Jeremy Poldark (6 page)

" We have young Enys to dinner the first
time for several months. Joan is pleased, but I am a little doubtful of the
attachment.' It has run on so long that I don't think it will come to anything.
Especially after Dwight's affair with that w-woman last year."

"The girl threw herself at him," Ross
said. ". I hope I shall not be the skeleton at the feast to-day."

"No indeed. Your visits are as rare as
Enys's. Come along in. I can join you in a minute"

"There was business in my visit as
well," said Ross. "To do with my approaching assize call."

He found a certain detached interest in watching
the responses of various people-when he mentioned his. coming trial. In some
people's eyes a morbid speculative gleam would betray itself behind the show of
sympathy; others, would shy away as if they had been told you were going to
have your, leg off. Harris Pascoe wrinkled his mouth in distaste and made a
show of fixing his spectacles more firmly; behind his ears:

We hope for a happy outcome of that."

"But in the meantime a prudent man puts his
affairs in order."

"There's very little more to do at present,
I think." " Except become solvent."

"Ye-es. Q-quite so. Quite so. Would you
like to look at your account while you are here?"

They went into the bank, and Pascoe opened one
of the great black books, dusted a little stale snuff off a page, and coughed.

" The position in a nutshell is this. You
have a credit balance of a little over a hundred and eighty pounds. You have a
permanent mortgage, on your property with the bank of two thousand three
hundred pounds, bearing seven per cent interest. You have a further
indebtedness outside, I understand, of - of one thousand pounds, is it? b-bearing
interest at forty p-per cent-repayable when?"

" This December or next."

" This December or next. And your income in
round figures, as it were?"

" Not more than three hundred a year net.

Harris winced again. " Er-yes. That's after
living expenses are paid, I suppose?"

Ordinary expenses of food, yes."

" Well, it just won't go, will it? You'll
remember when you c-contemplated taking out that second bill I advised you
instead to sell the mine shares. However, I'm not here to say I told you so.
Any other substantial debts?"

“No”

A bluebottle had entered through an open window
and was exploring the room; with great vigour. The banker pushed the ledger
along the desk, and Ross signed his name against the last entry in his account.

I am concerned," he said, '"to see
some sort of security for my wife. I try not to take a pessimistic view of this
trial, but no good comes of being an ostrich." He raised his deceptively
sleepy eyes, and there was a touch of irony in them again. " There are,
various ways in which the law can deprive her of my support - so if she comes
to widowhood or grass widowhood before her time I should take some comfort in
knowing she would not be without a home."

" I think you can be assured of that,"
the banker said quietly. "Your liquid assets will meet the second
mortgage. If they do not quite I will make up the difference."

They walked back into the private room. "You
have the disadvantage of being my friend, Ross said.

"Not all d-disadvantage.

'I've a long memory - if the law will allow me
to keep it."

I'm sure it will." In some embarrassment,
since the conversation seemed to be becoming emotionally charged, he went on
in a different tone. "There is one thing I should t-tell you, Poldark,
though it's not yet public property. I am enlarging the scope of my business
and taking partners into it.”

Ross had his glass filled. It was not good news
to him, who at the moment felt himself dependent on the personal good will of
the banker, but he could not show that.

" A considerable step, but naturally you
wouldn't take it without good reason."

"No. I think I have good reason. Of course,
when my father began his tin discounting it was a d-different matter. Business
was simple and straightforward thirty years ago, and we did not issue bank
notes until I was married. We have always held a high r-reputation, and so long
as such a trust existed there was no need for complicated systems of finance.
But things have changed and we must move with the times. Nowadays a bank is
subject to all k-kinds of new responsibilities and stresses-and they are more,
I think, than one man-or one-family-should shoulder."

" Who are to be your new partners?"

" St. Aubyn Tresize, whom you know. He has
money and prestige and wide interests. The second is Annery, the solicit or. A
warm man. The third is Spry."

"I don't know him."

"From Come-to-Good. A quaker. I shall be
managing partner and we shall be known as P-pascoe,. Tresize, Annery &
Spry. I think the meal will be ready now. A drop more brandy just to top, up
your glass?"

"Thank you"

As they moved towards the stairs which led up to
the living rooms of the house, Pascoe added:

"In fact it was our experience of last
autumn which finally decided me to take this action."

"You mean the failure of the Carnmore
Copper Copper Company?'.'

"Yes....:. No doubt, fighting it out as,
you fought it out in the arena all the time - you could feel the pressure of
the hostile interests, the other copper companies and the banks concerned,
plainly enough. But sitting here - you know I hardly ever go out-sitting here
in this quiet bank one was aware, of s-subtle stresses too."

" Also hostile."

