A Nice Derangement Of Epitaphs Part 12

They looked. Half the sea-faring nations of the west lay there quietly enough together, with the scent of the salt sh.o.r.e for ever in the wind that stirred the pale gra.s.ses over them. Edvard Kekonnen, seaman. Hugh O'Neill, master-mariner. Alfonso Nunez, master-mariner. Va.s.silis Kondrakis, seaman. Two Spanish s.h.i.+pmates, unknown by name. Sean MacPeake, master-mariner. Jean Plouestion, fisherman. Walter Ruiz, or X, fisherman, seaman or master-mariner. "I will bring my people again from the depths of the sea." It didn't much matter if no one else knew what to call them, the voice they were listening for would have all their names right.

"Yes," said Simon, a small, wry smile curling the corners of his mouth, "this is the point of departure for a good many heavens, seemingly, Valhalla, Tir-nan-Og, the lot. It's the sea-going men who made the western islands heaven, I suppose." He slipped into song again, very softly: "' Far the cloudless sky stretches blueAcross the isle, green in the sunlight.'

It sounds like Jan Treverra himself designing that paradise, doesn't it?

"'There shall thou and I wander freeOn sheen-white sands, dreaming in starlight'."

"I was thinking much the same thing," agreed George, smiling. "What was it Dom said about your two epitaphs, that first evening we were up at the Place with you? Something about making the after-life sound like a suns.h.i.+ne cruise to the Bahamas."

Simon had begun to turn back towards the gravelled walk, his hands deep in his pockets, the air of the Hebridean song still soft and sweet in his mouth. He halted suddenly, stiffening; for a moment he hung perfectly still, then he turned a face sharp and pale beneath its gold with contained excitement.

"Dom said what what? Would you mind saying that again?"

"He said the Treverra epitaphs made the after-life sound like a suns.h.i.+ne cruise to the Bahamas. Why? What nerve did that p.r.i.c.k?"

"The nerve it should have p.r.i.c.ked then, if I'd been even half awake. And I was there?" he protested furiously. "I heard this? And I didn't connect?"

"You laughed. Like the rest of us," said George, patient but mystified.

"I would! The fate of many another pregant utterance in its time. Why do I never listen properly to anyone but myself? My G.o.d, but I see now how it all began, all the first part of the story. You only have to put one bit in place, and all the other pieces begin to slide in and settle alongside. George, come to the Place to-night, will you? We're dining with the old lady, because Paddy has to go back to school to-morrow. Bring Bunty and Dominic, and come to coffee afterwards. You, too, Dan, please. I'd like you to be there."

"With pleasure," said the Vicar equably, "if you want me."

"I do. I want you all, everyone who was involved in this investigation from the beginning. Because I can see my way now," said Simon, suddenly s.h.i.+vering in the chilling air of early evening and the tension of his own incandescent excitement. "I believe I can clear up the strange, sad case of Jan and Morwenna, the mystery that set off all these other mysteries. And I will, to-night."

They gathered round the long table in Miss Rachel's library, ten of them. The curtains were drawn, and the tide, already well past its height, lashed and cried with subsiding force off the point, in the soft, luminous dark. Miss Rachel sat at the head of the table, dispensing coffee royally and happily, with Paddy at her left because she would not let him out of her reach now that he was regained in good condition and angelic humour, and had forgiven her freely under the pretence of being freely forgiven. On her right, Simon, curiously quiet and strained and bright. Tamsin moved about the foot of the table handing coffee-cups, helped by Dominic. George and Bunty on one side of the table, Tim and Phil and the Vicar on the other. It was a long time since the old lady had a.s.sembled such a satisfactory court, she didn't even seem to mind that it was turning out to be Simon's court rather than hers. The more he disclaimed it, the more honestly he abdicated, the more surely this evening belonged to him.

"I wasn't the one who put my finger on the spot," he was saying with pa.s.sionate gravity. "That was Dominic. I had to have my nose rubbed in the truth before I could even realise it was there."

"Me?" said Dominic, staggered. "I didn't do anything, how on earth did I get in on the credits?"

"You took one look at the Treverra epitaphs, and put your finger on the one significant thing about them.'They make heaven sound like a suns.h.i.+ne cruise to the Bahamas,' you said."

"Did I? It must have been just a joke, then. I I didn't see anything significant." didn't see anything significant."

