Bereft of their womenfolk for three weeks, the Poldark household went along much as usual. The summer was a fair one and the wheat and the oats were cut early. Hay was ricked. Potatoes were drawn and stored. The apples and the pears and the quinces were filling and ripening. Turf and furze was cut and stacked for the winter. Altogether a poor time of year to be away from the farm – not to mention the hollyhocks – and Demelza had almost cried off at the last moment.
‘No,’ said Ross. ‘This is the time to test the training you have given ’em. Everyone depends too much on you for the ultimate decision; and much more beside. Let ’em do it by themselves for once. And if the worst comes to the worst I shall be here to make sure the roof does not fall in.’
‘Really it is two hands short. Clowance is as busy as I am in the summer.’
‘All the more reason for you both to take a holiday.’
Demelza thought of the two trunks lying packed upstairs. ‘And we have spent so much! It doesn’t seem right – just for two weeks – when we are no longer so well off as we used to be.’
‘No, it’s a disgrace,’ said Ross.
She eyed him carefully. ‘But you told us to!’
‘Would you have your daughter go into society dressed like a balmaiden? And as for you – could you possibly be allowed to look like a poor relation?’
‘… The more reason for me not to go.’
‘Anyway, Caroline has lent you both so much. Shawls, fans, reticules, favours.’
‘And a veil, a parasol, a French watch, a capuchin cloak, a turban bonnet. That is quite disgraceful, what we have borrowed from her! Her drawers and cupboards must be empty!’
‘She has enjoyed doing it. You know that. She is taking a vicarious pleasure in the whole trip. You must both try to enjoy it for her sake, if not for mine.’
‘Oh, we’ll try,’ said Demelza. ‘I promise we’ll try.’
With both the women gone and only little Isabella-Rose to lighten their way Ross had more time alone with Jeremy. His son was out and about early and late, full of energy and enterprise, riding here and there on matters to do with Wheal Leisure; but it was all powered by some other fuel than the high spirits with which it had begun. Several times he thought to tell Jeremy of his conversation with John Treneglos riding home on the afternoon of Midsummer Day. But he felt it might seem that he was trying further to blacken the Trevanions and by implication Cuby in Jeremy’s eyes. He remembered once as an eighteen-year-old boy when he had fallen in love for the first time, with a young girl from Tregony, that his father had tried to give him a bit of sage advice and how utterly he had hated it. Even his father mentioning the girl’s name was like a foot bruising a lily. The very words destroyed the delicacy of the relationship they were offering counsel on.
Not, of course, that his father had been the most tactful of men. But was he? It seemed that he was out of step with Jeremy all along the line. And didn’t all young persons resent their parents’ involving themselves, even merely interesting themselves, in their love-affairs? Particularly a broken one.
Out of step with Jeremy? It still was so somehow, in spite of the decision to open the mine together. Nothing overt, certainly. Their day-to-day contacts were frequent now and not unfriendly. Ross had said nothing about the fishing trips, feeling it was Jeremy’s responsibility to tell him. Jeremy still said nothing. Perhaps he intended never to say anything. Did he not suppose that Ross would be curious as to how he had acquired so much knowledge? And why the subterfuge, for God’s sake? Were his father and mother ogres that he had to do this all by stealth? Or fools, to be so ignored?
Yet was this not the time, now, while they shared the house more or less alone, to have it out, to find out what was behind it all?
After supper on the first Tuesday Jeremy gave him an opportunity of a sort by making a passing reference to Caerhays.
Ross said: ‘Horrie’s father was rather in his cups the day we rode home from signing the agreement. I mentioned the name of Trevanion to him, saying you’d been over there, and he began to talk about them. Did you know they were related?’
‘Who?’
‘The Trenegloses and the Trevanions.’
‘No.’
So Ross repeated most of what had passed. When he had finished – and what was to be said could be said quite briefly – he waited, but Jeremy did not comment. His face expressionless, he helped himself to a glass of port.
‘I thought you should know,’ Ross said. ‘For what good it is … This perhaps makes Major Trevanion’s attitude more understandable – if no more admirable … I should have guessed something of the sort.’
