Warleggan

by Winston Graham

  He had been expecting, half dreading this meeting. Now that it had come, it had all the anticipated sense of shock, it brought all the old feelings alive. In the middle of his anger he recognized them, every one. Her brilliant hair blowing in the breeze was a renewed offence; so was the curve of her strong feminine mouth, the laughter in her eyes.

  Dwight said: ‘There are times, ma’am, when we can’t wait for the Last Trump, but must pass a little judgment by the way.’

  She swung up on her horse, and the animal sidestepped spiritedly on the cobbles. ‘And who is next to receive a chastising? May I accompany you for the entertainments?’

  ‘You may accompany me, but I’ve no entertainment to offer. I’m riding home now.’

  She shook her head. ‘You underrate yourself, Dr Enys. Your company is fair entertainment for me any day.’

  He bowed. ‘Thank you, but we differ as to that. Good day.’

  He rode off fairly boiling. She thought him a fool, and no doubt she was right. His life seemed bounded with futilities, and her being on the spot served to point them. He had just left St Ann’s when he heard the thump of hooves in the lane and Caroline drew abreast of him. Her groom was left behind.

  She said angrily: ‘We meet after fifteen months and you haven’t even a civil word for me!’

  That, he thought, was a trifle cool. ‘I’m old-fashioned in these matters, Miss Penvenen. I thought civility should be shown on both sides.’

  ‘I might have known better than to expect any from you.’

  ‘Indeed you might.’

  ‘The truth is that you do not like to be laughed at.’

  ‘That is the truth.’

  They were silent for a little way. She turned her whip over and over in her gloved hands and glanced at him. ‘I’m sorry.’

  He looked at her, startled, and she at once laughed.

  ‘There, Dr Enys, you didn’t expect me to say that and it has quite frightened you. You see how dangerous it is to prejudge a person. I should have thought your medical training would have warned you against it.’

  ‘So it should. The symptoms were deceptive.’

  ‘And now that you find yourself undeceived, don’t you owe me an apology?’

  ‘Yes . . . I’m sorry.’

  She inclined her head. ‘Do you think that if I show a properly sober frame of mind and promise never to laugh again, we might share this road as far as Trenwith?’

  ‘You’re staying with your uncle?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Unwin Trevaunance is down, I hear.’

  ‘He is.’

  The groom was not overtaking them but was following just out of earshot.

  ‘And how is the scurvy in Sawle?’ she asked.

  ‘Not so bad as last year. The potato crop didn’t fail, and I sometimes wonder if even potatoes help to keep it at bay. On the whole—’ He stopped and looked at her face; but if she was secretly deriding him, she gave no sign this time.

  ‘Perhaps I’m wrong in calling you Miss Penvenen.’

  ‘Why? Oh . . . No, I’m not married yet.’

  ‘Is it to be soon?’

  She wrinkled her nose. ‘Not soon. At least, not to Unwin. He’s jilted me.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well, I’m not sure which way round it was, but Uncle says it was the other way. Uncle was in the greatest of a passion when he learned of it – said I had been leading Unwin a dance. But really, Dr Enys, there’s no harm in a man performing a dance once in a while, is there? Why should I sell myself to Unwin just to become Lady Trevaunance when Sir John dies? I was not meant to be an MP’s wife. I should get no pleasure in spending all my money furthering Unwin’s career. I’d better prefer to spend it furthering my own!’

  Dwight hoped his feelings did not show in his face.

  ‘And what brought you to this sudden decision?’

  ‘Oh . . .’ A glint came into her eyes. ‘I think it was my first real meeting with Ross Poldark.’

  ‘Ross Poldark happens to be married.’

  ‘Yes . . . and incidentally last night had no eyes for anyone but his cousin-in-law – that lovely fair-haired woman with the grey eyes. I think that’s their relationship, isn’t it? But it looked closer.’

  ‘You misunderstood it. Anyway—’

  ‘Anyway, he had no eyes for me, you were going to say. Quite true. I shouldn’t object to Poldark as a husband, I believe, but someone spoke him first. No . . . what I mean is that when one sees a ship of the line, one is that much less content with a third-rater. Do you understand me, dear Dr Enys?’

