Demelza

by Winston Graham

  “How many?”

  “One.”

  “I’ll take the book,” Ross said and threw away all five.

  And then it seemed that he forgot Sanson had to draw first, for he stretched out his hand to draw at the same time. Their hands somehow got mixed up with each other, and instead of drawing more cards, Ross’s hand had caught Sanson’s wrist. Sanson gave a grunt as Ross slowly turned his hand up. In the palm of the hand was the king of trumps.

  There was a moment’s silence.

  Ross said, “I wonder if you will explain how you came to have a card in your hand before you drew one from the pack.”

  Sanson looked as if he was going to faint. “Nonsense,” he said. “I had already drawn the card when you caught it.”

  “I rather think that was so, Ross,” said George Warleggan. “If—”

  “Oh, no, he had not!” Hick and Vosper broke in together.

  Ross suddenly released the fat man’s wrist and, instead, caught him by the ruffles of his shirt, pulling him out of his seat and half across the table.

  “Let me see if there are any more tricks inside you.” In a moment the quiet scene had broken into confusion. The table was upset and sovereigns and guineas were rolling across the floor. Sanson was struggling on his back while Ross ripped open his shirt and pulled his coat off.

  There were two playing cards in the inner pocket of his coat. That was all.

  Ross got up and began to examine the coat, taking out his own bills and putting them on a chair. Sanson stood there mutely and then made a sudden rush to retrieve his coat. Ross held him off, then dropped the coat and thrust him sharply away. The man half sat in a chair, choked, got up again. Ross twisted him around and took him by the back of his shirt and the seat of his silk breeches.

  “Open the window, Francis,” he said.

  “Listen, Ross”—George interposed his heavy figure—“we don’t want any horseplay—”

  But Ross stepped aside and carried the struggling miller to the french window. They went out and down the four steps. Some of the others followed, but George Warleggan did not go farther than the top step.

  The river was out. Under the late stars it looked like a black pit with sloping sides. As he got near the bank, Sanson began to struggle harder and tried to kick himself free. They neared the edge. On the very brink he began to shout for help. Ross shook him till he stopped. Then he tensed his muscles, lifted the man off his feet, swung back and away. The effort nearly took him over the brink himself. Sanson’s shouts, thin and childlike, ended in a heavy plop.

  Ross recovered his balance and stared down. He could see nothing. He turned away and went back to the house, not looking at any of the people he met. Near the steps George caught his arm.

  “Has he gone in the river?”

  “He has gone where the river should be. It was not at home.”

  “Man, he’ll suffocate in that mud!”

  Ross looked at him. Their eyes met together with a peculiar glint, like the memory of an old strife.

  “I am sorry for assaulting your guest and causing this commotion,” Ross said. “But if you will give such fellows the protection of your roof, you should arrange for a more convenient way of disposal.” He went in.

  • • •

  Demelza had been in the bedroom ten minutes when Ross came up. She had undressed, hanging up her lovely frock in the massive mahogany wardrobe, and taken down her hair and combed it and put on her nightdress with the frill of lace under her chin. She looked about sixteen, sitting up in bed and watching him with a wary expression.

  For though she understood Ross’s mood she did not know how to manage it. He was beyond her.

  He shut the door and glanced at her, eyes so light-colored, as they always were when he was angry. He looked at her sitting there and then looked down at something in his hand.

  “I have brought your brooch,” he said. He was dead sober, might not have touched a glass all day.

  “Oh, thank you.”

  “You left it on the chair.”

  “I didn’t rightly like to touch it, Ross.”

  He moved over and put it on the dressing table. “Thank you for the loan of it.”

  “Well, I—I—I didn’t like to think of Wheal Leisure, all your planning and scheming. Have you got it all back?”

  “What?”

  “All you lost tonight.”

  “Oh, yes.” He began to undress.

  “When did you first think he was cheating, Ross?”

  “I don’t know… When you came. No, later than that, but I wasn’t sure.”

  “Was that why you wouldn’t let up?”

  “At times he didn’t cheat and then I began to win. I knew if I kept on long enough he’d have to start cheating again. His hands kept getting sticky with sweat; it was my chief hope.”

  “What happened to him, Ross? He wasn’t suffocated?”

  “George got two servants.”

  “I’m glad. Not for his sake, but…” She began to slip out of bed.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To put the brooch away safe. I couldn’t sleep with it lying there.”

  “You’ll have to sleep with it lying somewhere.”

  “Then let it be under my pillow.”

  She looked tall and very young and slender in her long white cotton nightgown. She did not look like the mother of Julia.

  Ross caught her elbows as she came back.

  “Demelza,” he said.

  She stopped and looked up into his strained face, still uncertain.

  “It has not been a good night for your debut into society.”

  “No,” she said, lowering her head.

  His hands went around the back of her neck and buried themselves in the mass of her hair where it curled over her shoulders. He pulled on it gently until she was again meeting his gaze.

  “Those things I said to you in the dance room.”

  “Yes?”

  “They were not well said.”

  “About?”

  “You had a right to the attentions of those men since I was so neglectful.”

