How Green Was My Valley (40 page)

“I will find out from Tegwen Beynon,” I said. “She knows.”

Bron was round the table and holding me by the collar in a moment.

“Huw,” she said, stern and cold, “if you have words with that slut of a girl be careful
to come nowhere near this house again. Now then, warning.”

“I will, or I will be told,” I said. “I will know or I will find out.”

Bron put her arm round me and kissed my forehead.

“If I tell your father of this,” she said, “he will strap you and you will go on your
way just the same and God knows the harm. Have you asked Mr. Gruffydd?”

“I could,” I said, “but I know my answer.”

“If I knew I was doing right, I would tell you now,” she said, “but you are a boy,
and I might be wrong. I will think it over for a day, is it?”

“Right,” I said. “Thank you, Bron.”

“Good night, now,” she said, and smiling her smile that was not a smile.

“Good night, Bron,” I said, and kissed her quietly upon the mouth, and ran.

There is strange, and yet not strange, is the kiss. It is strange because it mixes
silliness with tragedy, and yet not strange because there is good reason for it. There
is shaking by the hand. That should be enough. Yet a shaking of hands is not enough
to give a vent to all kinds of feeling. The hand is too hard and too used to doing
all things, with too little feeling and too far from the organs of taste and smell,
and far from the brain, and the length of an arm from the heart. To rub a nose like
the blacks, that we think is so silly, is better, but there is nothing good to the
taste about the nose, only a piece of old bone pushing out of the face, and a nuisance
in winter, but a friend before meals and in a garden, indeed. With the eyes we can
do nothing, for if we come too near, they go crossed and everything comes twice to
the sight without good from one or other.

There is nothing to be done with the ear, so back we come to the mouth, and we kiss
with the mouth because it is part of the head and of the organs of taste and smell.
It is temple of the voice, keeper of breath and its giving out, treasurer of tastes
and succulences, and home of the noble tongue. And its portals are firm, yet soft,
with a warmth, of a ripeness, unlike the rest of the face, rosy, and in women with
a crinkling red tenderness, to the taste not in compare with the wild strawberry,
yet if the taste of kisses went, and strawberries came the year round, half of joy
would be gone from the world. There is no wonder to me that we kiss, for when mouth
comes to mouth, in all its silliness, breath joins breath, and taste joins taste,
warmth is enwarmed, and tongues commune in a soundless language, and those things
are said that cannot find a shape, have a name, or know a life in the pitiful faults
of speech.

So I kissed Bronwen for the first time, and I was sorry, and not sorry, afraid and
yet brave with a gladness.

“Huw,” Mr. Gruffydd said, next afternoon, “there was a matter you wanted to know from
your sister-in-law yesterday. I am hurt to think you would go to anyone other than
me for knowledge. And knowledge of that sort, Huw, is not to be imparted by any woman.”

“I thought you would be angry with me, sir,” I said, and blushing like a fool, and
hot to think that Bron had told on me again.

“I am angry with you, now,” he said, but with no anger in his voice. “If I am fit
to instruct you in the Word of God, why am I unfitted to instruct you in the things
of His natural goodness?”

“No, sir,” I said, and saying it only because I could think of nothing else, and hoping
for a deep hole to come under my feet.

“Very well,” he said, and still busy with the wheel. “There are some things you know,
and some things you shall wait to know. Do you know the calculus?”

“No, sir,” I said, “but I am learning.”

“Good,” he said, “one thing at a time. You cannot know until you have had time to
learn, and impatience will gain nothing but confusion, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said, and coming to be in a good sweat with the plane.

“Then first things first,” he said. “There are men and women. But before that, they
shall be boys and girls, and before that, babies, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“And before that?” Mr. Gruffydd asked me, “what?”

What, indeed. What, before babies. Nothing, I could think of.

“Nothing, sir,” I said, “like in the beginning was the Word.”

