Bella Poldark (11 page)

'Carried there by salaried scavengers, who collect the waste in the streets and eventually sell it to the farms as fertilizer. Do you know that last year over two hundred cartloads of such animal waste was sold by auction for nine shillings a load? You do not know the economics of a small town, Captain Prideaux.'

It dawned upon Philip Prideaux that he was not winning this battle. But he had not charged at Waterloo for nothing.

'It may be, Sir George, that you do not think you can help in this matter; but I was hoping, if not for help, at least for your advice.'

'Are you a resident of this town?'

'I am at present staying with my cousins at Prideaux Place.'

'Then I would advise you to forget all about Truro and see if you can do any better with the town of Padstow. It is an imperfect world.'

Philip stirred restlessly at the rebuke. 'There are, I am told, sir, about thirty public wells in Truro; from them most of the people in this town draw their drinking water. Many of these wells are very shallow and polluted. The Forbra Hunt keeps its hounds - thirty or forty couple of them - at Carvedras, and these are mucked out into the leats. The Ferris Tannery has diverted a part of one of the streams into its pits, so that it has become a scene of indescribable putrefaction. Privies empty into the same watercourses, wool merchants wash their fleeces, pigs root everywhere; in the bad streets children defecate openly--'

'You make me wonder,' said George, 'how any of us survive.'

'Some do not, Sir George. In some of the worst districts of the town: Goodwives Lane, Calenick Street, the old opes in Pydar Street, cholera, the pox, typhus, measles, scarlet fever--'

'Is this part of your new-gained appointment? I did not know that the Duchy of Cornwall--'

'No, no, sir, not at all. I approached you entirely as a private person.'

'Is this even archaeology? Are you studying hygiene too?'

Philip affixed his spectacles to his nose again. 'I'm sorry, I feel I have been wasting your time, sir. I should not have come. But at a party on Wednesday I met a Dr Daniel Behenna, and we had a considerable conversation--'

'Ha! Behenna! He's getting too big for his boots--'

'I should regret it if you thought he had urged me to come and see you. Not at all. I was the first to comment on the stench in the town, and he gave me some of the information I have since tried to verify. I did not think to call to see you until I had done this.'

'Does my wife know you have come?'

'No, sir. I believe she has been out with the hounds most of this week. But although you live mainly at Cardew, you have this excellent house in town, and it simply occurred to me that I could perhaps solicit your advice.'

George regarded the young man thoughtfully. He supposed the fellow was worth knowing. He had never met the head of the family, the Reverend Charles PrideauxBrune, who was, he believed, something of a recluse. And they were connected with the Glynns of Glynn, and the Sawles of Penrice.

'Sometimes,' George said, 'towns grow rapidly. Truro has. Towns and cities in any event are never planned before they come into being, they multiply and add to themselves in a piecemeal way. Enough foresight is never shown. Nor perhaps ever enough public spirit. Poor people particularly breed too fast. Disease is nature's way of limiting the population. It is not possible to put the world to rights. Perhaps it is not always even desirable--'

'Surely it is desirable to try.'

George scowled.

'In this world it is not enough just to be an idealist.'

'Then a practical idealist.'

'You have come to instruct me.'

'Far from it, Sir George. I will leave you now. And thank you for your time.'

Captain Prideaux got up, enormously tall and erect, enormously rigid. As he got to the door he said: 'May I as a favour request that you should not tell Lady Harriet of my visit.'

'If you say so--'

'I fancy sometimes she laughs at me.'

For the first time a small stirring of empathy moved in the rich banker.

'She laughs at everyone.'

When he left the bank Philip Prideaux was full of a sense of frustration, so intense that it was almost overwhelming. He wanted to kick something, to break something. By now he knew the symptoms. A surgeon in the West Indies had told a court martial he was subject to 'brain storms' - that surgeon's views had resulted in an acquittal for him on the one occasion when his frustrations had become in supportable. Since then he had been able to stamp down these terrifying impulses. He hoped and believed they would decrease with time as the visions of the carnage at Waterloo faded.

He turned in at the Fighting Cocks Inn, which was down an alley near the bank, and ordered a large cognac. He drank it off almost at a gulp and could feel the strong spirit burning as it went down. He ordered another.

'Captain Prideaux, isn't it?'

A sallow, good-looking young man, expensively but quietly dressed, lank black tidily trimmed hair, a velvet cloak held in place by a gold chain.

'That is so.'

'You don't remember me?'

