Bella Poldark

by Winston Graham

  So escape was still easy from here. He only had to jump. But where in Heaven and Hell was Valentine? The cloth across his face was dry now and he dampened it again in a jug of milk, retied it, returned to the hall.

  Three more doors. He shouted again. From the passage the blackest of the smoke was how issuing A studded green door had been propped open with a wedge. Valentine might well have gone looking for Butto in the kitchens. But could he follow? If Valentine had gone that way he was surely lost.

  He entered the dark cavern of the passage. An unlighted candelabra stood on a table in an alcove. Shelves on one side of the passage were lined with ornamental china, some of it broken. The heat was intense and Ross felt a wave of dizziness sweep over him. He steadied himself against one of the shelves and the wood was hot to his touch.

  He stopped, trying to get his breath, trying not to cough. His eyes were smarting and running with tears.

  He could not get a proper breath. He was suffocating. He could not walk into a furnace.

  He stagged back into the hall and a burning lath fell at his feet. He tried to stamp it out, but one of his riding boots began to blister.

  ‘Valentine!’ he shouted, and choked. There was something that sounded like an answering cry. He turned in its direction, took a few steps, stumbled over a chair and fell, bringing some curtains down on top of him and breaking the fall.

  Voices near; hands on his ankles, hauling him back, hands under his shoulders, Valentine was kneeling beside him. They were back in the big parlour. ‘Father!’ he said. ‘Father, you should not have followed me. I came out the other way. I found Butto. He’s dead.’

  Then a hail of plaster rained down on them, followed by one of the supporting beams, then half the ceiling collapsed as they were being dragged out.

  Chapter Eight

  They took Ross to Trenwith, the nearest of the big houses and about equidistant from the nearest cottage of St Ann’s. They made an improvised stretcher of an old door, and he lay on a blanket and covered by a blanket. Amadora, confronted by the emergency, in all ignorance put him in the very bedroom where he had taken Elizabeth against her will twenty-seven or more years ago, and so had started all this trouble, which had gone on so relentlessly and for so long.

  Dwight caught up with the procession just as it reached Trenwith, so followed the four men carrying the door upstairs.

  They laid him on the same bed and Dwight bent over him. There was a bruise turning blue on his forehead, one shoe had been burned and had fallen off, part of his jacket was in black tatters, there were bruises coming up on his shoulder and arm. But the most alarming symptom was his breathing, noisy and laboured and uncertain.

  ‘Twas the smoke,’ said Trebethick. ‘At first when we got him out he could not seem to breathe at all. I thought he was a goner. Then twas like a corncrake. We dashed water ’pon him. I hope we done right.’

  Dwight was listening to Ross’s heart. It was fast but not unsteady. He might have run a mile. Dwight did not at all like the breathing: it resembled that of some of his patients when they were dying: it might go on for hours before it finally ceased. Concussion and shock. The bruise on his forehead was spreading and a trickle of blood oozed.

  On the way here Trebethick had told Dwight what had happened, and one of the boys had been sent running to tell Demelza.

  Ross gave a huge sigh, and his eyelids fluttered but did not open. Then after a dangerously long pause the breathing began again.

  Demelza came riding bareback, a habit she had developed as a girl, slid off the mare, leaving her untethered, was met by Amadora and led swiftly up the stairs. Into the room, and hand to mouth she stared wide-eyed at her husband, then sharply at Dwight, who said: ‘My dear, there has been an accident at Place House – a fire, and Ross was caught in it.’ He tailed off because he saw Demelza was not listening.

  She went to the bed and bent over Ross, peering, deeply peering. A lock of her hair, loosened in the gallop, fell over and touched his injured shoulder. She pulled it out of the way, then looked again at Dwight.

  ‘It is concussion and shock, I believe,’ Dwight said. ‘The burns are not serious. Bone should be here any minute with bandages and salve. I don’t see any signs of internal injuries.’

  ‘Could you?’ These were the first words she had spoken since entering.

  ‘Could I? Not altogether. But internal injuries betray symptoms, and I see no such symptoms.’

