Bride of Pendorric (8 page)

” It is indeed.”

“I’m having a wonderful time going through the records. It’s always been an ambition of mine to have a living in Cornwall. It’s the most intriguing of all the counties—don’t you think, Mrs. Pendorrie?”

” I can well believe it might be.”

” So individual. I always say to Susan that as soon as you cross the Tamar you notice the difference. It’s like entering a different world—far away from prosaic England. Here in Cornwall one feels anything might happen. It’s a fey country. It’s due to the old superstitions and customs. There are still people here who really do leave bread and milk on their doorsteps for the Little People. And they swear it’s disappeared by morning.”

” I warned you,” said Roe, ” that our vicar is enthusiastic about the customs of the place.”

“I’m afraid I am. Mrs. Pendorric, are you interested?”

” I hadn’t thought much about it. But I believe I could be.”

” Good.

We must have a talk some time. ” We started to walk round the church and he went on: ” These are the Pendorric pews. Set apart from the rest, you see . at the side of the pulpit. I believe in the old days they used to be filled by the family and the retainers. Things have changed considerably. “

He pointed to one of the most beautiful of the stained-glass windows.

” That was put in in seventeen ninety-two in memory of Lowella Pendorric. I think the colouring of the glass is the most exquisite I’ve ever seen.”

” You’ve seen her picture in the north hall,” Roe reminded me. ” Oh yes … didn’t she die young?”

” Yes,” said the vicar, ” in childbirth with her first child. She was only eighteen. They call her the First Bride….”

” The first! But there must have been other brides. I understood there had been Pendorrics for centuries.”

The vicar stared blankly at the window.

“The sayings become attached and the origins are often steeped in legend. This is a memorial to another Pendorric. A great hero. A friend and supporter of Jonathan Trelawny who is himself buried at Pelynt, not so very far from here.

The Trelawny, you know, who defied James II and of whom we sing:

‘ And shall Trelawny die?

Here’s twenty thousand Comishmen will know the reason why. “”

He went on to point out other features of the church, and after renewing his wife’s invitation to coffee, he left us, but not before saying that he looked forward to meeting me soon and that if I wanted any information about ancient Cornwall he would be pleased to give it to me.

I thought his kind face was a little anxious as he laid his hand on my arm and said: ” It doesn’t do to take much notice of these old stories, Mrs. Pendorric. They’re interesting just as curiosities, that’s all.”

He left us outside the church and Roe gave a little sigh. ” He can be rather trying when he gets on to his favourite hobby. I began to think we were in for one of his longer lectures and we’d never get rid of him.” He looked at his watch. ” Now we’ll have to hurry. But just a quick look round the old graveyard. Some of the inscriptions are amusing.”

We picked our way between the gravestones; some were so old that the words which had been engraved upon them were obliterated altogether;

others leaned at grotesque angles.

We stopped before one which must have been more sheltered from the winds and weather than most, for although the date on it was 1779 the words were clearly visible. Roe began to read them aloud: “When you, my friends, behold Where now I lie, Remember ‘tis appointed For all men once to die. For I myself in prime of life The Lord took me away And none that’s on the Earth can tell How long they in’t may stay.”

He turned to me, smiling: “Cheerful!” he said.

“Your turn. When Morwenna and I were children we used to come here and read them to each other, taking turns.”

I paused before another stone, slightly less ancient, the date being

1842.

” Though some of you perhaps may think From dangers to be free Yet in a moment may be sent Into the grave like me.” I stopped and said: ” The theme is similar.”

” What do you expect here among the dead? It’s appropriate enough.”

” I’d rather find one that didn’t harp so much on death.”

” Not so easy,” said Roe. ” But follow me.” He led the way through the long grass and eventually stopped and began to read; ” Though I was both deaf and dumb Much pleasure did I take With my fingers and my thumb All my wants to relate.”

We smiled. ” That’s more cheerful,” I agreed. ” I’m so glad he was able to find pleasure through his misfortune.”

I turned to look at a stone nearby, and as I did so I tripped over the edge of a curb which was ‘hidden in the long grass and I went sprawling headlong over a grave.