  ‘I understand you,’ said Dwight, wondering what his own category was in His Majesty’s Navy.

  ‘So you can appreciate it is a very sad story,’ said Caroline, ‘of a young woman left almost at the church door, and no redress. Can you wonder that at any moment she may fall ill and go into a decline?’

  ‘I can understand,’ Dwight said, ‘that she will now have more time on her hands.’

  There was a long pause. After it Caroline said steadily: ‘You dislike me very much, don’t you?’

  He flushed. ‘D’you really think that?’

  ‘Have you ever given me cause to think otherwise?’

  They had already passed Trenwith, passed her turning for Killewarren. He said suddenly: ‘If what I feel for you is dislike – for coming between me and my work sometime every day in the last fifteen months – if that’s dislike . . . If being unable to forget your voice, or the way you turn your neck, or the lights in your hair – if that’s dislike . . . If wanting to hear that you’re married and dreading to hear that you’re married . . . If resenting the condescension that pretends you’re not out of my reach . . .’ He stopped, unable to finish his sentences. ‘Perhaps you can identify these symptoms for me.’

  They rode on in silence, and then Caroline reined in her horse.

  ‘I must go back. I shall be late for dinner as it is. Tell me, do you ever ride for pleasure?’

  ‘Seldom.’

  ‘I shall be out on Thursday early. Would you like to meet me at the gates soon after seven?’

  At least she was not laughing now. He could hardly believe that within ten minutes of their meeting all his good resolutions had been tipped overboard, with apparently no effort on her part and no resistance on his. He knew as plainly as if it had been issued by proclamation that, Unwin or no Unwin, Caroline was not for him. Her uncles would make very sure that she either married a title or more money. A penniless doctor with a good name but nothing to it would be better occupied putting straws in his hair.

  The groom was coming up with them. She said: ‘Or I could be ill if you preferred it. How long does it take to develop the scurvy?’

  ‘It’s an unpleasant disease,’ Dwight said, taking off his hat, ‘and so bad for the complexion. I shouldn’t advise it.’

  A week passed before Malcolm McNeil paid his visit to Nampara. He walked over one bright summerless afternoon, without prior notice since he wanted it that way, and on foot since he was keen to harden himself before returning to duty. As he came down the valley, he noticed the changes that three years had brought. On the opposite hill was a new mine with a pumping engine hissing and clanking, and a whole litter of sheds and piles of refuse, and leets and a smithy and a spalling house. Industry had advanced at the expense of farming. More fields lay fallow than a rotation of crops justified, and there were few cattle or sheep or pigs about. A dark-lashed baby was asleep in a cot near the front door. The servant who let him in left him in the parlour, which seemed to him to have become smaller and poorer since his last visit. A kitten came and mewed round his legs, and he picked it up and gave it his forefinger to bite.

  Mrs Poldark was about five minutes, and she looked flushed when she came in.

  ‘I’m sure this is an ill-chosen time, ma’am,’ he said. ‘I was passing and thought to avail myself of your kindness . . .’

  ‘No, not at all. But Ross, I’m sorry to say, isn’t here. He’s
over to the mine. I’ll send Gimlett to fetch him.’

  McNeil vigorously protested, and she allowed herself to be persuaded, knowing that Ross was likely to be deep in some work – probably fathoms deep – and would not want interruption. McNeil sat down and fastened his moustache more firmly in and let the kitten slide on to the shabby rug.

  Being a Scotsman and a widely travelled one, he had not been much impressed by the women in these parts on his last visit. But there had been three good-lookers at the party the other evening, and this Mrs Poldark was the one with that little something more than looks which teased his curiosity. He fancied he knew potentialities when he saw them; and a spark was seldom long absent from this young woman’s fine eyes. It was like the glint of a soldier’s sabre at night.

  He said: ‘You have heard the latest war news, perhaps?’

  ‘War news? I didn’t know we were at war.’

  He smiled. ‘Nor are we, ma’am. I mean the French war with the Austrians. The information has just come through.’

  ‘Is it good or bad?’