‘Why?’
‘Well, money counts everywhere these days, particularly among the landed gentry of Cornwall, where by and large there is so little of it. Family is a consideration but fortune is a much greater one. It’s the more regrettable in this case that people with so much property as the Trevanions should be in such a plight. It is not ill-fortune that has beset them but overweening pride, the pretentiousness of one man in building such a place.’
‘You say it makes Trevanion’s attitude more understandable. I don’t think it does Cuby’s.’ A rictus of pain crossed Jeremy’s face as he spoke the name. But at least he had spoken it, seemed prepared to discuss the matter.
‘Trevanion’s much older than she is. Eleven or twelve years, is it? For long enough he must have taken the place of her father. If her mother agrees with him it would be difficult for a gently-born girl to go against their wishes.’
Jeremy gulped his port. ‘You haven’t met her, Father…’
‘No,’ said Ross peaceably. ‘Of course not.’
Jeremy poured out a second glass and looked across the table. Ross nodded and the port bottle came into his hand. There was a long silence, not a very friendly one.
‘In what way should I revise my opinion?’
Jeremy said reluctantly: ‘Oh, I don’t know…’
‘She’s very young, isn’t she?’
‘Yes.’
‘Doesn’t that have a bearing?’
‘She’s young, but I do not believe she would be persuaded – even brow-beaten – into accepting their plans for her … unless she were willing.’
‘She has an elder sister?’
‘Yes. A sweet girl.’
‘I mean…’
‘I know what you mean, Father. But Clemency’s very plain. I don’t think she would attract rich men.’
‘Even Cuby yet may not,’ Ross said. ‘However pretty and charming. Pray don’t take that wrong. But there’s a great dearth of young men in the county – or even old men – with large fortunes. Remember it is usually the other way round – the men who are the fortune-seekers. Trevanion will have to find someone not only with a considerable fortune but also willing to lend a substantial part of it to him, or to take over the house, or make some such arrangement. It won’t be easy.’
Jeremy finished his port again. ‘Are you trying to comfort me?’
There was anger in his voice, sarcasm.
‘Well, it may be that now we know the true objection we can at least assay the situation afresh.’
‘Find me a fortune and all will be well.’
‘Ah, there’s the rub.’
‘But will it be well? If I went to India and came back a rich man, should I be enchanted to marry a girl who was marrying me only because I was the highest bidder?’
After a moment Ross said: ‘You must not think too harshly too soon. As I said, there are family pressures, even on the strongest-minded of young girls. And it remains a fact that she is not married to anyone else yet, nor in any way attached. The best laid plans…’
Jeremy got up from the table and walked to the open Swindow where the plum purple of the night was stained by the lantern shafts of Wheal Grace. A moth batted its way into the room, flying drunkenly from one obstacle to another.
‘But I do think harshly.’
‘Not more so, surely?’
‘Yes, more so.’
‘Then I’m sorry I told you … I think you’re wrong, Jeremy.’
‘You’re entitled to your view, Father.’
‘Of course.’
There was another taut silence. Ross was determined not to let Jeremy’s anger affect him.
‘There may even be a change in Trevanion’s fortunes.’ The moth had reached the candle and, having singed itself, lay fluttering on the table, beating one wing and trying to become airborne again.
‘And now,’ Jeremy said, ‘I think I will go to bed.’
Ross watched him cross the room, pick up an open book, find a spill to use as a bookmark. This was probably as unpropitious a moment as there could be for going on to the other subject, yet he chose to do so.
‘Perhaps you will spare me a moment longer.’
‘Father, I’m not in a mood to discuss this any more.’
‘No. Nor I. It’s essentially your own affair, and I mentioned it only because I thought you ought to know what John Treneglos had said. Something else.’
‘We’ve both had a long day…’
‘That day I was talking to John Treneglos he said something more to me. He said that these fishing trips you have been taking for so long were all a mask, a deception as it were for other ends. Those ends being regular visits to Harvey’s of Hayle to learn the practical side of engineering and the properties and potentials of high-pressure steam.’
