How Green Was My Valley (33 page)

He stopped still, with his eyes staring pink-rimmed in his face black with dust, and
made to lift my shirt.

“What is that, boy?” he said, and whispering.

“School,” I said.

“Did you have that in school?” he said, and looking again. “He have cut you to the
bone, man.”

“Say nothing,” I said, and on with my shirt. “You know what Mama will say.”

“I know well what I will say to him who did that,” Ianto said. “Wait you till I have
bathed.”

I took my tea from the oven, and then Bron came in to take clothes off the line for
Ianto and some for Ivor.

“How is the old man?” she said, and pulled my cheek.

“Good,” I said.

“Good,” she said, and picked up my can. “Did you like the apple pie I made for you?”

Then she felt the weight, and looked at me between a smile and a frown.

“Are you carrying stones in this, then?” she asked me, and took the staple from the
catch to open it.

“Well, goodness gracious, boy,” she said, in wonder. “Not a bite you have had from
it. Where is the use in cooking special for you, and tramping it home again?”

“Leave him alone, Bron,” Ianto shouted from outside, with the bucket going down hard
on the stones. “Look at his back.”

“No,” I said, and ran from the house and up the mountain, with Bron calling after
me.

Right up the top I went, and glad to sit down in the cold wind.

Pain is a good cleanser of the mind and therefore of the sight. Matters which seem
to mean the world, in health, are found to be of no import when pain is hard upon
you.

That evening while the cold froze the pain, while I saw again the faces of Mr. Jonas,
and fought again with Mervyn Phillips, and saw Ianto’s face, and tried to find rest
for my boiling mind, I fell upon a loud dream that had no start and no end, and I
saw the Valley outside its skin and bone of grass and trees, with clearness and with
immortal truth. As ants do burrow, I saw men working, far below me, to bring money
to their houses. I saw fewer men paying out that money, and keeping most for themselves.
I saw the riches of the earth crumble before picks and taken away by the shovel. It
came to me that presently, as with all other things, those riches would have an end.
The money would not be paid, for there would be none for master or man. The pick and
shovel would rust. The collieries would be left to flood-water and rats. The men would
go. The houses would empty. The Chapel would be dark. The grass would try to cover
all, out of pity.

And I was afraid.

I looked up in the darkening sky and saw the big winding wheel chopping the light
with its spokes as it slowed down, and swung to stop. I heard the clatter of the last
lamps and the rattle of the last brass checks as the men handed them in, and their
boots heavy in the dust going farther and farther from my hearing, and the voice of
a myriad rats, having happiness in the black waters of the empty pit, rose up to sweep
aside all other sounds, and terror found me.

I awoke too stiff to move, in darkness, and still held tight by fear, so tight that
I dare not move my eyes. Little at a time I had my legs at work, and as the sounds
of night came more and more to comfort me, I sat.

The wind was sharp about his business and whistling a little tune to let his friends
on the mountain know he was up and about to clean house, and no nonsense with loose
leaves or dead twigs, for he would have them, and quick. The more he whistled, the
more the trees tried to hush him, and the bigger the tree, the bigger the hush, and
beating at him with their arms to stop him tickling them, but no use, for he was in
one side and out the other, and nothing they could do only wave at him, and hush more.

The sky was full of thin light from the stars, and down below me the village was a
long criss-cross of small yellow lights, one bright one outside the Chapel, two outside
the Three Bells, and a couple of small ones up on the other side of the mountain in
the farmhouse, all else dark, with the dark, clear softness that tells of coming rain.
The mountain on the other side had turned over to sleep and his black hipbone curved
up and fell away to thigh in the darkness, and farther over, the other mountains slept
too, with shadows in the colour of lavender going to deep blue.

The wind held up above his head the sound of the choir from the Chapel for me to hear,
and gave it back, but in those few notes I heard the rich, male voice of the men of
the Valley, golden, brave, and clean, with heart, and with loftiness of spirit, and
I knew that their voice was my voice, for I was part of them as they were of me, and
the Valley was part of us and we were part of the Valley, not one more than the other,
never one without the other. Of me was the Valley and the Valley was of me, and every
blade of grass, and every stone, and every leaf of every tree, and every knob of coal
or drop of water, or stick or branch or flower or grain of pollen, or creature living,
or dust in ground, all were of me as my blood, my bones, or the notions from my mind.