  ‘Oh, good. Without question. The French broke into Belgium like a rabble, it’s said, expecting no doubt to make men run at the sight of their unshaven faces; but when they met the Austrians, one disciplined charge was enough; the whole French army tairned and ran from the battlefield. And when their own officers – their own generals – tried to stop them, they murdered them, stabbing them with bayonets!’

  ‘And what does that mean? That France is defeated already? Have they other armies?’

  ‘None in the field . . . So much for your revolutionaries. It’s strange how nairvous people have been at the thought of these cut-throats let loose. Folk forget that when a country throws away its discipline it throws away its strength. I trust this will be a lesson to the noisy windbags in Paris.’ He paused and stretched a booted leg and twisted his moustache. ‘Though for myself . . .’

  Demelza waited. ‘What for yourself, Captain McNeil?’

  ‘Well, I confess I should not have been discontented to have a tilt at them some way or another. I should not be wishing Britain into war, ye understand, but for a soldier a small bout of fighting now and then restores his self-respect.’

  ‘I shouldn’t have thought ’twould be likely you would lose that.’

  ‘No, ma’am. But in times of peace one is sent on – one is liable to be called upon for distasteful and rather shabby missions which . . .’ McNeil stopped and withdrew his leg and looked at Demelza. Demelza looked at him without a flicker of a change of expression. He swallowed and said: ‘I’m sorry. I thought I heard a baby crying.’

  She got up and went quickly to the window, peered out. ‘No. I can see him. He’s still asleep.’

  ‘Perhaps it’s your little girl. Though by now I suppose she will be—’

  ‘She died, Captain McNeil. More than two years ago.’

  ‘Oh . . .’ He got up. ‘Forgive me, ma’am. I’m sorry.’

  Demelza came back. ‘It’s nothing to forgive. You were not to know.’ She stood by the table for a moment, fairly close to him. ‘Pray sit down.’

  ‘It must have been a grievous blow. You will feel a gap in your life . . .’

  ‘It is hard to explain, for ’tis more than a gap. Or it has been with us. There is a change. Nothing hasn’t been the same since. Those who are left are different people trying to live the same lives.’

  McNeil stood looking at her. He cursed himself for having got the conversation on the wrong leg. Yet in what she said he detected an alloy of something besides sadness. She did not look in the least a discontented woman, but all clearly was not well between her and life. It might be a circumstance worth exploring.

  Ross was not, as Demelza not unreasonably supposed, fathoms deep; he was in conference with Francis and Captain Henshawe in the changing shed near the mine. The two young engineers, Bull and Trevithick, who had built the engine, had been over to correct a minor fault, and Ross had taken the opportunity of sounding them on the potentialities of their child. It seemed plain to him, and they confirmed it, that the engine was capable of a good deal more than was at present demanded; and he proposed that the main shaft should be sunk another twenty fathoms so that two new levels could be begun. This meant engaging more men; but as he pointed out to Henshawe and Francis, the prospect of profit was increased out of proportion to the expense. The great expense was the engine. While it worked, let it do the maximum.

  Francis the gambler was all for it, Henshawe more cautious; but inevitably, as the chief partners, the cousins had their way. Henshawe’s interest was nominal, and in any case he was not an obstructive man. He knew Ross’s overriding need of quick results. Nor did he comment, as he might have done, that in his wide experience of mines in this district he had seldom known the copper lodes to improve with depth, as was often the case further west. Nothing was so unpredictable as a mine – one reason why they were always feminine – and he was not prepared to take the responsibility of standing in the way of Ross’s instinct.

  After the meeting Ross walked home alone, content that the effort was to be made but content with nothing else.

  Elizabeth’s confession at the party had had an unexpected effect on him. Behind the strong and sometimes lawless impulses that moved him from time to time was a bitterly clear-minded critic who saw his own acts, usually after he had performed them, with great detachment. Sometimes, though not very often, this critic turned on others. It did so now on Elizabeth. She wasn’t at all less attractive to him – much the reverse. But he found himself liking her less. Her single mistake had distorted all their lives, pulling them out of their natural pattern. Then, having picked the wrong man, she had let him know it, and he, deprived of her love but not of his need for her, had run the conversational course downhill watched and blamed by Ross who thought he had all he could desire. Their lives had been the tragedy of one woman who couldn’t make up her mind.

