CHAPTER XIV
‘On your Peril!’
Meanwhile, what had become of Nance? When Gwenifer had fallen on the rocks, and had lain so still and white where she fell, Nance, in a frenzy of excitement, had seized her opportunity and, leaving her without pity, had sprung into the boat and rowed swiftly into the darkness away from Maldraeth and towards the Liliwen, which was beginning to show like a ghost in the moonlight.
Over the dark waters her strong arms rowed the little boat, with only one idea in her mind – that taunts and misery were behind her, and happiness and rest before. In a short time she had reached the black hulk of the ship, where Captain Jack, leaning over the rail, had heard the sound of the oars in the rowlocks, and stood watching with great surprise the black speck approaching.
‘Hoi, mate!’ he called out, ‘what’s the matter?’ but there was no answer from the fast-nearing boat.
‘I thought you were stopping in the village tonight,’ cried the captain; but again there was no reply, for Nance’s courage had failed her, and she found no voice to answer. The moon was rising over the moor, and by her faint light Captain Jack saw it was a woman who had rowed so straight and swift over the dark sea, and a wild hope arose within him. Gwenifer! could she have relented? Was she coming to him for help of any kind? With eager hands he threw down the ship’s ladder, and saw a woman grasp it and quickly climb up towards him; he stretched out his hands to help her, and in a moment she had stepped on board. Captain Jack recognised his midnight visitor and his heart sank like a stone.
‘Nance,’ he cried, ‘you here? What is the meaning of this?’
‘Yes, yes, Jack anwyl,’ Nance answered, her heart beating almost to suffocation, ‘’tis me, Jack; I have come; I told you I would. I am coming to sail with you, to be your servant, your slave, only to be with you, Jack – oh! say you are glad to see me. Why do you stand aside like that? Hasn’t the Lord given us to each other? I prayed for you by night and day, and He has heard my prayers, and given you to me, and me to you, to be together for ever and ever, in this world and the next.’
‘Nance!’ said Captain Jack, ‘what do you mean? Where is your husband, Gildas, that noble man, that neither you nor I are worthy of? He flung the word ‘honourable’ in my teeth; and in my deed, if I did this wicked thing, he would be right; but bad as he thinks me, I will not. Nance, go back to him, to him to whom you owe your love and honour. Why have you done this foolish thing? Oh, Nance! Why have you come?’
‘Why have I come?’ said Nance, her arms dropping at her side, her face white, her eyes flashing. ‘Why have I come? Because I love you, Jack, because I cannot live away from you, and because’ – and she grasped his hands between her own, and bent her face upon them – ‘because, Jack, you love me – yes, yes, I have heard it in the watches of the night, I have heard it in your voice, and seen it in your eyes when you came up so often to Scethryg; all the time I knew it was because you loved me, Jack! and because I loved you, and prayed for you.’
‘Good God!’ said Captain Jack, ‘I have done wrong! Nance, Nance, come, be brave, ’merch-i! Remember you are a wife, and Gildas Rees’s wife, too.’
A scornful smile was all Nance’s answer, and the sailor saw that to be kind he must first be cruel, and to awaken Nance to a sense of duty he must show her the futility of her mad passion.
‘’Twas never you,’ he said, ‘’twas Gwenifer I sought; ’twas Gwenifer I loved, and though she refuses me ’tis Gwenifer I will love for ever!’
For one moment Nance seemed dazed and stunned by this sudden revelation. Gwenifer the dumb, the silent one, to dare to come between her and the man who had been given in answer to her prayers! ‘No, no!’ and she burst into a loud, shrill laugh that startled the sailor; so fierce it was, so mirthless.
‘Come,’ he said, ‘you must get back, Nance. ’Tis a dream, a fancy, that you have taken into your head. I, the roving sailor, to be preferred to Gildas Rees; and he your wedded husband in the sight of God and man! Oh, Nance, cast from you such dishonour. I know tomorrow when you awake you will be sorry for this wild freak; but no one knows it, save you and me, and no one ever shall; I swear it, Nance. No one shall ever know what has happened tonight if you will go back to Scethryg; the boat is ready, I will help you down the side.’
