Penhallow (16 page)

‘What on earth do you mean? You can’t mean that Bart’s serious about her?’

‘Can’t I? Well, you trespass on his preserves, and you’ll find out,’ said Eugene.

Clay looked very much astonished, but as Jimmy the Bastard came up the backstairs at that moment, with an armful of boots, he questioned Eugene no further.

Jimmy, whose ears were extremely sharp, had heard every word of the brief conversation. It confirmed his own suspicions, and he was pleased, seeing a way of revenge on Bart. His countenance, however, betrayed no emotion whatsoever, and he met Eugene’s narrowed eyes without blanching. Clay went off, whistling, but Eugene lingered to say: ‘You have quite a genius for turning up where you are least expected, haven’t you. Jimmy?’

Jimmy looked sullenly at him. He recognised an intelligence superior to his own, and resented it. The other Penhallows despised him, and generally ignored him, so that he was able to spy upon their doings pretty well as he chose; but Eugene, he knew, was fully alive to his activities, and, therefore, rather dangerous. He said defensively: ‘I was bringing your shoes up.’

‘Kind of you,’ said Eugene. ‘Do you know, Jimmy, that if I were you I’d be very careful how I trod? Somehow I feel that one of these days, when your natural protector is removed, an evil fate may befall you.’

‘I haven’t done any of you any harm,’ Jimmy muttered, turning away. But he knew that Eugene was right, and that if Penhallow were suddenly to die he would be kicked out of the house without ceremony or compunction; and he began to think that he would do well to make provision against an uncertain future. He thought he would rather like to go to America. His knowledge of that vast country having been culled solely from the more lurid films dealing with the underworld of bootleggers and racketeers, he was strongly attracted to a land where it seemed that his own buccaneering talents would find ample scope. His only day-dream consisted of an agreeable vision of himself as the chief of a gang, living in an opulent apartment with one of those glamorous blondes who apparently abounded in gangster circles. But he was a practical youth, and he knew that the achievement of his ambition depended largely on his amassing some initial capital. He wondered whether Penhallow would leave him any money in his will, but was inclined to doubt it. Penhallow, he knew quite well, encouraged him partly because it amused him to do so, and partly to annoy his family, and was not in the least likely to leave his money away from his legitimate offspring.

He placed the boots he had brought upstairs in their respective owners’ rooms, and went slowly back to the kitchen, where, since Sybilla was baking, he thought he would pick up one of her saffron cakes. But before he had traversed more than half the length of the stone passage, Martha came out of the still-room, and informed him that Master was shouting for him, and he had better go to him at once, or he would learn what was what.

Penhallow was sitting up in bed, with the fat spaniel sprawling beside him, and a blotter on his knees. As Jimmy came into the room he was licking the flap of an envelope. He remarked genially that he had a job for Jimmy to do. Jimmy saw at once that one of his restless, energetic moods was upon him, and reflected coldly that if he didn’t quieten down again there was no knowing when he mightn’t be took off sudden.

‘I shall get up today,’ Penhallow announced. ‘It’s time I saw something of my dear family. We’ll have a tea party. I’ve got a fancy to see that old fool Phineas again. I’ve told Con to fetch him and his sister out to tea in that flibberty-gibbett of a car of his; and you can take yourself to Liskeard, you lazy young dog, and give this letter to my nevvy. I’ll have him and his stuck-up wife out here too. And on your way back, stop at the Vicarage, and give my compliments to Venngreen, and tell him I find myself good and clever today, and I’ll be happy to see, him and his good lady to tea at five o’clock.’

‘She won’t come,’ observed Jimmy dispassionately.

Penhallow gave a chuckle. ‘I don’t care whether she comes or not. You tell her you won’t be there, and maybe she will. But Cliff will come, and what’s more he’ll bring his wife, because he knows better than to offend me. He can take a look at Clay while he’s here, and settle when the whelp’s to start work with him.’

Jimmy put the letter he had been given into his pocket, and removed the blotter and the inkstand from Penhallow’s knees. ‘I see Mr Clay hugging Loveday Trewithian upstairs just now,’ he said, casting a sidelong look at his parent.

‘The young dog!’ exclaimed Penhallow, warming towards Clay. ‘So there is some red blood in him, is there? She’s a damned fine girl, that one.’

‘Ah! Maybe there’s others as thinks as much,’ said Jimmy darkly. ‘There’ll be trouble and to spare if Mr Bart was to hear of it, that’s all I know.’

