“Oh, no. I thought I should find it more easily. I am very sorry to have trespassed again.”
“I’m glad you did. I was getting a little bored with that cottage. They can manage very well without me. What have you been doing since I last saw you?”
“We had a wedding, you know.”
“Of course. We all knew about that. And Dermot Tregarland returned with his fair bride. We are kept well informed, you know.”
“Well, apart from the wedding, I have done very little. My mother has not been very well this winter and I have been helping to look after her.”
“I hope she has now recovered?”
“She wasn’t really ill. And thanks, she is quite well now. As a matter of fact, she is here in Cornwall with me.”
“Good. Look. Here we are. Now you are here, you must try a glass of their very special cider.”
“That sounds rather a good idea.”
“I assure you it is. Let’s take the mare to the stables. She’ll be all right there.”
We did so. I thought she must have been there before because the man in charge seemed to know her. Everyone here seemed to know everyone else.
The inn looked just as it had last time I had seen it—the fireplace with the glistening brasses, the cosy atmosphere. Mrs. Brodie came out to serve us. She recognized me immediately.
“Well, Miss, so you be back with us then? That be nice. Come back to see your sister, ’ave ’ee?”
I was amazed at her memory and told her so.
“That be part of the business, Miss. We do remember our customers.”
“I told her she must try some of your excellent cider,” said Jowan Jermyn.
“That be nice of ’ee, sir.”
“The best in Cornwall,” he added.
“And who am I to say nay to that? I’ll get two tankards right away. That right?”
“Absolutely.”
He smiled at me when she had gone. “She’s a dear old soul,” he said. “She has a mind like the Records Office. She knows what happens to every one of us from the time we were born.”
“Isn’t that rather uncomfortable?”
“It has its drawbacks, naturally, unless, of course, you are living a blameless life. That isn’t much use to Mrs. Brodie. She likes a bit of excitement. But there are advantages. A visit to the inn and you can come out knowing more about your neighbors than you did when you went in.”
“I think I would prefer anonymity.”
“Does that mean…?” He raised his eyebrows. “But, no, I am impertinent.”
“Not in the least,” I retorted. “I merely mean that I should not like to have my actions put on record. I suppose she will tell people that I, coming from Tregarland’s, took a tankard of cider with the enemy across the boundary.”
“Undoubtedly.”
“Which cannot be of great interest to anyone.”
“I disagree. But it does depend on what news is going around at the time. The system has to be kept going and any scrap of news is better than no news at all. Besides, you have forgotten the feud.”
“But I am not really involved. I am not one of the enemy.”
“That,” he said, “is a nice thought.”
Mrs. Brodie appeared with the tankards.
When she had gone, he said: “How long shall you be here?”
“It isn’t decided yet, but it won’t be a long visit. Though my mother and I will be here for the birth…and before that, I daresay.”
“Oh, the baby.”
“My sister is going to have one. But I expect your excellent news service has told you that already?”
“It has indeed. I am very interested and delighted that you will be a frequent visitor.”
“My sister likes to have her family around.”
“Naturally.”
“And as she and I are twins…”
“Of course. Well, let us hope it all goes well.”
“But of course it will,” I replied with conviction.
“Of course. The cider is good, isn’t it?”
“Very.”
“The West Country is famous for it, you know—Devon and Cornwall.”
“So I have heard.”
“You did tell me last time we met that you had left school last summer. Shall you stay at home or take up some career?”
“Because of my sister’s sudden marriage, I have not thought of anything but that. Until the baby is born I think we shall be quite preoccupied with that.”
“And you will be here often, so that we shall be neighbors. I am sure they are very happy at Tregarland’s about the child.”
“Oh, yes, they are.”
“It will be a comfort…after what happened.”
“You must be referring to Dermot’s first wife. I think he is very happy now. That other is all in the past.”
“Oh, yes.”
“I suppose people round here know all about his first marriage.”
He lifted his shoulders as though to imply what did I expect.
“Did you know her?”
“Not personally. I had seen her around. She lived with her mother in one of the cottages right on the cliff looking down on West Poldown. One saw her around quite a bit. She worked at the Sailor’s Rest.”
“The Sailor’s Rest? Isn’t that the inn on the west side overlooking the river mouth?”
“That’s it.” He grinned at me. “Something of a mésalliance, I fear.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“Shock waves ran round the place when they married. I can’t imagine old Mr. Tregarland was very pleased with the choice of his son and heir. People liked her. Annette, she was…Annette Pardell. Mrs. Pardell still lives in…er…Cliff Cottage, I think it is called. She never got over it. She’s a widow and Annette was her only child. You didn’t know this?”
“No, not the details. Dorabella told me that Dermot had been married before and that his first wife had died. She had drowned when bathing.”
“Annette was a great one for the sea. They say she was in it every day during the summer. A big, strong girl, the last you’d think to go that way. She’d been swimming since she was a child. They came down here from the North of England—Yorkshire, I think. I gathered Mrs. Pardell had some sort of pension, enough to get by. She rented Cliff Cottage and has been there ever since she came to Cornwall. Annette was a fine-looking girl. Mrs. Pardell had plans for her and was not too pleased when she landed up in the bar. She was an excellent barmaid, bright and saucy. You know the sort. She got on well with the men customers, and the women liked her, too. There was talk when she married the son of the big house, as you can imagine—and then she died like that.”
“Was Dermot very upset?”
He was silent for a while.
“I don’t know,” he said at length. “But I don’t think it had been very good at the house. You know how it is. Annette did not really fit in. And there was the baby…”
“What baby?”
“Oh…she was going to have a baby. That was why she shouldn’t have gone swimming. She was not in a fit state to do so. It was foolish of her. There was no one about apparently. It was early morning. She’d always liked a swim first thing in the morning. The temptation must have been too strong for her. Of course, in her condition, she should have known better. She went down to that beach below the Tregarland gardens and went in from there. Her body was washed up a week or so later. There was mystery for a few days, but her bathrobe and slippers were there on the beach to indicate what had happened.”
“What a terrible tragedy! And the baby…”
“I reckon they are overjoyed now that there is another little one on the way.”
“Oh, yes. They are thrilled, of course.”
“I understand that. And I am delighted because it means that you will be down here often, and you and I can have a little rendezvous. You can’t invite me to Tregarland. I am wondering whether I can ask you to my place. This is the first time that stupid feud has been a nuisance.”
“Tell me about yourself,” I said.
He lifted his shoulders. “What do you want to know?”