  ‘Did he fall?’

  Dwight looked at Trebethick, who said: ‘Not that I know, ma’am. I was not on the spot, d’ye see, but I been told he went back into the house to bring someone else out, and the ceiling gave way over his head.’

  There was a long silence, eventually broken by Demelza. ‘Were there others – injured?’

  Neither man spoke. Then Trebethick said: ‘I believe twas the ape that caused it. So Cook said. He broke out of his compound and upset something. There was more than usual folk in the house, but I b’lieve they all – or most – got clear away.’

  ‘Have you seen it, Dwight?’

  ‘Not yet. I’ve heard of no more casualties, but I met the men carrying Ross and thought this must be my first case.’

  Demelza knelt beside the bed. ‘Ross!’ she whispered. She looked up: ‘His eyelids flickered.’

  ‘They have done before. It is a good sign.’

  A tap at the door, and Bone put his head round. ‘I brought what you asked for, sur.’

  ‘Come in. Demelza, get Amadora to make you some tea or give you a glass of wine. I’ll just make Ross as comfortable as I can.’

  ‘I’ll help you,’ she said. ‘I want to stay here.’

  Darkness had fallen on the fog before Ross began to come round. Two candles flickered, and a dark slender woman sat before a fire burning low.

  He could not at all think who he was, where he was, what time it was. There were items of furniture which he partly recognized, but they seemed to belong to a distant past. He could not understand it at all. His memory knew the brown draped velvet curtains held back by a knotted cord. And there was a gilt-framed mirror over a walnut dressing table. He could picture a face reflected in the mirror. But it was not the face of the woman who crouched before the fire.

  It was Elizabeth. Merciful Christ, but Elizabeth had been dead twenty years. Knowledge flooded upon him, memory came back; all of it encompassing the fullest remembrance of today. He sat up and his head opened and shut, and he sank back on the pillow with a gasp of pain.

  The dark woman was beside him, staring, staring.

  ‘Demelza,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, thank God!’

  ‘Where are we? What time is it?’

  ‘Seven, I think. Or maybe eight.’

  ‘Did someone bring me here – to Trenwith?’

  She did not remark his knowledge of something he had just questioned. ‘You were dragged from the fire at Place House. Dwight has been.’

  He looked down painfully at himself. ‘So I see. God! That smoke!’

  ‘Your breathing is better. For a time I—’

  ‘I could do with a drink.’

  She hastily crossed the room, took up a cup and a pitcher and brought it back. ‘Can you sit up a little? I’m afraid . . .’

  He edged himself up by his elbows, grimacing with pain. She pushed the pillow up to support him, and with one forearm round the back of his head helped him to sip the water.

  He swallowed two or three mouthfuls and then indicated he had had enough. He began to cough, heavily. Huskily. Then he stopped and half-smiled up into his wife’s anxious face. ‘I’m all right now.’

  ‘Well . . . better, thank God.’

  ‘It was incredible how quick the fire spread. Is everyone safe?’

  ‘Geoffrey Charles has just gone to be sure. He was away – in Camborne – and so knew nothing about it until he returned for supper about half an hour since. He put his head in the door, but you were still – still sleeping, so he said he would go at once and ge
t the latest news.’

  Ross brooded. Then he looked about the room, noticing uneasily that his first impression had been mistaken. This was certainly Elizabeth’s old bedroom but the dressing table was not, as he had supposed, the same. The curtains were maroon instead of brown. Perhaps the gilt mirror was here. For the rest he must have had an hallucination.

  ‘I believe that ape started it. When I reached the house – I could hear him screaming – something must have upset him. We were – all assembled in the drawing room when one of the servants burst in to say the house – was on fire. By then, by the time we streamed out into the hall – the – the house was – full of smoke.’

  ‘Try not to talk about it. Just lie still for a while. Or would you like something to eat?’

  ‘Not yet, thank you. Is Valentine injured?’

  She hesitated. ‘I don’t rightly know.’

  ‘Did the others come here? I suppose this is the nearest big house, but the Crown at St Ann’s has rooms.’

