Bride of Pendorric

Chapter IV

I had begun to think that someone was amusing himself—or herself—at my expense.

I had heard the playing of a violin; I had heard the singing. Why should I be the one singled out to hear these things? I was sure it was because of the legend and because I was the new Bride. Somebody in this house was trying to make me nervous.

I wondered why. Had my practical attitude, my determination not to be affected by stories of ghosts and hauntings, irritated someone? Was my scepticism a challenge? That seemed the most likely. Someone who believed in the ghost of Pendorric was determined to make me change my tune.

I wondered to whom I could talk about this subject which was beginning to take up too much of my thoughts.

BE I mentioned it to Roc, he would laugh and tell me I was coming under the spell of Pendorric as all the Brides did. Morwenna was always friendly, but somehow remote; as for Charles, I saw less of him than of anyone in the household and I couldn’t imagine myself chatting cosily with him. The twins? Impossible. Lowella was too much of a scatterbrain, and I could never be sure what Hyson was thinking. Indeed, if someone was trying to scare me I rather suspected it might, be Hyson, for after all, there was an element of childishness in the method.

I had never liked Rachel Bective and it occurred to me that she might have sensed my dislike, returned it, and was trying to make me uncomfortable in my new home.

There seemed only one person in whom I could confide and that was Deborah. She was more affectionate than Morwenna, more inclined to share confidences; and I felt that, being a Devonshire woman, she was’ practical and looked on superstition much as I myself did. There was an opportunity to talk to her when I went to her room to look at her albums, and we sat in the window-seat of her sitting-room with the books across our knees while she explained the pictures to me.

They had been arranged with care, in chronological order, with a caption beneath each ; and most of the early ones were of Barbarina and her husband. There were several of Barbarina and Deborah herself, and I couldn’t distinguish which was which.

” That’s because we’re in repose,” explained Deborah. ” She was much more animated than I; she had all the charm. But you don’t see that in a snapshot.”

There were many of Roc and Morwenna; and I found it absorbingly interesting to study his little face and discover there a hint of traits which were his today.

Then I turned a page and there were no more pictures.

” That last one was taken a week before Barbarina died,” Deborah told me. ” After that I didn’t use this book. This was what I thought of as Barbarina’s Book. It couldn’t go on after she had gone.” She picked up another album and opened it. I looked at pictures of an older Roc and Morwenna. ” After a while,” went on Deborah, ” life started to go on in a new pattern, and I took my pictures again.”

I turned a page and stopped, for I was looking at what I thought was a group consisting of Roc, Morwenna and Barbarina.

” This one doesn’t belong in this book.”

Deborah smiled. ” Oh yes it does. That isn’t Barbarina. She died sai months before that was taken.”

” So it’s you. But you look so exactly like her.”

” Yes … when she was no longer there to be compared with me, people thought I was more like her than I had been before. But that was because she wasn’t there, of course.” She turned the page as though she couldn’t bear to look at it. ” Oh, and here’s Morwenna and Charles. He’s very young there. He came to Pendorric when he was eighteen or so. Petroc’s idea was to train him so that he could take over, and mat was what he did. See how Morwenna gazes up at him. He was a god to her.” She laughed. ” It was rather amusing to see the effect he had on her. Every sentence she uttered began with Charles says …” or Charles does . ” She adored him from the moment he came to Pendorric, and she’s gone on doing so ever since.”

” They’re very happy, aren’t they?”

” Sometimes I used to think that there was too much devotion there. I remember one occasion when he went down to market and was involved in a smash-up. It was only a minor affair, and he was in hospital for less than a week, but Morwenna was … stricken. And I thought then:

“You’re not living a life of your own, my dear. You’re living Charles’s life. That’s well enough if Charles goes on living and loving you. But what if he doesn’t?” I think she’d die of a. broken heart. “

” Charles seems quite devoted to her.”

” Charles would always ‘be a faithful husband, but there are other things in his life than his marriage. He’s devoted to the Church, you know. Peter Dark often says he doesn’t know what he’d do without him.

Charles’s father was a parson, and he was very strictly brought up.

He’s deeply religious. In fact I wonder he didn’t take holy orders. I think cultivating the land is a sort of religion with him. As a matter of fact he has moulded Morwenna to his ways. There was a time when she was as ready for mischief as her brother. I’ve never known her go against Charles in any way . except perhaps one thing. ” I waited expectantly and Deborah hesitated as though wondering whether to go on.

” I meant… her friendship with Rachel Bective.”

“Oh, doesn’t Charles like Rachel?”

” I don’t think he has any strong feelings of dislike, but at one time Morwenna used to bring her home from school for every holiday. I asked if she hadn’t another friend who might come, or whether Rachel hadn’t a home of her own to go to, and I remember how stubborn Morwenna was.

“She must come here,! she said. She wants to come and she hates going to her own home.” Charles didn’t actually say he disapproved of her, but he never took the two of them riding or with him when he went round the farms, as he took Morwenna when she was alone. I thought that would be enough to make her stop inviting Rachel. But it wasn’t. “

” And now she’s living here!”

” Only until the children go away to school again. And then I expect she’ll find some excuse to stay, although perhaps now you’re mistress of the house …”

Deborah sighed, and I knew what she meant. Unprivileged Rachel had come from a poor home to Pendorric, had loved what she had seen and longed to make it her own. Had she believed that she might be the new Bride of Pendorric? Roc had evidently been friendly with her, and I could understand how easy it was to fall in love with him. Was Rachel in love with Roc? Or had she been at some time? Yes, I decided in that moment, Rachel Bective might have a very good reason for resenting me.

I said slowly: “Do you remember telling me about Barbarina’s playing Ophelia and singing a song from the play?”

Deborah was very still for a few seconds and I was aware that she did not look at me. She nodded.

” I thought I heard someone singing that song in the east wing. I wondered who it could be.”

The silence seemed to go on for a long time, but perhaps it was only for a few seconds. Then Deborah said: ” I suppose anyone might sing that song.”

” Yes, I suppose so.”

Deborah turned to get one of the albums which I had not yet seen; she sat beside me explaining the pictures. She evidently did not appear to think it strange that I should have heard someone singing the song.

A few days later, in response to an invitation, I called at the doctor’s house. It was a charming place—early nineteenth century—surrounded by a garden in which were beehives. Mabell Clement was a very busy person, tall and fair like her brother, and she wore her hair in a thick plait which hung half-way down her back—at least that was how it was when e I first met her; on later occasions I saw it made into a knot in the nape of her neck that was always threatening to escape restriction; she wore smocks, sometimes caught in at the waist by girdles, with raffia sandals, amber beads and swinging ear rings.

She was determined that everyone should recognise her as an artist, and this seemed to be her one foible, for she appeared to be good-natured, easygoing, and a good hostess. She was very proud of her brother; and he was affectionately tolerant towards her. I imagine that meals were served at odd times in that household, for Mabell admitted that when the urge to paint or pot or look after her garden came to her she simply had to obey it.

I was shown over Tremethick itself, the pottery shed, and what was called the studio, and I had an interesting afternoon.

Dr. Clement said that he would drive me back to Pendorric, but half an hour before I was due to leave, a call came through from one of his patients and he had to go off immediately.

Thus I walked back to Pendorric alone.

As I came into the village there was no sign of anyone. It was one of those still afternoons, very hot and sultry; I passed the row of cottages, and looked for Jesse Pleydell, but he was not at his door to-day. I wondered whether to call on him as I had promised to do, but decided against it. I wanted to find out from Mrs. Penhalligan or Maria what tobacco he smoked and take some along for him when I went.

The churchyard lay on my right. It looked cool and some how inviting.

I hesitated and then slipped through the lych gate. I have always been attracted by graveyards, particularly deserted ones. There seems to me to be a sense of utter peace within them, and I liked to think of all those people lying beneath the grey stones who had once lived and suffered and now were at peace.

I walked among the tombstones and read some of the inscriptions as Roc had, not very long ago; and eventually I saw ahead of me the Pendorric vault.

Irresistibly attracted I went to it. I wanted to see if the laurel wreath was still there.

It was gone, but in its place was a small wreath of roses, and as I went closer I recognised the Paul Scarlets which grew in the garden.

There was no note on the flowers, but I was sure they were there in memory of Barbarina. It occurred to me then that Carrie was the one who put them there.

I heard a rustle in the grass behind me, and turning sharply saw Dinah Bond picking her way towards me. She looked even more vital here among the dead than she did in the old blacksmith’s shop; she held herself erect and swung her hips as she walked, in a manner which was both graceful and provocative.

” Hallo there, Mrs. Pendorric,” she called jauntily. ” Hallo,” I answered.

” It be quiet in here … peaceful like.”

” I thought the village looked peaceful today.”

” But too hot to move about much. There’s thunder in the air. Can’t you feel it? All still and waiting like … for the storm to break.”

” I expect you’re right.”

She smiled at me half insolently, and what was worse, with something which I felt might have been compassion.

” Having a look at the family vault? I often do. I be tee haven’t been inside, Mrs. Pendorric.”

” No.”

She laughed: ” Time enough for that, I reckon you think. It’s cold as death inside … and all the coffins laid out on shelves. Sometimes I come and look at it … like this afternoon … just for the pleasure of knowing I’m outside and not locked in—like Morwenna once was.”

” Morwenna! Locked in! How did that happen?”

” It’s years ago. I was only a kid then … about six, I think. When are you going to let me tell your fortune?”

” Sometime, I expect.”

” No time like the present.”

“Why are you so anxious?”

” I’m just taken that way.”

” I haven’t any silver to cross your palm with.”

” That! It’s just a way to get the money. I wouldn’t do it for money—not for you, Mrs. Pendorric. Now I’m married to Jim Bond, I don’t do it professional like. That went out when I gave up my gipsy ways. “

” Tell me about the time Morwenna was locked in the vault and who did it.”

She didn’t answer, but sat down on the edge of a grave stone, and resting her chin in her hands stared broodingly at the vault.

” The key of the vault was always kept in a cupboard in Mr. Petroc’s study. It was a big key. She’d come down for the holidays.”

“Who?”

” Rachel Bective.”

” How old was she then?”

” I’d say about as old as those twins are now … perhaps a year or so younger. I was always trailing them. I think it was the colour of her hair. Mine was that black and hers was ginger colour. I wanted to keep looking at it. Not that I liked it, mind. I liked Morwenna, though. Miss Morwenna we were told to call her. I never did, though, and she didn’t mind.

“She was like Roc—they never minded things like that. But she did, that ginger one. She’d say to me: You’ll call me Miss Rachel or I’ll know the reason why.” Miss Rachel! Who did she think she was? “

” Tell me how Morwenna came to be in the vault.”

” I was always in the churchyard. I used to come here to play among the tombstones; and one day I saw them together and I hid and listened to them talking. After that I just wanted to watch them and listen to them some more, so I was often where they were, when they didn’t know it. I knew they’d be at the vault, because I’d heard about it the day before when they were in the graveyard reading the inscriptions.

Morwenna told Rachel that’s what she used to do with her brother, and that made Rachel want to do it, for she did always want to do everything they did. She wanted to be one of them and she couldn’t . she couldn’t ever be . no more than she can now. Oh, she be educated, I do know . but I’d be as good as her if I’d had the schooling. “

” What has she done to you, that you hate her so much?”

” Tain’t what she’s done to me. Her wouldn’t deign to give much thought to the likes of I, Mrs. Pendorric. It’s what she’d do to others.”

” You were telling me.”

“So I were.” She held her hands in front of her, as though she were reading her own fortune. Then she went on:

” I heard ‘em talking. She wanted Morwenna to get this key so that they could have a look at the vault, and Morwenna didn’t want to. You see, it was in her father’s study. He was away at the time—he were often away after the accident—and she said to Morwenna:

‘ You’ll be sorry if you don’t. ” I was up in a tree and they couldn’t see me, but I knew that Morwenna would get the key because she knew she would really be sorry if she didn’t. Then I heard they were coming there next afternoon, so I were there too.”

” So Morwenna did get the key.”

Dinah nodded. ” I was here in the graveyard next day when they came, and they had the key. Rachel Bective opened the door of the vault and they went in, though Morwenna didn’t want to much, but Rachel was saying: You’ve got to. You’ll be sorry if you don’t,” and Morwenna was saying: “I can’t. Not again.” Then all of a sudden Rachel laughed and ran out of the vault, slamming the door after her. Then she locked it and Morwenna was shut in. “

” It must have been a horrible experience. I hope she didn’t stay there long.”

Dinah shook her head. ” No. There’s a little grating in the vault and Rachel was soon at that. She kept calling out: ” I won’t let you out till you say you’ll ask me for Christmas. I’ll go back and I’ll tell them I don’t know where you are. Nobody’ll think you’re in here because I’ll take the key back and put it where it belongs . and it’ll be weeks before they find you, then you’ll be a skeleton like the bride in “The Mistletoe Bough ” ” So Morwenna said she would do what she wanted and Rachel opened the door. I never forgot that, and I don’t never pass this spot without thinking on it and how poor Morwenna had to say she would do what it was Rachel wanted, and how pleased Rachel looked in her sly way.”

” She was only a child, I suppose, and she must have longed to come to Pendorric for holidays.”

” And you reckon that excuses her … doing a thing like that!”

” It was a childish trick….”

” Oh, no ‘tweren’t. She’d have left her there if Morwenna hadn’t given way.”

” I’m sure she wouldn’t.”

Dinah looked at me scornfully. ” I’m beginning to read your fortune, Mrs. Pendorric, without so much as a look at your hand. You’re one of them that says: Oh no, it bain’t that way … just when you don’t want it to be. Your sort has to beware.”

” You’re quite wrong. I assure you I face facts when I know they’re there to be faced.”

” Ay, but it’s knowing they’re there that’s important, don’ tee think, Mrs. Pendorric? I’ll tell ‘ee this: There’s people that don’t change much all through their lives. You can’t tell ‘tis so till you’ve proved like … but it don’t do no harm to be on your guard.

Oh, I do know a lot about Pendorrics . living close you might say, all of me born natural life. “

” I expect there’s always been a great deal of gossip about the family.”

” There was at the time, and though I was yet to be born, they were still talking of it when I were a little ‘un. My mother was a sharp one. Nothing much she missed. I remember hearing her talk of Louisa Sellick, the one he were sweet on before he married Miss Barbarina.”

“Louisa Sellick?” I repeated, for I had never heard that name mentioned before.

” Oh, ‘tis an old story and all happened long ago. Ain’t no sense in reviving it like … ‘cept of course, you be the next Bride.” I went over to Dinah, and looking down at her said earnestly : ” I sometimes get the impression that you’re trying to warn me about something.”

She threw back her hair and laughed up at me. ” That’s because I want to tell your fortune. They say The gipsy warned me,” don’t ‘em? Tis a kind of joke. “

” What do you know of Louisa Sellick?”

” Only what my mother told me. Sometimes I’ve been out that way … where she do live now, and I’ve seen her. But that was after he were dead like … so it weren’t the same. They say he used to go out to visit her and that Barbarina Pendorric killed herself because she couldn’t endure it no more … him liking Louisa better than her.

She’d thought when she first married that it was all over; that were when Louisa went out to live on the moor. “

” And is Louisa still living there?”

Dinah nodded. ” Well, least she were when I were last that way. Tis Bedivere House—a sizeable place. He bought it for her. Twas their love nest, you might say. And when he rode out on his business he’d land up at Bedivere. Perhaps there’d be mist on the moors or he was too busy to get back to Pendorric … see what I mean? But it was found out that she were there … and then things happened.”

” Do you often go out that way?”

” Not now. I got a home of me own now, remember. I married Jim Bond, didn’t I? I sleep on a goose-feather bed and there’s four walls all round me. But when I go out that way … Rozmary Pool and Jamaica Inn way … I see the house and I look for Louisa. She ain’t so young and pretty now … but we none of us stay that way for ever, do us?”

I remembered suddenly that listening to Dinah’s conversation I had stayed out longer than I had intended to. I looked at my watch. ” I’d no idea it was so late,” I said.

She smiled lazily. ” You’d better get back, Mrs. Pendorric. Time don’t matter to me, but I know it does to the likes of you. Some folks rush about like they thought they hadn’t got much time left. Perhaps they’re right. Who’s to say?”

She was smiling her mocking enigmatic smile.

” Goodbye,” I said, and started to pick my way through the gravestones to the lych gate.

