How Green Was My Valley

  “Why am I a humbug, Mr. Jonas?” I asked him.

  He was looking at me from under the bandage, with his head up. I could just see blue hurt flesh, and I was sorrier than ever.

  “Why?” he said, and sent breath from his nose with impatience. “As an illustration, your school record. You deliberately tried to ruin my name with Mr. Motshill, and since the devil is kind to his own, you were quite successful for a time. For a time. It may be some consolation to you to know that I shall be teaching Standard Six again when I return.”

  “But why am I a humbug?” I asked him.

  “Because you pretend to be what you are not,” he said, and in a temper to take the voice from him. “But why should I expect anything else? After all, look at your background. As I told Mr. Motshill, why be surprised? Coal miners. Living like hogs, with nothing in life but beer and bruisers and using the Chapel as a blind. Welsh. Good God, what a tribe.”

  “But why am I a humbug, Mr. Jonas?” I asked him again.

  “Get out,” he said, “you make a murderous attack on me presumably because I check the use of jargon in school, and yet you have the audacity to question me in English. Simon-pure humbug.”

  “You started in English,” I said, “I thought you never spoke Welsh or I would speak it to you.”

  “Look here, Morgan,” he said, and shifting on his elbow, as though he would throw me out as soon as finished, “there is no reason why I should talk to you like this, and God knows why I should do it. But I want to tell you this before you go. Welsh never was a language, but only a crude means of communication, between tribes of barbarians stinking of woad. If you want to do yourself some good, stop troubling your tongue with it.”

  “Oh,” I said, and nothing else I could think of, except my mother and father and Bron.

  “Yes,” he said, “oh, English. The language of the Queen and all nobility. Welsh. Good God Almighty, the very word is given to robbers on race-courses.”

  “But you are Welsh, Mr. Jonas,” I said.

  “I had the misfortune to be born in the country,” he said.

  “No mistake about that,” I said, and standing. “Welsh is in your voice and in your speech, too, and hatred will never change them for you.”

  “Get out,” he said, “get out at once.”

  “I wish I could have the tongue of Dr. Johnson,” I said, “only for a minute. I would hit you harder than I have with fists. You would never rise from your bed. I would strike you dumb and paralyse you. I am not sorry for what I did. I wish I had done more. I only came because Mr. Gruffydd asked me to.”

  “Ruth,” he was shouting. “Ruthie.”

  “Live in hell,” I said, “and when you are dead, go there.”

  I was down the stairs quick, and Mrs. Jonas picking up her skirts to come up.

  “What did you do to him?” she said, and pulled me by the arm.

  “Nothing,” I said. “Only told him to live in hell.”

  “What right have you got to tell a man to live in hell?” she asked me and ready to fly at my face with her shaking fingers, “you wicked devil, you, putting him in pain and then telling him to live in hell. Go you and live there before I will kill you.”

  “Ruth who, were you, before to marry?” I asked her, and her mouth that was open to say more closed again, and her eyes emptied, looking from side to side in wonder, and a hand went to her cheek, and I felt the heat going from her.

  “Morgan,” she said, in a small voice of surprise. “Ruth Morgan, I was. Why, then?”

  “Good,” I said, and went from the house, with noise at the door again, and laughing all the way down the street. Elijah was right that time, for I was neighing still, up on top of the mountain.

  “He was mistaken,” Mr. Gruffydd said, when I told him. “Welsh, they call us, from the Saxon word waelisc, meaning a foreigner. About the race-course, I cannot tell you. But if some of our fathers were a bit ready with their hands and quick in the legs the English must blame themselves. Perhaps most of them never heard of the laws they made against us. You cannot blame ignorant men. You might as well kick a dog for not wishing good morning.”

  “Why did Mr. Jonas call me a humbug, then?” I asked him.

  “Sticks and stones shall break my bones,” said Mr. Gruffydd, “Mr. Jonas should look home. Never trouble with people who call names, Huw. They are the infantile, the half-grown. And a man has got to have an inner knowledge and experience of the science of humbug before to honour another with the term. Remember, Huw. Be still, and know that I am God. Worry about nothing, especially the tongues of others.”