  Outside a cow was lowing in the dark.

  Ross said: ‘How long before we leave for London?’

  She was startled. ‘Twas supposed to be tomorrow week, but you will surely not have recovered sufficient.’

  ‘It’s hard. I’m trying to relate one thing with another.’

  ‘You surprise me, Ross. Half an hour ago you looked at death’s door.’

  ‘I feel none too far away yet. But these feel like superficial burns, and the beam that fell on me was only a glancing blow.’

  ‘We shall have to see. And wait to know what Dwight says.’

  He took another drink, and while he held the cup there was a tap at the door. Geoffrey Charles came in, his face very white. He smiled brightly enough at Ross and expressed his joy at the improvement. He was still in his riding clothes.

  ‘The fire is pretty well over now, the house mostly gone. They have saved a few things from the west side, and the stables and the horses are intact. It will be much easier taking a detailed look when tomorrow comes. Lanterns cast as many shadows as they cast light. Ross, you were lucky. They say you went back in again to rescue Valentine.’

  ‘Is he injured?’

  ‘I’m afraid he’s dead.’

  ‘He was found in the dining room. The big ape was lying beside him.’

  ‘How can that be?’ Ross said harshly. ‘I went back into the room where we had been meeting. Through the window, of course. Valentine had gone in but five minutes before, looking for Butto. When I got in I heard – or thought I heard – a cry from the hall. I opened the door. The hall was almost impossible – but I went in to see if I could find him – I looked in three rooms and then gave up. On my way back through the hall something fell on me – I was dragged out. Valentine was beside me. He said he had come out through another door. He told me Butto was dead.’

  There was a horrible silence. Geoffrey Charles’s face was mottled with shock. He said grimly. ‘I was not there, of course. I can only go on what I have been told.’

  ‘Who told you?’

  ‘At first just the captain of the mine, Trebethick. But three of the servants were also there, and they did not contradict his version. Apparently about six o’clock George Warleggan and his lawyer friends left to ride home. His daughter-in-law, Selina, is staying at the Crown in St Ann’s with her cousin and little George. Apparently there was some dissension because old George wanted them all to return with him, and Selina became hysterical. Then I met Sam.’

  ‘Sam? Our Sam?’

  ‘Yes. His forge is not so far away, you know, and he heard of the fire from some tinker who was passing. It was he, I gather, with two of the miners, who first got into the dining room and found the bodies.’

  ‘The last thing I remember,’ Ross whispered, ‘before the beam knocked me out – was Valentine kneeling beside me and telling me that Butto was dead, but that he had got out by a side door.’

  The cow was lowing again in the misty dark.

  Geoffrey Charles said: ‘Valentine built a sort of den in one of the cellars so that Butto could keep warm in the winter. In the cellar, Cook told me, there were bales of straw and blankets and sacks. Somehow Butto got out and accidentally set fire to his den. Thank God it was not at night.’

  Demelza had been very quiet. ‘Where is Valentine now?’

  ‘At Sam’s insistence they have taken him to the church. Sam has borrowed some candles from the mine and is going to sit with him all night.’

  Chapter Nine

  ‘Mama,’ said Henry, ‘are you and Papa not in love any more?’

  Demelza stared down at her child. ‘What do you mean?’

  At this response he stumbled. ‘I only – only thought . . .’

  Demelza said: ‘Your Papa is very sad about your cousin Valentine’s death.’

  ‘Yes . . . I ’spect you are too?’

  ‘Of course. We all are.’

  ‘I only thought,’ Henry began again, and stopped again.

  ‘That Papa is more so. He and Valentine saw much of each other. After dear Jeremy’s death Valentine was more the same age, and your father used to call on him, and Valentine, as you know, came here. Valentine was sometimes quite a difficult young man to deal with—’

  ‘What’s difficult?’

  ‘Headstrong. And then Valentine’s wife ran away with Baby George and Valentine was left on his own. Because we are sort of cousins and because we are almost neighbours your father felt he should try to help him, and so he became very fond of him. It has been very upsetting for us all.’