‘I will not go!’ she cried, ‘I will not go; never, never!’ and her voice rose into a frenzy of passion. ‘’Tis false, ’tis false that you love Gwenifer!’ Then her mood changed, and in tender, sorrowful accents she pleaded, ‘Oh, Jack, my heart is breaking; it is burning in my breast like a heavy burning stone! And in my head a burning, too. Oh, Jack, say one kind word to me to heal me of my pain.’
‘Poor Nance,’ said Captain Jack, touched by the sorrowful appeal, ‘you heart is sore! I know that heavy stone, that burning heart. Come, I will help you into the boat; the path of duty is hard sometimes, no doubt, but I believe ’twill bring us peace at last. Then say so, Nance, whatever.’
‘Peace?’ said Nance, with a scornful laugh, ‘in my deed no! Have you no word of kindness for me, when I have borne so much, and dared so much for you?’
‘Not one word, Nance! Go back you must! At once! The moon is rising fast, we shall be seen, and you will lose your character for ever!’ and laying hold of her hand he endeavoured to draw her towards the gangway, but her mood had changed again, and she struggled violently.
‘Never, never, never!’ she cried, and scream after scream rent the night air. Flinging her arms round his neck, she clung to him with mad tenacity; he tried to loosen her frantic grasp, but she burst into a loud peal of laughter again, laughter that made the sailor’s blood run cold. Suddenly her grasp relaxed, and she fell into a fit of hysterical sobbing mingled with screams and laughter; she sank at last exhausted upon the deck, and Captain Jack seizing his opportunity lifted her tenderly, and with a sailor’s deftness climbed down the ladder, and laying her down gently took the oars and rowed rapidly back towards Maldraeth.
When he reached the shore he raised her in his arms once more, and wading through the surf carried her safely beyond the reach of the tide, and set her gently on the sand.
‘Now, mestress!’ he said in a firm though not harsh tone. ‘Awake! be brave! There’s the path. Go home, and think no more of this dark night!’
She stood a moment as if dazed before she turned towards the dangerous cliff path; and Captain Jack shuddered as he saw her walk increase into a run, and dreaded lest a false step might hurl her to her death. But on and on she ran without a look behind, up where the steepness made the heart beat hard and the breath come quickly, up where the crooked track edged the scarped rocks, up to the very summit, and out of sight beyond the highest ridge. Here, when she reached the moor, she cast but one glance towards Scethryg, then turned, and fled as if for very life.
Away, away towards the cold grey hills that stretched eastward beyond the moor. The moon rose higher, the hours went by, but long after Captain Jack had reached the Liliwen, and thrown himself distressed and anxious into his bunk, Nance’s face was still towards those bare grey hills; and on the wings of the night wind she was still speeding on. Away, away, she cared not where, for in her brain some cord seemed to have snapped, and all she thought of, all she desired, was to reach the Wildrom mountains where Dakee would pity her and comfort her.
The sun had scarcely arisen next morning when Gwenifer rose and went out in search of the cows. She had obeyed Gildas so far as to stretch herself on her bed, but not to sleep; the events of the preceding night had touched her so nearly that it was no wonder if her heart and mind and soul shared in the upheaval that had come into her placid life. Several times during the night she had risen, and peered through her tiny window at a tall familiar figure who paced up and down on the edge of the cliff. Full well she recognised Gildas’s restless steps, and longed to join him even as she shared in his anxiety; but she waited in obedience to his wish until the sun rose, before she went out to call the Scethryg cows, where the heath tufts and the golden broom were just catching the glint of the sunrise. She knew it was not yet milking-time, so she turned from her path to join Gildas as he stood in deep thought, looking out over the bay where the Liliwen no longer flaunted her red pennon in the breeze. Her light footsteps made no sound on the dewy grass, so that when she laid her hand upon his arm as usual, he started violently.
‘Caton pawb! Gwenifer, thou cam’st like a spirit over the moor. Didst do my bidding and go to bed and rest last night?’
‘Yes.’ And he started back two or three steps.
‘What?’ he said as if bewildered.
‘Gildas, I can speak,’ she said, with a light and happiness in her eyes that not even her sympathy with him could quench.
‘Speak!’ he exclaimed, ‘speak!’ and drawing near her, he clasped both her hands within his own. ‘Lodes, what does it mean?’ and a light and colour overspread his dark face that had been absent for many a long day. ‘Gwenifer, I did not think that God would ever send such a gleam of light to brighten my darkness; but this, Gwenifer! ’tis more than I could ever hope for! I am glad indeed! indeed! I don’t know what to say! Tell me, lass, how did it happen?’
