How Green Was My Valley (32 page)

“Are you right, Morgan?” Mat Powell asked me, and his hair falling across his eyes
and him blowing it away, “keep away from him, man. A couple more lefts like that and
you will be good for the cats.”

Time again, and in we went with a push from the seconds, pulling up before we went
full-tilt into each other. Careful again, I worked round him, knowing the holes in
his guard and his habit of hitching his trews with his elbows. But while a man is
hitching his trews, his fists are idle. So I got him moving faster to have them falling
the quicker, and sure enough, there they slipped, and down went his elbows to hitch
them up.

In I went, with my father’s face near to him and his words in a whispered shout loud
in my ears, and Dai Bando standing behind me with his hands working my arms as they
had that morning. A good long left hard on the base of the nose, from the shoulder,
with feet planted firm, a pace forward as his head went back with drips of blood flying
away from my fist, one, two, three, more short ones, more poke than punch, to have
him off his balance, then a pace forward to be nearer to him, and right, half-arm,
with my swung body full behind it, to the spot between his breast bones, and my fist
meeting flesh with a hard, clean sound, and going in as to a hole, a big grunt as
he doubled forward, and now I swung on my heels to catch his chin with a left as his
head came forward, and brought my right to the side of his jaw with all the strength
of my muscles, and down he went full length, and down I went, too, backwards, from
the force of hitting him.

And there he was, getting up to his knees with his hand holding his jaw and blood
shining wet on his face, and there I was, on my feet again and waiting, and Mr. Jonas
came round the corner.

“The bell has gone,” he said to the crowd. “Are you deaf?”

Then he saw me over the boys’ heads.

And he smiled.

“Dear, dear me,” he said, coming closer, very slowly, with his hands behind him, and
putting his feet with deliberate steps, “so our coal-mining friend has been indulging
his favourite passion again?”

He came to stand over me, but I took no notice, and put on my shirt, and a couple
of boys helped Mervyn Phillips into his. All the other boys had gone away quietly,
but I could hear them running blind as soon as they were out of Mr. Jonas’ sight.
I wished I was with them.

“I should report you to Mr. Motshill, of course,” he said. “But I shall punish you
myself. You are in Standard Six and I am responsible for your conduct. You were warned,
so you cannot complain. Go to my desk and get my stick, and wait till I come.”

I turned from him and went into the school, with Mat Powell beside me. The day was
a bit grey, not very cold, and a spitting of rain in the east wind, nothing to cheer.
I have never hated anything without life so much as I hated the yellow bricks of that
low schoolhouse.

“Stuff my coat down your trews,” Mat said, “or he will have you in blood.”

“No matter,” I said. “There will be no change in it for him.”

Inside the classroom we went, Mat to his seat in the long desk, me to take the stick
from the hook and stand by the book cupboard. The class was more than forty in number,
more than half of them boys and the rest girls. I had never had much interest to look
at the girls, for they were always quiet, and I never troubled to tell one from another,
for they were only girls. But facing them I had more chance to see them, and a dull
lot they were, except two.

Ceinwen Phillips sat near her brother. Both of them were the same height and the same
shape of face, but Ceinwen was shorter and finer in the nose, with a mouth always
a little open to show good teeth and fat and square in the bottom lip. A good big
eye she had with her, blue like her brother’s, but with plenty of woman in it, and
long curling hair to her waist the same colour as new hay.

She looked murder at me when her brother came in, and kept looking, straight and without
a blink, while she felt for her handkerchief in her belt to give him to wipe off the
blood. Past face after face I looked, along the long desks, past my empty place and
more faces, some on the list and some not, to Mat Powell who was looking bright at
me as though to cheer, past more faces to Shani Hughes, who sat at the end of the
row nearest to me. In something of blue was Shani, a blue that you will see in the
fire sometimes, a pale, but not watery blue, with depth in it, and plenty of sky.

Shani had hair the colour of September leaves, that shone, and a red ribbon coming
up behind her ears with a bow on top. She was small, and gentle in her voice and movements,
dark in the eye, and with a little line of a mouth, and sideways, looking like those
queens on coins from Greece. In her eyes I found pity, and dark sadness.

