The pool of St Branok

She spoke vehemently. My mother was a great talker—unlike my father. I liked to see him sitting there smiling at her indulgently and lovingly while she talked in her vivacious way. I think I resembled her more than I did my father—although I had his looks. I was fair-haired with large dreamy-looking greenish eyes and a wide mouth. I looked as though I should have been serious, thoughtful, but the effect was spoilt by my pert nose which was quite unlike my father's rather noble-looking long one. It gave the contradiction to my seriousness, as it were. My father would touch it sometimes when I said something outrageous, as though my audacity was due to my nose.

I did not realize how lucky I was to have such parents in those days; but that, after all, is the sort of conclusion one comes to later in life.

They were the glorious days of childhood before I was suddenly aware that day at St Branok Pool that the world can be a very frightening place.

I remember those pre-Branok days when the sun seemed to shine perpetually and each day was a week long. I had a governess, Miss Prentiss, who despaired of turning me into the little lady she felt would be worthy of the House of Cador. I ran wild and as my parents did not seem to disapprove of this, what could a governess do? I believe she bemoaned her task to Mrs. Penlock, our cook, and Watson, our butler, when she deigned to go to the kitchen, which was on special occasions only, she being very well aware of the echelons of society which placed her on a higher rung of the social ladder than the domestic staff.

But Mrs. Penlock, who had been at Cador in the days when my mother was a girl, in her stately black bombazine, reigned majestically below stairs and could deal adequately with Miss Prentiss. So could Watson—a very dignified gentleman, except when he was making himself agreeable to one of the prettier maids, and he even did that with an air of condescension.

They were happy days. I suppose I was allowed to run wild, as Miss Prentiss said. My mother had had a certain amount of freedom when she was young and wanted me to have the same. There was nothing of the stern parent about her or my father. "Little children should be seen and not heard," said old Mrs. Fenny who lived in one of the cottages near the harbor in East Poldorey, shaking her head, ominously considering the fate of those who were heard as well as seen. She was one of those old women who look for sin and seem to find it. She spent hours looking out of her tiny window onto the quay to where men sat about mending their nets or weighing up their catch, and noting everything that went on. In the summer she would be sitting at her door, so much more convenient for discovering any misdemeanor and passing on any bit of scandal that came her way.

"There will always be people like that," said my mother. "It is because their lives are so dull. They are unhealthily curious about others whose lives seem more eventful, and because they are envious they seize every opportunity to slander them. Let's hope none of us ever get like that."

There were several others like Mrs. Fenny in both East and West Poldorey. The people of the east side regarded those of the west as aliens— though slightly less foreign than those who came from the other side of the Tamar. Mrs. Fenny always referred to them as "They West Poldorers" with a certain contempt. I always laughed when I heard her western counterparts speak of the inhabitants of the east side with equal scorn and superiority.

I loved the harbor with the little fishing boats swaying on the tide, secured as they were to the great iron rings which made you watch your step as you ran along. I liked to stand by and watch the men as they worked.

"Good day to 'ee, Miss Angel," they would call.

Angel. It was so incongruous. It was Angelet really. My mother was very interested in the family and she told me of an ancestress who had lived during the time of the Civil War. Her name had been Angelet and I was named after her. I am afraid the diminutive form did not exactly suit me. Perhaps people used it to try to make me live up to it.

They all knew who I was, " 'er from Cador, Miss Angel who might have inherited the place but for Mr. Jack." I could imagine their conversation when he was born. "Well, it be right and proper for a lad to be the master. 'Tis no place for a maid."