Roe picked me up. ” All right, darling? Not hurt?”

” I’m all right, thanks.” I looked ruefully at my stocking. ” A run-ladder. That seems to be all the damage.”

” Sure?” The anxiety in his eyes made me feel very happy and I forgot my earlier vague misgivings. I assured him that I was all right and he said: ” Now some of our neighbours would say that was an omen.”

” What sort of an omen?”

” I couldn’t tell you. But falling over a grave! I’m sure they’d see something very significant in that. And on your first visit to the churchyard too.”

” Life must be very difficult for some people,” I mused. ” If they’re continually seeing omens it doesn’t give them much chance of exercising their own free will.”

“And you believe in being the master of your fate and captain of your soul, and the fault not being in your stars and so on?”

“Yes, I think I do. And you, Roe?”

He took my hand suddenly and kissed it. ” As usual you and I are in unison.” He looked about him and said: ” And that’s the family vault over there.”

” I must see that.”

I made my way to it, more cautiously this time. Roe following. It was an ornate mausoleum of iron and gilt, with three steps leading down to the door.

” Locked away there are numerous dead Pendorrics,” said Roe. I tamed away. ” I’ve thought enough about death for one bright summer’s morning,” I told him.

He put his arms round me and kissed me. Then he released me and went down the three steps to examine the door. I stood back, where he had left me, and saw that on one of the gilded spikes of me railings a wreath of laurels had been put.

I went towards it and looked at it more closely. There was a card attached to it and on it was written: ” For Barbarina.”

I did not mention the wreath to Roe when he came up to roe. He did not seem to have noticed it.

I felt a strong desire to get away from this place of death; away to the sun and the sea.

Lunch was a pleasant meal served in one of the small rooms leading off the north hall. I felt that during it I became better, acquainted with Morwenna and Charles, who were determined to make me feel at home. The twins and Rachel Bective ate with us. Lowella was garrulous; Hyson said scarcely a word; and Rachel behaved as though she were indeed a friend of the family. She reproved Lowella for over-exuberance, and seemed determined to be friendly with me. I wondered whether I had made a hasty judgment when I had decided I did not like her. After lunch Roe and Charles went off together and I went to my room to get a book. I had decided that I would do what I had wanted to ever since I had seen it—sit under one of the palm trees in the quadrangle.

I took my book and found my way out. It was delightfully cool under the tree, and as I sat gloating on the beauty of the place it occurred to me there was a look of a Spanish patio about it. The hydrangeas were pink, blue, and white, and multi-coloured masses of delightful blooms; the lavender scented the air about the water over which bronze Hermes was poised; I saw the flash of gold as the fish swam to and fro.

I tried to read, but I found it difficult to concentrate because of those windows which would not allow me to feel alone. I looked up at them. Who would want to peer out at me I asked myself. And if someone did, what would it matter? I knew I was being absurd.

I went back to my book, and as I sat reading there I heard a movement close behind me, and I was startled when a pair of hands were placed

over my eyes and quite unable to repress a gasp as I said rather more sharply than I intended: ” Who is it?” As I touched the hands, which were not very large, I heard a low chuckle and a voice said: ” You have to guess.”

” Lowella.”

The child danced before me. ” I can stand on my head,” she announced.

” I bet you can’t.”

She proved her words, her long thin legs in navy-blue shorts waving perilously near the pond.

” All right,” I told her, ” you’ve proved it.” She turned a somersault and landed on her feet, then stood smiling at me, her face pink with the effort.

” How did you guess Lowella?” she asked.

” I couldn’t think of anyone else.”

” It might have been Hyson.”

” I was certain it was Lowella.”

“Hyson doesn’t do things like that, does she?”

” I think Hyson’s a little shy.”

She tamed another somersault.

“Are you afraid?” she asked suddenly.

“Afraid of what?”

“Being one of the Brides.”

“What brides?”

” The Brides of Pendorric, of course.”

She stood very still, her eyes narrowed, as she surveyed me. ” You don’t know, do you?” she said.

