Виктория Холт - Mistress of Mellyn

“Twas a pity. We all liked her. She seemed to look on it as a privilege to live in Mount Mellyn. Old houses were her hobby, she used to tell us. Well, it seemed she had other hobbies besides, so out she went.”

I turned my attention to the countryside. It was late August and, as we passed through lanes with banks on either side, I caught occasional glimpses of fields of corn among which poppies and pimpernels grew; now and then we passed a cottage of grey Cornish stone which looked grim, I thought, and lonely.

I had my first glimpse of the sea through a fold in the hills, and I felt my spirits lifted. It seemed that the nature of the landscape changed. Flowers seemed to grow more plentifully on the banks; I could smell the scent of pine trees; and fuchsias grew by the roadside, their blossoms bigger than any we had ever been able to cultivate in our vicarage garden.

We turned off the road from a steep hill and went down and down nearer the sea. I saw that we were on a cliff road. Before us stretched a scene of breath-taking beauty. The diff rose steep and straight from the sea on that indented coast; grasses and flowers grew there, and I saw sea pinks and red and white valerian mingling with the heather—rich, deep, purple heather.

At length we came to the house. It was like a castle, I thought, standing there on the diff plateau—built of granite like many houses I had seen in these parts, but grand and noble—a house which had stood for several hundred years, and would stand for several hundred more.

” All this land bdongs to the Master,” said Tapperty with pride. ” And if you look across the cove, you’ll see Mount Widden.”

I did look and saw the house. Like Mount Mellyn it was built of grey stone. It was smaller in every way and of a later period. I did not give it much attention because now we were approaching Mount Mellyn, and that was obviously the house which was more interesting to me.

We had climbed to the plateau and a pair of intricately wrought-iron gates confronted us.

” Open up there!” shouted Tapperty.

There was a small lodge beside the gates and at the door sat a woman knitting.

” Now, Gilly girl,” she said, ” you go and open the gates and save me poor legs.”

Then I saw the child who had been sitting at the old woman’s feet. She rose obediently and came to the gate. She was an extraordinary looking girl with long straight hair almost white in colour and wide blue eyes.

” Thanks, Gilly girl,” said Tapperty as Cherry Pie went happily through the gates. ” This be Miss, who’s come to live here and take care of Miss Alvean.”

I looked into a pair of blank blue eyes which stared at me with an expression impossible to fathom. The old woman came up to the gate and Tapperty said: ” This be Mrs. Soady.”

” Good day to you,” said Mrs. Soady. ” I hope you’ll be happy here along of us.” ” Thank you,” I answered, forcing my gaze away from the child to the woman. ” I hope so.”

” Well, I do hope so,” added Mrs. Soady. Then she shook her head as though she feared her hopes were somewhat futile.

I turned to look at the child but she had disappeared. I wondered where she had gone, and the only place I could imagine was behind the bushes of hydrangeas which were bigger than any hydrangeas I had ever seen, and of deep blue, almost the colour of the sea on this day.

” The child didn’t speak,” I observed as we went on up the drive.

” No. Her don’t talk much. Sing, her do. Wander about on her own. But talk … not much.”

The drive was about half a mile in length and on either side of it the hydrangeas bloomed. Fuchsias mingled with them, and I caught glimpses of the sea between the pine trees. Then I saw the house. Before it was a wide lawn and on this two peacocks strutted before a peahen, their almost incredibly lovely tails fanned out behind them. Another sat perched on a stone wall; and there were two palm trees, tall and straight, one on either side of the porch.

The house was larger than I had thought when I had seen it from the cliff path. It was of three stories, but long and built in an L shape.

The sun caught the glass of the mullioned windows and I immediately had the impression that I was being watched.

Tapperty took the gravel approach to the front porch and, when we reached it, the door opened and I saw a woman standing there. She wore a white cap on her grey hair; she was y tall, with a hooked nose and, as she had an obviously dominating manner, I did not need to be told that she was Mrs. Polgrey.

” I trust you’ve had a good journey. Miss Leigh,” she said.

” Very good, thank you,” I told her.

” And worn out and needing a rest, I’ll be bound. Come along.-in. You shall have a nice cup of tea in my room. Leave your bags. I’ll have them taken up.”

I felt relieved. This woman dispelled the eerie feeling which had begun, I realised, since my encounter with the man in the train. Joe Tapperty had done little to disperse it, with his tales of death and suicide. But Mrs. Polgrey was a woman who would stand no nonsense, I was sure of that. She seemed to emit common sense, and perhaps because I was fatigued by the long journey I was pleased about this.

I thanked her and said I would greatly enjoy the tea, and she led the way into the house.

We were in an enormous hall which in the past must have been used as a banqueting room. The floor was of flagged stone, and the timbered roof was so lofty that I felt it must extend to the top of the house. The beams were beautifully carved and the effect decorative. At one end of the hall was a dais and at the back of this a great open fireplace. On the dais stood a refectory table on which were vessels and plates of pewter.

” It’s magnificent,” I said involuntarily; and Mrs. Polgrey was pleased.

” I superintend all the polishing of the furniture myself,” she told me.

“You have to watch girls nowadays. Those Tapperty wenches are a pair of flibbertigibbets, I can tell ‘ee. You’d need eyes that could see from here to Land’s End to see all they’m up to. Beeswax and turpentine, that’s the mixture, and nothing like it. All made by myself.”

” It certainly does you credit,” I complimented her.

I followed her to the end of the hall where there was a door. She opened this and a short flight of some half a dozen steps confronted us. To the left was a door which she indicated and after a moment’s hesitation, opened.

” The chapel,” she said, and I caught a glimpse of blue slate flagstones, an altar and a few pews. There was a smell of dampness about the place.

She shut the door quickly.

” We don’t use it nowadays,” she said. ” We go to the Mellyn church.

It’s down in the village, the other side of the cove . just beyond Mount Widden. “

We went up the stairs and into a room which I saw was a dining room.

It was vast and the walls were hung with tapestry. The table was highly polished and there were several cabinets in the room within which I saw beautiful glass and china. The floor was covered with blue carpet and through the enormous windows I saw a walled courtyard.

” This is not your part of the house,” Mrs. Polgrey told me, ” but I thought I would take you round the front of the house to my room. It’s as well you know the lay of the land, as they say.”

I thanked her, understanding that this was a tactful way of telling me that as a governess I would not be expected to mingle with the family.

We passed through the dining room to yet another flight of stairs and mounting these we came to what seemed like a more intimate sitting room. The walls were covered with exquisite tapestry and the chair backs and seats were beautifully wrought in the same manner. I could see that the furniture was mostly antique and that it all gleamed with beeswax and turpentine and Mrs. Polgrey’s loving care.