Bride of Pendorric (39 page)

” August 20th. There was another scene yesterday. Petroc says I’ve got to be calm. He says he doesn’t know what’U happen if I don’t control myself more. Control myself! When he treats me like this! He says I’m too possessive. He says, Don’t pry into my life and I won’t pry into yours.” What sort of a marriage is this?

” August 27th. He has not been near me for more than a week. Sometimes I think everything is over between us. He can’t stand scenes, he says.

Of course he can’t, because he’s in the wrong. He just wants to go on living his own way-which is more or less the same as before he was married;

but everything must seem all right on the surface. There mustn’t be scandal. Petroc hates scandal. The fact is he’s lazy. That’s why he married me. Pendorric needed money. I had it. It was simple. Marry money and there’s no need to worry. Why does he have to be so amusing, so charming on the surface—so feckless and cruel underneath? If only I could be as lighthearted as he is! If only I could say Oh-that’s just Petroc. I must take him as I find him. ” But I can’t. I love him too much. I don’t want to share him.

Sometimes I think I’ll go mad. Petroc thinks so too. That’s why he stays away. He hates it when I lose control. Father used to hate it too. But Father was kind and gentle with me. He used to say, Barbarina my dear, you must be quiet. Look at Deborah. How calm she is. Be more like your sister, Bar barina. ” And that used to help. I’d remember that Deborah and I were like one. She had all the calmness in our nature. I was the volatile one. Father might deplore my wildness; but it was what made me attractive and Deborah a little dull. Deborah ought to comfort me now but even she has changed.

” August 29th. From my window I saw Deborah come back from a ride to-day. She was wearing a hat with a blue band. Not mine this time.

She’s got one exactly like it. As she came round from the stables the children were just going out with their nurse. They called to her. ‘ Hallo, Mummy,” they said. Deborah stooped and kissed first Morwenna, then Roe. The nurse said: Morwenna’s knee is healing up nicely, Mrs.

Pendorric. ” Mrs. Pendorric! So the nurse and the children had mistaken her for me. I felt angry. I hated Deborah in that moment and it was like hating myself. I did hate myself. It was some minutes later when I said to myself, But why didn’t Deborah explain?” But she didn’t.

She just let them think that she was the children’s mother—the mistress of the house.

” September 2nd. If this goes on I think I shall kill myself. I’ve been thinking about it more and more. A quiet sleep for ever and ever.

No more Petroc. No more jealousy. Some times I long for that. I often remember the Bride story. Some of the servants are sure Lowella Pendorric haunts the place. They won’t go in the gallery where she hangs, after dark. This Lowella died after a year of marriage, having ;a son ; she was cursed by her husband’s mistress. The Pendorric men haven’t changed much. When I think of my life at

Pendorric, I’m ready to believe there might be a curse on the women of the house.

” September 3rd. Petroc says I’m getting more and more hysterical. How can I help that? All I ask is that he should be with me more, should love me as I love him. Surely that’s not asking too much. All he cares about is that he should miss none of his pleasures, which means women—women all the time. Though I believe he’s kept on with this Louisa Sellick. So he’s faithful to her—after his fashion. There’s one other thing that he cares about: Pendorrie. What a fuss the other day When they discovered woodworm in the gallery. The wood’s particularly bad in the balustrade—near Lowella Pendorric’s picture—the one who was supposed to have died because of the curse, and haunt the place. That’s what’s made me think of her so much. ” September 12th. Deborah is still with us. She doesn’t seem to want to go back to the moor. She certainly has changed. Sometimes I think she’s growing more like I used to be, and I’m becoming more like she was. She’s inclined to use my things as though they were hers. We did this in the old days but it was different then. She comes into my bedroom and talks. It’s odd but I fancy she’s trying to get me to talk about Petroc, and when I do she seems to shy away. The other day when we were talking she picked up a jacket of mine—a casual sort of thing in mustard colour. ” You hardly wear it,” she said. ” I always liked it.” She slipped it on and as I looked at her I had a strange feeling that I am Deborah and that she’s so longing to be in my place that she is Barbarina. I felt it was myself I was looking at. Is Petroc right? Is all that I’m suffering driving me crazy? Deborah took off the jacket but when she went out she slung it over her arm and I haven’t seen it since.