  “Oh…but I knew why you were. It wasn’t for want of knowing—or sympathizing. I was worried. They came around like a swarm o’ bees. I didn’t have time to think. And then when you came…”

  She climbed back into the big curtained bed, and he sat on the edge on her side, his feet on the step. She nursed her knees and looked at him.

  “And then there was Verity.”

  “Verity?”

  She told him.

  A long silence followed, one of those communicative, friendly silences that frequently fell between them.

  “Oh, God,” he said. “It is a wry world.” He leaned back against her knees. “All this week I’ve wanted to strike at the air, for there was nothing more substantial to strike at. As you know. But I believe I am too tired to hate anymore just at present, Demelza.”

  “I’m glad,” she said.

  After a few minutes, he got into bed beside her and lay quiet, staring up at the canopy of the bed. Then he leaned across and blew out the candle.

  She put her arms about him and drew his head onto her shoulder.

  “This,” he said, “is the first time I have been sober for four days.”

  It was the first time they had ever lain like that, but she did not say so.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  There was no doubt next morning that the Warleggans looked with disfavor on the end of the gaming quarrel. Constraint and stiffness were marked. Ross wondered if they expected their guests to sit down and be ruined in silence.

  But he did not have much time for considering the matter just then, for he had to see Harris Pascoe before they left for home.

  All during those days, the cop
per company had almost been forgotten, but now there was much business to do and much to discuss. After a while, the banker said nervously, “I hear you have been in Launceston for a few days.”

  “So you’ve heard.”

  “It is a curious thing, you know, that I hardly ever stir from my house except now and then to walk up the hill for the good of my health—and yet all the n-news of the world comes to me. I trust you’re no worse for the adventure?”

  “No worse if you mean in body. Of course there is another few days for the fever to come out.”

  Pascoe winced slightly. “I—er—gather that your action in breaking open the jail has not been a popular one.”

  “I did not expect it to be.”

  “Quite so. The young man died? Yes… Mind you, I don’t think very much will come of it in that case. The question of whether the prison was, in fact, fit for human habitation would naturally come up at any inquiry on your behavior, and it would not be in the interests of the magistrates concerned to have too much publicity given to the incident. Really, you know, almost all of them are well-meaning gentry with apathy as their worst crime. Many of them rule with admirable public spirit. And they have regard enough for what the country thinks not to wish to show up badly. I think they will decide to close their ranks and ignore your part in it. That’s my personal opinion for what it’s worth.”

  Ross tapped his riding boot.

  “It is p-perhaps a little unfortunate,” Pascoe said, looking out of the window, “that several of your fellow shareholders on the Carnmore Copper Company should be, so to say, on the other side of the fence.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, they are magistrates, are they not, and as such likely to see the matter in their own light: St. Aubyn Tresize and Alfred Barbary and the others. However, that may not at all eventuate.”

  Ross grunted and rose. “We shall have plenty to fight without fighting among ourselves.”

  Pascoe fixed his spectacles and dusted some snuff off his coat. “I was not at the ball last night, but I am told the Assembly altogether was most enjoyable. Your wife, I understand, was quite the success of the evening.”

  Ross looked up sharply. Pascoe was not normally a man of sarcasm.

  “In what way?”

  The banker met his gaze in slight surprise. “In the pleasantest way, I imagine. If there is an unpleasant way of being a success I have yet to learn it.”

  “Oh,” said Ross. “Yes. I was very much out of sorts last night. I took little notice.”

  “I hope it isn’t any symptoms of the fever?”

  “Oh, no… You were saying?”

  “About what?”

  “About my wife.”

  “Oh, I was merely repeating what came my way. Several ladies remarked on her beauty. And I believe the lord lieutenant asked who she was.”

  “Oh,” said Ross, trying not to show his surprise. “That is very gratifying.”

  Harris Pascoe went with him to the door. “You’re staying with the Warleggans?”

  “We could hardly refuse. I don’t think we are likely to be asked again, for the news of my being concerned in the copper company can’t be long in leaking out.”

  “N-no. And the trouble last night between yourself and Matthew Sanson will be a further strain on good feeling.”

  “You’re certainly well informed.”

  Pascoe smiled. “A man named Vosper told me. But that s-sort of quarrel is soon about the town.”

  “There’s no reason why it should be a reflection on the Warleggans. They were not even playing at the time.”

  “No, but he’s a cousin, you know.”

  Ross halted. “Of the Warleggans? I didn’t know.”

  “The old man, the grandfather—you knew he was a blacksmith? Yes, well he had three children. The daughter married a good-for-nothing fellow named Sanson, father of Matthew Sanson. The eldest child of the old man is Nicholas, George’s father, and the younger son is Cary.”

  “Oh,” said Ross, thinking it over. There was a lot to think over. “He’s a miller by trade, isn’t he?”

  “S-so they call him,” said Harris Pascoe with a peculiar expression.

