Penhallow (11 page)

He grinned, but said" I’m damned useful to Ray. He’d be willing to employ me up at the stud-farm.’

‘He would not, then, and well you know it. You tell Raymond you’re planning to marry Loveday Trewithian, and see what! Besides, there’s nothing he could do for us, whatever he chose, while your father’s alive.’

‘Well, then, I’ll set up as a trainer on my own.’

‘Not without some money you won’t, love. Leave the Master give old Penrose his notice to quit, and put you into Trellick, and you may put up the banns the first Sunday after.’

‘I can’t wait!’

She sighed. ‘Why won’t he set you up the way he said he would, Bart?’

‘What’s the good of asking why my father won’t do a thing? I don’t know — daresay he doesn’t either. He talks a lot of rot about my not being ready for it, but that’s not it.

‘Seeming to me,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘he’s set on keeping you here under his thumb, my love, the same as he has Mr Raymond. But he’ll not last for ever, not the way he’s carrying on, and so they all say.’

‘Well, I’m sick of hanging about, meeting you in odd corners. I’d rather have it out with the old man, and be damned to him!’

‘Wait!’ she counselled him. ‘There’s plenty of things can happen yet, and now’s not the time to say anything to him that he wouldn’t be pleased to hear. He put himself in a fine taking over the letter he had from Mr Aubrey, by what my uncle told me. Wait, love!’

‘I don’t believe you mean to marry me,’ he said sulkily.

She leaned towards him, till her arm touched his. ‘Yes. I do mean. You know I do! And I will be a good wife to you, even if I’m beneath your station, my darling Barty. But there’s not one of your brothers, nor your father neither, would leave you marry me, if they could stop it. We must be sensible. If it were found out you were keeping company with me before you’ve twopence to call your own, they’d send me packing, and manage it so that you couldn’t come next or nigh me.’

That made him laugh; and he hugged her to him, and pinched her cheek. ‘You don’t know me if you think any one of them could manage anything of the kind! Besides, why should my brothers care what I do?’

‘Your brother Conrad would,’ she insisted. ‘Bart, I do be afraid of Conrad. He looks at me as though he’d like to see me dead.’

‘What rot!’ he scoffed. ‘Con? Why, you silly little thing, Loveday, Con’s my twin!’

‘He’s jealous,’ she said.

But Bart only laughed again, because such an idea was so alien to his own nature as to be ridiculous to him. If Conrad looked darkly, he supposed him to be out of sorts, and gave the matter not another thought. When Loveday suggested that Conrad might divulge their secret to Penhallow, he replied without an instant’s hesitation: ‘He wouldn’t. Even Eugene-wouldn’t do that. We don’t give each other away to the Guv’nor.’

Her fingers twined themselves between his. "Jimmy would,’ she said, under her breath.

‘What?’ he exclaimed.

‘Hush, my dear, you’ll have one of the girls over hearing you, and telling my uncle on me! Jimmy wouldn’t make any bones about carrying tales to your father.’

‘If I catch the little bastard’s nose in my affairs, I’ll twist it off!’ swore Bart. ‘He carry tales to my father! Let me see him snooping round us, that’s all! You needn’t worry, my sweet! He’s a damned sight too scared of me to pry into my business.’

‘He’d do you a mischief if he could,’ she said in a troubled tone.

‘Rot, why should he?’

She lacked the words to be able to explain her own vague intuition to him, and sat tongue-tied, twisting the corner of a little muslin apron she wore. He would not, have understood her had she had the entire English vocabulary at her command, for he had a very simple mind, and such twisted thoughts as flourished in Jimmy’s crafty brain he would neither have believed in nor comprehended. He sat looking at Loveday’s downcast face with a puzzled frown, and presently asked: ‘You haven’t said anything to him, have you?’

She lied at once. She was ashamed to confess to him that her pride in her conquest had made her boast to Jimmy that she was soon to be married to a Penhallow. Besides, it was certain that he would be roused to quick wrath, and she was afraid of his anger, which, although it might be of short duration, quite possessed him while it lasted, and made him do things which afterwards he was sorry for. She said: ‘Oh, no! But he’s sly, Jimmy is, and there’s little goes on in this house he doesn’t know about. We did ought to be careful, Bart, love.’

‘I want you,’ he said. ‘I don’t care a damn for Jimmy, or anyone else. I’m going to have you.’

