The Loving Cup (4 page)

Stephen said: 'Well, I'd best be going.' 'I'll see you sometime.' is the - stuff where it was?' 'Yes.'

'We can meet at the Gatehouse, then. Tomorrow about noon?'

‘I
can't. I'm to go with my family to St Day Show Fair. I have not been very sociable of late, and I especially promised my mother I should go.'

Stephen thought this out. 'Very well. So be it. Perhaps
‘
tis better this way. I'll meet you at the end of the month. Saturday week at noon at the Gatehouse, eh?'

'Agreed.'

'By then I shall know for certain whether me present idea for — for a new type of investment will look promising enough to follow. Maybe I shall interest you.'

'Maybe.'

Stephen Carrington said impatiently: 'You cannot keep your share of the stuff lying there for ever.' 'Why not?'

'All the risks we took: were they for nothing?'

Jeremy smiled into the dark. 'On the whole I believe for nothing worth while, Stephen. But I admit it is a personal view come to after the event. Do not let it depress you.'

I

Both Sir George and Lady Harriet Warleggan were home when the young Poldarks called on the Saturday forenoon.

It was a disagreeable day. Seeing the pellucid sunset of last night and the clear moon that rode through the hours of darkness, it would have been a perceptive sailor or shepherd who could have foreseen the grey dawn, the steady southwesterly wind and the intermittent rain that came with it.

In fact Lady Harriet was in one of her customary places
-
the stables - when a maid arrived to tell her of the visit, and she tramped through the kitchens, kicked off her muddy boots, and, accompanied by her two great hounds, came in stockinged feet into the larger withdrawing room where George, himself disturbed from an interview with Tankard about the rotten borough of St Michael, was sitting opposite the two young people, sipping sherry and looking cold and unwelcoming.

It was not really surprising, for Geoffrey Charles accepted his allowance of £500 a year without a sign of gratitude or obligation, and never wrote. The only correspondence which took place was with Valentine.

But the arrival of a step-step-mother, as it were, did help to break the ice. So did the dogs, which, though well behaved, were so enormous that they provided light relief and a topic for conversation.

Harriet had a talent for taking a situation as it came without regard to history, ancient or modern. She neither knew nor cared what other people were feeling, and every circumstance was treated strictly on its merits. Also, having discovered the nationality of the little dark girl, she immediately began to chat to her in broken Spanish. It seemed that when she was seven years of age she had spent a year in
Madrid, in the home of a grandee who was connected by marriage to the Osbornes. Amadora was enchanted, and soon lost that element of defensive shyness with which she was, accustomed to greet new situations or Geoffrey Charles's old friends.

George said evenly: 'I have no keys. They are with the Harrys. All you have to do is go over and call at the lodge. They will give them to you at once. You will find the place neglected. The Harrys were always rogues.'

‘I
wonder you kept them on.'

George shrugged.

'After your mother died I could find little interest in the place.'

And little interest in preserving it for Francis's son, thought Geoffrey Charles. 'I have not seen my home since Grandfather died, which must be seven years, or nearly so. Is it still furnished?'

'Partly. Many of the new pieces I had taken there were later brought here. You'll observe that bureau. Such original furniture as was not disposed of remains. Is that a permanent injury to your hand?'

Geoffrey Charles looked down. 'Who knows? It only happened in April of last year. So it may yet improve. But in fact, excepting that I find it impossible to open the fingers wide, it is little inconvenience. The trigger finger is not impaired.'

George eyed his step-son. It was difficult to relate this tall thin tight-faced man with the genteel, delicate, over-plump, over-mothered boy he had disciplined so many years ago. In the early days George had
tried.
Indeed, before he married Elizabeth, before even Francis died, he had tried hard to please the boy, bought him presents, attempted to please the mother by pleasing the child. Even after their marriage he had done his very best with Geoffrey Charles, wanting to befriend him, until the quarrel over Drake Carne, Demelza Poldark's brother, had written off any friendship between them for ever.

Now at this meeting after so long a gap, the less said the better. They had nothing more in common, except the old elvan and granite house of Trenwith. The one important interest they had once dee
ply shared had died nearly four
teen years ago, leaving a five-day-old baby behind.

