THE MILL IN THE MOONLIGHT.
"Little I know of life
By worldly joys begot,
But the rapture well I know
That dwells in a mountain cot;
The glory that comes at eve,
As I sit 'neath the elder tree,
And watch the crimson sun
Sink down behind the sea."
--Ceiriog.
Another year had passed over the simple village, whose history we
have hitherto followed, unmarked by anything more than the ordinary
events of daily life. A golden harvest had been gathered on the
uplands, and the herring fishing had been unprecedentedly plentiful.
The work at the sail-shed was once more in full swing, and Mwntseison
was peaceful and contented.
Over the cottage fires in the evening, when the peat burnt brightly,
and the "uwd" simmered in the iron crock, the events connected with
the Mishteer's and Mari Vone's deaths were frequently the subjects of
conversation; but Gwladys' connection with them seemed gradually
forgotten. She was amongst them still, and had dropped so naturally
into her old place of Nani Price's daughter that her marriage was
seldom called to mind. She was well content that it should be so,
for into the even flow of her innocent life it had only brought a
sorrowful "troubling of the waters," from the memory of which she
shrank with a self-upbraiding regret, and she never by word or deed
alluded to the past.
Her simple, guileless nature was already throwing off the clouds that
had darkened her life; a tide of youthful vigour and joy ran full in
her veins; Nature asserted her right to be happy, and she seemed to
grow in beauty as the days sped on. True, a pensive look often
crossed her face, but it rather added to, than detracted from, the
charm of her expression. She gradually took up all her old
habits--tossing the hay in the hay-fields; binding the sheaves in the
corn-fields; singing at her work in the garden; and still carrying
her creel to the beds of laver, to the great relief of Nance Owen,
who grew more infirm with advancing years.
"There's good she is to me, calon fâch!"[1] she would say. "As
isel[2] as ever! You would never guess she had money in the bank."
Indeed, "the money in the bank" was little more than a myth to
Gwladys. Mr. Lloyd, the lawyer, looked after her affairs with great
interest, and the respect which every Welshman feels for those who
will not touch their capital. He sent Gwladys her dividends
regularly; but the blue envelope which brought them was always an
anxious mystery to the simple girl, and its receipt was invariably
followed by a journey to Caer Madoc in Peggi Pentraeth's donkey-cart,
where, having deposited the money in the bank, she and her mother
returned with lightened hearts, feeling very rich with a few
sovereigns in their pockets. 'N'wncwl Jos generally drove them on
these occasions, managing to receive his "pinshwn" on the same day.
The journey was always kept a dead secret beforehand, for "who knew
but that a donkey-cart bearing two such wealthy people as Gwladys and
'n'wncwl Jos might not be waylaid, and its occupants robbed on the
road."
Not that any inhabitant of the village would do such a thing! but
stray sailors from far-off ports _did_ sometimes find their way to
Mwntseison, and English tramps often passed through in their
wanderings.
'N'wncwl Jos had found a comfortable resting-place for his latter
years, for Lallo had come forward with kindly offers of hospitality.
"Come and live with me and Siencyn," she had said, when on his return
from Mari's funeral, the old man had begun to look mournfully around
him. "Thou wilt be company for Siencyn when he comes home, and when
he is away thou canst help me with that andras of a pig, for he wants
a firm hand over him."
"Oh, he'll get that," said 'n'wncwl Jos, "if I come to live with you;
and a firm leg, too, if he doesn't behave."
And so it was settled, and Lallo found something to occupy her time
and thoughts; and the old man, though he lost much of his jocularity,
regained by degrees his old cheerfulness, and spent much of his time
with Nani Price and Gwladys. He was always a welcome guest, not only
because of his connection with Mari, but that sometimes he rowed up
to Traeth Berwen, and stumped up as far as the old mill to see Ivor
Parry.
"Jâr-i! Ivor is getting on," he said one evening, while Gwladys, at
her work, listened with fluttering heart. "He's getting a reg'lar
jolly miller; and there's beautiful cwrw Acsa brews! without my
secret, too. But his heart is at Mwntseison still, though so many
friends are gone from here. There's questions he asks me. 'How is
Josh Howels?' he sez. 'And how is Nani Price and her daughter?'
"'Oh, quite well,' sez I; 'and Gwladys is as ugly as ever.'"
Gwladys smiled pensively.
"'How is it you never come up to see us at Mwntseison?' sez I; and he
didn't answer, but looked up after the smoke to the chimney."
A few evenings after this conversation Gwladys took her way over the
cliffs which stretched at the back of the sail-shed towards the
valley of the Berwen. She was bent on the same kindly errand that
had frequently taken Mari Vone on this path, namely, to gather ferns
for Peggi Pentraeth's donkey. She never went more than half-way to
Traeth Berwen, partly shrinking from passing the grassy mound on
which her friend had breathed her last, alone and unattended, and,
moreover, a little proud reserve withheld her footsteps.
