White Rivers

by White Rivers (retail) (epub)

  And yet… why had they been left to her, if they were not meant to be read? With infuriating logic, Philip had pointed it out more than once, and had finally given up when she had refused to even think about it, as stubborn as only a true Tremayne could be.

  One day she vowed to read them, but to record her family’s history in detail was something she had avoided all these years. She didn’t care to think about doing it now. Unless it was all made into a completely fictional account, exorcising the past in a subliminal way. She didn’t deny the charm and the magnitude of it, but as always she dismissed it, still certain that such intimate thoughts should be private and had never been intended for the public gaze.

  She refused to think about it any more. The April sunshine beckoned her outdoors, to do what her womenfolk had always done when something troubled them, however undefined it was: take to the moors and the open spaces…

  * * *

  Once there, she parked her car near the pottery, and then set out to walk across the moors, revelling in the cleanliness of the air and the solitude; it was then she heard the voice.

  ‘So, young madam, ’tis a goodly while since you’ve been upalong these parts, and wi’ such a pensive look on your pretty face too. Is it old Helza you’m coming to see?’

  Lost in her moorland reverie, Skye spun around, her heart thudding. If she believed in such things, she could readily fancy that the old crone had metamorphosed out of thin air, as spindly and spiky-haired as ever, her darting little witchwoman’s eyes assessing every inch of the curvaceous shape of Skye Norwood.

  Even as she gulped, unnerved as always by the sight of old Helza with her arms habitually full of sticks, the old crone cackled in a way that threatened to curdle the blood.

  ‘You startled me,’ Skye said crossly, knowing that showing anger was the best way to hide fear. And she was no gullible child to be taken in by superstitious nonsense, for pity’s sake. She was a mature wife and mother…

  ‘Oh ah. And what was filling your head so much that ’ee couldn’t see a body four feet ahead of ’ee, then?’

  ‘It’s none of your business.’

  Helza cocked her wizened little head on one side. Skye knew she should just brush past her and carry on with her walk, but for the life of her, she couldn’t do it. It was as if she was transfixed by those mesmerising eyes.

  ‘And what of your business then? The pots be doing well, by all accounts, and a fine living’s come out of the ashes.’

  Skye flinched. ‘Is it money you want? I have a little with me.’

  Helza cackled again. ‘No, my pretty one. I want no money from you today.’

  ‘What then?’ Skye said, her mouth dry.

  Why couldn’t she just pass? It was no more than coincidence that had brought her this way, much further than she had intended, to where the old Larnie Stone reared its head into the sky, and the town of St Austell could be seen through the hole in its granite middle.

  She shivered as her eyes were drawn to it, knowing the old tale of her grandmother’s tragic friend, the girl Skye’s own daughter Celia had been named after.

  ‘I see you ain’t forgot the tale I told ’ee, my pretty,’ Helza said with satisfaction, as if reading her mind.

  ‘I haven’t forgotten a thing,’ Skye said, remembering the hoarse way the tale had been related in the old crone’s stinking hovel. Nor could she forget what she owed her – if her darkest suspicions were to be believed. Though did you really owe somebody a debt for setting fire to premises with a person still in it – however despicable that person was? It was tantamount to being a partner in the crime, and that was certainly something Skye had tried to forget over the years.

  But she shivered again, remembering the near-rape in the old linhay at Clay Two, when the oafish Desmond Lock had overpowered her before Helza had appeared, to terrify him. And then the horror of discovering that the linhay had mysteriously burned down, with only the boot from Desmond’s clubbed foot to be found. Skye’s eyes glazed, hearing Helza’s cackling laugh, and she closed her eyes tightly for a few moments, willing the memories away. When she opened them again, the witchwoman had gone.

  ‘You’re becoming as moonstruck as that one,’ she said furiously, talking to the air, then twisting her lips as she realised how the action matched the words.

  She struck out purposefully towards the splendid edifice some distance ahead of her now, and tried to force back into her veins the familiar warm glow of pride in its conception.