  “Why do you worry, Mr. Gruffydd?” I asked him, and hot with sorrow as soon as it was out. His eyes carried loads of darkness, and he saw with tiredness, and with patience that was willed, but not felt.

  He looked down at me with something of a smile, something of a frown, something of hurt, and surprise, too, as though I had put out a foot to trip him.

  “Worry, my son?” he said, with quiet. “I am not worried now and I never have or will. You must learn to tell worry from thought, and thought from prayer. Sometimes a light will go from your life, Huw, and your life becomes a prayer, till you are strong enough to stand under the weight of your own thought again.”

  “Yes, sir,” I said, and willing to run from there, “I am sorry I said it to you.”

  “Do you find a difference in me, Huw?” he asked me, and his eyes coming to watch mine a little sideways, as though to make sure I was going to tell truth.

  “Yes, sir,” I said.

  “How, then?” he asked me, eyes still.

  “You are heavier in your talk,” I said, “not so much smile, not so much interest, and not much of gladness, either. And nothing for the furniture.”

  He turned from me to look up the mountain, and I was stricken with terror, in the quiet little street, with only two of us in it, down there by the side-door of the Chapel where a little path went dusty to the river, and the top of the water full of ragged windows giving light, and me in the midst of a fight that I could neither see nor hear, and yet shaken by its tumult, and its wounds.

  “I have failed in my duty, then, my little one, is it?” Mr. Gruffydd asked me, after moments and moments.

  “No, sir,” I said, and ready to spill my blood for him. “No, sir, indeed. Only saying that you are a bit different from old times.”

  “Eh, dear, Huw,” he said, and put his hand behind him and touched my shoulder, “go from me, now, and come in the morning for a start on the furniture, is it? We will finish it with a couple of good days’ work.”

  “Yes, sir,” I said, and went from him with misery.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  IESTYN’S SISTER was in the house when I went in, and I knew from my mother’s face that there was trouble, though a stranger would never have seen it. Blodwen was dark in the skin, with black hair and round brown eyes, looking at you always as though you stood down at the bottom of the garden. A calmness was in her, and she sat still, back straight, with her hands folded and her feet almost under the chair. She spoke English nearly always, but plainly, for she went to school in London, and then to Paris, and I suppose the teachers there stood no old nonsense from anybody.

  “Well, Huw,” she said, and smiling very pretty, too. “How are you?”

  “Well, thank you,” I said. “How are you?”

  “Impossible to feel better,” she said. “I wondered whether you would bring the harp to Tyn-y-Coed to-night for me?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Good,” she said, and smiled again, but I knew from the way my mother was standing that I was one too many in the room, so out I went and down to Bron’s to pack the harp.

  I told Bron about Mrs. Jonas and she clicked her tongue.

  “I was at school with her,” Bron said. “Is Blodwen still with your Mama?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “More trouble, then,” Bron said. “Angharad will be home here before long, you will see. Drunk
en swine, he is.”

  “Who, Bron?” I asked her.

  “Never mind,” she said.

  Then it was that I understood the looks and nods and words here and there, when Angharad and Iestyn were spoken about in the house. It made me feel quite empty inside to think of Angharad having trouble, but there was nothing I could do, and I knew from the look of Bron that not another word would come from her, even with hot pincers.

  So up with the harp and over the mountain to Tyn-y-Coed, and a lovely walk with plenty of stops, and a little hum from the harp every time I put her down.

  A good big house was Tyn-y-Coed, built in the time of the second George on the house that came from before Elizabeth. The old part was still there, on one side, with chimneys of brick, and laid beautiful. Big windows on two floors, the rest of the house, and a big porch with pillars that went narrower toward the top. All of it was in white with green shutters, and all the farm buildings whitewashed and kept spotless. A lovely bit of property, it was, with trees to shade it and gardens front and back, brown cows in the pasture, black and white and brown chickens in the yard, geese and ducks white by the pond, and turkeys sitting on the gate by the stables.

  Blodwen was there before me and standing at the door, with the houseman to take the harp from me.

  “Come and take tea, Huw,” she said, with her face in the green shadow of trees. “Wash in the little room.”

  So I went in to have tea, and very good, too. I liked that big room at Tyn-y-Coed. It was high, and the windows big and plenty of them, planned in a day when men thought spaciously and lived graciously, and had a love for good work. A look at the ceiling would have shown you that, never mind the furniture. And as for the fireplace, you would think it shame to burn coal there, so pretty it was, of white marble, simple, and so easy in its curves, and straightnesses, and flutings, that it was pleasure distilled to pass the hands over it, and think of the steadfast mind that carved it into shape.

  Blodwen always had a little laugh at me when I went to Tyn-y-Coed, but it was a gentle laugh, and with sympathy, because I told her why I liked to put my hands on work that had been blessed by good minds and the passing of time.

  “Would you like to come and live here, Huw?” she asked me, when we were having wheat cakes.

  “No,” I said. “If it was my house, yes.”

  “Supposing I asked you to?” she said.

  “No,” I said. “I shall be working soon.”

  “Must you?” she asked me, and looked at me straight, and her eyes were very brown. “There are plenty of pieces of furniture that need repairs. And I think that furniture you made for Mr. Gruffydd is simply lovely. Come and work here, Huw.”

  “I said I would work with my father,” I said, and the face of Isaac Wynn coming to harden me.

  “Oh, dear,” she said, and breathed sharp, “I hate to think of you going down the pits. I hated my father going down, and I shall always be glad that Iestyn sold his interests.”

  “He put four hundred men from work, too,” I said.

  She looked at me, and tapped a teaspoon gently on her saucer as though she would be saying something in a moment to take the butter from the toast. Then she put the teaspoon down, and gave her nose a dab with a piece of lace that was never in this life a handkerchief.

  “You speak like your brother, Owen,” she said.

  “Good,” I said.

  “Has he had any more news about his patents?” she asked me, as though it was of no interest.

  “No,” I said, “but a gentleman from America is coming to see him next week. Going to buy it, he is.”

  “Oh,” she said, and a look in the teapot. “Is he going over there, do you know?”

  “Perhaps,” I said, “if he can get somebody to do his union work for him.”

  “Why he bothers with that nonsense is more than I shall ever be able to understand,” she said, with impatience. “It can never be a union in the sense of the word.”

  “More than fifty thousand members,” I said, “and growing every week.”

  “How do you know?” she asked me.

  “I write the letters to London,” I said, “ever since it started. And if Owen goes, Ianto or Davy will be there to take it to the top. We will join with Monmouth soon, and then the Dockers, and the Firemen.”

  She sat quietly for minutes, hands folded, feet almost under the chair, a mauve shadow in the coming darkness, and the fire giving reddish light to her cheek, and eyes of red to silver.

  “I heard him speak the other night,” she said.

  “Over the mountain?” I asked her, and surprised, too.

  “Yes,” she said, and I will swear she was blushing, because her voice was low, with a hem of whisper. “We went over together.”

  So that was why Owen was ready for three meetings in one night, with Ianto and Davy and he to take one each.

  “I suppose he has plenty of friends?” she asked me, and in a sudden moment I knew she was warmer towards me, though there was no change in her, only her voice. As though a wall had fallen somewhere without a sound.

  “Yes,” I said, but taking care. “Plenty, indeed. In all the valleys. He could be drunk every night.”

  “Does he drink?” she asked me, with fright, quick.

  “No,” I said, “not a drop. Tea and water, Owen. Sometimes a drop of my mother’s beer.”

  She seemed to go lower in the chair.

  “I suppose, with a lot of brothers,” she said, “young ladies abound? Have some more tea, Huw, please. Try this cake?”

  “Tea, yes, please,” I said, and handed my cup. “Cake, no, thank you. I have had plenty and very good, too. No young ladies.”

  “Oh,” she said, “but of course, you men always say no, when you should be saying yes.”

  “No young ladies,” I said, and firm. “They are a nuisance. Some, anyway.”

  “Am I a nuisance, Huw?” she asked me, and laughing.

  “No,” I said, “I like you. So does Owen.”

  “How do you know?” she asked me, very small.

