It is certainly possible when one is only sixteen to go to sleep in the
depths of misery, and to awake after a few hours of slumber, with a
heart, if not as light as a feather, yet quite sufficiently so, to
enable one to dance, not walk, to eat with an appetite, and to laugh
with more than surface merriment. These easily changed feelings may be
reckoned as some of the blessings of this pleasant age.
At sixteen we have our sharp sorrows, but we have our equally keen
pleasures, and it is quite impossible for us to be sad always.
So on the morning after Gwen had related to me her dream, though there
were sore places which I could not quite bear to touch, somewhere about
my heart, yet the leading fact which danced before my young eyes lay
concentrated in the one word--_change_. We were going away, we were
going to make another place our home; we would soon be in all the grand
excitement of a move. I was very childish in the matter, for this
experience was so new to me, so completely novel. I had never seen a
house in the chaos of a removal. I had never seen furniture ruthlessly
piled up in corners, beds in packing-cases, chairs and tables upside
down, carpetless and straw-littered floors.
It must have been centuries since Tynycymmer had known such a
revolution. Except in the attics, everything was in apple-pie order.
Even the Tynycymmer attics were not half so disorderly as they should
be. Regularly twice a year they were well cleaned out, and reduced to
an alarming degree of niceness. The drawing-rooms, dining-room, study,
library, were always destined to hold just their own furniture, and no
other. And how proper and staid that old furniture looked! those chairs
would never tumble down with one, those rather thread-bare carpets would
fade and fade, it was true, until all brightness and beauty had left
them, but how provokingly orderly they would keep, and how unnecessary
it was to do anything to them except at the grand annual cleanings!
I have been so put out and so tired by the everlasting sameness of
Tynycymmer, that on some of these exciting occasions, I have forced my
way into the dethroned and disarranged rooms, tied the housemaid's white
apron over my hair, and flourished wildly about with a mop, never
subsiding into rationalism until I had laid one or two articles of value
in fragments at my feet.
But now we were going to have confusion grand and glorious, for the
cottage at Ffynon was to be furnished with some of the superabundance of
Tynycymmer.
Mother and David went through the old rooms many times, and everything
that was small enough, and choice enough, and pretty enough, was marked
to go. Mother and David both looked sad during these pilgrimages
through the Tynycymmer rooms. But whenever David said, "Mother I should
like you to have this, for such a corner," or, "Mother, we will put this
in Owen's room," she just bent her stately head in acquiescence, and
said, "It shall be as you wish, my son."
So the rare cases of old china went away, and the choicest landscapes
were removed from the walls; only the family portraits remained in the
portrait gallery, and a painter's proof of Noel Paton's "_Mors Janua
Vitae_," which David and Amy had brought home after their wedding tour,
was left undisturbed in David's study.
Then the waggons came, old-fashioned, slow, and cumbersome, and the
furniture was stowed in, and Gwen and mother and David went to and fro.
At last the cottage was ready, everything to our least belongings,
packed and put away, and mother and I saw the day dawn when we were to
leave Tynycymmer, and take up our abode at Owen's house. I found on the
morning of that day in late October, I found on that last day, to my
astonishment, that even going away had its sorrows. A mist of tears
came dimming my eyes as I looked at the sea, as I wandered through the
gardens and grounds, as I peeped into the no longer orderly rooms.
Memories I had tried to put out of sight returned to me. That arbour
overhanging the sea, where I had talked to Amy of Owen, and Amy, in a
short, vivid, last flash of resentment, had told me I was wrong; that
David was the brave man. Poor little gentle Amy! I had never loved her
very much, I had scorned her earnest words; but they were true. I
acknowledged them with a great stab at my heart, when I visited the
arbour for the last time.
Here was the horse-chestnut-tree where Owen and I had sat and dreamed
dreams, summer after summer. I hurried away from it. Here was the
cherry-tree from which I had stolen the cherries, for which Owen had
reproved me. Here, crawling listlessly after me, was the lame, and
half-blind terrier, which had once belonged to Owen, and had been
sportive enough when Owen and I were together. Here was the study,
where I had copied Owen's exercises. Here the stain, still left in the
carpet, where Owen had upset the ink. Here the spot--here, by the deep,
mullioned window--where, after a long labour for Owen, he had put his
arm round my childish neck, looked full into my eyes, and "called me the
best little sister in the world."
