Bonds of Earth, The (13 page)

A
FTER TWO DAYS
of heavy, albeit intermittent rain, the storms moved on from Cornwall and Morwenna was able to make her way across the moor to the Spurre estate to keep her tryst with Tom once more – but the gamekeeper's nephew did not put in an appearance.

She waited by the hedgerow boundary for two hours before telling herself that the heavy rain had undoubtedly caused disruption at Spurre Hall and there would be work for Tom to attend to, perhaps closer to the big house. Disconsolately, she returned to the cottage at Wheal Hope.

When it was a similar story on the second day she began to feel uneasy. Perhaps something had happened to him! After all, his work meant he spent a great deal of time among the trees and woods of the estate. There had been many severe storms – and lightning was known to strike trees! But how could she find out?

When there was still no sign of him on the third day after the storms had passed on, she decided to check whether he was at the cottage among the trees, where he used to take her. Tom had told her she was never to go onto the estate unless he was with her, but she was so concerned she felt she had no alternative.

The relationship she had with Tom had been a carefully calculated one after their first casual meeting, but she had grown to like him a lot. She decided she would be a good wife for him and had no doubts about his potential as a husband – and father.

If there was no sign of him at the cottage Morwenna knew she would need to think of something else, but she had felt utterly frustrated outside the estate hedge, waiting in vain for him to put in an appearance.

On the way to the gamekeeper's cottage the thought came to her that perhaps he was actually moving in to the cottage. If this was so he was no doubt being helped by his uncle and it would be very difficult for him to leave him and come away to meet her.

The thought buoyed her spirits until the cottage came into view and she slowed her approach, no longer certain of what to do next. The cottage looked deserted with no sign of anyone in residence.

There had been a musty unlived odour inside the cottage and, although it had never dampened the ardour of either of them, Tom had commented on it and, had he taken up residence, she would have expected him to open every window to allow the fresh air from outside to clear the mustiness.

Arriving at the front door of the cottage she paused. Should she go inside and see whether Tom, or any of his belongings, was there? What if somebody else had moved in…?

This possibility had not occurred to her before but the cottage was on the estate and Sir John Spurre might have had other plans for it.

‘What do you think you're doing here?'

The voice startled her and, turning to see where it came from, she was dismayed to see Marcus Grimble standing at the corner of the cottage. He had come from the rear of the building and was standing looking at her, nursing the gun he was in the habit of carrying whenever he walked the estate.

‘I asked you what you're doing,' he repeated. ‘This is private property and you could be prosecuted for being here.'

‘I … I came here looking for Tom – Tom Miller. I usually meet him by the hedge to the moor but I haven't seen him for a while and wondered whether he was all right. He brought me here to show me the cottage, but it was only the once,' she lied, hoping Grimble would believe her.

‘He shouldn't have, but Tom won't be showing anything to you any more, he's gone.'

‘Gone? Gone where? When will he be back?'

‘If he
ever
comes back it won't be for many a year, he's gone to America.'

Morwenna knew little about America, but she was aware it was somewhere across the sea and a very long way from Cornwall. ‘But … he told me he was going to be a gamekeeper and would be moving into this cottage!'

Morwenna's distress was patently genuine and, looking at her speculatively, Grimble said, ‘Now why should Tom have told you a story like that, unless…?'

Leaving the sentence unfinished, he said, ‘I think we'd better go inside the cottage, young woman, and you can tell me what it is you and my nephew have been getting up to.'

‘I'm not going inside there with
you
!'

Grimble's revelation that Tom had left the country had come as a great shock, but it had not stripped her of her common sense.

‘I'll be getting home before my pa wonders where I am and comes looking for me.'

‘I shouldn't think your pa's
too
particular about where you get to or you wouldn't have been able to get to know young Tom well enough to have him show you places like this. Who are you, anyway, and where do you come from? You're not from these parts or I'd know you, although your face seems familiar.'

‘Who I am is none of your business – but my pa is captain of the Wheal Hope.'

‘Oh, so you're a mining girl? I've heard all about what they get up to around Caradon way … but you're still trespassing on Spurre land, so I think you'd better come inside the cottage and we'll decide what we're going to do about it.'

At that moment they both heard a muffled explosion. It came from the direction of the Wheal Hope and there was nothing unusual in the sound. Black powder was used to blast through the granite in the deepening shaft and also pursuing tin lodes which already showed great promise at two levels.

The sound had hardly died away when the ground beneath Morwenna seemed to tremble and it was accompanied by an ominous rumbling. The sound disconcerted both those at the cottage – but only Morwenna was immediately aware of its significance.

When she was a very young girl her father had been a shift captain on a coastal mine. A tunnel extending seaward had come too close to the sea-bed and during a storm sea water had broken through, flooding the mine with a terrible force that carried everything before it, rocks, machinery – and men. The Wheal Hope was a long way from the sea, and not close to the place where she and Grimble were standing, but she had no doubt that something similar had occurred at the Wheal Hope.

All other considerations immediately forgotten, Morwenna turned to run back the way she had come.

‘Stop! Come back or I'll shoot you.'

Running as she had never run before, she did not slow even when she heard the sound of his shot. But Grimble had fired into the air and neither slowing her pace nor looking back at him Morwenna kept on running.

W
HEN THE DISASTER
at the Wheal Hope occurred, Goran had just returned to Elworthy Farm on the pony after checking on the well-being of his sheep which had been grazing on the moor during the recent storms.

He had dismounted in the farmyard and was holding the reins of the pony and talking to Albert Bolitho when they were interrupted by the same sounds and sensation experienced by Morwenna and Marcus Grimble.

The feeling of the ground trembling beneath their feet frightened the farmyard animals and the pony almost pulled free from Goran but, as had Morwenna, Albert realized immediately what had happened.

