'I went down to Morvah. That's about two miles up the coast from here. Just outside the village, on the hills, there's a farm. Belongs to a farmer called John Clynt. His wife, Lizzie, is about twenty years younger than him, you know — a lovely girl she is. I met her at a dance once and I'd go up to the farm sometimes in the daytime when I was in port. Her husband's out farming all day. Well, I went there, you see. I knew she'd hide me away for the fun of having me during the day. But how was I to know the police would find out about that woman at Lamorna? She brought the paper up to me this afternoon. I was in one of the hay lofts, you know. And one look at her face told me she'd do what Syl had done. Syl was in love with me. That's the trouble, you know. They all fall in love with me, damn them. Why is it that women can't behave rationally? Syl was jealous. I knew that. But to go and give a man away to the police! That's what I can't forgive.'
'Oh! for God's sake, shut up,' I said.
'But, look you, man, she'd no cause to do a thing like that. I never told her I loved her. But a man needs a woman now and then. It was the same with Liz. She thrust the paper at me as I lay down there in the straw waiting for her to come to me and her face was set, you know, like a piece of sculpture in a church. But for the scandal if her husband found out, she'd have been down to Morvah village right away to fetch the police. But I couldn't stay. There was murder in her eyes as she stood over me whilst I read that story in the paper. The only place I could go was Cripples' Ease. What's Manack got to grumble at? It was the most sensible thing to do. Indeed, it was the only thing to do. I'd like to get my hands on Sylvia Coran now. I'd teach her not to go sneaking to the police. I'd — " He looked up and saw that I'd picked up an electric torch and was moving towards the door. 'Where are you going?'
'Up top — to get a breath of fresh air,' I told him.
'No,' he said. 'Stay down here and talk to me, man. I'm not used to these mines. I don't like — '
'I'm going up top,' I said.
His face looked white and scared as I closed the slabs upon the lamplit gloom of that little rock chamber.
There's something about a man who's scared that always seems unwholesome. They say a dog can smell fear. Maybe that's it. But I just couldn't stay down there with Dave Tanner. I went up the raise and climbed the shaft. At the top I poked just my head over the protecting wall. The night was bright with moonlight. There was nobody around and I climbed out. The sea was all silver and the stars gleaming palely behind the dark outlines of the old engine houses. A faint rhythmic beat pulsed in the still air, it was the sound of a ship's engines. The dark outline of her showed against the silver of the sea. She glided slowly along the rim of the cliffs like a phantom.
I strolled down to the sheds of Wheal Garth and in the shadows there lit a cigarette. It was so wonderfully still and peaceful. I drank in that stillness. This world of moonlight seemed so remote from that other world — the world in which Dave Tanner was scared and —. I pushed the other thoughts out of my mind. The moonlight and the stars and the stillness with the rhythmic beat of the ship's engine like a distant tom-tom — that for the moment was reality, not the rest.
The moonlight and the peaceful beauty of the place made me restless. I turned and climbed up the slope behind me. My boots rustled on the heather, scaring rabbits into their burrows. It was only when I came within sight of Cripples' Ease that I stopped to think why I was walking towards the house. Then I knew I was going to see Kitty. I needed her shy understanding. I wanted her sympathy. Not only that. There was more I wanted. The blood tingled in my veins. I wanted to see her smile, to make her aware that I was a man — not just Miss Nearne's son.