‘’Twas last night,’ said Gwenifer, ‘only I wouldn’t tell you when you were so troubled, mishteer. I was very unhappy, and suddenly I found I could speak. I cannot tell you more than that, mishteer.’
‘No need, no need! Gwenifer can speak, so Scethryg is not quite accursed!’
‘No, no, no indeed!’ said Gwenifer. She would like to have told him that this was a dark and sinful suggestion, but her words still came with a little hesitancy, and moreover she knew that though speech is silver, yet sometimes silence is golden.
‘’Tis cruel to throw a shadow over thy happiness, lass, but I cannot help it. Nance has never come back, and now it is too late. I will go back to Scethryg and to my work, and forget her, Gwenifer, as though she had never been. Keep this all to thyself; but I needn’t tell thee now any more than when thy lips were sealed. I will go home, and to my work; but Gwenifer, thou knowest me of old, the things I cannot speak about are here all the time,’ and he pointed to his broad chest. ‘Joy for thee, lodes, and thankfulness indeed! Art coming to the milking?’
She nodded, and they turned towards Scethryg together.
When after breakfast Het and Gwenifer entered the turnip field, the mishteer and Ben were already bending over their work.
Gildas had eaten a hurried breakfast, and Het had attributed his silence to annoyance at having failed to procure labourers to help in the hoeing – an impression that Gwenifer did not attempt to correct, being thankful that as yet she had not discovered the true cause of his depression.
She had succeeded also in diverting Het’s attention at breakfast-time from the mestress’s empty chair, by launching her on the favourite topic of her own sinfulness and hardness of heart.
‘Yes, in my deed!’ she said. ‘Evan Roberts will have to knock pretty hard at the door of my heart before ’twill open! although, mind you, I’m doing my very best to be converted! ‘’Tis an odd thing, whatever. But come on, the weeds are growing while we are talking. There’s late the mestress is today!’ she added, as she went out, Gwenifer following with a heavy heart, for she had not failed to see Gildas’s troubled looks.
A sleepless night and a wounded spirit had left their marks upon his face; there were dark rings round his eyes, and his lips were set and bloodless.
‘Dear anwl, there’s ill he looks!’ said Het, as he passed them in the field. ‘Yes, yes, the conscience is a troublesome customer to deal with! Oh, you may look black, ’merch-i! but depend upon it, ’tis his behaviour in Brynzion is weighing on him.’
Both she and Ben were under the impression that they had left the house to the care of the clever mestress, who would soon set all in order, and bring out their ten-o’clock lunch to the fields, as usual; ignorant of what Gwenifer and Gildas knew only too well – that the bustling housewife’s place on the hearth and at the board was vacant, and would never more be filled by her. To Gildas, as he bent over his work, that sunny morning was so fraught with gall and wormwood that not only his mind and heart were aching, but his very flesh seemed weighed down with a mortal sickness, which darkened the fair scene around him and made him often pause in his work and lean upon his hoe for rest. It was not wounded love that was torturing him, so much as burning shame and wounded pride; for his love had died out in bitter anger and contempt, every scene in the tragedy of the night before having increased that contempt and crushed his love more completely. But the disgrace, the dishonour, the stain upon his honest name, remained as a thorn in his flesh from which he tried in vain to free himself.
What should he say when the terrible question was asked, ‘Where is the mestress?’ What but the truth could be the answer to that? ‘She is gone, gone for ever, from a happy home to shame and disgrace and misery.’
His first impulse was to answer thus, to face the worst, to stand up alone, and defy Fate that had already been so cruel to him, to do its worst, for there was nothing more, he thought, of misfortune or disaster that could be heaped upon him! Poverty! How well he could have endured it, had he only been able to keep his name untarnished! But shame! Did not the old proverb say, ‘Gwell angau na chywilydd’? ‘Better death than disgrace.’ Yes, indeed, a hundred times; and under the brilliant morning sunlight there was darkness, black as night, in his heart. Gwenifer, working near, watched him from under her white sun-bonnet, with cheeks as white and eyes as dark-ringed as his own.
