‘Would it not be possible on this occasion to treat me as a foreign neutral and allow me to pay the fine?’
‘It would be possible’ – the man’s eyes flickered to Ross’s purse – ‘on condition that you left Roscoff immediately.’
‘I am waiting for the return of the cutter. It is promised for Monday night.’
‘That will not do. There is a vessel in now, the May Queen. She will leave tomorrow night. You must board her immediately and leave with her. If you are found ashore after midnight tonight you will be arrested.’
Ross said: ‘The May Queen, I think, comes from the Isle of Wight. That is two hundred miles from my home. Perhaps the next—’
‘It is your own concern, monsieur. Mine only is that you leave here.’
‘Perhaps an offer of another twenty guineas . . .’
‘Would lead to your arrest for attempting to suborn an officer of the Republic. Now, monsieur, I will trouble you for the fine and an undertaking to leave . . .’
Chapter Twelve
Ross boarded the May Queen just before dark that evening. Its master, a man called Greenway, was helpful enough in offering a passage home but was not amenable to the suggestion that he should find an excuse to remain in Roscoff another day. The French were funny these times. You could never be sure how they would jump. And in any event Captain Poldark would do well for his own sake to be out at sea by Sunday night.
Captain Poldark was not at all pleased at the idea of being out at sea by Sunday night, so Greenway made another suggestion. Almost certainly some other vessel would arrive in Roscoff tomorrow before they left. If Captain Poldark was determined against his best interests to stay, then they could ferry him over to the new arrival, which would be sure to stay in port twenty-four hours buying stock and loading up.
So it happened that just after dark on Sunday Ross was transferred to the Edward, a two-masted lugger from Cawsand, and he remained on board all through a blustery Monday, with only the company in the cramped quarters under the foredeck of a cat and a parrot.
It had not escaped him that the arrival of the agent and the two gendarmes might have been sparked off by Jacques Clisson, as a convenient way of pocketing a hundred guineas and perhaps making something extra as an informer for the French. It would be a way of scaring him off back to England, with a day of reckoning for Clisson too far off for him to worry about. Tonight would show, for he had arranged to meet Clisson at the same tavern at eight. One wondered how quickly news travelled round the port, whether Clisson would in any case learn that he had left and not turn up.
At seven-thirty, when he had just been estimating the distance to swim ashore, the tiny coracle of a ship’s boat arrived as promised, and a young Devon lad rowed him to the harbour side. Disbursement of another guinea ensured that the boy would stay with the boat, just in case there was need of a hurried exit.
It was three ill-lit busy streets to Le Coq Rouge. Ross had borrowed a scarf from the skipper of the Edward and with this round his head and a stoop of the shoulders he hoped to be unrecognized as he eased his way through the crowds. The tavern was a greater risk, but he pushed aside a blind man importuning at the door and went quietly in. It was more than half full, and the light here was poor also, but he soon saw that Clisson was not there. It wanted five minutes to eight.
He sat in a corner and ordered a drink and waited. It was all a gamble, he thought, a gamble on his judgment of the amount of surveillance likely to be kept, a gamble on his estimate of another man’s character, an estimate swinging to belief in Clisson after the deep suspicions of the first encounter. At half-past eight he ordered another drink and wondered if he could find out where Clisson lived. Five minutes later Clisson walked in.
His little round bland face was creased in a scowl as he peered about the low flickering room. He saw Ross and pushed through and sat beside him.
‘They told me you had left. I came only on the chance, just to be sure. It is bad for me to meet you here.’
If he was playing fair Clisson was probably as anxious to see him as he was to see the Breton. Another seventy-five guineas was at stake.
‘I shall be glad to leave,’ Ross said.
‘So I would advise you to if they are interested in you. But first, well, I have been successful. I have a full list. You have the money?’
‘Here.’
Clisson held out his hand. Ross hesitated and then passed the purse. Clisson weighed it in his hand, and then opened it to see the colour of the gold. ‘Enough. I will take the amount as correct. Here is the list.’