Philip put on his glasses and hoped his fingers did not noticeably tremble. 'I - er - recall we have met, but just at the moment my mind was far away and ..."

'Paul Kellow. We met at a party at Cardew. Lady Harriet gave a card party.'

'Of course, of course. How d'you do.'

'Bring your drink to this table. We seem to share the same taste in liquor and I have a bottle of it, not yet half sunk.'

They moved through the low-timbered bar and sat down, Philip awkwardly, seeming to fold his legs and his neck at the same time. He did not welcome this meeting, but he had no wish to offend. Paul refilled his own glass and then topped up Philip's.

'Seen the Gazette this morning?'

'No. I haven't seen a newspaper for a day or two.'

'You still staying with the Warleggans?'

'Dear me, no. I am living most of the time with my cousins in Padstow. But last night I lay at the Red Lion.'

'Not much in it,' said Paul, pushing the broadsheet across. 'You don't ask me where I live.'

'I assume you are a resident in Cornwall and have a home in this district. Was your wife not with you at Cardew?'

'She was.'

They eyed each other. The brandy was doing Philip good. But when the bottle was pushed towards him again he fumbled with his eye glasses and shook his head.

'Where do you live, Mr Kellow?'

'Tregony. My wife is a Temple.'

'I do not know Cornwall very well, in despite of being part Cornish. I was at school in Devon, where my father lives, but then went straight into the Army and have spent half my life abroad.'

'Do you know the Poldarks?'

'But slightly. The Captain Poldark who died. Was he not in the Oxfordshires? And Major Geoffrey Charles Poldark, who lives in the family home on the north coast.'

'You don't know Sir Ross Poldark, who also lives on the north coast?'

'No. I've heard much of him.'

'You know his daughter, I believe?'

'Mrs - er -- Carrington? Er -- yes.'

'Stephen Carrington, that was her husband. I was his best friend.'

'Indeed.'

'Killed in a riding accident. We were the greatest friends. And Jeremy Poldark. The one who was killed at Hougoumont. We did many things together. A great threesome. Broke the law a few times, I tell you. You ever broken the law, Philip?'

It occurred to Prideaux to think that this was not perhaps the first bottle of brandy that had been drunk.

'Once at least.'

'Miss them both. Both great friends. Both great men. I miss them both. Of course that was all before I married. Bit of a rake, I was. Bit of a blade, you know.'

'Indeed?'

'Jeremy was in love with my sister, Daisy. Going to marry her. It was all fixed up. Then he met Cuby Trevanion and everything was changed.'

'That's very sad. At least - you are, I trust, happy in your own married life.'

Paul laughed. It was not a mirthful sound. 'Perhaps we're all accursed. Do you think we are all accursed, Captain PrideauxBrune?'

'My name is Prideaux. It is only my cousin who has the hyphenated name. Why do you consider yourself accursed, Mr Kellow?'

'Because my new wife . . . Could I - should I call her new after a marriage already lasting nearly three years? Because my wife, whom both I and my father-in-law were expecting to produce for us a son and heir - for whom perhaps we might have arranged a hyphenated surname such as Temple-Kellow - how does that sound?' Paul finished his brandy and poured another. 'Come along, man, stop fiddling with your specs and take your drink like a captain of the Dragoon Guards, which I believe you once were . . .'

Philip allowed his glass to be filled and stared at his slender but saturnine companion. 'What are you trying to tell me?'

'My wife complains of a pain in her hip and a swelling

there, so in the end I send for a sawbones, one Daniel Behenna, who has the reputation of being an acceptable member of his useless profession. He tells me that this twenty-two-year-old woman is suffering from a scrofulous tumour, which will have to be excised!'

Philip had now taken off the offending eye glasses and laid them on the table. The small tense crisis in his own emotional life having subsided, he was able to pay more attention to this casual friend.

'I am - grieved to hear it. I do not know precisely what a scrofulous tumour is, but any form of illness in one's wife . . . Have you consulted any other surgeon or physician?'

'Not yet.'

'By chance I met Dr Behenna at a soiree the other night. He is clearly a responsible man. There must be others.'

'There are many others - all quacks like him.'

'Many people have boils on their legs, or abscesses. Did he give you to suppose it was likely to be a serious operation?'

'Everything is serious with Behenna,' said Paul. 'It is his nature to be pompous. But I have omitted to point out to you that two out of three of my sisters have died of pulmonary phthisis, so it is not unnatural that I should take this seriously.'