Jeremy put the book down again, closing it over the spill.
‘Is it true?’ Ross said.
‘Yes, that’s true.’
‘What was the particular object in the subterfuge?’
‘Does it matter?
‘Yes. I think it does.’
‘Why?’
‘Because it seems you have gone out of your way to hide this from me all along. And from your mother too. Your study of the theory of steam and steam engines, the books you’ve read, the letters you’ve written and received – and more particularly, the practical experience you’ve been gaining. You even told Dwight not to mention the books he was lending you. Don’t you think I’m entitled to an explanation?’
Jeremy was a long time before he spoke again. ‘You thought all such experimentation dangerous,’ he muttered.
‘When? Did I say so?’
‘Yes. And you have never believed in the possibilities of strong steam.’
‘I don’t yet know what the possibilities are. Perhaps no one does. Certainly there are dangers.’
‘So, when I showed an interest you told me to keep away from it.’
‘Did I? … Yes.’ With the corner of his spoon Ross lifted the moth, and it began to flutter around again. ‘Yes, on recollection, I did. So you thought, what the eye does not see, the heart does not grieve. Is that it?’
‘I had not thought of it in perhaps those disagreeable terms. But yes.’
‘I suppose you realize it has put me in a false position?’
‘I hadn’t realized, no.’
‘Well, as you’ve grown up, come to manhood, you have seemed to me to have too little purpose … interest, direction.’
‘Does Mother feel the same?’
‘Should she not? Of course your mother – like most mothers – tends to see only the best. I tried to. I told myself I was expecting too much too soon. But sometimes your way of treating things came to irritate me. In spite of efforts to the contrary. You may have noticed.’
‘Yes.’
‘Sometimes I have shown – or at least felt – less than admirable patience with what you have had to say. I don’t think I’m altogether deficient in a sense of humour … but this – this aimless flippancy…’
‘It’s just a different sort of humour,’ Jeremy said.
‘Maybe. But you see, however flippant, it wouldn’t have seemed aimless if … I find my judgments – opinions of you – call them what you will – were built on wrong information – or rather lack of information. Few things are more galling than to feel one has been … made a monkey of.’
‘I see what you mean. If it’s my fault I’m sorry.’
‘Perhaps it does not matter that you don’t sound it.’
‘Well would you have been better pleased if you had known I was disobeying your strict orders not to do what I wanted to do?’
‘For God’s sake, boy, are your parents tyrants that you have to scheme and lie to get your own way! Could there not at least have been a discussion on it?’
‘You’d said no. What more could you say?’
‘I’m not sure I meant it as irrevocably as you took it.’
‘Well, I so took it.’
Ross said: ‘I knew Francis Harvey well and liked him. If you have a boy who is just growing up and he shows a tendency to play with a dangerous thing which has killed a friend you say to him, “don’t do that! you’ll injure yourself.” So I did to you with high-pressure steam, just as I would tell you to beware the vellows on the beach, or keep away from the cow just after she’s calved, or don’t go down that mine, it’s been closed for years and the planks will be rotten. If when you grow older you don’t understand that as a filial impulse, you’ll make a bad father!’
‘I think it was a little more than that.’
‘It’s hard to recollect my exact feelings after several years. Perhaps I was afraid of your becoming too fascinated by Trevithick.’
Jeremy blew out a breath. ‘That’s possible.’
Ross said: ‘His inventions are so high-flying and then come to naught. The collapse of his demonstration in London, fascinating though it was, did not surprise me. Nor did the explosion that killed those men. And since then, what has he done?’
‘The wonderful experiment at Pen-y-Daren, when his locomotive drew five wagons with ten tons of iron and carried seventy men a distance of ten miles. That was a marvel.’
‘That was before the London experiment.’
‘Maybe.’ Jeremy was disconcerted at his father’s memory. ‘But it was still a marvel and has yet to be equalled.’
