The Angry Tide (8 page)

So it came that he met Dwight and they jogged home together in the wind and an occasional flurry of mist. June had been a damp month. The sun had got permanendy lost in a southwesterly air current that blew before it unending canopies of cloud.
Demelza
had wanted to know where it all came from. Did somebody manufacture it, she asked, just over the horizon?

So perhaps in this tiring weather it was not surprising that Dwight should seem quieter even than ever, more withdrawn. Ross minded it not at all: the soft air was so fresh after the stinks of London, He needed sun for his hay and drier winds to keep the blight off his potatoes, but he was not in a mood to complain of that.

Prescntiy Dwight said: 'All
is well between you and
Demelza
now?'

'What? Should it not be?'

'Well, Ross, I am your closest friend, aside from being your doctor, so I ventured to ask, knowing there had been - a few difficult times last year. It's not my wish to intrude.'

Ross checked his horse. 'If by difficult times you mean Demelza's passion for Lieutenant Armitage, then, yes, I grant you, they were difficult. What do you do about a young man, a brave one, in many ways an admirable one, but sick - and as it turned out mortal sick -who attempts - and succeeds or fails, I know not - to make a cuckold of you? And what do you do about a wife whose loyalty has hitherto been absolute, and you see her like a sapling blown in a hurricane, bowing to the
ground, perhaps uprooted by it?’

'Oh
.,.
I’
m not sure if-

'But perhaps you know more than I? Caroline was Demelza's only confidante.'

Dwight smiled and pulled his hat on more firmly. 'We are all very close to each odier, Ross. It is a very peculiar relationship. Sometimes I dunk you know C
aroline better than I do. In th
at case, do you suppose for one moment that any confidence Demelza made to her would
ever
be passed on to me?'

Ross nodded.'... You have to face the fact, Dwight, that a jealous man is a suspicious one.'

'Armitage is dead. Whatever it was, however little or however great, it is over. There can be nothing now. Hold what you've got, Ross. You're so lucky. Above all forget. If you let it fester...'

'D'you know, in spite of everything
-
for many people think we are the most devoted couple - my relationship with
Demelza
has neve
r been anythi
ng but a fiery one. In eleven years we have survived a number of storms - most of the
m, perhaps, of my making. Now we
m
ust try to survive one of hers.’

'Which is always harder.'

'To be sinned against rather than sinning? Of course. Put in those terms it makes me ashamed. But you are not dealing always with the rational emotions. Feelings spring from the depths of one's entrails -to master those when they come needs a control, an iron control, of one's tongue, one's eyes, one's very thoughts...'

They were near now where their roads separated, Dwight to fork left towards the declivity in which stood John Jonas's Mill, with four cottages on the rise beyond and the finger of a worked-out mine pointing to the sky; thence a mile of moorland to Killewarren; Ross straight on to Bargus Crosslanes and past it to Grambler and Nampara,
Ross said: 'We are talking of
my problems, Dwight. I think we
have not yet dealt fully with yours.' 'Why d'you say that?'

'You said, "You're so lucky." While acknowledging it as the truth I sense some extra meaning.'

'Oh, I think I meant as compared with the most of my patients that I see, rich and poor. They're a sorry lot and make me feel health is the first condition of life. Without it - nothing.'

'Well, I assume since they
are
your patients they are likely to be ailing to call you in. I confess I meet a number of healthy people about. Of course it is a prime essential; and those who have it don't appreciate it until it is lost. But this seems to have a personal implication. Hasn't it? You've told me you're not unwell yourself. There's a darkness of spirit in you, Dwight.'

They had both checked their horses at the fork in the path. Ross's Sheridan was restless and anxious to be home.

Dwight said: 'Sometime perhaps we can talk of it.'

'I have no appointment. Let us get down for a minute. Is there some way I can help?'

'No
..
.
’
Dwight patted his horse's neck. 'There's no need to get down. It can be said in a few words, if you wish it. Sarah will not live.'

Ross stared at him.
'What?'

'Have you observed that the child has a slight bluish tinge to the lips? It is little noticeable but, being a surgeon as well as a father, I noticed it. She has been born with a congenital defect of the heart. A murmuration. Perhaps even a perforation - that I don't know - one cannot be sure.'

'My
God,'
said Ross. 'My God. My God!'

Dwight narrowed his eyes and stared at the colourless day. 'When one sees, as I do, hundreds of children brought into the world in poverty and squalor and deprivation, many of them attended by some clumsy midwife who mishandles the mother, bites the cord with her teeth and gives the child a drop of gin to keep it quiet, and they all, or almost all, in the first place, in the first months of life, whatever happens later, they almost all are perfect in every way, it is very strange to contemplate the paradox of a rich child, attended by her own father and brought up with all the care and attention of a princess, that such a child should be flawed, and flawed in a way that it is beyond the skill of man to cure.'

