The Loving Cup Page 6

‘Oh, I like tall dark girls as well,’ said Ross. ‘Also tall redheads with beautiful eyes.’

  ‘After these little flippances,’ said Caroline, ‘perhaps you would consent to describe her to us.’

  Ross grunted. ‘She’s small and dark – with a proud little face – half scared – prickly, half ready to fight – half wishing to be warm and loving.’

  ‘That’s three halves,’ said Caroline. ‘But I believe I take your meaning.’

  Dwight said: ‘And what of Morwenna and Drake, who had such a friendship with him?’

  ‘They are coming next week. Geoffrey Charles wrote at once, but Drake had just received an order for a new schooner, and, Drake like, does not feel he should leave until the keel is laid.’

  ‘She’s a Catholic, I suppose?’ said Caroline suddenly.

  ‘Amadora? Must be.’ Ross accepted another slice of strawberry pie. ‘A pity.’

  ‘I thought you were rather in favour of Catholics?’

  ‘I’m not in favour of Catholicism. I’m in favour of people being able to worship how they will, without penalty – which they can’t do yet in England.’

  ‘Nor the Wesleyans.’

  ‘Nor the Wesleyans indeed. What I dislike most is religious exclusivism, from whatever direction it comes.’

  ‘The two sects we’ve just mentioned are notably among the most exclusive. The Wesleyans believe that only the saved will see Christ. The Catholics don’t believe we are members of Christ’s church at all!’

  ‘I know. It’s a bigoted world.’

  ‘From which we’re not free either,’ said Dwight. ‘Those anti-Catholic meetings all over the country last year! After all, for the last two and a half centuries most of our own countrymen have been taught that Rome is the Scarlet Woman, etcetera.’

  ‘Surely,’ said Demelza, ‘if two people love each other, that will be most important. Where there is real love, there can be give and take.’

  Ross said: ‘Well, it depends on the strength of the love and the strength of the religious conviction. Doesn’t it? In two or three years when children start coming and the love is not quite so warm . . .’

  ‘Ross, no doubt, judges from his own experience,’ said Demelza, scowling at him.

  ‘It’s because my own experience is so rare that I cannot judge from it,’ said Ross. ‘Look around you. Present company naturally excepted.’

  Caroline said: ‘But does anyone know yet whether the young couple intend to settle here?’

  ‘Geoffrey Charles is returning to join his regiment in a couple of months. She will go back with him. But how they will feel when the war is over . . .’

  Demelza said: ‘How they feel when the war is over will much depend upon how they feel at the end of this visit. And how she feels will much influence how he feels. Isn’t that so? And how she feels, who knows? may be just a small matter influenced by how nice we are to her.’

  Caroline patted her hand. ‘Put very well, my dear. I shall go and wait on her tomorrow and offer her . . . what can I offer her that she hasn’t already got?’

  ‘Can you speak Spanish?’

  ‘Enough to know that the Italian for butter means donkey in Spanish. No more.’

  ‘Apparently Harriet Warleggan can. They struck up a sharp friendship that cannot be welcome to either of their husbands.’

  The meal came to its end with nuts and grapes and raisins – and of course port. Demelza sipped her port and stretched her legs. Still lacking a little of the vitality she had had before baby Henry was conceived, she was nevertheless zestful enough for most occasions; and of all the meals of her life these were the ones she enjoyed most. (Saving the noisy family meals, which were a thing apart.) To sup at Killewarren with her oldest and dearest friends, in Ross’s company, was better even than when they came to her. There was no niggling anxiety as to whether the veal would be properly done or whether the poached peaches would be served half cold. Caroline always seemed able to employ better and more efficient servants. Demelza admitted that she was not a very good manager herself. She had never quite got into the way of being angry with servants if they didn’t do what they were told. (Ross could do it in a second; but it was not Ross’s business.) This was the luxury of enjoying an excellent meal and wines without a thought to the kitchen.

  ‘Please?’ she said, having not heard a question.

  ‘Dreaming again,’ said Caroline. ‘I was telling Ross that I might be losing Dwight sometime soon.’

  ‘Very unlikely,’ said Dwight. ‘Caroline is romancing.’

  ‘Far from it! I know from his manner.’

