The driver of the carriage Kerensa hired helped her down on to the gravel driveway outside the Manor house. She thanked him, then shifted the sleeping child who had grown heavy in her arms.
‘If you’ll wait, I’ll have some money sent out to you,’ she said.
‘No need for that, m’lady,’ replied the friendly driver. ‘Someone can settle up next time they’re in town.’
The carriage was drawing away when Polly opened the huge main door to her. ‘My lady!’ she gasped, at the unexpected sight before her.
‘Is Sir Oliver still here, Polly?’ asked Kerensa, bringing Kane into the warmth of his new home.
‘Yes, my lady,’ Polly said, following closely at the girl’s heels and peering over her shoulder at the child who was waking up. ‘He was about to leave for Ker-an-Mor Farm but has just come back for something and gone into his study.’
‘Good. Will you fetch me a tray of food and tea please, Polly? I’m ravenously hungry.’
‘And in need of a clean dress,’ the housekeeper remarked, wrinkling her nose.
‘That can wait. I’ve put up with the smell this past hour and more so a bit longer won’t hurt me.’
Polly excitedly dashed off to the kitchen and Kerensa walked into her husband’s study.
‘Oliver, I owe some money for a carriage I hired from Marazion, and Jack will have to ride over to Ned Angove’s and collect Kernick.’
Not having heard such a blunt statement, delivered so directly and positively from her before, Oliver looked up from his desk. He gazed at her as she stood in the doorway, holding a small child who was looking up at her with its thumb in its mouth.
‘There’s no fire in here,’ she went on disapprovingly. ‘I’ll take him through to my sitting room. Ruth should have lit one in there by now. This is Kane, by the way.’
‘Kerensa…’ Oliver began.
But she had already left the room. He followed her into her sitting room where she placed the child in an armchair and pulled off her hat and cloak.
‘Kerensa,’ Oliver started again, ‘will you tell me what’s been happening and what you’re doing with that child?’
He didn’t sound cross, only puzzled, but she was still in a protective mood. ‘I’m not giving Kane up, whatever you say,’ she told him fiercely, taking the boy into her arms again. ‘I had to fight to get him.’
‘What do you mean, you had to fight to get him?’
‘Just exactly what I said. I’ll leave here before I give him up.’
‘You don’t have to do that, my dear,’ Oliver said, becoming alarmed. ‘I wasn’t about to make any such suggestion, but I would like to know what this is all about.’
Kerensa sat down with Kane cuddled against her. ‘I bought him in Marazion, from a dreadful sailor,’ she said. ‘That is, I exchanged him for my saddle and a guinea, and I had a legal document drawn up to prove it, so no one can take him away from me.’
Oliver rubbed his chin. ‘You amaze me, Kerensa.’
‘Have you nothing else to say?’ she asked, her resolution undiminished.
‘All right,’ said Oliver, never one to shy away from a challenge. ‘Why did you acquire the child from this… dreadful sailor?’
‘Because the little boy’s been so cruelly ill-treated,’ she replied, anger rising in her again. ‘Just look at his poor little body.’
Pulling aside the blanket and shawl, she lifted the boy’s gown. Oliver came and crouched at her feet, looking intently at the bruises, scratches and sores on the child’s torso. He gingerly took one tiny hand.
‘Hello, Kane. You are in a sorry state, aren’t you?’ he murmured very softly.
‘These aren’t the clothes he was wearing when I came across him crying miserably on the beach. He had nothing more than a filthy rag on then. I cleaned him up in the back of Araminta Bray’s shop, and Lowenna Angove took a note for me to Mistress Gluyas’ for these,’ Kerensa said, holding out a piece of the child’s gown, pleased at Oliver’s interest. ‘I couldn’t bear to leave him. He was going to be sold for a shilling in the market, and goodness knows what would have happened to him then.’
‘Mmm, he’s crawling with lice too, poor little fellow, and smells nearly as bad as Beatrice.’
‘Mrs Bray gave me some soap and hot water to clean him up but it hasn’t made a lot of difference. You don’t mind me bringing him home, do you, Oliver?’ she asked earnestly.
‘I don’t know… I’ll have to think about it. I haven’t had time to get used to the idea yet.’