George said: 'Well, the war has taken a favourable turn at last. Your Wellington should feel better pleased with himself now.'

'I believe he is. Though he is never one for self-satisfaction. Is the Armistice still in operation?'

'Yes. And will be I suspect so long as it suits Napoleon to rebuild his armies after last winter's defeat in Russia.'

Geoffrey Charles said: 'For almost two weeks now I have been without up-to-date news. If the Armistice continues with Austria and the rest, it means that Wellington's Peninsular Army is the only one at present in the field against France.'

'Exactly what many pe
ople are thinking. As you say,
there is little cause for self-satisfaction.'

Silence fell between the men while the women chatted on. Even in this brief interchange there was something in George's turn of phrase or tone of voice that rubbed Geoffrey Charles the wrong way. George had always been a critic of Wellington; Wellington had very briefly occupied one of George's parliamentary seats and had left it without a thank you; George never forgot slights; Geoffrey Charles knew all this and knew also that George had always criticized the decision to send British troops to Portugal and Spain. . 'Well,' he said, uncrossing his long thin legs, 'I think we should go. It will take us a couple of hours, I suppose
...
Amadora
...'

'Go?' said Lady Harriet. 'Before you have been dined? I'll not bear it. Otherwise I shall suppose you have no fancy for your new step-mother.'

'Oh, far from it, ma'am! The contrary! But when we reach our house we shall have much to do before dark -'

'So you shall go with candles. I cannot conject what Amadora's mother would think if she learned that we had turned her away.' Harriet got up. 'Down, you blasted brutes; there is no occasion for excitement!' She glanced at her husband, who was trying not to glower. 'Dinner shall be
early to accommodate them. But for half an hour first, Captain and Mrs Geoffrey Charles, you shall see my livestock.'

II

They dined with a modest lack of disaccord. Geoffrey Charles thought that on the whole his step-father had done well for himself, though he could not see Lady Harri
et fitting into the compatible,
but slightly subordinate role his own mother had filled. There would be ructions in plenty here. She was an attractive woman, more beautiful than pretty but not quite either. And young. Only a few years, he'd swear, older than himself. She had an eye for a young man, he could tell that. Would George be able to satisfy her, to keep her, to prevent her from straying? If she felt like it, there would surely be no stopping her. George looked older; lines were indented in his cheeks, his hair iron-grey, thinning.

Present at the table too was Ursula, now a strapping girl of nearly fourteen, with a fat neck and thighs so sturdy that they made bulges in her s
kirts; but none of it flabby, al
l hard flesh, ready to stand her in good stead in life. Geoffrey Charles could scarcely believe that his own slender, delicate, patrician mother had borne her. And a girl of few words, curtsying awkwardly to Amadora, allowing her cheek to be brushed by Geoffrey Charles, but firmly intent on the main purpose of the hour: food.

Valentine, George explained, was not yet come from Cambridge. He was expected next Wednesday, if he could be bothered to take the coach and did not squander his money in London. He had not been home at Easter at all, having spent the vacation with Lord Ridley, a new friend of his - said George smugly - in Norfolk. So his last visit was Christmas. When, Harriet volunteered, he had turned the house upside down. Then they had all been quite mad with delight at the news of Napoleon's retreat from Moscow.

'Which should have ended in his fall,' said Geoffrey Charles. 'But he hypnotizes the French. They worship him so when he calls for more cadres to fill his decimated regiments, they come in their thousands: old men; boys of sixteen.'

'Not always willingly, I'm told,' said Harriet. 'They have no choice. The
levé
e en masse
in France is complete.'

'Nothing of which detracts from Napoleon's greatness,' said George. 'He bestrides the world like no other man. Our own politicians, our own generals, the petty kings and emperors who oppose him, are pigmies by comparison.'

'Perhaps you'd be surprised,' Geoffrey Charles said, 'at the admiration and respect he inspires in the soldiers who oppose him -
our
soldiers particularly. But that does not — or should not — remove the necessity to bring him down. While he exists as Emperor of France there can be no peace, no security, no hope of a lasting settlement that will leave other nations free.'