My interest in Barbarina grew as each day passed. I went often to that room of hers and thought about her. I wondered if she had been of a passionate and jealous nature. She must have been terribly unhappy if, as Dinah had suggested, her husband had paid periodic visits to that woman on the moor.

I had heard no more violin-playing, nor singing in that strange off-key voice. Whoever had been responsible for that had evidently decided to give it a rest, and I was only faintly disconcerted because I had failed to discover who was playing the part of the ghostly musician. But I did want to know more of Barbarina. Deborah was always willing to talk about her, and in fact obviously delighted in doing so. She was gradually building up the picture of her sister in my mind; sometimes she would even describe the dresses they had worn for certain parties, and so vividly did she talk that it was as though Barbarina materialised before my eyes. Since my talk with Dinah the picture had become even clearer, and I knew that one day soon my curiosity would be too much for me and I should have to go out on the moor to see if I could catch a glimpse of Louisa Sellick for myself.

I had not made any excursions alone by car so far, and I couldn’t very well ask Roc to take me there, nor Morwenna. I had an uneasy feeling that I’d do better to leave the past alone, and yet, because I could not suppress a feeling that I ought to know, I seemed unable to stop.

Dinah’s veiled warnings didn’t help me to leave the subject alone, either.

There were three small cars in the garage besides Roc’s Daimler and Charles’s Land-Rover; Morwenna used one of them and I had been told that the others were for general use.

I had often said that I wanted to go into Plymouth to do some shopping, and although I didn’t exactly say I was going there on this occasion, I let Morwenna think so.

Roc had gone off on estate business that morning and I hadn’t even told him I was going out, which, after all, did occur to me on the spur of the moment.

I had paused by the picture of Barbarina in the gallery and looked up into those sadly brooding eyes, wondering whether when she had discovered that her husband was visiting that house on the moor she had confronted him with her discovery. ” I should if I ever found that Roc was involved in such an affair,” I said to myself; and I remembered the sly looks of Rachel, the bold ones of Dinah Bond, and the beauty of Nurse Grey.

I did seem to be growing very jealous since I had arrived at Pendorric. Was I changing my nature or discovering characteristics which I had not known before that I possessed?

In any case, I assured myself, I was not the sort to suffer in silence. If I had a shred of evidence that Roc was being unfaithful to me, I should confront him with it and insist on the truth. What had Barbarina done?

Was I identifying myself with Barbarina and reading things from her life into mine so that our stories were beginning to seem similar? In any case my interest in her was becoming a little morbid. Although this thought Occurred to me it did not prevent my wanting to see the house where my father-in-law had installed her rival, but I did try to tell myself that it was really the moor that fascinated me, and it was the ideal morning for a drive.

I set out about half past ten, and branching off the road to Plymouth I was on the moor in a very short time.

It was a glorious morning. A fresh breeze ruffled the rough grass and I felt a sense of adventure as I looked ahead at the folds of moor and drove for miles without seeing any person or building. Eventually I slowed down before a signpost, and saw that I was only a few miles from Rozmary Pool.

I drove on. I could see the hills with Brown Willy towering above them and Rough Tor in the distance. This was a very lonely spot, and looking about me I saw several mounds which earlier Roc had pointed out to me as the burial grounds of ancient Britons.

It was here that King Arthur was reputed to have fought his last battle. If it were really so, I thought, it would have looked exactly as it looked today.

And suddenly I saw the Pool; it was not ‘large and I guessed that at its widest part it could not have been more than a quarter of a mile across. I stopped the car, and getting out walked to the water’s edge.

There was no sound but the murmur of the wind in the rough grass. I thought of the legend as I remembered it and as I supposed thousands of visitors to this place must have done: of Bedivere standing at the edge of the water with the dying Arthur’s sword in his hand, debating whether or not to throw it, as commanded, into the middle of the mere.

Finally he had done so and an arm had appeared from the centre of the Pool and grasped the sword Excalibur.

I smiled and turned away.

Bedivere, I murmured. Bedivere House. It must be fairly near; Dinah had said so.

I got back into the car and drove slowly for half a mile, and then found a narrow road which I decided to explore.

I had not gone very far when a boy came out of a narrow lane and started to walk in the direction I was going. Drawing up beside him I saw that he was about fourteen; he smiled, and right from the first moment I knew there was something familiar in that smile.

“Are you lost?” he asked.

” Not exactly. I’m just wandering round. I’ve come from Rozmary Pool.”

He grinned. ” Well, this is a second-class road. It doesn’t lead anywhere much except to Bedivere House … and then back on to the main road. Only it gets a bit rougher. Your best plan, if you want to get on to the main road, is to turn back.”

” Thank you,” I said. ” But I’ll go on for a bit and look at Bedivere House. What’s it like?”

” Oh, you can’t miss it. It’s the grey house with the green shutters.”

” Sounds interesting—especially with a name ‘like that.”

” Oh, I don’t know,” he said with a grin. ” I live there, you see.” He had his back to the light, and then I noticed that the tips of his rather prominent ears were faintly pink and pointed.

He had stepped back. ” Goodbye,” he said.

” Goodbye.”

As I started off a woman came into sight. She was tall and slim and she had a mass of white curly hair.

” Ennis,” she called. ” Oh, there you are.”

She glanced at me as I passed, and as I rounded the bend I saw the house at once. The boy had been right; there was no mistaking it.

There were the green shutters. It was more than a cottage—a house of some seven or eight rooms, I imagined. There was a green gate opening on to a lawn with a flower border. Inside it were plants which looked like tomatoes ; and both the doors of the glass porch and the house itself were open.

I drove a little way past, then got out of the car and, shading my eyes, looked round me at the view.

I was aware of the woman and the boy coming back; they were arm in arm; and together they went into Bedivere House.

I was certain then that I had seen Louisa Sellick; but I did wonder who the boy could be. Ennis. I believed there was a Cornish saint of that name; there was no doubt of whom he reminded me. Of some of the portraits I had seen at Pendorric—and, of course, of Roc.

I was changing for dinner when I next saw Roc, and still thinking of the boy to whom I had spoken near Rozmary. By now my imagination had made the resemblance between him and Roc more startling. Roc must have looked exactly like that at thirteen or four teen, I told myself. I could picture him playing in the graveyard with Rachel and Morwenna; riding his horse out to Jim Bond’s when it cast a shoe; swimming, boating . I was already dressed when he came into our room, and was sitting at the window watching the waves below us.

” Hallo,” he called. ” Had a good day?”

” Yes, Roc. And you?”

I stood up and found myself staring at the tips of fais ears. Surely only Pendorrics had such ears.

” Very good.”

” I took the Morris on to the moors,” I told him. ” I wish I’d been with you.”

” So do I.”

He picked me up and swung me off my feet.

” It’s good to have you to come home to,” he said. ” I’ve talked to Charlie about your looking into estate affairs with me. We’d be partners then. What do you say?”

” I’m so glad. Roc.”

” You were the brains behind that studio,” he said. ” We need brains in Pendorric.”

I had a sudden vision of my father at work in the studio, and, as whenever I thought of him I must think also of his death, I knew that a shadow passed across my face.

Roc went on quickly: ” We need brains, now that the days of the grands seigneurs are over. It’s the farm workers who get the best end of the stick these days. They’ve got their unions to look after them. I’ve never heard of a union to protect the interests of the poor landowners. Rents must not be put up; repairs must be done. You see how we could use a business woman like you!”

” Oh Roc, I’m going to love it.”

He kissed me. ” Good. You’re in business.”

” Roc, you’re not worried, are you?”

” I’m not the worrying type … otherwise …”

“Otherwise you would be?”

” Oh, darling, what’s the good of worrying? If we can’t afford to go on in the old way, we’ve got to adjust ourselves to the new. Temper the wind to the shorn lamb, or is it the other way round? My God, we’re shorn all right—fleeced in fact. Left, right, and centre.” I had put my arms about his neck and my fingers almost involuntarily caught his ears—a habit they had. He was smiling and I was vividly reminded of the boy I had seen that afternoon.

” Roc,” I said, ” I saw a pair of ears exactly like yours today.” He burst out laughing. Then he looked grave. ” I thought they were unique. You’ve always told me so.”

” They’re Pendorric ears.” I touched them with my forefinger.

“And they match your eyes. They give you that satyr’s look.”

” For which I have to be truly thankful, because it was that which made you fall in love with me.”

” He had the same sort of eyes … now I come to think of it.”

” Tell me where you found this paragon.”

” It was on the moor near Rozmary Pool. I asked him the way and he told me he lived at a place called Bedivere House and his name was Ennis.”

There was just a short pause, but during it I fancied—or did I think this afterwards? —that Roc’s expression had become a little guarded.

“What a lot of information be gave! After all you only asked the way, didn’t you?”

” It was all very naturally given. But the likeness was really astonishing. I wonder if he’s related to you.”

” There’s Pendorric blood all over the duchy,” said Roc. ” You see we were a roistering riotous band. Not that we were the only ones. The old days were very different from these. In those days it was God bless the Squire and his relations and make us mind our proper stations’; it was touching the forelock and thinking themselves lucky to have a place in the stables, the kitchens or the gardens. It was the droit de seigneur. Now of course it’s We’re as good as you and crippling taxation. Ah, the good old days have gone for ever. And talking of the rights of the squire … well, there’s your answer.

You walk round this countryside and you’ll discover traces of Pendorric in half the natives. It was the order of things. “

” You sound regretful. I believe you’re sighing for the old days.” He put his hand on my shoulder and smiled at me. Did I fancy that there was a hint of relief in his face, as though he had come up to a dangerous corner and had rounded it satisfactorily?

” Since I met and married Favel Farington,” he replied, ” I ask nothing more of life.”

And although he was smiling, I couldn’t doubt that he meant what he said; and, as usual, he had the power to disperse all my doubts and fears with a look, a word and a smile.

Roc kept his promise and the next day took me with him to his study, and, as much as he could in a short time, explained certain matters about the estate. It did not take me very long to grasp the fact that although we were by no means verging on bankruptcy we were in a way fighting a losing battle against the times.

Roc smiled at me ruefully. ” It’s like the tide slowly but surely creeping in. The end of the old way is not exactly imminent, but it’s creeping towards us. Mind you, we’ve hung on longer than most. I’d be sorry if we fell to the National Trust in my time.”

” You think it’s certain to happen. Roc?”

” Nothing in life is certain darling. Suppose I were to win a hundred thousand … I reckon that would put us on our feet for a few generations.”

” You’re not thinking of gambling?” I asked in alarm. He put his arm about me. ” Don’t worry,” he said. ” I never risk what I can’t afford to lose.” , ” You told me that before.”

” It’s only one of many things I’ve told you before. How much I love you, for one thing.”

” The conversation is wandering from the point,” I said with a laugh.

” That’s right,” he retorted. ” I know you’re going to be a good business woman. You’ll keep me on the straight path, won’t you? Things have been in a far worse state than they are now, I can assure you; and we’ve pulled through. Why, in my father’s day . “

” What happened then?”

“We were in much greater difficulties. Fortunately my mother brought enough to put us on our feet again.”

I stared at the open book before me, and instead of the columns of figures saw that sad sweet face under the blue-banded hat. There seemed no escape from Barbarina.

Roc, who was standing behind my chair, stooped suddenly and kissed the top of my head.

“Don’t let it worry you.

Something will turn up, you’ll see. It always does for me. Did I ever tell you I was born lucky? “

Strangely enough that was a very happy day for me, and the fact that the finances at Pendorric were not as sound as they should have been gave me a feeling of deep comfort.

I had begun to think that Roc was too much like his father and that my story was turning out to be too similar to that of Barbarina. But this was the difference: Barbarina had been married for her money when Roc’s father was in love with Louisa Sellick. Roc, needing money for Pendorric, as his father had, had met me, a penniless girl, and had married her.

Oh no, my story was very different from that of Barbarina.

Mrs. Penhalligan was making Cornish pasties when I went down to the kitchen.

She looked up flushed and bright-eyed when I entered; her pink cotton sleeves were rolled up above the elbow, her short fat fingers busy.

One of the twins was sitting under the table eating a pasty. ” Good afternoon, Mrs. Pendorric,” said Mrs. Penhalligan. ” Good afternoon, Mrs. Penhauigan.”

Mrs. Penhalligan went on rolling her pastry. ” Don’t do to let it hang about too long, ma’am,” she murmured apologetically. ” The secret be to make it and pop it into the oven as quick as you can. This be for Father. He’s terrible particular about his pasty and he do want one regular each night. So when I bake I do four or five for him. I keep them in a tin … they be all nice and fresh that way, though the best is them as is eaten straight from the oven.”

“I’ve come to ask what tobacco your father smokes. I thought I’d go along to see him when I have the time and take him something to smoke.”

A head popped over the side of the table. ” Beware the Ides of March,” said a voice low with prophecy.

” Oh give over. Miss Lowella, do,” said Mrs. Penhalligan.

“She’s been under my feet all day. Looking through the window, popping up here and there with her talk of Beware of this and that. Reckon she belongs to be in Bodmin Asylum.”

Lowella smiled and went into the bake house

” I don’t know,” grumbled Mrs. Penhalligan. ” That Miss Bective, she’s supposed to be looking after they two. Well, where be she to, half the time, I’m wondering.”

” You were going to tell me what tobacco.”

“That I were, and right good it is of you, ma’am. Tis Three Nuns—the Empire, you do know. His one extravagance. But then it’s only the two ounces a week he smokes and Maria and me like him to have his little treat.”

” I’ll remember.”

Lowella had come back; she was holding a small pasty in her hand. ” Someone won’t be wanting her supper like as not,” commented Mrs. Penhalligan.

Lowella regarded us both solemnly before crawling under the table.

“He’ll be that pleased,” went on Mrs. Penhalligan.

“I reckon hell be sitting out this afternoon. It’ll make his day.”

” I’ll be getting along,” I told her.

As I made for the door Lowella darted out from under the table and reached it before me.

” I say, Bride,” she said, ” I’ll come with you if you like—to see old Jesse, I mean.”

” Don’t bother,” I replied. ” I know the way.”

She shrugged her shoulders and went back into the kitchen, presumably to sit under the table and finish her pasty and now and then pop up to tell Mrs. Penhalligan or Maria or Hetty to beware the Ides of March.

Not far from the cottages was a house which had been turned into a general store. It was small, overcrowded, and run by a Mrs. Robinson who had come to Pendorric for a holiday twenty years before, realised that the nearest shop was two miles away, and had bought the house and made it into a shop. She sold among other things the brands of tobacco smoked by her neighbours, and kept stocks in readiness for them. So I had no difficulty in getting what I wanted.

As I came out of the shop I saw that the twins were waiting for me. I was not pleased, for I had wanted to be alone with the old man, but there was nothing I could do but accept their company as graciously as possible.

They fell into step beside me without a word, as though we had arranged to meet.

” Where’s Miss Bective?” I asked.

The twins exchanged glances as though each was waiting for the other to speak.

It was Lowella who answered. ” She’s gone off in the little Morris.

She said we were to pick her six different wild flowers. It’s botany.”

” How many have you found so far? ” ” We haven’t looked yet. My dear Bride, how long do you think it’s going to take us to find six different wild flowers? Becky won’t say much if we don’t find ‘em anyway. She’d never say we were undisciplined, would she, because if she did they’d say we ought to go to school, and if we went to school there wouldn’t be any excuse for Beoky to be at Pendorric.”

” Don’t you think you ought to obey her instructions? After all she is your governess.”

” You oughtn’t to be worrying about us,” said Hyson. Lowella leaped on ahead and ran up the bank to pick a wild rose. She stuck it in her hair and danced before us singing, ” Beware … beware … beware the Ides of March.”

Hyson said: ” Lowella is quite childish sometimes. She goes on repeating things.”

” She seems to like warning people,” I commented. ” I remember Beware the awful avalanche!” ” ” I like Ides better,” called Lowella.

“You can’t have avalanches in Cornwall, but you can have Ides anywhere. Pity they’re in March and this is July.”

” She doesn’t know anything,” put in Hyson scornfully. She went on to quote:

“” March, July, October, May, The Ides fall on the fifteenth day.

Lowella had paused. ” But what are Ides?”

” Just a date, stupid. Instead of saying the fifteenth, the Romans said the Ides.”

” Only a date,” wailed Lowella. ” It sounds marvelous. I thought it was something ‘like witches … or ghosts. Fancy having to beware of a date.”