It was a long speech, and it came out so quickly that Ross realized his friend had had these words, or similar, in his mind night and day over the past months.

'Dwight, I don't know what to say. I suppose
...
Caroline doesn't know?'

'No. I can't tell her. I have thought of every way. Of trying to break the news gently — even of writing. It's
impossible.
It must take its course,'

Ross caught at his reins harshly to keep Sheridan quiet. The horse shook its head and a drip of foam fell from its mouth.

Dwight said: 'You mustn't tell Demelza. Not that
she
would say anything, but she could not keep it out of her face.'

'Dwight, this is the worst thing that has happened to us - to us as a quartet - since Julia died. But - forgive me - my knowledge of medicine is limited to a few crude facts. Can you be so sure?'

'Yes - unhappily. At least, nothing is certain in this life, but there is hardly anything could be more certain. I have seen it a half dozen times all told - as it happens, more often when I was a student in London. The complaint is readily detectable. One puts one's car to the child's chest. The normal heart beat is a gentle
thump
-
thump.
Sarah's heart goes
hush - hush.'

'Let me ride a way with you, Dwight.'

'If you wish. But not as far as Killewarren, or Caroline will wonder you don't come in. And your face at the moment would betray you.'

Ross wiped his gauntlet glove across his nose, and they moved off slowly in the direction of Jonas's Mill. Sheridan was difficult to turn away from home.

After a while Ross said: 'But she seems - bright, alert, in every way Well. Is there nothing else to show?'

'Not yet. There may not be. It is simply a question, Ross, of waiting for the first infection. Whether it comes this year or next, her heart will not have the resources to meet it.'

Chapter
Seven

In July Drake
Carne
had two visitors, one regular and expected, the other irregular and unexpected. The first was his brother Sam, whom God had chosen - and Sam felt this in all humility - to help to draw lost souls nearer to the gates of Paradise. He had received again and again the impress of the Seal and the earnest of the Spirit in his heart, beholding, as in a glass, the glory of Christ. Yet humbly witnessing, never claiming for himself more than he could offer to others. Employed as a tut-workcr at Wheal Grace, he spent every leisure moment cither in class or in prayer with his fellow Wesleyans or helping in some practical fashion with the problems of the poor and the sick in Grambler and Sawle. As a stranger to the district, having come from Illuggan little more than four years ago, he had been regarded with suspicion at first, and with not a little hostility from those who were not of his religious persuasion. But good works had worn the resistance down and he was now as popular as any ma
n who didn't drink in the kiddle
ys could be.

Sam visited his brother twice weekly, though, as his commitments ever grew, the visits tended to become shorter. He had twice refused Drake's offer of a partnership in the blacksmith's shop, saying that his call lay elsewhere.

On this Tuesday Sam stayed longer than usual, helping Drake fix the shafts into a cart. When they were almost done he said: 'Brother, it pleasures me to hear tell you are going with a young woman again.'

'Give me another heave,' said Drake. 'Now, if you'll hold 'n steady while I drive in another nail.' This was done. 'Rosina Hoblyn, you d' mean? I've seen her thrice - and all but once by accident. Tis oversaying it to say I'm going with she.'

'Well
...
it is not for me to direct ee
, Drake; though I will say I would gain p
leasure to see you wed to a fitt
y young woman.
Tis
hardly natural to spend all your life alone. You know how I've grieved that you've not come back fully to us in the Society; but I know too how you've suffered these last three year gone, and twould raise my heart just to feel you was making the first steps to climb out of the pit.'

Drake stood back and frowned at the cart. 'Tis level or not level, brother?' 'Tis level.'

'This side? You think this side too?'

'Aye
,.,
Drake, you're still some young, yet already you're in a good style of trade. Day after day, month after month, you've risen early, wreaked late and eaten the bread of carefulness. It is not in you to seek riches, but modest riches will come your way. To what end, brother? I ask myself, and you must ask yourself, to what end?'

'That is what I never do ask myself,
’
said Drake.

'Not yet. For you have been sore stricken. But in time the sorest wounds must heat.'

'Must they?' said Drake.

'I ask your pardon, brother, if I tread on delicate ground. But if I do, ye must know tis out of love and affection that I do. There comes a time I d' b'lieve when tis necessary to look about the world and see what tis your duty to do. Not your inclination, maybe, but your duty. For looking to help others is the best way of looking to save yourself. If now - if now you became convinced through prayer that twas your Christian duty to alter your condition in life by exchanging the state of a single for that of a married man, then I would say there are few young women who would be more comfortable to you than Rosina Hoblyn.'