  Far better now if he had never known. The knowledge served no purpose but to destroy what was left of his peace of mind. The result of all this, contrariwise, had been a new warmth in his feelings for Demelza. He wouldn’t have been able to explain why, unless it was that he felt Demelza incapable of any such behaviour.

  When he got to his own front door he heard a man’s voice and surprised the coattails of Malcolm McNeil, who was just taking his leave.

  Demelza smiled over her visitor’s shoulder. ‘Oh, Ross, I was afraid you was underground, or I should have sent for you. Captain McNeil has been entertaining me with stories of the American war. I wonder you never speak of it yourself.’

  McNeil said: ‘Captain Poldark is more modest, I’ve no doubt. The latest news suggests we shall not need him again just yet.’

  ‘Oh, you’ve heard it?’ said Ross in slight disappointment. ‘My cousin has just told me. It may of course be exaggerated.’

  ‘From what I gather, the road to Paris is open. The sooner the city is occupied the better.’

  ‘No doubt you’re right. I confess I still have a sneaking sympathy for the republicans – if only they would behave like reasonable men and not like apes. If I were a Parisian, I should not want to open the gates to Francis of Austria.’

  McNeil said: ‘By the way, did ye hear more of the man who killed his wife when I was last here, and escaped from your cove?’

  ‘Mark Daniel? No. I expect he was drowned. The dinghy he stole from us was barely seaworthy.’

  ‘Indeed, so?’ McNeil looked at Ross with an unbelieving eye. ‘Well, I’ll be on my way. I’m returning to Salisbury in a few days’ time, but I doubt I shall be down again before long. It is a fascinating part.’

  This last remark he seemed to address to Demelza. She said: ‘I hope you’ll take back a good report of our behaviour this time.’

  McNeil said: ‘How could I do otherwise, ma’am?’

  Ross watched the Scotsman’s broad-shouldered figure walking briskly up the valley.

  ‘He is a thought less impressive
out of his soldier’s clothes. I hope he did not come here because he suspects us of being concerned in the tub-carrying.’

  ‘Oh, no, he invited himself to call when we met last week. He is here only for his health this time. He has no interest in smuggling at all.’

  ‘Did he tell you so?’

  ‘Yes . . . Yes, he did.’

  ‘H’m,’ said Ross.

  Demelza’s indignation grew with her alarm. ‘I don’t see that there is any reason to suspect him at all!’

  ‘Only that that was his business last time, and Cornwall is a long way to come just for a convalescence.’

  ‘I’m certain sure you’re wrong.’

  ‘You were careful what you said, I suppose?’

  ‘Of course! You should know I am more frightened of discovery than you are.’

  Ross said musingly: ‘I think I shall ride over and see Tremcrom tomorrow.’

  ‘Why? He promised there was to be no more landing in our cove until September.’

  ‘No, nor shall there be. I want to locate Mark Daniel.’

  ‘I should not suppose it safe for him to come back.’

  ‘No. But he was in Cherbourg last Christmas. You know why we opened Wheal Grace. It was part on account of the old maps, part on account of what Mark told us when he hid in the old workings before we helped him to escape. Well, we have spent months trying to find out what he found. Why should we not get him to help us? In a few more months it will be too late.’

  ‘I’d rather Mark came than you went, Ross. Up till now you’ve taken no real part in the Trade.’

  ‘Well, the first thing is to see if he can be found.’

  ‘No, Ross, that isn’t the first thing.’

  ‘All right, I’ll not go if it can be avoided.’

  Mr Trencrom lived in an unpretentious six-roomed house tucked away as if not to be seen behind a sharp cleft in the hillside half a mile from the village of St Ann’s. Although it was known that he was a very rich man, no evidences of wealth were allowed to appear in his house or in the clothes he wore, and there was plenty of speculation as to where he kept his money and what he did with it. Nothing suggested the miser in the size of his body or the warmth of his welcome when Ross called the next evening; and Ross came straight to the point, explaining the inquiries he would like put in hand.