  White Rivers Pottery had grown, truly like a phoenix from the ashes, from the humble linhay of Clay Two, to the splendid workshop and showroom it was today. The whole site of the old Clay Two pit had been landscaped and sculptured into an attraction in its own right.

  The old dirt tracks had been transformed into proper roads, where visiting folk could drive their motor cars and watch the potters at work if they were so inclined, and then browse to their hearts’ content in the showroom. Some astute advertising in The Informer newspaper had ensured that the opening day had been well attended, and in the six years since the pottery had become a reality, it had never looked back.

  Gradually, Skye felt herself relax, calling herself all kinds of foolish names for heeding an old moorswoman’s taunts. Sensible folk scoffed at Helza anyway – at least, they did so once they were well away from her, Skye admitted. But in these more enlightened days, the general feeling among younger folk was that Helza had inherited few of the reputed powers of her so-called sister-witch, Zillah.

  Skye swallowed. She hadn’t felt so confident some years ago when she and a distant relative by the name of Lieutenant Lewis Pascoe of the American army, had visited Helza’s hovel, and been almost knocked back by the stench of it. They had learned of events in their mutual past that were too horrific to accept, and yet too appallingly believable to be anything but true. Things that linked them together, and drove them apart. Things concerning her grandmother Morwen, and Celia Penry, her own daughter’s namesake…

  She pushed the memories away as she saw the young lad approaching her now.

  ‘Are you took bad, Missus – Ma’am? You’ve been standing so still it made me fret for you. Are you needing a doctor, or a quiet sit down, maybe?’

  At that moment the concerned boyish voice was like balm to her ears, especially after the raucous sounds that Helza had made. She smiled swiftly at the young apprentice, clearly on his way back to the pottery from an errand, and blush-red now at speaking so personally to the vision that was Skye Norwood.

  Skye forced a smile to her cold lips. ‘You’re a honey, Ethan, but I’m perfectly well, thank you, and I’m just daydreaming, that’s all. So tell me, how is everything at White Rivers? Have you become an expert potter yet?’

  As they fell into step, she made herself sound interested in the work – which she was, of course, she reminded herself hastily. And so was this likeable lad, the spit of his brother Adam who was going to marry her cousin Vera in two weeks’ time. He was a generation younger than Adam, and Vera referred to him as his parents’ little afterthought, although there had been a brother between Ethan and Adam who had been killed in France. The oldest Pengelly brother, Nicholas, lived in Plymouth; he had clearly broken away from the family circle, if only moving over the border separating Cornwall from Devon. But to Skye, it was odd, and endearing – and sometimes a little alarming – how so many Cornish families seemed to rotate and intermingle; even the American branch of her own. It was almost incestuous – but not quite – and she quickly veered her thoughts away from the ugly word as she listened to Ethan’s stumbling reply to her question.

  ‘’Tis all going right well, Missus – Ma’am – and I’m starting to throw a fair pot, so me brother says.’

  ‘I’m sure you are. It’s not as easy as it looks, is it?’

  ‘Have you ever done it, then?’ Ethan asked in some astonishment that such a vision should ever dirty her hands with the clay.

  Skye laughed. ‘That I have, and a silly mess
I made of it, though at the time Mr Lock was kind enough to say it wasn’t a bad first effort.’

  ‘Would that be old Tom Lock that died t’other week? They say he had a weird son who worked up here long afore the pottery got properly built.’

  Skye kept her voice calm. ‘They both spent some time here in the old linhay a long time ago, and it was the son who died when the place burned down.’ She resisted a huge shudder, remembering again how the weird Desmo Lock had forced himself on her, and was only stopped by the very witchwoman she seemed so fatally attracted to contacting. After the linhay had burned down, with Desmo Lock in it, old Tom Lock’s brain had been turned because of it all.

  Two tragedies, and all on account of her – if her own beauty could be blamed for such a thing. Her thoughts became self-mocking for being so high and mighty as to think she was some twentieth-century Helen of Troy…

  ‘Did you know ’em very well?’ Ethan went on curiously, unwilling to leave the old tale alone.

