A Cornish Orphan, page 13
‘It’s not true, is it, Lottie?’ Tom said in a very audible whisper, looking up at Lottie.
‘I think it’s true.’ Lottie looked at him kindly and held him close, her arm around his shoulders. Tom leaned against her, his eyelids heavy as he processed her reply. Matt was hunched on the arm of the sofa where Lottie couldn’t reach him. He looked desolate and alone, detached, floating further and further away in a bubble of sorrow.
Jenny looked at her three children. They haven’t got a daddy, she thought. Compassion fired up her courage and she went to them, crossing the room in her peach organza dress, and squeezed herself onto the sofa. She held out her arms, and hugged Lottie and Tom in a tight little knot of grief and love. ‘It’s gonna be hard,’ she said. ‘Very hard. But you’ve got me, and we must stick together. Together we’re strong.’ She looked at Matt, but he didn’t move from his lonely bubble. Suddenly he swung down from the sofa, without looking at anyone, and stumbled out, into the rain. He slammed the door so hard that the china jingled in the kitchen. His footsteps melted into the thundery evening.
‘Matt!’ Jenny cried.
Vic held up his hand. ‘Let him go, girl. Let him deal with it in his own way.’
‘You’re going to have trouble raising HIM without a father,’ Nan said.
Jenny let that remark pass, and focused on comforting Lottie and Tom. She’d find the fire to confront Nan on another day. Not now when she felt shocked and beaten. Being a mother mattered more. Questions queued in her mind. What had happened to Arnie? Where had they taken his body? Who had found him floating in the harbour?
But before she could begin to ask them, something happened outside on that thundery evening in May. An almighty reverberating boom rocked the little town of St Ives. The sound crackled along the harbour and circled the bay, dying away into a rumble. Seconds later another boom, exactly the same.
‘That wasn’t thunder.’ Nan sat up very straight. ‘That was the call-out maroon.’
Vic had already jumped to his feet. ‘I’ve got to go.’
‘You’re not in a fit state to go out,’ Nan said.
‘Course I am. D’you think Arnie would want me to sit here? I’m going.’ Vic was already on his way out.
‘Take Arnie’s oilskins,’ Jenny said.
Vic shook his head. ‘I couldn’t.’
Tom started to howl. ‘I don’t want Grandad to go.’
‘Don’t be such a baby,’ Nan said. ‘Grandad is a proud Cornishman. He’s going to help man the lifeboat. There’s a ship out there in distress.’
Tom howled louder than ever. Finally it was too much for him.
‘I’ll put him to bed and read him a story,’ Lottie said. She was remarkably calm.
‘That’s my girl.’ Jenny threw her a look of gratitude.
Vic turned in the doorway. ‘Whether you like it or not, Jenny, Nan has got to stay here until morning. She’s had a fall, and a terrible shock. You keep the peace. Keep the peace – both of you.’
Jenny and Nan eyed each other uneasily as Vic went out. They listened to his heavy footsteps running down to the harbour.
‘And by the way, it’s my birthday,’ said Lottie, ‘but it doesn’t matter.’
John De Lumen set up his easel on the edge of Wharf Road. He wanted to paint the harbour in the morning sun at high tide when the water lapping against the wall was a mysteriously jewel-bright green. The colours of the granite and the boats were warm and earthy against the sea, and the sun shone silver through the wing feathers of the herring gulls. After the long winter in London, he enjoyed just being in St Ives, in the clear, clean air. Today was the last day of his holiday, and there had only been one disappointment. He hadn’t seen the child. He was still working on his oil painting, Discovering Charlotte, and one more glimpse of her would have helped to refresh his memory. But perhaps she didn’t live in St Ives. She could have been on holiday on that hot day in July.
As he unpacked his watercolours and brushes, it occurred to John De Lumen that there was something uncannily different about the place. Stroking his beard, he gazed around to try to identify the change, and realised the harbour was unusually still and quiet. The boats rocked gently on the tide, but not one of them was in use. The two piers were deserted. No fishermen mending nets or sorting lobster pots. No voices calling to each other. No whistling. No laughter.