Ross said: ‘Trevithick is now a sick man. Back in Cornwall and little advanced for all his years in London. As you told me, you were unable to get to see him.’ He added as Jeremy was about to speak: ‘That is not meant to be a prejudiced view. Nothing would please me more than to see him succeed triumphantly –’
‘Mr Woolf,’ said Jeremy, ‘is just as committed to strong steam. Only he is not interested in developing the road carriage.’
‘Well I must ask myself then, was there any other reason apart from consideration for your physical safety that made me dislike the idea of your becoming involved on a practical level.’
‘Does it matter now? Why ask these questions? What do you want me to do?’
‘Nothing, of course. Except to take me into your confidence a little more freely.’
‘I’m sorry again,’ Jeremy said, but sulkily.
Ross said: ‘It could have been an instance of false pride.’
Jeremy was surprised enough to look at his father.
‘What, in you?’
‘Yes, possibly. In spite of oneself one sometimes nurtures false notions of what a man of our position shall do. As you will have observed, throughout my life I have worked alongside my workers and cared not a curse for calloused fingers or dirty nails in seeing to the mine or farm. But studying the principles of steam and motion at a practical level is a little like becoming a – a refined blacksmith.’
‘Does that matter either?’
‘Well, what other young man of your position has wanted to do this? Quite different from standing by and taking an intelligent interest and encouraging the working inventor. It is somewhat akin to entering the forces without becoming an officer.’ Ross put out one of the candles in an attempt to discourage the moth. ‘Dear God, how consequential and old-fashioned this sounds! Pray don’t think I agree with it; I am trying to explore my own motives and give them a public airing.’
Jeremy poured himself a third glass of port.
‘I came across this view when I first went to Harvey’s, Father. Mr Henry Harvey was quite pleased to entertain me as the son of Captain Poldark who had called to look round his works; but he could not quite believe that I wished to work on the nuts and bolts. Twasn’t done, my dee-ur!’
His lapse into the comic vernacular was a first sign of lessening tension.
Ross said: ‘Even now I am not quite sure what the fascination is.’
‘Of steam? For me, you mean?’
‘Of course.’
Jeremy shut one of the windows and latched it. ‘I must have told you this before.’
‘Others perhaps. You never bothered to inform me.’
The young man raised his eyebrows at this bitterness escaping.
‘It’s too late tonight, Father.’
‘I don’t think so.’
Jeremy hesitated, aware of the clash of wills.
‘Is this a condition of some sort?’
‘Of course not. Of course not.’
Still he hesitated. ‘Well … isn’t it obvious? Strong steam is the most remarkable discovery since the wheel…’
‘Is it?’
‘Well … consider its power. And, unlike gunpowder, its peaceful uses are limitless. In the end it will provide light and heat and replace the horse and the sail. It will transform civilization!’
Ross said: ‘For the better?’
‘I believe so. Anyway its power has come to stay. We cannot turn back. If we don’t develop it, others will.’
Ross looked at his son, who was now, much against its wishes, helping the injured moth out of the other window before he closed it.
‘With Saturday’s meeting coming on, it’s important I should know as much on all this as I can.’
‘But that’s just it; I don’t want the decision on the engine to be influenced in any way by my being your son! The choice should be made quite indifferently.’
‘So it shall be. But let us be practical. Saving the presence of some complete outsider, some engineer from Truro or Redruth, the decision ultimately has to be mine. What do the Trenegloses know? And the Curnows and Aaron Nanfan have already been consulted by you…’
‘Mr Harvey and Mr West will be here.’
‘Yes – I’m relying a good deal on that.’
There was a pause. Jeremy finished his port and inelegantly wiped his mouth on the back of his hand.
‘Well, let us see when Saturday comes, Father.’ Ross put out another of the candles.
‘Lately I have been looking again at our old engine at Wheal Grace, and I have been talking to Peter Curnow. You’ve made many unfavourable comparisons during the last weeks with what can be built now. But Beth was put up by Trevithick, or at least to Trevithick’s designs. Have his ideas changed so radically in twenty years?’
‘When Beth was built the Watt patent of his separate condenser had some years to run; and if other engineers infringed it they courted a lawsuit. Watt was pretty unscrupulous, wasn’t he?’