” September 14th. I cry a lot. I’m so wretched. No wonder Petroc hardly ever comes near me. For some weeks he’s been sleeping in the dressing-room. I try to tell myself it’s better that way. Then I don’t know whether he’s there or not, so I don’t have to wonder whom he’s with. But of course I do.

” September 20th. I can’t believe it. I must write it down. I think I’ll go mad if I don’t. I could bear the others; but not this. I know about Louisa Sellick and I can understand it-arid up to a point forgive it. After all he wanted to marry her. It was because of Pendorric that he married me. But this. It’s all so unnatural. I hate Deborah now. There isn’t room for the two of us in this world. Perhaps there never was. We should have been one person. No wonder she’s going about deceiving people—not correcting them when they call her Mrs. Pendorric. Petroc and Deborah!

It’s incredible. But of course it’s not. It’s inevitable in a way.

After all, so much of me is Deborah and so much of her me. We are one—so why shouldn’t we share Petroc as we have shared so many other things? Gradually she’s been taking what’s mine—not only my husband but my personality. The way she laughs now—the way she sings. That’s not Deborah; it’s Barbarina. I go about the house outwardly calm letting the servants think that I don’t care. I stand there smiling when they talk to me and pretend to be interested as I did to-day when old Jesse talked about bringing something into the hall—some plant or other. It’s getting too cold out of doors or something and he doesn’t think the hothouse is quite right for it. Yes, yes, yes, I said, not listening. Poor old Jesse! He’s almost blind now. I told him not to worry; we’d see he was all right. And Petroc will, of course. That’s one thing about him—he’s good to the servants. I’m writing trivialities to prevent myself thinking. Deborah and Petroc —I’ve seen them together. I know. It’s her room he goes to. It leads from the gallery not far from that spot where the picture of Lowella Pendorric hangs. I lay listening last night and heard the door close.

Deborah who is getting like I used to be—and Petroc. How I hate them—both! There shouldn’t be two of us. I’ve tolerated others but I won’t tolerate this. But how can I stop it?

” September 21st. I’ve decided to kill myself. I can’t go on. I keep wondering how. Perhaps I’ll walk into the sea. They say that after the first moment of struggle, it’s an easy death. You don’t feel it much.

My body would be washed in and Petroc would see it. He’d never forget.

I’d haunt him for the rest of his life. It would be his punishment and he deserves to be punished. It would be the legend coming true. The Bride of Pendorric would haunt the place, and I, Barbarina, would be that bride. It seems somehow right—inevitable. I think it is the only way. “

The rest of that page was blank and I thought I had come to the end of the diary. I yawned, I was very tired.

But as I turned the page I came to more writing, and what I read startled me so much that I was almost wide awake.

” October 19th. They think I am dead. Yet I art still here and they don’t know it. Petroc doesn’t know. It’s a good thing that he can’t bear to be near me, because he might discover the truth. He’s away most of the time. He goes to Louisa Sellick for comfort. Let him. I don’t care now. Everything is different. It’s—exciting. There’s no other word for it. I shouldn’t write in this book. It’s all so dangerous, but I like to go over it again and again. It’s ‘funny—really funny because it makes me laugh sometimes—but only when I’m alone. When I’m with anyone I’m calm—terribly calm. I have to be. I feel more alive now than I have for a long time-now that they think I’m dead. I must write it down. I’m afraid I’ll forget if I don’t. I had made up my mind how I would die. I was going to walk into the sea. Perhaps I’d leave a note for Petroc, telling him that he’d driven me to it. Then I’d be sure that I’d haunt him for the rest of his life. It all happened so suddenly. I hadn’t planned it that way at all. Then suddenly I saw how it could be done. How a new bride could take the place of Lowella Pendorric, for it was time she rested in her grave, poor thing. Deborah came into my room. She was wearing my mustard-coloured jacket, and her eyes were bright; she looked sleek and contented, and I knew, as well as if she’d told me, that he’d been with her the previous night. You’re looking tired, Barby,” she said.

Tired! So would she, had she lain awake as I had. She’d be punished too. She would never forgive herself. I doubted whether she and Petroc would be lovers after I had gone. Petroc’s really concerned about the gallery,” she said. It’ll probably mean replacing me whole thing.” How dared she tell me how Petroc felt! How dared she talk in that proprietorial way about Petroc and Pendorric! She used to be so sensitive to my moods; but now her mind was full of Petroc. She picked up a scarf of mine—Petroc himself had bought it for me when we were in Italy—a lovely thing of emerald-coloured silk. She put it absently about her neck. The mustard-coloured jacket set it off perfectly.