With his thumb stuck firmly in his mouth, Kane’s brown eyes followed all of Oliver’s movements as he allowed the big man to tickle his wet dribbly chin.
‘He seems to like you,’ Kerensa smiled. ‘The poor little mite was terrified of the sailor. He frightened me too.’
‘Did he hurt you?’ Oliver asked quickly, his face darkening. ‘Because if he did…’
‘No, it was just a horrible experience,’ Kerensa replied, putting a hand on Oliver’s shoulder in case he was about to ride off to Marazion to thrash the life out of the sailor.
Oliver knew what her gesture had meant. He took her hand and kissed it, then bent forward and kissed her cheek. ‘Well, my love, I am very proud of you. Not many men would have had the courage to stand up to such a bully, as you obviously must have done.’
‘Of course, I owe money to Nancarrow and Holborn’s too for having the document drawn up, Oliver,’ she said weakly, a feeling of tiredness coming over her after the excitement.
‘I’ll settle that, don’t you worry about it.’
‘What about the saddle? I told the sailor he could sell it for about fifteen guineas.’
‘Double the amount is more likely.’
‘Do you mind very much, Oliver? I only had a guinea and he said it wasn’t enough and I couldn’t think of anything else to do.’
‘A saddle isn’t important, my love. A child’s well-being is. You sit quietly and rest while I get Beatrice to take the boy up to the nursery and Polly to see to you. What you need now is a rest and a change of clothes,’ Oliver said soothingly.
‘No!’ Kerensa said. ‘Kane won’t let anyone near him but me at the moment and I don’t care about myself, I won’t do anything until we’ve settled what’s to happen to him right now.’
Oliver looked taken aback but he could see her determination – and he admired her for it. ‘What would you like to do with him?’ he asked quietly.
‘I thought of nothing else all the way home. I want to bring him up as ours, Oliver. I found him when he needed me and as far as I’m concerned he’ll always need me. I felt he belonged to me at the moment I held him in my arms.’ Kerensa’s eyes filled with tears as she spoke. ‘I couldn’t let him go now, Oliver. Please try to understand, I don’t want him put to a kind family on the Estate or something like that. I want him to be ours, but if you can’t accept that I’ll go away and keep him all to myself.’
‘Dear life, Kerensa,’ Oliver said, moved by her tears and intensity and fearful at her threat, ‘you don’t have to go, I’ve already told you that. In fact, you can fill the house with every stray brat in the parish if only you’ll stay and never leave.’
‘Do you mean it?’ she said, looking into his deep dark eyes. ‘That you don’t ever want me to leave here and Kane can stay?’
‘Yes, I couldn’t bear it if you left me now, my love,’ he answered softly. ‘And Kane can stay.’
‘As ours?’
Oliver looked into the large startled brown eyes of the child. The little boy might be between him and Kerensa now in the physical sense but there was no reason for him ever to part them. ‘As ours,’ Oliver whispered.
‘Oh, Oliver!’ Throwing an arm around his neck, Kerensa kissed him. ‘I know you’ll grow to love him as I do already. You’re wonderful, Oliver Pengarron, for all your proud and stern ways, do you know that? And do you know that I love you so very, very much?’
‘What!’ Oliver exclaimed, sweeping an arm around her closely and making Kane protest at being squashed between them. ‘Do you mean it, Kerensa?’
‘Yes, yes, yes. I love you, and have done for a long time.’
‘I love you, Kerensa Pengarron. You’re wonderful. I’ve also loved you for a long, long time.’ He was serious for a moment but then they kissed and laughed, and kissed and hugged, trying to placate Kane at the same time. ‘I’d kiss the boy too if he wasn’t so dirty,’ Oliver asserted, but doing it anyway.
A small group of women had gathered in the room but were ignored. Having told Ruth and Esther and Beatrice about Kerensa’s arrival home with the infant, Polly had come with them to view the Manor’s tiny guest.
‘I do ’ope they baint goin’ to keep that up fer long or that little small boy there will be starved to death,’ muttered Beatrice, with her lopsided grin.