My Valley, O my Valley, within me, I will live in you, eternally. Let Death or worse
strike this mind and blindness eat these eyes if thought or sight forget you. Valley
of the Shadow of Death, now, for some, but not for me, for part of me is the memory
of you in your greens and browns, with everything of life happy in your deeps and
shades, when you gave sweet scents to us, and sent forth spices for the pot, and flowers,
and birds sang out of pleasure to be with you.

It was my dream, and the vision, that carried me to Mr. Gruffydd that night, for I
wanted to know if they were right or wrong. I felt them to be right, but I wanted
them to be wrong. As I went down, the nightingales were singing near the blackberry
bushes by the Glas Fryn field, and I thought of Shani Hughes.

When I got in the village I found nobody about, not even a cat, but there was a voice
coming from the Chapel, stopping now and again for people to shout, and I remembered
the big meeting called for that night by Mr. Gruffydd. I went closer and tried the
door at the back, but it was locked, so round to the front I went, and found the porch
crowded with people pressed close together, listening, with their faces pale in the
light of the oil lamps, and on each face an openness, a peace, a smile of hope, as
though great news had come for each one and they were having joy of it.

Through the open doors I saw the packed rows of people, and down the aisles all were
kneeling, with even the big seat crowded with kneelers. Mr. Gruffydd’s eyes were closed
and his fists were tight upon The Book.

“Beloved God,” he prayed, “give light. The darkness is in men’s minds, and in that
darkness is Satan, ever ready, ever watchful, quick to find a way to harm, a deed
to hurt, a thought to damage. Give light, O God.”

“Amen,” said the people.

“The evil that is in Man comes of sluggish minds,” prayed Mr. Gruffydd, “for sluggards
cannot think, and will not. Rouse them with fire, O God. Send upon us thy flames that
we may be burnt of dead thoughts, even as we burn dead grass. Send flames, O Lord
God, to make us see.”

“Alleluia,” said the people, with one voice.

“All things are expedient, but all things edifieth not,” prayed Mr. Gruffydd, “but
there are things needful which we lack, and which would edify. These things we know,
and pray for, Lord God, the same things that Thy dearly beloved Son asked for, and
died for. And of those, our daily bread, that others, blind in sight and soul, would
take from us. Let them be brought from their blindness, Lord God. Let them see.”

“Alleluia,” said the people.

“As once the Voice sang in Darkness when the Earth was born,” prayed Mr. Gruffydd,
“so let again another voice sing through the darkness in men’s minds and let it say
Let There Be Light, and Lord let there be light. For the lighted mind of man can bring
to fruition all good things for himself and for his kind, if he choose. But too many
skulk behind the golden bars of the mansion of Mammon, and are filled and replete,
and forget their brethren, and deny them, and allow them to walk in hungry idleness,
and their women to die of want, and their children to perish even before they are
born. Lighten our darkness, Lord God. Let there be light.”

“Alleluia,” said the people.

“Come unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden,” sang Mr. Gruffydd.

“Hosanna, hosanna,” sang the people.

“Come, let us sing unto the Lord,” sang Mr. Gruffydd.

The people in the porch were going to their knees in tears, and as the congregation
started to sing, they lifted their voices with them.

“Huw,” said Bronwen’s voice, and I turned, and saw her, watching me, with the hood
of her cloak over her head, and the cloak close about her, with her hands outside
and held toward me. She was smiling the old smile, with her eyes closed up and showing
only diamonds of light, and her mouth wide, but soft, and showing the tips of her
teeth.

“Come, you,” she said. “We have looked all night.”

“I went to sleep on the mountain,” I said, and she put her arms about me, and lavender
was warm next to me, and the gentle soft of her firm bosom pressed against me, and
the touch of her mouth on my forehead.

“You will have your death with cold,” she said, and a shake in her voice. “Your Mama
is in Chapel, but dragged there, and only because I said I would look for you.”

“What is going on in there, Bron?” I asked her, under her cloak, with her arm about
me, and hurting my back, but a good hurt and one to forget, as we went up the Hill.