A dirty piece of thin parchment. A great many names, seventy or eighty, some so badly written as to be barely readable. His finger went down the column. ‘Lieutenant Archer, the Travail.’ He had almost missed it, for the writer had a peculiar way of making a ‘t’. So some had been saved. He checked his haste, went carefully on. ‘Mr Williams (acting captain), the Travail. Mr Armitage, Lieutenant, the Espion. Captain Kiltoe, the Espion, Captain Porter, master, the Thames, Mr Rudge, midshipman, the Travail, Mr Garfield, master, the Alexander, Mr Spade, Lieutenant, the Alexander, Mr Enys, surgeon lieutenant, the Travail, Mr Parks, midshipman, the Travail—’
He had gone on and missed it. He peered closely at the name to make sure there was no mistake. Then he took a thin sheet of paper out of his tobacco pouch with a list of officers from the Travail. All the others were on it – Archer, Williams, Rudge, Parks, and a half-dozen more. And Enys. So he was alive. There could be no mistake. There could be no cheating over this. So the time and money had not been spent in vain.
‘Thank you,’ he said.
‘Monsieur.’
‘Now I must go.’
‘And quickly. But I will go first. Forgive me if I do not see you back to your ship.’
While Ross was away Demelza had a caller. If not precisely from Banbury Cross, the visitor nevertheless rode an excellent white hunter and was in essence a fine lady, though the anxieties of the last months had tarnished her brilliance. Demelza at the time was baking bread. This she always did herself and would never leave to Jane Gimlett, who had a heavy hand. The bread was just beginning to plum when someone rat-tatted on the front door. Jane came back and told her it was Miss Caroline Penvenen.
‘Oh, Judas. Well, ask her into the parlour to wait, will you, Jane. Tell her what I am doing, and will see her in a moment.’
While the woman was gone Demelza rubbed her floury hands and arms on a towel and went to look at her hair in the cracked mirror by the larder door. She set it to rights as best she could and undid her apron. Then she went into the parlour.
Caroline was standing by the window looking taller than ever in a grey waisted riding habit and small fur hat. The bright light silhouetted her figure but concealed her expression as she turned.
‘Demelza, I am renowned for arriving at inopportune moments. I hope you are well.’
‘Yes, well, but just at this minute, as Jane will have said . . . But stay. Stay to dinner. If you can excuse me for the next quarter of an hour . . .’
They had kissed, but a little uncertain of each other.
Caroline held Demelza at arm’s length before releasing her. ‘I could hardly have told even now. How long is it?’
‘About six weeks, I suppose.’ Suddenly her mind jumped on. ‘You have news of Ross?’
‘Oh, no. You will have the first news, my dear. I came only to see you.’
‘Well, make yourself comfortable. Sit down and rest. Is your horse seen to? . . . Oh, what a fine horse! Is he your own?’
‘I have had him two years – since my twenty-first birthday. But look, must I be punished for coming at this wrong time by being made to sit here like a naughty girl? May I not keep you company?’
‘Well . . . baking bread is tedious, and the kitchen will be overwarm for you after your ride and—’
‘Would you believe it, I have not seen bread made since I used to steal into the kitchen in my mother’s house. But perhaps it would e
mbarrass you if I came?’
This was precisely what it would do, but Demelza had to protest it would not, so presently they went together into the kitchen, to Jane Gimlett’s manifest confusion, for she clearly thought that whatever Mrs Poldark chose to do in her own home was her own business but that this was certainly no place for a lady of Miss Penvenen’s birth and breeding. In the end she dropped a basin and knocked over a stool when bending to pick it up, so Demelza sent her off to do something in the still room, promising to recall her when the fire wanted taking out of the oven.
‘Where is Jeremy?’ Caroline asked, perching on the stool that had now been set upright again. ‘He is well?’
‘Yes, thank you. Though he is always ailing little things. He is not at all like Julia, my first child, who never ailed one day all her life until she caught the morbid sore throat that killed her. You’ll stay to dinner?’
‘I would like to, but thank you, Uncle Ray has taken the fancy for me to dine in his room. Although he eats little himself he seems to like the sight of another doing what he cannot.’
