Daphne Dumorier Fullscreen My cousin Rachel (1951)

I leaned over the harbor wall, near to the quay, and saw some boys fishing from a boat, getting themselves entangled in their lines.

Presently they sculled towards the steps and clambered out.

One of them I recognized.

It was the lad who helped behind the bar in the Rose and Crown.

He had three or four fine bass on a piece of string.

“You’ve done well,” I said.

“Are they for supper?”

“Not for me, sir,” he grinned, “they’ll be welcome at the inn though, I’ll be bound.”

“Do you serve bass now with the cider?” I asked.

“No,” he said, “this fish is for the gentleman in the parlor.

He had a piece of salmon yesterday, from up the river.”

A gentleman in the parlor. I pulled some silver from my pocket.

“Well,” I said,

“I hope he pays you well.

Here’s this for luck.

Who is your visitor?”

He screwed his face into another grin.

“Don’t know his name, sir,” he replied,

“Italian, they say he is.

From foreign parts.”

And he ran off across the quay, with his fish dangling from the string over his shoulder.

I glanced at my watch.

It was after three o’clock.

No doubt the gentleman from foreign parts would dine at five.

I walked through the town, and down the narrow alleyway to the boathouse where Ambrose had kept his sails and gear for the sailing boat he used to use.

The small pram was made fast to the frape.

I pulled in the pram, and climbed down into it; then paddled out into the harbor and lay off, a little distance from the quay.

There were several fellows pulling to and from the vessels anchored in the channel, to the town steps; and they did not notice me, or if they did cared little, and took me for a fisherman.

I threw the weight into the water and rested on my paddles, and watched the entrance of the Rose and Crown.

The bar entrance was in the side street.

He would not enter that way.

If he came at all, it would be by the front.

An hour passed.

The church clock struck four.

Still I waited.

At a quarter before five I saw the landlord’s wife come out of the parlor entrance and look about her, as though in search of someone.

Her visitor was late for supper.

The fish was cooked.

I heard her call out to a fellow standing by the boats that were fastened to the steps, but I did not catch her words.

He shouted back at her and, turning, pointed out towards the harbor.

She nodded her head, and went back inside the inn.

Then, ten minutes after five, I saw a boat approaching the town steps.

Pulled by a lusty fellow in the bows, the boat itself new varnished, it had all the air of one hired out for strangers, who cared to be rowed about the harbor for their pleasure.

A man, with a broad-brimmed hat upon his head, was seated in the stern.

They came to the steps.

The man climbed out and gave the fellow money, after slight argument, then turned towards the inn.

As he stood for a moment on the steps, before entering the Rose and Crown, he took off his hat and looked about him, with that air of putting a price on all he saw that I could not mistake.

I was so near, I could have tossed a biscuit at him.

Then he went inside.

It was Rainaldi.