"You did, though you may not have realised it or taken it seriously. All that pretty verse about year-long summer, and golden sands, and sapphire seas-you saw intuitively what it really meant, and that it was very much this side the grave. Whether you ever examined what you knew or not, you offered it to me, and I didn't have the wit to look at it properly, and learn from it."

They saw now, dimly, where he was leading them. They sat still, all eyes upon Simon. His thin, long hands were linked on the table before him. The cigarette he had lighted and forgotten smoked slowly away to a cylinder of ash in the ashtray beside him. The tension that held them all silent and motionless proceeded from him, but only he seemed unaware of it.

"If ever there was a crazy bit of research, this was it. There we were, with Treverra's own tomb-well, not empty, but empty of the man who should have been in it, and his wife's coffin unhappily not empty, but most tragically occupied, by the poor lady who had died there, and, as we found out afterwards, by a pretty large sum in old money and jewels. This crazy, sad puzzle, and those two epitaphs for clues, and nothing else.

"You remember Treverra was the adored leader of the smugglers round these parts. We know he also had at least one s.h.i.+p trading legitimately with the West Indies and America. We can guess, now we know about the tunnel from his vault to the Dragon's Hole, that he must have had the tunnel improved and the tomb dug out at the end of it to provide a safe runway to the harbour and Pentarno haven, for a very practical purpose. What could be more respected than a family tomb? And what could make better cover for the secret road to the sea and the s.h.i.+ps? He completed it about six years before he died. Maybe he always had in mind that it might eventually provide a way of retreat, if Cornwall ever got too hot to hold him.

"Well, now, suppose that the authorities and the preventives were closing in on this local hero, and finally had something on him that he wasn't going to be able to duck? I think there are signs that they would have welcomed an opportunity to bring him down. Most of the gentry dabbled in smuggling, but in a mild, personal way. Treverra went beyond that. Not for profit, probably, so much as for fun. He liked pulling their legs, and leading them by the nose. They wouldn't forgive him that. He resigned from the bench, where by all accounts he was a pretty generous and fair-minded Justice. I think he knew his scope here was narrowing. And then, you see, any of the local people who heard of any threat to him would warn him. He was the idol of the coast. Yes, I think he knew time was getting short, and made his plans accordingly. Among other things, he wrote his epitaph. And hers, I'm almost sure, was written at the same time, by her, by him, or by both together, I can't be sure. But I like to think of them sitting here, in this very room, with their heads together, capping each other's lines, and laughing over the supreme joke of their shared and audacious career. Look at Morwenna's face! That lovely, fragile creature was a lot more than a sleeping partner.

"So there's Treverra, only fifty-two years old, in the very prime of his life and vigour and powers, and the authorities closing in for the kill. And what happens?

"Treverra 'dies', and is buried. In the tomb he had made for himself, with the swivel-stone in the corner giving access to the cave and the harbour.

"And at night he arises, this 'dead' man, after all the decorous funeral business is over and the mourners have gone away. Maybe he was provided with a good crowbar inside the coffin for the occasion, even more probably he was also visited and helped out by his older son after dark. He had two sons. The elder was just twenty at this time, the younger was a schoolboy of fourteen. I think the elder was certainly in all the plans, you'll see why when we come to the case of Morwenna. Treverra, then, emerges from his tomb exceedingly alive and l.u.s.ty, and retires gaily by his back way, from which, at low tide, he can reach either Maymouth harbour or Pentarno haven. What does it matter which he used? At either one or the other a boat is put in for him, to take him aboard s.h.i.+p-his own s.h.i.+p or another-and s.h.i.+p him away to the reserve fortune he's been salting away in readiness in the year- long summer of the West Indies.

"A suns.h.i.+ne cruise to an island paradise, just as Dominic said, if I'd only listened to him. But not Tir-nan-Og! Not even the Bahamas, perhaps, but near enough. According to the records most of his trading had been done with Trinidad, Tobago and Barbados. Somewhere there, I judge, we might still pick up his traces.

"How many were in the know? It's guesswork, now, but I'd say just the three of them, Jan, Morwenna and their elder son, and maybe the skipper of his s.h.i.+p. There may have been a family doctor in it, too, to cover the deaths, but if so, he kept his mouth tightly shut afterwards to protect himself, and who can blame him? They may have managed without him? It hardly matters now. I'm sure that's what happened. It accounts for the empty coffin, that was later to be filled and over-filled. And it accounts for what followed.