“Fair play, Huw, my little one,” Mr. Gruffydd said. “You are having a good try. The
Word was with God. And so with babies. Huw, there is an engine up in your back that
Owen made. How did he make it? With hands, we know. But from the mind, before that,
yes?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“And babies are born from the mind, too, Huw,” Mr. Gruffydd said. “From the mind of
God. For they are little engines, but full of wonders, and a splendid mystery, for
they are driven not by old oil, but by life itself, but instead to stay the same size
as they were made, they grow and grow, day by day, to boy and girl, and then to men
and women. There is a wonder for you, my son.”

“But how do babies come, sir?” I asked him. “What is before babies?”

“Impatience,” said Mr. Gruffydd. “Pity this is not the school of Pythagoras, for then
you would be under a vow of silence for five years while your master taught you.”

“I am sorry, sir,” I said, and hoping for the hole again.

“Good,” said Mr. Gruffydd. “Now then, as to babies. Man was born in the image of God,
and God took Woman from the rib of Adam, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“So now there was Adam and Eve in the Garden,” said Mr. Gruffydd. “And what happened?”

“She sinned against the tree of knowledge,” I said, “and gave him to eat of the apple,
and they knew they were naked, and took fig leaves.”

“Good,” said Mr. Gruffydd, and going hard with the wheel. “What then?”

“Then came an Angel with a flaming sword,” I said, “and sent them from the Garden.”

“To earn by the sweat of their brows,” said Mr. Gruffydd. “And what after?”

“Then Cain and Abel,” I said, “and Abel was a good man, but Cain killed him.”

“Wait,” said Mr. Gruffydd. “Before to kill them, have them first. Adam and Eve we
have got. Where did we have Cain and Abel?”

“From the Bible, sir,” I said.

“But where from, to get in the Bible, boy?” Mr. Gruffydd asked me. “Adam was created,
we know, and Eve from Adam. But where did Cain and Abel come from?”

“They were sons of Adam and Eve,” I said.

“Good,” said Mr. Gruffydd, and went to start on another leg. “They were the sons of
Adam and Eve, and they were begotten, as the children of men and women have been begotten
ever since. By a father and mother. Now, Huw, why is a man a father, and why is a
woman a mother?”

“Because Adam is one, and Eve the other,” I said.

“But why, I said,” Mr. Gruffydd said, and looked up at me. “What makes a man a father?
Wherein lies the difference? How do you tell a man from a woman, a father from a mother?”

“Well, sir,” I said, “one is with moustache and trews, and the other with smoothness
and skirts.”

“Huw,” Mr. Gruffydd said, “you are different on the outside from a girl, or you would
be knitting instead of fighting, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“How, different?” Mr. Gruffydd asked me, going hard with the spindle.

“A girl is swollen in the chest,” I said, “and we are not.”

“And?” Mr. Gruffydd asked me.

“We are different below the waist,” I said, “and girls are flat.”

“Good,” said Mr. Gruffydd. “Now then, what do you know of the womb? What is a womb,
Huw?”

“It is in the Bible, sir,” I said.

“Thus saith the Lord that made thee, and formed thee from the womb,” said Mr. Gruffydd,
from the Word, in his deep voice. “Engines from the mind of man, babies from the mind
of God. But as engines must have a union between brains and hands, and then must come
forth in the womb of silver-sand to have shape, so a union must come between a man
and woman, and the baby comes forth with shape from the womb. Now, the iron-master
made the womb of silver-sand for the engine parts to have shape, and Owen put them
together. So God made the womb of warm flesh for the parts of the baby to have shape,
and who put it together? The mother and father, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“And who is with the womb, of the two?” Mr. Gruffydd asked me.

I had a vision of Mrs. Beynon below me, with veins in her face and her hands tearing
at the wall.

“The mother, sir,” I said.

“Good,” said Mr. Gruffydd, “so now we know that a man is father, and a woman is mother.
He is father because he is different from her. She has a womb within her, and if it
is the Will, a baby shall have shape and life. How?”

“From a union,” I said.

“Now as to the union,” Mr. Gruffydd said, in another voice, and as he would point
the difference between the grains of two pieces of wood. “You have heard of the seed
of man, Huw?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“Good,” he said. “There is wheat, and barley and corn. All seed. And you must sow
to reap, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“So to have the baby in shape, there must be sown, first of all, the seed of man,”
said Mr. Gruffydd. “And it is sown in the womb. That is why men and women marry. Marriage
is the union. Do you sow wheat out of season? Would you put seeds to earth in snow?”