'You would, eh?' said Drake.

Sam eyed his brother. Although a man still of slim build, the years at the forge had given Drake great physical strength. His were the sort of muscles that hardly showed except when they were being used. They were being used now when he lifted the end of the cart bodily on to a low trestle and began to knock out the wheel pin.

Drake said: 'You think I'd make Rosina a comfortable husband if I didn't love her?
’

'Love might come, brother. If you shared in the love and worship of Christ, love
would
come. Then if your marriage was blessed with the precious fruits of little children, your soul would become like a watered garden and you would know the truest fulfilment of life.'

'And Morwenna?' said Drake.

There was silence. It was a name never mentioned by cither of them. The silence was shattered by a single blow of the hammer, and the pin fell to the floor. Drake began to lever off the wheel.

'Morwenna is wed,' said Sam.

'That I d' know all too well.'

'And
is
a vicar's wife and has a child of her own...'

'And is in hell.'

'Drake, ye cannot know this.'

'I know this. Would ye, then, brother, counsel me to find my own heaven and leave her in hell?'

'Ye can do no other. It is grieving, Drake, over what cann't be undone. You are bespoiling your life, grieving, grieving, grieving —
’

'Oh,' said Drake. 'Sometimes I forget.' He put the wheel down and sighed. 'Tis shameful to me now how oft I forget. No ache, no misery lasts for ever. But to take another
woman.
That would be more shameful still, and twould not be fair on Rosina. I could never bring to her a full heart.'

'Perhaps you would - in time,'

'And in the meantime what do I say to she? That I would wed her for convenience, that I need someone to keep my home and breed my children? Is that what I should say?'

Sam bent to re-tie his boot. 'Perhaps I shouldn't've spoke. Perhaps twas better not to have asked. But I have a concern for ee, brother, and I want the scales to fall from your eyes, the gall of bitterness to be eased and sweetened. For if Christ wills, ye have a long life to live.'

As Drake passed by he touched h
is brother's shoulder, 'Leave me
be
yet a littl
e, Sam. If I have a long life to live, then leave me be a little yet.'

It was one of the few fine days of a second damp month of summer, and old Pally Rogers, his spade beard grizzled in the wind and the sun, rattled down the hill in his cart, raising a hand of greeting as he passed by.

Drake said: 'It seem me
many folk d'live their lives without any of the trouble that come to we. What of yourself, Sam? You have all this concern for my misfortune, but what of your own?'

'My own?'

'Well, what of Emma Tregirls? Now she
've left the Choakes and gone Te
hidy - miles away. Are you not just the same as me?'

Sam nodded. 'Yes, brother. We both have a soreness
of the heart. But mine is balme
d by the grace of the Holy Spirit. Nightly I pray for Emma. Nightly
I pray that she may see
and discover the bond of iniquity by which she is enslaved. If that d'happen, then there shall be double rejoicing; rejoicing for a spirit which has obtained an interest in the blood of Christ, and rejoicing that so splendid a human being, while changed from glory to glory by the spirit of the Lord, shall also come to me as my wife, and that we shall cleave and be as one flesh and discover together the liberty of p
erfect love, carnal and eternal’

It was Drake's turn to look at his brother, the tall fairhaired man with the lined young face, the kind, intent blue eyes, the shambling walk. Sometimes, Drake thought, Sam's sentiments came out just a little too smooth as if from a sermon he'd prepared. But he knew this not to be so: if the words came a bit too easy, this was from constant teaching of the Bible to his classes; Sam spoke them from the deepest convictions of his heart.

'And you're happy 'bout that, 'bout leaving Emma go?'

'I have faith,' said Sam.

'Faith that she'll come back?'

A shadow crossed Sam's face. 'I didn't leave her go. She went and I could not stay her. I would have wed her whether or no but she wouldn't come to mc, she said, unsaved and she wouldn't - or couldn't - find salvation. I have faith that Jesus will order my life - and hers -in such a way as may be best to further His will,'

Jack Trewinnard came skidding into the yard with a bucket in one hand and a hoe in the other. When he saw Drake had company he hastily wiped his nose on his sleeve and went out through to the stable,

Drake said: 'Well, brother, I reckon there is little to be said on cither side, is there. I know Demelza feels as you do about Rosina, for twas she in the first place who contrived that we should meet. Rosina, I grant you, is a goodly person, neat and clean and of a nice presence, and she would do her most for any man she was wed to. And I have some taking for her as a person. She's
-
kind. And pretty. But... it must all wait a while. It is - too soon. If there ever could be anything it is too soon. You must give mc leave to live my own life, Sam. Twill be better for all concerned.'