‘Is there any change?’
‘Nothing for the better,’ Caroline said lightly. ‘But he simply will not allow himself to die. I had never realized before what tenacity we Penvenens had!’
Demelza took out as much of the dough as she could lift in her hands and put it on the board. ‘It is hardly to be wondered at that you’re so thin. Surely he will not mind if you stay out one day?’
Caroline tapped her boot. ‘It is very odd – you know that old saying about blood being thicker than water? Well . . . I was thrown upon my uncles when I was ten years old, and I do not think in the years they had legal charge of me that I could claim to have been an obedient or grateful niece. Indeed, I should not be surprised if they both wear a few grey hairs the more for having had this care thrust upon them. But . . . when one of them is ill, and sick to death – indeed, certainly doomed to death by the sugar sickness then I am surprised to find myself drawn into defending him against these unfair attacks. It is like a husband and wife quarrelling, when, against an assault from outside, they patch up their differences and stand shoulder to shoulder. So . . . I am standing shoulder to shoulder with Uncle Ray – so far as I can, that is – which is difficult physically since he now never stands at all.’
‘Did your father and mother die young?’ Demelza asked. ‘Ross has never told me.’
‘Ross does not know. Yes, my father was the youngest of three brothers, of whom Ray is the eldest. When my father was twenty-eight he financed an expedition to discover the sources of the Nile. He never came back. My mother married again but died when I was ten. My step-father is still alive and is a member of the Middle Temple, but I have not seen him for many years and he has never shown an interest in me. So the two staid old bachelors adopted me and spoiled me and gave me the promise of a considerable inheritance, which has made me the object of various fortune hunters, such as Unwin Trevaunance.’
It was the first time these two women had talked alone, and they were still not at ease. Demelza was conscious of her homely clothes, her homely occupation, her ungainly appearance, while this elegant red-haired girl sat on a stool and tapped her riding boot and watched her. Nowadays she seldom felt conscious of her humble origin when dealing with people, she had been Mrs Ross Poldark for seven years and that was enough. But Caroline was a rather special case: someone for whom she could only feel friendship and gratitude but someone almost of her own age whose upbringing had been a world away from hers, who did not soil her hands with work one day in the year and who always talked so casually even when serious. Someone, moreover, for whom Ross at this moment was risking his life and liberty.
‘Why do you knead each lump so long?’ Caroline asked.
‘Because if I don’t the bread will have holes in it. We eat a lot of bread. There are five loaves here and a little over. Perhaps if I made you a small one with this smaller piece you would like to take it back with you?’
‘Thank you. It’s my birthday, so I shall look on it as a present.’
‘Oh, it is not good enough for that! Happy returns! I wish . . .’
‘What do you wish?’
‘I was thinking out loud. I’m sorry . . . I wish that Ross could come back today with the news we both seek.’
‘Do not be sorry for saying that.’
‘I’m not sorry for wishing it, but I am superstitious. It appears to me it is something we should not talk about.’
‘Well, that may be so . . . But sometimes I think while I am cooped up in that old house that I must talk to someone about it or I shall go out of my mind. Demelza, I am sorry to have brought this anxiety on you.’
Demelza began to lift the round masses of kneaded dough on to a metal tray. ‘Ross tells me there is little risk.’
‘But it must give you anxiety, his being in France at this time. I think I should tell you that it is not at my request that he has gone.’
‘I don’t suppose it is. Even though you have good right to request it.’
‘No . . . No one could ever have that right.’
This part done, Demelza stood back and rubbed her hands down her apron and then with the back of her wrist pushed the dank hair away from her eyes. ‘He has been gone a week and four days. If all goes as planned he should be home soon.’
‘I dread his coming.’
‘Let us go back into a more comfortable place. There is nothing more I can do here for ten minutes or so.’
They went back and chatted for a time. The thing Caroline most needed was to talk, and to talk specially of Dwight, which she now did in her helplessly flippant way, apologizing every now and then for boring her listener with such a tedious recital. Presently they went back into the kitchen together and Demelza went under the arch of the stove, opened the iron door of the oven and raked out the white hot remnants of the gorse. Then Caroline lifted the other end of the heavy tray and they slid it into the oven. On this came Jeremy crying out for food, and in the end Caroline was persuaded to stay to dinner with them after all.