It was nearing ten o’clock; she knew it by the look of the sky, by the special flowers that waited for that hour to open, by the length of her shadow on the leaves; oh no! no need of watch or clock to tell her how the day was speeding. So, being near the gap into the lane, she passed out unnoticed, and hurrying back to Scethryg prepared the lunch of tea and bread-and-butter and packing it into the usual basket carried it into the turnip field.
Gildas had just looked at his watch; yes, it was ten o’clock, and he must face the question, ‘Where is the mestress?’ But raising his eyes from his hoe, they lighted upon Gwenifer coming through the gap in the hedge, straight and slim, and strong of limb. She carried the round basket poised on her head, and he blessed the welcome sight, thankful for an hour or two’s reprieve. She lowered her basket, and Het and Ben drew near, flinging away their hoes as they came; but Gildas went on working until Gwenifer went up to him and laid her hand on his arm as of old. He turned his dark face towards her, its expression so altered that her lips trembled nervously as she said, ‘Will I go and prepare the cawl?’ and she pointed to Het and Bryn.
‘Yes, they will be wanting their dinner; and, Gwenifer, lass, I am not forgetting thy new happiness, though I am so silent, thou know’st me – ‘the hard log’ as people call me.’
‘I know much better than that, mishteer,’ said Gwenifer.
Gildas looked at her a moment with a wondering gaze.
‘I think the fairies have been teaching thee in thy long silence: thy words are slipping from thy tongue like music!’ he said.
As a matter of fact, Gwenifer’s speech had returned to her without the rough country burr; there was a little hesitancy, sometimes followed by a rapid flow of retarded words, and the soft tones seemed to have caught somewhat of a foreign accent. But of this Gwenifer was unconscious; she revelled in her new-found power, and while she worked at her hoe she continued to murmur softly the words of some quaint old hymn, or a rhyme which had impressed her in the past.
‘Go thou, and leave the turnips,’ said Gildas.
She turned away at once, but he called after her, and she waited while he took a few steps towards her. ‘Remember! Nance is gone away, but I don’t know where, no more dost thou.’
She bowed her head slowly as she turned away. It would be long before she could avail herself freely of her restored gift of speech; indeed, she never entirely lost the habit of using her expressive eyes and eyebrows, her hands also, in conversation.
‘Well, in the dear’s name what’s become of Gwenifer?’ said Het, shaking the crumbs off her apron as she sought her hoe again. ‘Perhaps the mestress wants her,’ she muttered to herself, ‘for it’s Gwenifer, Gwenifer, from morning till night! Well, we’d better set to work, Ben and me, for it seems to me this farm is going to be left pretty well to us two!’
When noontide arrived, the cawl hung over the fire bubbling cheerfully; the bare table was laid with its blue plates and basins, and Gwenifer, hearing footsteps approaching over the stubble, hastily filled the basins from the big crock, and set the bacon at the end of the table. Through the open window came the scent of the gorse, borne in on the sea-wind, which had risen into a playful gale, tossing the spray into the sunshine, and racing the wavelets after each other, as though it said, ‘See what a happy day we are having!’ The smell of the seaweed, the odour of the brine, came in too, mingled with the sunshine through that open window, striking Gildas Rees, entering at the doorway, with an almost bitter sense of its purity and freshness, so different from his present state of mind and feeling that he almost turned away from the quiet calm of the old kitchen with loathing.
He cast one look round the table where Het and Ben were already seated, Gwenifer hovering around them. A glance at the vacant chair, one deep breath, and Gildas had conquered his weakness and taken his seat naturally before the dish of steaming bacon.
‘Where is mestress?’ asked Het between the sups of her cawl. ‘Caton pawb! I have not seen her since tea-time yesterday!’
‘She is gone,’ answered Gildas slowly, as though he counted the words.
‘Gone? Where?’ asked Het, while Ben stared open-mouthed.
‘I don’t know,’ was all Gildas’s answer, and Het turned to question Gwenifer.
‘Well, bendigedig!’ she said, ‘was ever such a thing? What has become of her? In my deed, mishteer, what will we do? Is she lost? She must be somewhere!’
