Monk Adderley had steered Demelza into a corner seat while Ross and the girl were still choosing their food.
Those are handsome buttons,’ Demelza said, pointing to the large ones he wore on each sleeve.
‘Yes? You notice the lock of hair preserved in each?’
‘That’s what I thought it was. How nicely worked. Do they – does the hair belong to Miss Page?’
‘No, to a Lieutenant Framfield. He was the last man I killed.’
For the first time Demelza noticed the scar on the side of his head, half hidden by his stiff, curled hair.
‘The last?’
‘Well, two is all. And another maimed.’
‘Do you not get put in prison for murder? Or even hanged?’
‘Fair fight is not murder. Of course there is sometimes a trial. The first time I pleaded benefit of clergy.’
‘Are you a clergyman?’
Adderley’s eyes crinkled again. It seemed to be the nearest he ever came to laughing. ‘A cleric, my dear. A clerk. I can write. I was excused on those grounds and sentenced only to be branded.’
‘Branded?’
‘Yes . . . With a cold iron. Let me show you the mark.’ He extended his long thin hand in which the bones and veins delicately showed. She repressed a shiver.
‘There is no mark . . . Oh, I see.’
The second time I was found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to ten days in prison.’
‘And the third time you really will be hanged?’ she asked politely.
‘Who knows? Who cares? Ah, here’s Poldark with my little girl. I feel sorry for Drommie.’
‘Why sorry? Ross is good company – if he likes his company.’
‘Which he appears not altogether to be doing at this moment. No, my dear, I meant on other counts. Drommie has a beautiful body. I should know. I have investigated it thoroughly. I could commend her to any sculptor. But as to her mind, I do not think there will ever be anything more important in it than a hairpin.’
The lady being so discussed said to Ross: ‘Are you strong? You look very strong.’ Her voice and eyes were full of a bored innuendo.
‘Very,’ he said, looking her over.
‘How interesting.’ She yawned. ‘How vastly interesting.’
‘But I’d warn you. I have one weak leg.’
She looked down. ‘Which one?’
‘They take it in turns.’
After an appreciable moment she tapped him on the shoulder with her fan. ‘Captain Poldark, you’re making merry with me.’
‘I wouldn’t presume on such short acquaintance. Has Captain Adderley never told you the old infantryman’s adage?’
‘What is that?’
‘It’s one leg of an elephant saying to another: “Damn your eyes, move a little quicker.’”
‘I call that quaint.’ She yawned again.
‘Is it past your bedtime, Miss Page?’
‘No . . . I’ve only just got up.’
‘My daughter’s just like that.’
‘How old is she?’
‘Nearly five.’
‘Now you’re jesting again.’
‘I swear it’s the truth.’
‘No . . . I mean comparing me! Is Monk a friend of yours?’
‘It would seem so.’
‘And of your wife’s?’
‘That remains to be seen.’
‘Of course. She’s vastly attractive.’
‘I think so.’
‘And me?’
He looked at her. ‘You?’
‘Yes . . . what do you think of me?’
He considered. ‘I think it is past your bedtime.’
‘That could be considered an insult, Captain Poldark.’
‘Oh, no!’
‘Or – as a compliment . . .’
He smiled at her. ‘Oh, yes,’ he said.
People sat at tables of varying size, and wine and bread and knives and forks were rapidly put before them. Adderley had chosen a table for four, which made them somewhat isolated from the rest. Ross bore the company he did not want with great good humour, and only occasionally rose to bait that was put before him. As when Adderley began to speak of the expenses of the last election and how it had cost Lord Mandeville and Thomas Fellowes upwards of £13,000 between them to get in, of which he’d been told, by God, that near £7,000 had gone in innkeepers’ bills. And how lucky he and Ross were to be the tame lap-dogs of an indulgent peer.
‘I think our “indulgent peer” is here tonight,’ Demelza put in as she saw Ross about to speak. ‘I haven’t seen him for upwards of two years, Ross, and I must ask him how Mrs Gower is.’
