The Angry Tide by Winston Graham
‘But you say Pearce – old Nat Pearce had been embezzling money . . . That’s hard to credit! The poor old fool must have been senile. What in God’s name! But it shouldn’t have broken Pascoe?’ He got up. ‘There was clearly the old malice at work.’
‘Yes, Ross.’ She got up too, went to a drawer, handed him the anonymous letter. ‘About fifty of these were written, so Joan Peter told me, delivered by hand to the most important people in the town, especially customers of Pascoe’s Bank.’
He dropped the letter on the table, where it curled like a snake beside the slice of cheese he had been eating. ‘Joan Peter. You saw her? Where is Harris now?’
‘I went in last Monday, Ross. Just to see. See if I could help. The bank was shuttered, the door nailed, a notice on it stating that because of inability to meet its creditors Pascoe’s Bank had closed and would not re-open. I was turning away, but Joan saw me, called me to the side door. Harris was not there: he’s staying with his sister in Calenick.’
‘And what in the devil’s name was Joan doing there? It says in this paper that her moneys were withdrawn. Is it some fool behaviour of that God-damned cousin of mine?’
‘Yes, Ross. He was in debt and his bills were called in—’
‘To the Warleggans, I suppose.’
‘I think so.’
He picked the letter up again. It uncurled reluctantly in his fingers, and he stared at it as if it were unclean.
‘So this is George’s doing. If so—’
Demelza said: ‘George and Elizabeth left Truro the day after the Whitworth funeral. They went to stay with some cousins of hers in Salcombe. That was before the crisis started.’
‘He would wish to keep his fingers clean while others did the work . . . It would not be Nicholas: I give him credit for a modicum of ethics. It was Cary, I suppose.’
‘The uncle? I think so from something Joan said. Ross.’
‘Yes?’
‘Cary Warleggan called in his loans to St John. That’s all we know. We may suspect, but that’s all we know. He couldn’t have been responsible for Mr Pearce, for other things. He may have used the opportunity. But I don’t want you – at war with George again.’
‘Must I stand being kicked in the face all day and all night and return a simper and a smirk? My dear, you cannot admire being married to a worm. You must give it permission to turn once in a while.’
‘I would want it to turn, Ross, but not with violence. If you broke the law, did something destructive, knocked George down, broke his jaw, as I’d love for you to do, twould exactly suit the Warleggans. He’d nurse his jaw with satisfaction if he could have you up in court for it. You – a reformed renegade – with a long record of violence. He’d like nothing better than to see you forced to resign your seat in the House.’
‘My dear, I think you overrate the delicacy of those men who sit on the benches at St Stephen’s. I’ve seen some rough dealings from time to time.’ He refilled his glass, brought the port decanter to her without asking her, without looking at her. She raised her eyebrows at him as he came back. He let out a slow breath and slumped in his chair. ‘As God is my judge, I still can’t believe it! Pascoe had friends! And his three partners!’
‘Men of straw, Harris called them.’
‘And Basset’s. Warleggan’s I know he could not appeal to, but Basset, Rogers & Co. stepped in two years ago.’
‘Joan told me: she said Pascoe’s paid out over nine thousand on Thursday, nine thousand on Friday, eleven thousand on Saturday. They’d two thousand left, and needed at least eight more to see them safe. Harris went to see Mr King of Basset’s on Sunday afternoon but Mr King said Lord de Dunstanville was in London and Mr Rogers in Scotland, and he couldn’t commit himself without their authority.’
There was a tap on the door and Jane Gimlett put her head round. ‘Is it convenient to clear, ma’am?’
‘Yes, do.’ Demelza thought the breathing space a good thing, to give them a few moments to reflect. Ross began to fill his pipe furiously. So furiously that the bole snapped from the stem.
Demelza got up quickly. ‘There’s another in the cupboard.’ She went across and rummaged, handed another pipe to him, took the broken pieces. With an effort he smiled.
‘Thank you.’
By the time Jane had finished, the next pipe was going.