A smile curled Penhallow’s mouth; he looked across at Jimmy with a little interest and some amusement narrowing his eyes. ‘One of Bart’s fancies, is she? Young rascal! If I were only ten years younger, I’m damned if I wouldn’t cut him out with the girl! All the same, I’ll tell him to be careful: Reuben wouldn’t like it if his niece got herself into trouble, and I don’t want any fuss and nonsense out of him.’

‘You don’t have to worry about that,’ Jimmy said, with a fair assumption of innocence. ‘Mr Bart’s going to marry her.’

‘Going to what?’ demanded Penhallow, his brows beginning to lower.

‘Well, that’s what I heard Mr Eugene say,’ Jimmy muttered, carrying the inkstand over to the refectory table, and setting it down there.

‘You’re a fool!’ Penhallow said irascibly. ‘Marry her! That’s a good one!’

‘I didn’t ought to have spoken of it,’ Jimmy said. ‘Mr Bart would very likely murder me if he knew I’d let it out. Don’t let on I told you, sir.’

Penhallow’s brow was by this time as black as thunder. ‘What cock-and-bull story have you got hold of?’ he shot at Jimmy.

‘Loveday said to me herself as how she would be Mrs Bart Penhallow.’

‘Oh, she did, did she? Well, you may tell Loveday that she’s flying too high when she thinks to trap one of my boys into marrying her!’

‘She’d tell Mr Bart on me if ever I said a word to her she didn’t like,’ Jimmy said. ‘They’re only waiting till you set Mr Bart up at Trellick, Master, and that’s the truth, for all nobody dares to tell it to you.’

An alarmingly high colour suffused Penhallow’s cheeks, and his eyes glared at Jimmy under their beetling brows, as though they would drag the whole truth out of him, but he said nothing for some moments. Then he barked: ‘Get off with you to Mr Cliff’s, you damned little mischief-maker! I don’t believe a word of it. Trying to pay Mr Bart back for having twisted your arm, eh? I’d do well to send you packing! Get out!’

Jimmy departed, satisfied with his morning’s work, since he knew his father well enough to be sure that the information he had imparted would rankle.

Penhallow lay thinking it over for some time. The spaniel sat up, and began to scratch herself. He cursed her, and she sat on her haunches, lolling her tongue at him, and wagging her stump of a tail. ‘Old fool!’ Penhallow said, and pushed her off the bed, and tugged at the bell-pull.

Martha answered its summons, and came in scolding.

‘The devil’s in you, surely!’ she said. ‘Ring, ring, ring, and Jimmy gone off to Liskeard, as well you know! If it’s whisky you want, I’ll not give it to you, my dear, not at this hour of the day I won’t!’

‘Shut up! You cackle like a hen!’ Penhallow replied roughly. ‘Where’s Eugene?’

‘Where would un be, but keeping himself out of the draughts, and driving everyone that can be bothered to listen to un silly with his talk of neuralgia in un’s head?’ retorted Martha. ‘There never was one of them, not even Clay, and it was not me had him to nurse, I thank my stars! That was a more troublesome child than Eugene, and un’s no better, nor never will be! What do you want with un, my dear?’

He pinched the patchwork quilt between his fingers, regarding her in a brooding way for some moments. ‘What’s between young Bart and Loveday Trewithian?’ he asked abruptly.

She gave a dry chuckle. ‘Eh, you’re a nice one to ask!’ she said. ‘What do you expect of a son of yourn, when you put a ripe plum in his reach? Why should you worry your head?’

"Jimmy’s got hold of a damned queer story,’ he growled. ‘He’s been telling me Bart means to marry the girl.’

"Jimmy!’ she ejaculated scornfully. ‘I reckon Jimmy would be glad to do un a mischief if he could!’

‘Maybe.’ He went on pleating the quilt, still looking at her under his brows. ‘Seems to me Con’s none so friendly with Bart these days.’

There was a question in his voice, but she merely tossed her head, and said: ‘Chuck-full of crotchets, Con be and always will! Marry Loveday Trewithian! Please the pigs, her bain’t come to that!’

‘What’s the girl like?’ he asked.

She sniffed. ‘As bold as yer mind to! Sech airs! I never did see!’

‘You send my sister in to me!’ he ordered. ‘You’re nothing but a doddering old idiot, Martha!’

She grinned. ‘Iss, sure, but I was a fine woman in my day, Maister!’

‘You were that,’ he agreed.

‘When I was in my twenty,’ she nodded. ‘That Loveday warn’t nothing to me, but I never took and thought to marry above my station, as well you knaw, my dear! I don’t knaw where the world’s a-going!’

‘Get out of this, you old wind-bag, and send my sister to me!’ he said impatiently.