  ‘Headstrong,’ said Henry. ‘That’s what you call me sometimes.’

  ‘So you are. But not in the same way. Fortunately.’

  ‘I’m not as bad as Valentine?’

  ‘Oh no. Oh no.’

  Henry rubbed one shoe against the other. ‘You would not let me keep anything like Butto?’

  ‘I should hope you wouldn’t want to.’

  ‘At the – at the inq . . . what do you call it?’

  ‘Inquest.’

  ‘At the inquest Lieutenant Lake said that if he had not gone back in to try to save Butto Valentine would not have lost his life.’

  ‘How do you know? You were not there.’

  ‘Ellen Porter told me.’

  ‘She had no business to.’

  ‘And she said . . .’ Henry was suddenly breathless. ‘She said, if Papa had not gone back in to try to save Valentine, Papa would not have been hurt.’

  ‘That is true.’

  ‘Ellen says they were both brave men risking their lives for a dumb animal.’

  ‘Perhaps so. But it did no good. One human life wasted, and another grievously near being killed also.’

  ‘Is Papa . . . Will Papa be well enough to go to London next Friday?’

  ‘It has not yet been decided.’

  Physically Ross made a remarkable recovery. All the burns were light: three places bandaged and four others to be dabbed with a zinc ointment three times a day. Concussion and suffocation had been the real dangers, and once the smoke had cleared itself from his lungs he was able to breathe normally. The concussion had left him with occasional dizzy spells, but he had been careful not to tell Dwight about them.

  His chief sensation was of deep-rooted grief, which mingled with chagrin at Valentine’s totally unnecessary death. It was not like losing Jeremy – he was not gut-frozen with despair and loss – he felt more as if he had received a poisonous wound. Ross wondered whether it was just Valentine’s frustration and natural recklessness which had goaded him into going back to look for Butto. Maybe everyone had underestimated the tie between the young man and the ape. Affection in Valentine had been rare to show itself, but, just as his attachment for his son had become evident over the last year, perhaps his fatherly instincts had extended to cover the ape-waif he had picked up in Falmouth and come to care for.

  Valentine’s death had shaken open a whole raft of memories in Ross, memories of Valentine as a child, memories of Elizabe
th, conversations they had had, such as their encounter in the churchyard when his frustrated love for her had welled up afresh. All those years ago. Back to thinking of the letter she had written him – kept for years but then destroyed – in which she told him she was going to marry George Warleggan. And her final, still partly unexplained, death in childbirth.

  He wondered whether Demelza sensed some of the turmoil he was going through: thoughts, feelings, memories overlaid, suddenly turned over, stirred, no longer entombed. Although Demelza had been half afraid to trust Valentine, his death had shocked her in a new way, and she had drawn away from Ross as if temporarily estranged.

  The other great mystery to Ross was his own hallucination – for that was all it could be. When he had fallen in the blazing smoke-filled debris of the hall he had seen Valentine beside him, and Valentine had said, ‘I came out the other way. I found Butto. He is dead.’ And twice he had called him ‘Father’. Twice. In actual fact Valentine by then was apparently already dead, clutching to Butto’s hand, as he had been found by Sam and the others when the fire died down.

  Some sort of thought transference in the moment of death? A communication, mind to mind? If he, Ross, had not been dragged out by David Lake and others it would have been his last living thought. ‘Father.’ ‘Father.’ In his memory he could not recollect Valentine ever having called him that. It was a claim. A greeting. An assertion. Now he could claim no more.

  The funeral was tomorrow. Since the fire he had ridden three times to see Selina, and once had seen George. Place House was a ruin. Part of a roof still stood, precariously, waiting for the first gale. Skeletal walls. Recognizable but mainly unusable furniture. Volcanoes of black ash, still smoking. The stables untouched, and a conservatory and some outbuildings. There had been looters picking over the ruins several nights, but little remained to steal except some food and drink. David Lake had taken charge and came over every day from the Crown at St Ann’s. The mine had restarted.

  As he climbed awkwardly from his horse, Demelza was coming up from Nampara Cove.

  She said gently: ‘You are riding too much.’