When the door closed Demelza said: ‘Was I right to do that, Ross? To go to Mr Daniell and borrow money from him?’
He didn’t answer, frowning into the fire.
‘I did consider trying to see Lord Falmouth, but was afraid he might be in London.’
‘He was. You didn’t think of Dwight?’
‘Dwight? How could he . . . Oh, you mean—’
‘He is now in control of Caroline’s money.’
‘But you know he will not touch it.’
‘I know. He might just possibly have taken a risk for this. For a bank to fail only for a few thousand pounds . . .’
‘No, I didn’t – it never occurred to me. I’m sorry.’
Silence fell. The pipe was not drawing properly. He took it out and looked at it. Then he threw it violently on the fire. In a charged voice he said: ‘But if you paid all the money you borrowed from Ralph-Allen Daniell into Pascoe’s Bank, how did you meet the wages here next morning?’
‘I didn’t.’
‘You . . .’
She said: ‘We had a hundred and ten pounds in the house. You know what we always keep, Ross. I went to the mine in the morning and spoke to them in groups. I said Pascoe’s Bank was in trouble and it was necessary that we should help. I said if it had not been for Pascoe’s Bank the mine would not be in existence at all. That was right, wasn’t it?’
‘You might say that,’ said Ross.
‘So I said – we could not pay them in full but that I – we would pay them a quarter of what was their due, and that you would make up the rest when you returned.’
‘Ah,’ said Ross.
The stem of the pipe had fallen in the hearth and he picked it up with the tongs and put it back into the flames.
‘In fact,’ said Ross, ‘it has so happened that I paid ten guineas in Fowey today for this two-year-old mare. Therefore in my purse at the moment is one guinea, a seven-shilling gold piece, and five pennies. That is my total wealth. I thought to replenish it when I got home.’
There was silence again.
He said: ‘I suppose none of the bills have been paid either, for the timber, coal and other supplies delivered to the mine in February and March?’
‘No, Ross.’
‘Do we still owe Jonas for flour, and Renfrew for tackle and those other bills to the Truro tradesmen?’
‘Yes, Ross.’
He said: ‘I think there’s another pipe in the drawer beside the desk. I might as well break them all.’ He got up and went to the desk.
She said: ‘Did I do right or wrong, Ross? I have to know. I had to – to make the choice.’
As he passed her he put his hand briefly on her shoulder.
‘You’re worth all Westminster,’ he said.
Chapter Eleven
I
Harris Pascoe said: ‘My dear Ross, it has been a very miserable business, and I agree that if more of my friends had been on hand we might have w-weathered the storm. But in some circumstances life does not admit of grades of success or failure. If I were captain of a ship that had been wrecked it could be argued that two more lights at the harbour mouth would have enabled me to avoid the rocks. But if the ship is lost, it is lost and the captain bears the responsibility.’
‘For treachery? For false lights? For desertions of the crew?’
‘You carry the analogy too far. In fact I am getting on in years and shall not feel a lessening of responsibility altogether unwelcome. Money? Yes, I have lost it all, but my sister is unmarried and has a c-competence. I regret most the loss of reputation. One does not want to take one’s exeat after thirty years in a town with a cloud on one’
Ross tapped his boot. ‘You sit there in such apparent calm. It doesn’t become you. If you don’t think of yourself, what of your clients? – all those who have relied on you for judgment and advice: they don’t disappear overnight.’
‘Basset, Rogers & Co. will take over the business, and the accounts will be automatically transferred unless a client expressly wishes different. They are also taking over the liabilities – though I think these, apart from my own losses, will be negligible. It is a little early to be sure yet – much good stock was thrown on the market at a loss – and we had to discount bills at 15 per cent – of course liquidations are expensive in many ways – but I would have thought all debts could eventually be met in full. Eventually. So I don’t think your money – even the last eight hundred pounds, which your wife with such noble generosity paid into the bank on the Friday – will ultimately be lost. It may be a few months—’
‘Then for God’s sake, why cannot the bank be reconstituted as before? Harris, that must be possible!’