” If something was going to happen on a certain date, if it were prophesied to happen… that would be more frightening or as frightening as witches or ghosts.”

” Yes,” said Lowella slowly, ” I suppose it would.” We had reached the row of cottages and old Jesse was seated at his door. I went over to him and said: ” Good afternoon. I’m Mrs. Pendorric.”

I noticed that his hands, resting on his knees, started to shake. ” Tis good of ‘ee, ma’am,” he said.

” I’ve brought you some tobacco. I found out from Mrs. Penhalligan what brand you smoke.”

His trembling hands closed over the tin and he smiled.

“Why, ‘twas thoughtful of ‘ee, ma’am. I mind how kind she always were….” Hyson had gone into the cottage and brought out a stool which she set beside the old man’s chair. She nodded to me to sit down while she squatted on the other side of him. Lowella had disappeared. “Your daughter has been baking pasties this morning,” I told him. ” A wonderful cook, my Bessie. Don’t rightly know what I’d do without her. I’ve got a lot to be thankful for. Mr. Roc—he’s been good to me.

Is the little ‘un here? “

” Yes, I’m here,” Hyson answered.

He nodded and turned to me. ” I hope you find this place to your liking, ma’am.”

” I’m delighted with it.”

” Tis a long time since we’ve had a new Bride at Pendorric.”

” There was my mother,” said Hyson, ” and before that my Granny Barbarina.”

” A sweet lady, she were. I remember the day she come.”

” Tell us, Jesse,” urged Hyson. ” The new Bride wants to hear about it.”

” Well, we’d seen her many a time. Twasn’t like her coming from nowheres. I remember her as a little ‘un, her and her sister. Used to visit us … and master and mistress used to visit them. Hyson their name was. Such pretty names. Miss Barbarina and Miss Deborah.”

” I was named after them,” put in Hyson.

” So you were pleased when she became Mrs. Pendorric,” I said. ” I reckon I were, Mrs. Pendorric. We didn’t rightly know what would happen. We knew something of how it were, and there was talk of giving up Pendorric. Pendorric as it were in the old days, that be. Us didn’t know what would happen to we like. There was talk of Mr. Petroc marrying that Sellick girl and then …”

” But he didn’t,” Hyson said. ” He married my Granny Barbarina.”

“I remember the wedding. Twas a wonderful summer’s day. It was there in the church. The Reverend Trewin were parson then. Oh, it were a grand wedding. And Miss Barbarina was a picture with Miss Deborah her maid of honour, and Mr. Petroc looking that handsome … and it was so right and proper that it should be.”

” What about the other girl?” I asked.

” Oh, that were reckoned to be done with. She’d gone away … and all was merry….”

” Merry as a marriage bell,” murmured Hyson.

” A wonderful mistress she were. Kind and good … and gentle like.

She used to ride a lot and play the violin. Often I’ve been working on the quadrangle gardens and heard her. “

I was aware of Hyson, looking at me intently. Hyson, I thought, was it you who tried to scare me? And if so, why?

” Then she had a way of singing to herself. I remember once, coming home, I heard her singing in the graveyard. It sounded so queer and yet beautiful and like something not quite natural. I went in and saw her. She’d been putting flowers on the grave of little Ellen Pascoe from the cottages. Little Ellen had died of tile meningitis, and it was her way of saying she was thinking of ‘un. We thought a terrible lot of her here in the cottages.”

” You remember her very well,” I said softly.

” It seems only yesterday she were talking to me, as you be now. I was working then. Right up to the time she died I was working. But she knew I couldn’t go on. I told her what was happening to me and she did comfort me. She said:

‘ Never be feared, Jesse. I’ll see that you be all right. ” And every time she saw me she’d ask after me. And I was getting blind, Mrs. Pendorric. I can’t even see you now. But you remind me of her in a way. You’ve got a kindness which was hers. Then you be happy. I can tell that. So were she . at first. But it changed for her, poor gentle lady. Then she weren’t happy no more. My tongue be running away with me, I fear. Bessie says I be alone so much that when people come to see me I’ve got so much to make up for. “

” I’m glad you want to talk,” I said. ” It’s very interesting.”

” She’s the new Bride, so she naturally wants to hear about the other one,” said Hyson.

” Ay,” went on the old man. ” You’re happy … as she were when she first come. Twas only after, poor body…. I wish you all happiness, Mrs. Pendorric. I wish for you to stay as you be now for evermore.”

I thanked him and asked him about his cottage; he told me that if I cared to look over it, he would be pleased. It was kept clean and tidy by his daughter and granddaughter. He rose, and taking a stick from the side of his chair led the way into the cottage. The door opened straight into the livingroom ; it was certainly clean and tidy.

There was his armchair with his pipe-rack and ashtray on a table beside it with a small transistor radio. There was a framed photograph on the wall, of Jesse standing, his hand resting on the shoulder of a woman sitting, whom I presumed to be his wife; they were both looking into the camera as though they were only engaged in the unpleasant duty for the sake of posterity. There were photographs of Mrs. Penhalligan at her wedding.

Leading from this sitting-room was a kitchen with a door which opened into a garden. This, like the cottage, was trim and well kept, with wallflowers and cabbage roses bordering a small lawn; a water barrel leaned against the wall to catch the ram.

There were two rooms upstairs, he told me; and he managed the stairs well enough. There was nothing wrong with him except his affliction and the fact that his memory was not what it had been. He settled in his armchair and bade me be seated while he told me about his meeting and marriage to Lizzie, and how she had been under-housemaid up at Pendorric in the days when he had worked in the gardens there.

This went on for some time, and during it Hyson, presumably becoming bored, slipped away.

The old man said suddenly: ” The child has gone?”

” Yes,” I told him. ” I expect she’s gone to find her sister. They’re supposed to be collecting flowers for a botany lesson.”

” The little one … she questions and cross-questions …”

” She’s a strange child.”

He nodded.

“She wants to know about it. It’s on her mind. Tain’t good, I reckon. Her’s young. T’as nought to do with her.”

” I think the story has caught her imagination. It’s because it’s a ghost story.”

” Mrs. Pendorric.” He almost whispered my name, and I went closer to him.

” Yes, Jesse?”

“There’s something I don’t talk of no more. I told Mr. Petroc and he said, Don’t talk of it, Jesse. Tis better not.” So I didn’t talk.

But I want to tell you, Mrs. Pendorric. “

” Why do you want to tell me, Jesse?”

” I don’t know … but you be the next bride, see … and there’s something tells me ‘tis right and proper you should know.”

” Tell me, then.”

” My eyes was bad and getting worse. Days was when I couldn’t make out shapes and such-like. I’d think I saw someone and when I come close I’d find it to be a piece of furniture. That bad they’d got to be. But the more bad they got the more I seemed to hear, and sometimes I knew sum mat without seeing or hearing. They say ‘tis the compensation of the blind, Mrs. Pendorric.”

” Yes, Jesse, I am sure there are compensations.”

” That day I come into the hall, Mrs. Pendorric. And she were in the gallery. I knew who ‘twas because I heard her speak. Low like she spoke … and then ‘twas as though there were two shadows up there I don’t rightly know … and ‘tis a long time to look back. But I believe, Mrs. Pendorric, that there were two on ‘em up on that gallery a minute or two afore Mrs. Pendorric fell.”

” And you didn’t make this known before?”

” Mr. Pendorric said for me not to. You see, drfme picture were there the picture of the other bride, and they did say she’d haunted the place for more than a hundred years trying to lure a bride to take her place. There were two on ‘em up there. I swear it, Mrs. Pendorric . but Mr. Petroc he didn’t want it said. I’d always obeyed the master, as my father had and his father afore him, so I said nothing . but I tell you this, Mrs. Pendorric. “

” It’s so long ago. It’s best forgotten, Jesse.”

” So I thought, Mrs. Pendorric. And have thought these twenty-five years. But you being here … and reminding me of her … in a way . and you being so good and friendly to me like, well, I thought I should tell ‘ee. Tis a warning like. And there’s a feeling in here .. ” He tapped his chest. ” There’s a feeling that I shouldn’t keep ‘ee in the dark.”

I couldn’t see why he should feel this, but I thanked him for his concern.

I changed the subject, which wasn’t difficult, for now that he had told me he seemed more relaxed as though he had done his duty. He talked of the cottage and the old days when his Lizzie had been alive; and after a time, I left.

I did not see the twins as I walked back to Pendorric.

The next day Nurse Grey telephoned me.

” Oh, Mrs. Pendorric,” she said, ” Lord Polhorgan has asked me to ring. He was wondering if you could come over this afternoon. He rather particularly wants to see you.”

I hesitated and said that I thought I could manage it, and asked how he was.

” Not quite so well. He had an attack during the night. He’s resting to-day, but he says that he hoped you would be able to come, if not to-day, tomorrow.”

I set out that afternoon, wondering whether to pick some flowers from the garden to take to him; but as he had so many more than we had that seemed rather unnecessary.

When I arrived he was in his usual chair, not dressed, but wearing a Paisley silk dressing-gown and slippers. He seemed delighted to see me.

” Good of you to come so promptly,” he said. ” I was afraid you wouldn’t be able to manage it.”

” I’m sorry you haven’t been so well.”

” It’s all ups and downs, my dear. I’ll get over this little bout as I have others. They’re bringing in the tea. Will you pour as usual?” I did so and noticed that he ate very little and seemed rather more silent than usual, yet in a way expectant.

And as soon as the tea was cleared away he told me what, he said, he had been longing to ever since we had first met.

” Favel …” he began, and it was the first time he had used my Christian name, ” come and sit near me. I’m afraid what I have to say is going to be a great shock to you. I told you when we first met that I was an old curmudgeon, didn’t I?”

I nodded.

“An impossible person. In my young days I thought of nothing but making money. It was the only thing of importance to me. Even when I married, my chief thought was to have sons … sons to whom I would leave my fortune … sons who would carry on my business and add new fortunes to the one I made. I had a successful business life, but I was not so successful in my domestic affairs. My wife left me for another man—one of my own employees. He wasn’t a success. I couldn’t understand why she could leave a luxurious home for him … but she did. I divorced her and I got the custody of our daughter, which was something she hadn’t bargained for. The child was six years old at the time. Twelve years later she left me.”

“Doesn’t it distress you to talk of the past?”

“It’s a distressing subject but I want you to understand. My daughter left me because I was trying to arrange a marriage for her. I wanted her to marry Petroc Pendorric, who was then a widower. His wife had died accidentally and I thought there was a good opportunity of joining up the families. I was an outsider here, and I thought that if mine was linked with one of the oldest Cornish families I should be so no longer. Pendorric needed money. I had it. It seemed to me ideal, but she didn’t agree.”

There was silence during which he looked at me helplessly, and for the first time since I had known him he seemed at a loss for words. ” There are often such disagreements in families,” I said. ” My wife went … my daughter went. You’d think I’d learned my lesson, wouldn’t you? Flattered myself that in the world of commerce I’d learned all the lessons as they came along. So I had…. But this was something I was pretty backward in. Favel, I don’t know how to explain. Open that drawer. There’s something in there that will tell you what I’m trying to.”

I went to the drawer, and opening it took out a photograph in a silver frame. As I stared at it I heard his voice, hoarse as I had never heard it before, with the depth of his emotion. ” Come here to me, my child.”

I came to him, and he no longer seemed the same man to me. Sitting there in that very luxurious room he had become more frail, more pitiable: and at the same time infinitely closer to me.

I acted on impulse, and going to him I took his frail body in my arms and held him against me as though he were a child and I was assuring him that he could rely on me to protect him.

” Favel …” he whispered.

I drew back and looked at him. His eyes were wet, so I took the silk handkerchief from the pocket of his dressing-gown and wiped them. ” Why didn’t you tell me before … Grandfather?” I asked. He laughed suddenly and his stern features were relaxed as I had never seen them before. ” Afraid to,” he said. ” Lost wife and daughter. Was making a bid for the granddaughter.”

It had been such a shock to me that I was still feeling all this was unreal. My thoughts were muddled. It did not occur to me in that moment to ask myself the explanation of that extraordinary coincidence which had allowed me to marry a man who came into my life by chance and turned out to be a neighbour of my grandfather. That was to come later.

” Well,” he asked, ” what do you think of your old ‘grandfather?”

” I don’t know yet what to think. I’m so bewildered. “

” I’ll tell you what I think of my granddaughter, then. If I could have chosen just how I wanted her to be, she wouldn’t have been different in one detail. Do you know, Favel, you’re so like your mother that when you’ve been sitting there playing chess with me I’ve often found my mind slipping back … and I’d be thinking she’d never gone away. You’ve got the same fair hair, though she didn’t have that white streak in it; and your eyes are the same colour … sometimes blue, sometimes green. And you’re like her in your ways .. the kindest heart and the impetuosity. Rushing in before you’ve had time to consider. I often wondered how that marriage of hers would work out. Used to tell myself it couldn’t last, but it seems it did.

And she chose a Cornish name for you. That shows, doesn’t it, that she didn’t think of the past always with regret. “

” But why was I never told? She never spoke of the past, and you”

” She never told you? Nor did your father? You’d have thought they’d have mentioned it now and then. And you never asked, Favel. How was that?”

I looked back to those sunlit days of my childhood.

“I think that they felt all that had happened before their marriage was unimportant.

That’s how it strikes me now. Their lives were so . entwined. They lived for each other. Perhaps they knew she hadn’t long to live. I suppose that sort of thing makes a difference. As for myself, I never thought of things being other than they were. That was why, when she died, everything changed so much for us. “

“And you were fond of your father too?” he said wistfully. I nodded.

” He came down here to paint one summer. Rented a little place a mile or so away along the coast … little more than a shack. When she told me she was going to marry him I thought it was a joke at first.

Soon learned it wasn’t. She could be obstinate. I told her she was a fool. Never stopped to think. Told her I wouldn’t leave her a penny if she married this man. Told her he was after her money anyway. So they just went away one day and I never heard from her again. ” He was thinking of all the years that had been lost to him. Here he sat in the midst of his opulence—the loneliest old man I had ever met. And it need never have been.

Now he had learned that he was the one who had been foolish—not my mother and father. And pitiably he was reaching out to me to give him, for the short time left to him, the affection which more than twenty years ago he had rashly thrown away.

I turned to him impulsively and said: “Grandfather, I’m glad I came home to you.”

” My dear child,” he murmured. ” My dearest child.” Then he went on:

“Tell me about her. Did she suffer much?”

I shook my head. ” There were several months when she knew and we knew…. They were terrible months, particularly for my father, but it wasn’t really long—though it seemed so.”

” I could have paid for the best attention for her,” he said angrily.

“Grandfather,” I replied, “it’s over. It doesn’t do any good to reproach yourself—or them—or anyone. You’ve got to put that behind you. I’m here now. Your own granddaughter. I shall see you more often now. I shan’t feel like waiting for a reasonable period before calling again. You’re my very own grandfather and it’s wonderful that my home is so close to yours….” I stopped, picturing myself coming into the studio and seeing Roc there with my father. ” It seems so strange that Roc should have come to my father’s studio … and that we should have married,” I said slowly. ” I mean, it seems too lucky to be true.”

My grandfather smiled. ” It wasn’t just a matter of chance, my dear.

Your mother never wrote to me. I had no idea where she was or what was happening to her. I had told her that if she married her artist I wanted nothing to do with her, and she took me at my word. But . your father wrote. It was a month or so before Roc went abroad. He told me that your mother was dead and that they had a daughter: Favel. He asked me if I would like to see you, and he gave me the address of that studio place of yours. “

” I see,” I said. ” I wonder why Father wrote.”

” I had my suspicions. I thought he was after something. People often say that men in my position are comfortably off. Having money isn’t always comfortable, I can tell you. You’re constantly watching in case you’re going to lose something; you’re for ever on the alert for ways of increasing what you have; and you’re always suspecting that people are seeking your acquaintance because they want a little of what you’ve got. No. I’d say I’m uncomfortably off. In any case I was wary of your father. I said: He wants to borrow something. Lilith wouldn’t let him write when she was alive—too proud. But now she’s dead he’s after something. I put his letter on one side and didn’t answer it.

But the thought of my granddaughter kept bothering me. I wondered what she was like . how old she was. Your father hadn’t said. And I wanted to know more about her. “

He paused and looked at me reflectively, and I said: “So you asked Roc to … spy out the land?”

He nodded.

