The Stranger from the Sea: A Novel of Cornwall, 1810-1811 by Winston Graham

Author:Winston Graham
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group

II

Ross had not yet seen Francis Basset, Baron de Dunstanville. He told himself that his home affairs were too pressing; but he had already found time to visit Lord Falmouth.

The truth was that for the last year or so a coolness had grown up between them, dating from the scandal of the Duke of York’s mistress, Mrs Clarke, and her sale of army commissions. This cause célèbre had occupied parliamentary time for far too long when so many greater issues had to be decided; but a member of the Commons called Colonel Gwyllym Wardle had persisted in his accusations and had linked it with an attack on the corruption implicit in the rotten parliamentary boroughs. On this Ross had sided with him, making one of his rare speeches in the House, and, when the issue flared up locally he had taken the part of the reformers who had held meetings up and down the county demanding change and an end to bribery and venality. Basset had passionately resented this, had indeed spoken at meetings and gone to great pains to spike the guns of the protesters. Although the agitation had now subsided, and although superficially everyone was again the best of friends, he had never quite forgiven Ross for his support of these Jacobin elements.

It was therefore not a particularly propitious time to discuss the county’s affairs and more especially Warleggan’s. Nor did Ross know how far Basset would be concerned to vent his resentment on George and his uncle in the way Falmouth had hinted as a possibility. During the last ten years many changes had taken place in the Cornish Bank, the present directors being Mackworth Praed, Stackhouse, Rogers, Tweedy, Poldark and Nankivell. De Dunstanville had chosen to withdraw his name, though everyone knew that his interest, in terms of money, was still the controlling one. There was to be a meeting of the partners next week at Truro. The Warleggan situation would no doubt all be discussed there, since it was difficult to believe that two banks, operating so close to each other in a small town, would not each be sensitive to fluctuations in the other’s health and credit. If such a discussion took place what was his, Ross’s, attitude to be?

On a sudden morning of brilliant sunshine – which presaged rain before dark – Ross walked out to where Demelza was digging in her garden. Ten years ago, inspired by her visit to Strawberry Hill and oppressed by the way the mine and its workings were encroaching on the land before the house, she had persuaded Ross to have a drystone wall built enclosing and extending the area of the garden she had then cultivated. It lay in a large oblong running up and away from the house, the house and the library comprising an L-shaped joint and part of two sides. With this shelter from the wind miracles had been wrought with daffodils, tulips and other spring and early summer flowers. By July the best was over, for the soil was too light to retain moisture.

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