From Shani back to Ceinwen I looked, and found murder in her still, and back to Shani.
And I made my mind strong whatever Mr. Jonas might do to me, to keep shut my mouth.

He came in behind me, quietly, and without a look at him, I knew he was smiling, and
the quiet grew hot as he came to stand behind me. He took the stick from my hand,
but I still looked at the picture of the Duke of Wellington on the back wall.

“Mervyn Phillips,” Mr. Jonas said, hitting the stick against his leg, “please be so
good as to come to the front, and make a back.”

Mervyn Phillips came out, not looking at me, and blushing with the stains still on
his face, and stood to one side, bending down. Ceinwen Phillips was smiling now, and
she nudged the girl beside her. Smiles there were all round the class, but not good
smiles, only moves of the mouth, as though they were thankful not to be in my place.
I felt that dragging inside me, deep down, not of fear, but of expectance, waiting
for the next to happen and not sure when, but hoping it to be soon, when you find
your hands wet and the skin of your face pricking with heat.

“Please to bend across his back,” said Mr. Jonas, still behind me, still sweet, but
sudden, to make me jump.

Across his back I climbed and locked my hands about his neck. The stick swished twice
as though Mr. Jonas were getting his length. The sound screwed itself inside my brain
and my will flew to my back that was naked with wonderment, and tender with nerves
alive for a hurt.

The stick swished again, and I saw the swift shadow on the floor and heard in anguish
the flat squash of it falling across me, and the sharp, shocking burning of its work.
Swish again, and the shadow, and the grunt of Mr. Jonas, and the movement of Mervyn
Phillips’ throat under my hands, and his sway forward, and the spread of his feet
to be firmer and again the sharp wounding. And again and again and again without pause,
as clocks work, and the sound changing as the strokes fell upon me and worked upward,
and down again, until my back was a long hurt that seemed to be in flames, and a blindness
in my eyes, and thunder filling my head, and the strokes coming to be only a hard,
dull laying on, mattering nothing, and hurting no more than snowflakes.

And the stick broke. The top flew over me and bounced where I could see it.

“Now then,” said Mr. Jonas, in falsetto, and breathless, “fight again. Was just a
taste. Back to your place. No more nonsense. Teach you manners.”

I looked at him as I slipped from Mervyn Phillips’ back, and found him pale, wet about
the forehead, with a blueness about the mouth, and a shifting of muscles pulling one
side of his face, and a pinkness in his eyes, and a trembling in the hands that he
tried to have quiet by linking his fingers. His eyes stared hard at me, moving over
my face, but I kept my eyes on his. His tongue put wet about his mouth, and his breath
pulled him up short as though reins had been jerked, and then I turned away from him
and got my legs to bring me to my seat. On my way I saw Ceinwen Phillips’ handkerchief,
with the blood of her brother on it, ripped in strips on the desk before her, and
her face hidden and her shoulders trembling.

“Now,” said Mr. Jonas, still in falsetto, but breaking more to his own voice, and
forgetting his painful English, “we will have geography. Turn to your atlas and find
India, be so good.”

And while he taught geography, I sat.

Many times that day I wished I was on my back with the ice on the grass cold against
me. I was on fire, and in no haste to move even an arm. Dinner-time came, but I sat
on, wanting nothing except to drink, but unwilling to move even for that. And I was
saved to do it, for Shani came in a few minutes before the bell to settle her books,
and found me.

“O,” she said, with the back of her hand quickly to her mouth, and her eyes going
big, “are you here still?”

“Yes,” I said.

“And no dinner?” she asked me.

“No,” I said.

“Will I get it for you?” she said, and came closer with a look round at the door.
“You can eat quick, see.”

“Only a drink I want,” I said.

“Drink, is it?” she said. “Wait you.”

She went running from the room, quick but quiet, from toe to toe, with a rush of skirts,
blue, with yellow braid in three lines all round the bottom and some in lovers’ knots
on the front, with her hair moving as a feather blown from the bed when a blanket
shakes, gentle, and curving, and up and down. Back again, more careful, carrying a
flower-pot with water running down and off her hands, and shining splashes dark on
her dress.