He picked up his favourite brush and smoothed it between finger and thumb. He dipped it in Cerulean Blue intending to begin painting the sky and as he did so, the church bell began to toll, a rhythmic, muffled tone singing softly over the water. Outside the lifeboat house, a group of men was assembling, not talking but silent, their tanned faces serious. They looked like fishermen but wore suits and black ties. Without fuss they arranged themselves into three rows in a crescent shape, all standing proudly with square shoulders and strong faces looking up Wharf Road.
‘Excuse me, sir.’
Startled to be tapped on the shoulder by a policeman in a helmet and black cape, John dropped his paintbrush, leaving a daub of Cerulean Blue on the pavement.
‘Would you mind moving, sir? You can’t paint here until later today. There’s a big funeral in St Ives.’
‘Yes – yes, of course.’ John quickly closed his paint box and bundled everything into his bag. ‘Who is it? A local person, I suppose.’
The policeman lowered his voice. ‘A tragedy for St Ives, sir,’ he said. ‘A young man, one of Cornwall’s best lifeboat crew – died in tragic circumstances – a family man, loved by everyone.’
‘I’m so sorry.’ John folded his easel. He noticed people waiting outside their doors along Wharf Road. ‘If I stand quietly over there and pay my respects, will that be all right?’
‘Yes, sir. Thank you. You can come back and paint your picture later today.’
John crossed the road and tucked himself into a shop doorway. He hadn’t planned to be watching a funeral. He could have moved on to paint somewhere else. It was just a gut feeling that for some reason he had to be there and watch this Cornish funeral. Part of life’s rich tapestry, to an artist. And a memory to take back with him to London, a reminder of the close and loving community found in these Cornish towns. So he stood still to watch, dispassionately, not expecting to become emotionally involved.
Wharf Road was clear, swept clean by many brooms in the night, and the ceremony began, for John De Lumen, with a single comment from a woman who stood nearby. ‘They’m comin’.’
Everyone stiffened and turned to look expectantly at the group of men gathered outside the lifeboat house. John De Lumen’s mouth fell open as the St Ives Male Voice Choir began to sing, deeply, from the heart and from the belly, in flawless harmony. Their power filled the harbour from West Pier to Smeaton’s Pier with a quality of sound John had never heard before: a ringing, compellingly human music. It moved him profoundly. He knew the hymn tune. The words reached his soul in well-remembered phrases: A thousand ages in thy sight – are like a moment gone and Time like an ever rolling stream – bears all its sons away.
There was a moment when the choir, the bell and the seagulls were in balance, and the intensity was like a clarion, a warning of the grief to come. It was joined by the clop of horses’ hooves and the slow procession appeared at the far end of Wharf Road. First came a flagbearer dressed in Cornish tartan solemnly carrying the flag of St Piran, then the two black horses, walking so carefully, their coats shining in the sun, a plume of black nodding on each head. They pulled a wagon with the coffin draped in the RNLI flag and surrounded by flowers in RNLI colours of orange, indigo and white.
John watched it passing, a lump in his throat, a sadness surfacing from way back in his life. He was unprepared for what he saw next. Behind the coffin came three children dressed in black, two boys with their heads bowed, and a little girl walking between them, a black veil covering her small face. She walked with grace and courage and as she passed close to him, John saw the tumble of blonde hair swinging down her straight back. Charlotte! A child of tragedy, John thought, and it added poignancy to his painting. It would be in her eyes. He longed to talk to her but now she seemed even more remote from him than she had on the beach. He hoped that sunny summer day was locked into little Charlotte’s heart to help her through this tragedy.
Behind the children came a woman, all in black, walking alone, her pretty face unreadable under the black veil. Obviously the widow, tragically young. What did the future hold for her now? A grim time of raising three children, alone, and in poverty.
Next came a donkey cart, the donkey led by a man whose deeply tanned face looked swollen, his eyes red-rimmed from grief. The donkey plodded dutifully, its long furry ears pricked as if doing its best under the circumstances. A name was on the brow band of the bridle. Mufty. Sitting on the donkey cart was a silver-haired lady in a magnificent black velvet cloak which covered her huge body and sashayed over the edges of the cart. She wore a broad-brimmed hat with a black veil. The grandmother. She turned her head and looked directly at John, her eyes fierce, looking him up and down as if she thought him an impostor, an ‘Emmet’ who had no business gawping at this Cornish funeral. The sun flashed on a set of purple beads around her throat. A formidable lady. One who could freeze the roots of his hair with one imperious glance.
