Gossamer Cord

“Wouldn’t they give you a cutting or something?”

I was afraid I was betraying my ignorance of horticulture and that she would sense there was some ulterior motive behind all this.

“I wouldn’t ask them. I wouldn’t have aught to do with them.”

“Oh, that’s a pity.”

I had blundered.

She said: “Well, I’ve got work to do.”

She nodded curtly. It was dismissal.

I had imagined a cosy chat, being invited into the house, perhaps a glass of homemade cider or elderberry wine. Far from it! I should find it very difficult to get any information out of her.

I wanted so much to talk to her, to hear about the daughter who had worked as a barmaid at the Sailor’s Rest, who had married the heir of Tregarland’s, who had met an untimely death. But there would be nothing of that from Mrs. Pardell.

Disappointed, I retraced my steps.

I wished I could talk to her. She would be down to earth; there would be no flights of fancy, only solid facts. I believed I could have had a clear picture from her.

But why did I want it? It was all in the past. Yet what I had learned had made me think differently. People were not always what they seemed. Dermot himself…the charming, rather debonair young man on a walking tour in the German forest had given no hint of the tragedy in his life which could not have left him unscathed. How different he would have seemed—to me at any rate—if I had known that he had had a wife who had been drowned not long before her baby had been born. Then there was the old man who had led a riotous life and nowadays was more or less a recluse with a keen and, I was sure, mischievous delight in what was going on around him. Matilda, of course, was easy to know. Her son Gordon puzzled me a little. He was so aloof, so wrapped up in the estate toward which Dermot seemed almost indifferent.

On the way back to Tregarland’s an idea came to me.

I really did want to see more of Mrs. Pardell, and I should have no excuse for calling again. I could not just hang over the fence and gaze at the garden. And if I did, it would not be long before she would discover my ignorance. And then I imagined that shrewd Northern lady would soon suspect other motives—particularly when she discovered I was a guest at Tregarland’s and the sister of Dermot’s second wife. How much did she know? The Cornish were suspicious of foreigners and she would undoubtedly be dubbed one.

I decided to act on the idea which had come to me. It might misfire, but there was no reason why I should not give it a trial.

When I returned to the house, I went to the garden which sloped down to the sea and the private beach—that beach where Dermot’s first wife had gone to bathe on that fateful morning. I stood for a moment, letting the faintly scented air gently caress me. It was beautiful here, but I kept thinking of Annette’s coming down the slope. She would walk slowly, being heavily pregnant. How could she have done that? She must have known what a risk she was taking. I was lost in thought until I reminded myself why I was here.

I saw one of the gardeners at work some little way off, and I went to him.

I knew his name was Jack, so I said: “Hello, Jack.”

He touched his cap and leaned on his spade.

“Nice day, Miss,” he said.

“The gardens are looking beautiful.”

He looked pleased.

“They’ll be a real treat in a week or so. Let’s hope us don’t get no more of them there winds.”

“They are the garden’s biggest enemy, I suppose.”

He scratched his head. “There be others, but you can’t get away from them there winds. And here…well!” He lifted his shoulders in a helpless gesture.

“You’ve got that plant,” I began. “Is it some sort of Christmas rose?”

“Oh…I do know what you mean. It be a Christmas rose…with a difference like. It’s not one that you come across every day of your life.”

“Could you show it to me? I’d like to see it.”

I followed him up the slope a little way.

“It be over ’ere, Miss. There. Beauty, ain’t she?”

“Jack, can you take cuttings of these things?”

“Well, Miss, course you can. Trouble is they don’t always take root. This ’un…well…’er likes it here. Perhaps her fancies a bit of breeze now and then, and there’s the salt in the air. You’ll get some as flourishes by the sea and there’s others can’t abide it.”

“I met someone who was asking about that rose. Is it possible to take a cutting that I could give her?”

“Well, Miss, I don’t see why not.”

“Would you do that for me?”

“Course I would, Miss. Don’t guarantee it’ll take.”

“She’s a good gardener and would try very hard.”

“Someone round here then?”

“Someone I got into conversation with. She mentioned the rose, you see…”

“Oh, aye. Right you are, Miss. When would you want it?”

“Tomorrow?”

“You come to me, Miss, and I’ll do it then.”

“Oh, thank you, Jack. She’ll be delighted.”

“I just hope it takes, that’s all.”

I smiled. I did not care greatly whether it “took” or not. I was obsessed at the moment about having a talk with the mother of Dermot’s first wife.