‘So I’ve been told.’
‘At Grace we have a Boulton & Watt type of engine working at only a few pounds above the pressure of the atmosphere, with some improvements, of course, by Bull and Trevithick, and it is a good engine, will work for years if properly treated. There are many such about. Indeed many of them are working at far below their proper efficiency because of ignorance and neglect. I wouldn’t say that about Beth. But her best is just not good enough.’
Ross put out the third candle. From the last he lit two carrying candlesticks.
Jeremy said: ‘When the Boulton & Watt patent firstly ran out they took away all their experienced engineers and agents. Murdock left the year before, and so many mines depended on him … It seems as if for a few years there weren’t enough Cornishmen to go round who knew the science of it or had the experience. Isn’t that so? You must know it better than I do…’
‘It was that, I suppose. And also there was no rivalry – Boulton & Watt against anti-Boulton & Watt. Whatever the reason, things fell apart for a while, I know.’
‘But it didn’t stop invention, did it. People went on experimenting. Of course the basis of the biggest advance lies in the high-pressure boiler and the new ideas incorporated in that; but there are others. Much of the advance lies in the accuracy of the manufacturing.’
‘Which Harvey’s seem confident of achieving.’
‘Yes … Oh, yes. My – this engine for Wheal Leisure is not so different from others they have recently made; but as you will have seen from the measurements, it is much smaller than that at Grace. Yet you’ll find it more powerful and much cheaper to run.’
Ross handed one of the carrying candlesticks to Jeremy. He thought of saying more but decided not.
‘I wonder how your mother and Clowance are faring.’
‘Very well, I should guess.’
‘So should I,’ said Ross.
In a state of embattled but increasing amity the two men climbed the stairs to bed.
On Saturday in a discussion that lasted from eleven till one it was decided to proceed with the engine designed by the chief venturer’s son. Afterwards dinner was taken – a purely masculine meal – and then Mr Henry Harvey and Mr William West set off on their long ride home. Three times the following week the chief venturer’s son rode to Hayle, twice with Horrie Treneglos as companion, the last time with Paul and Daisy Kellow.
There was, of course, nothing whatever to see as yet, and in any event, even when completed, the engine would be shipped piecemeal – by sea given the right weather – and would be totally assembled only on the site. Paul was chiefly interested in the road machine, and Daisy similarly, though there was precious little of this to see either, as Jeremy had warned her on Midsummer Eve. Still, she seemed to find enough to occupy her while Jeremy was deep in discussion with Messrs Harvey, West and Pole.
As they mounted to return home Daisy said to him: ‘What does it all mean, Jeremy? “A neck joint to be made with a dovetail spigot and socket and iron cement?” Is that not what I heard you say?’
‘I’m sorry, Daisy. I told you it was all very tedious.’
‘Yes, but what did it mean?’
‘Mr West believes that such heating tubes may sometimes crack but will never burst. Is that not of sufficient importance?’
She lowered her eyes. ‘I’m sorry if I am tedious to you asking such stupid questions.’
‘You could never be tedious.’
‘Well,’ she said, glimmering a smile at him, ‘since St John’s Eve you have given me little opportunity to be so.’
‘Then it is my concern to be sorry, Daisy, not yours, for I have been so engaged with plans for the mine and for the engine that I have had little time for anything else.’ Which was only true in so far as he had deliberately sought the absorption. He had come so close to seeking the counter-irritant of a love-affair with Daisy. But she was not a girl to be lightly had – or if lightly had not to be lightly discarded – and he had just retained sufficient common sense to perceive that taking another girl on the rebound was not the recipe for a happy marriage.
Even as it was the relationship was difficult enough; he genuinely liked her and found her good company. One side of him also wanted her. She was an altogether attractive young woman with a lively, challenging, sparkling manner and a pretty figure. He knew he only had to nod. So keeping her at a friendly distance without offending her was a matter of balance and a cause of frustrating self-restraint.
