Bella Poldark

by Winston Graham

  This was the first time the two old friends had met since Canning had lost his eldest son of some wasting disease. It was pleasant to exchange news, and Canning was quick to congratulate Ross on his daughter’s marriage to Edward Fitzmaurice. George Canning had never been on the friendly terms that Ross had been with Henry Lansdowne, but he admired the family’s integrity and intellect while deploring their Whiggish tendencies.

  Canning himself was on the point of resigning from the government, and was in as low a spirit as Ross had ever seen him. In earlier days Canning had been friendly with Queen Caroline, so that in the controversy over her vulgar return he had felt it a measure of his loyalty to support her as best he could. That had alienated him completely from the King, who persisted in believing that soon after Caroline became the Queen she also became Canning’s mistress. Now in the latest turn Caroline was being tried for her alleged adultery with her Italian companion Bartolomeo Bergami.

  Canning was very uncertain as to his future, but would shortly go to Paris to rejoin his wife and daughter, and thought he would not return unless a Catholic Emancipation Bill should be brought forward in the New Year, in which case he would come over to speak in its favour.

  They parted as firmly friendly as ever, but Ross felt a sense of disappointment that this immensely gifted man should seem to be moving into a dead end. Long ago he should have been Prime Minister.

  Unknown to Ross, while he pondered the misfortunes of his distinguished friend, a little drama was playing itself out in George Street.

  Demelza and Bella had just finished their supper and been joined by Christopher, who listened to the news of their visit to Dr Ernest Faber. They were both uncertain about his prescription of ‘an heroic treatment’ for the voice, and Christopher was indignant.

  ‘It is as true of voice specialists as a friend of mine said it was over rheumatism: you choose your treatment and then go to the doctor who prescribes it. Every medic has a cure, nobody agrees what it is.’

  ‘I should prefer rheumatism,’ said Bella.

  ‘Oh, there are heroic treatments for that too,’ said Christopher, ‘such as jumping from a bath of hot water into one of cold, and then back again, six times. I’m sure you will disregard Dr Faber. I can think of nothing more likely to irritate the throat than nitric acid.’

  ‘I told Mrs Parkins when we came in,’ said Demelza, ‘and she said she had had an actress staying here last year and she used some such acid.’

  ‘And did she survive?’

  ‘I suppose so. But I have already advised Bella not to touch the stuff. I’d sooner consult Meggy Dawes.’

  ‘I’ve smelt it,’ said Bella. ‘It could be worse.’

  There was a tap at the door. Demelza was nearest and opened it.

  Mrs Parkins said: ‘Excuse me, m’lady, but there be a young man to see Miss Isabella.’

  Something conspiratorial about her: Demelza went out into the passage. Three steps lower down was Maurice Valéry.

  ‘Lady Poldark,’ he said, advancing and bending to kiss her hand.

  She put her other hand to her own lips. ‘Monsieur Valéry. Quiet, please. It – it is not convenient—’

  ‘I have come to see Bella. I only heard yesterday that she was in London.’

  ‘Monsieur, unfortunately it is not convenient—’

  ‘Why? Is she not well enough? She wrote me saying she was much better.’

  ‘Yes, she is much better. But Lieutenant Havergal has just come to see her.’

  That stopped him in his tracks. ‘That is unfortunate. I have been travelling all day, and I must return tomorrow. Her voice – she said it was still troubling her?’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘I went first to Madame Pelham’s thinking you would be staying there. I must see her—’

  The door opened behind Demelza and Bella looked out.

  ‘Maurice!’ she breathed. ‘Oh, my God!’ She hesitated. Then: ‘Pray come in.’

  It was a pleasant living room, the one where Demelza specially remembered she had rebuffed Mark Adderley and where she had nursed Ross with the pistol wound in his arm. A long mirror doubled the image of Christopher Havergal looking towards them as they came in.

  ‘Christopher,’ she said, determined to head off a first explosion, ‘you will know Maurice Valéry. He has just arrived from France and called to see how Bella is.’

  Christopher’s face was white and taut. ‘Then he will not need me to greet him. If you will give me leave, I shall go now and call some other time when Valéry has returned whence he came.’

