The Miller's Dance by Winston Graham
‘But this was before gunpowder?’ said Clowance. ‘How long has gunpowder been invented?’
‘Gracious knows. Hundreds of years, I reckon.’
‘But is there any copper here, Ben? Or other metals? Can you see any real signs?’
‘Oh, aye, they’ve worked here proper. Though it look more like tin to me. See these holes, they be what is called a working-big.’
‘I don’t follow you.’
‘A space two feet and a half wide be the room a man must ’ave to wield his pick in a lode without breaking any of what they d’call the non-orey strata. So they call it a working-big, meaning the lode was at least two and a half feet wide. Here and here and here. See.’
‘But is any left?’
‘Not so’s I can see. You’d have to break up this face to be sure. We’ve a whole new lot o’ workings to explore, that’s for certain.’
‘Let’s go on a bit further.’
‘The air’s none too good. The further we d’go . . .’
‘It’s not bad. No worse than in the fifty level you’re just opening.’
Ben hesitated and then obeyed. In fact he was just as excited as Clowance. The next piece of tunnel was more broken, with shafts and winzes running and climbing in different directions. It was becoming a honeycomb. Ben chipped now and then with his hand pick so that the glint of new-cut stone should be there to guide them back the way they had come. The temperature was high and humid; but the ground looked more promising, the walls having greenish tinges, which Ben said was probably iron sulphate. He stopped again and they bent together.
‘Thur’s still some better stuff here. I reckon we may yet find where they’ve finished working the lodes.’ He looked up at the lowering, uneven roof, from which came the occasional drip of reddish water. ‘We gone far ’nough now, Clowance. These here props is rotten.’
‘If they’ve stayed up for centuries they’re not likely to fall just this moment. See round this corner.’
But round the corner an underhand stope had been worked, and the ground fell away sharply, some of the steps looking slippery and damp.
‘Tis far ’nough, Clowance. Without a rope I’d not go no farther myself, that I wouldn’t.’
She stopped, peering down. She was in her element.
‘Sure? You’re not telling me—’
‘No. Sure. There’s water down thur.’
Her candle lurched as she stooped to pick a stone from among the rubble. She threw it down the stope. The stone rattled a couple of times and then there was a plop.
‘All the way we’ve come,’ said Ben, ‘it has been draining this way.’
‘Yes . . .’ Clowance still peered down towards the unseen water, then she looked at the rubble she had disturbed. She knelt and ran her fingers over it.
‘What’s to do?’ said Ben.
She stood up. ‘This. This is not a stone, Ben.’
He stared at a circular brown thing she had in her hand. It was about the size of a ha’penny. He picked it out of her palm, stared at it.
‘Some sort of a coin, I reckon.’
‘Some sort of a coin,’ said Clowance.
Heads together, they examined it by the light of two candlepower.
‘Ha’penny? Penny? Tis not quite neither. You can see the head thur. But what head, that’s what’s a puzzle.’
‘What’s the metal?’
‘Copper or bronze.’ He scratched it with his nail. ‘Tis more like bronze to me.’
‘What is bronze, Ben? I never quite know.’
‘Mixture of copper and tin, I s’pose, mainly.’
‘Has there ever been bronze coinage in England? For many years, I mean? I doubt it. Look. You can see the letters round the head.’ She rubbed the coin. ‘A-N-T-O-N. Can you not see that?’
‘Yes.’
‘Perhaps it’s foreign. French or Spanish.’
‘May be.’
‘Was there ever any king of England called Anton?’
‘The lettering d’go on. Round the corner, see. But it don’t do to get too excited, Clowance. You know how the tin comp’nies used oft-times to make their own coins. Most possibly tis one of they.’
‘What is on the back? I can’t make it out.’
‘It d’look like a vase to me. Or a jug. And there are some letters. P.O.T., is it? But that would be a shortening of something. Be they sticks?’
‘Or ears of wheat? Ben, have you seen coins that the tin companies struck?’