The male voice choir began a new hymn, the fisherman’s hymn, Eternal father strong to save. And behind the donkey cart the crew of the lifeboat marched in their oilskins and sou’wester hats, each carrying an upright oar. It made an impressive statement. John became more and more deeply moved, overwhelmed to see the entire population of St Ives following in their best, blackest of black clothes, and all of them singing the hymn. It resounded from the cottage walls and the harbour with a great roaring, earthy, emotional song.
So much love. For one young fisherman.
John found himself swept along, carrying his gear, wanting to follow, to be part of this close community, to be there inside the church of St Ia, hidden in a stone corner, watching Charlotte in her hour of grief. Learning more about her strength and beauty, and her vulnerability. Coming closer to solving a mind-haunting mystery that had caused him to swap his comfortable predictable world for the life of a struggling artist.
The tolling bell and the singing stopped as the cortege reached the open doorway of St Ia’s Church. The seagulls took over with a symphony of screams, their orange beaks and white wings colouring the sky. The crowd waited respectfully, watching the coffin being unloaded onto the pallbearers’ shoulders. A whiff of incense uncurled from the candlelit interior and sombre organ music rolled over the stone floor and out into the town. John stared at the straight backs of the mother and her three children. He watched the grandmother being helped down from the donkey cart in her voluminous cloak.
Suddenly there was a commotion at the church door. The coffin had gone in and the mother gently ushered the children to follow it inside. The older of the two boys hesitated.
‘I’m not going in there,’ he shouted at his mother, and he tore his arm from her grasp and ran, dodging wild-faced between the waiting crowds. The mother gave an anguished cry, ‘Matt!’
‘Let him go.’ The grandmother’s voice echoed louder than the male voice choir, the purple beads glinting around her throat, sending a ripple of servitude through the long queue of mourners. Nothing happened until she turned in a swirl of black velvet and continued on her way to the church door. The Queen of St Ives, John thought, awed. He hoped he would never come face to face with her. Another more reckless creative part of his mind imagined a painting of her.
Someone had managed to grab the boy who had run away. Another substantial Cornish woman. ‘Shame on you, Matt Lanroska,’ she shouted. ‘You get back in that church before I give you a good hiding.’
But Matt struggled like a wild cat. ‘Get off me. It’s none of your business.’ He kicked at Maudie Tripconey’s swollen ankles. Then he spat at her disapproving face, ripped his arms free from his sleeves and escaped, leaving Maudie holding his jacket and tutting. He ducked under the barrier and fled onto West Pier, expertly dodging in and out of the stacks of lobster pots. This time it was the policeman who strutted after him.
What happened next took John’s breath away. At the end of the pier, Matt stripped off most of his clothes revealing a suntanned wiry body. The policeman broke into a heavy run. ‘Don’t do it, lad.’ Matt looked back at him, then he jumped, out into shimmering space and plunged like a gannet down into the deep water.
Had it not been for her grief, Nan might well have felt like the Queen of St Ives, for she had masterminded the funeral of her beloved grandson. She paid the undertaker after breaking into the substantial roll of cash she kept in an earthenware jar in the larder. It was her rainy day money, never to be squandered, but kept craftily hidden under a pile of grain. The undertaker’s eyes had popped with surprise when she’d counted out the wad of pound notes, sending beads of pearl barley bouncing over his dark oak table. Many of the flowers had come from her own garden, mostly marigolds, moon daisies and calla lilies, but she had bought some from a florist, and a pair of damask curtains provided the royal blue background cloth. She’d sent Vic to organise the male voice choir, choose the hymns and arrange for Wharf Road to be swept clean. It had all gone smoothly, but what Nan hadn’t expected was the way the entire town had downed tools and shown their quiet love and respect for Arnie’s life. Nan felt emotionally overwhelmed by it. She would behave impeccably. With the dignity of a queen. But it was hard. The music. The flag of St Piran. The bell tolling. The memory of Arnie’s soulful eyes, those long lashes, that knowing smile, carried in her heart, now and forever.
