By Berwen Banks. Allen Raine

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ and his voice woke the echoes from Moel Hiraethog, the hill which they were nearing, and which they must compass before reaching the valley of the Berwen. "Ha! ha! ha! Can I speak Welsh? Why, I am Welsh to the core, Cymro glan gloyw![1] What are you?"

      "Oh! Welsh, of course. You can hear that by my talk."

      "Indeed no," said Cardo. "I did not know anyone at Traeth Berwen could speak English as well as you do."

      He was longing to find out who his fellow-traveller was. He saw in the dim light she was slim and fair, and had a wealth of golden hair; he saw her dress was grey and her hood was red. So much the moonlight revealed, but further than this he could not discover, and politeness forbade his asking. As if in answer to his thoughts, however, her next words enlightened him.

      "I am Valmai Powell, the niece of Essec Powell, the preacher."

      A long, low whistle escaped from the young man's lips.

      "By Jove!" he said.

      The girl was silent, but could he have seen the hot blush which spread over her face and neck, he would have known that he had roused the quick Welsh temper. He was unconscious of it, however, and strode on in silence, until they reached a rough-built, moss-grown bridge, and here they both stopped as if by mutual consent. Leaning their elbows on the mossy stone wall, they looked down to the depths below, where the little river Berwen babbled and whispered on its way to the sea.

      "There's a nice noise it is making down there," said Valmai. "But why do you say a bad word when I tell you my uncle's name?"

      "A bad word? In your presence? Not for the world! But I could not help thinking how shocked my father and your uncle would be to see us walking together."

      "Yes, I think, indeed," said the girl, opening a little basket and spreading its contents on the low wall. "See!" she said, in almost childish tones, and turning her face straight to the moonlight.

      Cardo saw, as he looked down at her, that it was a beautiful face.

      "See!" she said, "gingerbread that I bought in that old street they call 'The Mwntroyd.' Here is a silver ship, and here is a gold watch, and a golden girl. Which will you have?"

      "Well, indeed, I am as hungry as a hunter," said Cardo. "I will have the lassie, if you are sure you have enough for two."

      "Anwl! anwl! I have a lamb and a sheep and some little pigs in my basket." And she proceeded to spread them out and divide them; and they continued to chat as they ate their gilded gingerbread.

      "Suppose your uncle and my father knew we were standing on the same bridge and looking at the same moon," said Cardo, laughing.

      "And eating the same gingerbread," added Valmai.

      "My word! There would be wrath."

      "Wrath?" said the girl, looking thoughtfully up in her companion's face; "what is that?"

      "Oh, something no one could feel towards you. 'Wrath' is anger."

      "My uncle is angry sometimes with me, and—too—with—with—"

      "My father, I suppose?" said Cardo.

      "Yes, indeed," said the girl; "that is true, whatever. Every Wednesday evening at the prayer-meeting he is praying for the 'Vicare du,' and Betto told me last week that the Vicare is praying for my uncle on Tuesday evenings."

      "Oh, Lord! has it come to that?" said Cardo. "Then I'm afraid we can never hope for peace between them."

      They both laughed, and the girl's rippling tones mingled musically in Cardo's ears with the gurgle of the Berwen.

      "It is getting late," she said, "we had better go on; but I must say good-night here, because it is down by the side of the river is my way to Dinas. You will be nearer to keep on the road till you cross the valley."

      "No, indeed," said the young man, already preparing to help his companion over the stone stile. "I will go down by the Berwen too."

      "Anwl," said Valmai, clasping her hands; "it will be a mile further for you, whatever."

      "A mile is nothing on such a night as this."

      And down to the depths of the dark underwood they passed, by a steep, narrow path, down through the tangled briers and bending ferns, until they reached the banks of the stream. The path was but little defined, and evidently seldom trodden; the stream gurgled and lisped under the brushwood; the moon looked down upon it and sparkled on its ripples; and as Valmai led the way, chatting in her broken English, a strange feeling of happy companionship awoke in Cardo Wynne's heart.

      After threading the narrow pathway for half-a-mile or so, they reached a sudden bend of the little river, where the valley broadened out somewhat, until there was room for a grassy, velvet meadow, at the further corner of which stood the ruins of the old parish church, lately discarded for the new chapel of ease built on the hillside above the shore.

      "How black the ruins look in that corner," said Cardo.

      "Yes, and what is that white thing in the window?" said Valmai, in a frightened whisper, and shrinking a little nearer to her companion.

      "Only a white owl. Here she comes sailing out into the moonlight."

      "Well, indeed, so it is. From here we can hear the sea, and at the beginning of the shore I shall be turning up to Dinas."

      "And I suppose I must turn in the opposite direction to get to Brynderyn," said Cardo. "Well, I have never enjoyed a walk from Caer Madoc so much before. Will they be waiting for you at home, do you think?"

      "Waiting for me?" laughed the girl, and her laugh was not without a little trace of bitterness; "who is there to wait for me? No one, indeed, since my mother is dead. Perhaps to-morrow my uncle might say, 'Where is Valmai? She has never brought me my book.' Here it is, though," she continued, "safe under the crumbs of the gingerbread. I bought it in the Mwntroyd. 'Tis a funny name whatever."

      "Yes, a relic of the old Flemings, who settled in Caer Madoc long ago."

      "Oh! I would like to hear about that! Will you tell me about it some time again?"

      "Indeed I will," said Cardo eagerly; "but when will that be? I have been wondering all the evening how it is I have never seen you before."

      They had now reached the open beach, where the Berwen, after its chequered career, subsided quietly through the sand and pebbles into the sea.

      "Here is my path, but I will tell you," and with the sound of the gurgling river, and the plash of the waves in his ears, Cardo listened to her simple story. "You couldn't see me much before, because only six weeks it is since I am here. Before that I was living far, far away. Have you ever heard of Patagonia? Well then, my father was a missionary there, and he took me and my mother with him when I was only a baby. Since then I have always been living there, till this year I came to Wales."

      "Patagonia!" said Cardo. "So far away? No wonder you dropped upon me so suddenly! But how, then, did you grow up Welsh?"

      Valmai laughed merrily.

      "Grow up Welsh? Well, indeed, I don't know what have I grown up! Welsh, or English, or Spanish, or Patagonian! I am mixed of them all, СКАЧАТЬ