“I knew he was going to Italy, so I asked him to do me this favour. I couldn’t go myself. I wanted him to find out what this studio place was like and what my granddaughter was like. My plan was that when he came back, providing I liked what he told me, I’d invite my granddaughter to Polhorgan … her father too, perhaps, if she wouldn’t come without him.”

“So that was why Roc came to the studio.”

“That was it. But you’re impetuous like your mother. You fell in love with him. So instead of his bringing back a report to me, he brought you back as his bride.”

” So Roc … knew … all the time?”

” He knew.”

” But he didn’t give me a hint … in fact he never has.”

” Well, you see, I’d asked him not to. I didn’t want you to come over to see your grandfather. I wanted us to meet as strangers. I wanted to know what you thought of me and I wanted to know what I thought of you. But the minute I saw you—you were so like your mother—I felt she’d come back to me. My dear child, I can’t tell you what a difference this has made to me.”

I touched his hand, but I was thinking of Roc . Roc as he had come into the studio. Roc lying on the beach talking about Pendorric, about the Folly and the man who lived in it, who, he knew all the time, was my grandfather.

” So Roc was carrying out your wishes,” I said.

” He did even more than I asked. He brought you home.”

” I can understand his not telling me that in the beginning, but later I told him that I wanted to break the news to you yourself.”

I was silent. Then I said: ” You wanted my mother to marry Roc’s father.“

” Ah, that was in the days when I thought I could manage people’s lives better than they could themselves. I know different now.”

” So I’ve pleased you … by marrying a Pendorric.”

” Had you wanted to marry a fisherman. Granddaughter, I’d have made no objection. I learn my lessons … in time. All the lonely years need not have happened if I’d not tried to interfere. Fancy, if I’d raised no objections to their marrying, I’d have had them with me all those years. She might never have died. I shouldn’t have had to wait till my granddaughter was a married woman before I knew her.”

“Grandfather,” I insisted, “you wanted my mother to marry a Pendorric. Are you glad I’ve married Roc?”

He was silent for a few moments; then he said: ” Because you’re in love with him … yes. I shouldn’t have wanted it otherwise.”

” But you spoke of linking the families. My mother left home because you wanted her to marry Roc’s father.”

” That was years ago. I suspect those Pendorrics wanted not so much my daughter as my money, and your father wanted her for herself … must have done, because she knew me well enough to understand that when I said there’d be nothing for her if she ran away, I meant it.”

I was silent and he lay back in his chair and closed his eyes though he had taken my hand and kept it in his. I could see how the veins stood out at his temples and that he was more flushed than usual. Such excitement was not good for him, I was sure.

My grandfather! I thought, watching him. So I had a relative after all. My eyes went round the room at the paintings on the wall. They were all of the old school. Grandfather would not buy modern paintings, which he loathed, but all the same he would have an eye for a bargain. I guessed that the pictures in this room alone were worth a fortune.

Then I thought of the studio, and my mother who had bargained so fiercely over my father’s work; and it seemed to me that life was indeed ironical.

I was glad that I had a grandfather. I had liked him from the moment we met; but I wished—oh, how I wished that he were not such a rich man. I remembered what he had said about being uncomfortably off.

Although it was less than an hour since I had discovered I was the granddaughter of a millionaire, I understood very well what he meant.

I sat with him for an hour after that; we talked of the past and the future. I told him incidents from those early days which I had not thought of telling before, because I now understood how vitally interested he was in every seemingly insignificant detail. And he told me that Polhorgan was now my home and that I must treat it thus. I walked back to Pendorric in a state of bewilderment, and when I was midway between the two houses I looked from one to the other. My homes, I murmured. And my pride in them was spoilt by an uneasy suspicion which was beginning to grow within me.

I was relieved, when I went up to our bedroom, to find that Roc had come in.

” Roc,” I called, and as he turned to look at me he said: “So he’s told you?”

“How did you guess?”

” My darling, you look just like a woman who has been told that she is the granddaughter of a millionaire.”

” And you knew all the time!”

He nodded, smiling.

“It seems extraordinary that you could keep such a secret.” He was laughing as he took me by the shoulders. ” It’s women who can’t keep secrets, you know.”

He put his arm round me and held me against him; but I withdrew myself because I wanted to look into his face.

” I want to think about it all … as it happened,” I said. ” You came to the studio, looking for me. You were going to report on me to my grandfather.”

” Yes. I was going to take some pictures of you to show him. I was determined to do the job thoroughly.”

” You did it very thoroughly indeed.”

” I’m glad that you approve of my methods.”

” And my father …” I said. ” He knew too.”

“Of course he knew. He’d lived near Pendorric. That was how he first met your mother.”

” Father knew … and didn’t tell me.”

” I’d explained to him my promise of secrecy.”

” I can’t understand. It was so unlike him to have secrets from me.”

” This was a very important matter. I reckon he wanted you to please your grandfather. It’s understandable.”

I looked at him sharply; he was smiling complacently. ” How I wish” I began.

“What do you wish?”

” That you hadn’t known.”

“Why? What difference does it make?”

I was silent. I felt I was going too far. I was almost on the point of asking Roc whether he had married me on account of my grandfather’s money, when I didn’t even know that I was his heiress. But everything was changed. When I had thought of Barbanna I had continually told myself that our positions were so different because she had been married for her money. The simple fact was that now I was beginning to wonder whether I too had been.

” What’s on your mind?” persisted Roc.

” It’s the shock,” I replied evasively. ” When you think you haven’t any family and you suddenly find yourself con fronted by a grandfather it’s a little bewildering. It takes time to adjust yourself.”

” You’re a little aloof, you’re weighing me up. I don’t much like it.”

He was looking at me intently, very seriously.

“Why?”

“I’m afraid of being weighed in the balance and found wanting.”

” Why should you be afraid?”

” Because you’re hiding something from me—or trying to.”

” You are the one who hides things successfully.”

” Only one thing—and I had made a promise not to tell.” He laughed suddenly, and seizing me, lifted me and held me up so that I had to look down on him. ” Listen,” he said, ” and get this clear. I married you because I fell in love with you. It would have been the same if you were the granddaughter of old Bill the Beachcomber. Understand me?”

I put out my hands and touched his ears; he lowered me until my face was on a level with his. Then he kissed me; and as usual, while I was with him, I forgot my fears.

Now that the news was out, the whole of Pendorric village was agog with it. I knew that I had only to appear for the subject to be discussed. People looked at me as though they had discovered something different about me. I was the focus of attention in the neighbourhood.

In the first place I had come out of the blue as the Bride of Pendorric; and now it turned Out that I was the granddaughter of old Lord Polhorgan. Many of them could remember my mother’s running away with the painter; and it seemed a fitting romantic sequel that I should return as a bride.

Mrs. Robinson at the general store whispered to me that my story was good enough for the television; Dinah Bond told me, when I met her one day in the village, that she knew there was something dramatic in my hand and she would have told me if only I’d let her; Morwenna and Charles appeared to be delighted; Lowella was vociferous, squealing her delight, and went about singing something about ” When Grandpappa asked Grandmamma for the second minuet,” which appeared to be quite irrelevant; Hyson regarded me with silent interest as though this new development was not entirely unexpected.

For several days everyone talked of it, but I guessed that it would turn out to be a nine days’ wonder.

There were two conversations which stood out in my mind. One I had with Rachel Bective, the other I overheard.

I had gone down to Pendorric beach to swim one afternoon and as I came out of the water I saw Rachel emerge from the gardens and step on to the beach.

I looked about for the twins, but she was alone. She came over and said: ” What’s the sea like today?”

” Quite warm,” I answered, and lay down on the shingle. She sat down beside me and started playing idly with the pebbles.

“What a surprise it must have been for you” she said.

“Had you no idea?”

” None at all.”

” Well, it’s not everyone who gets presented with a grandfather at your time of life. And a millionaire peer at that!” I thought her expression a trifle unpleasant and I half rose, preparing to go up through the gardens.

” Roc knew of course,” she went on. Then she laughed. ” He must have been tickled to death.”

“You think it’s an amusing situation when families are broken up?”

” I think it’s amusing that Roc should go out to find you and bring you back—his bride. No wonder he has been looking so smug.”

” What do you mean?”

Her greenish eyes under the sandy brows glinted a little; her mouth was straight and grim. I thought: she is either very hurt or very angry. And suddenly I wasn’t so annoyed with her as I had been a few minutes before.

She seemed to take a grip of herself. ” Roc always liked to know what other people didn’t. He’d think it great fun having a secret like that, and the rest of us being in the dark. Besides …” I waited for her to go on, but she shrugged her shoulders. Then she gave a harsh laugh which seemed to hold a note of bitterness. ” Some people have all the luck,” she said. ” Mrs. Pendorric and granddaughter of Lord Polhorgan, who already dotes on her.”

” I think I’ll be getting back,” I said. ” It’s not so warm as I thought.”

She nodded, and as I crunched my way over the shingle she sat looking out at the sea; and I could imagine the expression on her face, for she had betrayed the fact that she was jealous of me. Jealous because I was the granddaughter of a rich man? Or jealous because I was Roc’s wife?

I believed it might be for both these reasons.

The second conversation took place the following day and I heard the end of it unwittingly. I was in the quadrangle gardens and one of the windows on the ground floor of me north wing was wide open, so the voice came floating through to me and I had caught the gist of the conversation before I could get out of earshot.

It was Charles and Morwenna who were speaking, and at first I did not realise they were talking of me.

“I thought be was looking pleased with himself.” That was Charles. ” I’ve never known him so contented.”

” She’s a pleasant creature.”

” She has everything.”

” Well, it won’t be before it’s needed, I can tell you. I’ve had some anxious moments wondering what the outcome could possibly be. Of course we’re taking things rather for granted.”

” Not a bit of it. That type never leave much outside the family.

After all, she’s his granddaughter and he can’t last much longer. “

I got up and walked across to the south door, my cheeks flaming. As I entered the house my eyes went at once to the picture of Barbarina. I stood looking up at it. I could almost fancy the expression had changed; that a pitying look was in those blue eyes, that she was saying to me: “I understand. Who could understand better than one to whom it has all happened before?”

My grandfather wanted the whole neighbourhood to know how delighted he was to welcome his granddaughter home.

He told me that it was years since there had been any entertaining at Polhorgan and he proposed to give a ball to which he would invite all the local gentry.

” You are not nearly well enough,” I told him; but he assured me that he would come to no harm. He put his hand over mine. ” Don’t try to dissuade me. It’ll give me the greatest pleasure. The ball will be for you and your husband. I want you to arrange it all; I want it to be a setting for you, my dear. Please say you will.”

He looked so pleased at the prospect that I could only agree, and when I told Roc and Morwenna about it they were amused and, I could see, delighted. I had ceased to be angry with Morwenna and Charles, telling myself that loving this old house as they obviously did, it was only natural that they should be pleased because a member of the family might very possibly come into a great deal of money.

“Just fancy,” said Morwenna, “Polhorgan is going to throw off its dustsheets.”

The twins were delighted, and when Lowella was told that balls were not for twelve-year-olds, she boldy called on my grandfather and asked for an invitation for herself and her sister. Such conduct, which he called initiative, delighted him, and he immediately wrote to Morwenna asking her to allow the twins to attend.

Lowella was wild with excitement when she heard this; Hyson’s eyes gleamed with secret pleasure. Lowella went about the house quoting in an ominous voice:

“’ There was a sound of revelry by night Morwenna helped arrange the list of invitations, for, as a Pendorric, she knew everyone in (he neighbourhood.

“They will all want to come and see Lord Polhorgan’s granddaughter,” she told me. Roc, who was present, put in:

” Nonsense. It’s Mrs. Pendorric they want to see, for she’s a far more important person than his lordships’ grand daughter.”

” They must think it all very extraordinary,” I suggested. ” Nine days’ wonder, darling,” Roc assured me. ” You know there are a lot of skeletons locked away in cupboards in these parts.”

” It’s true enough,” Morwenna assured me.

Deborah was as excited as the twins at the prospect of the ball, and invited me to her room to see some material which Carrie was going to make up for her. There was a choice of two colours and she wanted me to help her decide.

Laid out’ on a table were two rolls of crepe de Chine—one delicate mauve, the other pale pink.

I was fingering the stuff. ” One hardly ever sees it now,” I commented.

“We’ve had it a few years, haven’t we, Carrie,” said Deborah. I had not noticed Carrie come silently into the room; she carried a tape-measure about her neck, and a pair of scissors and a pincushion were attached to her belt.

” I found it in Plymouth,” she said. ” I was afraid there wouldn’t be enough for the two of you.”

Deborah looked at me, smiling gently; then she laid her hand on Carrie’s shoulder. ” Carrie’s a wonder with her needle. I’m sure she’ll make me something worthy of the ball.”

” You remember the dresses I made for the engagement party?” whispered Carrie, her eyes ecstatic. ” Empire style. You had the pink then; she had the mauve.”

” Yes, we decided we had to be different then.”

” Before that it was always the same. What one had the other had.”

” I’ve brought Mrs. Pendorric up to help me decide which colour,” said Deborah.

” Mauve was her colour. She wore it a lot … after …”

” Perhaps I’d better decide on the pink,” murmured Deborah. She took me into her sitting-room, and as we sat together looking over the sea she said: ” I rather dread Carrie’s making new things for me. It always brings it home to her. You see, in Devon she used to make everything in twos. She can’t forget.”

When I left Deborah I ran into Rachel Bective. She gave me a grudging smile and looked almost wistful.

“Everyone’s talking about the ball your grandfather’s giving,” she said. ” I feel like Cinderella. Still, I suppose the governess can’t expect to be invited.”

” What nonsense,” I retorted. ” Of course you’re invited.” The smile which lighted her face made her almost pretty. ” Oh,” she muttered in an embarrassed way, ” thank you. I … I’m honoured.”

As she turned and left me I thought: Her trouble is this p complex about being employed here. If only she could forget that, she’d be so much happier and I should like her so much better.

During me next few days I spent a great deal of time at Polhorgan. My grandfather was anxious that I should make a thorough tour of the house, and this I did in the company of Dawson and his wife, who were very respectful to me now that they knew I was their master’s granddaughter.

Polhorgan was not built in the same mould as Pendorric. This was one large house whereas ours at Pendorric was like four smaller ones. At Polhorgan there was an immense hall which was to serve as the ballroom, and Dawson and his wife had uncovered the furniture so that I could see it in all its glory.

It was a magnificently-proportioned room, with its high vaulted ceiling and panelled walls; and there was a dais at one end which would be ideal for our orchestra. Dawson suggested that some of the exotic plants should be brought in from the greenhouses and that I might like to talk to Trehay, the head gardener, about what I should like.

Leading from mis hall were several rooms which would serve as supper rooms. I could see that Mrs. Dawson was a most efficient woman and delighted at the prospect of being able to show what a skilful housekeeper she was.

She showed me the kitchens, which were models of modernity. ” All this, madam,” sighed Mrs. Dawson, ” and no one to use it for! I could have cooked for his lordship with one little stove, for all he eats.

Although the nurse wants a bit of waiting on, I do assure you! ” Mrs. Dawson’s lips tightened at the mention of Nurse Grey, and I began to wonder whether the nurse was generally unpopular in the household.

It was while she was showing me round mat Althea Grey herself appeared. She was looking as attractive as ever in her uniform, and she gave me a pleasant smile. I was struck afresh by the perfection of her features, and I remembered uneasily the occasion when I had found her on the beach with Roc.

” So you’re showing Mrs. Pendorric the house,” she said.

” Well, it looks like it, Nurse.” Mrs. Dawson’s voice was tart. ” If you like I’ll take over. I expect you have work to do.”

” As housekeeper I reckon it to be my duty to show Mrs. Pendorric the house, Nurse.”

Nurse Grey smiled at me and shrugged her shoulders; but as though defying Mrs. Dawson to challenge her right to be there, she remained with us.

Mrs. Dawson was put out, and behaved as though she were unaware of the nurse’s presence. I wondered what Althea Grey had done to make herself so disliked.

We walked up a beautiful staircase and inspected the rooms on the first floor of the mansion with their enormous windows and those superb views to which I had become accustomed at Pendorric. Mrs. Dawson uncovered some of the furniture and showed me beautiful pieces, mostly antique, which I guessed must be worth a great deal.

“Jewelled in every hole,” murmured Althea Grey, her lovely blue eyes mischievous.

