CHAPTER II

The Old Storehouse

When he opened the outer door, Gildas’s first encounter was with the stormy wind, which blew out his candle before he had more than a moment’s glance at the visitor who knocked at his door so late.

That glance, however, was sufficient to reveal the figure of Hezekiah Morgan, an old man who for two years had been permitted to occupy a loft over the storehouse, paying a small rent for this poor refuge from the storms of life. He had once filled a responsible position as master of ‘Bryn Austin’, one of the best schools in South Wales; but now, broken in health and spirits, he was thankful to find a shelter in the old loft, which had before his advent been used as a receptacle for old boards, broken harness, rusty tools, and many other unconsidered trifles connected with farm life.

‘Hezek!’ exclaimed Gildas in surprise. ‘Come in, man, while I light my candle and hunt for your key. In the dear’s name! where have you come from in such a storm, and so early in the year? Is Nance with you?’

‘Yes,’ said the old man in a gentle voice, which trembled a little from the stress of the wind with which he had battled. ‘Yes, here she is’; and he drew aside the folds of his shabby brown cloak, disclosing the figure of a child, who clung to him closely and looked out from her hiding-place with laughing blue eyes and a dimpled roguish face.

‘She has only played hide-and-seek with the wind under my old cloak. It has buffeted me sorely, but everything is fun to Nance.

‘We were on the Wildrom Mountains when we heard of the calamity which has befallen thee and deprived me of a good friend. Gildas, my heart aches for thee, lad; and so I returned, thinking perhaps I might be of some service to thee. The herb o’ gold has not ripened yet, and the moon-wort was only beginning to seed; but I could stay no longer after I had heard of thy sore loss. One of the servants at the farm where we lodged brought a newspaper home from the fair and lent it to me, and in that I read of the accident.’

‘Here is the key,’ said Gildas, finding it between the plates on the dresser, where he had been fumbling, partly to hide his awkwardness, for a lad of sixteen shrinks from speaking of his sorrow.

‘Will I put the ‘cawl’ on again?’ he asked. ‘A bowl of it would warm you before you go.’

‘No, no,’ said the old man. ‘I have all we want in my wallet, and little Nance will soon kindle a fire and put things straight. Good-night, my lad; I see thine eyes are heavy with sleep.’

‘Good-night,’ said Gildas, unbarring the door again; and as the old man went out, a bright round face peeped smilingly from under his cloak. The wind caught them at the doorway, and a peal of merry laughter from the child reached the lad’s ear with the swirling blast. However, neither laughter nor wind prevented his falling into a heavy dreamless sleep as soon as he had thrown himself upon his bed, while out in the ‘old storws,’as it was generally called, the old man and his grandchild spread their simple supper in the light of the fire of wood which they had soon kindled. In its warmth and brightness, Hezek – or, to give him his proper name, Hezekiah Morgan – lost the tremble in his voice somewhat, and regained his usual placid demeanour.

His had been a life of strenuous efforts, ending in the failure and disappointment that generally attend the man who allows himself to be led captive by a headstrong passion. As a schoolmaster he had been very popular, so much so that to have been a pupil of Hezekiah Morgan was considered the best stepping-stone to success in life; but in a weak moment he had given way to a foolish fancy, and had married a beautiful but uneducated peasant girl.

This was the commencement of his reverses; for, finding, to his disappointment, that he could not raise her to his standard of grace and refinement, he became dissatisfied and depressed, and turned for solace more and more to his own desultory and curious studies, interesting himself much in astrology as well as astronomy, and, most of all, devoting himself to his favourite study of botany; for in the herbs of the field he believed was to be found a cure for every ailment to which humanity is liable.

Gradually he lost interest in his school, the numbers of his pupils dwindled away, and his wife, keenly alive to her own shortcomings, sank into ill-health and died at the birth of her first child, leaving her eccentric husband and his helpless offspring to face the journey of life without her. This child – a girl – had grown up somehow, and married early a well-to-do farmer, who had willingly taken her old father also to live with him, as out of his former earnings he still possessed sufficient to pay his son-in-law for his board and lodging. But misfortune had not done with Hezekiah Morgan; for his daughter, inheriting her mother’s malady, died soon after the birth of her first child.

For the next six years the old man lived on at the farm, feeling himself, as his small savings diminished more and more, an unwelcome encumbrance.