  Bella put her hand up. ‘No. You must stay, Christopher. It would upset me greatly if you were to go now. I have been ill and claim that right. Maurice, pray sit down. Have you had anything to eat? To come so far, so quickly. Tu es gentil.’

  The two men glanced at each other, then away.

  ‘Jodie I met last afternoon and she said she heard you were come to London to see specialists. I – I broke off as quickly as I could. I am – so glad to see you. You are looking paler, but very well. The high notes, they have not yet come?’

  Bella told him of her experiences so far, the conflicting advice, the disagreeable lotions. Conversation became haltingly more general, tried to become normal, wandered to accounts of Clowance’s wedding. Maurice had met Edward Fitzmaurice once. He said he knew of a Madame Kaletski, who was renowned for her experience with the troubles of opera singers. If the advice Bella received in London was of no avail, she must come to Paris to see her. Apparently she had studied under M. Mesmer, and sought to discover the causes of impediments and how to overcome them.

  Christopher said: ‘She caught this filthy disease in Rouen. Had she not gone, there would have been no trouble with her voice at all!’

  ‘Christopher!’ Bella said. ‘That may be true. No one knows. But it’s a disease which is widespread. I might have caught it in London. My mother, years ago, caught it in Cornwall. You mustn’t blame anyone for it.’

  ‘He blames me,’ Maurice said, ‘because I invited you to come over. Bella, it would tear my heart out if I thought I had destroyed your life – your singing life. You know what I think of your voice. You know what I think of you!’

  ‘I think in a little while you should both go,’ Demelza said. ‘Bella is in full health now, but if you both care for her you should not quarrel in front of her. You should not quarrel at all.’

  There was a taut silence. Then Bella said: ‘Tell me, Maurice, about your own career. Have all my friends in Rouen dispersed? What are you planning to put on now?’

  It was a fine night, and Ross walked home from the Commons.

  He gave a penny each to three beggars who crouched at the corner of George Street and the Strand as he turned down. A half moon gave some shadows to the night, and a knife-grinder still plied his trade by the light of a candle-lit window.

  Lower down there was a scuffling, a grunting and shrill laughter as two cloth-capped women, arms folded, were urging two heaving figures to go ahead and split each other’s guts. Just enough light for Ross to recognize the figures.

  ‘Havergal! For God’s sake! And Valéry! What in Hell are you about . . . ? What on earth’s got into you both? . . . Have you been calling?’

  Maurice was the first to withdraw, trying to pull his cravat straight. Christopher took a pace to follow him, but Ross barred his way.

  ‘Stop it, I say!’ To the two women who were picking their noses and grinning: ‘Go on. Off with you! It’s all over now. Off you go or I’ll call the watch!’

  Hissing and spitting at him, they edged further away, then flounced their hips and moved up the street, talking coarsely and loud enough to be overheard.

  ‘This – man – has insulted me,’ Maurice said, gathering his breath as he spoke.

  ‘No more than you deserved! Little Frog!’

  ‘Sale Anglais! I shall have satisfaction for that!’

  ‘Damned sure you will.’ Christopher fingered the bruise on his cheek. ‘So
rry, Poldark, this is no business of yours. You just walked in at the wrong moment.’

  ‘I think,’ said Ross, ‘if you were visiting my daughter, it is very much my business. Kindly explain yourselves.’

  They interrupted each other to tell of the coincidence of their joint call, the bickering argument that had gone on in the house; then Lady Poldark had asked Christopher to go, and had retained Maurice for twenty minutes more so that they should not meet outside. But Christopher, fuming, had waited.

  ‘It is now, what, about ten o’clock, is it not so?’ Maurice said. ‘It will be light at five. I shall be put to it to find seconds, but Hyde Park is not far away. No doubt suitable gentlemen will be found to arrange the contest.’

  ‘I can find two for you,’ said Christopher contemptuously. ‘At my club. You need not bother about that!’

  ‘Listen to me,’ Ross said, his heavier voice having its way. ‘There will be no duelling in this matter. It is not to be considered.’