The obvious hostility between them made me a little uncomfortable. ” I hear we’re to have about sixty guests, Mrs. Pendorric,” said Althea Grey. ” It’s a good thing we have a sizeable ballroom, otherwise we should be treading on each other’s toes.”

“Well, Nurse,” put in Mrs. Dawson with a twitch of her nose, ” that shouldn’t worry you, should it?”

” Oh but it will, I hate having my toes trodden on.” She laughed. ” Oh, you’re thinking that as I’m merely Lord Polhorgan’s nurse I shan’t be there. But you’re wrong, Mrs. Dawson. Of course I shall be there. I couldn’t let him go without me in attendance, could I?” She was smiling at me as though inviting me to join in her victory over Mrs. Dawson, who looked extremely put out; and I supposed this was the usual tug-of-war between two servants each of whom thought herself in a higher position than me other. That must be the reason for the animosity.

” Of course not,” I said hastily; and Mrs. Dawson’s face was grim. ” I reckon, madam,” she said, ” that Nurse Grey could show you the upper rooms.”

I thanked her and assured her that I should be pleased if she stayed with us, but she muttered something about having things to see to, and left us.

Althea Grey grinned when we were alone. ” She’d make life a trial if I’d let her. Jealous old witch.”

” You think she’s jealous of you?”

“They always are, you know. I’ve come up against this sort of thing before, nursing in private houses. They don’t like it because they have to wait for us. They’re anxious all the time to tell us that they’re as good as we are.”

” It must be awkward for you.”

” I don’t let it bother me. I can manage the Mrs. Dawson characters, I can tell you.”

In spite of her delicate beauty I was sure she could. We had come to my grandfather’s room, and when I went in with her he gave me his warm and welcoming smile, and I felt my spirits rising when I realised what a difference my coming had made to him. Nurse Grey ordered tea and the three of us had it together. Conversation was all about the ball, and before she left us Nurse Grey warned my grandfather that he was becoming far too excited. ” You have your pills handy?” she said.

For answer he took the little silver box from his pocket and showed her.

” That’s good.”

She smiled at me and left us together.

I had had a busy morning, and after lunch, because the sun was shining and it was a long time since I had been in the quadrangle, I went there and sat in my favourite spot under the palm tree. I had not been there more than five minutes when the north door opened and a twin came out.

I was always a little ashamed of my inability to distinguish which was which when they were not together, and tried to discover without exposing my ignorance.

She came and stood before me.

“Hallo. How you like mis place! But you haven’t been here lately, have you?”

” I’ve been too busy.”

She regarded me solemnly. ” I know. It is a busy business, suddenly finding you’re Lord Polhorgan’s granddaughter.”

She stood on one foot and hopped a few paces nearer. ” Just fancy! You might have been here always … if your mother and father hadn’t gone away. Then we should always have known you.”

“That could easily have happened,” I admitted.

” But it was more exciting the other way. There wouldn’t have been this ball perhaps … if you’d always been here. There wouldn’t be any sense in giving a fatted-calf sort of ball if you’d never been away, would there?”

” Would you say this was like the prodigal’s return?” She nodded vigorously.

“You’re rich now, aren’t you; and you must have been poor, though perhaps you didn’t eat the husks that the swine did eat.”

I was sure it was Lowella now. She had started to hop all round my seat, and when she was immediately behind me she stood close, breathing down my neck. ” Everybody wasn’t pleased when he came home, were they? There was the brother who’d stayed at home. He didn’t see why the fatted calf should be killed for the brother who’d run away when he wanted to.”

” Don’t worry. I haven’t got a brother who’ll be jealous of my having a welcome.”

” There doesn’t have to be a brother. A parable’s different, isn’t it?

It doesn’t always mean exactly what it says. You have to work it out—Becky says so. Carrie’s waiting for me to try on my dress for the ball. “

” She’s making it for you, is she?”

” Yes, it’s gold colour. She’s making two—exactly alike. It’ll be fun. They won’t know which is Hy and which is Lo.”

“You’d better go if Carrie wants to fit on your dress, hadn’t you?”

” You come with me and see it. It’s very pretty.” She started to hop towards the west door and I rose and followed her into the house, unsure again whether I had been speaking to Hyson or Lowella.

She started to hum as we went up the stairs, and the song she hummed was the tune that I had heard in that strange, off-key voice which had startled me so. This humming was quite different, though, rather monotonous and tuneless.

“What’s that you’re singing?” I asked.

She stopped, turned slowly and looked down on me, for she was standing several stairs above me. I knew then that she was Hyson.

” It’s Ophelia’s song in Hamlet.”

” Did you learn it at school?”

She shook her head.

“Did Miss Bective teach it to you?” I was becoming too anxious, I realised; and she guessed it and found it amusing. Again she shook her head. She was waiting mischievously for the next question.

I merely continued: ” It’s a haunting tune,” and started up the stairs.

She ran on ahead of me until she came to the door of Carrie’s sewing room.

Carrie was seated at an old-fashioned sewing machine and I saw that she was working on a gold-coloured dress.

There were two dressmaker’s dummies in the room, one a child’s and the other an adult’s. On the smaller one was another gold-coloured dress, on the larger a mauve evening dress.

” Ah, there you are. Miss Hyson,” said Carrie. ” I’ve been waiting for you. Come here, do. That neck don’t please me.”

” Here’s Mrs. Pendorric, too” said Hyson. ” She wanted to see the dresses so I brought her up. “

I went over to the dummy on which the other gold-coloured dress had been arranged.

” It’s lovely,” I said. ” This is Lowella’s, of course.”

“I fitted it on Miss Hyson,” mumbled Carrie.

“Miss Lowella can’t stand still for more than a second or two.”

“It’s true,” said Hyson primly.

“Her mind flitters and flutters like a butterfly. She can’t concentrate on anything for any length of time.

Becky says it’s deplorable. “

” Come here, then,” said Carrie, snipping a cotton and withdrawing the dress from the machine.

Hyson stood meekly while Carrie slipped off her dress and put on the gold-coloured silk.

“It’s delightful,” I said.

” The neck’s wrong.” Carrie was breathing heavily as she purred and clicked over the neck of the dress. I went over to the mauve dress and examined it. It was beautifully made, but like all Deborah’s clothes it had that slightly old-world look. The rows of flounces in the long skirt would have been iqj fashionable many years ago, so would the lace fichu at the neck. It was like a charming period piece.

” I thought you were going to make up the pink,” I said. ” Ur,” grunted Carrie, her mouth full of pins.

” I suppose Deborah changed her mind, but when I was here I thought she said she would have the pink.”

Hyson nodded at me vigorously and inclined her head towards a dress hanging behind the door. I looked and saw an exact replica of the dress, this time in pink.

I stared in astonishment.

” Carrie made two, didn’t you, Carrie?” said Hyson. ” She made two gold dresses … one for me, one for Lowella, and she made two like that—one pink and one mauve—because ever since they left Devon they never had the same colour. It was different after they left Devon, wasn’t it, Carrie?”

Hyson was regarding me almost triumphantly and I felt impatient with her.

” What on earth are you talking about?” I demanded. Hyson became engrossed in the tips of her shoes and would not answer me.

” Carrie,” I insisted, ” I suppose Miss Deborah has had the two dresses made up. Perhaps it’s as well if you’ve had the material for a’ long time—which I believe you said you had.”

” The pink’s for Miss Deborah,” said Carrie. ” I like her in pink.”

” And the mauve …?”

Hyson darted away from Carrie and ran to me; she laid a hand on my arm and smiled up at me.

“The pink was made for Granny Deborah,” she whispered, ” and the mauve for Granny Barbarina.”

Carrie was smiling at the mauve dress as though she saw more than a dress; she said quietly: “Mauve were your colour, my dear; and I always say there weren’t two prettier maidens in Devonshire than my Miss Deborah and Miss Barbarina.”

I-was suddenly impatient with the stuffy sewing room. I said: “I’ve things to do,” and went out.

But when I had shut the door I asked myself what motive lay behind Hyson’s strange behaviour. I could understand that Carrie’s mind wandered a little; she was old; and she had clearly been devoted to Barbarina. Deborah had said that she had never recovered from the shock of her death. But where did Hyson come into this? She was just a mischievous child, I suspected; could it be that for some reason she resented my coming to Pendorric? That talk about the fatted calf—what had been the meaning behind that?

I looked over my shoulder and restrained the impulse to go back into the room. Instead I went along the corridor until I came to the door of Deborah’s sitting-room.

I hesitated for a moment, then I knocked.

“Come in,” said Deborah.

She was seated at a table reading.

” My dear, what a pleasant surprise. Why, is anything wrong?”

” Oh no nothing. I’m just a little puzzled, that’s all.”

” Come and sit down and tell me what’s puzzling you.”

” Hyson’s a queer child, isn’t she? I’m afraid I don’t understand her.”

She shrugged her shoulders.

“It’s not always easy to understand what goes on in the mind of a child.”

” But Hyson is so very strange. Lowella is quite different.”

” It’s the case of the extrovert and the introvert. They are twins of entirely different character. Tell me what Hyson’s been doing to upset you.”

I told her about the dress I had seen on the stand in Carrie’s sewing room.

Deborah sighed.

“I know,” she said.

“She’d done it before I could stop her. I’d decided on the pink and the pattern; then I found that she was making up not only the pink but the mauve.”

” Does she really think that Barbarina is still alive?”

” Not all the time. There are occasions when she’s as lucid as you or I. And at others she thinks she is back in the past. It doesn’t matter. The dresses are exactly alike, so that I can wear either of them. I never scold her.”

“But, what about Hyson?” I said.

“Does Came talk to her?”

“Hyson understands perfectly the state of affairs. I’ve explained to her.

But I’ve told her that she must never hurt Carrie’s feelings. Hyson’s a good child. She does her best. You look disapproving, my dear. “

” I think it’s a little … unhealthy,” I said.

” Oh, it does no harm, and it makes Carrie happy. While she can believe that Barbarina is still with us she’s contented. It’s when she faces up to what really happened that she is depressed and sad. It’s easier in Devonshire. There, of course, she is often under the impression that Barbarina is in Cornwall, and that we shall shortly be visiting her. Here it’s not so easy, because she thinks Barbarina should be here.”

I was silent and she laid her hand over mine.

” My dear,” she went on softly, ” you’re young and bursting with sound common sense. It’s difficult for you to understand the vagaries of people whose minds are not quite as normal as your own. Don’t let Carrie upset you. She’s been like this for so long. I couldn’t bear to make her unhappy … that’s why I humour her. So I let her say: Miss Deborah shall go to the ball in the pink dress and Miss Barbarina in the mauve. It’s of little consequence. And talking of dresses-tell me, what are you going to wear?”

I told her that it was a green and gold dress which I had bought in Paris during my honeymoon. I had so far had no chance to wear it and the ball seemed the ideal occasion.

“I’m sure you’ll look wonderful, my dear, quite wonderful ; and your grandfather and your husband will be so proud of you. Oh Favel, what a fortunate woman you are to find a husband and a grandfather all in a few months !” ” Yes,” I said slowly, ” it’s certainly very strange.” She laughed merrily. ” You see, strange things are beginning to happen to you since you came to Pendorric.”

It was arranged that Roc and I should go to Polhorgan half an hour before the guests were due to arrive, so that we should be there, with Lord Polhorgan, to receive them.

I bathed and dressed in good time, and was rather pleased with my appearance when I put on my dress. It was a sheath of green silk chiffon billowing out from the knees into a frothy skirt; there was a narrow gold belt at the waist and a gold tracing showed through the chiffon from the satin underskirt.

I had piled my hair high on my head, and I was delighted with the Parisian effect.

Roc came in while I was standing before the mirror, and taking my hands held me at arms’ length to examine me.

” I haven’t a doubt who’ll be the belle of the ball,” he said.

“And what could be more apt?” He drew me to him and kissed me as lightly as though I were a porcelain figure which he feared might break under rough handling.

” You’d better dress,” I warned. ” Remember we have to be early.”

” First I want to give you this,” he said, and took a case from his pocket.

I opened it and saw a glittering necklace of emeralds and diamonds. ” Known—rather grandiosely—as the Pendorric Emeralds,” he told me. ” Worn at her wedding by her whom they call the First Bride.”

” They’re exquisite. Roc.”

“I had them in mind when I suggested you should buy that dress. I don’t pretend to know anything about clothes, but being green it did seem they’d match.”

” So I’m to wear them tonight?”

” Of course.” He took them from the case and fastened them about my neck. I had looked soigne before, but now I was regal. The emeralds did that for me.

” Why didn’t you tell me that you were giving me these?”

” But in all the best scenes the jewels are clasped about the lady’s neck at the precise psychological moment!”

” You have an eye for drama. Oh Roc, they’re quite lovely. I shall be afraid of losing them.”

” Why should you? There’s a safety chain. Pendorric brides have been wearing them for nearly two hundred years and not lost them. Why should this bride?”

” Thank you. Roc.”

He lifted his shoulders and surveyed me sardonically. ” Don’t thank me, darling. Thank that other Petroc who married Lowella. He bought them for her. They’re your heritage anyway. It’ll be nice to show that opulent grandfather of yours that you’ve a husband who can give you something worth having.”

“You’ve given me so much that’s worth having. I don’t want to disparage the necklace, but …”

” I know, darling. Kind hearts are more than emeralds. A sentiment with which I am in complete agreement. But it’s getting late, so we’ll develop that line of thought later.”

” Yes, you’d better hurry.”

He went into the bathroom and I looked at my watch. We should be leaving in fifteen minutes. Knowing his tendency to talk while dressing, and feeling this would delay him, I went out of the room into the corridor and stood at the window looking down at the quadrangle. I was thinking about my grandfather and all that had happened to me in the last weeks, and it seemed to me that my life, which until then had run along expected lines, had suddenly become dramatic. I did not think I should be very surprised whatever happened to me next.

Still, I was happy. I was more deeply in love with my husband every day; I was growing fonder of my grandfather, and I found great pleasure in being the one who could bring such happiness into his life. I knew that he had changed a great deal since I had come; and, since he had revealed his relationship to me, even more. He often reminded me of a boy in his enthusiasm for simple things, and I understood that this was because he had never bad time to be really young.

Some impulse made me lift my eyes from the pond and the palms. That feeling which came to me often when I was in the quadrangle was strong at that moment. I had never analysed it, but it was a feeling of eerie discomfort, a notion that I was being watched intently and not casually or in a friendly way.

My eyes went at once to the east windows . to that floor on which Barbarina had had her music room.

There was a movement there. Someone was standing at the corridor window—not close, but a little way back. Now the figure came nearer.

I could not see the face, but I knew it was a woman because she was wearing a mauve dress.

It was me one I had seen on the dressmaker’s dummy; the dress which Carrie had made for Barbarina.

” Barbarina …” I whispered.

For a few seconds I saw the dress clearly, for a pale hand had drawn back the curtains. I could not see the face, though . then the curtain fell back into place.

I stood staring at the window.

Of course, I said to myself, it was Deborah. She has decided to wear the mauve dress after all. That’s the answer. But why did she not wave to me or let me see her?

It had been all over in a few seconds, hadn't it? She couldn’t have seen me.

Roc came out of the room, shouting that he was ready. I was about to tell him what I had seen, but somehow it had become unimportant. When I saw Deborah at the ball in the mauve dress I should be satisfied.

The ballroom at Polhorgan was magnificent. Trehay, eager to show off his more exotic blooms, had made a wonderful show, but it was the hydrangeas, indigenous to Cornwall, that in my opinion were the most dazzling.

My grandfather was already in the ballroom in his wheelchair with Althea Grey beside him, looking startlingly beautiful in her eggshell-blue off-the-shoulder dress, with a white camellia adorning it. Her hand was resting on my grandfather’s chair in a proprietorial way.

“You look more like your mother than ever,” said my grandfather brusquely; and I knew he was moved as I stooped and kissed him. ” It’s going to be wonderful,” I replied. ‘ I’m so looking forward to meeting all your friends. “

My grandfather laughed. ” Not my friends. Few of them have ever been here before. They’ve come to meet Mrs. Pendorric—and that’s a fact.

What do you think of the ballroom? “

Quite magnificent. “

” Have you got anything like this at Pendorric, Roc?”

” I’m afraid we don’t run to such glory. Our halls are tiny in comparison.”