‘A few.’ Ben was cautious.
‘Any ever like this?’
‘I don’t mind that they were.’
‘Or of bronze?’ She reversed the coin again, rubbed it with a corner of her jacket. ‘Round the corner by the head it says – seems to say – INNS. Isn’t that a religious abbreviation, put over the cross? Early Christian surely.’
‘I dunno nothing ’bout that.’
‘No, I’m wrong. That’s INRI. Damn, I thought it might prove . . .’
‘Seems me it be more like IUNS.’
‘Or IUUS. Or INUS.’ She clutched his arm. ‘INUS. It could be INUS!’
‘I don’t see what that d’mean.’
She continued to hold his arm. ‘Look, dear Ben. Look carefully. Hold still, dear Ben! Your head down a little more. Now see! Spell it out. Running up round the coin, you get what?’
‘A-N-T-O-N. What we’ve said afore.’
‘And going further round, down the other side? If that is I-N-U-S? What do we get then? Run them together, dear Ben, run them together.’
‘Anton – inus,’ he said, mispronouncing it.
‘Antoninus!’ she cried. ‘There was a king of England called Antoninus – though they called him emperor then. A Roman, Ben, a Roman Emperor!’
Ben stared at the coin, much more disturbed by Clowance’s warmth towards him than by the possible discovery. ‘What do that mean?’
‘It means that if this coin is really what it seems, that it dates from Roman times, from the time when Rome ruled Britain. Which was around the time of Christ. Which was one thousand eight hundred years ago! I don’t know when Antoninus lived, but I’ve heard of him. It means these old Trevorgie workings may have been used, worked . . . Papa will be entranced! And Jeremy. Oh, Ben, what a wonderful discovery!’
They held hands there in the slimy dark, her face aglow, his reflecting her pleasure. Then they turned, still holding hands, began to make their way slowly out again, stopping every few yards to notice something new, things they had missed on the way in – a basket half full of broken ore-rubble bursting open at the side, a stone wedge, a piece of horn that had come probably from a pick. All these things seemed now to be of the greatest antiquity. It was as if they had gone in blindfold and the discovery of the coin had unbandaged their eyes.
They returned to the second cavern, which was the largest of those they had so far discovered, and Ben began to pick here and there at the rubble. He soon unearthed part of a wheel, but it was not a wheel from a cart. It lay near a narrow pit running along one side of the cavern, and was iron-bound at the sides.
‘What’s this?’ Clowance asked, picking up the end of something white. Suddenly she dropped it.
Ben squatted beside her. He fished at the thing and gradually drew it out from the rubble. Then he too dropped it.
‘Well . . . could be an animal.’
‘It doesn’t look like it to me!’
‘Dr Enys’ll no doubt be able to tell us ’bout that.’
‘It is like the bone of a man’s forearm!’ said Clowance.
‘Maybe . . . Though tis some thin.’
‘Well, they are thin. There’s two aren’t there, side by side. Feel your own arm.’
They stared at the long slender bone. No doubt if they dug further into the rubble they would come upon other bones which would settle the question. After a few seconds Ben stood up.
‘Best go, my dear.’
Clowance continued kneeling. ‘I wonder how long – who it was – w
‘No one’ll ever know that.’
Quietly they left the cavern, stooped and twisted through the next tunnel and out into the first cavern, then down the ladder to the 30 level, and more tunnels till they reached the ladder leading up the main shaft to the daylight.
‘Tis a proper mystery to me,’ Ben said as they paused for breath, for a cleaner breath at last. ‘How that has all existed all those years and no one has never found’n before. And there’s air – of a sort – bad but bearable. There must be an outlet somewhere, two outlets more likely, probably part blocked. I wonder . . .’
‘What?’
‘They d’say the blown sand have moved over all they ’undreds of years, have buried houses, villages. Maybe the old mine have been so buried.’
Clowance was thinking of the bone they had found. ‘I wonder,’ she said, ‘if the Romans used slaves . . .’
