At the time it was said of him "There's a boy that gets on he is," Enoch
Harries was given Gwen the daughter of the builder Dan Thomas. On the
first Sunday after her marriage the people of Kingsend Welsh Tabernacle
crowded about Gwen, asking her: "How like you the bed, Messes Harries
fach?" "Enoch has opened a shop butcher then?" "Any signs of a baban
bach yet?" "Managed to get up quickly you did the day?" Gwen answered in
the manner the questions were asked, seriously or jestingly. She
considered these sayings, and the cause of her uneasiness was not a
puzzle to her; and she got to despise the man whom she had married, and
whose skin was like parched leather, and to repel his impotent embraces.
Withal she gave Enoch pleasure. She clothed herself with costly
garments, adorned her person with rings and ornaments, and she modeled
her hair in the way of a bob-wig. Enoch gave in to her in all things; he
took her among Welsh master builders, drapers, grocers, dairymen, into
their homes and such places as they assembled in; and his pride in his
wife was nearly as great as his pride in the twenty plate-glass windows
of his shop.
In her vanity Gwen exalted her estate.
"I hate living over the shop," she said. "It's so common. Let's take a
house away from here."
"Good that I am on the premizes," Enoch replied in Welsh. "Hap go wrong
will affairs if I leave."
"We can't ask any one decent here. Only commercials," Gwen said. With a
show of care for her husband's welfare, she added: "Working too hard is
my boy bach. And very splendid you should be."
Her design was fulfilled, and she and Enoch came to dwell in Thornton
East, in a house near Richmond Park, and on the gate before the house,
and on the door of the house, she put the name Windsor. From that hour
she valued herself high. She had the words Mrs. G. Enos-Harries printed
on cards, and she did not speak of Enoch's trade in the hearing of
anybody. She gave over conversing in Welsh, and would give no answer
when spoken to in that tongue. She devised means continually to lift
herself in the esteem of her neighbors, acting as she thought they
acted: she had a man-servant and four maid-servants, and she instructed
them to address her as the madam and Enoch as the master; she had a gong
struck before meals and a bell rung during meals; the furniture in her
rooms was as numerous as that in the windows of a shop; she went to the
parish church on Sundays; she made feasts. But her life was bitter:
tradespeople ate at her table and her neighbors disregarded her.
Enoch mollified her moaning with: "Never mind. I could buy the whole
street up. I'll have you a motor-car. Fine it will be with an advert on
the front engine."
Still slighted, Gwen smoothed her misery with deeds. She declared she
was a Liberal, and she frequented Thornton Vale English Congregational
Chapel. She gave ten guineas to the rebuilding fund, put a carpet on the
floor of the pastor's parlor, sang at brotherhood gatherings, and
entertained the pastor and his wife.
Wherefore her charity was discoursed thus: "Now when Peter spoke of a
light that shines--shines, mark you--he was thinking of such ladies as
Mrs. G. Enos-Harries. Not forgetting Mr. G. Enos-Harries."
"I'm going to build you a vestry," Gwen said to the pastor. "I'll
organize a sale of work to begin with."
The vestry was set up, and Gwen bethought of one who should be charged
with the opening ceremony of it, and to her mind came Ben Lloyd, whose
repute was great among the London Welsh, and to whose house in
Twickenham she rode in her car. Ben's wife answered her sharply: "He's
awfully busy. And I know he won't see visitors."
"But won't you tell him? It will do him such a lot of good. You know
what a stronghold of Toryism this place is."