The Twisted Sword by Winston Graham Read Free Book Online Page A

to London this month, as there are trusts and other business matters to attend to. It has been very wet here almost since Christmas, mild and gloomy with the primroses out and some camellias too.
    Your loving Mother, Frances Bettesworth
    After she had read it twice Cuby passed it to Jeremy. He pored over it for a couple of minutes and then handed it back with a smile.
    'I think you are already half-way to forgiveness.'
    'This came also,' said Cuby, handing him a thin slip of paper.
    It read:
    Dearest darling Cuby, Sweet Jeremy, how I envy you both.
    Love, Clemency
    Henrietta Kemp had apparently overcome her lifelong distrust of the French and her disapproval of the degeneracy of their capital city, for she accepted Ross's invitation within the twenty-four hours, and at dawn on the following Monday they left as a family of five and made the disagreeable muddy jolting journey to London. They put up at Ross's usual lodgings in George Street in the Adelphi. Ross sent word to the Prime Minister that he had arrived, and was invited to call on him at Fife House on Saturday morning at ten o'clock. On the Friday evening Ross took Demelza and IsabellaRose through a light sprinkling of snow to the theatre in Drury Lane. They saw Morton's comedy Town and Country, with Mr Kean playing Reuben, and after it a musical piece called Rubies and Diamonds. Ross privately thought it all rather poor stuff but Demelza enjoyed it, and they were both diverted by IsabellaRose's enchantment. Her eyes sparkled like the diamonds in the title. She sat rapt, with clasped hands, and came out flushed with a rare joy. She might, like Joan of Arc, have seen a vision, but it was not a holy vision, it was an artificial tinsel-deep theatrical interpretation of life. It served for her. She was lost in the glitter, the candle-lit glamour, the powder, the paint, the perfume, the lines declaimed in unnatural voices, the sheer glorious make-believe of it all. Just at the end, as they were leaving, a man said: 'Captain Poldark.'
    A sturdily built well-dressed young man with a craggy face. Smiling. Then looking at Demelza.
    'Mrs Poldark. What an unexpected pleasure. Edward Fitzmaurice. You'll remember..."
    'Of course,' said Demelza. 'How are you, Lord Edward? I think you don't know our younger daughter, Isabella Rose?'
    They moved talking through the crowd towards the entrance. As she had not seen him since the morning after Clowance had turned him down, Demelza half expected there might be some constraint - as there certainly was that morning when they left Bowood - but clearly Edward had long since got over his disappointment. Perhaps he had realized, Demelza thought with a pang, that it was all for the best, and the unrestrained, untamed blonde girl from Cornwall would never have settled into the brilliant but restricted social life he was offering her. (So now she was the wife of a young entrepreneurial seaman living in a small terraced house in Penryn and looking, Demelza thought on her last visit to Nampara, dark under the eyes and less buoyant than usual.) Of course the question soon came up. Eyeing the crush of carriages for his own Edward Fitzmaurice asked how was their elder daughter? She was married? Well, that was hardly surprising, was it? And happy? Good, good. Well, it had been a delightful week they had all spent together in Bowood. A pity you were not there, sir. And another pretty daughter! How old would she be? Fifteen? Demelza smiled at Bella, who beamed at Edward, and then smiled at her mother for not giving the game away. How was Lady Isobel? And Lord and Lady Lansdowne? His brother and sister-in-law were very well. They had two sons now, you know. Aunt Isobel had been ill with a gouty infection but was now quite recovered. She had a new ear trumpet which it was claimed magnified the sound more than her previous one, though he had to admit he had not been able to notice the difference. No, he was still unmarried but was much taken up with Parliament