Gossamer Cord

“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?”

“You love your estate. I believe Jermyn Priory has been in your family for years.”

“Yes. It was a priory in the fourteenth century. In the sixteenth it was destroyed with countless others and later the house was built using some of the stone from the desecrated priory. My family came here at that time and we have been here ever since. My father was a younger son, and I did not inherit the place until two years ago. I have an excellent manager. We get on well together and he lives in a house close to the Priory. He has an efficient wife who has taken upon herself to see that I lack nothing. I have a good housekeeper and am surrounded by excellent people, so I am well cosseted. There! You couldn’t get better than that from Mrs. Brodie.”

“You seem to be well satisfied with life.”

“Up to a point. I often go to London and now and then travel on the Continent. I should like to see more of my neighbors, but it is surprising how this stupid feud gets in the way. It’s ridiculous after all these years. But there it is.”

“Perhaps if you made a few advances…?”