” Like that panelling? I had that specially brought here from the Midlands. Some old mansion that was broken up. Used to say to myself, One day that’ll be mine.” Well, so it was in a way. “

” There’s a lesson in it,” said Roc. ” Take what you want and pay for it.”

” I paid for it all right.”

” Lord Polhorgan,” said Althea, ” you mustn’t get overexcited. If you do I shall have to insist on your going back to your room.”

“You see how I’m treated?” said my grandfather.

“I might be a schoolboy. In fact I’m sure at times Nurse Grey thinks I am.”

” I’m here to look after you,” she reminded him. ” Haw you your TNT.”

He put his hand in his pocket and held up the silver box. ” Good. Keep them handy. “

”I shall be keeping my eye on him too,” I said.

” How fortunate you are, sir,” Roc murmured. ” The two most beautiful women at the ball to watch over you!”

My grandfather put his hand over mine and smiled at me. ” Aye,” he agreed, ” I’m lucky.”

” That sounds like the first of the guests,” said Althea. It was.

Dawson, spectacular in black livery with gold frogs and buttons, was announcing the first arrivals.

I felt very proud standing there between my grandfather and my husband as I greeted the guests. My grandfather was cold and formal; Roc quite the opposite. I was, naturally, the centre of a great deal of interest; I guessed that many of these people wanted to see what sort of woman Roc Pendorric had married. The fact that I was Lord Polhorgan’s granddaughter meant that they were aware of our romantic meeting, for they all knew my mother had run away from home and had not communicated with her father again. It made a good story, and naturally there had been a certain amount of gossip about it. Roc was told that he was lucky, and now and then I sensed the underlying significance of that remark. Polhorgan was an imposing structure, but a great many of these people possessed houses as grand. The difference was that they had been in their families for hundreds of years, while my grandfather had earned the money to build his.

Moreover, it was unlikely that any of these people could match the opulence of the furnishings they now saw. It was well known that my grandfather was either a millionaire or something near it. So when they told Roc he was lucky, I presumed my grandfather’s wealth had something to do with it.

However, I was beginning to enjoy myself. The music had started and the guests were still arriving. They were not all young; indeed there were some very old people present, for the invitations had been issued to whole families. It was going to be a very mixed ball. The party from Pendorric had arrived, and the twins came ahead, arm in arm, looking exactly alike in their gold-coloured dresses; behind them Charles and Morwenna, and then . Deborah.

Deborah was wearing the pink dress which Carrie had made for her, and looking as though she had stepped out of a twenty-five year-old magazine.

But pink! Then who had been wearing the mauve?

I forced myself to smile at them; but I could not stop thinking of the vision I had seen at the window. Who could it have been? Deborah had taken my hands. ” You look lovely, dear. Is everything all right?”

” Why yes … I think so.”

” I thought you looked a little startled when you saw me.”

” Oh no not really.”

” It was something. You must tell me later. I’d better pass on now.”

More guests were approaching, and Roc was introducing me. I took the outstretched hands, still thinking of the vision I had seen in the mauve dress.

I danced with Roc and with many others that night. I was aware of my grandfather’s eyes, which never seemed to leave me. I think I was a successful hostess.

I was grateful to Deborah, who was determined to put me at my ease since I had shown her that I was disturbed.

She took the first opportunity of talking to me. Roc was dancing with Althea Grey and I was standing by my grandfather’s chair when she came up.

” While you have a moment, Favel,” she said, ” I’d like to chat. Tell me, why were you startled when you saw me?”

I hesitated, then I replied: “I thought I’d seen you earlier in the evening at the east window—before we left Pendorric … in the mauve dress.”

There was silence for a few seconds and I went on: “I was dressed and waiting for Roc when I looked out of the window and saw someone in the mauve dress.”

” And you didn’t recognise who it was?”

” I couldn’t see a face. I only saw the dress and that someone was wearing it.”

” What ever did you think?”

“I thought you’d decided to wear it.”

” And when I came in the pink surely you didn’t think you’d seen … Barbarina?”

” Oh no, I didn’t think that really. But I wondered who …” She touched my hand. ” Of course you wouldn’t think it. You’re too sensible.” She paused and said: ” There’s a simple explanation. I had a choice of two dresses. Why shouldn’t I try on the mauve and finally decide on the pink?”

” So it was you.”

She did not answer; she was staring dreamily at the dancers. I realised that I didn’t believe what she was hinting. She had not said that she had tried on the mauve dress, she had put it differently. ” Why shouldn’t I* try on the mauve …?” It was as though she did not want to tell a lie but at the same time was trying to set my mind at rest.

That was just a fleeting thought which came into my head as I looked at her kind, gentle face.

Almost immediately I said to myself: Of course, Deborah tried on the mauve first. It was natural. And moreover it was the only explanation.

But why should she go to the east wing to do it? Because Carrie would have put the dress there, was the obvious answer.

I dismissed the matter from my mind. Deborah saw this and seemed contented.

Grandfather said that I must not remain at his side, as he liked to see me among the dancers. I told him I was rather anxious about him, as he looked more flushed than usual.

” I’m enjoying it,” he said. ” I should have liked to have done more of this in the past. Perhaps we will now, eh, now you’ve come home?

Where’s your husband? “

He was dancing with Nurse Grey and I pointed him out. They were the most striking couple in the room, I thought; she with her fair looks, he so dark. ” He ought to be dancing with you,” said my grandfather.

” He did suggest it, but I told him I wanted to talk to you.”

” Now that won’t do. Ah, here’s the doctor. Nice to see you unprofessionally. Dr. Clement.” Andrew Clement smiled at me. ” It was good of you and Mrs. Pendorric to ask me.”

” Why don’t you ask my granddaughter to dance? Dont want her to be glued to the old man’s chair all the evening.” Andrew dement smiled at me and we went on to the floor together. t> Do you think this is too much excitement for my grandfather? ” I asked.

” I wouldn’t say he was too excited. No, I think it’s doing him good.

I’ll tell you something, Mrs. Pendorric; he’s been much better since you’ve been here. “

“Has he?”

” Oh yes, you’ve given him a real interest in life. There were times when I was afraid he’d die of melancholia … Sitting in that room day after day, staring out at the sea. Now he’s no longer lonely. I think he’s changed a great deal; he’s got something to live for, and you know he’s a man of immense energy. He’s always gone all out for what he wants, and managed to get it. Well, now he wants to live.”

” That’s excellent news.”

” Oh yes, he’s told me how delighted he is with you. He wanted me to witness his signature on some important documents the other day, and I said to Nurse Grey afterwards that I hadn't found him so well for a very long time. She said it was all thanks to that granddaughter of his on whom he doted.”

” I cant tell you how happy I am if I can be of help to him. Is your sister here tonight?”

” Oh yes, though ballroom dancing isn't much in her line. Now if it were folk-dancing…”

He laughed, and at that moment he was tapped on the shoulder by a dark, handsome young man. Andrew Clement pretended to scowl, arid said: “Oh, is it that sort of dance?”

” Afraid so,” said the young man. ” I’m claiming Mrs. Pendorric.” As I danced with this young man he told me he was John Poldree and mat he lived a few miles inland.

” I’m home for a bit,” he went on. ” Actually I’m studying law in London.”

” I’m so glad you were home for the ball,” I told him. “”

“Yes, it’s good fun. All very exciting too—your turning out to be Lord Polhorgan’s granddaughter.” ** Most people seem to think so. “

” Your grandfather has a striking-looking nurse, Mrs. Pendorric.”

” Yes, she’s certainly very beautiful.”

” Who is she? I’ve seen her somewhere before.”

” Her name is Althea Grey.”

He shook his head. ” Can’t recall the name. The face is familiar, though. Seem to connect her with some law case or other … I thought I had a good memory for such things, but it seems I’m not so good as I thought.”

” I should think if you’d met her you’d remember her.”

” Yes. That’s why I was so sure. Well, it’ll come back I expect.”

” Why don’t you ask her?”

” As a matter of fact I did. She absolutely froze me. She was certain she had never met me before.”

There was a tap on his shoulder, and there was Roc waiting to claim me.

I was very happy dancing with my husband. His eyes were amused and I could see that he was enjoying himself.

” It’s fun,” he said, ” but I don’t see half enough of the hostess. I expect she has her duties, though.”

” The same thing applies to you.”

” Well, haven’t you seen me performing? I’ve had my eyes on every wallflower.”

” I’ve seen you on several occasions dancing with Althea Grey. Was she wilting for lack of attention?”

“At things of this sort, people like Althea and Rachel could be at a disadvantage. The nurse and the governess! There’s a certain amount of snobbery still in existence, you know.”

” So that’s why you’ve been looking after Althea. What about poor Rachel?”

” I’d better keep an eye on her too.”

” Then,” I said lightly, ” as you’re going to be so busily engaged elsewhere I’d better make the most of the time that belongs to me.”

He squeezed my hand. ” Have you forgotten,” he asked, his lips touching my ear, ” that the rest of our lives belong together?”

Supper was very gay. We had arranged that it should be served in three of the larger rooms which adjoined the hall; they all faced south and the great trench windows opened on to terraces which looked over the gardens to the sea. There was plenty of moonlight, and the view was enchanting.

Trehay’s flower scheme was as beautiful in the supper rooms as it was in the ballroom; and no effort had been spared to achieve the utmost luxury. On the overladen table were fish, pies, meats and delicacies of all description. Dawson and his under-servants in their smart livery took charge of the bar while Mrs. Dawson looked after the food.

I shared a table with my grandfather, John Poldree and his brother, Deborah and the twins.

Lowella was as silent as Hyson on this occasion; she seemed to be quite overawed, and when I whispered to her that she was unusually subdued. Hyson answered that they had made a vow not to call attention to themselves, in case someone should remember that they weren’t really old enough to go to balls and tell Rachel to take them home.

They had escaped Rachel, they told me, and their parents; and so would I please not call attention to them in case Granny Deborah noticed?

I promised.

While we were talking together, some of the guests strolled out on to the terraces and I saw Roc and Althea Grey walk by the window. They stood for a while looking out over the sea and seemed to be talking earnestly, and the sight of them threw a small shadow over my enjoyment.

It was midnight when several of the guests started to leave, and finally only the Pendorric party remained.

Althea Grey hovered while we said good-bye and congratulated each other on the success of the evening. Then she wheeled my grandfather’s chair to the lift which he had had installed some years before when he had first been aware of his illness, and he went up to his bedroom while we went to our cars.

It was half-past one by the time we reached Pendorric, and as we drove under the old archway to the north portico, Mrs. Penhalligan opened the front door.

” Oh, Mrs. Penhalligan,” I said, ” you shouldn’t have stayed up.”

“Well, madam,” she said, “I thought you’d like a little refreshment before settling down for the night. I’ve got some soup for you.”

” Soup! On a hot summer’s night!” cried Roc.

“Soup! Soup! Glorious Soup!” sang Lowella.

” One of the old customs,” Morwenna whispered to me. ” We can’t escape them if we want to.”

We went into the north hall and Mrs. Penhalligan led the way into the small winter parlour where soup plates had been set out; and at the sight of them Lowella danced round the room chanting: “’ There was a sound of revelry by night’.”

” Oh Lowella, please,” sighed Morwenna. ” Aren’t you tired? It’s after one.”

” I’m not in the least tired,” insisted Lowella indignantly.

“Oh, isn’t this a wonderful ball!”

” The ball’s over,” Roc reminded her.

” It’s not-not till we’re all in our beds. There’s soup to be had before that’s over.”

” You’d better let them sleep late tomorrow, Rachel,” said their mother.

Mrs. Penhalligan came in with a tureen of soup and began ladling it out into me plates.

” It was always like this in the old days,” said Roc. ” We used to hide in the gallery and watch them come in; do you remember, Morwenna?”

Morwenna nodded.

“Who? ” asked Hyson.

“Our parents, of course. We couldn’t have been more than …”

” Five,” said Hyson. ” You’d have to be, wouldn’t you, Uncle Roc? You couldn’t have been more, could you?”

” What memories these children have!” murmured Roc lightly. ” Have you been coaching them. Aunt Deborah? ” “What soup’s this?” asked Lowella.

” Taste it and see,” Roc told her.

She obeyed and rolled her eyes ecstatically. We all agreed that it was not such a bad custom after all, and that although we should not have thought of hot soup on a summer’s night there was something reviving about it and it was pleasant to sit back and talk about the evening.

When we had finished the soup no one seemed in a hurry i go to bed, so

we talked about Polhorgan and the people we had met there, while the twins sat back in their seats, desperately trying to keep awake, looking like daffodils which had been left too long out of water.

” It’s time they were in bed,” said Charles.

“Oh Daddy,” wailed Lowella, “don’t be so old fashioned I”

” If you’re not tired,” Roc pointed out, ” others might be. Aunt Deborah looks half asleep and so do you, Morwenna.”

” I know,” said Morwenna, ” but it’s so comfortable sitting here and it’s been such a pleasant evening I don’t want it to end. So go on talking, all of you.”

“Yes do, quick,” cried Lowella; and everyone laughed and seemed suddenly wide awake. ” Go on. Uncle Roc.”

” This reminds me of Christmas,” said Roc obligingly, and Lowella smiled at him with loving gratitude and affection.

” When,” went on Roc, ” we sit around the fire, longing for our beds and too lazy to go to them.”

“Telling ghost stories,” said Charles.

“Tell some now,” pleaded Lowella. Do, please. Daddy. Uncle Roc. “

Hyson sat forward, suddenly alert.

” Most unseasonable,” commented Roc. ” You’ll have to wait a few months yet, Lo.”

” I can’t. I can’t. I want a ghost story—now!”

“It certainly is time you were in bed,” commented Mor

Lowella regarded me with solemn eyes.

“It’ll be the Bride’s first Christmas with us,” she announced. ” Shell love Christmas at Pendorric, won’t she? I remember last Christmas we sang songs as well as telling ghost stories. Real Christmas songs. I’ll tell you the one I like best.”

“’ The Mistletoe Bough’,” said Hyson.

“You’d like that. Bride, because it’s all about another bride.”

“I expect your Aunt Favel knows it,” said Morwenna. ” Everyone does. “

” No,” I told them, ” I’ve never heard it. You see, Christmas on the island wasn’t quite like an English Christmas.”

“Fancy! She’s never heard of ” The Mistletoe Bough’. ” Lowella looked shocked.

” Think, what she’s missed,” mocked Roc.

“I’m going to be the one to tell her,” declared Lowella. ” Listen, Bride! This other bride played hide and seek: in a place …”

” Minster Lovel,” supplied Hyson.

“Well, the place doesn’t matter two hoots, silly.”

” Lowella,” Morwenna admonished; but Lowella was rushing on. ” They were playing hide and seek and this bride got into the old oak chest, and the lock clicked and fastened her down for ever.”

” And they didn’t open the chest until twenty years later,” put in Hyson. ” Then they found her—nothing but a skeleton.”

“Her wedding dress and orange blossom were all right, though,” added Lowella cheerfully.

” I’m sure,” said Roc ironically, ” that must have been a comfort.”

” You shouldn’t laugh. Uncle Roc. It’s sad, really. ” ‘ A spring lock lay in ambush there ‘,” she sang. ” ‘ And fastened her down for ever’. “

” And the moral of that,” Roc put in, grinning at me, ” is, don’t go hiding in oak chests if you’re a bride.”

” Ugh!” shivered Morwenna. ” I’m not keen on that story. It’s morbid.”

” That’s why it appeals to your daughters, Wenna,” Roc told her.

Charles said: “Look. I’m going up. The twins ought to have been in bed hours ago.”

Deborah yawned.

“I must say I find it hard to keep awake.”

” I’ve an idea,” cried Lowella. ” Let’s all sing Christmas songs for a bit.

Everyone has to sing a different one. “

“I’ve a better idea,” said her father.

“Bed.” Rachel stood up. ” Come along,” she said to the twins. ” It must be nearly two.”

Lowella looked disgusted with us because we all rose; but no one took any notice of her, and we said good night and went upstairs.

The next day I went over to Polhorgan to see how my grandfather was after all the excitement.

Mrs. Dawson met me in the hall and I congratulated her on all that she and her husband had done to make the ball a success. ” Well, madam,” she said, bridling, ” it’s a pleasure to be appreciated, I must say.

Not that Dawson and I want thanks. It was our duty and we did it. “

” You did it admirably,” I told her.

Dawson came into the hall at that moment, and when Mrs. Dawson told him what I had said, he was as pleased as his wife. I asked how my grandfather was that morning.