  • • •

  They took leave of the Warleggans at one, George magnanimously coming down the steps to see them off. No word more of the fracas of the night, and Sanson was as if he had never been. They separated with laughter and thanks and various insincere promises to meet again very soon, and the five Poldarks turned their horses up Princes Street. As she was about to mount, an ostler from the Seven Stars Tavern came across to Demelza and gave her a sealed letter, but with so many people about she only had time to thrust it into the pocket of her riding coat and hope that the others hadn’t noticed.

  They did not leave constraint behind, for Francis had not spoken a word to his sister since the previous night, and while they rode bunched together no one seemed inclined to talk. But when they reached the open moors, Ross and Francis rode ahead and the three girls followed in line abreast, with the two Trenwith servants and the baggage on ponies behind. So it happened that Ross and Francis had the last friendly talk they were to have for many a day, and behind them, since Verity had nothing to say, Elizabeth and Demelza spoke together as equals for the first time in their lives.

  Ross and Francis, carefully avoiding the subject of Captain Blamey, talked of Matthew Sanson. Francis had not known of his relationship with the Warleggans.

  “Damn me,” said Francis. “What troubles me is that I have played with the skunk for the last three years. There’s no question but that he has been the greatest gainer. He used to lose sometimes but seldom to me. It gives me to wonder how much I’ve been cheated.”

  “Of most of it, I should guess. Look, Francis, I don’t think this should stay as it is. I’ve no more to gain by pursuing it. But you have. And so must others have. I don’t think you can afford to consider the Warleggans.”

  “We might try to squeeze some of his back winnings out of him?”

  “Why not? He’s a miller and swimming in money. Why should he not be made to pay?”

  “I wish I had thought of it before we left; I could have sounded some of those I know will be feeling sore. I’ve an uncomfortable feeling that before we can do anything he will clear out of the district.”

  “Well, there are his mills. He can’t abandon them.”

  “N-no.”

  Ross saw that Demelza and Elizabeth were talking, and the sound of their voices on the wind gave him pleasure. It would be strange and gratifying if those two women made up a friendship. He had always wanted that.

  When they reached Trenwith, they had to go in and take tea. And Geoffrey Charles had to be inspected as well as Julia, so it was late before Ross, carrying the crowing baby in his arms, and Demelza, edging up her horse to peer at his bundle, began the last three miles to Nampara.

  “Verity has taken it bad again,” Ross said. “Sitting there through tea scarcely speaking. Her expression made me uneasy. Thank God, at least, that we had no part in it.”

  “No, Ross,” said Demelza, the letter burning in her pocket. She had looked at it a moment at Trenwith.

  Mistress Demelza,

  Since you brought us together this second time, I turn to you for further help at this crisis in our affairs. Francis is quite impossible; there can never be any reconciliation. Therefore Verity must choose, and choose quickly between us. I do not fear her choice but only lack the means to communicate with her and make final arrangements. It is in this that I ask for your help…

  “No, Ross,” Demelza said.

  As they reached the coppice, turning into their valley, the sun came out, and they stopped a moment to look down. He said suddenly, “I dislike coming back today, to our house and to our land, because it’s to the thought of Jinny’s misery and to my failure.�
�

  She put her hand on his. “No, Ross, it can’t be. We’re coming back to our happiness and to our success. I’m sad for Jinny too, shall always be, but we can’t let other people’s misery spoil our lives. We can’t, for else there’d be no happiness for anyone ever again. We can’t be all tied up one with another like that, or why did God make us separate? While we’ve got our happiness we must enjoy it, for who knows how long it will last?”

  He looked at her.

  “That’s all ours,” she said, “and we must cherish it, Ross. ’Tis no good crying for the moon and wanting everyone to be so lucky as we are. I’m content an’ I want you to be the same. You were once, not so long ago. Have I failed you?”

  “No,” he said. “You have not failed me.”

  She took a deep breath. “How lovely it is to see the sea after being away for more than a day.”

  He laughed a little—the first time since he had come home.

  The wind had been blowing from the southeast for a fortnight. Sometimes the sea had been flat and green and at others full of spumy feathery breakers, but a great swell had developed. They could see the long line of breakers parading slowly in, the sun-green tops breaking far out and spreading the whole bay with white valleys of glinting foam.

  As they dipped among the trees Garrick came bounding toward them, froth on his mouth and his red tongue lolling with excitement. Darkie knew him and ignored the show, but Caerhays, Demelza’s new horse, did not like it a bit and there was some sidestepping and head-shaking before it all quieted down. As they restarted they saw a girl’s figure running across toward the rising ground on the side. Her long black hair blew out, and she carried a bag, which she swung as she ran.

  “That’s Keren Daniel again,” said Demelza. “Whenever she goes to Sawle for anything she takes a shortcut back across my garden.”

  “No one has told her different, I suppose. By the way, I was asked this morning if Dwight Enys was going with a woman in the neighborhood. Have you heard any such rumor?”

  “No,” said Demelza, and then everything slipped into place. “Oh.”

  “What is it?”

  “Nothing.”

  They reached the bridge and crossed it. Ross had the sudden impulse to meet Demelza’s desire for happiness, to atone to her for what had been unpleasant in the previous night. Why not? Strange sometimes how easy bitter words came, how hard the kind ones.