“No, sir,” I said.

“No,” he said, “or you would be clapped in the madhouse, quick. There is a time and
a season for all things. And the time of sowing the seed of man is at the time of
marriage, not before. Never mind how impatient the farmer is to have a field of growing
corn, he must wait for the season to sow, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“Yes,” he said, “or be known for witlessness. So with man, Huw. The time of marriage
is the time of the sowing.”

The sun was on his way down the other side of the mountain, and against the orange
and red of the sky on top, sheep were black, with rays of white light coming up from
under them and lining their fleeces with hot gold.

“Well,” said Mr. Gruffydd, “what more is there to know?”

“How is the seed sown, sir?” I asked him.

“How long have you had your mind on these things, Huw?” he asked me.

“A long time, sir,” I said.

“Oh,” he said, “supposing your mind was on food for as long, would I be in the right
to call you a glutton? So in this matter. Be careful how you waste your time, or there
might come a time to call you a wastrel, and an idler. Now you want to know how is
the seed sown, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said, “please.”

“Very well,” he said. “You said yourself that you are different on the outside from
a girl. That is because you will grow to be a man, and at that time you will be guardian
of the seed of man. Yes?”

“Where will I have it, sir?” I asked.

“Impatience, again,” said Mr. Gruffydd. “You will have it within you, made from your
own blood, and ready against the time of the sowing in those parts of you that are
different from the girl. At the time of marriage, and not before, you will unify with
the woman who will be your wife. And all things will follow.”

“But how, unify, sir?” I asked, and having my voice from the top of my lungs, with
trembling, for I felt heavy with knowledge, but greedy for more, and greed made heat
within me.

“What does the word mean, Huw?” he asked, and stopped the wheel, for it was almost
dark in the room, and even the shine was gone from the table-top.

“A joining,” I said.

“It is exactly that,” said Mr. Gruffydd. “That part of you that is outside is a link
to the womb of the woman who is your wife, and through that link shall pour your seed,
which is given by God, and willed to bear fruit of child by the Mind of God. So?”

“Is that all, sir?” I asked him, and worried, with no happiness.

“Is that all?” he said, and held up his hands. “What more, then?”

“Well, sir,” I said, “I thought it was something more. Something terrible.”

“It is terrible, Huw,” said Mr. Gruffydd, and in quiet, with his hand on my head.
“It is indeed terrible. Think, you. To have the responsibility of a life within you.
Many lives. Think of the miseries and afflictions that can come to those lives beyond
the span of your own. Think to have small children in your own likeness standing at
your knee, and to know them as flesh of your flesh, blood of your blood, looking to
you for guidance as you look to God the Father for yours. Can that be anything but
terrible, in majesty and in beauty beyond words?”

“Yes, sir,” I said. “But why do grown-ups say I am not to know, if that is all it
is?”

“Well, Huw,” Mr. Gruffydd said, and laughing now. “Shall it be shouted from the house-tops,
then? Are there to be no proprieties? Do you undress in front of everybody in sight?”

“No, sir,” I said.

“Then if you are careful of your own modesty,” Mr. Gruffydd said, “think how much
more so must we be modest about the business of birth. It is a responsibility that
comes with age. Would you tell little Gareth about the workings of the engine?”

“No, sir,” I said.

“Of course not,” said Mr. Gruffydd. “He would like to know, no doubt, but his little
brain would never grasp what you were saying. But in time to come, he will know as
well you. Is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“Because it will be simple to him,” said Mr. Gruffydd, “for he will have reached the
age of understanding. And he will say to you, then, is that all it is? And you shall
say, that is all, my son, just as I say now to you. Well?”

“But why will it do Nan Mardy good to see the tail of a shirt?” I asked, and it was
out before I could stop it.

“That is a low joke, Huw,” Mr. Gruffydd said. “It is because she is an elderly woman
who has had no husband, and therefore no children. Hwfa meant she would be the better
for a husband.”

“How do you know about Hwfa, sir?” I asked him, and cold with surprise.