” That’s why I’m asking you to tell me.” She came towards me and, putting her hands on my knees, she looked searchingly into my face;

she was so close that I could see the long dark eyes which slightly resembled Roe’s, and the clear unblemished skin. I was aware of another quality which reminded me of Roe. I thought I sensed a certain mischief in her look but I was not sure. ” Will you tell me?”

I asked.

For answer she looked over her shoulder and up at the windows, and I went on: “Why did you ask me if I was afraid?”

” Because you’re one of the Brides, of course. My granny was one. Her picture’s in the south hall. Have you seen it?”

” Barbarina,” I said.

” Yes. Granny Barbarina. She’s dead. You see, she was one of the Brides too.”

” This is all very mysterious to me. I don’t know why she should die simply because she was a bride.”

” There was another Bride too. She’s in the north hall” She was called Lowella and she used to haunt Pendorric until Granny Barbarina died. Then she rested in her grave. “

” Oh, I see, it’s a ghost story.”

” In a way, but it’s a live person’s story too.”

” I’d like to hear it-” Again she turned to look at me and I wondered whether she had been warned not to tell me.

” All right.” She spoke in a whisper. ” When Lowella in the south hall was a bride there was a great banquet to celebrate her wedding. Her father was very rich and lived in North Cornwall and he and her mother and all her sisters and brothers and cousins and aunts came to dance at a ball here at Pendorric. There were violins on the dais and they were all eating and dancing when the woman came into the hall. She bad a little girl with her; it was her little girl, you see, and she said it was Petroc Pendorric’s too. Not Roe’s—because this was years and years ago. It was another Pendorric with that name—only they didn’t call him Roe. This Petroc Pendorric was Lowella’s bridegroom, you see, and the woman with the little girl thought he ought to have been hers.

This woman lived wild in the woods with her mother, and the mother was a witch so that makes it a curse that works. She cursed Pendorric and the Bride and all the fun stopped then. “

” And how long ago did this happen?” I asked.

” Nearly two hundred years.”

” It’s a long time.”

” But it’s a story that goes on and on. It doesn’t have an ending, you see. It’s not only Lowella’s story and Barbarina’s story … it’s yours too.”

“How could that be?”

” You haven’t heard what the curse was. The Bride was to die in the prime of her life and she wouldn’t rest in her grave until another Bride had gone to her death … in the prime of her life, of course.”

I smiled. I was astonished that I could feel so relieved. That ominous phrase the Brides of Pendorric was now explained. It was only this old legend which, because we were in Cornwall, where superstitions prevailed, had lived on and provided the old house with a ghost ” You don’t seem very worried. I would if I were you.”

” You haven’t finished tike story. What happened to that bride?”

” She died having her son exactly a year after her wedding day. She was eighteen years old, which you must admit is very young to die.”

“I expect a great many women died in childbirth. Particularly in those days.”

” Yes, but they said she used to haunt the place waiting for a bride to take her place.”

” To do the haunting, you mean?”

” You’re like Uncle Roe. He always laughs at it. I don’t laugh though.

I know better. “

” So you believe in this haunting business.”

She nodded.

“I’ve got the second sight. That’s why I’m telling you you won’t always laugh.”

She leaped away from me and turned another somersault, her long thin legs swaying before me. I had the impression that she was rather pleased because I was going to be shocked out of my scepticism. She came to stand before me again and with a virtuous expression said: “I think you ought to know. You see, the Bride Lowella used to haunt Pendorric till my Granny Barbarina died. Then she rested in her grave because she’d lured another bride to take her place and do the haunting. My Granny Barbarina’s been doing it for twenty-five years. I reckon she’s tired. She’d want to rest in her tomfc, wouldn’t she? You can bet your life she’s looking out for another bride to do the job.”

” I see what you mean,” I said lightly. ” I’m the bride.”

“You’re laughing, aren’t you?” She stepped back and turned another somersault. ” But you’ll see.”

Her face seen from upside down looked jaunty as her long dark ponytail trailed on the grass.

” I’m sure you’ve never seen the ghost of your grandmother-have you?” She did not answer but regarded me stolidly for a few seconds;