  Dwight said: ‘What Caroline is trying to tell you in her roundabout way is that I have recently received a letter from Sir Humphry Davy. You remember him, Ross: you met him at the Duchess of Gordon’s party.’

  ‘Yes, of course. And since somewhere, I can’t recollect where.’

  ‘Sir Humphry?’ said Demelza.

  ‘He was knighted last year. And is recently married.’

  ‘To a widow,’ Ross added. ‘Does she not also have money?’

  ‘A considerable fortune. But I believe they are truly in love.’

  ‘Money doesn’t prevent that,’ said Ross.

  ‘No, but it can give rise to unworthy gossip . . . They were here in Cornwall in May, visiting his parents in Penzance. George Warleggan and Harriet invited them to spend a night at Cardew. We were asked to sup there.’

  ‘Well, I suppose Davy is now the foremost scientist in England.’

  Dwight took a nut and cracked it, but did not put the kernel in his mouth.

  ‘When I met Davy at Cardew he told me of an invitation he had received from France. He has kept in touch with most of the leading French scientists through these latest years of the war. Scientists of note like Ampère, Guy-Lussac, Laplace. Early last year Napoleon himself heard of Davy’s discoveries and achievements, and at once offered Davy unconditional permission to visit Paris and to travel through France and anywhere else in Europe he chose. It is a notable recognition of his achievements. And I think also a notable testimony to Buonaparte’s breadth of vision that in the middle of so bitter a war he should make such an offer to a national of his bitterest enemy.’

  ‘And Davy? He did not accept the invitation?’

  ‘Not then. But it was an open invitation, and he thinks of accepting it this autumn.’

  Demelza took a sip of port, but no one spoke.

  Then Ross said: ‘It’s a different situation now for Napoleon. Then he was riding high, true master of Europe. Now he’s between two fires. I should ask for a further assurance if I were Davy.’

  ‘I don’t believe Napoleon would go back on his word.’

  ‘Don’t forget the end of the Treaty of Amiens,’ Caroline said. ‘Ten thousand British tourists interned as prisoners of war. Yourself and Ross escaping back across the Channel by the skin of your teeth. And me alone in this house carrying Sophie!’

  ‘And this letter you have had from Sir Humphry?’ said Demelza, seeing already how the land lay.

  Dwight smiled. ‘He has been told he may take his wife, a couple of servants, one or two friends of like mind.’

  ‘Such as who?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Such as what friends?’

  ‘Oh . . . a chemist, a scientist perhaps, not more than two or three. As you will have guessed by now, he has asked me if I would like to be one of them. He suggests that as a medical man I could be of value to them, travelling as they are as a small group in a foreign and hostile country.’

  Ross glanced at Caroline, who was frowning with concentration at a black grape.

  ‘A dilemma.’

  ‘The letter only reached me yesterday. It is a delectable thought to be able to meet all those French scientists on their own ground. Even to see Paris again, right in the depths of the war . . . But I believe Humphry Davy intends to go on to Italy after his stay in Paris; he has some plans to visit the Auvergne and even go as far as Naples, which would m
ean his being away at least a year. And that would not be feasible – or tolerable – for me.’

  Caroline said: ‘I wonder what the French authorities would feel about it if Sir Humphry brought with him an escaped and unransomed prisoner of war!’

  ‘I doubt, my dear, if they would be likely to discover it after eighteen years.’

  ‘Caroline has a long memory,’ said Demelza. ‘We both have! And little wonder.’

  There was a tap at the door and Myners came in. ‘Dr Enys, sir. Mr Pope is sick again. A messenger has just come from Place House. It is Music Thomas, who says it is urgent, but of course . . .’

  The implication was that Music Thomas was not the most reliable of informants.

  Dwight said: ‘Tell Tresidder. Ask him to saddle Parsee. And tell Thomas to go back and say I am coming at once.’

  ‘Very good, sir.’

  When they were alone Caroline said: ‘D’you know it is just about a year ago, isn’t it, that this happened before? You were supping with us, and someone came from Place House asking for Dwight. We must be careful not to allow this to become a habit.’

  ‘Do you see much of them – socially, I mean?’ Ross asked.