“It is the Revival, boy,” Bron said, and tears shining on the very tips of her eyes,
long shining tears, shining in the shine of the stars, and her eyes sad, and her voice
going from her.

“Why, Bron?” I asked her, and a bit frightened, because she was different.

“The men in the Three Valleys came out to-night,” she said, “and our colliery will
come out to-morrow, I suppose. Come, you. There is brandy broth for you.”

Into the house I went, misgiving myself because of the news, and still a bit frightened
of the Revival, but happy to wash for a bowl of brandy broth, indeed.

O, Brandy Broth is the King of Broth and royal in the rooms of the mouth. A good chicken
and a noble piece of ham, with a little shoulder of lamb, small to have the least
of grease, and then a paste of the roes of trout with cream, a bit of butter, and
the yolk of egg, whipped tight and poured in when the chicken, proud with a stuffing
of sage and thyme, has been elbowing the lamb and the ham in the earthenware pot until
all three are tender as the heart of a mother. In with the carrots and turnips and
the goodness of marrow bones, and in with a mixing of milk and potatoes. Now watch
the clock and every fifteen minutes pour in a noggin of brandy, and with the first
a pint of home-brewed ale. Two noggins in, and with the third, throw in the chopped
bottoms of leeks, but save the green leaves until ten minutes from the time you sit
to eat, for then you shall find them still a lovely green.

Drink down the liquor and raise your eyes to give praise for a mouth and a belly,
and then start upon the chicken.

Bron left me to myself and went down to meet Ivor, so I went to bed, full, happy,
and caring nothing for all the hurt of all the Englished Welshmen that ever festered
upon a proud land.

Chapter Nineteen

U
P ON THE MOUNTAIN
next morning Dai Bando saw my back and dropped his hands, and his eyes that were
always half closed went to nothing in a frown.

“What is this, boy?” he said, in his high little voice.

“School,” I said.

“Have your brothers seen it?” he asked, and put his fingers to his mouth to whistle
at Cyfartha.

“Ianto did,” I said, “but there is nothing to be done because of my mother.”

“Well, I will go to my death,” said Cyfartha.

“Who is he?” Dai asked me, and looking at me sideways, with his head on one side.

“Mr. Jonas,” I said. “Mr. Jonas in school, and Mr. Jonas-Sessions out.”

“Mr. Jonas-Sessions,” Dai said, and rubbing his knuckles together. “Have we got business
to do over in there, Cyfartha?”

“There is the match for Thursday,” Cyfartha said.

“So if we do go over there,” Dai said, and staring hard at him, “we are only going
over by there to fix the match for Thursday, eh Cyfartha?”

“No other reason I can think of, Dai, my little one,” Cyfartha said, and very sober.
“Unless you are thinking of paying a call social.”

“There are worse ways of spending five minutes,” Dai said. “Plenty, indeed. Mr. Jonas-Sessions,
is it? Eh, Cyfartha?”

“A good man with a stick, Dai,” said Cyfartha. “I wonder what would he do with a box
of eggs?”

“Social, me, to-day,” said Dai, “in my best breeches and bowler bloody hat. Eh, Cyfartha?”

“Me, too,” said Cyfartha.

“Go you home, boy,” said Dai, and very kind, “and come in three mornings from now.
Is it?”

“Thank you, Dai,” I said.

“And if you do see a couple in their best doing it big to-day,” Dai said, “it is none
of your business. Eh, Cyfartha?”

“Eyes open,” Cyfartha said. “Mouth shut.”

So off I went home, and into trouble.

“Huw,” my father said, “off with your shirt.”

“It is nothing, Dada,” I said, for my mother was watching cold.

“Do you dare to answer me?” my father shouted, in black rage. “Off with your shirt.”

Off it had to come and quick, indeed.

My mother went to stand by my father to put her hands about his shoulders. I stood
for a moment with the heat of the fire on my side. There was quiet, but I could feel
my mother’s eyes.

“Why did you have that, my son?” my father asked me.

“I was fighting, Dada,” I said, and back in my shirt.

“Did you win?” my father asked, and patting my mother’s hand to stop the shake.

“Yes, Dada,” I said.