And, said Adderley, how old Reynolds was known in the House as the Dinner Gong, because whenever he got up to speak a hundred and forty members would walk out. And how on one occasion two years ago, a distinguished lady sitting in the strangers’ gallery, caught up in a long debate, had been unable to contain herself so that what she spilled fell upon the head of old John Luttrell, thereby ruining both his hat and his coat. ‘And twas lucky it did not blind him, by God!’ said Adderley.
Miss Page went off into little muffled screeches of laughter. ‘How deliciously vulgar of you, Monk! I call that entertaining!’
‘Don’t tell me,’ said Monk to the others, ‘that you do not appreciate the anecdote! Walpole always encouraged vulgar conversation on the grounds that it was the only talk all could enjoy.’
‘Not at all,’ said Ross. ‘For are we not all vulgars ourselves?’
No one spoke for a moment.
‘In what way?’
‘Of a common or usual kind. You cannot suppose there is a uniqueness in human beings that puts one or another above the rest – surely! Common, customary or familiar. We all share the same hungers and the same functions: the young and the old, the lord and the beggar. Only the perverse fail to laugh and cry at the same things. That’s common sense. Vulgar common sense.’
The uneasy supper went on to its end, and presently broke up, and the ladies retired and the men also, and when they came down dancing had begun; and an hour passed pleasantly. Monk danced once with Demelza, and then not again, for Dwight took her away, and then Ross, and then other men intervened. She was not sure of the most fashionable steps, but what she knew seemed to suffice.
It was not until there was a brief interval at one o’clock that Monk, noticing her briefly alone, came across to her.
‘When may I see you again, Mrs Poldark?’
‘But you are seeing me now, Captain Adderley.’
‘Is this your very first visit to London?’
‘You know it is.’
‘Well, if I may say so, ma’am, I see you as a person of great undeveloped potentiality. My dear, you’ve scarce lived yet, believe me!’
‘I’ve lived very well, thank you, Captain Adderley.’
‘You have not tasted the sophisticated pleasures.’
‘I always think they are only for folk who have tired of the simple ones.’
‘I’ll wait upon you. When will your husband be out?’
‘When I am.’
‘Then I’ll wait upon you when he is in.’
‘You’re most kind.’
‘I hope you will be also.’ His eyes went up along the lines of her peach-coloured gown, noting where it clung, to her bare arms and shoulders and low neck, the pale olive swelling of her breasts; at last up to her face and eyes, and his expression conveyed exactly what he would like to do to her. She found herself flushing, an unusual occurrence for her at any time.
Then she felt a hand put into her gloved hand. It was Ross, come up behind her.
‘Adderley, you must return to your Miss Page. She is greatly lacking your attentions.’
‘Do you know, Poldark,’ Monk said gently, ‘there is only one person I ever take instructions from, and that is myself.’
Demelza squeezed Ross’s hand to stop his reply.
‘Ross,’ she said, ‘Captain Adderley has paid us t
he compliment of saying he would wait upon us. While that would be – quite delightful, I was suggesting instead that we should all meet at the play on Thursday. You were telling me that we should go, Captain Adderley.’
She could sense the hesitation on both sides. Since Adderley had told her nothing of the sort, it represented to him a small deception of her husband and therefore progress along the road he wished to pursue. Ross had indeed talked of going to the play, and a blank refusal at this point could only have been seen as an affront.
Adderley said: ‘That would be amusing, my dear. The play I have seen twice and it’s tedious. But the women are interesting.’
And so it was settled.
Chapter Four
I
By three in the morning people were beginning to depart. Caroline had seen what had been happening to Demelza, and took Monk Adderley off on her own and away from the danger zone. Later she said to Demelza: ‘Sometimes I think him a little crazed. Not because he has taken a fancy to you! But because he is at times . . . ungoverned in his behaviour. Treat it lightly – as a joke.’
‘That’s all very well, but—’
‘I know. But explain to Ross . . . I’ll suggest to Dwight that we also go on Thursday. And in the meantime I will see what else there is in the pool of young women who might be dandled in front of Monk’s nose to divert him.’