Again Gildas’s bare ‘I don’t know where she is,’ and nothing more. He felt he had a right to say this, as when he saw her last Nance had been standing on the shingle at Maldraeth, as if undecided what to do, and he had yet a gleam of hope that she might have changed her mind and turned to Nelli Amos’s for a night’s lodging, that she might still return and so save her name and his from disgrace. It was only a faint hope and one that had in it but little comfort, nevertheless he felt it justified him in asserting that he was ignorant of her whereabouts, and that for her own sake he had better keep his fears to himself for a least another day. He had shaken from him the cowardice (as he considered it) which had overpowered him at first, and was quite prepared to face the talk and gossip of the neighbourhood; so that when Het followed up her fruitless questioning with a proposal that when work was over she should go down to the village and ask Nelli Amos if she had seen the mestress, he was able to answer calmly, ‘Yes, perhaps thee’dst better do that,’ and the meal proceeded in silence except for Het’s continued speculations, some of them so ridiculous that Gwenifer, with all her anxiety, could not help smiling. Could the mestress have got shut up in one of the outhouses, and failed to make herself heard? Could she have met the Ladiwen that was said to haunt the moor, and swooned away in terror? In her deed, she would go round by the moor, and look for her, Ladiwen or not! And when she returned to her hoeing with the rest of the household, she continued her rambling suggestions until evening.
Gildas hoed on silently, only occasionally straightening himself to direct Ben, or remind him of a duty.
The lad seemed strangely absorbed and silent, keeping as near his master as his work permitted; once or twice helping him by picking up the hoe which had fallen out of his hand in a fit of abstraction.
‘Mishteer!’ he said at last, and Gildas looked up as though he scarcely knew him. He had liked Ben when he had been a careless, whistling farm-boy only, but lately, since the ‘revival,’ a change had come over him; and recalling that he had been present at Brynzion on the night when he had been insulted, as he considered, by the whole congregation, he had not felt so kindly towards the lad, although he had been too just to let any change be seen in his manner. For Ben was more punctual and steady in the performance of his duties than he used to be, and he had certainly been more truthful of late. Gildas started when he heard him a second time call, ‘Mishteer, how far is it to Penwern?’
‘To Penwern? Thirty miles. What of that?’ said Gildas.
‘Oh! then mestress will be a good while away. Because I suppose she’s gone there. She told me last week that she would go one day and see her old home.’
‘Did she? Told thee? How came that about, then?’ said Gildas, catching at a straw.
‘Yes,’ continued Ben. ‘She was telling me about the land over there, so flat and even, and the crops so rich, and I asked her, didn’t she want to see the place sometimes? “Yes,” says the mestress, “and some day, soon, I’ll take my pack on my back and walk, there, to meet Dakee, and see the old place again!” So no doubt she’s gone, mishteer.’
‘Very like!’ was all Gildas’s answer; and in his heart he knew that the lad had meant to throw a gleam of light upon his darkness.
‘Perhaps,’ he thought, ‘Ben’s suggestion was the real explanation of Nance’s absence. Perhaps in a hasty moment she had set off alone to her old home’; but then came the memory of the words, ‘I choose him, then; I choose, I choose Captain Jack!’
When the shadows lengthened, and supper-time arrived, Het hurried through her meal, looking often at the old clock in the corner, whose loud ticking seemed to resound through the house, so silent were they who sat at the table. ‘Will I go, mishteer?’ she said at last, ‘and ask Nelli Amos if she has seen the mestress?’
Gwenifer shrank with repugnance from the thought; but Gildas answered, with quiet firmness, ‘Yes, go, if thou pleasest, and tell them all.’
‘I tell thee she’s gone to Penwern!’ said Ben hotly. ‘No need to ask in the village. Didn’t she tell me she was going!’ But Het was not to be delayed, for had not mishteer said, ‘tell them all if thou pleasest’? Here was licence indeed! And she was not going to be baulked of the pleasure of being the bearer of such news by Ben’s foolish suggestions; so as soon as the supper was cleared away she set off, at first crossing the yard with leisurely steps, but no sooner had she gained the lane than her sedate walk changed into a run, which brought her quickly to the village, where in five minutes she was surrounded by a gaping crowd, who thoroughly appreciated her feast of gossip, in spite of the pity expressed on all sides for the mestress. ‘Pwr thing, fach! To think it had come to this! To think Gildas Rees could be such a villain that she had to leave her home! Well indeed!’
