels and found the stores full of fruit and scarce another vessel in port, they could afford to laugh at the caution of the other skippers, hove to or brought up somewhere till the gale moderated, while the slippery-heeled Janet Coombe had nipped in and got the best of the market.

  When the steamers began to capture the fruit trade and freights became scarce for a sailing ship in the western isles, the Janet Coombe loaded with salt or clay for St John’s, Newfoundland, and after fighting her way across the Atlantic she would fill with salt fish and travel down to the Mediterranean ports with her cargo, sometimes taking only sixteen days for her passage back.

  During these races, and the battles against wind and sea, Joseph forgot Plyn, and Christopher, and lived only for the zest of this life, which needed all his strength and endurance, and a keen mind alert to danger and unforeseen disaster. The old quiet days at Plyn were nothing but a dim memory, this was the life for which he had been born, he, and this ship that was part of him.

  These were the days when Joseph was conscious of really living, and not merely eking out a solitary existence as he did on shore, try though he might to forsake loneliness and cleave to his family. Here on the ship Janet was with him, but at Plyn he found her not. Christopher was only a boy, and though in the years to come he would be an ever-present joy and consolation, yet at the moment it was impossible to make him understand everything, for all his affectionate ways.

  When Christopher was twelve, there came an incident that was like a sharp blow to his father, and though Joseph reasoned with himself and pretended it was just childish nonsense, he was aware after this of a queer bitterness that clung to him, and a disappointment in his heart half sorrowful, half afraid. It happened that in the spring of that year the Janet Coombe made the record for the fastest passage from St Michaels to Bristol, and the ship remained there for the space of a few days to unload, after which she was to return to Plyn in ballast.

  Susan’s sister Cathie had married a shopkeeper in Bristol town, and there Joseph lodged for his visit. Cathie had been spending a little while with her sister in Plyn, and was returning in time to look after her brother-in-law. It was then that Joseph suggested that Cathie should bring back Christopher with her to Bristol, so that he should be able to sail with him on the Janet Coombe to Plyn.

  During the few days at Bristol Joseph wondered rather that Christopher did not show more interest in the unloading and the life of the quayside. If he himself as a boy had been given the chance of a visit to Bristol, he knew it would have been impossible to dr
ag him away from the shipping and the wharves, and that he would have gone hungry rather than miss the sight of a barque leaving the port, or the entrance of a full-rigged ship.

  Christopher, though exceedingly affectionate and pleased to see his father at meal-times, seemed perfectly content to be taken by his aunt to look in the shop windows of the town, and to carry her basket for her, never once suggesting that he should change his walk in the direction of the harbour.

  Again, nothing seemed to please him better than to be allowed to stand behind the counter in his uncle’s own shop, and be permitted to help serve the customers.

  At last the boy bade farewell to his uncle and aunt, and stepped aboard the Janet Coombe with his father. It was fun running about the deck and talking to the men, also it was a fine morning. After a day, though, the ship seemed a trifle cramped. It started raining, and Christopher, who hated getting wet, went below to the cabin. It was so small and stuffy, and such a squeeze too at night, sleeping in the poky bunk alongside of father.

  He didn’t fancy the food much, though he was too polite to say so. Joseph appearing for a moment down the companionway roared with laughter at his small pinched face.

  ‘Feelin’ her roll?’ he said, bringing an atmosphere of wet oilskin into the close cabin. ‘We’re in for a dirty night, so I reckon you’ll be a bit squeamish-like. Never mind,‘twon’t take long afore you have your sea-legs. Lie down in my bunk an’ take it easy, though speakin’ for myself, I got over it as a boy by climbin’ on deck an’ layin’ my hand to some work. You’ll find me on deck should you want a breath o’ air.’

  Christopher had no intention of going on deck. He lay on the bunk groaning and sniffing; every lurch of the little vessel was agony to him. Being in ballast of course the Janet Coombe pitched much worse than if she had been carrying a cargo, and they were reaching that part of the ocean where the Atlantic meets the Channel, and there was a heavy cross sea. All night it continued thus, with poor Christopher below. It wasn’t fair, he ought to have been told sailing was like this. Father was mean and unkind to bring him.