‘Get Trellick, and there’s no one can stop us marrying,’ she said. ‘I won’t have you, love, else.’

Her caressing tone robbed her words of offence. She was passionately in love with him, but she had a native caution, born of her circumstances which he lacked. She had the more subtle mind, too, and he was aware of it, sometimes a little puzzled by it but on the whole respectful of it. He said: ‘Well, I’ll try to get the Guv’nor to see reason. But if he won’t ‘

‘We’ll think of something else,’ she said quickly.

His hold round her waist tightened; he forced her head up with his free hand, and stared down into her face, a little smouldering light glowing at the back of his eyes. ‘It won’t make any difference! Or will it? Come on, out with it, my girl! Would you turn me down, if the old man chucked me out? I believe you would!’

Her lips invited him to kiss her. He did not, and she said: ‘You silly! Don’t I love you fit to die? There won’t never be anyone else for me, my dear.’

He was satisfied at once. She herself could hardly have told whether she had spoken the truth or not, for she meant to have him, and to make him a good wife, too, and had not so far considered the possibilities of defeat. But without being consciously critical of him she was in no way blind to his faults, and she knew that his autocratic temper, as much as his dislike of submitting to any form of discipline, would make him a very unsatisfactory man to employ. As his own master, with his own farm, he would, she thought, do very well, for he understood farming, was generally popular with the men under him, and would, besides, be largely guided by herself.

Having put him in a good humour again, she soon impressed upon him once more the need for caution, representing to him the folly of approaching his father at a moment when he was already exasperated by the extravagance of another of his sons, and coaxing him into promising to wait until Penhallow was in a mellow mood before bringing up the question of Trellick Farm again. Bart thought her a clever little puss, and laughed at her, and kissed her until she was breathless, swearing to be entirely guided by his long-headed little darling.

Left to himself, he would have blundered in upon Penhallow then and there, blurting out the whole business, plunging into a noisy quarrel, and ending up very much where he was when he started. He could see that there might be something to be said for his Loveday’s more roundabout methods.

She slipped away from him presently, but not without difficulty. He was daily growing harder to manage, more determined to possess her utterly, less easily held at arm’s length, incapable of perceiving thee need for secrecy in their dealings with each other. He could not understand her fear of being discovered in his company, and the thought that she could be afraid of her uncle and her aunt seemed to him ludicrous. One was not afraid of one’s butler or of one’s cook.

But under her smiling front Loveday was uneasy. She had caught Reuben looking at her narrowly once or twice, and had been obliged to listen to a crude warning from Sybilla, who told her with the utmost frankness that she need not look to her for help if she let Mr Bart put her in the family way. She received the warning in demure silence, too shrewd to speak of Bart’s promise to marry her. Sybilla and Reuben might treat the young Penhallows with the familiarity of old servants, but they would have been shocked beyond measure at the notion of their niece’s aspiring to marry into the family.

There was a good deal of gossip amongst the other maid-servants, in more than one of whom Bart would have found an easier conquest, but since it was plain from their hints and giggles that they had no more suspicion of the true state of affairs than had the Lanneirs Loveday was content to suffer their whisperings, and met teasing and innuendo with unruffled placidity. She was not very popular amongst her fellows, being thought to give herself airs, and to be above her company, but as she had no intention of associating with any of the servants once she became Mrs Bart Penhallow this in no way troubled her.

In her more hopeful moments, she was tempted to think that Penhallow would not dislike the marriage as much as her native shrewdness told her clearly that he would. It sometimes fell to her lot to wait on Penhallow, carrying in his trays when Martha could not be found, and Jimmy was otherwise engaged. Penhallow blatantly approved of this arrangement, told her she was the prettiest sight that had come his way for many a long day, pinched her cheek (and any other portion of her anatomy which she allowed to come within his reach), and told her she was a hard-headed little bitch for refusing to give him a kiss. Sturdy common sense, however, made her admit to herself that this was scarcely behaviour to be expected of a prospective father-in-law, and she never permitted herself to indulge for long in undue optimism, but set herself instead to think out ways and means of achieving her ends with the least possible amount of unpleasantness.

It was characteristic of her that she sought no allies in the household. Her mistress had raised her to the role of confidante, but she gave no confidences in return for the many poured into her sympathetic ears. When Faith, with Vivian’s words of warning nagging in her head, said awkwardly, and after a good deal of circumlocution, that she hoped Loveday was too sensible a girl to lose her head over any attentions which might be paid to her by Penhallow’s sons, she was able to meet Faith’s anxious gaze perfectly limpidly, and to reply in her soft way: ‘You don’t have to worry about me, ma’am, indeed!’