‘Didn’t I tell you,’ said Nelli Amos, ‘that he was a cruel, hard man? You’ll believe me now! Ach-y-fi! The sooner he clears out from here the better. But tell again, Het, where is she gone to?’
‘He says he doesn’t know,’ said Het, ‘and Gwenifer doesn’t know, so there for you!’
‘But I know,’ said Ben, suddenly making his appearance among them. ‘Didn’t she tell me her own self about a week ago that she was going down to Penwern to see the old place, and to meet her Dakee? ’Tis there she’s gone, of course! There’s no need for Het to clabber, nor for the mishteer to vex, pwr fellow!’
‘Pwr fellow?’ said Nelli Amos, her eyes gleaming vindictively. ‘Pwr fellow indeed! The man who drives his young wife away from home, and resists the Holy Spirit openly – “Pwr fellow,” dost call him? Come away from Scethryg, my lad, before Gildas Rees turns thee to his wicked ways!’
‘Wicked ways?’ said Ben indignantly. ‘’Tis wicked ways to hound down a good man as thou art doing, Nelli Amos. I tell thee if every man was as upright as mishteer, there would be no need of being converted, and if thou hadst been truly converted thou wouldst know better what a good man is.’
At Ben’s words, spoken with burning cheeks and flashing eyes, a moment’s silence fell upon the group, a silence of shocked surprise. Could this be Ben Penpit – who had prayed so eloquently at Brynzion, who had been looked upon as the flower of the revival, a brand snatched from the burning? Was he now going to prove himself an apostate?
‘Gildas Rees indeed!’ cried Nelli Amos again, bringing her excited face close to Ben’s. ‘A good man, dost say? I am ashamed of thee! Wilt ask him a few questions for me? Ask him when he was last in a place of worship? Ask him what he has done with his wife? And ask him, how is he going to get his harvest in? There’s three nice questions for thy good man.’ And she laughed maliciously, but Ben only whistled as he turned away. Was he forgetting the Diwygiad, or was he putting its best principles into practice? However that might be, nothing availed to assuage the storm of indignation which Het’s news had aroused. All Tregildas was moved, and in every one of its fifteen houses the mestress’s disappearance formed the supreme topic of conversation for many days to come, the women without exception attributing her flight to her husband’s hardness and cruelty. Some of the men, more lenient in their judgment, thought probably there were faults on both sides, and strongly advised non-interference, as the quarrels of a young married couple were soon made up, and no doubt the mestress would return when she had ‘stopped a bit in her old home.’
Meanwhile, Gildas, when supper was over, had lighted his pipe at the wood fire, and leaving the house had turned away towards the moor, where a fresh wind was blowing from the sea, that tossed and foamed with the boisterous glee of a nor’-wester that has not its usual serious intentions. ‘I mean no harm today!’ it seemed to say, ‘only a game of play with the waves and the seagulls!’ and Gildas, well acquainted with every sound and sight of the broad bay, understood what the wind was saying, but only looked out to sea with never a smile on his stern set lips. With his hands thrust deep in his pockets he passed over the springy turf, unconscious whither his steps were leading him, until at last the deep channel of the little Erva stopped him where it fell over the cliffs to the sands below. He gazed a moment at its swift-flowing waters, before he turned and retraced his steps. Up and down, backwards and forwards, he continued to pace, until the sun had long set and the moor was growing grey in the twilight, unconscious of all but his anger and his bitter thoughts; until suddenly, catching sight of Gwenifer’s brown cot, he stopped to look at it, for there was Gwenifer herself returning from the farm and lifting the latch of her door. He pictured her entering the empty cottage, kindling the fire of furze knots, turning gloom to brightness, and drawing the old oak stool to the cosy hearth. Oh for a few words of cheer and comfort from her! Should he follow her to the quaint low-browed chimney, and ask her help and guidance in his difficulties? No, he must not, he could not, he dared not seek the comfort of a word from her, for deep within his heart some secret instinct forbade his disclosing to Gwenifer the faults and sins of the woman whom he had chosen for his wife.
It would be an act of disloyalty, from which he shrank with distaste. ‘Not until I am certain, whatever,’ he thought; and even then, how could he sully this white-souled creature with the recital of such a story! No, he must bear his trouble alone. His face grew darker, his eyes flashed, his jaw showed out more square than ever, and, as if coming to a sudden determination, he turned round and walked hurriedly towards Scethryg.
