Chapter Two #3
A chill tiptoes up her spine. She isn’t sure what unnerves her more: Mrs. Dowling and the fisherman speaking matter-of-factly, the way one might discuss the weather, or Mr. Penrose’s words, you know all about that.
But underneath the apprehension lies an odd, insistent sense of recognition.
Could she have heard about the Bucca when she was here as a child?
She glances at the river and the feeling grows stronger, mixing with the lure of the water and reducing Mr. Penrose’s conversation with Mrs. Dowling to a murmur.
By the time their words grow into separate entities again, Mrs. Dowling is talking about a storm in which one of her cottages lost its roof.
Isabel feels bad she initially thought to refuse the woman’s friendship.
Without asking for anything in return, Mrs. Dowling is teaching her all of the things her mother would have taught her if she’d been born a cottager’s daughter.
She wonders if perhaps she was born a cottager’s daughter.
She studies the face of every person she meets.
Could this woman with the fish basket be her mother?
Does that man there share the color of her eyes?
The people in Helford treat her as if she has come home.
The storm doesn’t materialize, though the southwesterly stirs up the water.
The sea is a constant presence, beseeching, coaxing, consoling.
Whenever her frustrations mount, whenever the night is too long in the empty cottage, she has but to step outside and listen to the waves to feel a sense of calm.
Sometimes she watches the men of the Revenue Service pass by on patrol on the coastal path, the riding officers, alone or in pairs, and others on foot.
She should be glad they’re patrolling so frequently, but whenever she thinks of it, she can’t help but remember the way Lieutenant Sowerby towered over her, his sweet, liquor-tinged breath in her face; the look in his eyes when he reached for her.
She remembers the anger in him as he espoused the virtue of hanging smugglers, the way he wetted his lips as he envisioned the torments he claimed they’d put her through.
When she asks Mrs. Dowling about the patrols, the landlady tells her smuggling has become so widespread the revenue men are growing more and more ruthless.
Just last month they caught hold of a farmer in Coverack who stored contraband on his farm and they shot him—no investigation, no trial, nothing.
Mrs. Dowling’s indignation is as hot as the tea she purchases at what she calls “a particularly good price.”
On Tuesday, Isabel goes to the market and buys cheese, flour, carrots, and a side of ham. Fish, too: mackerel, brought in with the catch. Mr. Penrose gives her the same meaningful look as before, but he doesn’t say anything.
Mrs. Dowling has told her the market is always busy, but she didn’t expect it to be this crowded.
On her way back to the cottage the narrow road heaves with men, women, and children, all moving in the direction of nearby Manaccan.
An excited chatter rises from them like heat from a freshly baked loaf.
Curious, she turns away from the coastal path and follows the throng.
As they approach the crossroads, the voices fall silent.
Some people point, but Isabel can only see an ocean of hats, bonnets, caps, and scarves.
Somewhere to the left, a blackbird chafes at the quiet in a long, drawn-out trill.
It’s cool out this morning, but the road is dappled with sun.
She has a soup to make—her first-ever soup.
She ought to turn away and go home, but curiosity tethers her.
She pushes ahead, slipping between sweat-scented bodies, past the hard-soft shapes of other women.
An elbow pokes her side and then she sees it.
At first she thinks it’s a construction to help lift something, such as you might see in a shipyard.
Or perhaps it’s a ship’s mast, taken from its hull and incongruously put down here, by the side of the road to Manaccan.
But then her gaze falls on the row of revenue men, armed with pistols and swords, and the prisoner, arms tied behind his back, being led to the low scaffold.
And she sees the man leading the prisoner. One hand gripping the prisoner’s arm, the other the butt of his pistol, is none other than Lieutenant Sowerby. “Oh!” she gasps, nearly dropping her basket.
As if he has heard her, Lieutenant Sowerby looks up. A grin appears on his blushing moon face; there’s no hint of the anger she saw in him before. If anything, he looks gratified, the way a man might when he’s about to cut the meat of the stag he’s shot.
Lieutenant Sowerby gives her a nod as he shoves the prisoner onto the scaffold, pushing him toward the waiting noose with such force the man stumbles and drops to his knees.
Grabbing him by his shirt, Lieutenant Sowerby hauls him back to his feet.
“Trying to get away, Ferries? I’m afraid it’s a little late for that. The noose awaits—and hell beyond it!”
His voice drips malice above the hum of the crowd. The prisoner’s gaze swerves over the people before he turns to his captor and says something inaudible. Lieutenant Sowerby laughs, and raising his voice, says, “I’ll burn for this? You must be confounded, man! That pretty fate is all yours.”
At the sight of the noose, the prisoner’s knees buckle and Lieutenant Sowerby snaps at the nearest of the revenue men, “Help me hold him up.” Then, to the prisoner, “Try not to make a spectacle of yourself. Your wife’s watching, I’m sure.