That was quite enough to allay Faith’s misgivings, and when Penhallow remarked, with a chuckle, that if he knew anything of his sons she would soon be obliged to get rid of Loveday, she replied with perfect sincerity that Loveday was not at all flirtatious, and could be trusted to keep his sons at a distance.

Penhallow looked at her with undisguised contempt. ‘Lord, my dear, if ever I met such a soft fool as you! Don’t you know a hot-blooded wench when you see one? She’s got a warm eye, that girl of yours, and there ain’t a trick in the game she isn’t up to, you mark my words!’

‘I think you’re all of you most unfair about Loveday!’ Faith said, in her most complaining tone. ‘It’s simply because she’s my maid that you say these disgusting things about her!’

‘I don’t trust the gal,’ said Clara, who was sitting by the fire, engaged upon yards of her interminable crochetwork. ‘She’s sly. You’ll have Bart or Con gettin’ mixed up with her, if you don’t take care, Adam.’

He gave a laugh. ‘They’ve been wasting their time if one or other of them hasn’t got mixed up with her already, old girl,’ he remarked. ‘Damn it all, the wench has been in the house close on a year!’

‘It was all right before Faith took her out of the kitchen where she belongs,’ said Clara. ‘I don’t hold with puttin’ ideas into gals’ heads.’

But Penhallow refused for once to condemn his wife’s actions, merely saying derisively: ‘Bless your silly old heart, Clara, you can’t put ideas into the heads of girls like that ripe bit of goods: they grow there.’

‘In any case, I don’t see what it has to do with you, Clara,’ said Faith tactlessly. ‘I’m sure I have a perfect right to employ whom I choose for my personal maid!’

Penhallow rolled an eye in her direction. ‘Who said you hadn’t? Don’t, for God’s sake, start one of your grievances! It’s coming to something if Clara can’t give her opinion without having you jump down her throat!’

‘Oh, well!’ said Clara peaceably. ‘I wasn’t criticisin’ you, my dear. It isn’t anything to do with me, though that Bart of yours is a young rascal, Adam, and the way the gals fall for him is shockin’.’

He roared with laughter. ‘Spit and image of me!’ he declared. ‘He’s the best of the bunch, when all’s said and done!’

‘When are you goin’ to set him up for himself at Trellick?’ Clara inquired, obedient to her favourite nephew’s instructions.

Penhallow grunted. ‘Time enough for that. He’s useful to Ray here.’

‘I don’t believe Ray wants him, or any of them,’ said Faith.

‘Oh, you don’t, don’t you?’ said Penhallow, bending a fierce stare upon her. ‘And what do you know about it, I should like to know?’

Her colour fluctuated, as it always did when he spoke roughly to her. She replied defensively: ‘Oh, nothing! Only Ray never makes any secret of the fact that he thinks there are too many people in this house. And, really ‘

He interrupted her brusquely. ‘Ray’s not master here yet, and so I’ll thank him to remember! I’ll have whom I choose in the house, and be damned to the lot of you!’

‘Now, Adam, don’t put yourself in a temper for nothin’!’ his sister admonished him. ‘Ray doesn’t mean anythin’. He’s cross-grained, but he’s got a good heart, and if Faith hasn’t got more sense than to believe every word he says when he’s a bit put out, it’s time she had. All the same, ‘tisn’t natural for a young fellow like Bart to be hanging about with no more to do than Ray gives him, and, if I were you, I’d set him up on his own. Keep him out of mischief, I daresay.’

‘I don’t mind his mischief,’ replied Penhallow cheerfully. ‘I’ll hand over Trellick to him in my own good time. Won’t hurt him to stay at home for a while longer, and learn what Ray can drum into his thick head. He’s feckless, that lad. Ray’s a dull dog, but he knows his job. I’ll say that for him.’

So Clara had presently to report failure to Bart, who grimaced, and said: ‘Blast!’

‘I daresay he’ll change his mind, give him time,’ she said consolingly. She looked at him with mild curiosity. ‘What’s got into you all of a sudden, Bart, to make you so keen to get to work? Not thinkin’ of gettin’ married, are you?’