"For, you see, Morwenna would never have agreed to such a plan if there hadn't been provision in it for her to join him. Act two was to be the translation of Morwenna. She was to pine away-her own touch, that, I'd swear-and to be reunited with her lord in an earthly, not a heavenly, paradise. After six months the same programme is put in motion for her. She 'dies' of a broken heart, and is buried in the tomb prepared for her."

He broke off there, startled, for someone had uttered an almost inaudible sound that yet had the sharpness of a cry. A quiver pa.s.sed round the circle, and a rustle of breath, as if they had all been shaken out of a trail , Paddy, flus.h.i.+ng hotly, drew back a little into shadow. "I'm sorry! I was only thinking-She was so little little!"

"They took every possible care of her, Paddy. Or they thought they had. Yes, she was very slight and frail, she couldn't deal with tombstones herself, they knew that. She had to lie patiently in her coffin until dark, when her son would come to release her, and see her safely down the pa.s.sage and aboard. The light wooden coffin in which she was carried to the vault was pierced in a pattern of fine holes just above her face-did you notice that, George? The air in the stone coffin would easily be enough to keep her going until night. And she was well provided with funds for the journey, in money and jewellery. The wooden lid would be only very lightly fastened down, so that she could move it herself. And all she needed besides was the heart of a lioness, and that she knew she had. She She was the one who misquoted Dryden, that I'd swear to. 'None but the brave deserves the brave.' To lie and wait several hours alone in the dark didn't seem terrible to her, not by comparison with what it bought. was the one who misquoted Dryden, that I'd swear to. 'None but the brave deserves the brave.' To lie and wait several hours alone in the dark didn't seem terrible to her, not by comparison with what it bought.

"But that night of her funeral, you remember, is recorded as the night of the great storm, when the fis.h.i.+ng-boats were driven out to sea. And young Treverra, the new squire, was blown from the cliff path in the darkness, and drowned. A young man in mourning, wandering the cliffs alone-no one would ask what he was doing there.

"I'm afraid, I'm terribly afraid, he was on his way down the cliff path to the church and the vault, to see his mother resurrected and put safely aboard s.h.i.+p for Barbados.

"And no one else, you see, knew anything about her.

"No one else. She was dead, they'd just buried her. If the doctor knew, he'd a.s.sume everything was going according to plan, or at least that her son was taking care of her, until he heard of the boy being missing. And that may not have happened until well into the next morning. By then a doctor would know she'd be dead. He'd be afraid to speak. It couldn't help her, and it could, you see, harm not only himself but Treverra, too. He'd be a wanted man again as soon as it was known he was alive. And nothing and n.o.body could give Morwenna back to him now."

"But the s.h.i.+p," ventured Dominic huskily. "There was a s.h.i.+p lying off for her. Wouldn't they try to find out what had happened?"

"That's what makes me think that this time it wasn't their own s.h.i.+p. It would be risky to chance having it stopped in these waters, obviously. No, this time I think it was a matter of a simple commercial arrangement with some other skipper, in which case they wouldn't know anything except that they were to put in a boat at such and such a spot and pick up a lady. If they ever did manage to put in a boat in such a sea, it's certain she didn't come to keep the appointment. They couldn't know what that implied, to them it just meant their pa.s.senger hadn't turned up. Maybe they waited as long as they could, maybe they were driven out. What could they do but sail without her?

"And all that money, and the valuables she was to have taken with her, just lay uselessly in her coffin with her for two centuries, until Zeb Trethuan found it and started methodically turning it into money again. Thus setting the stage for the next death.

"n.o.body knew about it, you see. Young Treverra's body was never found, so the vault wasn't opened for him. His young brother came home from school and took over the estate, but he'd never been in the secret. To him his mother and father had died and been buried, no mysteries, no tragedy but the ordinary, gentle tragedy of bereavement, that happens sooner or later to everyone. By the time he he died and was buried, St. Nectan's was already fighting a losing battle with the sand, and they'd built St. Mary's, high up in the town, and abandoned the old graveyard by the sh.o.r.e. And Morwenna lay there alone, separated from her Jan, and he-G.o.d knows which was the unluckier of the two." died and was buried, St. Nectan's was already fighting a losing battle with the sand, and they'd built St. Mary's, high up in the town, and abandoned the old graveyard by the sh.o.r.e. And Morwenna lay there alone, separated from her Jan, and he-G.o.d knows which was the unluckier of the two."