. . . As they were waiting for their carriages to draw up George said:
‘So you burned your fingers, Monk.’
‘Not at all, my dear, Rome n’ a été bâti tout en un jour. One has to make the preliminary – clearances.’
‘And you have made those? I don’t believe it! She is a virtuous woman!’
‘You told me not.’
‘Well, who knows about any one of us? I said she was probably not. Perhaps later you will be able to inform me for sure.’
‘Of course. I can inform you now. Within a month she will not be a virtuous woman – if by virtue you mean faithfulness to her husband. I shall consider her virtuous if she is faithful to me, for as long as I want her.’
‘It’s a big claim. I would be tempted to wager on it.’
‘My dear, by all means. Nothing would give me greater satisfaction. What odds will you offer?’
George licked his lips, and glanced across to see that Elizabeth was not within hearing. ‘A hundred guineas to ten. I am not prepared to make longer odds than that, for, after all, if you win you get all the fun.’
‘No,’ said Monk, looking at his friend with his cold eyes. ‘I perceive that if I win you will be more satisfied than I.’
The Poldark coach was called soon after, and Demelza was handed in, and they moved creakingly away. There was silence for a while and then Ross said:
‘Monk Adderley is a freakish fellow.’
‘Freakish . . . yes. I am a little scared of him.’
‘It did not seem so. You asked him to join us at supper and have invited him to the theatre on Thursday.’
Demelza struggled with the difficulty of explaining. ‘In the first instance he had just asked me to go in to supper with him alone. I’m not sure of the courtesies in London, but I thought it might be insulting to refuse. So I suggested we should all go together.’
‘And in the second instance?’
‘I thought he and you were going to start growling at each other like a couple of tomcats, so I said the first thing that came into my head to stop it.’
They were crossing Oxford Road, and even at this late hour there were people about, drunks lying in the shelter of overhanging houses, drays and butchers’ carts rattling over the cobbles on late or early errands, beggars picking among the refuse and the droppings.
Ross said: ‘It’s strange that people who affect to find life endlessly tedious are themselves so tedious to know. Well, I suppose we must endure him on Thursday.’
‘Ross.’ Demelza turned her head and the light from a passing link-boy showed up her intent expression. ‘Caroline had a word with me about him during the evening. She told us not to take him serious. Not me. Not you. Especially not you. She said you must always treat him as a joke.’
Ross pursed his lips. ‘Adderley. Yes. He is a joke. But I think we must watch him lest the joke turn sour.’
II
They took a box at Drury Lane, which cost Ross twenty shillings and held four seats, and there saw Mr John Kemble, Mr William Barrymore and Mrs Powell in The Revenge, a tragedy in five acts by Edward Young. Demelza had not seen a play since the one performed in their library more than ten years ago, and that was a mere charade compared to this. She forgot the pale man, taut as a wire, in the chair beside her, who took what opportunities he could to put his face against hers to whisper comments and to touch her bare forearm with his thin cool fingers. She was far more annoyed by the noise from the pit; the scrambles that took place, the flying oranges, the shouts at the actors if something was displeasing. The light from the three hundred flickering tallow candles was so disposed behind the scenes that the stage was clearly but subtly lit. The brilliance of the costumes and the scenery, the resonance and drama of the actors’ voices, all cast a spell on her. Between the acts there was music to keep the audience entertained, and when The Revenge was over in a welter of blood and tragedy, two more short pieces were staged, as comic as the main piece had been sad. A wonderful evening.
Dwight and Caroline were in the next box, and in one interval Dwight was able to say to Ross:
‘I met Dr Jenner today.’
Ross looked vague. He had been more than a little preoccupied with angers that were swirling up in him and then dispersing in waves of self-mockery.
‘Jenner? Oh? This book you were reading . . .’
‘I believe it may be one of the great discoveries of our time. Of course there have been inoculations against the smallpox for some years, but this is different. There has not yet, in my view, been sufficient experiment. But I am hoping to see him again before I leave.’