Also hostile. I was not, as you know, directly
interested in the copper venture. It is not my business - as a custodian of
other people's money to take speculative risks. But I was aware that if I had
been so concerned I should not have been strong enough; to stand the strains
that could have been put on me. Credit is an unpredictable thing-as unstable as
quicksilver. One cannot box it up. One can only give it away - and once `given
it is elastic' up to the very point of breakage. Last autumn I realised that
the days of the one-man bank are over. It-disturbed me-shook me out of a
comfortable rut in wh-which I had been for many years. All this year I have
been feeling my way towards some broader organisation:

They went up the stairs to dinner.

When Francis got home it was just after six. He
had had to ride into the teeth of the wind all the way, and there had been a
half dozen torrential showers, some of them with more than a suggestion of
hail, to stream off his horse's head and his cape and to strike at his face
under the insecure hat, to trickle down his neck and soak his riding breeches
above the leather leggings. Twice too he had nearly come off when his horse
slipped in mud-filled ruts more than a foot deep. So he was not in a good
temper.

Tabb, last of the two remaining house servants,
came to take his horse and began to say something; but a gust of wind and
another flurry of rain bore it away and Francis went into the house.

It was a silent house these days; and already it
showed signs of poverty and neglect: wild weather and salt air is hard on man's
work, and there were damp stains on the ceiling of this fine hall and a smell
of mildew. Portraits of the Poldarks and the Trenwiths stared coldly across the
unfrequented room.

Francis tramped to the stairs, intending to go
up and change, but the door of the. winter parlour flew open and Geoffrey
Charles carne galloping down the hall.

"Daddy! Daddy ! Uncle George is here and
has brought me a toy horse! A lovely one! With brown, eyes and brown hair and
stirrups I can put my feet in!"

Francis saw Elizabeth had come to the door of
the winter parlour, so now there was no escape from greeting an unexpected
visitor.

As Francis went in George Warleggan was standing
by the fireplace. He was wearing a snuff-coloured coat, silk waistcoat and
black cravat, with fawn breeches and new, brown riding boots. Elizabeth looked
a little flushed, as if the surprise call had pleased her. George came seldom
these days, being not too sure of his welcome here. Francis had queer moods and
resented his indebtedness.

Elizabeth said " George has been here an
hour. We were hoping you would be back before he had to leave."

" Quite an honour these days." Francis
bent to satisfy Geoffrey Charles with admiration for his new toy. " Now I
am here you'd best stay till this shower is over. I've been anointed many times
on the way home."

George said evenly: "You've lost weight,
Francis. So have I: We shall all look like sans-culottes before the century is
out"

Francis's eyes travelled over George's broad
frame. "I notice no change for the better.''

The cream curtains in this room were inches
farther across the windows than Francis liked them; they diffused the light,
giving it a tactful and opaque quality which irritated him. He went across and
pulled them sharply, back. When he turned he saw that Elizabeth had flushed; at
.his last remark as if it were her responsibility.

"We ordinary people," George said,
"are affected by the vagaries of fortune. Our faces, our figures are
marked and warped by all the storms that blow. But your wife, my dear Francis,
has a beauty which is untouched by ill luck or indifferent health and only
grows more radiant when the tide turns."

Francis threw off his coat. "I think we all
need a drink. We can still afford drink, George. Some of the old instincts
remain."

"I have been pressing him to sup with
us," Elizabeth said. "But he will not.”

"Cannot," said George. "I must be
back at Cardew before dark. I had been as far as St. Ann's this afternoon on
mining business and could not resist calling on you when so near. You come so
little to town these days."

George was right, Francis thought cynically as
his wife took a wineglass from him, Elizabeth's beauty was too pure to be
affected by everyday circumstance. George still envied him one thing.

" And how's mining?" he asked. One
advantage of being out of it is that one can take a purely academic interest in
its vagaries. Are you thinking of closing Wheal Plenty?"

"Far from it." George poked the carpet
with his long malacca stick and then stopped because just there the pattern of
the carpet was wearing thin. "Tin and copper are both rising. If it goes
on we may be able to restart Grambler one day.

"If that was possible!" said
Elizabeth.

"Which it is not." Francis drained'
his glass at a draught. "George is romancing for your benefit. Copper
would have to double its price to justify a new outlay on Grambler now it is
closed and derelict. Had it been saved from closing there might have been
another story. It will not reopen in our lifetime. 'I am fully resigned to
spending the rest of my days as an impoverished farmer."

George humped his shoulders. "I'm sure you
are making a mistake. You're both making a mistake of remaining shut up here.
There is plenty to be had of life even in these depressed days. Poldark is
still a good name, Francis, and if you moved in society more opportunity would
come of bettering yourself. There are patronages to be had, if nothing better,
paid offices which carry no obligation and no loss of prestige indeed, the
reverse. I could become a burgess any day if it pleased me, but at present it
pleases me to keep out of the political field. As for you"

"As for me," said Francis, "I am
a gentleman and want no patronage either from gentlemen or others."

He said it without emphasis, but the sting was
there. George smiled, but it was not the sort of observation he would be likely
to forget. Few people had the courage to make such remarks to him nowadays.