And all because of a girl who had discarded him and was waiting around to marry someone with money. His father, it seemed, had expected him to take comfort from what he had told him of the Trevanions’ situation. He had found no comfort in it at all. The obstacle between him and Cuby was now greater because it was more assessable. Fundamentally the first objection had been ludicrously and offensively slight. But money was another matter. This was something you could set down on paper and add to or subtract from. To add to golden numbers golden numbers. It was a precise barrier which could precisely, but only in one way, be removed.
Jeremy saw no way whatsoever of even making a start to remove it. He had never previously felt any special desire to be rich. Of his two projects, the steam carriage would be likely to be years coming to practical fruition – if it ever did. As for the mine, that was a gamble; but unless they struck another Dolcoath it would be unlikely to put him in the category of rich man the Trevanions were looking for.
And if some miracle should occur, what, as he had said to his father, was the attraction of marrying a girl and into a family that only wanted his money?
So while he rode home with Daisy and joked with her and allowed a new little flirtation to develop, another part of his mind was allowing itself the brief luxury of thinking of Cuby – brief and seldom consciously permitted because it bred such bitterness and devastation in his heart. And as the day faded and he left Daisy and Paul at Fernmore with a promise that they should meet again on the morrow, so his last hopes, his last pretences faded too. It had to be faced. Life without Cuby Trevanion had to be faced – not for this week or for this year but for good. She was not for him. There must be other girls in the world. Daisy, even. But he could never see Cuby again. It would only tear him apart if he met her again. She was not for him – ever.
He was home before the sun set, but could not bring himself to go in. He felt so deathly tired and full of a misery and a pain more awful than before. He decided to walk up to Wheal Leisure, since this might for a few minutes take his attention away from himself. To one of the other men …
His father was there.
Jeremy’s first instinct was to avoid him, to dodge away so that there was no risk of his own mood being perceived. Somehow his father knew him both too well and not well enough …
But he checked the impulse. Ross greeted him with a smile and a raised hand and went on with his inspection of the building. Presently Jeremy joined him.
At least something, Jeremy thought, had come out of this miserable week. That talk, that non-quarrel they had had, had somehow begun to clear the air. For the first time he had been able to see his father as a vulnerable man. Previous to this he had seemed so formidable, secure in his position and in his accomplishments. His father and mother were such a pair – complete within themselves, self-contained, they seemed capable of dealing with any problem or emergency. At that supper talk he was sure his father had pretended a lesser knowledge of the development of the mine engine than he really had. But nevertheless the nature of that pretence – if it was such – and the nature of the whole conversation had suggested … Perhaps his invulnerable father was vulnerable in one respect only – to the feelings and happiness of his children. It was a new thought.
The house was now up to the second floor. Even in its site on the lower shelf of the cliff it was already showing against the skyline. When it was finished, with its arched door and windows, its sharply canted slate roof and cylindrical brick chimney, it would conform to an architectural tradition that blended use and dignity.
After a while Ross said: ‘Is something amiss?’
‘No…’ This question was just what he had been afraid of.
‘I mean – more amiss than usual.’
Jeremy smiled wryly. ‘No.’
Ross looked up at the building. ‘She will look somewhat grander than Grace has ever done. When we put up that house we were living hand to mouth in all respects. Seeking, ever seeking copper and never finding it. I was negotiating with the venturers of Wheal Radiant to sell them the engine when we at last found tin. I remember Henshawe’s face, how he looked when he brought those samples to show me…’ He paused. ‘Don’t forget I can have a fellow feeling, Jeremy. I was once in the same boat.’
‘What boat?’
‘Perhaps I should more properly call it a shipwreck … I mean the boat of loving a woman and losing her.’
‘History repeating itself … But you found…’
‘Someone better, I know. But it’s hard to think that at the time.’
Jeremy stirred the rubble with his foot. ‘A pity Captain Henshawe left. He had the keenest eye for a lode.’
‘Oh, and still profits from it. But the offer from Wales was too good. I could not stand in his way.’
‘I think Ben will do well.’
‘I hope so. It will come different when he has thirty or forty men to see to. There are many like him in the county – eccentrics by nature. It is an aspect of the Cornish temperament.’
‘I don’t think I like some aspects of the Cornish temperament.’