Ruth and Esther exchanged indulgent glances and Polly whispered to them, ‘I was beginning to think they were never going to realise how they felt about each other.’
‘Yer noticed too, did ’ee?’ Beatrice said, wiping away a long drop from her nose. ‘Wonder ’ow long it would ’ave took ’em without the young’un coming along.’
‘Good Lord,’ Oliver whispered, much later in their bedroom, ‘he’s got the same colour hair as you.’
‘You would never have guessed it,’ said Kerensa, as she looked fondly down on Kane’s sleeping form in the cradle only recently vacated by the Trenchard twins. ‘It took three good washes to get him this clean and there’s still some ground-in dirt in places. Poor little soul, I put him in the kitchen sink and he screamed and screamed so I had to take him out after only a short time. He’s got a thin scar running from the side of his neck right down his back, something he’ll carry for the rest of his life to remind him of his terrible beginning.’
‘Do you know,’ Oliver said thoughtfully, looking at Kane’s head from all angles, ‘he looks a cross between Arthur Beswetherick and Esau the fieldmouse.’
‘Oh, he doesn’t, he’s beautiful. Of course I can’t speak on Arthur Beswetherick,’ Kerensa gave her husband a playful slap on the chest. ‘What did he look like, Oliver?’
‘Nothing like Martin or William. He was considered most handsome. He would have taken quite a fancy to you, my love,’ Oliver said, with a saucy wink. ‘I would have had to watch him very closely.’ Looking back at Kane, he added, ‘Arthur had the same shade of brown eyes. What’s that strange smell? Reminds me of one of Beatrice’s herbal ointments.’
‘It is. He’s got one ointment for the sores on his little body and another one to get rid of the lice.’
As they peered over the cradle Kane turned over on his side, put his thumb in his mouth, and slept on. ‘Why isn’t he in the nursery?’ Oliver asked.
‘It’s too far away from our bedroom and I want to see to Kane myself. He only really seems happy with me at the moment so I asked Jack to bring the cradle in here.’
‘He likes to suck his thumb, doesn’t he? He’d better give up the habit if he doesn’t want children like that Drannock boy teasing him when he gets older.’
‘You mean Bartholomew?’ Kerensa said, her face reddening at the thought of the secret she shared concerning the other, older boy. She wished she could tell Oliver what she knew. With the declaration of their love fresh in her mind she wanted to keep nothing from him, wanted nothing ever to act as a barrier between them. Perhaps one day soon the time would be right and she would tell him about his fisherman half-brother in Perranbarvah.
‘Yes, that’s him,’ Oliver went on, taking her into his arms. ‘Have a good look at him the next time you see him, my love. I believe there’s Pengarron blood somewhere in that brat.’
‘Why? Because he’s rude and already showing more than a passing interest in girls of his own age and older?’
‘No,’ he said, feigning indignation. ‘The day he helped pull me out of the sea I saw the look of a Pengarron in his face, I swear. Quite clear, it was. It wouldn’t surprise me if one of my grandfathers was more than friendly with one of his grandmothers.’
Kerensa didn’t know what to say to this and returned her attention to Kane as he stirred. ‘It’s a bit of a squeeze for him in here, I’ll have to sort out a bed for him.’ She stroked his straggly hair. ‘I hope that sailor is not his real father. Any man would be better than him.’
‘Well, at least he will have a better life with us than he would have had left in that wretch’s hands. By the way, I got your saddle back from Ned Angove while I was in Marazion. Seems he got the sailor to agree to part with it just for one guinea. I returned Ned’s guinea and gave him one for his daughter for coming to your aid. I don’t think we’ll ever see that sailor again.’
‘Why?’ Kerensa said, alarmed. ‘Have you done something to him, Oliver?’ She would never forget the retribution served out to Peter Blake after he had abused her.
‘If I had come across him he would not have escaped a thorough thrashing, but Hezekiah is to see he will sail with him and never set foot on Cornish soil again. He’ll spend the rest of his life languishing in some foreign backwater port. Free Spirit came in on the evening tide and Hezekiah had heard all about you and the sailor. Seems you were prepared to fight tooth and nail for the boy. I’m very proud of you, my precious love.’ Kissing her warmly, Oliver pulled Kerensa to her feet. ‘Come on, to bed now, and I hope the little fellow doesn’t wake up for quite a while…’
‘I love you with my whole being, Oliver Pengarron,’ she said. ‘And if I ever have to, I’ll fight tooth and nail for you.’