'Scrofula,' said Philip, 'is that not the King's Evil?'

'It is Cornwall's evil! Those who do not cough have putrefying glands. I tell you, I've had enough of it!'

There was a long silence. The bar was almost empty, but a noisy quarrel was taking place in the street outside.

'I must go,' said Philip. 'It's a lengthy ride, and I promised to be back for supper.'

'Don't let me detain you.'

'Enys,' said Paul. 'Dr Dwight Enys. He is perhaps the best of a bad bunch. And he attended on my second sister until she died. If I could persuade him to come as far as Tregony

Philip picked up his spectacles but slipped them into his pocket.

'I wish you well, my friend. It's an unhappy time for you. I hope this doctor you speak of will help. Will you be in touch with Lady Harriet or Mrs Carrington? Pray let me know through them how your wife fares.'

'Here,' said Paul, as Prideaux was about to leave, and thrust the Royal Cornwall Gazette towards him. 'Take this and read what there is to read. I see another young woman has been murdered.'

'Oh?' Philip took up the paper. 'Another? You're referring to the one last year? Her killer was never found, was he?'

'This was at Indian Queens. Not so far from Padstow, is it?'

Philip read the newspaper. 'It says she was stabbed to death. Margaret Jenkins, aged twenty-two. The other, that other, if I remember, was a light woman . . . What, far from Padstow? Oh, ten or twelve miles, I would suppose. I shall pass through it on the way home this afternoon.'

'Take care how you ride then,' said Paul. 'Lest the murderer be still abroad.'

The weather that summer was drier than usual over the country as a whole, but especially so in Cornwall, where the most rain was generally expected. The sunshine was often smeared and windy, the land dry, the blown sand prevalent on the north coast, dust in the villages and towns. This year the East India Company under Stamford Raffles established a settlement in Singapore, and liberty of the press was finally permitted in France. George Canning wrote to Ross from Liverpool in April.

Dear Friend,

I dare to hope that the worst is over in the manufacturing regions of the North. Trade is picking up, prices are stabilizing, and though there is still 'widespread distress throughout the land', to quote you in your last letter, it is showing signs of easement, so that you will no longer have reason to reprove me for my government's hardness of judgement. Reform must come slowly. The heart of the nation is sound. I have been much concerned recently with our affairs in India, and earlier this month I was asked by Liverpool to move a vote of thanks to the Governor General of India, Lord Hastings (formerly Moira, of course) congratulating him and his army on their successful operations against the Marathas and thePindaris. But, in case you have not seen the speech, I would point out to you that I began by strongly emphasizing I was offering sincere congratulations on the military conduct of the campaign, not on the disposition of our confreres in Indian to stretch their limits ever farther. I congratulated Parliament too on its efforts to check this ambition. Would to God, I said, that we could long since have discovered a front - a resting place in India -- where it was possible to stand without advancing further. From the wildness of Bengal or the Maharashtra it may look different, surrounded as they are by rampaging bandits, and weak and corrupt Principalities crying out for assistance, but from this small island, which only three years ago finished spilling its blood to prevent a tyrant from becoming Emperor of Europe, it does not look to most sensible men - among whom I count the vast majority of my colleagues -- that we should be attempting to build a new Empire of our own in the East.

Old friend. When can we next meet?

In August a great protest rally, held in St Peter's Fields, Manchester, to draw attention to the bitter plight of the poor, ended in the deaths of eleven of the protesters at the hands of a regiment of undisciplined yeomanry sent in by panicking magistrates to disperse the riot. The number involved in this rally was about eighty thousand. They carried banners with their demands: 'No Corn Laws',

'Annual Parliaments', 'Universal Suffrage', 'Vote by Ballot'. The initiator of the rally, a man called Henry Hunt, was arrested and charged with high treason. Mary, Paul Kellow's wife, had greatly improved without; the need of the knife. Dwight had been prevailed upon to visit the frightened young woman and had prescribed goat's milk, The ban opium, fresh air, cold water to drink, hot linseed poultices applied to the tumour, which presently receded and healed. Both Mary and Paul were deeply appreciative. Dwight smiled but warned Paul in private that though over a period of months this might seem a cure, over an extended length of time the lump might return. 'If there is an infection of the lymphatic glands, this may resurface in the hip - or abdomen. I trust it will not. Your wife seems otherwise a very healthy young woman. So far so good.'

Paul's thin face had hardened at Dwight's words.

'Most of your profession claim too much, Dr Enys. At least you could never be accused of false optimism.'