‘The Wheal Hope must have broken through into water,' he cried. ‘If Cap'n Pyne wasn't prepared for it he'll be in serious trouble.'

Succeeding in bringing the frightened pony under control, Goran said, ‘I'll ride up there and find out what's happening.'

‘Take me with you.'

When Goran looked at the crippled miner, his expression showed clearly his disbelief that Albert could possibly be anything but a hindrance if there was an emergency at the mine, and Albert said fiercely, ‘I may not be able to help physically but the only man on the mine who knows more of mining than me is Captain Pyne and I don't think he's ever experienced a serious break through into water. I have!'

A granite mounting-block, accessed by three steps stood close to where the two men were standing and Goran said, ‘I'll help you up there. If you can get yourself into the saddle I'll mount up behind you.'

The pony objected to carrying a double burden but, holding the reins with his arms about the miner, Goran heeled the animal into motion, calling out a brief explanation to Harriet Bolitho who was emerging from the farm cottage as they passed by.

The mine was in a state of turmoil but around the head of the shaft miners were busily attaching a pulley and rope to a rapidly erected wooden tripod. The previous apparatus used to bring dug earth to the surface had collapsed and it was intended that a man should be lowered down the shaft to assess just what had happened.

‘Is anyone trapped down there?'

Albert called the question to a harassed miner whom he knew would be employed as a shift captain when the mine began full production. He appeared to be organizing all that was going on now.

‘Cap'n Pyne's down below with a four-man team. They've been following a copper lode that was found while the shaft was being dug. John James has come up from the thirty fathom level where he was checking on another lode and says he thinks the cap'n and the others might have been sheltering in one of the tunnels on the other side of where they were blasting. It should have only been a small blast but it broke through what was either some old workings or a reservoir. Jack tried to go back down to find out where the others were but the water had carried the ladders away and he couldn't get down to them.'

‘This lode that was being followed – was it down towards the bottom of the shaft? Would the water have hit them right away?'

‘They'll probably be safe for a while, but water's coming into the shaft above them and judging by the sound of it there's a whole lot of it. If it keeps up at its present rate no one can possibly get through and it will flood the whole of the Wheal Hope's workings – including the place where they're sheltering. To be honest I can't see any way we can help them.'

The miner made a gesture of hopelessness that horrified Goran, but Albert was speaking again.

‘We know there must be plenty of water down there because of all the springs in the area – and recent storms won't have made things any better, but if you've broken through into old workings there would have been an adit coming out somewhere by the river.'

‘An adit? Isn't that some sort of a mine tunnel?' Goran put the question to Albert.

‘That's right, most of the old-time mines had them – many of the newer ones too whenever possible. They're tunnels dug to take off water from a wet mine without the expense of having a pumping-engine and having to buy fuel to keep it working.'

‘There's an adit coming out in a copse of trees down at the bottom of Agnes Roach's farm. It must have been dug by the miners who worked on the big mine that was once on Spurre land. The mine was worked a very long time ago, possibly as long as hundred years or so, but some of the older folk still talk about it. You can see by the ground in front of this adit that it once carried a whole lot of water, but Elworthy Coumbe said his father told him the roof had caved in when they were cutting down a great oak, a bit farther up the slope. He's probably right, you can see the hollow in the ground where it fell in. I once went along the adit and came to where a lot of earth and stone was blocking it. There was a bit of water coming through too, although it was little more than a trickle.'

Suddenly excited, Albert asked, ‘How big is this hollow in the ground where you think the roof of the adit collapsed?'

‘Not all that big, perhaps half the size of your cottage and if I stood in it I'd probably still be able to look over the edge.'

Albert and the Wheal Hope miner exchanged glances, but their two reactions were very different.

‘It's too much of a long shot,' the miner said, shaking his head dubiously. ‘Even if it is the old adit and we could clear the roof fall it would take time.'

‘If we packed explosives into the fall we could blow a hole big enough to loosen up the blockage. If there's as much water in there as we think there is it would do the rest for us.'

‘It would still take more time than we have.'

‘Not if
I
did it. There's not another man in the whole of Cornwall with my knowledge of explosives, you've heard Cap'n Pyne say so – and I'm telling you it
can
be done.'

‘You do it? You're forgetting your leg….'

‘Let
me
worry about my leg. While you're finding reasons why it
can't
be done the water's rising up the shaft. If I have a try at clearing the blockage in the adit we'll feel we're doing
something
– and it might save the lives of Cap'n Pyne and four men.'

Albert's fervour finally convinced the other man. ‘What will you need, and where is it to go?'

‘I'll need a whole barrel of black powder and as much safety fuse as you have ready, candles, Lucifer matches, pipes and packing for the powder. I'll also need the best drill team you have – get Jim Darley and his two boys – and tell them to bring the longest borers they have.'

Turning to Goran, Albert, now very much the man in charge of the situation, asked, ‘Where is this adit?'

‘Come down through Elworthy land to the river and follow it upstream to the small copse on Roach land. The adit is in there.'

‘Right.' Turning to the miner, he said, ‘Get things moving with all the speed you can. Goran and me will go back to the farm to collect as many lanterns as we can find and go in and inspect this adit. We'll meet you there … but hurry, there's no time to waste.'

Riding away from Wheal Hope in the same manner as he and Albert had arrived, Goran caught a glimpse of Nessa … and his heart went out to her. With Jennifer in her arms she looked pale and on the verge of tears standing with her mother, a hot-looking and dishevelled Morwenna and two other women on the edge of the crowd about the shaft.

She was not looking in his direction and he could not tell whether or not she was aware of his presence at the Wheal Hope, but now was not the time to even think of speaking to her. She and the members of her family would be greatly distressed at the knowledge that Piran Pyne was trapped deep down in the mine and in imminent danger.