Oh! what ailed the place this morning; it was alive with Owen, peopled
with Owen in every nook. From each corner Owen started up and
confronted me, as he was. _As he was_--what was he now? I dashed my
blinding tears away. Kissed little David, hugged Gwen, who was
absolutely speechless with her own sorrow, got into the carriage beside
mother, and was off--away! For mother's sake, who was very white, and
seemed to be suffering intensely, I abstained from shouting. For
David's sake, who kept his hat well down, and who never spoke, I, too,
remained silent. In process of time we arrived at Ffynon, and at the
cottage which was to be our future home. A tree or two surrounded it; a
little scrap of a garden, neat with gravel, and bright with late
geraniums in pots, led up to it. Inside there was a drawing-room, low
and small; a dining-room to match; behind, kitchens, a pantry, and
cellars; over head, four bed-rooms. That was absolutely all. Goodness
me! dear, dear! as Gwen would say, was there ever such a nutshell of a
place! Why, it was a toy-house, a doll's abode. I could stand on
tiptoe and touch the ceiling of the apartment set aside for my slumbers.
I could stand by the bedstead at one end of the room, and nearly pull
the bell at the other. But then the bedstead was so pretty, so tiny, so
bright! The whole room, encased in its fairy-like pink and white, was
like a little bower; the muslin curtains were partly drawn, the blinds
partly down, the evening sun cast a glow over everything. I approached
the window, whistling to my canary as I went. I drew up the blinds, and
pushed back the curtains. My cheeks were hot, I wanted to see my waves.
Perhaps from long habit, I thought I should see them. I looked out,
and behold! a black country--hills, low and barren destitute of trees,
clothed with coal dust; straight, red brick chimneys, from which curled
volumes of ugly smoke; roads winding everywhere, of a grimy grey; a
train of coal trams, whizzing up to the noisy dirty station; the roar of
steam-engines filling the air; dark figures rushing here and there, and
the machinery and shaft of what I afterwards learned was David's mine,
quite close. The entrance to this mine lay within not many hundred
yards of the house. Oh! there was noise enough and life enough here,
but it was ugly! ugly! ugly! I quickly shut down the window; I drew the
blinds and curtains into their former position. I would not
acknowledge, even to myself, how my heart rose up in wild longing for
the green trees, and the fresh, sweet, salt waves of Tynycymmer; I only
said to myself, "The cottage is lovely, fairy-like; but the view is
ugly!"
That night I slept well in my little room, and in the morning was able
to acknowledge that, though the coal country was far from beautiful, and
Ffynon was not quite the home to choose, yet any change was welcome to
me; and had Owen only been coming back the hero I had painted him, had
dear old David's brave face not worn such a patient look, had my mother
not been quite so silent, and quite so sorry for leaving Tynycymmer, and
had Gwen been still to the fore to scold me, and pet me, I should have
been, notwithstanding the ugly view, the happiest girl in the world.
I got up early this first morning, and went out. I ran down, without
anyone knowing it, to the place where the machinery roared loudest, and
the black coal dust was thickest. I looked into the mouth of the shaft,
watched with interest the rows of grimy miners getting into the cage,
and descending into the mine; started back at first from their black
faces, which, relieved by the dazzling white of teeth and eyeballs, made
them look hardly human; presently gathered courage, came close, asked
eager questions, made all verbal preparations for a speedy descent into
the coal mine; rather laughed at the idea of fear in the matter, and
returned home in time for breakfast, my light dress covered with dirty
stains, my golden hair full of coal dust, my whole person very dirty
indeed.
"Gwladys," said mother, "you must never venture near the shaft alone
again."
"If you do, Gwladys, I must take you back to Tynycymmer," said David.
I did not want that; if Ffynon was dirty, it was very new and very
interesting.