Something happened when she took that scarf. It seemed tremendously important. My husband—my scarf. I felt I hadn’t a life of my own any

more. I wonder now why I didn’t snatch it away from her, but I didn’t. Come and look at the gallery,” she fiaid. It’s really quite dangerous. The workmen will be coming in tomorrow.” I allowed myself to follow her out to the gallery; we stood beneath the picture of Lowella. Here,” she said. Look, Barby.” Then it happened. It suddenly seemed clear to me. I was going to die because there was no longer any reason to go on living. I had thought of walking into the sea. Deborah was standing close to the worm-eaten rail. It was a long drop down to the hall. I felt Lowella Pendorric was watching us from her canvas, saying: “A Bride must die that I may rest in peace.” It was the old legend and there’s a lot of truth in these old legends. That’s why they persist. Deborah was, in a sense, a Bride of Pendorric. Petroc treated her as such—and she was part of me. There were times when I was not sure which of us I was.

I’m glad I wrote this down, although it’s dangerous. This book must never be seen by anyone. It’s safe enough. Only Carrie has ever seen it and she knows what happened as well as I do. When I read it, I can remember it clearly. It’s the only way I can come back to what really happened on that day. I can live again that moment when she was standing there, perilously close, and I leaned forward and pushed her with all my might. I can hear her catch her breath in amazement—and horror. I can hear her voice, or did I imagine that? But I hear it all the same. No, Barbarina! ” Then I know of course that I am Barbarina and that it is Deborah who lies in the Pendorric vault. Then I can laugh and say: How clever I am. They think me dead and I am alive all these years. But it’s only when I read this book that I am absolutely sure who I am.” I felt limp with horror.

But there was more to be read and I went on reading.

“October 20th. I shouldn’t write in the book any more. But I can’t resist it. I want to write it down while I remember, because it’s fading fast and I am not sure. There was some one in the hall. I was frightened. But it was only old Jesse and he couldn’t see. I stood in the gallery, looking at the splintered wood. I wouldn’t look down on to the hall. I didn’t stay long. Old Jesse had run for help. He might not see me but he knew something was wrong. I ran into the nearest room because I had to get out of the gallery before I was seen. It was Deborah’s. I threw myself on to her bed and lay there, my heart thundering. I don’t know how long I lay there but it seemed like hours. It was a few minutes actually. Voices, cries of horror. What was happening in the hall? I longed to see but I knew I must stay where I was. After a while there was a knock on the door.

I was still lying on the bed when Mrs. Penhalligan came in. She said:

‘ Miss Hyson, there’s been a terrible accident. ” I raised myself and stared at her. It’s the gallery rail. Twas worse than we thought.

Mrs. Pendorric—’ I just went on staring at her. She went out and I heard her voice outside the door. Miss Hyson, she be terrible shocked, poor dear. Tis not to be wondered at—they being so close—so near like. I for one couldn’t tell one from the other. “

” I went down to the sea and looked at it. It was grey and cold. I couldn’t do it. It’s easy to talk of dying; but when you face it—you’re frightened. You’re terribly frightened. I’d been so stunned by the news that they’d made me stay in bed until it was all over. I didn’t see Petroc unless others were there too. That was as well. He was the one I feared. Surely he would know his own wife. But even so there was something I knew about Petroc. He wasn’t the same. The gaiety had gone, the lightheartedness He blamed himself. The servants were talking. They said it was meant. And it happened right under the picture of that other bride. It was no good going against what was meant. Barbarina was meant to die, so that Lowella Pendorric could rest from the haunting. They wouldn’t go near the gallery after dark. They believed Barbarina was haunting Pendorric So she is. She haunted Petroc till the day he died. So the story was true. The Bride of Pendorric had died just as the story said she should and she couldn’t rest in her grave.

” I couldn’t go. I couldn’t leave the children. They call me Aunt Deborah now. I am Deborah. I’m calm and serene. Carrie knows, though.

Sometimes she calls me Miss Barbarina. I’m afraid of Carrie. But she’d never hurt me; she loves me too well. I was always her favourite. I was everybody’s favourite. It’s different now, though. People are different towards me. They call me Deborah and what is happening is that Deborah still lives and it is Barbarina who is dead.