The Making of William Edwards Part 22

CHAPTER XVIII.

IN THE GRIP OF A STRONG HAND.

Five years had come and gone since that sad October when Evan Evans rode away from Brookside Farm buoyant with hope and expectation, yet from that hour no word or sign of his existence, no token of his death, had come to set feverish doubt at rest.

They had been five worrying and wearying years. For although William brought home his larger earnings to the common store, and his brothers did their best upon the farm, and there had been none but ordinary losses, the abstracted money had never been replaced. Mr. Pryse had prevented that with his extortionate raising of the rent. Then he had taken to visiting the farm at intervals, making free comments with sarcastic flings at Rhys, and cutting allusions to the still-missing Evans, and to the missing lease, which he insisted the man must have carried off, if it ever existed.

Ales had much to bear through it all. Every doubtful or stinging allusion to Evan cut her like a knife. But deep in her heart, as in a well of truth and faith, she cherished a belief that in G.o.d's good time he would come back to comfort her, and confound his traducers. And so year after year she kept her place in spite of the black looks of Rhys and Cate.

Robert Jones would gladly have made another home for her. But Ales only shook her head, and said with a heavy sigh: 'What would I do if Evan came back? No, better remain for ever unmarried than for ever marred.'

And finding her constancy unshaken, the man brought an orphan niece into his cottage to care for himself and his mother, a tacit confession that his suit was hopeless.

Some such proverbial answer Mrs. Edwards gave to Rhys about this time when he urged how much better it would be to have Cate always at hand as his wife, than to be paying for her frequent services, when William was away wall-building, as was often the case. 'Besides, mother, you cannot be expecting to keep Jonet always at home,' said he. 'Thomas Williams is beginning to talk to her, and it is clear he do be thinking of taking a wife, and he five years younger than myself, look you.'

'It will take a long while thinking, if he do be thinking of Jonet for a wife, and him not even got his workshop built,' replied the mother with decision. 'Your patience will hardly hold out till Jonet makes way for Cate. But, indeed, there do be no room here for a wife. And Cate must know it.'

'We might make room, if you were willing,' he persisted. 'We need only be clearing out the fleeces, pots, pans, and other lumber, and shut in the place at the back with a bit of wall and a door, and there will be a room as big as the dairy.'

'Indeed, and where would you be for putting what you call "lumber"?'

Rhys hesitated, pushed his fingers through his loose brown hair two or three times, as if to rake up an idea. What he called lumber were household goods and utensils in common request, fire-b.a.l.l.s and turf included.

'Oh, sure, I can be talking to Willem about that;' and he strode away, with bent brows, leaving his mother to finish her whitewashing of the cottage front, and to digest his suggestion at leisure.

The Thomas Williams to whom Rhys had referred was the second son of the carpenter who had laughed in his sleeve at Mrs. Edwards' new notion of housing and scrubbing her swine, but who had ceased to laugh at improvements that had brought him in work all round. In fact, he had enclosed his workshop and glazed his small windows, not to be behind his precocious son.

That son, Thomas Williams, was fully five years older than William Edwards, but the two had been drawn together from the fact that both indulged in original ideas, and smarted under a want of appreciation at home.

Thus it happened that when Rhys gave his mother a hint that Thomas Williams was making up to Jonet, his own brother was engaged in rearing a workshop for the young carpenter in close proximity to the premises of Robert Jones in the Aber Valley. At home he had been told he was too young to set up for himself, but he had served his seven years'

apprenticeship to his father, had saved a little money, and was not so young as the self-taught mason, who was making _his_ first experiment in house-building for him.

On his father's hearth he was scoffed at for trusting so much as the raising of a workshop to the untried hands of a mere boy. So of his plans or his ulterior intentions he said little there, desirous to escape inevitable sneers and discouragement.

It was at Brookside Farm by the fireside after dark, the two young fellows had laid their heads together, and matured their plans, long before they were put into operation, and it was there the original idea of a workshop and living-room behind developed into something more.

It was there, night after night, whilst Rhys was down the hill at the weaver's, that Thomas Williams had unsuspected opportunities for seeing Jonet's fitness for wifehood. True, he had noticed her bright black eyes and hair, her clear complexion and pleasing smile, her neat attire and dapper figure, times out of mind on Sundays, and had thought how lithe and supple were her movements, how modest her demeanour. But it was on her mother's hearth, whether knitting, or spinning from her distaff, chatting all the while with one or other, and making much of her brothers, or when helping Ales to prepare supper, that he saw how ready she was to make herself useful and agreeable as well.