They went on up the ladder.
Beside the engine house was a timber changing shed where the miners left and collected their gear. Squinting in the bright daylight, they went in and Clowance took off her hat and jacket. Ben relieved her of these and hung them up, took off his own hat.
‘Cap’n Poldark’ll not be back tonight?’
‘No, but Mama will, also Jeremy. Ben, I think you should be there before I tell them. It is your find really. Why do you not come about six, and I’ll wait till then? We’ll tell them together.’
He flushed. ‘That’d be proper. Thank ee. About six, then. And Clowance . . . thank ee for coming down.’
She smiled brilliantly. ‘It was – wondrous. It must be good news – for us all.’
They came out of the shed. Stephen Carrington was standing there.
IV
He said: ‘Where’ve you been?’
They stared at each other. His face was taut with anger.
Clowance said: ‘Down the mine with Ben. Stephen, we’ve—’
‘Didn’t we agree to meet today, Clowance? Didn’t I say I was taking time off and would call for you at eleven?’
‘Oh, Stephen. I am very sorry. In the excitement I had totally forgot. Yes, you did! But it slipped my mind when Ben came—’
‘Oh, it did, did it?’
‘It was thoughtless of me. But when you—’
‘Just slipped your mind when this little misbegot came to call! When he came crawling out of the mine to see you—’
‘Stephen, don’t be stupid! What’s got into you? Look what we’ve found! Ben’s found—’
But it was too late. All Ben’s frustrated, buttoned-down antagonism exploded. ‘What did ee call me?’
‘I called ee what ee wur!’ snarled Stephen, mimicking Ben’s accent. ‘A little misbegot from Wheal Leisure that’s come crawling out of the mine intruding where he’s not wanted—’
‘Stephen!’ Clowance shouted angrily.
Ben aimed a swinging round arm blow at Stephen, who half parried it, but it hit him on the side of the jaw. Stephen stepped back, fists bunched, his whole face blazing, then rushed at Ben, brushing Clowance aside as he did so. There was a flurry of blows, and in a few seconds they had each other round the throat; they swayed across the yard and barged into the changing shed so that the wood nearly cracked; then they fell and rolled upon the rubble floor, fighting each other with the pent-up hate and rivalry of snarling animals intent on the ugliest injury.
‘Stephen!’ screamed Clowance. ‘Ben! Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!’ She rushed at them, clutching coat and hair and flailing fist, being hit herself in the process, her own sturdy body half involved. But hatred was too strong for her; so was the momentum of the clash.
Two men came out of the changing shed, Paul Daniel and one of the young Martins, startled by the crash against the side.
‘Stop them!’ Clowance turned, trying to get to her feet.
‘Paul! Harry! Stop them! They’re . . . They’re . . .
Soon five were involved. Paul, though now in his fifties, still had great strength and he took Ben by the coat, began to drag him away. Harry was not heavy enough for Stephen, but Clowance lent the help of all her own strength and great anger.
Presently they were separated, began slowly getting to their feet, trying to shake off the clutch of restraining hands. When it was seen that they were making no new move towards each other, the hands let them be. It seemed likely that Stephen, being the heavier man, would in the end have got the better of the fight, but at the time of interruption there had been little in it. Stephen’s coat sleeve was rent from shoulder to cuff; one eye was very red and would go black, his lip and his hand were bleeding. Ben’s shirt was in ribbons and he had livid marks round his throat and a split eyebrow. What injuries they had done to each other’s bodies was not perceivable.
Nobody spoke for a few seconds. Paul Daniel broke the shuffling, gasping pause.
‘Couldn’t think what that thur thump was,’ he said. ‘Shook the whole ’ut. Didn’t it, young Harry? Maybe twas fortunate we was around!’
Ben’s face was grey and sweaty, He coughed and swallowed. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Sorry it ever ’appened, Miss Clowance.’ He turned and walked away.
‘Ben!’ Clowance commanded, and he stopped but without turning to face her.