'Caroline tells me I see too much of the dark side.'

'Perhaps the dark side is often all there is to see.'

'Not in this case. But one thing I am sure of, Paul, is that you must not let her have any inkling of doubt. I speak to you as a friend. In all disease the mind is as important as the body. Be with her a lot. Keep her spirits up.'

They paused at the front door.

"You should have stayed to sup,' Paul said.

'you, Caroline is expecting me, and before dark.'

They waited for Dwight's horse to be brought round. Paul's lank hair lifted in the breeze.

'I don't know how you have the stamina to follow your trade,' he said, almost resentfully. 'That is, with a nature like yours.'

'One develops a good memory for failures.'

'And successes?'

'Oh yes. In making a diagnosis it is good to remember both.'

'And what diagnosis are you making for the prospects of my -- our future married happiness, Dr Enys?'

'There you should go to the soothsayer. It is not in my field at all.'

The horse's hooves could be heard outside. Paul said: 'I have the oddest premonition.'

'About your marriage?'

'About life generally. Its ultimate purpose - insofar as it has a purpose - seems to be evil, not good.'

Isabella-Rose returned at Easter, full of fun, life, talk, music, apparently unchanged. The only difference, Demelza thought, was that the Cornish burr in her voice had lessened. And her singing voice - her instrument, as she now called it - had improved. It was rounder, much more controlled. Ross confessed that he could now listen to it with real pleasure. 'But it is still not as sweet as Cuby's in the middle register,' he whispered to Demelza, who replied: 'Cuby has nothing but a middle register. Nor any power.' 'I know, my love, I know. Well, Fredericks is working wonders.'

Christopher did not come down with her. Rothschild's would not spare him for so long, but by discreet enquiry he was able to discover a Mrs Carne -- a banker's wife and no relative of Demelza's -- who was travelling to Falmouth and was glad of a young lady's companionship. Bella had a month off. One tried not to notice, but Nampara was much noisier, more alive when she was home. Henry's voice went up an octave to make itself heard, and they ran about the beach together like two puppies let out of a kennel. One minor irritation over the Easter period was the constant visiting of Agneta Treneglos. Whatever had happened between her and Valentine was apparently at an end, and since she had been forbidden by him to visit him at Place House she took to calling at Nampara in the hope of catching him when he was there. She always came alone, but one of her sisters usually arrived to fetch her home, so the inference was that she slipped away from Mingoose when no one was looking. Demelza had seen Ruth on a few occasions, but Ruth had simply stared at her as at a servant and never uttered a word. John had seen Ross twice more, but the name of Agneta was not mentioned. He too had turned a cold shoulder. Ross was determined not to send Agneta away, in spite of one or two complaints from Bella that she was cloying. He felt that at least eighty per cent of the blame rested with Valentine, and one could not take it out on a handicapped girl.

He had seen little of Valentine, who appeared to be making himself scarce until Agneta got tired and gave him up. He had been in Padstow for a week or more, staying, he let drop, with the PrideauxBrunes, but this Ross took with a pinch of salt. When Ross spoke of him to Philip Prideaux at a concert of the Philharmonic Society of Truro, which he had been cozened into attending by his musical daughter, Captain Prideaux looked blank and a mite puzzled. Ross had been introduced to Prideaux by, of all people, his elder daughter, who apparently was among Philip Prideaux's guests. Possibly a taste of the gay life in London had unveiled to Clowance what she was missing. The two ex-soldiers had a chat together in the interval, and Ross thought him an agreeable, well-meaning fellow, but taut and over-stretched. In time civilian life might induce him to relax. One certainly hoped so if there was any possibility - and it seemed far from an impossibility, noting the attention that Philip Prideaux was paying Clowance - that he, Ross, might be approached sometime by the other man and asked permission to become his son-in-law. Geoffrey Charles rearranged his plans to enable him to escort Isabella-Rose back to London. The weather turned bad, and the coach was stuck for six hours in the snow east of Exeter. Esther Carne had long since lost her cough and so was allowed to take charge of Juana. She began to venture more out of the gates of Trenwith and occupied her time off by visiting her uncle, Sam, who pressed her to go to see Demelza; but she said she did not like to presume. She kept a sharp lookout for Ben Carter, but did not see him. She questioned Sam, and then Sam's wife, Rosina, and then two of his flock, who were more forthcoming, and so learned more about him. So she was told of the scar on his cheek, which so resembled that on Sir Ross Poldark's that it had to be hidden by his beard - and all about the bitter fight he had had with Stephen Carrington, Clowance Poldark's eventual husband, of his being Sir Ross Poldark's godson, and the brother of Katie, who was wed to Music Thomas, and that only a couple of years ago he had moved out of his mother's shop - the one that sold the sweets in Stippy-Stappy Lane - and now lived on his own in a tiny cottage near Killewarren. Just before Whitsun Clowance had sent a letter to Lord Edward Fitzmaurice:

Dear Edward,

It is so kind of you to have written repeating your generous invitation to my Mother and myself to spend a week at Bowood with you and your Family in May or June. My Mother is not quite the person she was before Jeremy's death; she does not seem able to summon up the initiative for new scenes and new pleasures. She is not by any means sad all the time - or obviously sad any of the time - but although she went once to London last year, it was under the compulsion to decide my young sister's musical future, and she was - it seemed - altogether relieved to be Home. She loves her house and her farm and her garden, in which she spends increasing time. Nevertheless I believe I might have been able to bring extra pressure to bear on her were it not for the unfortunate position I happen to be in myself. As you will recall, I own this small sea-trading company which was begun by my husband. We operate from Penryn and Falmouth, and, since I am a woman, I depend on a Partner - a quite elderly man - who puts into practice the things I want to have done but am not exactly in a position to do myself. Well, Hodge last week slipped and fell down the hold of the Adolphus and broke his leg. There was fear that he would have to lose his leg, but they think now it may be saved. In the event, he will be laid up for many weeks, and I must try to carry on alone - or look for a replacement. It means I may not stray from Penryn for as long as this situation endures; so I must regretfully write this to say I cannot come to Bowood this early summer. If Circumstances should suddenly change for the better I will write you more. Most sincerely yours, Clowance Carrington

When she posted the letter she wondered why she had not told the entire truth to her old suitor. In the first place she had put the onus of refusal on her mother. Then she had sidled away and attributed the refusal to Tim Hodge's accident. What was wrong with that? Her mother was reluctant to leave Nampara in a way she had never been before. Hodge had broken his leg, but it was such a perfectly clean break that even Surgeon Charteris, who adored removing injured limbs, was persuaded to agree to splint it up and wait to see if it would set. So where was the deception? It lay in the knowledge that if she went to Bowood Edward would resume his suit; and even though she could always have said no, her own feelings were in such confusion that while she had no intention whatever of saying yes, she sheered away from an outright decision. It could be no next year . . . The letter posted, she would have liked to take it back and redraft it.

Ross had a further letter from George Canning.

Dear Friend The catastrophe of St Peter's Fields offends us all. I was travelling in Italy when this tragedy happened. Liverpool sent for me in great distress, which I can well understand. Sometimes I am frustrate with man's attempts to impose order, fairness, justice, decency upon the world, when a few evil men, or simple angry men, or hot-headed fools, can overturn the good intentions, the sincerity, the honesty of the great majority, and undo all the work of a well-meaning government. Now we must build again. I don't know if you know that the charge of treason has been dropped against Hunt and the other men arrested. The trial is not yet, but I expect they will get a year or two in jail to cool their hot heads. The alarm of the nation is understandable. It has been rumoured with some authority -- can rumour ever have authority, I wonder? - that behind the moderate demands put forward on the banners of the mob were far more sinister and revolutionary ideas - the destruction of the Bank of England, the equalization of all classes by an agrarian division of the landed property of the country, the removal of the Hanoverian dynasty from the throne and the election of a President, the abolition of all titles, and so on. Whether these are the true beliefs of the majority of the protesters, or are only the hot-headed fantasies of a few evil, covetous men, I know not. I strongly suspect the latter. But no man can forget what happened in France less than three decades ago. It is only twenty-five years since their king went to the guillotine. Outbursts like the one in Manchester could very easily lead to a full-scale revolution in England. Do not forget that Robert Liverpool claims he witnessed the storming of the Bastille. Is Wellington to feel that the great victory he gained only three and a half years ago is to be dissipated by the collapse of a stable England into fratricidal chaos and revolution? These must be the thoughts of any true Englishman on hearing the bad news from Manchester. That cooler reflection may suggest these thoughts are an over-response to the news does not and will not prevent many in authority from taking repressive

action. And at least for the time being I must side with them. You may well argue that had the reforms you urged have come more quickly no such riot might have taken place. I half agree. But it has. I envy you for getting out of the political scene when you did. Westminster is a muddy place in which to spend one's life. I may yet take some other post abroad.