If she went further than half-way, Berwen mill would be in sight, and
perhaps she might be seen from the mill. Not for worlds will a
well-brought-up Welsh girl give her lover a shadow of reason to think
that she is seeking him. She is not slow to respond to advances on
his part, but will never make any of her own. So she turned down a
cleft in the cliffs, and gathered her baich[3] of green and golden
bracken, and, tying it into shape with a strong cord, sat down upon
it for a moment to watch the setting sun before she slung it on her
back.
Behind her the rounded hills rose brown and flushed in the sunset
light; around her the rushes whispered in the evening breeze, the
green sward glowed in the sun's last rays, and every nodding flower
caught its crimson light. The sea murmured on the rocks below, the
floating sea-gulls still rose and fell on the heaving waters, and
though it was late autumn, a calm, serene beauty brooded over land
and sea, as though summer had returned with a last lingering
good-bye. Gwladys sat and watched the fading tints, filled with
tender memories of the past, not unmixed with an awakening flood of
hope in the future; not untinged, too, with a feeling of resentment
against Ivor, who had been very chary of his visits to Mwntseison of
late. She had been thankful to him at first for his avoidance of
her; it spared her so much embarrassment. But latterly, the longing
to see him again had grown upon her, and the old haunting hunger for
his love was again rising within her--not that it had ever died, nor
even slept, but that it had been repressed and buried under the sad
events through which she had passed. But now she was evidently
loosening the bonds which had kept it in check, for it rose again
within her, and threatened once more to flow in upon her in waves of
unrest. True, she had sometimes met her old lover on the way to and
from chapel, or market, or fair, but never alone, and always Ivor had
been calm and undemonstrative.
"Had he forgotten her?" she wondered. "Had the years brought him
submission and indifference. She was still so young--only
twenty-three. It was no wonder if that pensive curve of the lips and
that moisture in the brown eyes betokened a little wistful rebelling
against fate. Why! why should she not be happy? Why did Ivor so
persistently avoid her?" and so lost was she in her own thoughts,
that she did not hear a footstep which passed along the path above
her.
It was Ivor Parry, sauntering up from the mill with the intention of
paying one of his infrequent visits to Mwntseison. He had longed
latterly more and more for a sight of Gwladys, and he chafed under
the restraints which he had placed upon himself, and the proprieties
of village life which kept them apart.
But surely here she was close beside him! every barrier removed from
his path! no moral restraint to be fought with, as of old! nothing to
prevent their intercourse! The suddenness and greatness of the
thought took his breath away, and though, with a man's impetuosity,
he never hesitated to grasp the opportunity, still the strong man
trembled as he approached the unconscious girl.
"Gwladys!" he said at last, and in a moment she had started to her
feet, the rich blood surging over neck, cheek, and brow.
"Ivor!" was all her answer.
And then, with the ridiculous combination of the commonplace and the
romantic, their first embarrassed words were the usual remarks upon
the weather.
"'Tis tewi brâf!" said Gwladys, who was the first to recover
self-possession.
"Brâf, indeed!" said Ivor. "Wilt not sit down again?"
But she hesitated.
"Come!" he said, arranging the bundle of fern; "and will I sit by thy
side?"
"Oh, I don't know," said Gwladys, looking round, as if for
inspiration.
"Yes," said Ivor, laughing at her embarrassment; "look round at
earth, sea, and sky, and see if thou canst find a reason why I should
not sit on this bank beside thee?"
"Well, indeed, I suppose there isn't one whatever," she answered,
laughing, and sitting down on the furze again, while Ivor stretched
himself on the grass beside her.
Both felt the enchantment of the hour, and both endeavoured to
relieve the tension by falling into a commonplace remark.
But what was the matter with the sea to-night? that in every pause of
the conversation it sent up whisperings and murmurings, that bore in
their tones such personal suggestions to both Ivor and Gwladys!
They could distinctly hear the dash of the waves on Traeth-y-daran,
and in both their hearts arose the memory of the night they had spent
together there.
A bright star followed in the wake of the sun, and though Ivor only
said, "'Tis a fair sunset, and promises another fine day," to which
she smilingly assented, yet in the hearts of both arose the memory of
the star whose setting they had watched together.
Yes, though not a word of love was spoken between them, for Ivor
still feared to startle his companion by a too sudden change of
manner, still both felt that the barriers were down, that the cold
wall of separation was broken, and that once more the tide of love
was flowing full towards them.
At last, when the evening breeze grew colder, and warned them they
must part, there came a louder swish from the waves below, and
Gwladys, with drooping eyes, said:
"I don't forget what thou didst for me in the storm down there, Ivor.
I have never thanked thee, oh, no! but it is all here," and she laid
her hand on her heart.
