It suddenly occurred to me that she might feel it was her duty to warn me in some way. Mrs. Pardell was a woman who would do her duty, however she might wish not to.
She leaned toward me suddenly and said: “I don’t believe she went swimming of her own accord that day.”
“What?” I said, taken aback.
“She wouldn’t have done. I can’t tell you how much she wanted that child. It changed her. Mind you, we hadn’t been on the best of terms because of what she’d been up to. But she wouldn’t have gone. She knew it was putting the child in danger. I don’t because she would never have done that…and nobody could make me believe it.”
“Tell me what happened.”
“I expect you know something about it. It gets round. It’s the sort of thing people talk about. You know she was working there at the Sailor’s Rest. There she was, every night, laughing and joking. They were pleased to have her. She brought the customers in. I used to lie in bed waiting for her to come home every night. I said, ‘I’d rather see you cleaning someone’s house than doing that sort of job.’ It wasn’t a lady’s job and we’d tried to bring her up right.”
“I understand,” I said soothingly.
“There’s no need for me to tell you. I expect you know already how these people talk. That young man and his new wife has brought it all up again. When he married for the second time everyone was talking about Annette. With her, it was a case of having to get married. I don’t think he would have asked her otherwise and she’d still be there at the Sailor’s Rest. She might have married that young farmer at Perringarth on the moor. He was mad about her. But there it was. That Dermot Tregarland had to do the right thing by her. He seemed a decent young fellow then, but you can imagine what it was like up at Tregarland’s.”
She paused for a while before she went on slowly: “You might wonder why I’m telling you all this. It’s not like me to talk of it, but I’m thinking of your sister. I think you ought to look out for her.”
“Look out for her? In what way?”
“I don’t rightly know. It happened to my girl. It was about this time of the year…”
“I don’t see the connection.”
“Well, I just thought…you see…Annette and me…we wasn’t on speaking terms for a long time. When I heard she was going to have a baby and no wedding ring, I was flabbergasted. I told her her father would have turned her out. She laughed at that. Annette laughed at everything. She was never a good girl, always wayward, but…”
“I think she sounds rather lovable.”
Mrs. Pardell nodded her head without speaking. Then she went on: “When she got married and went to the big house, there was a lot of talk. I was in a way proud of her. He must have thought a lot of her, because there was his father up there, and I know he wouldn’t have liked it…her being a barmaid. She came to see me once or twice. There was one time…I knew it would be the last for some time because she wouldn’t be able to do that walk till after the baby was born. She had her car and she drove into Poldown, but she’d have to do the climb up the west cliff on foot. I am glad I saw her three days before she died. After all, she wasn’t the first one by a long chalk who had had to get wed in a bit of a hurry. She was happy enough. Dermot was a good husband and she could make him go her way. She said to me: ‘I can’t wait for this baby to come.’ She’d talk frankly about it, which I can’t say I liked very much. Sort of immodest, but Annette was like that. She said: ‘I can’t do anything now, Mam. It’s no good fretting about that. I can’t go swimming.’ I said: ‘Of course you can’t, you silly girl, in your state.’ ”
She sighed and I, amazed by this flow of confidence, just sat back quietly, fearing that at any moment it might stop.
“She’d always loved the water. I remember when we first went to the seaside. She was about eight years old then. I took her down to the seaside. She held up her hand…wonderstruck like…and ran right into the sea. After that it was swimming at school. She took to it like a fish. Regular champion she was. Won prizes. I could show you.”
“I should like to see them some time.”
“ ‘Well,’ she said to me: ‘It’s awful, Mam. I can’t swim. The doctor said no…some time back. It could hurt the baby.’ ‘Well, who’d want to swim in your state?’ I said. ‘I’d like to, but I wouldn’t do a thing to harm this baby. Mam, I’ve never wanted anything more. I’m going to love that baby like no baby was ever loved before.’ That’s what she said.”
She looked at me, her eyes blazing.
“Are you going to tell me that she went swimming on that early morning?” she demanded.
“But…she was in the water…the cross-currents…”
“Cross-currents, my foot. She could have swum in the roughest sea, that one. But she didn’t go in that morning. You’re not going to tell me she went in of her own accord.”
“Are you suggesting that she was lured in…by some spirit…of that girl who died long ago?”
“That’s what people here said at the time. But I don’t hold with all that nonsense.”
“Then what do you think happened?”
“I don’t know. But you’ve got a sister up there. She’s going to have a baby. They say there’s some curse put on Tregarland’s by them Jermyns. It’s all nonsense, but…Well, you look after that sister of yours. You wouldn’t want what happened to my girl to happen to her.”
She sat back in her chair, looking into her cup where the tea had grown cold. She looked exhausted.
She was like another person. The hard shrewdness was just a veneer. She was a woman mourning a daughter whom she had loved and lost.
I said: “I am sorry…”
She looked at me searchingly. “You really mean that, don’t you?” she said.
“Yes, I do.”
She nodded and we were silent again. I knew it was time for me to go.
I stood up and said: “If you will let me know what cuttings you would like, I am sure there would be no difficulty in getting them.”
She gave me a rare smile. I felt glad that she was not regretting her confidences. In fact, I had a notion that she felt better for talking to me.
It was almost as though we were friends.
When I left the cottage I felt bemused. She had so convinced me that Annette could not have gone swimming of her own accord. When? How? On those wild cliffs one could almost believe there was some foundation in the legends which abounded here.
I walked thoughtfully down the west cliff and into Poldown. I crossed the old bridge to the east side and made my way toward the sea.
On impulse, I decided I would go back right along the shore rather than take the cliff road. I set out, my thoughts still with Annette. I could picture her clearly, for the photograph told me a good deal. She was a girl who loved pleasure, and she was determined to get the most out of life; she was very attractive to the opposite sex and well aware of it. She was impulsive, living in the present; she was everything that her mother had taught her not to be.
A slight breeze was blowing in from the sea. I walked close to the frilly-edged waves and listened to their murmur.
A young couple with a small boy, carrying bucket and spade, came along. Holiday makers, I thought. We exchanged smiles as we passed.
Deep in thought, I went on. I came to a barrier of rock which went out into the sea. I scrambled over it and found that I was in a kind of cove. There was another rock barrier which shut it in. The high cliff protruding over it made it look rather cosy, shut in by the rocks on either side as it was.
I decided to sit down for a while and to go over my conversation with Mrs. Pardell. I settled with my back to the cliff, thinking how strange it was that she had suddenly begun to talk to me. I congratulated myself afresh as to the cleverness of my approach. Perhaps I had caught her at a moment when she felt the need to confide in someone. Poor Mrs. Pardell! How very sad to lose the daughter for whom, in spite of her disapproval, she had cared deeply.