  ‘Bid me leave to contradict—’

  ‘Listen,’ said Ross. ‘Duelling is a criminal offence in this country. You are not in France, Maurice. And Christopher, shame on you! An ex-soldier allowing yourself to meet a civilian—’

  ‘Oh,’ said Maurice. ‘I know how to use a pistol! Never fear for me. I have had other duels! This outrage must be expiated!’

  ‘I’ll shoot with my left hand,’ volunteered Christopher. ‘Anything for the fun of meeting this creature.’

  ‘You see?’ Maurice stood up to Ross. ‘You see it must be.’

  ‘I see nothing of the sort! Look . . . there is a tavern by the ferry. Let us go down and settle this over a drink.’

  ‘No,’ said Maurice. ‘It cannot be laughed away.’

  Ross tried to keep cool. ‘Let me tell you something. I once fought a duel in Hyde Park. I killed another man. Killing a man in a duel is not like killing a man in a battle. War, in some circumstances, is necessary, killing is a part of war. Duelling, beside that, is evil. It is a form of murder. What do you think Bella would say if she knew?’

  ‘She need not ever know,’ said Christopher.

  ‘She would, for I would tell her.’

  Maurice spat on the cobbles. ‘Ha! What a gentleman!’

  ‘Pray do not insult me. I would not wish to kill a possible son-in-law.’

  The knife-grinder’s wheel screeched, and sparks flew off the knife he was sharpening.

  Ross said, as if thinking out loud: ‘So you two gentlemen have been to see my daughter. I presume you both made her proposals of marriage?’

  Christopher flexed his right hand as if it was suffering from cramp.

  ‘You know my feelings about that, sir. You know she accepted me, and a house is waiting for her when she agrees to a date. But as you also know she says she will not commit herself to anything—’

  ‘Or anyone,’ said Maurice.

  ‘ – to anything until she knows whether she is going to regain her voice. Until then I must wait, and she must accept the unwelcome attentions of itinerant musicians who try to persuade her that they only can show her the way to success.’

  Ross put a very firm restraining hand on Maurice’s arm.

  ‘I do not think that is the best way to express the situation, Christopher. Valéry is a distinguished and talented musician. Bella went to Rouen of her own volition and made a great success of her visit. She tells me that there was a certain estrangement between you just before you left for Lisbon. This experience, or her illness, seems to have caused her to rethink her life. We must allow her time. Time to recover her voice or time to become reconciled to its loss. Therefore you must both wait. Agreed?’

  Neither of the young men was pleased with this summary. Bella’s father had the edge. Reluctantly, though clearly reserving their rights, one nodded, and then the other.

  ‘But,’ Ross said, ‘there is only one certainty about my daughter’s feelings. If there were a duel between you and one died, can you, either of you, possibly imagine for one-tenth of a second, that Bella would marry the victor?’

  An unusual silence fell upon the street, as if all the inhabitants were listening.

  ‘No,’ said Christopher, and waited.

  ‘No,’ said Maurice.

  Chapter Two

  On Monday evening the sixteenth of October Elaine Curnow was walking home from Lelant Downs towards her home at Rose-an-Grouse. It was no distance, but on the edge of a piece of woodland she was attacked by a man with a knife and her throat was slit. A plump little widow of forty-two, she did not quite match up to the other victims of the killer who had been at large so long, but the manner of her death seemed to bear his marks. The body was not found until the following morning because it had been dragged about a hundred yards and clumsily disguised among a tangle of gorse. The doctor who examined the body said it was clear she had put up a struggle and might indeed have scratched and clawed and perhaps inflicted injuries on her attacker.

