Frenchman's Creek

So that Dona, swept in an instant by a wave of shame and degradation, had handed back the purse, and turned her horse's head, and ridden back to town, hot with self-loathing, blinded by tears of abasement, while Rockingham pursued her with shouts and cries of "What the devil now, and what has happened?" and Harry, who had been told the adventure would be nothing but a ride to Hampton Court by moonlight, walked home to bed, not too certain of his direction, to be confronted by his wife on the doorstep dressed up in his best friend's breeches.

"I had forgotten - was there a masquerade - was the King present?" he said, staring at her stupidly, rubbing his eyes, and "No, damn you," said Dona, "what masquerade there was is over and done with, finished now for ever more. I'm going away."

And so upstairs, and that interminable argument in the bedroom, followed by a sleepless night, and more arguments in the morning, then Rockingham calling and Dona refusing him admittance, then someone riding to Navron to give warning, the preparations for the journey, the journey itself, and so here at last to silence, and solitude, and still unbelievable freedom.

Now the sun was setting behind the trees, leaving a dull red glow upon the river below, the rooks rose in the air and clustered above their nests, the smoke from the chimneys curled upwards in thin blue lines, and William was lighting the candles in the hall. She supped late, making her own time - early dinner, thank heaven, was now a thing of the past - and she ate with a new and guilty enjoyment, sitting all alone at the head of the long table, while William stood behind her chair and waited silently.

They made a strange contrast, he in his sober dark clothes, his small inscrutable face, his little eyes, his button mouth, and she in her white gown, the ruby pendant round her throat, her hair caught back behind her ears in the fashionable ringlets.

Tall candles stood on the table, and a draught from the open window caused a tremor in their flame, and the flame played a shadow on her features. Yes, thought the manservant, my mistress is beautiful, but petulant too, and a little sad. There is something of discontent about the mouth, and a faint trace of a line between the eyebrows. He filled her glass once more, comparing the reality before him to the likeness that hung on the wall in the bedroom upstairs. Was it only last week that he had stood there, with someone beside him, and the someone had said jokingly, glancing up at her likeness: "Shall we ever see her, William, or will she remain forever a symbol of the unknown?" and looking closer, smiling a little, he had added: "The eyes are large and very lovely, William, but they hold shadows too. There are smudges beneath the lids as though someone had touched them with a dirty finger."

"Are there grapes?" said his mistress suddenly, breaking in upon the silence. "I have a fancy for grapes, black and succulent, with the bloom on them, all dusty." "Yes, my lady," said the servant, dragged back into the present, and he fetched her grapes, cutting a bunch with the silver scissors and putting them on her plate, his button mouth twisted as he thought of the news he would have to carry to-morrow, or the next day, when the spring tides were due again and the ship returned.

"William," she said.

"My lady?"

"My nurse tells me that the servant girls upstairs are new to the house, that you sent for them when you heard I was arriving? She says one comes from Constantine, another from Gweek, even the cook himself is new, a fellow from Penzance."

"That is perfectly true, my lady."

"What was the reason, William? I understood always, and I think Sir Harry thought the same, that Navron was fully staffed?"

"It seemed to me, my lady, possibly wrongly, that is for you to say, that one idle servant was sufficient about the house. For the last year I have lived here entirely alone."

She glanced at him over her shoulder, biting her bunch of grapes.

"I could dismiss you for that, William."

"Yes, my lady."

"I shall probably do so in the morning."

"Yes, my lady."

She went on eating her grapes, considering him as she did so, irritated and a little intrigued that a servant could be so baffling a person. Yet she knew she was not going to send him away.

"Supposing I do not dismiss you, William, what then?"

"I will serve you faithfully, my lady."

"How can I be sure of that?"

"I have always served faithfully the people I love, my lady."

And to this she could make no answer, for his small button mouth was as impassive as ever, and his eyes said nothing, but she felt in her heart that he was not laughing at her now, he was speaking the truth.

"Am I to take that as a compliment then, William?" she said at last, rising to her feet, as he pulled away her chair.