Demelza was glad of this, for she had had enough lonely meals since Ross left, and she was also glad of Jeremy’s noisy presence, for as usual he talked all through the meal. This kept conversation on a suitably unemotional level and also seemed to divert Caroline, who was not used to small boys.
When it was over Jeremy sped off and Caroline rose to go. ‘No, no, thank you, my dear, for your consideration, but Uncle Ray will already be in a relapse after missing me for so long. It will take me until I don’t know what time to get home, and I must fly at once.’
‘I’ll tell Gimlett to bring your horse.’
‘I’m sure I have wearied you with all this talk. But, you know, at Killewarren, I cannot behave openly at all. I cannot fret except in my own room. If Dwight is dead I am not even his widow. I am nothing. Which is perhaps what I rightly deserve to be.’
Demelza kissed her. ‘Let us wait and hope.’
A few minutes later Caroline was riding her white horse over the stream and up the valley. Just before she disappeared among the straggling trees she turned and raised her hand. Demelza waved back and then went in.
Betsy Maria Martin had already cleared the table. Demelza went into the kitchen to inspect the bread and to receive Jane’s scoldings for having raked out the oven herself. Then she returned to the parlour and sat for a few minutes at her spinet. She still took lessons from Mrs Kemp but she had reached a stage at which she was making little progress. At first it had seemed so easy: she had been able to conjure tunes out of the spinet without any tuition at all; but as the music that Mrs Kemp gave her became more advanced so the effort to conquer it seemed to take some of the pleasure out of the playing. So now very often when she needed relaxation she shirked the new pieces and played the old, most of which never staled. Nor did Ross tire of them. Sometimes too she sang a little.
The trouble with music was that in some ways it was too nostalgic. If for fun she
even sang now: ‘There was an old couple and they was poor’, it brought up so many almost lost feelings of the heart that it nearly moved her to tears. If she sang, ‘I d’pluck a fair rose for my love’, it conjured up early memories of Trenwith House and that first Christmas time. And so on. Music, she thought, perhaps could be a continuing process, like life, a shedding of one skin as fast as another grew. Instead every tune seemed to exist with its notes firmly rooted in an event or an emotion or a period of time.
So, it was necessary to take trouble and put the old out of one’s mind and concentrate on the new. Mrs Kemp had brought her a piece in May by an Italian, but she had not yet begun to master it. The left hand would not quite ever get the notes right. That was her problem, she decided, it was not lack of application but lack of talent, lack of the sheer ability to use her fingers right.
A footstep sounded behind her and Jane Gimlett said: ‘Captain Poldark is home, ma’am.’
She leapt off the piano stool. ‘What? Where? Have you seen him?’
‘Make one move,’ said Ross, appearing in the doorway, ‘and phit, yer dead.’
‘Ross, my dear, my dear!’ She was in his arms and kissing him.
‘Did I not tell you there was no risk?’
‘Oh, you’re back! Safely back!’ She clung to him.
‘Can you find some dinner for me? I am ravenous hungry.’ He kissed her several times more, on the lips, the cheeks, the eyes, as if his hunger was not all culinary. Jane Gimlett discreetly disappeared.
‘And Dwight? What news have you? Is there any?’
‘Dwight is alive and a prisoner. That is all I know—’
Demelza let out a crow of delight. ‘You have told Caroline?’
‘No, I came straight home, of course. I will tell her—’
‘But she left not an hour since! Which way did you come?’
‘From Truro. She has been here? We must just have missed. I came to Cawsand on Tuesday and from there by pilchard driver direct to Truro. There I hired an old lame horse that reminded me of Darkie and have come limping home. I left him at the other side of the stream to surprise you, but then at the last moment thought I must not surprise you, so I stole into the kitchen and flushed out Jane to break the news. I believe my coming back has upset you more than my going away.’