  One significant find at the scene of the crime, apart from her carrier bag and neckerchief, was a man’s boot. The boot was of black leather and was built up, with a platform sole and heel. The constable and the investigating magistrates from St Erth concluded that the murderer was lame, with one leg a couple of inches shorter than the other. A wide alert was sent out, and in the first twenty-four hours three arrests were made, two old soldiers and a sailor with a wooden leg. But all of them had substantial alibis, and they had to be released. In the next few days a tall, thin ex-army Captain wearing small spectacles called on all the people in any way connected with the victim: her aged father with whom she lived, the innkeeper whom she worked for, her friends at chapel, her brother in St Ives. Mrs Curnow had two sons, but one was in the Navy and stationed at Portsmouth, the other in Australia. Eventually a verdict of ‘Murder, by person or persons unknown’ was returned, and the district began to settle back into its normal routines. But as the darker evenings crowded in considerable care was taken that women should not walk the barren districts alone. In various parts of Cornwall, where similar crimes had been committed, a sense of unease prevailed. Paul Kellow, back from visiting his parents in St Ives, thought a militia of some sort should be formed.

  Edward and Clowance returned from a month’s honeymoon, during which they had travelled as far north as Scotland and as far east as Norfolk. Edward had delighted in taking her to meet his friends, and, after an initial shying away from the idea, she found herself rather enjoying it. Edward was so inordinately proud of her that this, while adding to her initial apprehension, seemed to make the actual meetings stimulating and easy. He said to her once: ‘D’ye know, I don’t feel I need to introduce people to you, I just want to burst in on them and shout, “Look what I’ve got!” ’

  ‘Do you fish much?’ Clowance asked.

  ‘Not much. Why?’

  ‘You might feel perhaps the same if you had landed a big trout.’

  He thought. ‘With shiny scales? Yes, maybe. The most beautiful fish in the pond.’

  ‘I know,’ Clowance nodded, ‘with a big mouth and fishy eyes.’

  ‘That’s just it,’ he said. ‘That’s just it. How did you guess?’ And stroked her cheek.

  The happy couple returned to Nampara only a few days after a less happy trio returned from London. Bella had seen two more voice specialists and had refused Ross’s offer to take her to Paris to consult Maurice’s Madame Kaletski. By now Bella was tired of examinations and advice. She was putting a more cheerful face on things for the sake of her parents, but among all the long words and the prescriptions the truth was beginning to appear. No one knew. They could hear there was something wrong, but they could only guess why and they hadn’t the least idea whether it would come right.

  In addition to the professional experts they had also called on Mr Pieter Reumann, the musical director of the King’s Theatre whom they had seen on that first visit to consult about teachers. He said: ‘It is still good. Not now the best, no . . . Sometimes this happens with
out an illness to cause it. Young would-be prima donnas do not quite have the tonal development to make the top. They strain, and then the vocal cords lack the resilience to meet the musical demands. Last time, I think, you saw Madame Schneider.’

  ‘Yes. But she is in Rome at present.’

  ‘I know. She might be better able to advise than I.’

  Later he said privately to Demelza: ‘I do not think her voice will change now. Possibly she tried to do too much too soon. But why not advise her that that great ambition is – finished? She still has a good voice. She could still sing in the little musical plays we put on to complete an evening’s programme. I think she can act. Put it to her. Do not let her mope.’

  The arrival of Edward and Clowance for a week’s stay was a godsend. Bella put her terrible self-destroying despair behind her, and for the first time since her illness contrived to behave like her old extrovert self. The weather was still equable, and one morning Edward plunged in the sea with Ross. Presently the two girls joined them, and finally Demelza, holding Henry’s hand.

  As the icy water clutched Demelza by her waist and then by her shoulders, she again felt a surge of exhilaration that made her want not merely to gasp but to shout with joy. All might yet be well for Bella, she thought, and Clowance was so obviously excited and happy that it made her own heart sing.

  They were soon clustering indoors, drying off by a hot coal fire, talking and laughing, the only outsider, Edward, already a part of the fun.

  Later that day, as darkness was falling, and the wind rising, Edward said to Clowance: ‘I have never known a family quite like yours.’

  ‘What is wrong with it?’

  ‘Nothing is wrong with it. I just appreciate being a part of its easy, friendly ways. Affectionate without fuss, banter without rudeness, understanding of another’s point of view without bickering. You are lucky. My family has many virtues, I am proud of belonging to it, but there are little fences, little hesitations within it that are not unusual – in fact far more common – and I cannot see them in yours.’