"Innes, Hammond - Dead and Alive" - читать интересную книгу автора (Innes Hammond)

of memories.'
I searched despondently for the right thing to say. But when I looked up, she
had gone. The white of the bed that Jenny had slept in showed emptily in the
gloom.
For supper that night there were lamb cutlets and fresh peas and new potatoes.
But there was no whortleberry jam and only a small bowl of cream to go with the
gooseberry tart. The room was warm with the lamplight and a blazing log fire.
When she had cleared away Sarah came in and sat in the big cross-patched
armchair and her knitting needles clicked rhythmically as I sat and smoked and
stared into the flames.
I asked her who ran the farm now. 'My younger son,' she said. 'He's over to my
daughter's at Bude tonight. There's a big sale tomorrow. We could do with some
calves. My eldest is still abroad. He took a regular commission. He's in China
now.'
'And your husband?' I asked. 'Why did he go to sea?'
She put down her needles and looked into the fire. 'It was after Dunkirk,' she
said, and her voice was soft. 'He was a sailor, not a farmer, you know. We were
married in Penzance just after the last war. I was nurse to Mr Cavanna's
children - he had the mines out to Redruth. My husband and I met when he was on
survivor's leave. His ship was torpedoed off the Lizard. He was first mate in
those days. But by the end of the war he had his Master's certificate and his
own ship. He was a farmer's son, but he'd run away to sea. He'd got it in his
blood.
'But then, after the war, cargoes became difficult and at length his ship was
laid up with the others. And he came to me then and said, "Sarah, we must go
back to the land. You'd like that, with your own house and all, wouldn't you?"
The youngest of Mr Cavanna's children was away to school then, so we came up to
Tintagel and bought this farm. Let me see now, that was in 1924. It was good
land and close to the sea - and though the sea was in his blood he never wanted
to go back.
'That is, not until Dunkirk. He was at the wireless all day. After that he
couldn't work, but wandered day after day along the cliffs. I knew what was in
his mind. And I said, "When are you going to Plymouth?"
'That made it easier for him. He had been worrying about me and the farm. George
had been in the Territorials and was in Egypt. But Mervin was already working on
the farm. He was sixteen. Mr Penruddock showed him everything, and he was away a
week later. They made him a first mate on an old tramp called the William Pitt.
A year later he was master of one of the new Liberty ships and was away to North
Africa, landing supplies for the First Army. His ship was hit at Salerno the
following year. And then two months later it went down off Anzio. They say it
was a glider bomb. She was loaded with petrol and ammunition.' She sighed and
began to knit again. 'There were no survivors. The Admiralty sent me a telegram.
It arrived when I was milking the cows and I remember the poor beasts were very
uncomfortable because I couldn't go on, but went up on to the cliffs, which I
hadn't done since he'd left.
'And then a nice young man, whose family live over by Bridgwater, came and told
me all about it. He was about your age and very awkward, poor lamb. He'd been
the skipper of a landing craft that had been unloading my husband's ship.'
Strange how the threads cross and recross on the loom of life. 'His ship was the
Black Prince, wasn't it?' I said. . She paused at her knitting and looked at me