Fury burned around the edges of Nan’s grief and every time she thought it was under control, a new spurt of flame would burst out. She was furious with Jenny from the start. Then incensed with Matt’s behaviour.
When Jenny insisted on disappearing to search for Matt instead of going into the church hall where the wake was to be held, it added another spike to Nan’s seething resentment. She held it all in, sitting in the far corner of the hall in her black velvet cloak, trying to be civil to those who were brave enough to talk to her. Nan was proud of Lottie, very proud, as Lottie glided around with plates of biscuits and cakes, her sadness neatly hidden under a bright face and an appealing charm. Nan was even a little proud of Tom who looked wise and composed as he followed Lottie with his tray of sausage rolls.
For Jenny to miss the wake seemed outrageous and unacceptable to Nan. Jenny was out there in the May sunshine in her black mourning clothes, obsessed with finding that evil little boy. Let him drown, Nan thought. And her as well.
It was one of those rare days when St Ives was blessed with a calm sea lapping gently at the harbour wall, a lagoon of jewel-green water reflecting the palaces of cloud, the huddle of cottages and the masts of boats. The Atlantic in healing mode.
The water wrapped itself around Matt like cool satin, supporting him as he floated on his back, looking up through the lustrous air at the sky. ‘I’m down here, Daddy,’ he murmured. ‘Can you see me, Daddy? Are you there?’
Matt felt better in the water. It seemed to talk to him. ‘Trust and let go, and I will carry you,’ it said. The water protected him from the endless criticism and condemnation. Nobody liked him. And it hurt. It chipped away at Matt’s plan for his life, relentlessly, so that hardly any of it was left. His plan was like a letter of truth with burning edges. Only the middle was still readable, a mere fragment of his dream.
Arnie had taught Matt to swim; how to swim safely and creatively, how to swim for survival, and how to swim for pure joy. He’d taught him how to read the sea’s moods and currents, where and when to swim in and around St Ives.
It was May, and the sea was still cold. He mustn’t stay in too long. Matt looked back at West Pier and saw the policeman standing there holding a red and white lifebuoy ring. ‘Are you all right down there, lad? Want me to come and rescue you?’
‘Course I’m all right. I can swim,’ Matt called back. He rolled over like a seal and did a fast, smooth front crawl, heading for the boats. Soon he would be hidden from the policeman, and from the world. He swam between the boats, awkwardly avoiding the anchor ropes and when he found The Jenny Wren, he climbed aboard. ‘I’m here, Daddy. I’m in your boat.’
The one place where Matt felt at peace was on the deck of The Jenny Wren. Inside the cabin, with the May sunshine softly warm on the wooden seats, Matt felt drowsy, wanting to sleep as a way of switching off the stress. He curled up in a corner, his head on an old tapestry cushion Arnie kept there, hoping the gentle swell would rock him to sleep, knowing he was safely hidden. The singing inside the church and along the quay was loud enough to come floating over the surface of the water, reaching into the boat, as if pursuing him. Matt pressed his hands over his ears and stared out at the dazzling water beyond the harbour. He couldn’t sleep, but he could dream.
His dream was a memory of a time when Arnie had taken him out on the boat, into the wide expanse of the bay. Instead of fishing, Arnie had talked, his voice quiet, his eyes peaceful and kind. It was one of the few times when Matt felt loved. ‘One day, this boat will be yours,’ Arnie promised.
‘What about Tom?’ Matt had asked.
‘Tom’s just a baby. You’re my firstborn son, Matt, and you’re important to me.’
Arnie explained about the tides and currents of St Ives bay. Where and when it was dangerous. Why the Hayle River turned the sea red. Where the seals lived, and how the cormorants caught their fish. He’d let Matt have a go at steering the boat and taught him how to bring her safely back into the harbour.
Those times were precious to Matt. He almost felt Arnie was in the boat with him now. He wasn’t in that coffin inside the church. He was out in the light. Just him and Matt. And the words he’d spoken were woven into a shining cloak swirling around his shoulders. The Jenny Wren was his boat now. His own boat, and his sanctuary from the world.