  ‘No, I didn’t,’ she said crisply, ‘it was all a long time ago, and it’s best forgotten. And since we’re going to be related in a couple of weeks’ time, hadn’t you better start calling me Skye?’

  His fair-skinned blush deepened to scarlet. ‘I dunno,’ he said uneasily. ‘What will folk think?’

  She laughed, squeezing his arm at the innocent question. ‘When you’re all dressed up and slicked down, they’ll think what a well-mannered young man you are, and a credit to the family. And who gives a red cent what any other folk think!’

  His eyes were filled with admiration at this daring way of talking. But everyone knew that Mrs Norwood – Skye – was more progressive than most around here. It was because she was American, thought Ethan – and wished that he was too, if he could have a ha’porth of her self-confidence.

  ‘Me brother Nick’s comin’ back for it, Miss – ma’am – Skye – missus,’ he said, more confused than ever now. ‘He’s too busy to come back to see us too often.’

  ‘Well, I’m sure your mom will be glad to see him then,’ she said, thinking Nicholas Pengelly sounded a bit of a cold fish. ‘And it’s just Skye, remember?’

  * * *

  By the time Skye reached her car for the return journey to New World, she had recovered her composure. It was too golden a day to be in the doldrums for long, and things that were past and done with were best left in that secret place. After all, there was a wedding to look forward to, and her girls were going to look like angels.

  Her spirits began to lift at once, and she could laugh at herself for being briefly discontented with her lot. She might not be the mother of the bride, with the self-styled importance of Charlotte, but she was certainly the mother of the two smaller bridesmaids, and her own outfit had reached the final dressmaking stages.

  It was a dream of an ensemble, she thought, as she drove her car back down the hillside. A long, slim jacket in shades of green, over a straight-skirted frock of matching shot silk that was all the rage in Paris, the local dressmaker had told her earnestly; although, fairly predictably, Charlotte had exclaimed in horror on seeing the swatches of fabric. She remembered that brief, heated exchange now.

  ‘You can’t wear green, Skye. It’s unlucky, and it’s bad enough that Vera’s changing her name and not her letter without adding more chances of misfortune!’

  Skye had looked at her in exasperation. ‘I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about, but I’m not changing my mind about the outfit because of any old superstitious nonsense, Charlotte. Anyway, I don’t know what you mean about changing her name and not her letter.’

  ‘Oh well, I suppose we can’t expect you Americans to know everything,’ Charlotte said, clearly stung. ‘Our surname begins with P, and so does Adam’s, and everybody knows it’s a bad omen for two similars to wed.’

  Charlotte’s red face told her she believed everything she said, but Skye was too riled to spare her any sympathy.

  ‘And you honestly think that because a Pollard marries a Pengelly, this will spell disaster, do you? What about my own parents? That was more than a coincidence of letters. It was a Tremayne marrying a Tremayne, and there was no happier marriage in all the world!’

  But wasn’t she also aware that there was some dark secret about her parents’ beginning? Some reason why they had fled to America before a great scandal broke… and her Uncle Albie was undoubtedly involved somewhere along the line.

  But whatever the trouble was, they had survived it all, and it certainly hadn’t involved a premature birth, which would have been the worst disgrace of all. Skye’s brother Sinclair hadn’t arrived for some years after the marriage, and she was even later. As much of an afterthought as young Ethan Pengelly, perhaps, but a much-wanted one for all that. But she wished her cousin Charlotte hadn’t even put the memory of those thoughts into her mind.

  * * *

  Driving back to New World from the moors, and passing the glittering, sunlit tips of Killigrew Clay on the way, she knew the answer could very well be in those old diaries of Morwen Tremayne. And that was another thought that wouldn’t seem to go away.

  The answer could also come from Uncle Albert, she realised, but there were questions she never wanted to ask him. The last time her mother had been in Cornwall, when her own sweet Celia had been born, Skye had virtually seen the truth of it without the need for words.