  ‘Our girls are too young for theirs; and I confess he rather gives me the creeps. She’s well enough – if she would only stop worrying as to whether she ought to be condescending or be condescended to.’

  Dwight said: ‘I have visited him monthly since last year. They live in a social strait-jacket. And not only social. It is a queer household.’

  ‘Did you hear about Jeremy?’ Demelza asked. ‘Mrs Pope fell off her horse, and Jeremy found her and helped her home.’

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘Only last week. She sent him a silver stock-pin. Jeremy is quite taken with it.’

  ‘He might well have been taken with her too,’ said Ross. He added: ‘Do you know anything more of the mine Unwin is supposed to be opening on Mr Pope’s doorstep?’

  ‘I believe it is hanging fire,’ Dwight said. ‘Isn’t that so, Caroline? You heard something from Harriet Warleggan.’

  Caroline yawned. ‘A story that it was to be delayed. To do with copper prices. Chenhalls of course is the moving figure. But Unwin has certainly not been down of late.’

  Dwight got up, patted Ross on the shoulder, kissed Demelza on the cheek, put fingers over his wife’s long fingers. ‘Well, I suppose we must not keep the old gentleman waiting. Last time, my dear, I think you offered me a brandy before I left.’

  ‘What a memory,’ said Caroline.

  II

  Place House was square and solid, put up about a hundred years ago by masons who had used local stone and had no time for fripperies; but the second owner, having been to London and seen the work of Inigo Jones, had added a Palladian front to give a touch of elegance and distinction. In essence it was a roomy, but in its exposed position a draughty, house, built of elvan and heavy slate; the elegance had never quite come off; the pillars had stood the weather less well than the rest of the stone. There was no garden at the front to speak of: just a terrace with a balustrade looking down the combe towards the sea.

  When Dwight arrived the interior seemed to be fluttering with newly-lighted candles. Katie Carter let him in. Her manner was as agitated as the candles, her hair untidy, spraying out tonight from under her cap like seaweed. Almost as she let him in she began to explain breathlessly that she had been the first to answer Mrs Pope’s urgent call and had run up the stairs and found her trying to bring the Master round. Nowadays, Katie said, he had a light supper in bed; so he must have been took queer soon after eating it and wandered out upon the landing and fallen down in the open door of one of the other bedrooms, where the Mistress had found him. She, Katie, and the Mistress had managed to carry him back to his own room and lift him onto the bed.

  It was not usual or proper for a parlourmaid to say so much to a surgeon in a hoarse whisper as she led him up the fine polished staircase, spilling commas of candle-grease as she went, but Ben Carter’s sister was one of the village family and took such liberties without knowing she was taking them. Taller than Ben and just as dark in that Cornish way which had given rise mistakenly to stories of shipwrecked sailors from the Armada – though not perhaps mistakenly to a later dash of Spanish blood – she was as unlike Ben in most ways as she could be. She was altogether a big girl, clumsy, nervous, and her nervousness made her morose. Her feet were too big, and she often seemed to fall over them. Yet taken in hand, Dwight thought, she need not have been ill looking: she had escaped the pox, her skin was clear; her eyes, under lashes so black they might have been kohled, were large and full.

  Mrs Pope was waiting for him at the door of the bedroom; they shook hands gravely and he went to the patient. At first Dwight thought he was dead. His face was the colour of the sheet, his body was cold and there was no perceptible pulse. The pupils were dilated and turned up, the tongue was just showing between the decayed teeth. Dwight took a hand mirror and held it to the man’s bluish lips. After a few seconds the mirror became discoloured.

  Dwight said: ‘Warming pans, if you please.’ He rummaged in his bag and took out a bottle of ethyl oxide, spilled a few drops on a pad and held it to Mr Pope’s nose. Over his shoulder he said: ‘He has clearly had a severe spasm and has not come out of it yet. Has he been taking some exceptional exercise or been involved in emotional strain?’

  ‘Not at all,’ Mrs Pope said. ‘He retired at seven. This has been his habit since you first saw him. In that sense he has been a very good patient. I – er – took my supper downstairs and as usual his was sent up. Apparently he ate it. When I have finished my own meal I always come up to make sure that he is comfortable and wants for nothing. I found him like this, where he had fallen, on the threshold of his bedroom. We lifted him onto the bed and sent Thomas in haste to fetch you. I – feared him dead.’