‘Oh, if it is the aspect I think you’re thinking of, it is not peculiar to Cornwall. Indeed, the further east you go the more pronounced it becomes.’
Jeremy said: ‘Perhaps it is just human nature I detest.’
‘Some parts of it, no doubt.’
Jeremy said suddenly, roughly: ‘Did Aunt Elizabeth marry your cousin Francis Poldark because he had more money?’
Ross blinked. This was straight from the shoulder. But he had invited it.
‘Her mother was minded that she should marry him. Elizabeth was much influenced by her parents. But also there was the report – or rumour – that I had died of wounds in America. When I returned she and Francis were engaged … It is a very complex subject.’
‘All such subjects are, Father.’ Jeremy gave a short laugh. Abruptly he turned away. ‘Ben was a long time making up his mind to accept our offer. I think in the end it was on account of Clowance he took it.’
Ross frowned. ‘What mystery now?’
‘None … You – I expect you know that Ben has always been – well, lost for her.’
‘I knew he was fond. Not to that extent.’
‘Oh yes. I don’t think he has any hopes, but he may feel that if other things do not work out and by some miracle – miracle for him – she should turn to him, he would have more of a position, be earning money of a sort, be more in step, as it were.’
After a moment Ross said: ‘God, we are a wry lot.’
‘I echo that.’
As they returned home the sand was soft, recently washed by the tide; their feet crunched in it like walking over new-fallen snow.
Ross said: ‘Tell me, does Bella indulge in any courtship yet?’
‘Only with her guinea pig.’
They climbed the stile from the beach and made for the house. Stephen was in the garden examining Demelza’s flowers.
‘Stephen!’ Jeremy said.
‘Ah,’ Stephen nodded. ‘Good evening to you, sir. I trust I’m not intruding, like.’
Ross nodded back. ‘Not at all. Pray come in.’
‘These tall flowers, sir; these spikes with little roses. I don’t recall having seen ’em before.’
‘Hollyhocks,’ said Ross. ‘My wife has a weakness for them, but they get badly treated by the wind.’ Stephen bent to sniff them. ‘No smell.’
‘Little enough. You wanted to talk to Jeremy?’
‘Well, no, not exactly. I wanted a word with you, Captain Poldark, sir. With Jeremy too, if he’s the mind to stay. It is just a matter of business, like. I thought to come and have a word wi’ you.’
Ross glanced in at the window of Nampara. Mrs Gimlett was just lighting the candles. Isabella-Rose, not yet having seen her father’s approach, was dancing round Jane Gimlett. What vitality the child had! Far more even than the other two at that age.
‘Business?’
‘Well, sir, it is this way. No doubt you know I have been working at Wheal Leisure.’
‘Yes, of course.’
Stephen pushed a hand through his mane of hair. ‘As you know, Captain Poldark, your son and I, we got well acquainted while you was away; and since I returned to these parts he has told me about Wheal Leisure and what he has planned to do. Well, I’ve faith in that, Cap’n Poldark, I’ve faith in that.’
There was a pause.
‘Yes?’
‘A few weeks ago I went down the mine with Jeremy, and working in a mine is not for me! I’ve never in me life wished meself out of a hole in the ground so quick! But I’ve been thinking of the venture, as a venture; and I’m a bit of a gambling man. You know how it is when you’ve a feel that something is going to do well? I think Wheal Leisure is going to do well.’
Ross said: ‘And the matter of business is…’
Stephen came closer. He was carrying a small leather bag.
‘The business is I’d like to invest in the mine. No doubt Jeremy will have told you that I sold me prize in Bristol. Not that I got what I should’ve, but I got a share. Well … Jeremy has told me you have shares to sell in Wheal Leisure. At £20 a share. I’d like two, if you please.’
The two Poldarks looked at each other. Jeremy made a slight lift of the eyebrows to indicate to his father that this was as much a surprise to him as anyone.