He was devotedly attached to his little granddaughter, and upon him fell the chief care of the child, her rough father taking no interest in her, although she was an attractive little creature, full of sportive and enticing ways. It was convenient to feel, when the harvest, the sowing, the corn-grinding called all hands to work, that the child needed no care or nursing while ‘Dacu,’ or in English pronunciation, ‘Dakee,’ was ready to watch over her and guard her from every danger. And so it came to pass that every day, and in every season of the year, the old man and the child might be seen roaming about the farm lands, sunning themselves on the gold-starred hedges, or sheltering behind the haystacks; anywhere away from the house where they were both made to feel that they were only in the way.

At last there came a day when the hard-fisted and hard-hearted farmer announced his intention of bringing home a new mistress to the farm, and Hezekiah, who was now generally known as ‘old Hezek, the herbalist,’ had said, ‘Then perhaps you will not want to keep me here any longer?’

His voice trembled, and his hands closed and opened nervously, for he felt that banishment from the child would mean death to him.

The farmer had seen his anxiety and at once taken advantage of it.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘most like, look you, a second wife won’t care to see the first wife’s father here. ’Twill be enough for her to have another woman’s child to ’tend.’

‘No doubt, no doubt,’ said the old man, his tongue cleaving to his parched mouth. ‘You wouldn’t let the little one come with me, would you?’ To him the favour seemed too great to expect. ‘You know,’ he continued eagerly, ‘I have still enough to keep me in food and lodging. You have the capital, and for Nance’s sake you would send me the interest regularly. I would go back to Tregildas to end my days in my own neighbourhood, I think.’

‘Ten shillings a week,’ said the farmer grudgingly. ‘Tan-i-marw! ’Tis a fine thing to have money and nothing to do! But, look here. If you make your will to her, and sign it before you go, you may take the child. ’Twill be a great bother, but I’ll send the interest regular. You’ll take care of Nance?’

‘Yes, yes!’ said Hezek, ‘and whoever wants, she shall not.’

‘Very good,’ said the farmer. “This day week I’ll be bringing my wife home.’

Before the day was over he had written out the simple, document, and the old man had signed it with trembling fingers, trembling not in sorrow at having to leave the house where he had had little love or tenderness shown him, but in fear lest his son-in-law might change his mind, and refuse to let him take the child away with him.

‘When can I go?’ he asked, standing with his old battered hat in his hand.

‘That is as you will,’ answered the farmer. ‘There is no hurry for a day or two.’

‘Well, ’tis a fine day,’ said the old man, ‘I had better start at once; you will want to see little Nance sometimes, so we will come here on our rounds, perhaps, eh?’

‘Very good,’ said the farmer, reaching down his bill-hook, and turning towards the door as if tired of the conversation.

‘Good-bye, then,’ the old man called after him, for he had already reached the gate of the close.

‘Oh, fforwel!’ said the farmer, stopping; ‘I didn’t think you were going so soon. And here,’ he continued, returning slowly with his hand in his pocket, ‘give her this – this shilling,’ he said, with a burst of generosity. ‘’Tis better for me not to see her. Perhaps she’ll cry, and not be willing to go. And mind you, I wouldn’t be willing to let her go, only I know you’ll treat her well, and if I kept her here she’d worry our lives out fretting after you.’

‘Yes, yes! b’t shwr,’ said Hezek, ‘and I thank you for your kind consideration. Good-bye!’

One more ‘fforwel’ from the farmer, and he was gone to ‘trash’ his hedgerows and give a general tidy up, in preparation for the new wife who was to arrive so soon.

Hezek had never felt much affection for his son-in-law, nevertheless he felt sad and sorrowful as he tied up his few belongings in his knapsack, for, alas! his heart was warm and tender, and therefore open to many a wound that one more callous would have escaped. ‘Come, dear heart!’ he said, affecting a jocose and lively mood which he was far from feeling, ‘come, tie up thy bundle. We are going to run away together today, thou and I, as we have often planned. Come! and we will travel over the blue hills to where the sea is tossing and frothing; I will show thee the white-winged ships that sail over it to far-off lands, and the sea-pinks growing on the rocks, and the white sea-gulls that float through the air. I will show thee the house where I was born, and we will find a lodging somewhere near, and live there.’