” Very contented, madam, but sleeping. A little tired after all the excitement, I think.”

” I won’t disturb him for a while,” I said. ” I’ll go into the garden.”

” I’m sending up his coffee in half an hour, madam,” Mrs. Dawson told me.

” Very well then. I’ll wait till then.”

Dawson followed me into the garden; there was something conspiratorial about his manner, I thought; and when I paused by one of the greenhouses he was still beside me.

” Everyone in the house is glad, madam, that you’ve come home,” he told me. ” With one exception, that is.”

I turned to look at him in astonishment, and he did not meet my eyes.

I had the impression that he was determined to be the good and faithful servant, dealing with a delicate situation because this was something I ought to know.

“Thank you, Dawson,” I said. ” Who is the exception?”

” The nurse.”

” Oh?”

He stuck out his lower lip and shook his head.

“She had other notions.”

“Dawson, you don’t like Nurse Grey, do you?”

” There’s nobody in this house that likes her, madam … except the young men. She being that sort. There’s some that don’t look beyond a pretty face.”

I thought it was the usual story of a nurse in the house who was determined to establish the fact that she was superior to the servants. Probably Nurse Grey gave orders in the kitchen, which they did not like. It was not an unusual situation. And now that they knew I was Lord Polhorgan’s grand daughter, they regarded me as the mistress of me house. This was the Dawsons’ way of telling me I was accepted as such. “Mrs. Dawson and I have always felt ourselves to be in a privileged position, madam.

We have been with his lordship for a very long time. “

” But of course, you are,” I assured him.

” We were here, begging your pardon, when Miss Lilith was at home.”

” So you knew my mother?”

“A lovely young lady, and, if you’ll forgive the liberty, madam, you’re very like her.”

” Thank you.”

” That’s why … Mrs. Dawson and I … made up our minds that we could talk to you, madam.”

” Please say everything that’s in your mind, Dawson.”

” Well, we’re uneasy, madam. There was a time when we thought she would try to marry him. There was no doubt that was what she was after. Mrs. Dawson and I had made up our minds that the minute that was decided on we should be looking for another position. “

” Miss Grey … marry my grandfather?”

” Such things have happened, madam. Rich old gentlemen do marry young nurses now and then. They get a feeling they can’t do without them and the nurses have their eyes on the money, you see.”

” I’m sure my grandfather would never be married for his money. He’s far too shrewd.”

“That was what we said. She could never achieve that, and she didn’t.

But Mrs. Dawson and I reckon it wasn’t for want of trying. ” He came closer to me and whispered: ” The truth is, madam, we reckon she’s what you might call. an adventuress. “

” I see.”

” There’s something more. Our married daughter came to see us not so long ago…. It was just before you came home, madam. Well, she happened to see Nurse Grey and she said she was sure she’d seen her picture in the paper somewhere. Only she didn’t think the name was Grey.”

” Why was her picture in the paper?”

” It was some case or other. Maureen couldn’t remember what. But she thought it was something bad.”

“People get mixed up about these things. Perhaps she’d won a beauty competition or something like that.”

” Oh no, it wasn’t that or Maureen would have remembered. It was something to do with the courts. And it was Nurse something. But Maureen didn’t think it was Grey. It was just the face. She has got the sort of face, madam, that once seen is never forgotten.”

“Did you ask her?”

” Oh no, madam, it wasn’t the sort of thing we could ask. She would be offended, and unless we’d got proof, she could deny it, couldn’t she?

No, there’s nothing we can put a finger on. And now you’ve come home it doesn’t seem the same. His lordship’s not so likely to get caught—that’s how Mrs. Dawson and I see it, madam. But we’re keeping our eyes open. “

” Oh … it’s Mrs. Pendorric.”

I turned sharply to see Althea Grey smiling at me, and I flushed rather guiltily, feeling at a disadvantage to have been discovered discussing her with the butler. I wondered if she had overheard anything. Voices carried in the open air.

” You don’t look as if you’ve been up half the night,” she went on. ” And I’m sure you must have been. What an evening! Lord Polhorgan was absolutely delighted with the way everything went off.” Dawson slipped away and I was left alone with her. Her hair, piled high beneath the snowy cap, was beautiful; but I wondered what it was that made her face so distinctive. Was it the thick brows, several shades darker than her hair; the eyes of that lovely deep blue shade that is almost violet and doesn’t need to take its colour from anything because it is always a more vivid blue than anything else could possibly be? The straight nose was almost Egyptian, and seemed odd with such Anglo-Saxon fairness. The wide mouth was slightly mocking now. I felt sure that even if she had not overheard our conversation, she knew that Dawson had been speaking of her derogatively.

It was a face of mystery, I decided, a face that concealed secrets; the face of a woman of the world, a woman who had lived perhaps recklessly and had no desire for the past to prejudice the present, or future.

I remembered that the young man with whom I had danced had mentioned something from the past too. So Dawson’s suspicions were very likely not without some foundation.

I felt wary of this woman as I walked with her towards the house. ” Lord Polfaorgan was hoping you’d come this morning. I told him you most certainly would.”

” I was wondering how he felt after last night.”

” It did him a world of good. He enjoyed feting his beautiful granddaughter.”

I felt that she was secretly laughing at me, and I was glad when I was with my grandfather and she had left us alone together.

It was a week later mat there was a call in the night. The telephone beside our bed rang and I was answering it before Roc had opened his eyes.

” This is Nurse Grey. Could you come over at once? Lord Polhorgan is very ill, and asking for you.”

I leaped out of bed.

” What on earth’s happened?” asked Roc.

When I told him he made me slip on some clothes, and, doing the same himself, said: ” We’ll drive over right away.”

“What’s the time?” I asked Roc, as we drove the short distance between Pendorric and Polhorgan.

” Just after one.”

” He must be bad for her to ring us,” I said. Roc put his hand over mine, as though to reassure me that whatever was waiting for me, he would be there to share it. As we drove up to the portico the door opened and Dawson let us in. ” He’s very bad, I’m afraid, madam.”

” I’ll go straight up.”

I ran up the stairs. Roc at my heels. Roc waited outside the bedroom while I went in.

Althea Grey came towards me. ” Thank God you’ve come,” she said.

“He’s been asking for you. I phoned as soon as I knew.” I went to the bed where my grandfather lay back on his pillows; he was quite exhausted and I could see that he was finding it difficult to get his bread.

“Grandfather,” I said.

His lips formed the name Favel; but he did not say it. I knelt by the bed and took his hand in mine; I kissed it, feeling desolate. I had found him such a short time ago. Was I to lose him so soon?

” I’m here, Grandfather. I came as soon as I heard you wanted me.” I knew by the slight movement of his head that he understood. Althea Grey was at my side. She whispered: ” He’s not in pain. I’ve given him morphia. He’ll be feeling the effect of it now. Dr. Clement will be here at any moment.”

I turned to look at her and I saw from her expression that his condition was very grave. Then I saw Roc standing some little way from the bed. Althea Grey moved back to where he was and I turned my attention to my grandfather.

” Favel.” It was a whisper. His fingers moved in mine, and I knew that he was trying to say something to me so I brought my face nearer to his.

” Are you there … Favel?”

“Yes, Grandfather,” I whispered.

“It’s … good-bye, Favel.”

” No.”

He smiled. ” Such a short time…. But it was a happy time … the happiest time … Favel, you must be …” His face puckered and I bent nearer to him.

” Don’t talk, Grandfather. It’s too much of an effort.” His brows puckered into a frown. ” Favel … must be … careful…. It’ll be yours now. Make sure …”

I guessed what he was trying to tell me. Even when he was fighting for his breath he was preoccupied with his money.

” It’s different …” he went on, ” when you have it…. Can’t be sure can never be sure…. Favel … take care….”

“Grandfather, please don’t worry about me. Don’t think about anything but getting better. You will get better. You must….” He shook his head. ” Couldn’t find …” he began; but his battle for breath was too much for him; his eyes were closing. ” Tired,” he murmured. ” So tired. Favel … stay … be careful…. It’s different with money. Perhaps I was wrong … but I wanted … be careful. I wish I could stay a while to … look after you, Favel.”

His lips were moving now but no sound came. He lay back on his pillows, his face looking shrunken and grey. He was very near the end by the time Dr. Clement arrived.

We sat in the room where I had played so many games of chess with him—Dr. Clement, Roc, Nurse Grey and myself.

Dr. Clement was saying: “It’s not entirely unexpected. It could have happened at any time. Did he ring the bell?”

” No. Or I should have heard him. My room is next to his. The bell is always by his bed for him to ring if he wanted anything in the night.

It was Dawson who went in. He said he was locking up when he saw Lord Polhorgan’s light on. He found him gasping and in great pain. He called me and I saw that it was necessary to give him morphia, which I did. “

Dr. Clement rose and went to the door.

” Dawson,” he called. ” Are you there, Dawson?” Dawson came into the room.

” I’ve heard that you came in and found Lord Polhorgan in distress.”

” Yes, sir. He’d snapped on the light and seeing it I looked in to make sure he was all right. I saw he was trying to ask for something, but I didn’t, know what, for a while. Then I found out it was his pills. I couldn’t find them then so I called Nurse and came back with her. That was when she gave him the morphia.”

” So it seems as though this attack developed into a major one because he had no chance of holding it off.”

” I’d always impressed on him the need to have his pills at hand,” said Althea Grey.

Dawson was looking at her scornfully. ” I found them after, sir. After his lordship had had the morphia, that was. The box was lying on the floor. It had come open and the pills was scattered, sir. The bell was on the floor also.”

” He must have knocked them over when he reached for the pills,” said Althea Grey.

I looked at Roc, who was staring straight ahead of him.

“A sad business,” murmured Dr. Clement.

“I think I ought to give you a sedative, Mrs. Pendorric. You’re looking all in.”

” I’ll take her home,” said Roc. ” There’s no point in waiting here now. We can do nothing till the morning.”

Dr. Clement smiled at me sadly. ” There was nothing we could do to prevent it,” he told me.

” If he had had his pills,” I said, ” that might have prevented it.”

” It might have.”

” What an unfortunate accident …” I began ; and my eyes met Dawson’s and I saw that his were gleaming with speculation.

” It couldn’t be helped,” Roc was saying. ” It’s easy to see how it happened … reaching out … in a hurry … knocking over the box and the bell.”

I shivered, and Roc put his arm through mine.

I wanted to get out of that room; there was something in Dawson’s expression which frightened me; there was something too in the calm, beautiful features of Althea Grey.

I felt as though I were outside looking in on all that had happened since Roc and I came into this house. I saw myself leaning over my dying grandfather; I heard his voice warning me of some danger which he sensed ahead of me. Roc and Althea were standing together in that room of death. What words did they exchange while my grandfather told me to take care? What had been the expressions in their eyes as they looked at each other?

Dawson had done this with his hatred of the nurse, with his groundless suspicions. But did I really know that they were groundless? I felt the cool night air on my face and Roc’s tender voice beside me. ” Come on, darling, you’re quite worn out. Clement’s right. It has been a terrible shock to you.”

Those were sad weeks which followed, for only when I had lost him did I realise how fond I had become of my grandfather. I missed him deeply; not only his company, I began to understand; not only the complacent joy I had felt because I had brought so much pleasure into his lonely life; but he had given me a sense of security, and that I had lost. I had subconsciously felt that he was there—a powerful man of the world to whom I could go if I were in trouble. My own flesh and blood. I could have trusted him to do anything in his power to help me . should I have needed his help.

It seemed strange that I should have felt this need. I had a husband who could surely give me any protection I wanted; but it was the loss of my grandfather which brought home to me the true relationship between myself and my husband. To have lost him would have been complete desolation; he could amuse and delight me too, but the truth remained that I was not sure of him; I did not know him. Yet, in spite of this uncertainty I loved him infinitely, and my entire happiness depended on him. I was wretched because I must be suspicious of his relationship with Althea Grey, Rachel Bective and even Dinah Bond. And I had begun to feel-since I had discovered that I had a grandfather—that he was someone who had for me a deep and uncomplicated affection. Now I had lost him.

I was his heir and there were many visits from his solicitors. When I heard the extent of the fortune he had left I felt dizzy at the prospect of my riches. There were several be quests. The Dawsons had been left a comfortable pension; there was a thousand pounds for the nurse who was employed by him at the time of his death; all the servants had been remembered and rewarded according to their length of service ; he had left a sizeable sum to be used for the benefit of orphans—he himself had been an orphan—and I was very touched that he had remembered this charity. Death duties, I was informed, would swallow up a large proportion, but I should still have a considerable fortune.

Polhorgan itself was mine with all its contents; and this in itself was worth a great deal.

My grandfather’s death seemed to have changed my whole life. I was so much poorer in affection, so much richer in worldly goods; and I was beginning to be afraid that this last fact coloured people’s attitude towards me.

I fancied people like the Darks and Dr. Clement were not quite so friendly; that the people in the village whispered about me when I had passed. I had become not merely Mrs. Pendorric, but the rich Mrs. Pendorric. But it was in Pen dorric itself that I felt the change most, and this was indeed disturbing. I felt that Morwenna and Charles were secretly delighted, and that the twins watched me a little furtively as though they had overheard gossip which had made them see me in a different light.

Deborah was more outspoken man the others. She said:

” Barbarina was an heiress, but nothing of course to be compared with yourself.”

I hated this kind of talk. I wished that my grandfather had not been such a rich man. I wished th ait he had left his money elsewhere, for I was realising now that one of the facts which had made me so happy at Pendorric was that, although the old house and estate needed money.

Roc had married me, a girl without a penny. I could no longer say to myself: ” He could only have married me for love.”

It was with my grandfather’s money that the canker had touched our relationship.

“It was some weeks after my grandfather’s death that I had an interview with his solicitor and he brought home to me the advisability Of making a will.

So I did so, and, with the exception of one or two legacies, I left me residue of my fortune to Roc.

September had come. The evenings were short and the mornings misty; but the afternoons were as warm as they had been in July. It was two months since my grandfather’s death and I was still mourning him. I had done nothing about Polhorgan, and the Dawsons and all the servants remained mere; Al’thea Grey had decided to have a long holiday before looking for a new post and had taken a little cottage about a mile from Pendorric, which during the months of June, July and August wtas let to holiday makers.

I knew I should have to do something about Polhorgan, and an idea had come to me. It was to turn the house into a home for orphans—such as my grandfather must have been-the deprived and unwanted ones. When I mentioned this to Roc, he was startled.

” What an undertaking!” he said.

“Somehow I think it would have appealed to my grandfather because he was an orphan himself.”

Roc walked away from me—we were in our bedroom—and going to the window stared out at the sea, ” Well, Roc, you don’t like the idea? ”

“ Darling, it’s not the sort of project you can rush into. “

” No, of course not. I’m just thinking about it.”

“Things aren’t what they used to be, remember. There’d be all sorts of bureaucratic regulations to be got over … and have you thought of the cost of running a place like that?”

” I haven’t thought about anything very much. It was just a faint idea. I’m brooding on it, though.”

” We’ll have to do a lot of brooding,” he said.

I had a notion that he was not impressed with the idea, and I shelved it for the time being, but I was determined not to give it up easily.

I often called on Jesse Pleydell, who always seemed delighted to see me apart from the tobacco I took him. Mrs. Penhalligan said I kept him supplied and he was grateful, though my visits meant as much to him as the tobacco.

I shall never forget that September day, because it brought the beginning of the real terror which came into my life, and it was at this time that I began to understand how the pleasant picture had changed piece by piece until I was confronted with the cruel lest of suspicions and horror.

The day began normally enough. In the morning I went down to Mrs. Robinson’s and bought the tobacco. Knowing that I was going, Deborah asked me to buy some hairpins for her, and Morwenna asked me to bring some bass she needed for tying up plants. I met Rachel and the twins as I was setting out; they were going on a nature ramble, so they all three walked with me as far as the shop. When I came back I met Roc and Charles going off to the home farm together.

But I didn’t leave for the cottages until after tea, and when I arrived Jesse was sitting at his door catching the last of the sun. I sat beside him talking for a while, and because I thought it was getting a little chilly I went inside with him and he made me a cup of tea. It was something he enjoyed doing, and I knew better than to offer to help. While we sat drinking the thick brew, Jesse talked of the old days and how the Pendorric gardens had looked in his time. ” Ah, madam, you should have been here forty years ago … that was the time. I had four men working under me all the time, and the flowers in the cliff garden was a picture … a real picture.” He would go on and on in this strain, and because he enjoyed it I encouraged him to do so. I learned a good deal about life at Pendorric forty or fifty years ago when Jesse was in his prime. It was a more leisurely life, but even so the beginning of change bad set in.