  Dwight put a few drops of laudanum in a spoon, dipped his fingers in it and dabbed it on the old man’s lips and tongue. ‘The bell pull is by his bed. He had no need to get up.’

  ‘None.’ She shivered as if cold, pulled her green Chinese-silk morning gown more closely about her. Sometimes her long fair hair was elaborately built up, but this evening it was twisted into a casual pile and pinned in place by an ebony-coloured Spanish comb. ‘He never leaves his room after retiring, Dr Enys. At least I have never known it before. But since he was not bedridden I suppose he could do so if he chose.’

  ‘Are his children here?’

  ‘No. They are spending the night with the Teagues.’

  ‘I think they should be summoned.’

  ‘Tonight? They will be returning in the morning.’

  ‘Well, it is for you to choose, Mrs Pope. But when a man is in such a condition as this – which is virtually syncope . . .’

  ‘Does that mean? . . .’ Mrs Pope said. ‘Does that mean he is going to die?’

  ‘We cannot tell. But it has certainly been a very close call.’

  Mrs Pope began to cry. At least she took out a handkerchief and dabbed her nose, and gave an occasional trembling sigh. Dwight held the mirror up again, and thought the misting came a little more quickly. Presently Katie Carter and another woman came in, each carrying a warming pan.

  ‘Quiet, Kate,’ said Mrs Pope reprovingly, as the pan clattered.

  ‘Sorry, mum. I was in some ’aste . . .’

  The warming pans were slid under the sheets at the feet of Mr Clement Pope. Dwight took out a jar and put a leech on each of the man’s wrists. Unlike most of his profession, he was disenchanted with the practice of bleeding, but this was a case where it might ease the pressure of blood to the heart.

  Mrs Pope said to the other servant: ‘Pray see that Miss Pope and Miss Maud are sent for immediately.’

  ‘’S, mum.’

  The women went out. It occurred to Dwight to wonder whether Mrs Selina Pope always supped in this elegant deshabille. It was not his business to inquire. It was not even his business to
ask whether Mr Clement Pope had altogether obeyed his instructions to lead a quiet, regular and celibate life.

  ‘You will stay, Dr Enys?’ Mrs Pope said, looking at him from under damp lashes.

  ‘For the time, certainly. Until he regains consciousness or – there is some other change.’

  ‘Can I – get you something to drink? The maids will . . .’

  ‘No, thank you.’

  Time passes quickly or slowly when waiting, according to how occupied or pre-occupied the mind is that waits; so Dwight never knew, perhaps Selina Pope never knew, how long they sat there, Dwight on a chair by the bed, Mrs Pope on an early Georgian window seat upholstered in yellow silk.

  Dwight thought of his own two daughters, growing away now. Sophie eleven, Meliora nearly ten. Four years after the tragedy of Sarah’s death Caroline had found herself pregnant again and had produced these two girls in quite rapid succession. As if to redress the balance after the frailties of their first child, these two had ailed little and given small cause for anxiety even when they caught the childish diseases. Both thin to the point of being bony, they were bundles of vigour and energy, only exceeded in this by Bella Poldark. Sophie was going to be pretty but her looks were taking a long time to develop; Meliora didn’t have the features and her mouth was too big, but she would easily make up for this lack by sheer charm of manner. Both were fair but neither, surprisingly, a redhead.

  Dwight had wondered once whether to ask Sir Humphry Davy if he might bring his wife at least as far as Paris; but he knew without asking that she would not leave the children for longer than a month at the most. The idea of meeting the French scientists filled him with excitement; but he knew already that he had no alternative but to refuse.

  All this time there had been virtually no change in the patient; Dwight had removed the leeches and occasionally added a drop more ether to the pad he held under the sick man’s nose; Selina had crossed and uncrossed her elegant legs a number of times and had lifted her arms to bind in a thick strand of yellow hair. So perhaps it was an hour during which there had been virtually no conversation between them – before Mr Pope spoke.

  Yes, Mr Pope spoke, breaking a silence which for him had endured ever since he fell down with his heart attack.