‘Yes, for ever and ever, Dakee,’ said the child, executing a whirling dance around him, and flipping her tiny pink fingers. ‘Oh! there’s happy we’ll be! and father and the new mistress won’t ever find us.’

‘No, no, ’merch-i.’ And with his first week’s allowance in his pocket, the old man set forth with a flow of hope in his heart which had long been a stranger to it, Nance tripping beside him, her little blue bundle hung over shoulder, and her shilling tied up in the corner of her pocket-handkerchief.

Leisa, the servant, had filled a capacious wallet with sufficient food for two or three days. ‘Well, in my deed,’ she said, ‘I don’t know what will we do without you, when we are sick.’

‘Thou art never sick, Leisa, so thou wilt not miss me,’ answered Hezek, with a gentle smile, and he bade the girl ‘good-bye’ with real regret in his simple old heart. ‘But surely,’ he thought as he trudged along behind Nance, who fluttered like a butterfly from side to side of the mountain road, ‘surely there are kind hearts in the world somewhere still, and where if not in my old neighbourhood?’ His step became lighter and his voice more firm, as visions of his old home rose before him and old memories awoke within him.

‘I’ll go straight to Scethryg,’ he thought. ‘Jonathan and I were good friends long ago, perhaps he’ll find us lodging,’ and with this vague prospect reviving his spirits, he journeyed on over moor and fell, ever like the wounded deer, drawing nearer and nearer to his old home.

‘Tell me about the sea,’ Nance would say, when tired of her fluttering, she would return to the old man’s side, and, nestling her hand into his, would walk soberly for a few minutes.

‘The sea! Oh, it is broad and shining, stretching as far as we can see. The sea-pinks grow on the cliffs above it, and shells, pink, white, brown, and yellow, crowd in the chinks of the rocks around its edge.’

‘Shells and sea-pinks? Oh, Dakee!’ and Nance would look up at him with wondering blue eyes, and again ejaculate, ‘Oh, Dakee!’ And so they wandered on together side by side, often hand in hand, the child oblivious to all but the present happiness, the old man rejoicing in the feeling that at last his darling was all his own.

It was late on the second day when they reached Tregildas, Hezek weary and footsore, but Nance still brimming over with vivacity and excitement, for here in very truth was the broad blue sea that she had dreamt of; here were the cliffs, the white-sailed ships, and here the sea-pinks growing on the bare grey rocks. Here, too, were the ruined lime-kilns which Hezek had told her of, at the curve of the inlet, which in his youth had glowed like two fiery eyes looking out to sea, and when, on the strand, she picked up shells, real shells! her delight was unbounded, and she shed some petulant tears and pouted her red lower lip when the old man turned from the shore toward the higher lands of Scethryg.

‘Don’t cry, dear heart,’ he said. ‘But a little way further and we’ll be at the end of our journey.’

‘But I don’t want to go further,’ said the wilful child. ‘Go you, and leave me to pick up shells.’

‘Tomorrow, my little one; tomorrow thou shalt play all day on the shore.’ But Nance still sulked and lagged behind, until suddenly out of the gloaming a dark-faced boy caught them up dangling a bundle of fish. In a moment Nance was eagerly interested, and while Hezek inquired the way she danced round the silver mackerel and clapped her hands with pleasure.

‘Did they come from the sea, too?’ she asked. ‘Oh, there’s pretty things are in it. Will I carry them for you, boy?’

‘No,’ said the boy rather curtly, ‘but if you are going to Scethryg I daresay you will have them for supper: that is where I live.’

‘And that is where I want to go,’ said Hezek. ‘Jonathan Rees no doubt is your father, ’machgen-i; have you ever heard him speak of Hezekiah Morgan?’

‘Yes, I think,’ answered the boy, slackening his pace a little. ‘There is Scethryg,’ he said, pointing to an old farmhouse of grey stone.

‘Yes, yes, I know it well, my boy; I asked the way because that new bit of road puzzled me; now we’re on the moor I know every step of it– och-i, och-i!’

Jonathan Rees, waiting in the farmyard for the return of his son, was not in the best humour for granting favours when Hezek, preceded by Gildas, arrived.

‘So thee’st seen fit to come home at last, idle-pack!’ were his first words of greeting, words which his son took no notice of as he passed into the kitchen and delivered his fish to be cooked for supper.

‘You don’t know me, Jonathan Rees?’ said Hezek, with outstretched hand.