” He utters another short laugh. “You wouldn’t want to soil yourself in front of her, would you? ”
As if the moment isn’t wretched enough, Lieutenant Sowerby looks over again and finds her in the crowd, giving her a flushed smile.
Voices rear up, hard-edged and raw. “He deserves a trial, damn you!” one man shouts, and, “You monster!” This from the woman next to Isabel, a slender, ageless figure encased in stiff black cotton with her hair tied under a matching black bonnet.
The woman has balled her hands into fists, pressing one to each side of her face.
Turning to Isabel, she cries, “Poor Agnes! It’s unspeakable! ”
To the left of the row of revenue men, a young woman stands supported by two older women.
The blue cloth of her dress is stained as if she’s been kneeling in dirt; her hair is loose and uncovered.
She looks around with unseeing eyes until she catches sight of the prisoner and a thin, horrible wail escapes her.
Lieutenant Sowerby appears not to hear, or if he does, he gives no sign. Standing beside the prisoner on the scaffold, he calls above the noise: “Jed Ferries, you are condemned to death for treason in a time of war! You shall be hanged from the neck until pronounced dead.”
“All he did was smuggle some tea!” A boy this time, maybe fourteen years old.
Voices around him chime in and Lieutenant Sowerby searches the crowd, but not for the boy who called out, she thinks; for her.
She flinches back into the throng. The smell of sweat and dirt mixes with that of the mackerel she bought at the market and she nearly gags.
She begins to make her way back to Helford, wiping her hand on her gown over and over.
He was in her cottage. He kissed her hand, right there by the knuckles.
Behind her, the crowd has quieted again.
Glancing back over her shoulder, she sees the onlookers have removed their hats.
There isn’t any birdsong now; the air has grown still as stone.
Then there’s a crunch and a snapping, clear even from this distance, followed by a woman’s scream so full of despair it could split the marrow in one’s bones.
Back at the cottage, she goes through the motions of cooking the mackerel and carrot into a pasty-looking soup.
She opens the door a crack to let out the smells.
Gradually, the shakiness inside her drains away.
The sound of the river sloshes in through the open door.
It doesn’t calm her as much as it normally does, because through it she keeps hearing the crunch and the desperate cry that followed.
At night, the house creaks and moans around her. When she sleeps, she dreams of footsteps. The servants, up at all hours. They are calling in subdued voices. Did something happen? Is somebody ill; is there a fire?
She sits up with a jolt. She’s not dreaming. The footsteps are real. They’re downstairs and there are voices trailing them, climbing over them: male voices, low against the sound of the wind.
Her heart drums in her throat. She’s certain they can hear it.
She places her hand on her throat and feels it pulsing against her palm.
A scraping noise downstairs—a chair being moved or the door?
She looks around the room for something to defend herself with.
The fire poker. It’s made of wrought iron with a pommel at the end.
The iron is cold in her hand, the poker reassuringly heavy.
The air swishes when she gives it a swing.
She stands behind the bedroom door, clutching the poker. Footsteps start to come up the stairs and stop. “It’s narrow, but I think we can haul him up,” a voice says, and there’s a groan from somewhere down below.
“There’s a bed. It’ll be worth your while, Captain.” The first voice again, and then the speaker’s feet resume their climbing.
Other feet follow. They’re moving more slowly than she expected. There’s another groan, loud enough to be heard above the wind. A man in pain, she thinks. A man who is being carried up the stairs. A glow appears in the doorway.
Then the doorway fills—there are five of them, but in the light of the lantern, she sees only him.
Sweat pastes a shock of black hair to his forehead, and even in the faint light, she sees his face is so pale it has an almost gray hue, laid over the evidence of suntan like a veil.
He’s clean-shaven and his shirt is unlaced and partly torn, revealing a bleeding wound somewhere in the middle of his torso.
The white shirt has turned mostly red. The man’s eyes are closed, and for a moment she believes him dead, but then he opens them and fixes them on her.
And, extraordinarily, he smiles. Quietly, he says, “Look what the wind has blown in.”
Three men carry him; a fourth follows behind with a wad of bloodied cloth and a lantern, a tin-and-glass one he holds up high.
They turn to her, and the one at the back reaches for something at his waist, fumbling with the cloth as he does it—a pistol, she realizes, and she lifts the poker.
But the wounded man says, “Oppy!” sharply, the muscles in his face pulling taut, and when the man called Oppy looks at him, the wounded one shakes his head before closing his eyes as they lower him onto the bed.
When he opens them again, she’s still standing there, transfixed, the poker halfway to her shoulder. One of the other men, a bearded, bull-necked fellow with black teeth, says, “You can lower the poker, miss. We’re no threat to you, if you aren’t one to us.”