Pascoe narrowed his eyes. ‘With what capital? I have no capital now. A bank – and the partners in that bank – must possess a large sum of money of their own before they begin to accept the responsibility of lending and borrowing other p-people’s. There must be a – a large nucleus, free of encumbrance, as it were. It is from that nucleus that the whole system of credit springs. It may be wrong. In my case, as you have observed, it has proved disastrous. But that is the way it has all grown up. There is not a bank in the country, I venture to believe, that could meet all its creditors at the same time. But they do not need to, for their creditors have sufficient faith in them.’
Ross glowered at Miss Pascoe’s ginger cat, which was performing genuflections round a table leg, and asking for his attention.
‘In any case,’ said Pascoe, ‘my experience of banking, such as it is, may not altogether be lost, for Mr King has offered me the post of ch-chief clerk in the office of Basset, Rogers & Co.’
Ross tried to say something, but all that came out was a slight spray such as a bad actor produces when declaiming.
Pascoe smiled wryly. ‘I have not decided yet whether to accept.’
‘Then I will refuse for you,’ said Ross.
Pascoe shrugged. ‘The salary is not to be sneezed at.’
‘No, it is to be spat at, spat out, as is the offer! If I cannot do something better than that for you, you may drop me in the mud of the river!’
‘Don’t attempt too much, Ross, for you will be disappointed. Money is tight in the county. You may find a lot of well-wishers but not many well-doers. Above all and especially it will be realized that it is n-not a good thing to fight the Warleggans. It is not impossible that some extra obloquy will settle on their name from this. (Although nothing can be proven, many will guess.) But the success of their manoeuvre, while it may darken their reputation, will also strengthen it. Fewer voices will be raised against a family who have the power to do what they have done.’
‘I’ve not feared them in the past, so I’m not going to fear them now.’
‘Not fear them, no. But not to be hot-headed about them. Circumspection is all.’
Ross smiled grimly. ‘You’d like me to deny my own nature.’
‘Well, may I say if you quarrel with them it must not be on my behalf. And another thing,’ Harris Pascoe said, as Ross rose to go. ‘Do not quarrel with your friends on my behalf neither. Oh, it can easily happen. You will w-want them to do more than they are prepared to do. An impatient word can turn quickly to an angry one.’
‘Not if they are true friends.’
‘Well . . . I have said my say. And remember, just at the moment your own financial position is very far from secure.’
II
From Calenick Ross went to see Mr Henry Prynne Andrew. Mr Andrew was not a personal friend, but he had supported Pascoe right through and must be feeling sore. The next visit was to Mr Hector Spry, Pascoe’s Quaker partner. Throughout the crisis Mr Spry had not visited the bank but had spent all the time, he said, in prayer, feeling that this was the most effective help he could offer. Then Ross called on Lord Devoran, who was out. So he rode down the hill to see Ralph-Allen Daniell. An hour later he was back in Truro and had a bite to eat in the Fighting Cocks Inn, which was crowded, it being market day. The street outside was full of bleating lambs and stolid cattle and men in smocks and the smell of fresh animal dung.
After this snack he crossed the river to Tregothnan, but as he expected Lord Falmouth was still in town. Mrs Gower invited him to tea, which he politely declined; but before leaving he had a word with Mr Curgenven, who was full of quiet self-satisfaction that (unspoken) thanks to his attentive stewardship, his lordship would lose nothing from the Pearce peculations. Mr Curgenven was also at pains to point out that Viscount Falmouth was quite uninvolved in any Cornish banking house and, by implication, was unlikely to wish to be. This Ross already knew.
On his way north he called in to see Mr Alfred Barbary, one of his old partners in the Carnmore Copper venture, and made his final call of the day on Sir John Trevaunance. He had not much hope here. Sir John was a warm man and kept what he might have called his petty cash in Pascoe’s Bank, but in such investments as he had made in Cornwall he had always tended to lose money, so the glaze that came over his eyes whenever financial matters were mentioned grew to be of extra opacity if the subject involved investment in the county. So it proved now. They drank a brandy and talked of parliamentary matters, and Ross left.