‘No, I don’t,’ said the farmer, ‘but coming so late, you must be wanting a lodging, and there are two tramps in the barn already – so…’

‘No, no, I am no tramp; but indeed I thought perhaps you would give us a lodging – just for tonight, at any rate. Don’t you remember Hezekiah Morgan?’

‘Caton pawb! Where did you come from this time of night? Of course I remember you now’; and he took the proffered hand, but with no warmth of greeting. ‘Come in,’ he added grudgingly, preceding his visitor into the comfortable farmhouse kitchen, where Hezek proceeded to explain the reason of his advent and to make his request known. ‘I had a longing, you see, to end my days in my old neighbourhood,’ he said, when, after many hums and haws, Jonathan seemed inclined to make room for him.

‘Couldn’t he have the old storehouse?’ said the brown-skinned boy, who was watching Het frying the fish.

‘Of course I will pay whatever you like to charge me, in reason,’ said Hezek.

‘And if Dakee hasn’t enough, I have a shilling,’ said Nance, who thought it was time to suggest something definite for the warm glow of the fire was pleasant and the smell of the frying fish appetising.

Jonathan Rees took no notice of the child’s remark, but, seeing a chance of turning the old storehouse to some account, agreed to his son’s proposal; and finding that the old man made no demur to his rather exorbitant charge, added in an effusive manner, ‘Well, look you! You’re an old friend, so I’ll throw in the vegetables for your cawl into the bargain; and I daresay you and your grandchild will weed the garden in return.’

‘That we will, indeed,’ said Hezek; and so it was settled.

And feeling that he had made a good bargain, Jonathan waxed more amiable, and over their supper the two men vied with each other in recalling old memories, though the farmer was ten years younger than his guest, until at last Nance fell asleep, and was carried by Het up to the only spare bed the house possessed. Here Hezek, following soon, sank upon his pillow with a heart full of gratitude; for although he had not been received with the warmth and friendliness which he had associated with a return to his old neighbourhood, he was used to coldness and rebuffs, and was thankful that Jonathan Rees had agreed to his request, though grudgingly.

And so he and Nance settled down to the rude but safe shelter of the ‘old storws,’ where Hezek was to end his days and the child to grow up to womanhood.

‘Maldraeth! Maldraeth! When will we go to Maldraeth?’ she cried impatiently next morning, when the old man, assisted by Gildas, was endeavouring to bring some order into the confusion that reigned in the loft.

‘By-and-by, by-and-by,’ said Hezek, trying to pacify the wilful girl, who stamped her little foot and grumbled while the others worked.

‘By-and-by!’ said the lad irritably, for children, especially girls, were to him simply impedimenta to be ignored and avoided as much as possible. ‘By-and-by, if I was your grandfather, I’d give you a whipping!’

Nance stood still a moment to stare at him in astonishment before she answered, her eyes flashing, her cheeks burning. ‘You my grandfather!’ and pointing her finger at him she continued disdainfully, ‘You, indeed! There’s a fine grandfather you’d make! Not if you put on Dakee’s spectacles, and carried his wallet of herbs, you wouldn’t look wise! Tush! I don’t care that for you! Grandfather, indeed!’ and she snapped her fingers derisively; but Gildas was too busily occupied to notice the little irate fairy. He was entering into the business of domiciling the newcomers with real zest, and his father, who presently came to see how the work was progressing, said, with a little sarcasm in his voice, ‘Oh, yes! Come to Gildas for anything but the farm work!’ and he turned away before the boy, colouring hotly, had time to defend himself.

At last everything was arranged to his satisfaction, ‘And I’ll come tomorrow to board off the end for the two little bedrooms for you,’ he said, preparing to leave the scene of his operations for a time, when he was surprised to hear a sob from Nance, who was standing with her pinafore to her eyes.

‘What is it then, dear heart?’ said the old man, with tender pity.

‘I want to make friends with him,’ answered the child, looking at the brown-faced boy.

‘Oh yes, you must forgive her,’ said the old man.

‘Alreit, alreit!’ he said, turning towards to the door; but Nance, with her face to the wall, wept aloud.

‘Give me a kiss, then,’ she cried, for that was the only form of reconciliation she knew of.

‘Ach! no,’ said the boy, ‘I can’t bear kissing.’ Then, seeing another wail was imminent, he hastily dived his hand into his pocket and extracted a screwed paper of sweets.