Believe me, most cordially and sadly yours, George Canning.

Bella was home for a month in the summer. She did not need any subtle tactical questioning from her parents: she told it all. Mrs Pelham (Aunt Sarah) was sweetness itself and never allowed her to feel a burden or a trouble. (Ross had written to Caroline's aunt in April offering, indeed almost demanding, to be able to pay towards Bella's keep, and Mrs Pelham had replied to Caroline, asking her to tell her distinguished friend not to be so silly.) Dr Fredericks was a tyrant, Bella said, but a good teacher; and her friendship with two of the other girls had flowered and strengthened. Christopher was Christopher; need one say more? Christopher was Christopher, and arrived at the end of her holiday to take her back to London. While she was singing a lullaby for Henry and Demelza on the last night, and singing it with a singular sweetness that brought tears to Demelza's eyes, Christopher was sitting smoking with Ross in the old living room of the house, to which the music floated in only as the lightest of airs. Presently he said: 'Sir, forgive me for raising this matter, but I am trying to bide my time with what patience I can summon, and I have not mentioned the subject of marriage - not, that is, since last year, neither to you nor your wife, nor indeed to Bella, except that between her and me it is a wish that is so obvious that it need not be spoken.' He stopped and relit his pipe from a spill, taking its flame from the fire. (Bella on such occasions was always afraid he would set light to his moustache.) 'You, sir, and her mother are still legally in charge of your daughter, and I am eternally grateful that you agreed to my suggestion that she come to London to get the best teaching. Therefore therefore I would like to put forward a suggestion about our marriage. I would request that you would give us permission to marry this time next year.'

Ross's long pipe was drawing well, but he took it from his mouth and inspected it to give himself time to think. He had rather anticipated that Christopher would want the marriage earlier, but he was not going to say so.

'Assuming that your feelings for each other remain the same then?'

'Certainly.' Christopher smiled mischievously.

'Do you have any special reason to pick this time next year?'

'I have, sir. Isabella-Rose will have had fifteen months under Dr Fredericks, and you will observe how much her voice has improved in two terms. It could be that by the end of next year she may feel she has learned enough and will have the ambition to give some public recitals.'

'Bella tells me that she already sings at small parties Mrs Pelham arranges from time to time.'

'Yes, sir. And these will be invaluable to her in the struggle to become known. These little soirees are giving her confidence and poise.'

'Since when did Bella need confidence?'

Christopher laughed. 'Indeed. Then poise, projection, the faculty to adjust one's voice to the occasion. Above all, presence.'

They could just hear her from the library on a high note. No hint of strain.

'You will have thought of the problems of marriage, Christopher?'

'Problems?'

'A young woman if she is dedicated to a profession may find a conflict of interest in following it and at the same time living the life of a young bride.'

'We have talked about it together and how these problems could be faced. But at least she would be marrying someone who is as ambitious for her as she is for herself. I would be no jealous husband, begrudging her dedication to her success. In all cases her profession would take priority.'

'She might find she did not want it to.'

'For reasons of self-esteem I hope that's true. And I hope I should be able to steer her back to music'

Ross stretched his legs. 'And what would happen when the usual outcome of a marriage occurs?'

'Children? Yes, sir, that too is a hazard. But I am promised a move to the executive office of Rothschild - this should be next October - and this should mean I will have funds enough to take a modest house and hire a sufficiency of servants. If there were children they would not depend solely on their mother for attention.'

'There is, however, still the anatomical necessity that women have to carry their offspring for nine months before they are born. That is a time when a coming child is at its most demanding and, from a concert point of view, disfiguring.'

'You must be aware, sir -- or perhaps you do not go much to the theatre in London - you would know that audiences are well used to seeing their actresses gravid with child. They observe a convention to ignore the lady's condition and concentrate on her acting. So I believe where a singer is involved it does not seem to upset the singer that she is many months pregnant, nor upset the audience who see her and listen to her in this condition.'

The song had stopped. It was time for Henry to go to bed. Perhaps he was already asleep, lulled by that voice.

'I presume you have discussed all this thoroughly with Bella?'

'We have discussed it, yes. But we wait on your provisional assent. Yours and Lady Poldark's.'

'I cannot answer for her. But speaking for myself provided Bella remains totally committed - I--' Ross stopped. 'I think I must first ask leave to discuss the proposal - with Bella's mother.'

Christopher stroked his moustache. 'Thank you, sir.'