Ross made everything look easy but so many things weren't. Not for Francis. It wasn't easy to get the cook to give him extra cakes but Ross didn't even have to ask, just ducked behind the door and Mrs. Hobbes was filling his hands with the fresh sweets, enough to share with Verity and Francis if he wished, enough to be a glutton if he didn't. Ross had many faults but he wasn't greedy, so Francis and Verity feasted. Aunt Agatha would never lay out the cards and explain the meaning behind the jumping jackanape, the dark queen she stroked lovingly, the strange tree with fruit never seen in field or forest, if Francis tried, so carefully, to entice her but Ross had only to inquire with hands that reached before permission was granted, briefly saying "Aunty, please," before he'd gotten to every mystery. Ross complained about it, but his father gave him every attention, every howled curse and cuff, every bit of praise however brusque that a boy could want and then a man, an heir, and Francis's father made it clear Francis could only ever be found wanting, the poorest of the Poldarks even when he could be counted the richest.
The village girls, pretty and plain and everything in between, sighed or tossed their curls, swayed a little as they walked away, slowed a little if Ross gave a low whistle or called out "Sweeting, a moment!" not even bothering to learn a name before his arm was around a slender waist, his hand finding the lovely shape beneath the coarse dress without the least reticence. If he'd ever been denied, there was no evidence; he'd never once walked away with the rosy imprint of a hand making his whiskered cheek smart. And among the ladies it was no different. Before Elizabeth there had been shy Catherine Vingoe, Sophia Gwavas, the exquisite Dorothea Hammett with her hair like a wreath of yellow gorse, all of them ripe and ready before Ross's gaze, his effortless charm, the most serious prepared to giggle, the most giddy intent and solemnly yearning, a look in their eyes Francis could never light, that flickered when he approached, banked with even his greeting. Elizabeth had been the most beautiful, the most desirable and she had twined herself round Ross like ivy, like a climbing rose, until he was gone, till he'd been declared dead and only Francis remained of the ancient family and she'd let him take her hand while she looked away.
So it was not so very unexpected that Francis had never learned to swim, not in the sea, not in the brook or the lake beyond Pascoe's acres. Ross dove into the waves when they were rough and the salt was a rime along his forearms, stiffened his curls like Lucifer's, laughed as he spat out the drink he hadn't wanted. He waded the river where he rose and slid between the ropes and skeins of water like a selkie, he never minded matching his voice to the ocean's roar, the lake's slapping tickle against the shore. Francis had felt the iron fear the first time he tried, in the shallows, on a silky day when the sea was like a lake, and he'd never tried again to swim, to float, to risk the choking and the stinging dark. It hadn't mattered, not as a boy when he could ride and run, not as the master of Trenwith, when he could gamble and bathe in a great copper tub. It only mattered once and then never again and he couldn't even rue it, had only wished Ross had made a rescue easy, a hero's triumph he'd never appreciate. But for once, Ross hadn't and if Francis made death look easy, there'd been no one to see.