” Now when I were a boy things were different.”

That would have been about eighty years ago. Very different indeed, I thought.

” There was no talk then of not being able to keep up like,” mused Jesse. ” There was no thought that things ‘ud ever be different from what they always had been. Polhorgan House wasn’t here then—nor thought of—and all Polhorgan meant to us was the little old cove down there.”

I listened dreamily, staying rather longer than I had intended, and it was six o’clock when I rose to go.

It was always gloomy in the cottage on account of the small latticed windows, so I hadn’t noticed how dark it had grown. The sea mist had been lurking in the air all day, but now it had thickened. It was warm and sea-scented and not by any means unpleasant; it hung in patches and in some spots was really thick. It was especially so near the church; and as I paused at the lych gate to look at the gravestones with the mist swirling about them, thinking how strangely picturesque everything was, I heard it; it seemed to be coming from inside the graveyard—singing in that strange, high voice, which was slightly out of tune.

” How should I your true love know From another one? By his cockle hat and staff And his sandal shoon.”

My heart began to beat fast; my hand on the lych gate trembled. I looked about me, but I seemed to be alone with the mist. Someone was in there singing, and I had to find out who, so I opened the lych gate and went into the graveyard. I was determined to know who it was who sang in that strange voice, and because I was sure that it was someone from the house, instinctively I made my way to the Pendorric vault. I was almost certain now that it must be Carrie. She brought wreaths for her beloved Barbarina and she would have heard her sing mat song; what more natural than that hearing it often she had learned it by heart?

It must be Carrie.

As I reached the Pendorric vault, I drew up short in astonishment because the door was open. I had never seen it open before, and was under the impression that it would never be opened except when it was prepared to receive those who had died.

I went closer and as I did so I heard the voice again.

” He is dead and gone, lady,

He is dead and gone;

At his head a grass-green turf,

At his heels a stone. ”

And it appeared to be coming from inside the vault. I went down the stone steps.

“Who’s there?” I called.

“Carrie. Are you in there?”

My voice sounded strange at the entrance of that dark vault.

“Carrie,” I called. ^ “Carrie.” I put my head inside and saw that four or five stone steps led down. I descended, calling: “Carrie! Carrie!

Are you there? “

There was silence. Because of the light from the open door I could see the ledges with the coffins on them; I could smell the dampness of the earth. Then suddenly I was in darkness, and for a few seconds I was so shocked and bewildered that I could not move. I could not even cry out in protest. It took me several seconds to understand that the door had closed on me and I was shut in me vault.

I gave a gasp of horror.

“Who’s there?” I cried.

“Who shut the door?”

Then I tried to find the steps, but my eyes were not yet adjusted to the darkness, and groping I stumbled and found myself sprawling up the cold stone stairs.

Frantically I picked myself up. I could make out the shape of the steps now, and I mounted them. I pushed the door but it was firmly shut and I could not move it.

For some moments, I’m afraid, I was hysterical. I hammered on the door with my fists. ” Let me out of here,” I screamed. ” Let me out of here.”

My voice sounded hollow and I knew that it would not be heard outside.

I lay against the door, trying to think. Someone had lured me into this dreadful place, someone who wanted to be rid of me. How long could I live here? But I should be missed. Roc would miss me. He would come to look for me.

” Roc!” I called. ” Oh … Roc … come quickly.”

I covered my face with my hands. I did not want to look about me. I was suddenly afraid of what I might see, shut in this vault with the Pendorric dead. How long before I became one of them? Then I thought I heard a movement near me. I listened. Was that the sound of breathing?

The horror was deepening. I did not believe in ghosts, I tried to tell myself. But it is easy to say that when you are above ground in some sunny spot, some well-lighted room. Very different, buried alive . among the dead!

I had never known real fear until that moment. I was clammy with sweat, my hair was probably standing on end. I did not know, because there was no room in my mind for anything but fear, the knowledge that I was locked in with the dead.

But I was not alone. I knew it. Some breathing, living thing was in this tomb with me.

I had covered my face with my hands because I did not want to see it.

I dared not see.

Then a cold hand touched mine. I screamed, and I heard myself cry: ” Barbarina!” because in that moment I believed the legend of Pendorric.

I believed that Barbarina had lured me to my tomb so that I could haunt Pendorric and she might rest in peace.

” Favel!” It was a sharp whisper and the one who said it was as frightened as I was.

“Hyson!”

” Yes, Favel. It’s Hyson.”

Floods of relief! I was not alone. There was someone to share this horrible place with me. I felt ashamed of myself, but I couldn’t help it. I had never been so glad to hear a human voice in the whole of my life.

” Hyson … what are you doing here?”

She had come up the stairs and snuggled close beside me. ” It’s … frightening … with the door shut,” she said. ” Did you do this. Hyson? “

“Do it … do what?”

” Lock me in.”

” But I’m locked in with you.”

” How did you come to be in here?”

” I knew something was going to happen.”

“What? How?”

” I knew. I came to meet you … to see if you were all right.”

” What do you mean? How could you know?”

” I do know things. Then I heard the singing … and the door was open so I came in.”

“Before I did?”

” Only a minute before. I was hiding down at the bottom of the steps when you came in.”

” I don’t understand what it means.”

” It means Barbarina’s lured you in. She didn’t know I was here too.”

“Barbarina’s dead.”

” She can’t rest, till you take her place.”

I was recovering my calm. It was amazing what the presence of one small human being could do.

” That’s nonsense. Hyson,” I said. ” Barbarina is dead and this story of her haunting the place is just an old legend.”

” She’s waiting for a new bride to die.”

” I don’t intend to die.”

” We’ll both die,” said Hyson, almost unconcernedly; and I thought:

She knows nothing of death; she has never seen death. She had looked at the television and seen people drop to the ground. Bang! You’re dead. In a child’s mind death is quick and neat, without suffering.

One forgot that she was only a child posing as a seer.

“That’s absurd,” I said.

“We shan’t. There must be a certain amount of air coming into this place. They’ll miss us and there’ll be search parties to find us.”

” Why should they think of looking in the vault?”

” They’ll look everywhere.”

” They’ll never look in the vault.”

I was silent for a while. I was trying to think who could have done this, who had been waiting for me to leave Jesse Pleydell’s cottage and lure me to the vault with singing, like some cruel siren of the sea.

Someone who wanted me out of the way had done this. Someone who had waited for me to enter the vault and descend the stone steps, and then glided out from some hiding place and locked the door on me. I was recovering rapidly from my fear and realising that I was not afraid of human scheming; I felt myself equal to deal with that. As soon as I could rid myself of the notion that I was being lured to death by someone who was dead, I felt my natural resilience returning. I was ready to match my wits with those of another human being. I could fight the living. I said: “Someone locked the door. Who could it be?”

” It was Barbarina,” whispered Hyson.

” That’s not reasonable. Barbarina’s dead.”

” She’s in here, Favel … in her coffin. It’s on the ledge with my grandfather’s beside it. She couldn’t rest, and she wants to…. That’s why she’s locked you in here.”

“Who opened the door?”

” Barbarina.”

“Who locked the door?”

” Barbarina.”

“Hyson, you’re getting hysterical.”

“Am I?”

” You mustn’t. We’ve got to think of how we can get out of here.”

” We never shall. Why did she lock me in too? It’s like Meddlesome Matty. Granny was always warning me. I shouldn’t have come.”

” You mean that then I should have been the only victim.” My voice was grim. I was ashamed of myself. It was a terrible experience for the child; and yet it was doing me such a lot of good not to be alone. ” We shall stay here,” said Hyson, ” for ever. It’ll be like ” The Mistletoe Bough. ” When they next open the vault there’ll only be our bones, for we shall be skeletons.”

” What nonsense!”

” Do you remember the night of the ball? We all talked about it.” I was silent with a new horror, because the idea flashed into my mind that on that night when we had sat drinking soup after the ball, one member of our party may have thought of the vault as a good substitute for the old oak chest.

I shivered. Could there be any other explanation than that someone wanted me out of the way?

I gripped Hyson’s shoulder. ” Listen,” I said. ” We’ve got to find a way out of this place. Perhaps the door isn’t really locked. Who could have locked it anyway?”

” Oh, nonsense.” I stood up cautiously. ” Hyson,” I said, ” we must see what we can do,” ” She won’t let us.” ^ ” Give me your hand and we’ll see what it’s like here.”

” We know. It’s all dead people in coffins.”

” I wish I had a torch. Let’s try the door again. It may have got jammed.”

We stood on the top step and beat against it. It did not budge. ” I wonder how long we’ve been in here,” I said.

“An hour.”

” I don’t think five minutes. Time goes slowly on occasions like this.

But they’ll miss us at dinner. They’ll start searching for us in the house and then they’ll be out, searching for us. I want to look round.

There might be a grating somewhere. We might shout through that. “

” There’ll be nobody in the churchyard to hear us.”

” There might be.

And if they come looking . “

I dragged her to her feet and she cowered close to me. Then together, keeping close, we cautiously descended the steps. Hyson was shivering. “It’s so cold,” she said.

I put my arm round her and we stepped gingerly forward into the darkness. I could see vague shapes about me and I knew these to be the coffins of dead Pendorrics.

Then suddenly I saw a faint light, and feeling my way towards it discovered that there was a grating at the side of the vault. I peered through it and fancied I saw the side of a narrow trench. I knew then that a certain amount of air was coming into the vault and I felt my spirits rising. I put my face close to the grating and shouted: “Help!

We’re in the vault. Help! “

My voice sounded muffled as though it were thrown back at me, and I realised that however loudly I shouted I should not be heard unless someone were standing very close to the vault. Nevertheless I went on shouting until I was hoarse, while Hyson stood shivering beside me.

” Let’s try the door again,” I said. And we made our way slowly back to the steps. Once again we forced our weights against it and still it remained fast shut. Hyson was sobbing and bitterly cold, so I took off my coat and wrapped it round us both. We sat side by side on that top step, our arms about each other. I tried to comfort her and tell her that we should soon be rescued, that this was quite different from the old oak chest. We had seen the grating, hadn’t we? That meant that air was coming in. All we had to do was wait for them to come and find us. Perhaps we should hear their voices. Then we would shout together. Eventually she stopped trembling, and I think she slept. I could not sleep although I felt exhausted, bitterly cold, stiff and cramped; and I sat there holding the body of the child against me, peering into the darkness, asking myself over and over again: Who has done this?

There was no means of knowing the time, for I could not see my watch.

Hyson stirred and whimpered; I held her closer and whispered assurances to her, while I tried to think of a plan to escape from this place.

I pictured the family coming down to dinner. How upset they would be!

Where was Favel? Roc would want to know. He would be a little anxious at first and then frantic with worry. They would already have been searching for us for hours.

Hyson had awakened suddenly: ” Favel … where are we?”

“It’s all right. I’m here. We’re together….”

“We’re in that place. Are we still alive, Favel?”

” That’s one thing I’m sure of.”

“We’re not … just ghosts, then?”

I pressed her hand. ” There are no such things,” I told her. ” Favel, you dare say that … down here … among them.”

” If they existed they would surely make us aware of them, just to prove me wrong, wouldn’t they?”

I could feel the child holding her breath as she peered into the darkness.

After a while she said: ” Have we been here all night?”

“I don’t know. Hyson.”

“Will it be dark like this all the time?”

” There might be a little light through the grating when the day comes. Shall we go and look?”

We were so stiff and cramped that we could not move our limbs for some seconds.

” Listen!” said Hyson fearfully. ” I heard something !” I listened with her, but I could bear nothing.

I felt my way cautiously down the steps, holding Hyson’s hand as we went.

“There!” she whispered.

“I heard it again!”

She clung to me and I put my arm about her.

” If only we had a lighter or a match,” I murmured as we picked our way to where I thought the grating had been, “but there was no light coming from the wall, so I guessed it was still dark outside. Then I saw a sudden flash of light; I heard a voice call: ” Favel! Hyson! “

The light had shown me me grating and I ran stumbling towards it shouting: ” We’re here … in the vault. Favel and Hyson are here in the vault!” The light came again and stayed. I recognised Deborah’s voice.

“Favel! Is that you, Favel?”

“Here,” I cried.

“Here!”

” Oh, Favel! … thank God! Hyson …?”

“Hyson’s here with me. We’re locked in the vault.”

“Locked in …”

” Please get us out … quickly.”

” I’ll be back … soon as I can.” The light disappeared and Hyson and I stood still hugging each other.

It seemed hours before the door was opened and Roc came striding down the steps. We ran to him—Hyson and I—and he held us both against him.

” What the …” he began. ” You gave us a nice fright….” Morwenna was there with Charles, who picked Hyson up in his arms and held her as though she were a baby.

Their torches showed us the damp walls of the vault, the ledges with the coffins; but Hyson and I turned shuddering away and looked towards the door.

” Your hands are like ice,” said Roc, chafing them. ” We’ve got the cars by the lych gate. We’ll be home in a few minutes.” I lay against him in the car, too numb, too exhausted for speech. I did manage to ask the time.

“Two o’clock,” Roc told me.

“We’ve been searching since soon after eight.”

I went straight to bed and Mrs. Penhalligan brought me hot soup. I said I shouldn’t be able to sleep; in fact I should be afraid to, for fear I should dream I was back in that dreadful place. But I did sleep—almost immediately; and I was untroubled by dreams. It was nine o’clock that morning before the sun shining through the windows woke me. Roc was sitting in a chair near the bed watching me, and I felt very happy because I was alive.

“What happened?” asked Roc.

” I heard someone singing and the door of the vault was open.”

“You thought the Pendorrics had left their coffins and were having a little singsong?”

“I didn’t know who it was. I went down the steps and then … the door was locked on me.”

“What did you do?”

“Hammered on the door—called out. Hyson and I both used all our strength against it. Oh Roc … it was horrible.”

” Not the most pleasant spot to spend a night, I must say.”

“Roc, who could have done it? Who could have locked us in?”

” No one.”

” But someone did. Why, if Deborah hadn’t come there looking for us we’d still be there. Heaven knows how long we should have been there.”

“We decided to search every inch of the land for miles around. Deborah and Morwenna did Pendorric village, and the Darks joined up with them.”

” It was wonderful when we heard Deborah’s voice calling us. But it seemed ages before she came back.”

“She thought she needed the key, and there’s only one I know of—to the vault. It’s kept in the cupboard in my study, and the cupboard is locked; so she had to find me first.”

” That’s why it took so long.”

” We didn’t waste any time, I can tell you. I couldn’t imagine who could have got at the key and unlocked the vault. The sexton borrowed it some weeks ago. He must have thought he locked it.”

” But someone locked us in.”

Roc said: “No, darling. The door wasn’t locked. I discovered that when I tried to unlock it.”

“Not locked! But …”

” Who would have locked you in?”

“That’s what I’m wondering.”

” No one has a key except me. There has only been one for years. The key was locked in my cupboard. It was hanging on the nail there when I went to get it.”

” But Roc, I don’t understand how …”

” I think it’s simple enough. It was a misty evening, wasn’t it? You passed the lych gate and went into the churchyard. The door of the vault was open because old Pengally hadn’t locked it when he was there a few weeks ago and the door had blown open.”

” It was a very still evening. There was no wind.”

” There was a gale the night before. It had probably been open all day and no one had noticed it. Few people go to the old part of the graveyard. Well, you saw it open, and went inside. The door shut on you.”

“But if it wasn’t locked why didn’t it open when we pushed with all our strength?”

” I expect it jammed. Besides, you probably panicked to find yourself shut in. Perhaps if you’d not believed the door was locked you would have discovered it was only jammed.”

” I don’t believe it.”

He looked at me in astonishment.

“What on earth’s in your mind?”

” I don’t quite know . but someone locked us in. “

“Who?”

” Someone did it.”

He smoothed the hair back from my forehead.

” There’s only one person who could,” he said. ” Myself.”

” Oh Roc no!”

He threw himself down beside me and took me into his arms. ” Let me tell you something, darling,” he said. ” I’d far rather have you here with me than in that vault with Hyson.” He was laughing; he did not understand the chill of fear which had taken possession of me.