Ross said: ‘The shares that are being offered to the public were advertised in the Royal Cornwall Gazette of July 13. As stated in the advertisement you would have to apply to a Mr Barrington Burdett of 7, Pydar Street, Truro. I do not know whether they will yet have gone. Of course I should have no objections to your investing, but I must tell you of the pitfalls. You look a young man of experience, Carrington, and worldly wise. But sinking money in a mine carries with it unique risks, and it wouldn’t be fair to let you take those risks unwarned. It is all a little safer than staking your money on a horse or on the throw of a card, but not much.’
Stephen looked him in the eye. ‘You’re doing that, Captain Poldark.’
Ross smiled. ‘I have been lucky once, but nearly came to bankruptcy first. Just say it’s in my blood.’
‘I’m a trifle of a gambler meself,’ said Stephen. ‘Life, I reckon, is not worth living if you don’t take a risk. And working at the mine like I have been has got me interested. I happen to be down here. One way or another I’ve the hope to work around here. It’s a feeling, like. If tweren’t for your son I’d not be alive, so I’ve the feeling he’s me lucky mascot. So I’d like to take the gamble with me friends.’
Ross said: ‘Perhaps Jeremy will have told you how this system is operated. Those who put money into a mine are called the venturers, and each deposits into the purser’s fund in accordance with the number of shares he has taken up. If each share is provisionally valued at £20, then I must put in £100, and Mr Treneglos, Jeremy and Horace Treneglos the same. You if you bought two shares would of course pay £40. Wait … that is not the end of it. Every three months a meeting is held at which the purser accounts in his cost book for the money spent. When opening a new mine such as this it will be necessary to call for another similar amount to be put in at the first quarterly meeting. That doubles one’s investment. There might well be another later. When a venturer can no longer find the money to pay in his share, or is no longer willing to, he puts his holding up for sale. If the mine by then has not been proved he may well have to sell at a very big discount. When enough of the venturers are unable or unwilling to answer further calls then the mine closes down. You understand this?’
‘Pretty well,’ said Stephen. He swung his little bag against his thigh. ‘I reckon I can meet a second call. After that, twould depend on what I have done since. But –’
‘My father,’ said Jeremy, ‘rightly points out the dangers. There is of course the happier side – when the venturers meet quarterly and it is the business of the purser only to distribute the profits. This he does on the spot: in gold, in notes, in bank post bills. I have often thought a successful venturers’ meeting would be a suitable target for a highwayman, Father, for many of the venturers on such an occasion get as drunk as a Piraner.’
Ross was going to say something more but he was suddenly overwhelmed as Isabella-Rose came hurtling out of the house in a flurry of curls and ribbons and petticoats and threw herself at her father in great distress. ‘Bella, Bella, Bella!’ He lifted her in his arms and swung her round.
‘Papa-a-a,’ she bleated. ‘Mrs Kemp says I may not stay up to supper because I have been r-r-rude to her! She says I pinched her, when I did not! I merely tweaked her skirt, and she says that was r-r-rude too! She wouldn’t let me light the candles because she said I dropped grease on the carpet. Have you ever seen me drop grease on the carpet? Have you, Papa – have you?’
Ross kissed the delicate cheek, which he noticed was not at all tear-stained.
‘My little Bella, Mrs Kemp is a very kind person who, while your mother is away, has charge of you, do you understand? Mama cannot be here, so Mrs Kemp is in – authority. Do you know what that means?’
‘Yes, Papa, how strange of you to think I should not! But she says I pinched her, when I did not, and –’
‘Bella, would it not be a nice thing to do: to say you are sorry to Mrs Kemp – oh no, I didn’t say you pinched her – sorry for tweaking her skirt; and then, perhaps, if you said you were sorry for that, she might be persuaded to let you stay up to supper. See, we have Mr Stephen Carrington to supper, so do you not think you should run in at this minute and make your peace with Mrs Kemp?’
‘Thank you, sir,’ said Stephen Carrington, as the little girl, after an initial hesitation, went flying in.
‘I cannot promise about the shares,’ Ross said. ‘Food we can guarantee.’
He went in ahead of the two young men. He thought while Clowance was away it would be a good time to see more of one of her suitors and to make up his own mind about him.