Tamsin had got up from her place very quietly, and gone to her desk. She came back with the folder of the Treverra papers in her hand, and slid out upon the table the two epitaphs.

"Not that I don't know them by heart," she said in a low voice. "But suddenly they seem so new and so transparent, as though we ought to have been able to read the whole story in them from the beginning."

"You think I've made out a case, then?" Simon's eyes met hers down the length of the table, and there was nothing left of challenge or antagonism on her side, and nothing of pursuit or self-indulgence on his. They looked at each other with wonder and grief, and a certain frustrated helplessness, but with no doubt at all.

"I think it's so unanswerable a case that I don't know how we missed following the clues Jan left us. It's all here here! Don't you hear him? He couldn't play any game without making it dangerous to himself, there wouldn't have been any sport. He told them just what he was about. He made his exit snapping his fingers under the nose of the law, and daring them to follow his trail if they had the wit. But they hadn't, and neither had we.

'Think not to find, beneath this StoneMute Witness, bleached, ambiguous Bone-'

You see, he told them, don't look for me here, you won't find me. And then, his 'trackless maze,' 'the labyrinth beyond the tomb'-what was that but the real tunnel that opened beyond his his tomb? He told them how he made his getaway, kicked up his heels at them and invited them to go after him if they were smart enough. And then, the last four lines, those are for tomb? He told them how he made his getaway, kicked up his heels at them and invited them to go after him if they were smart enough. And then, the last four lines, those are for her her.

'There follow, O my Soul, and findThy Lord as ever true and kind,And savour, where all Travellers meet,The last Love as the first Love sweet'."

Simon sat looking at her with a face very still and very pale beneath its tan, and eyes that had no l.u.s.tre; his voice was gentle and impersonal enough as he took up the recital from her.

"Now listen to Morwenna, and I don't think you'll doubt that this really was Morwenna herself speaking: 'Carve this upon Morwenna's Grave:NONE B BUT T THE B BRAVE D DESERVES T THE B BRAVE.Shed here no Tears. No Saint could dieMore blessed and comforted than I.For I confide I shall but restA Moment in this stony Nest,Then, raised by Love, go forth to findA Country dearer to my Mind,And touching safe the sun-bright Sh.o.r.e,Embrace my risen Lord once more.'

Well, do you hear the authentic voice?"

They heard it indeed, suddenly fierce, impious, arrogant and gay, the reverse of its own conventionally presented image. Miss Rachel stirred uneasily, unwilling to acknowledge but unable to deny what she now saw in that delicate and beautiful creature in the drawing on the wall. Not the first and not the last in history to spit unwise defiance at the lightning.

"Why, she was the wilder of the two! That's surely more than a little blasphemous! And then such a terrible fate, poor girl. Mr. Polwhele, do you think that what happened to them was a kind of Judgment Judgment?"

"No!" said the Vicar, with large and unclerical disdain, and looked a little surprised at his own vehemence. "I should be ashamed to attribute to G.o.d a malice of which I don't find even myself capable. And I don't think the spectacle of two daring and exuberant children egging each other on to say outrageous things about me, in my hearing, would even drive me to knock their heads together, much less drop a mountain on them and crush them. I think I might even laugh, when they weren't looking. It would depend on the degree of style they showed. And Morwenna certainly had style. No, I don't think there was any rejoicing in heaven when there was n.o.body left to lift the stone away. Rather a terrible sense of loss. She was brave, loyal and loving, enough virtues to offset what the Authorised Version would call a froward tongue. No, I suppose one must say that they played with fire so persistently that it was inevitable they'd get burned in the end. But to them playing with fire made life doubly worth living. You can't have it both ways."

"If she was blasphemous," said Phil, s.h.i.+vering, "she certainly paid for it. She had the more terrible fate."