‘Here!’ he said, thrusting them into the child’s hand.

Nance smiled and accepted the peace-offering. ‘You shall be my grandfather, if you like,’ she said, sucking her sweets; but Gildas showed scarcely as much gratitude as she expected, for he was off at once and running down the ruinous flight of stone steps that connected the loft with the farmyard.

In the afternoon, however, he returned, full of interest and energy, having collected from all sorts of odd nooks and corners, and eked out by a small outlay in the village shop, a sufficient assortment of articles for the primitive ménage. A few cups, plates, and bowls ranged on a shelf which he had himself fixed on the wall, a crock for the cawl, a kettle, and a tea-pot, and behold Hezek and Nance settled into their new abode and quite content with its arrangement!

Once more, as the sun was setting, the child began to reiterate her cry for Maldraeth, a lonely cove under the cliffs; and he set out not unwillingly to gratify her desire, for it had been a favourite resort of his boyhood and often in his mind of late.

He had laid the scene of most of his legends and ‘stories’ on Maldraeth, stories that had beguiled many an hour when he and Nance had roamed about the fields of Penwern together, and for this reason she was now impatient to see it for herself. So over the moor and down the rugged path they made their way, even the excitable child consenting to ‘hold tight on Dakee’s hand’ as she looked over the dizzy height to the shore below. And when at last they reached the pebbly strand her voluble tongue was silent, and her little hand clung to his in a solemn awe as she saw the tall crags towering over the lonely beach, which even at noontide looked dark and forbidding.

‘See here!’ said Hezek, pointing to the bank of seaweed, driftwood, and starfish left by the tide on the sand. ‘’Twas here most likely that Gwrgan found the chain of gold with which he bought his freedom long ago, as I told thee. And then in that cave, perhaps, the white lady lived, who came out every night when the moon was shining, and sang so sadly and so sweetly that the shepherds on the hills would weep when they heard her. Dost remember? I have found wonderful things on this shore myself, for here comes everything in from the sea; the tide sweeps in here and leaves its treasures, because the rocks close almost round it.’

Nance, however, refused to stoop over the garlanded shore, turning even from the shells that lay scattered under her feet; and when at last the sun went down like a fiery red ball behind the grey sea, she began to whimper, ‘Come home, Dakee! Ach! I am not liking Maldraeth,’ and the old man was never afterwards troubled by the petulant cry of ‘Maldraeth, Maldraeth; I want to go to Maldraeth!’

Day in, day out, they roamed the fields, the moor, and Tregildas sands together – Hezek with bent shoulders and peering eyes, ever seeking for herbs and flowers, the child tripping about and making little excursions on her own account whenever a brighter flower or butterfly attracted her attention; and his expostulating cry of ‘Come back, dear heart!’ made no more impression upon her than did the sea-wind whistling over the moor, until, tired out, she returned of her own free will, and nestling her hand into his, looked up into his face with such bewitching contrition that she seldom heard the word of reproof which she knew she deserved. The other village children seemed but little attracted by Nance’s volatile ways, and left her rather severely alone, while she seemed inclined to shrink disdainfully from their stolid manners. Little Gwenifer Owen alone seemed to take to the stranger, who was of the same age as herself. They soon became much attached to each other, and Gwenifer was almost as close an attendant upon old Hezek the herbalist as his own grandchild, taking far more interest in his collection of herbs than did Nance, who was much too busy with her own affairs to waste her time upon ‘old plants that smell nasty, and haven’t got flowers on them.’

To Hezek the peace and safety of the old loft was as a haven of refuge from the storms of life which had buffeted him so sorely, and he thankfully settled down to his uneventful life. In autumn he made excursions inland, to some locality where the plants he required bloomed more freely than in the keen sea-air, and it was during one of these pilgrimages that he had learnt from the shepherd of a mountain farm the history of the disaster which had befallen his old friend Jonathan Rees. As we have seen, he hurried back to Scethryg, and, after a journey of many days, reached there on the stormy night when Gildas and n’wncwl Sam had been suddenly disturbed on their way to bed.

How they rejoiced in the shelter of the old loft when Nance had kindled the fire! How Hezek had basked in its light! How Nance laughed at the spluttering and crackling of the wood! And when they spread on the board the simple fare which they had had the precaution to bring with them, what simple happiness was theirs! What sweet content!