We dropped anchor after dark in the deeper water above Durgan. Two men rowed me to the bank of the river. It was raining still, a Cornish rain, an English rain, different in feel and taste and smell from what fell in Madrid or Lisbon. I thanked the men and scrambled ashore knee wet, pushing aside the branches of an overhanging tree, scarcely looking back. In moments the sound of their rowlocks and the plash of water was blanketed off by the dripping wood.
I began to run. It is about five miles, through woods, across moorland and along narrow tracks from Durgan to Arwenack. I ran all the way. When within sight of the palisade I lay down nuder a tree in the long wet grass trying to get back lost breath. The grass smelt sweeter than it had ever smelt before. After seven or eight minutes I went to the gate of the palisade and hammered on it. There was no reply, and I knew that one might knock there all night.
But you don’t keep a boy out of his own home however carefully you guard it. I followed the palisade down to the river’s edge, then lowered myself carefully into the water and by clinging to the ends of the last poles I swung under the great fence and crawled up the other side on to the grassy sward that led to Arwenack House.
They were astounded to see me, aghast, frightened. To appear after six months dripping water in the hall, dirty and emaciated, out at elbow and knee, with sores round the mouth, swollen feet and blue marks like bruises on my legs, was perhaps sufficient to startle anyone. They had given me up for dead, so some came near to thinking it was a ghost.
It is the only time in my life that I remember my father’s eyes lighting up on sight of me those eyes in which a light so seldom showed. The children were all abed, but the older ones were wakened and came tumbling down clustering round and showering excited questions. In no time I was surrounded by forty-odd people, a mixture of family and servants, while dogs licked my feet and leapt up at my face and others barked and quarrelled and urinated among the rushes.
The only absentee was Mrs Killigrew who was in bed with another child born a week ago, named Simon and already christened, for they thought him determined to slip away.
After the first clamour had subsided, the voice of Lady Killigrew could be heard. She had not moved from her chair when I went to kiss her, but now she looked down her long prehensile nose and said, enough of greetings, the boy must be fed and washed, he stinks of bilge water and looks as if he’s lived on nothing else for a week. She set the servants running and continued to stare at me with her cold blue eyes while others did the questioning.
It was a rich homecoming. I fell on the food when it came and wolfed it, still talking, answering, laughing and half crying, joking, trying to explain.
Not Only were they astounded, they were vastly impressed at the story. Even my father was impressed that I had been received at Court. In among all the happy conversation there was a questioning note. And I had to keep a guard on my tongue and its explanations.
It was midnight before anyone thought of bed and nearer two before I found myself again in~that long narrow room I knew so well with its tall window overlooking the river’s mouth and the security of it and the constriction. I was back in my mother’s arms, in my mother’s womb, held firm where none could attack, protected, supported, confined. Every board, every panel, every stair, every creak of bed and crack of wall and squeak of shutter were familiar and friendly, part of an eternity of childhood which belonged to me for ever.
But happy as I was there was something to ask my halfbrother before his chatter stopped in sleep.
“John, have you seen the Arundells of Tolverne?”
“No, scarce anything. Why?”
“You remember Sue Farnaby? She was staying with them in December when I called there.”
“Ah … Is that how the wind blows? Well, she’s pretty enough, I grant you, if only she had money. But she has none and you’d do well to think on that. Maybe it’s less important for you; but Father never fails to impress on me the need to marry an heiress. I believe he can scarcely wait until I am old enough.”
“Have you seen anything of her?”
“Of Sue Farnaby? No. Of course, being near fifteen, I am now old enough … It’s not pleasant to think one has to wed for duty. Grandmother once told me she saw her first husband only twice before they were betrothed, and she then but thirteen. And Uncle Henry to cap it says that’s nought, he knows of a boy of six who was carried to the altar and coaxed to say his vows so that after he might go and play. D’you think that’s true?”
“Have you seen Jonathan arid Gertrude Arundell? Have they issue yet?”
“I’ve seen no one but Thomas. Thomas came down the river all on his own one day in May. He has grown so gross, Maugan. But so strong with it. While he was visiting us the tide fell and his boat was caught in the mud. Sawna and Penrudduck went to draw it into the water but the mud was deep and they could not stir it. Down goes Thomas and by himself lifts the boat bodily and thrusts it into the water. I’ll vow you could not knock him down and break his teeth now.”
“What did he want?”
“It was some business to do with his father who he says is softening in the head. You know Sir Anthony was a ward of Grandfather, and it was some legal business, I believe.”
“Then why did Jonathan not come? He is the eldest and next head of the family.”
“That I don’t know. I don’t think Thomas has much respect for his brother.”
“I don’t think Thomas has much respect for anyone,” I said, and after I had spoken wished I had not, for it brought old apprehensions to the surface.
Next morning my father went out early seeing to the shearing of the lambs. Belemus was still away, and I found myself depending on my halfbrother for all the news. John said it had been another unnatural summer: the hay had been cut but would not dry, sheep were dying of the murrain, oats and corn were flattened by the rain and wind. This was true throughout the country and there would be great distress. There was also great fear of a Spanish invasion. Uncle Simon and his family were coming next week; there was plague in London though not nearly as bad as last year. Odeliahad had a quinsy in May and had been lanced by Glapthorne of Penryn. She had been tedious sick and Mother had saved her by riding into Truro and bringing back some draught. Penn, the falconer, had died in March: he had cut his finger and the poison had run through his body like quicksilver. Stevens was promoted in his place. Oliver Gwyther of Three Farthings House was paying court to Annora Job. Meg Levant was married to Dick Stable these three months. Yes, said John, Dolphin had called in in April, but after the trouble last time only Captain Elliot and William Love had come ashore.
So he talked on and on about the everyday things of life at Arwenack just as if I had only been away working in Truro; he talked about life as I had known it for sixteen years, while the familiar sounds and smells and sights seeped in. A girl in the laundry was starching and blueing my grandmother’s ruffs; another carried a wooden iron-bound pail full of buttermilk; in the yard Long Peter was tending a sick dog; Parson Merther led the younger children upstairs for an hour’s Greek; seagulls wheeled and cried in a sky of washed blue and broken cloud; the wind blew sweet off the sea; I was home and in a few days it was going to be hard to believe that the six foreign months had ever happened except in a vanishing dream.
Yet there was one intimidating task still to be undertaken.
At eleven my father came into the house with Rosewarne and Job and five dogs, and they all went into his study. I hung about outside and after twenty minutes the two servants left.
The last time I had been in this room was nearly two years ago when fever was rife in the house and Paul Knyvett had died and Mr Knyvett had left all the account books open on the table.