She went off, chuckling to herself; and some minutes later Clara came into the room, with her hands grimed with earth-mould, a trowel in one of them, and a fern in the other. She left a clod of mud from one of her shoes on the carpet, and had evidently caught her heel in the hem of her skirt again, since it sagged unevenly and showed a frayed edge.

‘You’re a sight, Clara,’ Penhallow told her frankly. ‘What’s that miserable thing you’ve got hold of?’

‘Nothin’ much. One of the film-ferns,’ she replied. ‘You wouldn’t know.’

‘No, nor care. Sit down, old girl: I want to talk to you.’

She obeyed, choosing the chair nearest to her, as though she had little intention of remaining long. ‘They tell me you’ve been settin’ the house by the ears again,’ she remarked.

‘My house, ain’t it? I’m going to get up."

‘You’ll get up once too often one of these days, Adam.’

‘You leave me to know what’s best for me! That wasn’t what I wanted you for. I’ve been hearing things about Bart.’

She did not speak, but he was watching her closely, and he thought that she stiffened.

‘Oh!’ he said dangerously. ‘So you know something, do you, Clara? Didn’t think to tell me, did you?’

‘I don’t know anythin’ at all, Adam,’ she replied. ‘It’s none of my business.’

‘‘That girl, Loveday Trewithian!’ he said, stabbing a finger at her. ‘What’s she up to? Come on, out with it!’

She rubbed the tip of her nose, leaving a smear on it from her grimy finger. ‘I don’t know, but I don’t like the gal.’

‘Bart said anything to you?’

‘No.’

‘I’ll have to look into this,’ he decided. ‘Buffle-headed, that’s what he is! Jimmy says Eugene spoke of Bart’s wanting to marry her.’

‘I don’t want to hear anythin’ Jimmy said, Adam,’ Clara replied severely. ‘And Eugene’s got a wicked tongue, which he uses to make trouble with. I wouldn’t set any store by what he says either.’

‘By God, I believe you’re all of you in league to keep me in the dark!’ he swore, suddenly angry. ‘I’ll know the truth of this business! Think I’m helpless, do you? You’ll find I can still govern this family!’

‘There’s no sense in losin’ your temper with me,’ she said.

‘If you’d the sense of a flea you’d know what’s apparently been going on under your long nose!’

‘I don’t go pokin’ it into what’s none of my business. Well for you I don’t, and never did!’ she replied, rather grimly.

‘Oh, get to hell out of this!’ he shouted. ‘A fat lot of use you are! You and your ferns! I’ll have that garden of yours dug up, damned if I won’t!’

‘You’ll do as you please,’ she said, rising. ‘You always have.’

He picked up a copy of the Field, and hurled it after her retreating form. It struck the closing door, and fell in a flutter of crumpled pages to the floor. He was rather pleased with himself for having still enough strength to throw an unhandy missile so far and so accurately; but the effort made him pant, and for some time he lay back against the welter of pillows and cushions, raging at his infirmity. When he had recovered his breath, and his heart had ceased to thud so sickeningly in his chest, he reached out a hand for the whisky decanter. He splashed a liberal amount into a club-tumbler, and drank it neat. He felt better after that, but bent on pursuing his inquiries into Bart’s activities. He was shrewd enough to guess that he would get little satisfaction out of his sons, and presently sent for Loveday herself.

He looked her over critically when she came into the room, appreciating her graceful carriage as much as the beauty of her face. She betrayed no alarm at having been summoned unexpectedly to his room. Her dark eyes met his with a look of submissive inquiry; she came to a halt beside his bed, and folded her hands over her apron. ‘Sir?’

His lips began to curl at the corners. He didn’t blame Bart for making a fool of himself over this girl: he would, in fact, have thought him a poor-spirited young man to have overlooked charms so obvious. He addressed her with a suddenness calculated to throw her off balance. ‘They tell me my son Bart’s been making love to you, Loveday, my girl.’

Her eyelids did not flicker; her deep bosom rose and fell easily to her calm breathing; she smiled slowly, and after meeting his gaze for a limpid moment, cast down her eyes, and murmured: ‘Young gentleman do be high-spirited, sir.’

He was very nearly satisfied with this answer. He let out one of his short cracks of laughter, and reached out a hand to grasp her arm above the elbow. ‘Damme, if I were only ten years younger— !’ he said, drawing her closer. ‘You’re a cosy armful, Loveday, aren’t you? Eh?’

She cast him a sidelong glance, provocative and alluring. ‘There be them as has said so, sir. You’re very good.’ Her smile broadened, and became a little saucy. ‘I try to give satisfaction, sir,’ she said demurely.