I have the letter on the desk beside me as I write. That, and the old, faded photograph and a brooch she gave to Kitty they're all I possess of my mother. I'll not attempt to describe my feelings as I read that letter. Here it is — read it and judge for yourself how I felt:
MY DARLING BOB,
Yes, you are still that. All these years the memory of you has been like a light shining in the darkness of my life. Pray God you found happiness. I found none. The thought of you and Jim and all the kindness and the love I left — it has been very bitter. They say I am not responsible for my actions now. But please believe me, Bob — at this moment my mind is very clear. I love you, and I have never loved anyone else.
They have shut me away in this room. The windows are barred. It is more than a year I think since I walked on the headland. I cannot even see my little garden from here. But today — today he has forgotten to lock the door. My mind is made up. I am going up to the headland for the last time. I shall give this letter to Kitty, together with the little brooch you bought me in Penzance that day we went over to the Mount by boat. It is all that I have left of you. Poor child. I grew very fond of her. But she is afraid of me now since her mother died.
Tell Jim I love him. He will not remember his mother, but tell him she never forgot him. Oh, Bob, I have paid dearly for my folly. Please, please do not think too hardly of me. I am going now. If this letter ever reaches you, do not fret at my passing. All I ask of you is that you will remember only that I love you both.
Your unhappy,
Ruth.
I sat for a long time staring down at the faded writing whilst the candle guttered in Kitty's hand. So much was hinted at. So much was left unanswered. I felt dazed and there was a lump in my throat. At last I looked up and in a flicker of lightning saw the bars of the window etched black against the storm. 'This was my mother's room, wasn't it?'
She nodded.
I looked down at the letter again. I must have sat staring at it for quite a time. I came out of my daze to find the girl tugging to pull her wrist free of my hand. She was shivering violently. The palm of my hand was moist on her flesh, and my body was bathed in a cold sweat. 'I must go,' she whispered frantically.
'No,' I said. And then I added quickly, 'I can't sleep here. Not in my mother's room.'
'You must,' she said. 'It'd look queer if you didn't.'
'I can't.' The way I said it sounded like a groan. I was afraid she'd go away and leave me. I didn't want to be left alone. 'She was fond of you, wasn't she?' I said.
'I don't know,' she replied. 'I thought so. But I was frightened. She looked at me so queerly sometimes. But she was kind to me — before.'
'Before what?' I asked.
She hesitated. Then she said, 'Before my mother was killed.'
I thrust the letter at her. 'Read it,' I said.
'No,' she answered quickly. 'No, I don't want to.'
'Read it,' I repeated.
But she stood up, wrenching at her arm. 'No,' she said. Her breasts were heaving in agitation. How perverse are a man's reactions. In that moment of all moments my mind could wander to admiration of her breasts as she stooped to free her wrist from my grip. The candle fell to the floor, flared for an instant and then extinguished itself. In the darkness I heard the skin of her bare feet on the floorboards. Then the door opened and closed and I was left alone in the darkness of that room. A flicker of far-off lightning showed me the sloping ceiling and the washstand like a lone sentinel against the crude flower pattern of the wallpaper. The bars of the window leapt into sight with the lightning. Then darkness again and I lay there, cold and numb, with my mother's letter in my hand.
CHAPTER FIVE
The Mermaid Gallery
When I woke it was light. I got out of bed and went over to the window. A grey mist was swirling up from the sea, blotting out everything but the tumbled ruin of the mine buildings that stood like wraiths amid the debris of the mine. It was on this scene of desolation that my mother had looked for a whole year. The bars and the mist — no wonder she had been driven to suicide. I shuddered and, turning to get my clothes, saw her letter crumpled among the blankets of the bed. I picked it up and hurried into my clothes. I wanted to get out of that room. I wanted to get away from Cripples' Ease. And yet there were so many questions to be answered. Why had she been shut away up here? They say I am not responsible for my actions now. Was she really mad? It was a horrible thought — as horrible as the girl's dread of saying anything. What was it that Friar had said? My mind shied from the thought of it and I went down the bare staircase into the silent house.
It was a quarter past eight by the grandfather clock in the hall. The girl was not in the kitchen. The old woman looked up at me curiously over a plate of porridge. I went through the scullery and the stables to the men's quarters. The room was empty and cold. I looked through the door beyond. It contained two Army pattern iron beds. The bed clothes were flung back. There was nobody there. I went out into the yard. The mist blanketed everything, deadening the sound of my boots on the cobbles. It was dank and chill.
I went round to the front of the house. To do this I found myself crossing that little waste of choked hydrangeas and foxgloves, and I stood still for a moment surveying the wreckage of the garden my mother had created. I glanced up quickly at the grey, watchful house and then remembered that she had not been able to see her garden. Her window was round the front. It caught my eye as soon as I turned the corner as though it had been waiting for me to appear.- It was a little dormer window high up in the slope of the roof. Its dim eye was disfigured by the iron bars. I could picture my mother's white, forlorn face peering down hour after hour, day after day.
The mist swirled, lifted and showed me the black granite of Botallack head across the mine workings. Then it closed down again in a damp veil. I went on, past the front door. Then I stopped and went back to gaze up at the faded lettering that showed through the flaking paint above the lintel. Nearne. That had been her maiden name. James Nearne might be her father. She might have named me after her father.
The old lettering fascinated me. But at length I was interrupted by the sound of voices. They were muffled and distant, yet when I turned I could see the short, round figure of Friar already emerging from the mist and quite close to me. He was coming up the track from the mine workings and he was followed by the taller figure of Slim Matthews.
'You have been working already?' I asked.
'Yep,' Friar replied. 'Since ruddy 'alf past five. An' a fat lot o' good it done us. The bleeding trucks ain't turned up.'
'What trucks?' I asked.
'Never you mind,' he answered. 'But the bastards shoulda bin 'ere at six.' His face looked tired and was filmed with a grey dust.
We had breakfast then. Nobody spoke during the meal. Friar and Slim seemed lost in their own thoughts. At length I said, 'When will I be able to have a look at the mine?'
'Dunno,' Friar replied. 'The Capting's gorn ter Penzance ter see aba't the trucks.'
'It won't do any good,' Slim said quietly. 'They've got scared.'
An' wot aba't us?' Friar snapped. 'Do they fink we're goin' ter sit on the ruddy stuff till it's all blown over. I'm for dumpin' it into the sea.'
'You tell that to the Captain,' Slim said with a hard laugh.
'Well, I reckon it's aba't time we packed it in. We're runnin' our bleedin' necks into a noose.'
Slim peered at him down his nose and there was a look of contempt in his eyes. 'Maybe,' he said. 'But suppose we do pack it in? Then we're on the run again. Stay and the whole thing may blow over.'
'That's all right for you,' Friar answered. 'You only got a two year stretch ahead o' you if you're caught. I ain't only a deserter. I got about three other charges against me, includin' resistin' arrest an' woundin' a copper. I don't want ter get caught.' His voice was almost a whine. 'I'd get five years at least. Five years is a hell of a long time.'