‘You are off home?’
Dwight smiled. ‘Not yet.’
Half joking, Ross said: ‘Perhaps I shall have to take Demelza home soon. She is not going to be safe here.’
‘I believe she’s safe, Ross. She can look to herself.’
‘That,’ said Ross, ‘was what I used to think.’
The last short play was nothing but a musical lampoon, a satire on the new fashions, all of them grossly exaggerated on the stage. The song that caught the public fancy was sung by a Miss Fanny Thompson and went:
Shepherd, I have lost my waist,
Have you seen my body?
Sacrificed to modern taste,
I’m quite a Hoddy-Doddy.
Tis gone, and I have not the nook
For cheese cake, tart or jelly.
For fashion I that part forsook
Where sages place the belly!
Everyone joined in the second and third choruses. It became a great roar of sound.
As the two thousand people were streaming out of the theatre Monk Adderley said: ‘Will you visit Vauxhall with me on Monday next, Mrs Poldark? I believe there is likely to be a late sitting of the House.’
‘Should you not be present, then?’
‘God forbid. But your husband will.’
‘Tell me,’ she said. ‘Why did they call you Monk? It seems – not apt.’
The eyes crinkled again. In a less sinister face it would have been attractive. ‘Not apt, as you observe, my dear. My father was so called and so liked his name that he has given it to all my brothers, to make sure it should be perpetuated.’
She raised her eyebrows. ‘Dear life! Do you mean there are several more Monk Adderleys walking the streets of London?’
‘No, ma’am. Two died in infancy. One had his throat cut in India. One is in Bristol still with my parents, but he is a tedious provincial boy who will grow up into a country squire . . . But tell me of your name. What does it mean in that bizarre Celtic language you have?’
‘
I don’t know,’ said Demelza, knowing well, but feeling it was a bad thing to give him a further lead.
‘Well, it is a passably provoking name. Ecod it is . . . Demelza . . . Demelza . . . It needs to be peeled off – like a cloak, like clothes, like a skin . . .’
‘Like a banana?’ she suggested.
‘Listen, satin-arms,’ he said, ‘I will take so much from you and no more. You have a sharp tongue, which I shall find very entertaining in due course. And shall know what to do with. On Monday, then. At nine.’
Before Demelza could speak Caroline said: ‘There’s room for two in our coach. We’ll take you home. Can you find a chair, Monk?’
Adderley said: ‘I shall go to White’s for an hour. Would you care to accompany me, Poldark? You can go in as my guest.’
Ross hesitated, and then said amiably: ‘Thank you, no, I think not. I’m not rich enough to be able to lose money nor poor enough to wish to gain it.’
‘What a tedious thought,’ said Adderley. ‘The importance of money is that it should always be treated as of no importance.’
III
Later that night, just as Demelza was dozing off to sleep, Ross said:
‘D’you know for once I believe Adderley was right.’
‘What? What about? What d’you mean?’
‘That money should always be looked on as unimportant. Now that I run a tin mine and have interests in rolling mills and the rest I am becoming too attached to the stuff.’
‘I have never been unattached to the stuff,’ she said. ‘Maybe it’s because I was born a miner’s daughter. Maybe it’s because I’ve never had so very much All I know is that having coins in my purse makes me happy, and having no coins makes me sad. I can’t work it out different.’
‘All the same,’ Ross said, ‘Adderley may be right in that, but he is wrong in all else. Wrong especially if he supposes I shall stand by and watch him attempting to cuckold me.’
‘And do you serious think he has the slightest chance?’
Ross did not answer.
Demelza sat sharply up in bed, wide awake now.
‘Ross, what are you thinking of? You are not serious in supposing . . . Because – because once something happened, because once I felt deeply about another man; do you think, do you suppose I am like to do that again – with the first such who comes along? Am I condemned – because of – of Hugh Armitage – to be suspected of feeling the same for every man who pays me some special attention?’ When he still didn’t speak she said: ‘Ross!’