‘Stephen!’ she said, trembling with anger, and near tears; ‘in front of Paul and Harry you will both apologize to me for this – this the most insulting scene I have ever witnessed! And you will apologize to each other!’
Silence again fell on the scene. A few jackdaws were chakking around the engine house as if themselves disturbed, but no one else apparently had witnessed the fight.
‘Stephen!’ Clowance said.
He was taking deep breaths as if still trying to rid himself of his anger.
‘Sorry,’ Ben said. ‘Sorry, Miss Clowance. Sorry, Mister Carrington,’ and went on his way.
After a few seconds Stephen said harshly: ‘Look, Clowance—’
‘That’s not what I want!’
Paul Daniel shuffled his feet. ‘Well, come along, ’Arry. We’re late enough as tis.’
They moved off just in time to hear Stephen say: ‘I’m sorry, Clowance.’
She took another trembling breath: ‘How dare you! How dare you make such a scene, say such utterly offensive things to Ben!’
With an anger growing in him again he tried to overbear her. ‘Because I happen not to like you going down the mine on your own with him, see! And I happen not to like you forgetting my existence just because he came to call on you. I had promised to come to see you; but what did that matter? He calls in and you forget everything—’
‘I forgot! Well, I forgot! It happens, for a very good reason—’
‘What reason?’
‘What does that matter now?’ Clowance said bitterly.
‘Well, ye forgot, didn’t you. Forgot I was even alive! And you was down on your own together best part of an hour, for that long I’ve been waiting! An hour! And then coming up all flushed and secretive as if—’
‘As if what?’
‘Well, how am I to know? What am I to know? Treated like a lackey!’
‘You’ve just behaved like a lackey!’
‘Careful what you say, girl!’
‘You treated him disgracefully! And then to fight like – like a scruffy dog . . .’
‘Two dogs. He struck me first! Did you happen to notice that?’
‘Stephen, he’s my friend! I’ve known him since I was a child and—’
‘And what am I supposed to be – not your friend?’
‘Don’t be utterly stupid!—’
‘God damn it!’ he shouted; ‘d’you think all your friends have a right and entitlement to swing their fists at me just when they fancy? If so, you can think again!’
‘I can think again about a lot of things,’ said Clowance, hardly able to get her breath.
‘Just tell your friends,’ Stephen said, towering over her, ‘just tell your damned friends to keep their j
‘It was certainly as well, since you had no regard for me!’
‘If we’d gone on like that much longer, him using his boots and nails, I’d have killed him!’
Clowance looked at him through her blurred vision. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You’d have killed him, wouldn’t you. Like that sailor in Plymouth. You only had to draw your knife!’
She turned and left him standing there before he could reply.
Chapter Eight
I
Friday, October the ninth.
After thirty years of searching, the old Trevorgie workings had been discovered at last – and dry enough in part for investigation without putting much extra work on the engine. A whole new area was opened up and pointed the way in which earlier lodes had been followed.
It was the day when Ross Poldark was re-elected for the corporation borough of Truro.
It was the day when Clowance Poldark broke off her engagement to marry Stephen Carrington.
It was the day when Ben Carter resigned as underground captain of Wheal Leisure mine.
The conflict, though at first mercifully private between the five of them, soon spread. Paul Daniel could be trusted to say nothing, but Harry Martin bubbled with the news until he burst. In any event the consequences were bound to make themselves known.
Ben did not return to Nampara at six as invited, so it was left to Clowance alone to break to her family the news of the discovery of the old workings. Jeremy was wildly excited about it and wanted at once to go to the mine to see for himself. Why was Ben not here? What sort of ore-bearing ground had he found? Was there a group already exploring the workings? Clowance, her round face gone curiously thin, had then to explain a little of what had happened when they came up, though she treated the quarrel as undramatically as possible. Ben had gone off – she did not know whither – and she had returned to the house, having had no further contact or conversation with Stephen. Demelza, observing her daughter’s brimming face, said pacifically: