Gwen Wynn: A Romance of the Wye

Met by his mother outside, he delivers the grocery goods and together they go in; when he is questioned as to the cause of delay.

“Whatever ha kep’ ye, Jack? Ye’ve been a wonderful long time goin’ up to the Ferry an’ back!”

“The Ferry! I went far beyond; up to the footpath over Squire Powell’s meadows. There I set Captain out.”

“Oh! that be it.”

His answer being satisfactory he is not further interrogated. For she has become busied with an earthenware teapot, into which have been dropped three spoonfuls of “Horniman’s” just brought home – one for her son, another for herself, and the odd one for the pot – the orthodox quantity. It is a late hour for tea; but their regular evening meal was postponed by the coming of the Captain, and Mrs Wingate would not consider supper as it should be, wanting the beverage which cheers without intoxicating.

The pot set upon the hearthstone over some red-hot cinders, its contents are soon “mashed;” and, as nearly everything else had been got ready against Jack’s arrival, it but needs for him to take seat by the table, on which one of the new composite candles, just lighted, stands in its stick.

Occupied with pouring out the tea, and creaming it, the good dame does not notice anything odd in the expression of her son’s countenance; for she has not yet looked at it, in a good light. Nor till she is handing the cup across to him. Then, the fresh lit candle gleaming full in his face, she sees what gives her a start. Not the sad melancholy cast to which she has of late been accustomed. That has seemingly gone off, replaced by sullen anger, as though he were brooding over some wrong done, or insult recently received!

“Whatever be the matter wi’ ye, Jack?” she asks, the teacup still held in trembling hand. “There ha’ something happened?”

“Oh! nothin’ much, mother.”

“Nothin’ much! Then why be ye looking so black?”

“What makes you think I’m lookin’ that way?”

“How can I help thinkin’ it? Why, lad; your brow be clouded, same’s the sky outside. Come, now tell the truth! Bean’t there somethin’ amiss?”

“Well, mother; since you axe me that way I will tell the truth. Somethin’ be amiss; or I ought better say, missin’.”

“Missin’! Be’t anybody ha’ stoled the things out o’ the boat? The balin’ pan, or that bit o’ cushion in the stern?”

“No it ain’t; no trifle o’ that kind, nor anythin’ stealed eyther. ’Stead a thing as ha’ been destroyed.”

“What thing?”

“The flower – the plant.”

“Flower! plant!”

“Yes; the Love-lies-bleedin’ I set on Mary’s grave the night after she wor laid in it. Ye remember my tellin’ you, mother?”

“Yes – yes; I do.”

“Well, it ain’t there now.”

“Ye ha’ been into the chapel buryin’ groun’ then?”

“I have.”

“But what made ye go there, Jack?”

“Well, mother; passin’ the place, I took a notion to go in – a sort o’ sudden inclinashun, I couldn’t resist. I thought that kneelin’ beside her grave, an’ sayin’ a prayer might do somethin’ to lift the weight off o’ my heart. It would a done that, no doubt, but for findin’ the flower warn’t there. Fact, it had a good deal relieved me, till I discovered it wor gone.”

“But how gone? Ha’ the thing been cut off, or pulled up?”

“Clear plucked out by the roots. Not a vestige o’ it left!”

“Maybe ’twer the sheep or goats. They often get into a graveyard; and if I beant mistook I’ve seen some in that o’ the Ferry Chapel. They may have ate it up?”

The idea is new to him, and being plausible, he reflects on it, for a time misled. Not long, however; only till remembering what tells him it is fallacious; this, his having set the plant so firmly that no animal could have uprooted it. A sheep or goat might have eaten off the top, but nothing more.

“No, mother!” he at length rejoins; “it han’t been done by eyther; but by a human hand – I ought better to say the claw o’ a human tiger. No, not tiger; more o’ a stinkin’ cat!”

“Ye suspect somebody, then?”

“Suspect! I’m sure, as one can be without seein’, that bit o’ desecrashun ha’ been the work o’ Dick Dempsey. But I mean plantin’ another in its place, an’ watchin’ it too. If he pluck it up, an’ I know it, they’ll need dig another grave in the Rogue’s Ferry buryin’ groun’ – that for receivin’ as big a rogue as ever wor buried there, or anywhere else – the d – d scoundrel!”

“Dear Jack! don’t let your passion get the better o’ ye, to speak so sinfully. Richard Dempsey be a bad man, no doubt; but the Lord will deal wi’ him in his own way, an’ sure punish him. So leave him to the Lord. After all, what do it matter – only a bit o’ weed?”

“Weed! Mother, you mistake. That weed, as ye call it, wor like a silken string, bindin’ my heart to Mary’s. Settin’ it in the sod o’ her grave gied me a comfort I can’t describe to ye. An’ now to find it tore up brings the bitter all back again. In the spring I hoped to see it in bloom, to remind me o’ her love as ha’ been blighted, an’ like it lies bleedin’. But – well, it seems as I can’t do nothin’ for her now she’s dead, as I warn’t able while she wor livin’.”

He covers his face with his hands to hide the tears now coursing down his cheeks.

“Oh, my son! don’t take on so. Think that she be happy now – in Heaven. Sure she is, from all I ha’ heerd o’ her.”

“Yes, mother!” he earnestly affirms, “she is. If ever woman went to the good place, she ha’ goed there.”

“Well, that ought to comfort ye.”

“It do some. But to think of havin’ lost her for good – never again to look at her sweet face. Oh! that be dreadful!”

“Sure, it be. But think also that ye an’t the only one as ha’ to suffer. Nobody escape affliction o’ that sort, some time or the other. It’s the lot o’ all – rich folks as well as we poor ones. Look at the Captain, there! He be sufferin’ like yourself. Poor man! I pity him, too.”

“So do I, mother. An’ I ought, so well understandin’ how he feel, though he be too proud to let people see it. I seed it the day – several times noticed tears in his eyes, when we wor talkin’ about things that reminded him o’ Miss Wynn. When a soldier – a grand fightin’ soldier as he ha’ been – gies way to weepin’, the sorrow must be strong an’ deep. No doubt, he be ’most heart-broke, same’s myself.”

“But that an’t right, Jack. It isn’t intended we should always gie way to grief, no matter how dear they may a’ been as are lost to us. Besides, it be sinful.”

“Well, mother, I’ll try to think more cheerful; submittin’ to the will o’ Heaven.”

“Ah! There’s a good lad! That’s the way; an’ be assured Heaven won’t forsake, but comfort ye yet. Now, let’s not say any more about it. You an’t eating your supper!”

“I han’t no great appetite after all.”

“Never mind; ye must eat, an’ the tea’ll cheer ye. Hand me your cup, an’ let me fill it again.”

He passes the empty cup across the table, mechanically.

“It be very good tea,” she says, telling a little untruth for the sake of abstracting his thoughts. “But I’ve something else for you that’s better – before you go to bed.”

“Ye take too much care o’ me, mother.”

“Nonsense, Jack. Ye’ve had a hard day’s work o’t. But ye hain’t told me what the Captain tooked ye out for, nor where ye went down the river. How far?”