‘Do you think I need more holly over the mantelpiece, Beatrice?’ Kerensa asked, critically viewing her handiwork at decorating her sitting room for Christmas Day.
‘Naw, that’ll do I d’believe, young missus. I’d best git these other bits cleared up afore the boy ’ere eats they berries.’
Kerensa looked affectionately at Kane who was lying on his stomach on the floor, happily playing tug-of-war over a wooden toy with Bob. With plenty of good food and goat’s milk and an overabundance of love and attention, the boy had undergone a remarkable change during the last few weeks. His protruding bones had gradually disappeared as his body filled out, and he quickly became sturdy on his feet while showing a notable strength at pulling apart his toys and any other item that found its way into his searching hands.
His weeping sores had healed and vanished, his red hair became straight and shiny, and although his milk teeth were either missing or rotten, Doctor Crebo, who had been called in to look him over, advised that with the correct diet and fresh air every day, his second teeth would be healthy and strong.
Kerensa was happy at last, and not the only one to dote freely on Kane. Beatrice often sat him on what little lap she had left, Jack would take his tiny hand and show him the Manor’s horseflesh. Nathan held him to look up into the nests and cages of any injured animals in the hut, Jake laughed to himself and turned a blind eye when he liberally watered his plants rather than ask to be taken to the water closet, and Polly, Ruth and Esther indulged in his every whim. Oliver, who was probably the most indulgent of them all and had no belief in a child having to ‘behave himself’, delighted in giving him endless rides on Conomor around the stableyard.
Looking back at the mantelpiece Kerensa decided one more piece of holly would be required to complete the effect she desired and climbed up on the chair in front of her, reaching upwards.
‘You be careful, m’dear,’ Beatrice rasped, gathering up holly branches and sniffing noisily as her nose ran. ‘I’ll ’ave these outside an’ the gard’ners can do what they like with ’em.’
‘Why must I be careful?’ Kerensa smiled. ‘I’m not going to eat holly berries, Beatrice.’
‘Careful of climbin’ about, young missus, is what I d’mean.’
‘The mantelpiece isn’t that high.’
‘Gis on with ’ee,’ blurted Beatrice. ‘I seen it in yer face days ago. Don’t ’ee know yerself yet, cheeil?’
‘Know what, Beatrice?’ Kerensa asked, stepping down from the chair, ‘What are you talking about?’
Clutching holly in one hand, Beatrice wiped the drip from her nose with the heel of the other. ‘Think ’bout it,’ she said, broadly grinning at the puzzled girl. ‘When did Nature last pay ’ee a monthly call, eh? You haven’t seen nothin’ since the young’un’s been ’ere, ’ave ’ee?’
It took a full ten seconds before it dawned on Kerensa what Beatrice was hinting at. Then… ‘You mean?’
‘Ais. Yer good ’n’ proper with child at last.’
‘Oh! I… that’s wonderful! Oh, Beatrice!’ Rushing across the room Kerensa hugged the old woman. ‘Where’s Oliver?’ she said, jumping up and down with excitement. ‘He’s going over to Ker-an-Mor Farm this morning. Has he left yet? He said goodbye to us earlier.’
‘Dunno, m’dear, let un go anyway, no need to run after un like every other female ’as all ’is life. Let un wait till later.’
A heavy step was heard heading towards the back of the house for the stableyard.
‘That’s him now,’ said Kerensa.
‘Let un wait, maid, like I tole ’ee. Went ’urt un.’
Kerensa paced up and down, rapidly thinking things over. She stopped and looked at Kane, then Bob, then Beatrice, rubbing her hands together before placing them over her flat stomach.
With a sudden rush she gathered up Kane in her arms. Beatrice chuckled as the girl dashed past her and her light steps could be heard running through the house.
‘Oliver!’ Kerensa shouted at the top of her voice, Kane bobbing up and down as she ran. ‘Wait for me! Oliver…’