Into the old kitchen, lit up now by its big log fire, where n’wncwl Sam sat by the hearth enjoying his evening pipe, Het returned from the village, clattering in and out of the dairy as of old. It was a bright and glowing scene, but Gildas saw nothing of it, as he went straight towards the old bookcase desk.
‘Caton pawb!’ said n’wncwl Sam, ‘what is this I hear, that Nance has gone away? Where, then, in the dear’s name?’
‘I know nothing in the world,’ said Gildas, ‘but stop a bit till I finish here, and I will talk to you,’ and sitting down to the desk, he drew pen and paper toward him, and began to write; n’wncwl Sam having perforce to be satisfied with his own ejaculations and guesses, aided by Het’s rambling remarks.
Writing a letter was not a simple affair to Gildas Rees, although he was by no means an ignorant or illiterate farmer. He read his weekly newspaper with interest and pleasure, forming his own opinions upon its political and religious views; but he generally sat long with his pen in his hand, gazing at nothing, before he was able to tackle a letter. This evening, however, he seemed to find no difficulty, but dashed straight into the subject.
‘You villain! you villain!’ he wrote.
‘These few lines from Gildas Rees, Scethryg, to tell you what he thinks of you, and to bid you beware of coming into his presence, or on his lands again – on your peril. Do you hear? On your peril.’
GILDAS REES
He folded and addressed it in his round plain handwriting to:
Captain John Davies,
Of the ‘Liliwen,’
Cardiff Docks,
and hurried out to Ben’s sleeping-room, a mere cupboard, boarded off from the hay-loft, where he was startled to see a light twinkling through the gaping boards. Ben was supposed to retire with the sun, or if later, to undress in the dark, for a light was not allowed so near the hay-loft; the glimmering spark therefore must be extinguished at once, and Gildas approached over the hay, his footsteps unheard by Ben. He stopped a moment where the crack in the boards gave a full view of the tiny room. What could the lad be doing? He was sitting on the edge of his rough wooden bedstead; in his left hand he held an old blacking-bottle, in which a candle was stuck, by the light of which he was reading a Bible, with a serious, earnest face. The mishteer, astonished at the sight, stood still to watch, while the lad who had had the reputation of being the ‘wickedest in the parish’ read on apparently with interest and pleasure. ‘The revival!’ was Gildas’s first thought, and with it came the wave of resentment which the memory of the Brynzion prayer meeting always roused within him.
But surely that placid, calm face, that changed look of ‘sweet reasonableness,’ instead of the careless inanity which used to be the expression of Ben’s face, spoke of some strange alteration in the lad. From Gildas’s sore, embittered heart the contempt and hatred faded away, and he continued to watch the boy, his face showing both interest and surprise.
An instinctive feeling told him that, ‘revival, or no revival,’ here was the real thing! the changing of a wild reckless youth into an earnest, thoughtful man. Could this be Ben – the roystering, drunken blackguard of the fairs and markets? Closing his book at last, he blew out his candle; but the little room was not altogether dark, for the rising moon shone in upon the truckle bed and upon the lad’s face as he knelt down for a few moments before getting into bed.
For the life of him, Gildas could not disturb him, but waited silently, while a few simple ejaculations rather than prayers expressed Ben’s inmost feelings. The last of these reached the mishteer’s ear through the rough bare boards, and fell with a soothing spell upon his troubled spirit, as though his mother’s hand had touched his forehead.
‘And oh, God, help the mishteer!’ asked Ben, ‘because he’s in sore trouble, and I know it’s not his fault!’
Then, after a moment’s silence Gildas knocked softly in the darkness before entering.
‘Ben! Wilt dress, and go down to the village for me?’ he asked, and Ben started up in bed.
‘B’t shwr, mishteer. What for?’ he asked.
‘To carry this to the post. And I don’t want any one to know the letter is from me, remember, or else I would go myself. Here it is, on the window board. I can trust thee, Ben.’
‘Well, b’t shwr!’ said Ben, shuffling into his clothes; and Gildas went backwards down the hay-loft ladder, well knowing that in a few minutes his letter would be safe in the postbox in the village and beyond recall. He remembered the forbidden light which Ben had held so near the hay, but he said not a word of reproof, nor ever let Ben know that he had watched him through the partition.