'I believe his Russian defeat has been a salutary lesson to him,' said George. 'He will be more amenable now. If Castlereagh has his wits about him we can achieve a peace with honour without the necessity of more fighting.'

'Do you intend to return to your regiment soon?' Harriet asked.

'As soon as possible,' said Geoffrey Charles, with a tight little smile, if you have been so long on the hunt you want to be in at the kill.'

After a pause: 'And Amadora?'

'Will come back to Spain with me. But all that is weeks ahead.'

'Those are miserable poor old hacks you are riding. Do their knees not knock together as they carry
you?...
Let me lend you something with better blood. As you observe, we are not lacking. Are we, George?'

'No,
’
said George. .

'Thank you, ma'am; you're very kind. We hired them from the Greenbank stables. But I am sure we can manage
...'

'Why should you ? A man shall take them back tomorrow. You may borrow two better mounts for the duration of your stay.'

'T'ank you
,' said Amadora, beaming. 'We have in Spain also good horses too.'

'I
know.
Don't I know! Anyway, my nags are eating their heads off at this time of year. It would be an obligement if you took 'em off my hands.'

'Sawle Church and churchyard,' said George, 'is in a very bad state. You would think that Ross Poldark would make some effort to support it, financially and otherwise; but no. It is not a question of Christian doctrine, it is a question of social obligation. When I was at Trenwith - and indeed when your father was at Trenwith - we accepted a trust, a responsibility. No longer so. When I was last over there your mother's grave was vastly overgrown and-'

'And my father's?'

The question was sharp. When a woman marries twice and then dies, shall she be buried with her first husband, even though her second husband pays for and supervises the funeral? It was a sore point with Geoffrey Charles that his father had been buried in the family vault, his mother given quite a separate entombment thirty yards away.

George, choosing not to pick up the challenge, said: 'And your father's, of course. I could wish that you might settle at Trenwith, so that there was again a patron to oversee the benefice. At present the Nampara Poldarks totally neglect it. And Odgers - their nominee, incidentally - is now so far gone in senility that by rights he should be removed.'

'As bad as that?'

‘I
'm told when he goes up for his sermon now his wife ties one of his legs to the pulpit so that he can't wander away until he has read his piece.'

'Reminds me of my bachelor uncle,' said Harriet. 'When he went to church he always took his tame jackal to sit beside him in his pew and wake him when the sermon was over. Misfortunately the jackal would go to sleep too and its snore was much to be wondered at. Sometimes the preacher could scarcely go on.'

'I did not know you could tame a jackal,' said Geoffrey Charles.

'Tame pretty near anything if you have the patience. I once had a bear cub but he died
...
My cousin owns a snake.' She lifted a dark eyebrow at George and gave her low husky laugh. 'So you see, George, how much more trying my little friends might be.'

‘I
am well used to your little friends by now,' said George. ' 'Mrs Poldark, will you take tea ?'

It was a sign for them to move, and after refusing further refreshment they took leave of George, wh
o pleaded pressure of work, an
d followed Harriet, Ursula, and the two hounds back to the stables. There Harriet insisted on lending Geoffrey Charles a horse called Bargrave - 'we bought him in a sale; your cousin Ross bid against us, but we got him; he has good quarters and makes nothing of these muddy lanes' - and a pale sorrel mare of much slighter build for Amadora - 'you'll find Glow hasn't quite the stamina but she is fleet over short distances and has the gentlest mouth.'

The rain had almost ceased as they rode away; it was a barely visible dampness just freckling their faces. Amadora laughed at the pleasure of it, and indeed at the pleasure of the morning's visit. They chatted in Spanish all the way down the drive and she said:
I
do not see Sir George as such a wicked man.'

Geoffrey Charles said: in his life I know him to have done a number of wicked things; things I find it difficult not to recall when I meet him; but I have no means of assessing evil and no special wish to judge him. He is older—for one thing
...
Also
...
the causes - at least some of the causes - are no longer there. It really all centred round my mother.'