"Did she?" Simon looked up, looked round the table with a brief and contorted smile. "I wonder how long Treverra watched and waited for her, or for news of her? He couldn't come home, you see, he couldn't even send letters, there was no one left here who knew he was alive. He had to stay dead in his old ident.i.ty, he was still a wanted man. Maybe he thought she'd changed her mind, and found it quite convenient to be a widow. Maybe he thought she'd married again. Maybe he even began to fear she'd been planning her own future and laughing at him even while she helped him to arrange his elaborate joke, She was only forty-one, and a great beauty. And he couldn't come back and fight for her. His joke had turned against him. Oh, believe me, if there was anything he had to pay for, he paid. There was only one agony he was spared-at least he didn't know how his darling died."

The moon was up when they went out to the cars, not too late, because Paddy had to leave by the traditional mid-morning train, and there were still the last little things to pack. The tide was half-way out, the moons.h.i.+ne turned the wet beach to silver, and the scattered clouds were moist with reflected light.

"I trust," said Simon, finding George Felse close beside him as they went down the steps to the drive, "you were duly impressed with my performance?"

The voice was deliberately cool and light, but tired. He had walked rather stiffly past Tamsin, when she hesitated and waited for him in the doorway. For several days now he had been walking past Tamsin, with aching care and reluctant resolution. It had taken her a day or so to realise it, and longer to believe in it. She had the idea now, she had betaken herself promptly where she was welcomed, between Paddy and Dominic. They stood chattering beside the Mini, all a little subdued. The soft voices had a sound of autumn in them, too, as gentle as the salt wind.

"Yes, you're quite a detective," conceded George. Simon's eyes were on Paddy, and the slight, brooding smile was unwary; he had no reason to suppose that George possessed the knowledge necessary to make it significant. "Now what about tackling the only mystery that's left? I'm sure you could put a finger just as accurately on Trethuan's killer, if you really tried."

The smile stiffened slightly for an instant, and then perceptibly deepened. "Maybe I will, yet," said Simon. "But there's just one more question I have to ask before I shall know what I've got to tell you about that case. Give me till to-morrow."

"I'll do that."

"Can I run you back to the hotel? It isn't too comfortable for four, but it's bearable for that distance."

"Thanks, but we'll walk. It's not far, and rather nice at this time of night. And I think we'll make our farewells to Paddy now. To-morrow," said George quite gently, "had better be left to the family. Don't you think so?"

The question that was to determine the ending of the Trethuan case was asked later that same night. And the person who had to answer it was Paddy Rossall.

They were all together round the fire before bed, Paddy's packing done, the last pot of tea circulating, when Simon said in a careful and unemphatic voice, so that the shock came only gradually, like the late breaking of a wave: "I hadn't intended to do this, and if the truth hadn't come out without any act of mine, I never would. But now we all know where we are. Paddy, you're fifteen, for all present purposes you're a man. You know I'm your father, as well as I know it. Now I want to talk to you, here, now, with Tim and Phil present, the only honest way."

The silence that fell was extreme. There might never have been sound or movement in the world.

"Simon," began Tim quietly, when he had his voice again, "do you think this is fair?"

"Yes, I think it's fair. I think it's absolutely necessary. We've been stalling it since yesterday morning, since we all knew where we stood. It's necessary for us all, if only to clear the air. I am who I am, and Paddy knows it now, why not say it? Paddy, you do do know. Say it!" know. Say it!"

"Simon, you've no right-"

Phil laid her hand restrainingly on her husband's arm. He had expected her to blaze into indignation, and she was silent; it confused and calmed him at the same time, effectively silencing him.

"Yes, I know," said Paddy in a small, tight voice. He had a cup of tea in his hand; he laid it down carefully on the tiled hearth, and wiped his palms slowly on his thighs. His face was taut and expressionless.

"Then listen to me. This once listen to me, and be sure I respect you and trust you to be honest. We all want you to be happy, to have a full life and a satisfying life. I'm going to speak up for myself now. It's the first time I've been able to do that, and I don't see why I shouldn't take advantage of it. I know I'm very late in making my bid, Paddy, but I've got a lot to offer. I've got an a.s.signment that's going to take me practically round the world for a series of articles and broadcasts. If you choose, you can come with me. It's entirely up to you. Everything I can give you, I'll give. Everything I can do for you, I'll do. I want you, Paddy, I want you very much. I'll do everything possible to try and deserve you, if you'll come with me."

"Now, look!" growled Tim.