  The brother and sister, Albert and Primrose – Primmy – Tremayne, had had a relationship that was once as close as sharing the same heart. No matter that it had been physically unfulfilled – and Skye was sure of that – just as she was sure that Albie had loved her mother with an agonising love.

  It could only have ended in one of two ways. Either lust would have won, or love would have superseded it. And thank God, love had come along in the shape of Cresswell Tremayne, Skye’s father.

  She jerked the car to a halt outside the house, realising her hands were damp. She knew so little of those past, shadowy days that were none of her business… and yet, sometimes it seemed that the memories that didn’t belong to her jostled to be known. As if someone was pushing them into her subconscious…

  ‘Dear Lord, I’m truly going crazy,’ she muttered. ‘I’ll end up being as mad as a country loon if I’m not careful.’

  Skye removed her hat and gloves, and went into the elegant bathroom alongside her bedroom to splash cold water onto her heated cheeks and hands, gazing at the face in the mirror. Morwen’s face. Angrily, she turned away, wanting to be herself and nobody else. For two pins she’d burn the damn diaries and be done with them; then she could never know the truth, and nor could anyone else. The hell of it was, she didn’t understand why it should be so important to her, anyway. No one else in the family gave a damn that Morwen had left them to her, or wanted to delve into the past.

  Deliberately, she made herself think of other things. Of the coming wedding, and the beastly little Sebby who could even overawe the inoffensive Ethan Pengelly at times. She fervently hoped the marriage between Vera and Adam would be a happy one. Vera deserved it.

  They had become friends during the war, and Skye didn’t forget how Vera had been such a brick when Skye had been terror-stricken at having to go on the wards in a French hospital and deal with sights that no young lady was ever meant to see. This was a humdinger of a thing to think about, she told herself now. But she only began to relax by imagining how cousin Lily would cope with being chief attendant, considering her lack of interest in all things romantic.

  Lily had apparently met the oldest Pengelly brother while attending a rough-and-ready women’s rights rally in Plymouth a few months back, and Vera and Adam had insisted she should call on him for politeness’ sake. Lily’s report was that he was very agreeable, but that she still wasn’t interested in men, thank you very much, and that if Vera’s idea had been a matchmaking scheme, it had failed dismally.

  Skye smiled, thinking of Lily’s indignant face at the time, and Vera’s innocent one. But it proved her own theo
ry. There was something inherently not quite right in the way these people wanted to cling to each other and to intermarry. Her smile faded slightly, remembering that her own folks had done the very same thing.

  * * *

  Plymouth had been home to Nicholas Pengelly for some years now. He was a practical man, and there was no yearning in his soul to return to the heart of Cornwall and his roots. Plymouth was near enough for his allegiance. He sent money home to his folks from time to time, but he always said it would take something very special to make him go back for good, and he hadn’t discovered it yet. But he had never believed in the word never, and a lawyer always had to see every side of things.

  The arrival of the strident Lily Pollard at his town house certainly hadn’t been the catalyst to make him think any differently. He wasn’t looking for a wife, and if he had been, she definitely wasn’t for him. He hoped the sister was a mite softer in temperament, for his brother Adam’s sake.

  He liked women as much as the next man. But at thirty-seven years old, he hadn’t seen one yet who made him want to give up his bachelor status. He freely admitted that, in part, the war years had seen to that, as they had done to so many others, instilling a sense of restlessness in their souls that had never existed before.

  Some of the men who had never ventured far from home prior to the war had become adventurers, looking for more than was under their noses. Nicholas had seen plenty of marriages broken up because of it. He had listened to enough of their heartaches, and tried to help them come to terms with what was left of broken dreams.

  His latest clients had been such a pair, and he was still fraught with their problems and bemoaning the fact to his partner who shared his chambers in the elegant riverside town house.

  ‘Will you just listen to me!’ he said now. ‘I’m starting to sound like a lonely hearts’ adviser, instead of a hard-headed lawyer.’