It had been a hard day and he was tired. This was not at all how he expected to spend his first day home. He had seen nothing of his children, nothing of the mine, on which in effect his future prosperity still depended. He carried in his saddle-bag eight pounds weight of gold coin, twelve of silver and one of copper, having confessed to Ralph-Allen Daniell his wife’s use for the former cash and his need for another draft to meet the as-yet-unpaid miners. He had asked for it as a plain loan, not an advance against profits on the furnaces.
He was annoyed at the way he had been paid the money at Basset, Rogers & Co., but they said they could do no other. Small change was the bugbear throughout the county, and barter widespread. Harris Pascoe had always saved up for him an abundance of copper for his monthly pay-day. If the miners got paid in coin too large they would take a four-shilling piece – or even a half-sovereign – to a kiddley, the owner of the kiddley would be unable or unwilling to change it and would accept the coin and mark the man’s credit on a slate. So the man would be encouraged to drink it all away instead of giving it to his wife.
He was passing Doctor’s kiddley as he reflected on this, and just then the half door swung open and three men came out – not drunk but having had their share. It was half light, when night was coming to the land but the sky reflected the shining sea. He glanced at them and rode by. A hundred yards on he came to a decision and turned Sheridan down the steep cobbly lane, known locally as Stippy Stappy, leading to the inlet of Sawle.
His horse did not like the descent, so he dismounted and led him down. He looped his reins over a post a dozen yards beyond the cottage he needed, took the saddle-bag with him as a precaution and went to the door.
Rosina opened it. ‘Oh, sir! Cap’n Poldark! Do ee come in. We – was not expecting . . .’
‘Is your father in?’ Knowing he was not.
‘No, sur. I thought twas his footfall. Mother, Cap’n Poldark be here!’
‘No, no,’ said Ross, stooping in the low room. ‘I wanted a word with you. By then perhaps Jacka will be in.’
She seated herself nervously, and he sat too, refusing her offer of drink. If he had taken all the drink he had been offered today, he thought, he would be in no fit state to ride home.
‘Perhaps you don’t wish to speak of what has happened since I went away, Rosina. Perhaps it is better that we shouldn’t speak of it. But I would like to say I am very sorry.’
‘You, sir? Why, twas naught to do with y
He looked at her, so respectable in this near-hovel; muslin cap, dimity frock, tidy, clean, pretty little face; she deserved a good man.
‘I think my brother-in-law failed of his duty, and shall tell him so when I meet him. I have been home little more than four-and-twenty hours and have scarce seen anyone yet.’
Her head came up. ‘I don’t think, sir, if you’ll pardon the liberty, that I d’want Drake Carne nor no other man to wed me out of a sense of duty. That is not what marriage ought to be.’
‘I agree. But if a promise is made in all truth of heart, then it should not be broken for an impulsive whim.’
‘Twas not a whim,’ she said. ‘He loved she afore ever he saw me, and when she became a widow he felt he must go. I respect him. I don’t respect her!’
‘She was forced into the marriage. Oh, you mean, now – now she has turned him away?’
‘So I’ve heard tell.’
‘You haven’t seen him since?’
‘No!’
Her eyes were filling with tears. Just then a heavy tread outside the window announced the arrival of Jacka.
The door shivered as he came in, flush-faced, heavy-browed, belligerent. Because the horse was further down, he had not expected his visitor, and his face registered the shock.
‘Cap’n . . .’
‘Want a word with you, Jacka. And I want it alone.’
‘Why, what’s amiss? I din’ knaw ee were home. What’s amiss, Rosina?’
‘Nothing to do with her,’ said Ross. ‘I want a quiet word.’
Rosina gathered her sewing. ‘I’ll go see where Mother’s to.’
While she was leaving Ross stared at Jacka, returning the heavy half-drunken glare until the miner blinked and looked away.
‘A bad business, this, Jacka. Drake Carne leaving Rosina like this. A very bad business.’
Jacka growled in his throat.