So it was that, out of the first design for a mere workshop, gradually a plan for the construction of a whole house shaped itself.

William Edwards was short and st.u.r.dy; his round face had become square, his forehead broad, his jaw inclined to be ma.s.sive; his keen grey eyes were deep set and thoughtful, his nose was large with broad nostrils, his dark brown hair crisp as a crown--at seventeen a premature man of thought and action, with strong, capable hands.

He was a thorough contrast to his friend, who was tall and slight, had a fair clear skin, with a tinge of healthy colour in his cheeks, and a crop of wavy auburn hair; in short, a handsome young fellow.

Handsome enough to attract Jonet, and more than Jonet; but not to lead Mrs. Edwards to countenance too much intimacy until a.s.sured that neither her son nor his friend had miscalculated his skill or its results.

Certainly William Edwards had not.

Pa.s.sers-by, or people having business with the turf-cutter, lingered to watch the young mason at his work, as the walls gradually rose above the foundations, until firm, even, and compact as if laid by a master-hand, with a couple of rooms in the rear and an undivided attic over all, the whole stood fair to view. But even before Thomas Williams had laid the last rafter, or the thatched roof was on, or the cas.e.m.e.nts were glazed, the owner might be seen at his bench plying plane or saw to make the whole substantial and complete.

The situation had been well selected. Proximity to Robert Jones'

premises was as good as a modern advertis.e.m.e.nt to both young builders.

Then it was on the main road to church, and was certain to arrest attention and inquiry.

Rhys stood before it the Sunday after completion, along with Cate and her father, feeling something like pride in his self-taught brother for the first time. He had taken a critical survey of all, back and front, when he heard Robert Jones calling out to him from his own low doorway--

'Look you there now! What do you think of that? Didn't I be telling you not to spoil a good builder to make a bad farmer?'

'Indeed you did, and I think you were right. But where he did be learning it all does be puzzling me.'

'Ah, well, you wait and see. The little one will be the big one in the end.'

The rest of the family had come up, Mrs. Edwards between William and Davy, Jonet having dropped behind with handsome Thomas Williams.

Congratulations came thick and fast, even from strange voices.

Rhys grasped his brother by the hand, and pressed it warmly.

'I did never be thinking you could do this, Willem, whatever. I do be pleased and proud to see it.'

"Deed, I did be knowing it long ago, and so did Robert Jones,' put in Owen Griffith.

'I wish I had known it. But where did you be learning to build like _this_?' asked Rhys, who held his dry walls of small account.

'Sure, and I did be studying at Caerphilly Castle, where you did be thinking me idling. Grand masonry does be there!' replied William.

Mrs. Edwards' eyes were swimming with tears. She saw a future before her son, and silently she thanked G.o.d.

'Will you like to be looking inside?' said the owner, who had unfastened the door and held it open whilst Mrs. Edwards and Jonet walked in.

The floor of the front shop was already thickly carpeted with curly shavings, and crowded with odd pieces of oak and pine shaped and trimmed ready to put together, a rush basket of tools was set upon the workman's bench under the window, pieces of timber were reared against the bare walls, and there was already an air of business about the place.

'It is all rough and bare at present,' said Thomas Williams apologetically. 'When the walls do be dry enough to whitewash, and these'--pointing to the incongruous pile upon the floor--'are made into stout seats and tables, and my tools do be set in order, as well as the house, you must be coming to look again, and rest on your way from church.'

'No one will be more welcome, whatever,' he added with emphasis, and a covert glance at Jonet, who had her feet on a flight of narrow stone steps leading up aloft. Presently she came down in surprise.

'Why, mother, look you; there is a big room overhead. What do that be for?'

Thomas flushed.

"Deed, William said it was best make the house complete at first, and show what we could do. Until it be wanted it will serve to keep my best timber dry and safe.'

'But you do not be noticing how solid and substantial are the walls.'

This to Mrs. Edwards.

'Yes, yes, sure I do! And I pray G.o.d to prosper the work of both your hands.'