“Drink now,” she said, and warmth in her eyes, “and put the pot under the desk for
a drink again. Are you hurting with you?”

“Yes,” I said. “Sore it is.”

“They said you had pieces of carpet down your back,” she said, “and that is why you
had a straight face.”

“Feel if there is carpet,” I said.

She came closer, and I smelt cloves and cinnamon about her as she put her hand to
touch my back. Only a touch it was, but so heavy and sharp it felt, that she might
have had hot iron in her hands.

“There is sorry I am,” she said, and her mouth making shapes and tears coming to fill
her eyes, that were brown and deep and big. “No carpet.”

“It is nothing,” I said. “No matter.”

“Will you tell your mother?” she asked me.

“No, no,” I said.

“Do you like birds’ eggs?” she asked me, and a smile trying to come.

“Yes,” I said, “I have got plenty.”

“No,” she said, and a smile, properly, now.

“Yes,” I said. “Have you got a nightingale?”

“No,” she said, and sat, with her eyebrows high, and still a smile, “have you? I was
going to give you a robin’s.”

“Why?” I asked her.

“Because you are hurting,” she said, and the smile was gone.

“I will have the robin’s if you will have the nightingale,” I said.

“Indeed I will,” she said, and here comes the smile again, bigger than before. “I
do love a nightingale. So pretty in song. Have you got nightingales over with you?”

“Millions,” I said. “And pheasants, and partridges, and hawk, and kestrel, and chaffinches.”

“We have got thousands of them,” she said, “but I would like to see a hawk nesting
and I would like to hear a nightingale. They used to sing to us, but not since the
new ironworks opened. They burnt all the trees.”

The bell went and so did her smile, and up she got, and off.

“After school,” she said, and her hand was white in a wave at the door.

Long was the afternoon, and infinite my thanks to be up and going home at last. Out
in the playground the air hit me as with a blow, and I had to lean against the wall
to have strength. Then on, down the street, tired with ache, and ready to lie down
anywhere.

Mervyn Phillips ran up beside me with Ceinwen coming on my other side.

“I am sorry you had all the stick, Huw Morgan,” he said, “but his knife is sharp for
you, and there it is. Will I carry your books?”

“Thank you,” I said, “but no matter.”

“Shall we shake hands, then?” Mervyn asked me, and a bit shy, a bit red with it, and
having a push from Ceinwen.

“Right,” I said, and we shook hands in shyness.

“Huw Morgan,” Ceinwen said, and bright red, her, and not with running, and her eyes
blue as blue, and big, and with shine, “I will kiss you.”

And she did, and I felt her mouth on my cheek, warmer than my face, and her breath
hotter and heavy with her life, and her hands hurting when she pulled me close. Then
she went running, with her hair in lines behind her, across the road in front of a
gig, and the driver turned to swear at her and she poked her tongue.

“See you to-morrow, Huw,” Mervyn said, and he ran to throw a stone at the driver of
the gig.

I was down at the Square and walking slowly when Shani caught me up, but I knew from
her step who she was, though she had to come in front of me to talk for I was past
turning.

“How will you go home?” she asked me. “Will I ask Dada to let me take the trap?”

“No,” I said, “I am going with Ellis the Post, now just.”

“There is glad I am,” she said, and a shadow in her eyes, and putting her hands together
in front with relief. “I am afraid you will drop every minute.”

“Drop?” I said, and anger spurted up inside me. “The day I drop will be the day I
die. Hurting, I am, only a bit. I will have the nightingale egg for you to-morrow.”

“And you shall have the robin,” she said, in a little voice. “Good-bye now.”

“Good-bye,” I said, and went to climb up beside Ellis, and O, there is sweet relief,
for the cushion was soft, and the blanket behind was kind to my back.

Up at home I went into a quiet house, and pulled off my clothes. Nobody was in, so
I was able to look at my back in the glass. It was striped with wide swollen marks
that cast shadows, so bumpy they were. Then I heard Ianto whistling, coming from the
pit, and made haste to dress, but he was in before I could get my shirt on.

“Hulloa,” he said, and threw his can at me to catch, but I dropped it. “There is a
mark-down you would have, man. The ball would be down the other end before you would
have your eyes open.”