"There is no need, lass. Between me and thee there is no need for
words, we have gone through too many bitter things together not to
understand each other now."
"Yes, indeed!" was all her answer; and, with great relief, from that
hour she put away from her all that was bitter in the memory of the
past, and began to make room in her soul for the flowers of hope that
were springing up within her.
"Well, good-night, lass. I have had a happy hour--and thou?"
"Well, yes, I suppose indeed," was all she answered; but it was
accompanied with such a happy smile that Ivor seemed quite content,
and astonished Acsa by entering the mill yard with a merry song on
his lips.
This night's meeting was the prelude to many more on the cliffs, on
the shore, or on the bay, and when the winter came in real earnest,
Ivor's visits to Mwntseison were of very frequent occurrence.
One evening in the early spring he walked again in the mill garden,
and sought and found under the furze hedge a bunch of sweet violets,
which he gathered before he took his way up the side of the hill to
meet Gwladys.
"Vayolettes! vayolettes!" he thought. "Mari Vone was right, the name
does suit them." And as Gwladys pinned them into her bodice, he was
reminded of the sea-pinks which he had snatched from the table while
'n'wncwl Jos lay ill in his bed, and which he still treasured between
the pages of one of the old brown books in the mill bookcase.
He would have told her of the incident had not a tender regard for
Hugh's memory made him hesitate to speak of anything which should
contrast their present freedom with the restraint of their former
meetings.
Backwards and forwards over the velvet turf at the top of the cliffs
they roamed together, the hours passing by unheeded, until, as they
reached the green mound, now lying bathed in the silver moonlight,
which they had named "Mari's pillow," Gwladys said:
"I must not go further, or my mother will be bolting the door."
"Wilt not come to the brow of the hill, 'tis only a little further,
and I have something to show thee there."
And she made no demur, but continued her walk to the edge of the
hill, which sloped down to the valley of the Berwen. The little
river gurgled and whispered in the moonlight, as it ran below them on
its way to the sea.
"We can hear the Berwen from here," said Gwladys; "but what hast to
show me, Ivor?"
"Only the mill!" said he, pointing across the valley to where the old
mill stood by the noisy little stream.
It was a picture of rural beauty as it stood there, like a grey
sentinel at the opening of the valley. Landwards, the cwm gradually
closed in, where the thick woods grew down to the water's edge;
between them the old church, the home of the white owls, which made
the glen their hunting ground, was dimly visible through the haze,
the mill itself showing clear and sharp, with its silvered points and
dark shadows, its ivy-covered gables well defined in the moonlight.
There was a firelight glow in the broad kitchen window, and the smoke
curled up from the grey stone chimney.
"Only the mill!" said Ivor again.
"Yes, there's pretty it is in the moonlight! and there's nice things
the river is saying down there!"
"Yes, 'tis a pretty home; but lonely, lass--lonely for me; wilt not
come and brighten it, Gwladys? Think how long I have waited; think
how much I have suffered--and thee, too! Come, Gwladys, come to the
mill with me! Come, f'anwylyd, I have not hurried thee; but every
week has seemed a month lately and every month a year! Is there any
reason in earth or heaven why we should not be married now? Why art
so silent, Gwladys?"
"Only, Ivor, I am wondering can it be that there is so much happiness
in store for me and thee?"
"Yes," said Ivor, in a loud, determined tone, "there is love and
happiness in store for us, if thou wilt only give thyself to me.
Come and be the mistress of the old mill, f'anwylyd; come and be the
queen and idol of my heart, as thou hast always been! When will we
be married? To-morrow?"
"Caton pawb, Ivor, thou art taking my breath away."
"Next week, then?"
"Well, indeed, it will only be on one condition," and she held up her
finger playfully.
"Oh, listen to her," said Ivor delightedly, "she's beginning to lay
down the law already; and what conditions does my queen enforce?" and
taking off his hat he made her a sweeping bow.
"Well, 'tis this," said Gwladys; "there must be no wedding--I
mean--only thee and me, Ivor."
"What! not the parson?"
"Oh, of course, fwlcyn dwl; but no one else."
"Agreed!" said Ivor.
"And no one at Mwntseison must know about it, only mother."
"Agreed!" said Ivor again. "And why must we have no one at our
wedding, fanwylyd?"
"There will be two there indeed, I think," she said, the merry
dimples giving place to a more serious, though happy smile.
Ivor looked at her for a moment inquiringly.
"Dost mean Hugh and Mari Vone?"
She nodded.
"'Tis a beautiful thought indeed, lass; and why not? and thou art
right, Gwladys, 'twould be hard indeed to find fit company for them."
And so it was settled between them; and in the old mill by the
Berwen, Ivor and Gwladys found in the long years to come that
happiness, so long delayed and waited for, is sometimes found even on
earth!
[1] Dear heart.
[2] Without pride.
[3] Bundle.
THE END