"No, Tim, let him talk." Phil drew him down again to his chair and held him there, charmed into quiescence by her bewildering serenity. It was too late, in any case, to deflect the encounter. The matter had been taken out of their hands, but for all that it was not yet in Simon's. Paddy was a person, too. They must place as much reliance in him as Simon did, they had better reason. n.o.body must argue back. Their arguments were already on record, fifteen years of them, without any world-tours, without any glamour, inexpert, imperfect, intimate arguments. But Phil knew their weight, and had already bet her life and Tim's on their validity.

So Simon was the only one who talked; and Simon was an unmatched talker when his heart was in it. He was ruthless, too, now that he was in pursuit of something he really wanted. Miss Rachel had been a shrewd prophet.

"That's all, Paddy. You know what you've got here, and now you know what I'm promising you. It's up to you. If you decide to come with me, I don't believe Tim and Phil will stand in your way." It was a fighting case he'd made, he felt drained with all that had gone out of him. And Paddy sat there with his hands clenched on his thighs, and his face white with tension, staring into the fire.

"Paddy, look at me!"

Paddy raised his head obediently, and met Simon's eyes full. His mouth and chin were set like stone, as if he felt the threat of tears not far away.

"Will you come?"

Paddy's lips parted slowly and painfully. He moistened them, and tried for a voice that creaked and failed him; tried again, and achieved a remarkably steady, loud and controlled utterance.

"I'm sorry, but this is where I belong. With my parents. I like you very much, and of course you're my father's best friend. But I'm not going anywhere, except back to school tomorrow. But thank you," he ended with punctilious politeness, "for asking me."

He uncurled his closed fingers with a wrench, and got to his feet abruptly, all his movements slightly stiff and pareful.

"If you'll excuse me, I'll go to bed now. Good-night, Mummy!" The quick, current touch of his lips on her cheek forbade her to manifest either surprise or concern. "Good-night, Dad!" His hand patted Tim's shoulder lightly in pa.s.sing. He was half-way to the door, magnificent and precarious, pa.s.sing close to where Simon stood stricken mute and rigid with shock. And then he spoiled the whole gallant show.

It was not a deliberate blow; he had hesitated and cast about him frantically for a second to find some formula he could use, but there was none, and the instant of silence grew enormous in his own ears, and had to be broken. You can't just excise a human being from your life, and pretend he doesn't exist, you can't call him "Uncle Simon" when he's just reminded you that he isn't anything of the kind, you can't say "Father" when you have a father already, and have just been at pains to point out that you have no intention whatever of swopping him for anybody else on earth. There wasn't anything left but that inalienable possession, a name, and only the respectful form was even half-way appropriate.

He said: "Good-night, Mr. Towne!", fighting off the silence in sheer panic, and instantly and horribly aware that even the silence had been preferable.

Simon jerked back his head and drew in breath painfully, as if he had been struck in the face. He reached out a hand in incredulous protest, and caught the boy by the arm.

"My dear child child-!"

Paddy turned upon him a pale face suddenly and briefly convulsed by a bright blaze of anger and desperation, and struck as hard as he could, frantic to end this and escape.

"That's just the point! I'm not a child any longer, I'm not all that dear to you, and above all, I'm not yours not yours. You gave me away, remember?"

For one electrifying instant Phil saw the two fierce, strained faces braced close to each other, staring in mutual anguish, more alike than they had ever been before. Then Paddy tugged his arm free and stalked out of the room; but in a moment they heard him climbing the stairs at a wild run, head-down for the privacy of his own room.

Simon hung still for a long, incredulous moment, his hand still extended, unable to grasp what had happened to him. Its finality there was no mistaking, but it took him what seemed an age to comprehend and accept it. He turned from them in a blind man's walk, and went and groped out a cigarette from the box on the table, to find his shaking hands something challenging and normal to do.

Phil had risen instinctively and taken a couple of hasty steps towards the door to follow Paddy, but then she checked after all, and sat down again slowly. She felt for Tim's hand, and closed her fingers on it gratefully. Simon's fair crest, pale against the dark curtains, Simon's rigid shoulders and patient, obstinate hands at work with matches, seemed to her suddenly close kin to Paddy's beloved person, and infinitely more in need of pity.

"I ought to take you apart," said Tim roused and scowling.

"Think you could do a better job than Paddy just did?" asked the taut voice.

"You asked for it."