  “Would he go with you over the mountain or two steps anywhere else?” I said. “No, indeed.”

  Orange came to light the wall outside in the passage, and Mrs. Nicholas came in with a couple of sticks of candles, wide and round in her black dress with a silver chain and many keys rattling, and the candles making her hold up her head and her face like a gold sun with sparks in her eyes.

  “Sitting in darkness,” she said, in a fat voice, and scolding. “There is silly you are, Miss Blodwen. In darkness with a young man. Dear, dear. Every tongue in the Valley will chat.”

  “Let them,” said Blodwen. “Do you mind, Huw?”

  “No, indeed,” I said, “but I would like to catch them.”

  “Catch them?” Mrs. Nicholas said, and lighting more candles. “Only go in any shop, or listen in the market. Like fleas in a poorhouse bed. Ach y fi.”

  “Nicky,” Blodwen said, “I believe you are as bad as the rest.”

  “Well, indeed, Miss Blodwen,” Mrs. Nicholas said, voice gone deep with shame, “there is a thing to say to your Nicky, indeed. Twenty years ago I would have had you over my knee for that, and no Nicky, please, Nicky, please.”

  “I still believe you can gossip with the best,” Blodwen said. “Eight for supper to-night, Nicky.”

  “Oh,” said Mrs. Nicholas, a bit sulky, “eight, is it, Miss Blodwen? Master Huw is staying, too, then, is he?”

  “No,” said Blodwen. “There will be another.”

  “Mr. Owen Morgan,” Mrs. Nicholas said, with a nod not to be argued with, up and with the candle-holders, and going to the door with quick steps.

  “Nicky,” Blodwen said, and coming to be angry. “You jump to conclusions. Eight to supper. That will be all.”

  “Yes, Miss Blodwen,” said Mrs. Nicholas, and turning round in the doorway, “Mr. Parry, Mr. Owen Jones, Mrs. Owen Jones, Mrs. Davies, Mrs. Griffiths, and Miss Griffiths, and you.” She turned round and wen
t to go out.

  “And Mr. Owen Morgan,” she said, over the shoulder, and the doorway was empty.

  “That woman becomes more and more impossible,” Blodwen said, “she takes advantage. Of course, Owen will be miles away.”

  “He was pressing his best suit, anyhow,” I said, “and particular about a shirt this morning, before the shift went down.”

  “Huw,” she said, with quiet, and warmth in her face, but cold serious. “Tell nobody, will you?”

  “Eyes open,” I said, remembering Cyfartha, “mouth shut.”

  And that was how I went so much to Tyn-y-Coed. Every piece of the furniture that wanted repairs, I did in my spare time. And made a suite of my own, too, but that was after.

  I saw Mr. Gruffydd looking at me many times in those few days I worked with him before I started in the colliery. I saw his face in a shining, pink rub on the polish of the sideboard panels when he was looking at me behind my back. When I looked round at him he always looked away. At first, I wondered. Then I feared. But as one day went to two, and the looks got less, and the talk dropped to one or two words about the thickness of the polish, and the weather, and how hot the plates were for dinner, I started to wonder again, until I was on tacks to ask him what was the matter. For it is discomfort’s own essence to be near a man and to feel him in torture of misery, to feel with him the very pain of the misery, and yet to be unable to help.

  Little Olwen was bringing our tea down to us, and I used to go out and stand in the porch to watch her all the way up the Hill again, and give her a wave when she turned round. So she turned round every other step, and I had to wave or she would have been there yet. It always took a good long time to wave her home, and the tea nearly cold when I got in to it.

  “She is very much like Angharad,” Mr. Gruffydd said.

  “Yes,” I said. “When she grows, nobody will know the difference.”

  “Twenty years’ time,” he said.

  What is there, in the mention of Time To Come, that is so quick to wrench at the heart, to inflict a pain in the senses that is like the run of a sword, I wonder. Perhaps we feel our youngness taken from us without the soothe of sliding years, and the pains of age that come to stand unseen beside us and grow more solid as the minutes pass, are with us solid on the instant, and we sense them, but when we try to assess them, they are back again in their places down in Time To Come, ready to meet us coming.