Elizabeth made an impatient movement. "It's
surely not reasonable to quarrel when there is friendship - when there are
friendships to be had. Pride can go too far."

"Talking of the Poldarks," Francis
went on, taking no notice of her. "I saw that other representative of the
name in Truro to-day. He didn't seem unduly depressed by his forth-coming
trial, though he was not anxious to discuss it with me. One can hardly blame
him."

Francis bent again to speak to his son and the
others were silent.

George eventually said: "I wish him an
acquittal at his trial, of course. But I don't think the outcome will affect
your good name, Francis. Am I my brother's keeper? Still less so, then, of a
cousin:"

Elizabeth said: " What chance is there of
an acquittal, do you think?"

"A lovely horse," said Francis gently
to Geoffrey Charles. "A lovely horse."

"I don't see how there can be a clear acquittal,"
George said, dabbing his lips with a lace handkerchief and watching Elizabeth's
expression. "Ross was a free agent at the time of the wrecks. No one coerced
him into doing what he did."

If one believes he did it"

"Naturally. That will be for the court to
find. But the fact that he has treated the law with contempt on a number of
previous occasions will be inclined to weigh to his detriment."

"What previous occasions? I know of no
others"

"Nor is the court supposed to,"
Francis said, straightening up. "But it will not be left in ignorance. I
came on this pretty little sheet in Truro to-day: There are sure to be others
in Bodmin before next week."

He took a crumpled paper out of his pocket,
straightened it, and, avoiding Geoffrey Charles's outstretched fingers, passed
it to Elizabeth.

I thought of showing it to Ross," Francis
added, "but decided it was discreeter to leave him in ignorance.

Elizabeth stared at the paper.' It was a typical
broadsheet, run off a cheap press, the ink blurred and unevenly spread.

True and Sensational Facts in the life of
Captain R-s P--d-k, bold adventurer, seducer and suspected murderer, shortly
to stand his trial on Criminal Charges at B-m-n Assizes next. Price One Penny.
Written by an Intimate Friend.

After a minute she put the paper down, and
looked at Francis. Francis looked steadily, interestedly, back at her. The
thing was written in the form of a biography, and none of the salacious rumours
of the last two years was missing - all set out as if the facts were beyond
dispute.

Francis offered it to George, but he waved it away.
"I have seen them about. One of our coachmen was caught reading a similar
thing yesterday. They are not important."

"Not important," said Francis gently,
"except to Ross."

"Come here, boy," George said to his
godson, "you have the reins entangled with the saddle. Look, this is the
way it goes."

Elizabeth said: "But if all this is
believed it will prejudice the jury, will prejudice everyone. They talk of a
fair trial”

"Don't distress yourself, my dear
Elizabeth," George said.

These scurrilous broadsheets are always going
about regarding someone or other. No one takes account of 'em. Why, only last
month there was some sheet issued purporting to show in the most lurid and
circumstantial detail that feeble-mindedness and insanity runs all through the
Royal Family and that the King's father, Frederick, was a pervert and a
degenerate beyond recall."

And isn't it so?" Francis asked.

George shrugged. " I suppose there is some
sludge of truth in the basest slander.

His meaning was obvious.

"It states," said Elizabeth,
"that Ross served in the American war only to escape charges of this sort
being brought against him before. But he was only a boy at, the time - there
was some boyish escapade, I know, but nothing serious. And this about
Demelza... And this…'

Francis read : " `Furthermore, there are
numerous brats scattered throughout the countryside whose parentage might be
in, doubt did there not exist the strange Circumstance of the scar wherewith
the Devil hath cursed all the Captain's offspring - this scar being so like
unto his own that the same branding iron might have been Employed. Here in
good earnest we find-"' " What does that mean?" Elizabeth asked.

Jinny Carter's child has a scar," said
Francis. "Jinny Scoble, as she now is. The pamphleteer has been to some
trouble to scrape up all the-er-what did you call it?- all the sludge. 'By an
Intimate Friend.' I wonder who it could be. Not you, George, I suppose?"

George smiled. "I earn my bread in a more
orthodox manner. Only a bankrupt would sell his services that way."

Money is not always the strongest
inducement," said Francis, his gibe turned against him

George bent his head to rest his chin on the
knob of his stick. "No, perhaps spite could play its part Anyway,
the matter is unimportant, isn't it? If the stories are all untrue they can be
refuted."

But he had touched Francis on a raw spot and.
his charateristic turning of the point when he had made it did not quite come
off. It had long been George's practice to swallow insults and to pay them back
at leisure. Francis had been brought up to no such self-control. It was
fortunate that just then Geoffrey Charles fell off his horse and pulled the
animal over on top of him, for when the clamour had subsided, the worst moment
was past. For two reasons Elizabeth exerted herself to prevent a recurrence of
it. First, George almost owned the things they stood in. Second, on personal
grounds, she did not want to lose his friendship. Admiration such as he brought
was rare enough in the life she led. She knew it was her due, and the knowledge
made it all the harder to be without.